26.
 Moira screamed again, entrapped by three huge brassy-red machines whose articulated tentacles reached out for her with sharp snipping hands. They had Moira caught by her long gray skirt, which came off in shreds.
“Sam,” Taxi said, tears welling in her eyes. “Shoot her.”
Sam’s eyes were white and manic as he shared her consternation. “Taxi, baby, I know what you mean but she’s a person.”
Taxi sobbed. “Yes, and a good one. Too good to die in pain like that. Finish her off! Kill her quick.” Taxi ran up the fence and down the other side and stood screaming.
At that moment, her eyes fell upon Johnny Smith.
Sam was shooting into the machines. “If I kill them, fine. If I kill her, fine. I’ll try to kill them fucking machines and then you go get her outta there.”
Johnny Smith pulled himself proud and erect for the first time since Taxi had seen him. He dropped the white robe, and she saw why they had exiled him. Johnny Smith reached out to either side with a huge pair of white wings. They were pearly in places, and changed to scaly and then entered his powerful back.
Graceful as a ballet dancer in the old cubes, Johnny Smith started to run.
As he ran, he jumped. As he jumped, he spread his wings and began to cup the air with them. Each time he pulled, the wings made a flapping sound. Pretty soon he was twenty, thirty feet in the air, headed straight for Moira.
Taxi heard a rattle of gunfire. The Toons were close now. She could hear not only their drums and fifes, but could hear their marching feet and the snap of their flag in the wind. It was the old fifty-star flag of the United States.
Johnny Smith yelled something and crumpled in midair.
Sam and Taxi screamed.
Johnny Smith fell down, nearly striking Moira. “Run!” he yelled, “run!”
Moira broke for the outer fence.
Johnny Smith looked a heroic figure. He had nearly overturned one of the crab machines when the second one tore one of his winged arms off. He bellowed with pain, but the third machine pushed him face down into the sand and they began to cut his body apart on orders from some old program probably gone nuts with sand and time.
Moira hit the fence, pursued by two of the faster armored machines.
Sam cut into them with the .50, and they both turned over dead onto their shells.
The Toons burst out of the bushes and marche across the dunes, firing.
Sam started to cut loose with the heavy machine gun, but Taxi stopped him. As they dropped into the sand, she said: “Save it. They are needed to protect those people.”
As she spoke, Moira dropped face first into the sand.
“Oh no!” Taxi threw herself across Moira.
The Toons stopped firing and stood watching.
Sam jumped up and hauled at the helium drive bottle. “I can’t get this thing over the fence. It’s too heavy!”
Taxi rolled Moira over, frantically looking for torso wounds.
There weren’t any. Just a shoulder wound. Thank God.
“Taxi — .” Moira whispered, whincing as she touched her shoulder.
“No time now, baby.” Taxi gave her a peck on the cheek. “You’re free now. It’s gonna be like this from now on, so get used to it. I get shot about once a year.”
After tying Moira’s wound up temporarily, Taxi ran to help Sam. Then Moira threw her wiry strength into it, using her good arm. Slowly, as the fence began to sag, the heavy bottle made its way up. “Shame to destroy this place,” Taxi said as the fence came down on the sand. They dragged the bottle clear and propped the fence back up as best they could, partly to keep the Toons and the crab machines inside.
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Copyright © 2018 by Jean-Thomas Cullen, Clocktower Books. All Rights Reserved.
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