Wasteland Warlords Episode 5: Chapter 5 - Breaking and Entering

“…and that, dear viewers, is the tale of how Lumberjack Joe and the Jaeger squad defeated yet another menace to wasteland society while he was drinking his juice in the IZ,” Joe concluded.

Alex checked her shotgun, then Clay’s Wyrd West revolver, making sure for the hundredth time they were both loaded and ready to go. When the signal came, there wouldn’t be time to dick around looking for ammo or body armor or tying boots. All the prep work needed to be done now, not later.

“Apologies to my Sooq viewers,” Joe was saying. “I know you guys heard that one already at story hour, but I had to get our new Lumberheads acquainted with the crew so they’d be more invested in this jailbreak. By the by, if any of you are ever out this way, make sure you stop in at one of the Sooq’s eight convenient locations. I found not one, but two Lawnboy motors last time I was in, and you won’t find a better group of ol’ timers to have a beer with outside a nursing home. I’m not sponsored by them yet, but if you’re listening, Tajira, I should be.”

Alex shot an annoyed glance Joe’s way. He didn’t seem to have any interest in getting ready for this attack. He’d been telling his ill-gotten viewers—the ones who stayed when they found out he wasn’t going to juggle any chain saws while Chonk played flaming bagpipes—about killing Dungeon Lords and Incants for the last hour, and he hadn’t run out of steam yet. The constant babble was starting to get on her nerves, and it didn’t help that nagging feeling that she might forget something vital.

“Don’t you need to be checking your gear?” she asked him. There was a sharp edge in her voice that Joe seemed, somehow, oblivious to.

“No, short stack, I don’t,” he said without breaking the rhythm of his monologue. He rapped his knuckles on the chest of his mech suit. “This baby makes her own shells for the forearm-mounted cannon. And Bertha is now equipped with her very own fyuela rune. No longer do I need to make meticulously sure that my beautiful Poulan Pro Classic has the required gas and two-cycle oil.” He squinted at something Alex couldn’t see. “Hey! Owlbear69 in the chat says the Sooq’s running a special this week on fyuela runes—two for the price of one! You can’t beat deals like that, folks. Get down there if you, too, want to power your small engines forever on basically nothing.”

He rubbed his hands together. “Now, who’s hungry? Like I promised earlier, I’ll whip us up a batch of my most famous new creation. Just got to find some wood here to build a fire… That wouldn’t be a problem for Bertha if we were anywhere with a couple trees, but out here in the sand, looks like we’re going to have to scrounge.”

“We are not lighting a fire,” Alex said. “We’re on a hill in the middle of the desert in the middle of the night, Joseph. You might as well put up a flashing Shoot Us sign.”

“But I have all the ingredients for Oreos and Spam,” Joe argued. “It’s only moderately tasty when you eat it cold. If we warm it up, it’ll get us pumped and ready to take on the world when the signal comes in.”

“I would enjoy a tasty Spam,” Bacon Bits said unhelpfully. Alex glared at her, but the former teacup pig shrugged the part of her back that passed for Wyrm shoulders. “I was quite fond of the Spamburgers Joe made at the last Sooq potluck.”

“See?” Joe said. “Chonk wants one, too, which means it’s three to one.”

“No,” Alex said with a grimace and a shake of her head, “when I’m the only reasonable adult here, my vote counts for a million. That makes it a million to three.”

“I promised the viewers I’d show them how to cook in the wilds of the wasteland.” He pointed to the hidden camera on his mech suit—the blinking red dot in the center of its core. “JakeTakeTwo and MartyHatXXX gave us a thumbs-up because I said I’d eat some Oreos and Spam on camera. You don’t want them to click away, do you?”

Alex took a deep breath through her nose and let it out slowly. Working with Joe was like working with a toddler. A toddler who also happened to have superpowers, a chainsaw, and a pet racoon with mechanical appendages. “Fine. If it’s that important to you, can’t you make some kind of microwave or something with your magical tinkering? Something small and easy to hide? Just no fire, okay? We can’t afford to give away our position unless you want to wind up locked away inside with Clay and Griff for the rest of our unnaturally short lives.”

Joe crossed his arms carefully below the level of the blinking red light and looked down his nose at her.

“This isn’t some kind of trick to keep me occupied, is it?”

“I don’t care what you make or what you eat or who you gross out as long as it doesn’t draw attention to our position before Clay gives us the signal.”

“Hot damn!” He grabbed her hand and gave her a low-five. “You’re on!” He started unloading bits and pieces of rusty junk he’d broken down and saved for later use. “All righty, Lumberheads, so what you want to do once you get your Arcane Tinkerer Incant powers…”

Shaking her head, Alex turned back to her gear. Finally the big lug had found a job that made an asset out of his two biggest character flaws—his inability to shut up and his innate weirdness.

While he tinkered, Alex settled back in to watch the prison. She honestly didn’t think it would be possible for Joe to get anything resembling a microwave up and running with nothing but bits and pieces of the machinery, weapons, and magical items he’d salvaged from across the IZ, but thirty minutes, a lunchbox, two Fire-damage enchanted daggers, a crank, and some wire later, Joe was heating a bowlful of crushed Oreos and canned meat chunks.

“Just wait until you taste this, short stack,” Joe said, rubbing his hands together excitedly while Chonk took a turn cranking the makeshift toaster oven. “You’re gonna flip your lid.”

A whiff of something sweet and savory in all the worst ways hit her nose and she grimaced. She might not flip, but odds were looking good that she would hurl.

“Guys, can you hear me?” Clay’s voice came in as loud and clear as if he were standing beside them. “We’re in the center tower, about to kick off this jailbreak. It’s go time.”

Alex locked eyes with Joe over the mechacoon’s head.

“I know what you’re thinking,” he said, pointing an index finger at her, “and the answer is yes, Oreo and Spam saves. It tastes even better the second day, if you can believe that.”

“I can’t,” she said in all honesty.

“Then boy are you in for a treat.” Joe pulled out the Camera Obscura. “Let’s go,” he said, waving over Chonk and Bacon Bits. “Squeeze in and say cheese. We got a brother and an old man to break out of prison.”

***

With the flash of the steampunk camera, a countdown timer began to tick down in the corner of Alex’s vision—19:59… 19:58… 19:57… They had less than twenty minutes before the Obscurement wore off and they were visible to enemies again. They had to get past the gates and hungry guard monsters and as far inside as they could make it before that happened.

Alex racked her Mossberg and led the way down the dune toward the Supermax. Bacon Bits flitted silently along behind her. With his longer strides, Joe caught up fast, Chonk riding in his customary seat on Joe’s shoulder pauldron.

In the quiet desert night, the crunch of their boots on the hardpacked sand sounded abnormally loud. Alex centered her breathing as they stepped out of the shadows and into the glare of the prison’s floodlights, reminding herself the guards and drooling monsters couldn’t see them. Yet. The timer continued its downward spiral 16:21… 16:20…

They passed beneath Watchtower 2 and stopped a few yards from the outer razor-wire fence.

“Joe,” she whispered, waving him over.

He knelt down, and Alex climbed on piggy-back style. Careful not to dislodge Chonk, she hooked one arm around Joe’s neck, then gave him the thumbs-up.

“Hold on to your hats, kiddies,” he said in a low voice, standing and looping his arms beneath her knees. “It’s time for Lumberjack Joe to get funky.”

Alex cringed as Joe’s rocket boots fired up, blasting them off the ground. But none of the patrolling guards or slavering monsters looked their way. The ones who did stop were all over the place, staring up at the sky like a jet might be passing overhead.

A little of the tension released from Alex’s shoulders and she let out a whoosh of pent-up breath. With fifteen minutes left on the timer, it looked like they might actually make it a decent distance inside before they had to fight for their lives.

Up, up, up they flew, clearing the guard booth and the first fence. Bacon Bits easily kept pace beside them, body undulating like a snake swimming across the top of a pond.

A second later, Alex gasped. As they passed over the top of the inner defensive wall, a sudden sensation washed over her like a bucket of ice water being dumped on her head. Icy fingers caressed her skin and sent shivers racing along her spine, making her hiss in surprise. Joe shuddered, and Chonk squalled. In the corner of her eye, the countdown timer turned an angry red and flashed 0:00.

[Notice: Obscurement has been disabled by Supermax Disenchantment Barrier.]

Klaxons wailed. Guards and monsters below locked onto their position, raising wands, crossbows, and rifles.

“Whelp, we’re boned,” Joe said. “I always said stealth was a waste of time. Hang on, passengers, it’s about to get bumpy.”

Alex tightened her grip as he wove through the incoming shitstorm of rifle fire. Chonk started to fall, then snatched a handful of Alex’s hair, his full body weight yanking on it painfully. Gritting her teeth, Alex disentangled him and moved his claws to a ridge of metal sticking up out of the back of the samurai armor she’d gotten from the Warlord of the West.

“What do we do, Alex?” Bacon Bits called. “Should I begin unleashing havoc?”

“Go for it,” Alex yelled back. She honestly didn’t have a better plan, and letting loose a little chaos couldn’t hurt now.

From below, the shots kept coming. A bullet sliced through her calf, and a bunch more ricocheted off Joe’s mech armor. She snarled out a curse. With Katotes’s lightning-fast health-regen, the graze would heal up in no time, but they couldn’t keep circling like this. Sooner or later, those guys below were going to get lucky and take her and Joe both out.

“Joe, can you repair your mech suit on the fly?”

“Can a Poulan Pro chew through hardwoods like they’re balsa?”

She rolled her eyes. “I’m taking that as a yes.”

“Easily, is what I’m saying, short stack. I’ve got Material Mending,” he said like she should’ve already known.

“Okay, see how the guards are kind of grouped together there”—she pointed—“and some more over there?”

He grinned. “I love where this is going.”

“We’re going to do the mother of all cannonballs.”

“I’ve been waiting for this moment my whole life. Just say the word.”

“You take the left group, I’ll take the right. Now!”

Joe banked sharply and shot toward the ground, wind screaming through the cracks in his mech suit.

Alex’s stomach lurched at the sudden change in angle. Brightly colored spells, bullets, and arrows whizzed past like fireworks on the Fourth of July.

A few guards were smart enough to realize what was about to happen. They turned tail—or crab legs or tentacles—and ran. The rest held their ground, unable to see anything but a growing target, and kept blasting away.

Alex let go of Joe’s neck and grabbed her thurible with her free hand. With Goliath Grip, she could wield two-handed weapons one-handed. This turned her into a double threat, able to swing the chained plague-spreading incense ball in her left hand while blasting the Mossberg in her right.

Ten yards from the ground, she kicked off Joe’s back and launched herself at the bunched-up group of angry crustacean mutants and overgrown bloodthirsty guard dogs.

Time to kick some ass.