Spirits of the Earth: The Complete Series: (A Post-Apocalyptic Series Box Set: Books 1-3) by Milo Fowler (paper ebook reader .TXT) 📕

right where I want him. He's going to make up for all those months of screwing around. I'll work him harder than he's ever worked in his life. Getting the shortwave radio is just his first chore on a very long list that'll keep him busy from now till his dying breath—whenever I decide that's to be.

"Well?" I step into the monitoring station.

Jamison starts, salutes, and returns to the screens. "This one's Tucker." He points. "The camera's online, so we're seeing what he sees. Right now...not much."

The screen shows a lopsided view of the recovery room's medical machines and the bed where Perch has replaced Mathis, as limp as a fresh corpse.

"Still out cold?"

Jamison nods. "For now. Soon as Perch comes down, we'll activate Tucker and send him on his way."

I glance at the other three monitors where the mutos remain right where we left them, facing the shortwave radio. The light on the receiver continues to blink. Could it be some kind of automated distress call from D-Day? I can't get my hopes up that it's anything more.

The door creaks open, then shuts. Perch silently takes his post at the control panel. "Showtime," he mutters.

I focus on Tucker's monitor. At first nothing happens, no change at all. It's the same view from the floor where he fell when I shot him. But then there's a jerk, and the image bounces. Tucker groans.

Jamison punches a pad on the console and leans in. "Can you hear me, Tucker?" Another groan. "This is Jamison. You remember me?"

What's he doing? Just send the freak after the radio, for crying out loud!

"I'll wake 'im up," Perch growls.

"No—wait." Jamison holds out his hand. "He's not a muto. We can communicate with him."

"That's what I'm doing." Perch spins a dial and the image on the screen goes haywire. Tucker's agonized scream comes through loud and clear.

Jamison looks back at me, his eyes pleading in the dim light.

"Get on with it," I order, folding my arms.

Perch chuckles at the controls as more screams erupt from the speaker. Jamison leans in again, keeps his voice calm.

"Stand up, Tucker. Get on your feet, and the pain will stop."

"Maybe." Perch snickers.

Good cop, bad cop. I lean back against the wall to watch. This ought to be good.

Hard to tell which gets the most results—Jamison's encouraging words or Perch's jolts of electricity. But they manage to get Tucker out of the recovery room, down the ladder, across the main floor, and into the south tunnel without him running into anything or anybody. Of course, nobody sees him.

"He's on his way," Jamison reports. He glances up at the screen, dark now that Tucker's in the tunnel. "Switching to night vision."

The green, fuzzy image doesn't change for close to half an hour, not until Tucker reaches the uppermost level of the parking garage. All that time, he doesn't say a single word.

"You'll need to take the stairs to the top, out to the surface," Jamison tells him. He releases the audio pad on the panel. "So far so good."

"We should put cameras in there," I muse aloud. "Thermoptic, infrared. See the mutos before they get close to Eden."

"Good idea, sir." Perch glances back at me and grins. "Tucker's next assignment?"

Glad to see he's on board. I'm willing to forgive and forget the stupid things he said up in the recovery room. He's a good soldier. I'd hate to have to put him down.

"We'll make a list." I chuckle, smoothing my mustache. Almost time for a trim.

Tucker takes the stairs one at a time with excruciating deliberation. That bullet to the chest could be slowing him down. Can't be comfortable. Jamison said it was just a flesh wound and that he stopped the bleeding, so Tucker should be fine. But will he be able to lift the radio? He sure had better. He botches this, Perch won't have to handle the shock collar. I'll crank it up myself and blow Tucker's head clean off.

The image on the screen pans left to right as Tucker walks through the uppermost level of the garage, passing by one derelict vehicle after the next. Their solar panels have been stripped by the mutos—not the ones we've managed to collar, the wild ones. Doesn't seem like they'd be able to figure out how to use them, but those freaks do surprise us on occasion.

"Now what?" Tucker speaks for the first time, his voice a monotone as he steps out of the garage and into the empty night.

"It talks." Perch guffaws.

Jamison leans in again, pressing the same audio pad on the console. "You're going to turn to the southeast—thirty degrees to your left."

"Any hint what I'm looking for?" Tucker sniffs, sounding dejected. No fun being our remote-controlled dog?

"We'll guide you to it."

"I'm just saying, you tell me what it is, I'll find it easy enough. I know where all the good stuff's at around here."

Excellent. He's a real godsend, and that's a fact.

Jamison looks back at me. "Sir?"

"Go ahead." There's no harm in it. Perch has him wired in case he tries anything funny.

"All right, Tucker." Jamison nods. "It's a shortwave radio. Should be located beneath what's left of a storage facility on the—"

"I know where it is," Tucker cuts him off. The image on the screen starts moving. He's heading out. "I replaced the batteries last week."

Half a smile creeps up the side of my face. Good ol' Tucker. But I have to catch myself. He's not Tucker, not anymore. He's an abomination. Only a means to an end.

We watch the screen as Tucker finds the sublevels and makes his way with obvious familiarity. Down another flight of steps, then through a long hallway where at the end three mutos stand staring at a fixed point between them.

"Our loyal hounds," Perch mutters. "On standby."

They look like they're asleep on their feet, swaying as they stare at the shortwave radio. Tucker slows his approach.

"Yours?" he makes sure, coming to a standstill.

"They won't hurt you," Jamison assures him.

"Move 'em," Tucker says.

Perch