War Girls (The Juniper Wars Book 5) by Aaron Ritchey (best short novels .TXT) 📕

I remembered our game of questions. About faith, hope, and love.

And God’s purpose in this world. My belief in some kind of big man in the sky was gone, ’cause over and over, I’d had to do awful things. God didn’t mess around on Earth in any real sense.

But maybe She uses tools. Might as well call it a woman, since God seemed more Goddess to me, a loving mother, who would listen, but who wouldn’t jump to fix things, like men so often do. No, God listens to us and gives us tools.

Sometimes those tools are nice and loving and they make sense. Like Baptista, she’d shown up as a tool we could use to get as far as we did. She was a clear-minded woman, a true patriot, who didn’t just follow orders, but considered them carefully.

And sometimes? The tools God gives the world are nasty, mean, and broken—as like to cut our legs off as help us. Like June Mai. She’d tried to kill us. She’d destroyed our home. And she’d jumped into the water after me, saved me with her own body, though it meant awkwardness and embarrassment.

And Wren. Wren had been a nasty gun in this world, a bullet from God’s gun. I still had the .45 caliber bullet in my pocket. That was Wren.

Maybe if there was a God, She’d fashioned Wren into a bullet early, and every experience, every bit of contrary shakti in her, was all part of some kind of perfect plan we’d never see, never guess.

Maybe our pain, our fear, our sin, isn’t a curse, but a tool. Like needlegrass. It’s sharp, but it’s also useful.

“God,” I whispered, praying, for the first time in a long time. “We’re in a fix. If this is the end so be it. But if it’s not, please. Use Wren. You made her into a Gamma for a reason.”

Please.

I looked east, into the ruins of Denver, into the storm, for this world is about storms if it’s about anything.

And you know what I saw?

I saw my sister, Wren Weller, once again, coming in to save the day.

’Cause she was a nasty bullet in God’s biggest gun—cold, hard to understand, violent, but useful, oh so useful.

I’d been immature. I’d been foolish in my despair.

The thing is? There is always a dawn, and in the darkness, there is always light. ’Cause of family and ’cause we’re not alone, not ever.

It’s fun to play tough and cool, but in this world, when there’s silence, listen, ’cause you will hear voices, and they might just be whispers, but they are there.

Wren wasn’t silence. Wren was a scream.

(ii)

My sister had taken some kind sheet metal and had fashioned a cleaver, as big as I was. Used duct tape for the handle. The thing was rusted, pointed, and full of woe. Such a weapon could easily cut a Hereford in half.

Cleaver in hand, she took steps back and took a run at the river. She leapt over Cherry Creek and landed on the bank. The Americans took aim, but she used the metal blade to block bullets. Most sparked off the blade, but not all. Some pocked into the piecemeal Kevlar quilt she wore under the black canvas tarp poncho.

Blood hit the snow. Even so, she would heal those wounds.

She got to my cage. Growling, she picked it up. I knew what was coming, and I was glad it was going to happen fast. One-handed, she spun around and flung me. I recalled Pilate’s lessons on creating that vortex of power, that spin at the hips, that every baseball player, golfer, and hammer thrower had perfected.

She spun and threw the cage, with me in it.

I soared above the river—I was going to hit the ground hard. I braced for impact.

The cage struck the snow and bounced. It was the snow that probably saved us all from broken bones. Again, that storm had been a gift. I was knocked about, feeling like a rock in a tin can. Another bounce, and I was flattened to the bars. Another bounce and another impact, rattling my teeth and bruising every part of me.

The cage rolled to a stop in the snow. I tried the door, still stuck.

Another cage cracked into mine, and another slammed past, juggling people inside the bars.

I winced at the damage, then looked up and into the face of Pilate; his cage lay on top of mine. He was pale from the pain, sweating, as he looked down into my eyes.

“That sister of yours,” he said.

“God’s bullet,” I replied.

“I know I am, but what is she?”

“A big damn hero.”

“Big is right.”

More gunfire roared from the Pepsi Center. Someone yelled, “What in the hell is that thing?”

The U.S. peacekeepers were seeing a Gamma for real. General Eibling now just might believe us. Wren leapt back over the river in a single bound and took Pilate’s cage door in her fists and ripped the door off. I was next.

Crawling out of the metal, I face planted into the snow, the muscles in my arms and legs trying to work through the pain and bruising.

Snow splashed into my face. A bullet whizzed by my face. We were taking fire from U.S. troops, trapped on the other side of Cherry Creek.

Wren went to the other cages, tearing off doors, and then setting herself up to shield us from the gunfire, as much as she could. She dropped an old hockey bag, full of our guns. She’d rescued my G18, the Colt Terminators, Pilate’s Beijing Homewrecker, and even Tina Machinegun. I buckled on the gun belt, Wren’s guns.

We got to our feet and went tromping through the snow, toward the downtown area.

President Jack’s zeppelin had paused above what used to be the lower downtown area, waiting there for some reason, and then I saw why.

The Heartbreaker drifted down from the clouds. Even from a distance, I saw the cables linking the two