All Chapters of APOCALYPSE QUEEN: LEVEL UP OR DIE: Chapter 11 - Chapter 20

[Alert: Safehouse Compromised,] LUS’s voice rang in my teeth, bright and urgent. [Sector Proximity Warning: 3 Hive Patrols converging on 4th Street. Time to Perimeter Breach: 18 minutes. Recommendation: Liquidation of location. Relocate.]"We're leaving," I said, snapping the cold tap shut.Ronan didn't argue. He pulled a black tactical shirt over his head, the dark fabric clinging to his shoulders, and reached for his sidearm. "The building's a beacon now. Once the Grey-S finish with the lower blocks, they’ll trace the noise from the garage right up these stairs.""First, we secure the capital," I said.I walked into the bedroom, pulled back the loose floorboard in the closet, and popped the heavy metal keypad of my safe. 4-0-9-2. The lock clicked open with a heavy, satisfying thud.[Asset Reclaimed: $12,400 Cash.] [Asset Reclaimed: 48 Gallons Potable Water (Ration Cards).] [Asset Reclaimed: 120 Days Dry Rations.] [Inventory Sub-Space Initializing... Storage Capacity: 15% Used.]I sw

The ambulance rattled to a stop behind a collapsed overpass, the engine ticking as it cooled, and for the first time in hours the city outside went almost quiet. Ronan killed the headlights and sat there a moment, both hands still on the wheel, before he finally turned around.He didn't look at Thorne. He looked at me and at the space between us that Thorne's hand still occupied against the tablet."Get out," he said, quiet enough that it took a second to register as an order and not a suggestion.Thorne raised an eyebrow, unbothered as always, and withdrew his hand at his own pace, not Ronan's. "I'll check the perimeter." He grabbed a gun and climbed out into the dark without hurrying, which I was fairly sure was its own kind of message.The rear doors, what was left of them, hung open to the cold. Ronan came back through the gap between the seats and crouched in front of me, close enough that I had to tilt my chin up to hold his eyes, the same way I had with Thorne an hour ago, exce

Dutch looked around his burning yard with the relaxed posture of a man assessing a slightly messy living room, entirely unbothered by the three corpses still dissolving into static near his boots."So," he said, turning the rebar over in his palm with a lazy flick of his wrist. "You three got a plan that involves something better than standing in the dark while the rest of those gray things smell the propane?""We've got a ride at the gate," Ronan said, his voice flat and unyielding. His crystalline blue eyes hadn't left Dutch since he'd dropped off the bus. "And we have somewhere to be.""A ride," Dutch repeated, a low whistle escaping his teeth. He turned his attention back to me, his dark hazel eyes lingering just long enough on the smoky gray of my irises to make it feel like an invitation. "You sure travel with an interesting crowd, darlin'.""You'll fit right in," I said.The words landed between us, light but deliberate. I let the silence stretch a beat, watching Dutch's grin s

The eleven miles north took almost two hours, the ambulance crawling around jackknifed semis and a bridge that had partially collapsed into the ravine below it, Ronan navigating by dead reckoning and whatever satellite fragments LUS still had access to.[Route Recalculated. Threat Density: Moderate. Recommendation: Maintain silence past mile marker 7.]We rode most of the way without talking. Dutch had wedged himself into the front passenger seat once Thorne moved to the back to catalog the salvage, and the two of them had fallen into an easy, low argument about fuel efficiency versus fuel purity that neither of them seemed interested in actually winning. It was the first thing that had sounded like normal life in days, two men bickering about nothing that mattered, and I found myself listening to it the way you'd listen to music from a life you used to have."You're quiet," Ronan said, glancing at me in the mirror."I'm thinking.""About the base.""About the gap," I said, "between w

By mid-morning, the ridge had stopped feeling like a crime scene and started feeling like a sanctuary. Or at least, as close to one as we were ever going to get.Ronan was rebuilding the fence line with the grim, terrifying efficiency of a man who fought wars for a living. Every post he pounded into the rocky earth sounded like a rifle crack. Thorne had commandeered the ambulance hood, his tablet propped against the glass, muttering load-bearing calculations under his breath.Dutch, meanwhile, was operating like a man possessed. He had rigged an absurd pulley system out of a truck axle to haul sheet metal, and now he was alternating between delivering fence wire to Ronan and shimmying up the rusted water tower to prep the base for the filtration rig.[Current Portfolio Status: Perimeter Fortification, 6%.] [Projected Yield by Sunset: 9%. Note: Current pace is sustainable. Interest is accumulating.]LUS hummed in my skull, its voice almost smug."Nine percent," Dutch called out, droppi