Beyond Armageddon V: Fusion (66 page)

Ross’ radio crackled with static and then the voice of Captain Carl Dunston reported from a recon Eagle circling overhead: “Bear, this is Dunston. We’ve got some newcomers to the party.”

Ross closed his eyes. He knew the newcomers would not be friendlies; there were no more friendlies around.

“What’d you see?”

”Look to the southwest, Bear,” Dunston said and Woody opened his eyes, raised his binoculars, and followed the direction. “Just off the river in from those docks. Just follow the railroad tracks.”

Ross’ field glasses first spied the rectangular white recon ship with the sharp nose cone. It hung over the far side of the river further to the south.

Dunston.

Ross found the spot the pilot directed him to: a huge labyrinth of railroad tracks complete with toppled box cars nestled among several partly-destroyed industrial and commercial buildings including the massive St. Louis Arsenal, all to the south of downtown by a little less than two miles.

Ross recognized the newcomers: self-propelled objects resembling upside down silver bowls with circular indents on top. He had seen them in action during the battle for Wilkes-Barre at the end of that first year.

“Centurians. The Redcoats are here.”

Rhodes mumbled, “Ah, shit.”

About a dozen of the heavy artillery pieces hovered into place in the massive train yard between Dorcas and Arsenal streets. Several smaller ground transports disembarked several hundred red and white clad soldiers slightly larger than the typical human male. The Centurian infantry mustered into ranks in preparation for battle.

“Damn,” Rhodes did not have binoculars but he held a hand above his eyes and squinted. He knew better, but the general could not help to ask in a hopeful tone, “Can they hit us from here?”

Ross lowered his glasses and answered, “You know they can. You know sure as shit they could probably hit the two of us right between the eyes from where they’re at.”

“Yeah, I know,” and Rhodes did, he had operated one of the captured Redcoat guns at Five Armies. Ironically the Eagle anti-gravity ship that spotted the approaching Centurians also came courtesy of those same aliens, although apparently they brought none of their own on that particular day. “Guess The Order figures they’ve got us whipped, time to send in their friends to get all the glory.”

“No bridges down there. They have to come across up here.”

“So we’ll just wait for them to cross then I’ll hit them with everything I got.”

Ross nodded his head and replied, “That’s about the size of it. Good luck, General.”

“You too, Bear. See ya’ when it’s over, one way or another.”

“Hey, you still with us?”

Jon Brewer could not be sure if the voice came from an angel or an earthly source—until he opened his eyes and saw Jerry Shepherd leaning over him.

“Yeah, I—oh, shit, my head hurts.” Jon felt a heavy
thump.

Shepherd slipped his arms around Jon’s shoulders and one general helped the other to his feet.

Jon first noticed a heavy fog of smoke drifting over the bombed-out basement foundation. He also noticed a distinct lack of sound: no gunshots, no explosions, only a few voices. He next noticed several stretchers and makeshift beds at the rear of the basement where a solitary nurse tended to a trio of wounded boys. She must have been one of the few ‘groupies’ to stay behind when most of the army’s families ran east.

Another heavy
thump.
Jon placed a hand on his head.

“Damn, this thing is pounding. I must have a concussion.”

Shepherd told Jon grimly, “You probably do, but the pounding ain’t in your noggin’.”

Jon climbed out from the bunker with Jerry Shepherd behind him.

The remains of a gruesome battle covered Front Street from north to south. Bodies—of monsters and men—lay everywhere. Some still moaned and twitched. Craters dotted the park and the pavement as well as three huge sinkholes from the unnatural earthquakes; fires burned from human vehicles and Voggoth’s Shell-Tanks. Jon surveyed the damage through blurry vision.

Thump.

General Cassy Simms and a handful of riders slowly trotted south toward him and Shep. As a gust of wind pushed the fog, Jon’s vision cleared enough that he saw Cassy’s eyes to be wide and glazed. An abrasion bled on her cheek; her black general’s uniform appeared wet with alien gore.

Shepherd explained, “It was a good fight, Jon. We stopped the little ones dead in their tracks.”

“No—no—I missed it?” He glanced around, still unable to focus on anything more than a few yards away.

Thump.

“They stopped coming about half an hour ago and pulled back. Their bridges are still up. They’ll be coming again soon. But we don’t have much left to face them, General. I reckon it’ll be over mighty quick.”

The quiet of the battlefield amazed Jon. He heard a few groans here, a couple of cries of pain, and random whispers. He also heard a buzzing noise. Something distant. He tried to look around but his head spun.

“Easy, big fella,” Shep consoled as Cassy dismounted nearby. “They showed up a few minutes ago. Moving into position now. I guess time’s up.”

“Who? What?”

THUMP.

Jon’s vision cleared—enough. A wind gust blew away much of the remaining fog. He saw the spinning clouds overhead. He saw a mighty flash of lightning. And in that flash he saw the latest arrivals to the battlefield: a trio of Geryon battleships. Each one a big dirigible with two smaller blimps attached to either side with a slow moving propeller to stern, a nasty-looking main gun that resembled a cross between a satellite dish and a howitzer on the bow, as well as a modular gondola hanging underneath the main frame.

Cassy Simms reported in a monotone voice, “Stonewall’s brigade has held the northern flank, sir. But there are only ten of us left.
Hoorah
.”

Shepherd walked to Cassy and told her, “Garret would have been proud, Cassy. Damn fine job.”

Jon took a step forward and nearly stumbled over the remains of an Ogre. It appeared to be a leg or something. He steadied himself and—

THUMP.

Jon faced west. The thumps did not come from his head. They came with each step the Leviathan took as it approached the riverbank: a walking skyscraper looming over the survivors of humanity’s last stand. The final weapon in the war of Armageddon.

They should have run. The natural flight instinct in the face of such a horrifying creature should have turned the men and women of humanity’s last battle into a hysterical mass.

But it was not courage that kept them from fleeing. It was exhaustion. Physical and mental. A sense of malaise overcame the soldiers as they watched the last act unfold.

Except for Jon. His emotions cut through the exhaustion; through the malaise.

“No.”

Not a plea, but an order. No. This will not be allowed.

Jon looked over his troops again. So many dead, but they still held. The odds had been stacked against them but they held. And now this?

No!

“Now, what are they up to?” Shep asked in a shaky voice that tried hard to sound calm but only partially succeeded.

Shep pointed Jon’s attention to a field across the river north of the battle. One of the Geryon battleships hovered there. A nice chunk of its gondola dropped away from the zeppelin on wires and fell to the ground.

“Steel Guard,” he told Shep. “Trevor told us about them, remember?”

“Oh, yeah, virtual reality robots or something. More of that
Star Trek
shit I can’t get a handle on.”

Cassy spoke the obvious with a sneer in her voice, “The Leviathan blows us over and they come marching through to take the credit.”

NO!

The remaining two Geryon airships floated into formation with one to either side of the Leviathan as the cloud-touching monstrosity came to a standstill on the far side of the Mississippi.

Only a handful of soldiers on the human side took refuge. The rest remained in the grip of that malaise. Either the Geryon’s would fire first and cut them to pieces or the Leviathan would unleash its big wind. Either way, in a minute Quincy would be the final resting place of humanity.

Jon, however, refused to go quietly.

“No, not after all this,” and he pulled his side arm—an automatic pistol—and stepped away from the group toward the bank. The mighty Leviathan towered high above. He craned his neck as if speaking directly to the monster across the river. Bolts of lightning crackled in the turbulent sky. The winds whipped in a frenzy like demons dancing a long night’s last song.

“We survived!”

He raised his gun and fired a single shot that echoed up and down the river.

“Everything they threw at us and we survived!”

Bang.
The second bullet, like the first, carried out over the Mississippi and fell somewhere in the water or on the opposite bank.

“We lost Johnny, and Stonewall and Casey! They were good people!”

The Leviathan sucked in air from above. A sound like an air raid siren competed with Jon’s voice but that voice still managed to reach the ears of his people, many of whom stepped forward with their own pistols and shotguns and rifles.

“YOU TOOK MY WIFE!”

BANG.

Shep and Cassy flanked Jon. They would face the end the same way they had survived the beginning: together.

The Geryon battleships shimmied as their main guns charged. They stayed to either side but slightly behind the Leviathan, clear of its blast cone.

“YOU STOLE OUR LIVES!”

A lightning bolt lit the sky like a miniature sun. The thunder boom that followed made the ground shake. Bubbles like sores rippled all along the giant creature’s skin as it filled with the air needed for its deadly weapon.

“WE’RE NOT RUNNING FROM YOU! GIVE US YOUR BEST YOU SON-OF-A-WHORE!”

A chorus of rifle and pistol fire rang out, all directed at the Leviathan. All futile. But they cheered nonetheless. One last act of defiance.

The Geryon’s reached full-firing power first.

Streams of laser-sharp energy shot out from the dish-like guns at the front of the airships. The dirigibles rocked from the power. The twin beams cut through the air and speared the Leviathan in a downward crisscross like golden swords skewering Voggoth’s pet. The lasers dragged up and down, cutting open the air sacs inside. Chunks of the impossibly-huge monster fell apart, a big one splashing into the Mississippi and showering the eastern bank; other pieces on the western bank where they landed in a serious of sharp impacts.

Jon held his breath but he heard others react with gasps; no one spoke.

Jon Brewer watched the Geryon’s carve the Leviathan into pieces and as he watched he saw something looming even larger over the scene than the dirigibles or the 1,000-foot-tall monster.

He saw—
he felt
—the hand of Trevor Stone.

He’s alive. He did it. Or Jorgie did. Whatever ‘it’ is.

The army of Voggoth hesitated, equally as dumbfounded as Jon’s forces. Still, they did react. A series of Spooks targeted the battleships but a halo of anti-air craft shells met the counter-attack. Only a handful of Spooks breached those defenses causing a flash here and a puff of smoke there but nothing fatal to the blimps.

“Sh-shep…”

Nothing.

Jon tried again to break through the trance cast over his people by the turn of events.

“Shep!”

“Huh? What? Oh, I—my god Jon, am I seein’ this?”

“Shep, get everyone together. Everyone who can walk and use a trigger finger,” and Jon swept his hands toward the bridges built by Voggoth’s mechanical frog-things. “Get them across. We’re attacking,” Jon turned and faced Cassy who watched with an expression of detachment; wonder.

“You too, Cassy. Everything we got left. And remember, the Geryons are
friendly.”

From his position atop the Cargill grain elevator, Woody Ross watched the 12
^th
Mechanized Infantry Brigade move along a convoluted series of roads and on-ramps that merged together just east of the Poplar Street Bridge. General Rhodes commanded this last combat-ready fighting force from a Humvee near the lead.

Also from his position, Ross could see Dunston’s reconnaissance Eagle flying over St. Louis beneath the storm clouds, having thus far managed to avoid The Order’s Spooks and the powerful AA batteries protecting the Centurian artillery south of downtown.

Human guns launched a series of muted volleys from the east side of the Mississippi. The howitzers shots landed in isolated
puffs
and
booms
amid Voggoth’s advancing force as the Roachbots, Feranites, and monsters of the mob passed the blasted remains of Busch stadium on I-64.

If everything went according to Ross’ plan, the lead elements of the enemy force would cross the Bridge and run head-on into Rhodes. He hoped the width of the bridge would create a bottle-neck for conditions like a modern-day battle of Thermopylae, negating the value of Voggoth’s superior numbers.