Deadly Wands (23 page)

And to get filthy rich himself.

“I’ll get the next class of marathoners
signed up. I need them too badly to let a buffoon like Jack take
them from me. When will the other battalions get here? I have a
busy campaign planned.”

“They should arrive within the week. A storm
held them up. You’re taller than I remember. If you’re gonna lead
us, you may want a better name than Shorty.”

Billy looked at his beautiful red suit and
decided on something more impressive. "Call me the Red Baron."

“No offense, boss, but you look like the gay
baron.”

Even Billy laughed at that.

"Aren't you gonna take your helmet off?" one
of the prettier ladies asked. Almost half of the marathoners were
women because, being lighter, they could fly farther.

Naturally he couldn't show his twelve-year
old face. Who’d follow a kid into battle?

"I can't. It's even more scarred than the
rest of me. My face has been burned too many times to heal
properly. If I show my face, I'll never get laid."

Tiny clapped him on the back, vouching for
him. "Not to worry. Guys your size don't get laid anyways.”

“That’s too bad because I’m willing to pay a
ton of gold to marathoners who have my children.” The ladies
knocked Tiny aside like he was some damn kid. They took off their
helmets and frantically fixed their hair. Billy hovered above them
and amplified his voice. “Honestly, I don’t care about looks,
bloodlines, or personality. But you must swear to follow me until
we win the war, and raise our kids to do the same. Agreed?”

Having the Baron’s children would give them a
special status back home. The money was so his kids didn’t grow up
poor.

“Are we going to France?" Tiny asked before
the women started undressing the Baron.

“I want you to set up on top of the Pyrenees
Mountain Range between Spain and France. Build defendable
mountaintop bunkers and gather supplies, but wait for me before you
start raiding. Avoid locals and stay hidden.

“We’ll keep the same operational doctrine:
avoid engaging superior enemy forces and unfavorable circumstances
-- just fly away. If you can fly higher, faster, and farther, then
you should be able to strike them with relative impunity. Combine
your strength to destroy any special units looking for you. If more
than a few of you are getting killed, then your commander is doing
something wrong. I respect that every squad elects their leader,
and all ten squad leaders elect a company leader, and all ten
company leaders choose the battalion leader, but any commander
losing too many troops must be replaced.

"I want you to cripple their air force, rob
their banks and businesses, and pound their ground troops,
equipment, and supply lines. Like before, you get half of what you
take, and I get the other half to fund the war. Does anyone have a
problem with that?"

“Not after all the wealth you helped us take
the last few years.”

Good. Now to find his mother's gay uncle.

CHAPTER 27

Everyone in France knew where the English
quads were: on the front lines as the Mongols launched another
offensive against Paris. The hundred thousand mediocre quads that
Genghis left in France gave the Mongols the numbers to overwhelm
the defenders.

Dawn had barely broke when Billy landed by a
French officer busy barking orders, who almost laughed at his
bright red suit. Billy had flown over a wave of civilians fleeing
west. Driving non-combatants in front of them was a three hundred
year old Mongol tactic that never got old. Asked about the English,
the officer impatiently waved towards a large hospital by the main
highway. Billy discovered the building full of recently wounded
soldiers.

He soon found his great-uncle unconscious and
burning with fever. A compatriot wet his brow and adjusted his
blanket. Billy noted his uncle’s missing leg.

"Will he live?" Billy asked.

"He needs a day to break the fever, then a
few more days of rest, which is probably three more days than the
Mongols will give us. Those who cannot fly will die here, and we
will not leave him.”

High-pitched warnings erupted across the
Paris suburbs as friendly quads launched to meet incoming enemies.
Going just by numbers, the Mongols enjoyed air superiority.

Billy left his backpack with his uncle and
flew out the window. A skirmish line of enemy quads preceded nine
hundred two-wanders formation-flying in a huge square block.
Mongols had ten times as many two-wanders as quads, and found the
best way to use them was to temporarily clear the air of enemy
fliers, then have them rise over the target and blast it on their
way down. Repeated often enough, two-wanders could destroy even a
city as large as Paris. Two-wanders could not replace quads, but
could compliment them.

Billy rocketed up, blowing past the quads
guarding the formation. Like the two-wanders, he rose in an arc,
then fell in a controlled fall in the path of the enemies. At the
angle he enjoyed, it was virtually impossible to miss. His pressure
waves smacked the first fliers back into their lines, each knocking
several others out of the sky. He fell while they rose, so all too
soon they collided. The difference was the two-wanders needed both
wands to control their flight.

Billy sliced a giant hole in their lines,
each swipe taking out several enemies. As they rose, he worked his
way down, then raced higher again, cutting a new trench in their
formation.

As their leader began their blasting run,
Billy dived with them, chopping as he went. Powerful wands from the
ground can fire over one hundred meters up, so at two hundred
meters they switched their wands to propulsion to fly away for
their next run. Billy noticed those on the ground using his
father’s longbows, even after all these years. He matched angle to
continue cutting them up until the formation disintegrated in
panic.

He saw two squads chase a group of French
quads, hoping to box them in. They positioned themselves so that
the French would have to show their backs to one or the other.
Billy poured on speed, but he could tell he wouldn't get there in
time. So Billy gave a primal scream that vented all the anger he
accumulated in life -- while burning torches from all four
wands.

The entire city below him stared up in awe as
the scream echoed across the front lines. The Baron was back. And
wore red, for some reason.

He sure got the enemy's attention. They not
only didn't pounce on the French, but both squads turned on him.
Like he always did, Billy let them come, popped out of their way,
and cut them from behind.

With the skies momentarily free, Billy flew
over the enemy ground forces and fired four wand volleys to let
them know the Baron was in town. Mongol squads soon chased him, but
he just evaded them to pound the two-wanders on the ground for
hours. French quads eventually showed up in force to overwhelm the
exhausted Mongol quads.

With the ground forces hiding, Billy flew
down the main highway, blasting the wagons that supplied the
Mongols, until one of them exploded with such force that it flung
Billy threw the air like a typhoon.

Bomb wagons! Normally, a quad must drop below
one hundred meters to send a fireball hot enough to detonate a
bomb, but he fired four wands at the same time, so the hundreds of
two-wanders firing at him from the ground may as well have been
shooting at the moon. He started blowing up more wagons and laughed
as the Mongols fled the highway.

He dropped down and used his wands to throw
the bombs after the fleeing enemy. Some of them could not believe
he could levitate bombs over one hundred meters. Some French quads
following him joined in the fun as Billy took over more munition
wagons. Soon hundreds of French fliers were literally cratering the
Mongol ground offensive.

The offensive died within sight of Paris.

CHAPTER 28

Sunset found Billy exhausted. Killing quads
in the air all day just took too much effort. Even for him. The
thought of going through this for two more days enraged him. He
needed to find an easier, faster, and safer way to kill so he could
send his great-uncle home.

He wondered what his dad would do as he
surprised two quads returning home, and laughed as the answer
became obvious. Billy dived, sliced into the calves of the younger
one and cut the neck of the older veteran. The younger one plunged
into a lake. Billy landed, changed armor and uniforms with the dead
quad, then flew to save the guy hanging onto a log.

"I got ya, trooper!" Billy said before
dropping him on the grassy shore. "Let me take a look at that." As
the guy howled in pain, Billy bandaged both leg wounds to stop the
bleeding. "You're not gonna walk for a while, but you may fly
again.”

"Thanks," the Mongol said, digging into his
pockets for a liquor bottle. Billy didn't drink because he was
usually high off his wands, and alcohol would only dull that
sensitivity.

"My name is Temujin," Billy truthfully told
him.

"Mutugen."

"Were you named after the Immortal's favorite
grandson?"

"I descended from him, so my parents hoped
it’d help my advancement."

"And has it?" Billy asked.

The Mongol laughed. "No! I don't think
Genghis Khan likes being reminded he lost his favorite grandson.”
He paused. “They sure are recruiting younger and younger.”

It struck Billy as ironic that he could only
show his face to Mongols. “I descended from Taran of Kiev. My
family enlisted me to keep me out of jail. Let's get you home."

Torches lit up the air base so returning
fliers could find it after dark. When on the offensive, the Mongol
Air Force would string temporary bases near the front so airmen
would spend more time over the enemy and less time going to and
from work. Billy landed near the infirmary and two troopers helped
his "buddy" off his back. Then he carried the wounded quad inside
and joked with him while the doctors re-bandaged his wounds and
applied healing wands.

It turns out that they knew many of the same
people from the steppe, so when Mutuge's commander came in, nobody
thought to question Billy's allegiance. Since they were the Second
Company of the 7th Battalion, Billy claimed to be from Fourth
Company of the 1st Battalion, and asked if he could bunk with
them.

"Hey everybody," their captain announced in
the barracks. "This is Temujin from the Fourth of the 1st. He saved
Mutugen's life, so he gets free drinks."

Not that anyone felt like partying. Billy
himself quickly ate and slept. The need to pee thankfully woke him
up, and he wondered what he’d have done if he slept all night. As
it was, he moved from cot to cot, silently slicing throats,
starting with the captain, then busted the locks of their chests to
take their wands and money.

Then he moved on to the next barracks. This
time, two guys sat on their cots recounting a close call. Billy
limped closer.

"You okay?" one asked.

"Idiot doctors," Billy sullenly replied.
"What do they know?"

Then several meters away he drew swords and
whacked them. One fell pretty hard, thumping the wooden floor.
Billy laid down on the nearest empty cot, but no one woke up.
Relieved, he sliced more throats and took their valuables,
remembering how he found his raped mother.

The third barrack had hardly any fliers,
while the fourth and fifth looked half full. The other five
barracks lay in a line a few hundred meters away, but Billy felt
too exposed just walking across, so he entered the colonel’s home
through the window. The pretty woman next to him died for sleeping
with the enemy. The colonel never woke up. Opening his safe took
far longer then he expected, but had more gold, silver, and wands
than he could possibly carry. Still, he had the backpacks, so he
loaded everything up and left them near the front door and changed
into the colonel’s uniform.

Billy strolled to the latrine trench, humming
a popular Mongolian song, and finally peed. When he returned,
however, he massacred the other five sleeping companies. What
surprised him is that they lost half of their battalion since the
offensive started. After the last barrack, he limped to the
infirmary, killed the wounded, including Mutugen, then woke up the
doctors, healers, and assistants in their dorm. He led them to the
backpacks. "We need to deliver these medical supplies to a unit
near the front right away."

His request was unusual, but not implausible.
On the way to the front he covertly dived to change into his red
armor hidden by the lake.

As dawn approached, he signaled well ahead of
time, descended in full view, and saw dozens of wands pointed at
them when they landed on the infirmary roof. Billy saw the same
French officer.

"You have too many wounded, so I brought you
more doctors."

"Where did you get them?

"I took them from a Mongol Air Force base."
Which nobody believed.

"Prove you are who you say you are," Frenchy
demanded, even though Billy never told them his name.

Billy popped up and blew four flames. The
soldiers burst into applause.

"We thought we lost you. We even sent scouts
looking for you."

"I thought you could use more wands," he
said, throwing his backpack forward. "You'll find several thousand
sets in there. Arm civilian quads and pound the enemy ground
troops. I took out the closest quad battalion, but you’ll only have
air supremacy for a day or two. If you have someone bring me
breakfast, I'll kill some more Mongols after I eat. Oh, and tell
the surviving English quads to come see Captain Smith."

Below, Billy instructed the medical team to
dump their backpacks around his great-uncle, which woke him up.

"Your fever broke! Your team can now take you
home."