Final Empire (18 page)

She gave me a quick salute and jogged back towards the jet.

Gavin, Peyton, McGarrity and Brynja followed me through the blustering shards of crystal. The gusting winds blew them in rolling waves, and the sound was like wind chimes rattling in a storm.

We passed through the archway, beyond the columns and up the winding marble staircase. Helmets secured, guns drawn, we marched single file, and McGarrity trailed close behind, his sword blazing. The torches and open windows provided him enough light to fuel his construct, though we were all aware that fact could change at any time.

By the time we’d reached the ninth level my thighs burned with lactic acid, reminding me – once again – of the afternoons I’d spent with a video game controller or a comic book in-hand, never once venturing outside.

“Everyone shut up,” Brynja said, pulling off her helmet.

Gavin cocked his head. “No one is saying any—”

“Shh,” she cut in, pressing her fingertip into his mouth. “There,” she whispered, though I’m not sure who would’ve heard her. She pointed towards a set of double doors at the end of a corridor. “Darmaki and a bunch of others…I can hear them.”

“What is that room used for?” I asked.

“It’s Darmaki’s armory,” she explained. “A big storage area filled with guns, swords…it’s huge. And there are a
lot
of people in there.”

“Define ‘a lot’,” Gavin grumbled.

She just shook her head.

“We should rush them,” McGarrity said, raising his broadsword overhead. “We scream, charge, and take these assholes out!”

Brynja rolled her eyes. “Uh-huh. Because the Braveheart approach worked
so
well in Thunder Bay.”

The last time McGarrity had used his patented ‘act first, think later’ approach, the results were less than impressive; his rush into the hospital following the occupation at Fortress 23 had resulted in him getting blasted with a volley of bullets, leaving him blood-soaked and unconscious. Needless to say he wasn’t much help for the remainder of the mission.

“I’ve picked up a couple new tricks since then.” He collapsed his broadsword and rubbed his palms together, generating a glowing umbrella; a canopy that stretched overhead, wide enough to cover the entire team. We stepped closer to him and the umbrella continued to expand, curling around us like a protective dome. It was blinding – like being inside of a light bulb but without any heat.

“Okay,
now
what?” Peyton asked, squinting at our bright confines.

“Now you stick close and we walk together,” McGarrity said. “And you might not wanna touch the dome.”

We shuffled forward as one down the corridor, like a family huddled beneath a single umbrella trying to stay dry during a downpour. We took baby steps, shoulder-to-shoulder, chest-to-back, moving for several minutes with no clue what lied ahead. We assumed McGarrity knew where he was going as he seemed to have no issue seeing through the opaque yellow orb. Then he stopped.

“Ready?” he asked.

We all nodded, some more reluctantly than others. Ready or not, we didn’t have much of a choice.

He moved forward and the doors burnt to cinder. We passed through them as if they weren’t there, trampling the ashes as we crossed the threshold. With only the stone floor beneath us visible, we had no idea how many others were in the armory, or what awaited us when the dome was set to disappear.

McGarrity scanned the perimeter of the protective bubble, eyes darting from side to side. “I’d get ready to fire, boys and girls…kinda now-ish.”

We pressed the stocks of our machineguns into our shoulders, leveling our barrels. The tip of Peyton’s gun was an inch too close to the barrier and it sizzled when it grazed the surface, causing her to gasp. She swallowed hard and reset her weapon.

Everyone seemed ready. I gave McGarrity a thumbs up and he nodded back, his eyes glistening with a maniacal energy that sent a chill up my spine. 

“Wait,” I shouted. “Steve, remember that we need him
alive,
right? Stay composed out there. I need you to be a surgeon, not a butcher.”

The smile that twisted across his face gave me little comfort. “Precision strikes, Mox. I got it.”

And then the dome disappeared.

We fired into the crowd of Darmaki’s followers. Like the mob that had rushed our transport, they were armed with old Soviet-era machine guns, firing them wildly. But they were protected by nothing more than white robes which were punched through with plumes of red as they fell. We aimed for their extremities, hoping for as few fatalities as possible, but it was too chaotic for true accuracy.

Our suits held up against their fire and McGarrity swung his sword so quickly that it created a blur; a solid block of light that deflected bullets as they whizzed towards him. His attack was a buzzsaw that sliced through our attackers with anything
but
scalpel-like precision. Limbs sailed off and streams of crimson painted the walls.

It didn’t take long for the mob to realize that our suits couldn’t be penetrated with bullets. Those who had functioning legs turned and ran, and those who were injured were dragged off by the able-bodied. They passed us by, hurrying out the corridor at our backs.

Once the wave of terrified soldiers had fled, we were able to see what lay ahead: at the end of the warehouse-sized armory, with its high ceilings and seamless alabaster walls stood Sultan Darmaki. Tall and confident, with a small gathering of super humans ready at his side. Dozer pitched forward like he was prepared to charge, his bronze musculature shimmering in the torch light. Botha (not yet in her giant-sized state) punched a gloved fist into her open palm; the knuckle-cracking pops echoed down the chamber like tiny firecrackers. Trey McLamore’s hands glowed with a hazy green energy, fingers curled into claws. Thankfully Jonathan Ma and his army of clones were absent thanks to a well-placed sniper shot from Peyton (had she been practicing her aim in secret?) and the rest of the superhumans I’d spotted during his party were absent – although Darmaki’s remaining brute squad provided more than enough resistance.

“Mister Moxon, my friend,” Darmaki shouted from across the long corridor. His voice carried effortlessly along the exposed walls. “I am impressed that you made it this far. And I am a
very
difficult man to impress.”

“No one needs to die, here,” I called out. “Give yourself up and everyone can walk.”

He let out a hearty laugh, head back, hands covering his stomach. “Oh, I
love
Americans. Your sense of humor remains intact, regardless of the circumstances. It is a virtue that has not yet spread to the East, I am afraid.”

“This is over, fucker,” Brynja seethed. “Mox wants you alive, but that doesn’t mean I can’t snap your arms off and drag you back to America kicking and screaming.”

His smile vanished at Brynja’s threat.

“You should control your woman,” he instructed me, harsh and forceful.

Peyton cocked her gun and redoubled her hand around the grip. “Oh,
screw
this guy.”

Before I could call out to her she’d broken into a sprint, racing across the wide-open space between us and Darmaki.

Dozer, Botha and Trey charged to meet her.

I sprinted into the fray, gun blazing with Brynja, Gavin, and McGarrity following close behind.

I emptied my clip into Dozer’s head and chest, but without even managing a distraction, much less any harm. I might as well have been lobbing pebbles at the side of a tank. Tossing my gun aside I pulled the cannon from my back, struggling to latch it onto my arm as I charged.

The collision happened before I could intervene. Dozer’s fist collided with Peyton’s helmet, knocking her off her feet. She slid backwards across the floor. McGarrity retaliated with a series of wild sword swings, chopping at the bronze giant like a towering redwood. The light show was spectacular, but his blade was still unable to penetrate the monster’s hide.

“This is useless,” Brynja shouted. “We need to detain him!” She pulled a long flexible cord from her utility belt that glowed when she extended it. She rushed in as McGarrity continued his assault.

“You’re going down, you son of a bitch,” he howled as he continued to hack away.

Brynja kept trying to approach Dozer and McGarrity, but the flailing sword was keeping her at bay. “Out of the way, you idiot! I’ve got him.” She shielded her eyes with an outstretched hand, the sparks bouncing off her gauntlet.

When the swinging sword relented for a moment she lunged, coiling the wire around Dozer’s wrist. He shrugged her off as McGarrity slashed once again, accidentally catching Brynja across her forearm. The blade sliced though her gauntlet and opened a wide laceration, sending a stream of liquid that dotted the stone floor. The fluid that poured from her veins had the same consistency of blood, but there was a single bizarre difference: it was blue. A bright molten cobalt that glistened in the torch light.

She grimaced, latching her hand around her forearm.

In the fray I couldn’t tell whether or not McGarrity had noticed the color that she’d bled, but he was clearly horrified by what he’d done. His attention shifted from Dozer to Brynja for a heartbeat too long, allowing a bronze hand to coil around his neck. And then another.

Glendinning squeezed until McGarrity’s face reddened, then purpled, eyes bulging from their sockets. His feet dangled inches off the ground.

I steadied the cannon and fired. Not at Dozer – his reflective surface would have deflected the beam – but at the space directly beneath his feet. I’d released just enough energy to destabilize the stone floor, forcing it to melt into quicksand. As he sank waist-deep I cut off the power, allowing the floor and his bronze exterior to meld together, coalescing into a singular piece of fused matter.

He bellowed and flailed his arms, trying to pound himself free, but his struggle was futile. His own impenetrable skin had combined with a portion of the floor; he could slam his fists into it for a century and it would never buckle.

McGarrity had rolled to safety, gasping for air. He was barking out painful coughs, dotting the stone floor with crimson. Deep welts circled his neck.

Gavin and I stood shoulder-to-shoulder, squaring off with Botha and Lamore.

“Are you ready to negotiate now, my friend?” Darmaki called out. His hands burst with flame, casting a sinister glare across his face. “I am impressed by your valor. I did not expect you to even make it up the staircase, but you have defeated my clones and bested my strong man. Impressive, though you
are
a betting man, are you not? I do not like your odds against my giant…and also what comes next.”

Gavin looked back over his shoulder; Peyton, his sister, battered into unconsciousness; McGarrity, lying half-dead on the floor; and Brynja, gripping her forearm, drops of bright blue liquid pooling beneath her.

He unlatched the strap from his shoulder and let his gun clack to the floor.

I ripped off my helmet.

“
Gav
, what the f—”

“I can’t,” he confessed weakly. “I’m sorry, I…I want to get out of here. With you and Peyton and everyone, all in one piece.”

“You don’t know this guy,” I pleaded. “He’s not gonna let us walk just because you surrender.”

“Let him beg,” Darmaki laughed. “Perhaps he can persuade me.”

I raised the cannon strapped to my arm, grunting from exertion, barely able to hoist it to waist-level.

Botha and Trey took a backwards step, but Darmaki advanced. His eyes blazed, a raging inferno crackling in each palm.

“Ah, we are playing yet another game, Mister Moxon. We both hold power in our hands. Me, with
real
power – the power divined to me from on high. And
you,
” he sneered, “with your technology; metal and silicone, cobbled together.”

“One flick of my finger and this technology turns you into a steaming meat waffle.” I flicked my thumb into the safety latch, spooling up the power with a low hum.

Darmaki’s smile was bright beneath his dark beard. “So you have enough power to unleash another blast? And
before
I can unleash this?” Pillars of flame rose from his palms, swirling towards the ceiling. “Or are you bluffing, my friend?”

“Let’s find out,” I said with false confidence, tilting the barrel of the cannon up as far as I could manage. Beads of sweat formed on my hairline, rolling down my temples.

“If I die you will have
nothing
, Mister Moxon. No evidence to clear your name. No company, no resources. And your friends…do you think they will all escape here alive?”

He extended his palms towards Brynja, flames pulsing, poised to burst.

“Mox,” Gavin said, his voice panicked. “Stop this right now, man. Do
something...
”

“Last chance,” Darmaki taunted me.

Inside the concealed grip of my cannon I was already squeezing the trigger. My anti-matter gun vibrated with power…but was unable to fire.