“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.