Eunoia

by R J Johnson

  Kline smiled and shook his head, “Not if you have someone who understands how to control people.”

  “You’ll never control everyone,” the Old Man replied, shaking his head. “You just can’t do it.”

  “I managed to fool you long enough…” Kline whispered.

  The energy net exploded, and Kline stood up, confident once again in his power. “You waited too long old man.”

  The Old Man sent another web of energy toward Kline, hoping to stop him once again, but Kline was ready. He held out a hand and exploded the web of energy as it came toward him.

  “That only works once on me.”

  “Then I suppose I’ll have to try something else…” the Old Man replied. He looked up and took off into the sky.

  Kline smiled and took off after him.

  The battle was back on.

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  Washington, Ash and Tate stood outside the perimeter of the camp where thousands of men and women were preparing for the battle of their lives.

  “How many did you manage to pull together?” Tate asked.

  “Four hundred thousand.” Washington answered.

  Ash shook his head. “It’s not enough. Kline has at least four million behind that wall of his.”

  “You go to war with the army you have…” Washington said with a soft smile. “The only other option is to run, and use guerilla tactics.”

  “Kline’s not going to put up with that,” Tate said, shaking his head. “It wouldn’t take him long to figure out where we were hiding and then,” he clapped his hands together. “He’d smash us like a bug.”

  “So it’s now or never,” Washington muttered.

  “At least they’re untrained civilians,” Ash commented. “Most of them won’t have much training and won’t know how to respond. We could hold the advantage anyway.”

  “Maybe,” Tate answered spitting on the ground in front of them. “But, they have the numbers, and that damn wall.”

  “But they don’t have a lot of offensive weaponry. That’s where we have them beat,” Washington said. “Artillery and air support can go a long way in winning battles.”

  “Maybe so…” Ash nodded. “Maybe so. But, our path to victory would be much easier without that damned wall.”

  He stabbed at the air with a pointed finger. “But that damn wall will keep us out unless we do something about it.”

  “Like what?” Tate asked.

  Ash sighed, his finger falling back to the ground. He turned to Washington and Tate. “If you gents have any ideas…?”

  Neither one spoke up.

  “Ok then,” Washington exhaled. “It’s up to good ol’ fashion hellfire.”

  He turned and waved to one of his men who rushed over to meet the man.

  “General?” the private asked.

  “Let the company know we’re going to war. Start bombarding the wall and get me the latest surveillance footage we have of what’s going on over there.”

  “Right away.” The private ran off and Washington turned to Ash and Tate.

  “Gents, it’s up to you now.”

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  Christina and Scott ran toward the edge of the wall where thousands of men and women were milling around. Most of the people around them were lost in that dream like zombie state, while others remained animated, the thrill of destroying the world enough for them to follow Kline.

  But all of them were carrying some sort of weapon. Handguns were everywhere, and long rifles like M60s, and M16s were everywhere. There were hunting rifles of every caliber and some of the rougher looking characters were even carrying grenades and other explosives.

  Scott’s eyes went wide as he watched a pair of men carrying a trunk full of rockets as a third trailed behind them with the shoulder mounted rocket.

  “That can’t be legal…” Scott muttered. Christina shushed him as she pulled him through the crowd.

  For the most part, Kline’s zombiefied followers didn’t seem to notice them. They were like drones at this point – no real orders had come for them. Unless they presented as some kind of threat, Scott and Christina could walk through the crowds of Kline’s bloodthirsty followers without consequence.

  “How much further to the wall?” Scott called out to Christina. The wall loomed large above them, standing taller than most of the skyscrapers in Manhattan. But, the base of the wall was still a few blocks away.

  “Keep your pants on,” Christina shouted back at him. “We gotta get closer if we want to tear this wall down.”

  “How do we know that army will be ready?” Scott called after Christina.

  Christina paused, and turned back to him grimacing, “Because the Old Man said they would be, and we have to trust his plan.”

  “Says you…” Scott snorted. “You didn’t spend the last three days as a statue thanks to his ‘plan.’”

  “Yeah, well, you’re free now, so quit your bitchin’,” Christina snapped at him. “We’re wasting time, come on!”

  Chapter Fifty

  Kline and Alex were exchanging blows as they fell through time thanks to the slipstream Kline had created. But the battle raged, with neither man finding an advantage over the other. The stones they carried made them too strong, and they were both too disciplined.

  And both refused to give up.

  They crashed out of the time slipstream once again. Kline went flying, landing hard against the side of a mountain ravine, while Alex tumbled down the hillside into a huge glacier that lined the side of the mountain.

  Below them, an impossibly large lake, blue as the sky around them shimmered. Kline picked himself up, stumbling several times over the loose soil and rocks around him.

  He screamed in defiance, the blood running down over his eye. The Old Man had managed to knock him hard while in the time slipstream. The healing stone flashed bright as the wound sealed up quickly.

  Kline whirled around, looking for the Old Man, hoping to target him with several well-placed missiles.

  “Come back you coward!” Kline shouted, the echo of his voice thundering through the canyon.

  The slight whisper of the wind through the pine trees was his only answer.

  He turned around once again, when he was hit hard.

  The Old Man had flown right at him, grabbing at Kline’s side, and pushing him into the ground below. The rock, snow and dirt flew up in front of them, as Alex used Kline’s body as a bulldozer, pushing him hard through the debris flying up all around them.

  Kline grabbed the Old Man’s robes and used them as leverage to flip them around. The Old Man tumbled head-over-heels as Kline took control. Kline threw the Old Man hard, up against a wall of ice.

  Huge cracks appeared all around the Old Man’s body as the force of his impact thundered through the valley. Kline stood proud for a moment, admiring his handiwork, when he floated up, and hurled himself toward the Old Man, intent on finishing him once and for all.

  Alex was woozy, but he was able to dodge Kline’s fist at the last moment, throwing himself out of the way.

  Kline crashed into the ice, the wall splitting open.

  A vast reservoir of water began flooding out of the cracks, as the giant ice dam lost cohesion and stability.

  Kline and the Old Man looked up at the crumbling dam at the same time.

  “Oh… shit…” the Old Man managed.

  The ice dam burst, and a flood of water poured down on the both of them washing them and most of the valley behind them away.

  The Old Man grasped for the water stone. If anything could protect him, it would be this.

  The problem was, he was having trouble keeping stable. The water currents were throwing him to and fro, and Alex found himself unable to grab the right stone.

  For his part, Kline seemed to give up resisting the current, resolving that the flood would carry him wherever it decided to go.

  The Old Man felt his face smash into a boulder currently being carried along with the curr
ent and he decided it was time to get out of the water. Feeling his feet drag along the bottom, even for an instant was all he needed.

  He pushed up with his feet against the ground and rocketed out of the water above the now raging flood. He looked down at the damage the flood had created and winced.

  The entire Pacific Northwest was being flooded thanks to his fight with Kline. A massive glacial lake had built up behind a river fork, and their fight had destroyed the only thing holding the water back.

  Alex only hoped their fight wouldn’t prevent humanity from evolving or something silly like that.

  He didn’t have much time to contemplate the circumstances when he felt a sharp stabbing pain in his side. He looked down in horror to see a massive granite spear running through his abdomen and side.

  He gasped in pain, and began to fall back to the ground, where Kline was waiting for him.

  He pulled at the granite spear in his midsection and it melted off of him. The stone in his pocket glowed wildly as his abdomen healed.

  “It’ll… take… more than that Kline…” Alex wheezed. He turned to look up at Kline in defiance.

  “Let’s see how true that is…”

  Kline launched himself up at the Old Man as Alex rose to meet the challenge.

  Chapter Fifty-One

  Scott and Christina reached the edge of the wall where Kline’s followers were milling about, waiting for orders or an enemy.

  “What now?” Christina asked.

  Scott swallowed, “We open up the wall.”

  “And just how do you expect to do that?” Christina asked, sounding annoyed.

  “With this,” Scott pulled out the Stone of Gibraltar, and Christina grinned.

  “That’s the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen.” Christina said.

  “Wait ‘til tonight,” Scott replied.

  He turned toward the wall, and aimed the stone at the top, “Let’s hope this works…” Scott closed his eyes and begin imagining the wall separating apart, as if being opened by a zipper.

  Christina gasped as the wall of seemingly solid stone began to do exactly that. The top of the wall pulled apart, as if torn by a gigantic hand.

  That’s when Kline’s zombified followers began to take notice of Scott and what he was doing. Christina saw them coming.

  “Scott!” She shouted. “They know!”

  Scott ignored her, and concentrated hard on pulling the wall down. “Keep ‘em off me until I get this wall down!”

  Christina nodded, and reached into her pocket for the stone the Old Man had slipped her. It was the shape-shifting stone, one she didn’t need any help using.

  She grinned and began shifting into an enormous purple dragon. She roared loudly, rearing back, blowing a huge flame out of her nostrils. The zombie followers of Kline turned away from Scott and began rushing toward her, firing with everything they had.

  She roared in pain as the bullet struck the thick hide. They hurt, but fortunately didn’t do much in the way of permanent damage.

  She roared once again and grabbed the nearest gang member in her jaws, clamping down hard on the weapon in his hands, breaking the rifle in two. She pulled and threw the gang member into a crowd of people firing on her, knocking them down like ten pins.

  “Atta girl,” Scott muttered, concentrating on the wall in front of them.

  Christina grabbed another one of Kline’s followers by the scruff and pulled him up in the air, her massive wings beating against the New York night air. The wind knocked another group down, as she threw the man up against the wall.

  Scott was grabbed from behind, and dragged away by three men in suits. Scott turned, and grabbed the wrist of one of the men holding onto him, ossifying his body into a statue. He turned, and opened up his palm, throwing two granite spears toward the other two men’s midsections.

  Both men fell, killed by Scott’s spears.

  Scott fell back in horror at what he had done. The man who had been ossifying into a statue had paused, his face frozen in terror as he had realized what was happening to him. Scott turned and wobbled for a moment, throwing up on the grass next to him.

  He had no intention of ever doing that again.

  The wall was a little more than halfway down. But it wasn’t enough. If they were going to let Ash and Tate’s army into New York City, the wall needed to completely come down.

  But he wasn’t powerful enough for that. He needed another stone to double his power, nad the only other one out there right now was being used to keep him alive. Christina had her hands full with Kline’s zombies, and he would’ve been dead already if not for her efforts.

  He turned and held out the Gibraltar stone again, aiming it at the cleave he had already managed to open. The wall continued to melt down before his eyes, but at a frustratingly slow pace.

  For her part, Christina was busy with Kline’s zombies. Kline’s entire army had begun to move over to the disturbance where Scott was trying to open up a hole, and there were beginning to be too many for her to handle. Just as she thought she was getting the edge on the crowd, another thousand soldiers would show up.

  There were simply too many. If she was really going to fight off what seemed like an inexhaustaible amount of men and women Kline had at his disposable, then she would need another stone. Something that Scott needed if they were going to open up the wall.

  They were both stuck and they were both beginning to come to the same realization.

  She looked down at Scott who was struggling with the stone in his hands, trying to will the wall to come down faster, while simultaneously fighting off another set of Kline’s zombies with the stone. He looked up at her, his eyes filled with love for her and regret.

  Regret that they were running out of time together.

  She knew all this because she felt it too. Their time was coming to an end. There were simply too many for them to fight. Christina landed next to Scott and began blowing flames all around him to try and keep him safe from Kline’s hordes of zombies. They may go down, but at least they’d go down fighting.

  Scott knew Christina was taking the brunt of the attacks now. Her tortured screams sounded the warning loud enough. They were running out of time, and the wall was simply not coming down fast enough.

  “I love you,” Scott shouted over the sounds of battle. “I love you Christina more than anything else in this world. And I’m grateful for every second we had together.”

  Christina didn’t respond – she couldn’t really, not in the dragon form she was in. But her heart swelled, hearing her lover proclaim his love for her in what might be his last minutes.

  And she wasn’t about to let that go to waste.

  The shape-shifting stone glowed brightly and her dragon form got bigger.

  Scott felt the power in the Gibraltar stone grow even brighter, as the beam of energy pulling the wall down seemed to intensify. The wall began to split apart at a much fast rate, the sides crumbling instantly when the beam of energy touched it.

  Christina roared, and blew a massive bout of flames down Fifth avenue, where thousands of Kline’s zombies were. The zombies were pushed back by the massive explosion, giving the pair a moment to breath.

  “I don’t know how much longer we have!” Scott shouted back at Christina. “But I’m almost through, I just need…”

  Throngs of men and women stood back up, as the healing blue light began flowing all over their body. Christina shifted back into her human form as she watched Kline’s zombies get back up, ignoring their injuries.

  “They’re connected with Kline’s healing abilities too!” she shouted in a warning to Scott. “Come on, we gotta get outta here and try bringing down this wall somewhere else!”

  “We’re almost through!” Scott cried out, gritting his teeth.

  “We don’t have time!” she screamed back at him.

  The zombies began moving in for the final kill, as if knowing it didn’t matter what Scott and Christina threw at them.

  Th
e wall was beginning to fall through, Scott was almost through. He could even see the lines of trucks and equipment lining up on the other side, and even the faces of expectant men and women waiting to do battle with Kline’s minions.

  Suddenly an explosion rocked under his feet as a grenade had managed to get too close to him. He was thrown clear, far away from Christina who was still locked in mortal battle with the thousands of zombies milling through the street.

  He weakly held out a hand, willing the rest of the wall to come down when he realized the Gibralta stone had fallen from his hand. He lowered his face in shame, he was too late.

  That’s when a shadow fell over his face, blocking the light. A man in a suit, someone who had probably in better times worked on Wall Street, or at an advertising firm, stood over him. He a baseball bat wrapped in wire in one hand, and a .45 caliber in the other and approached Scott slowly, watching him struggle under the wreckage with dead fish eyes.

  The zombie raised the pistol, and aimed it at Scott’s head. Scott closed his eyes, and thought of Christina.

  But before Scott released what he thought would be his dying breath, several bullets raked through the zombie’s corpse, tearing him apart.

  The buuuuuuurrrrrrrrrp of the A-10 Warthog’s .50 cal machine gun echoed through the streets, as the rest of Kline’s followers looked up at the flying cannon.

  The A-10 Warthog began to make short work of the zombies lining and milling around the streets. Surprisingly, they left Christina’s dragon alone, as if knowing the dragon was on their side this time around.

  The zombie resistance began to fall apart, as the bodies stacked up. Another Warthog flew through the small crack Scott had created and joined his partner in the sky in an aerial dance of destruction.

  The remaining zombies on this side of the island began to retreat, hoping to draw the planes back to other, better equipped members of their tribe.