The Genie and the Engineer 3: Ravages of War

by Glenn Michaels

  Paul nodded, a sense of dark foreboding in his thoughts. “Then let’s come up with a really good plan that will get the job done with the least risk possible. Oh, and one more thing. No word of this to Mom yet, understand? Or to any of the Scotties with her. Not until we know more.”

  “Clear, Dad,” Irona 222 replied but with a pained look.

  Ω

  “Dad?”

  Paul sighed and slowly turned to face Daneel 1, who was coming through the French doors to join him on the balcony.

  It was past midnight. He had been staring at a star filled sky, the mountain air around him cool, crisp and clean.

  He was thinking. Wondering what lay ahead. Questioning himself and his plans. Was he doing the right thing?

  “Dad?” Daneel 1 asked again. “Are you sure that we are doing the right thing?”

  Paul smiled sadly, impressed at having Daneel echo his thoughts so precisely. “No, I’m not. There are so many unknowns here. We might find Bishop 911 and his patrol sitting in some theater somewhere, watching a Godzilla movie marathon and having a grand old time.”

  “Not likely, Dad,” the Scottie protested.

  “No. I don’t think so either.”

  “Shouldn’t we tell Mom? You know, that they are missing?”

  Paul chuckled. “No, that is the one thing I’m sure we must not do.”

  “Oh? Why not?”

  Cocking his head to one side, Paul turned to look back at the stars. “They’re ageless, you know. Those stars. Our ancestors were looking at those lights in the sky back in the days when they hunted saber tooth tigers. Those early men. They protected their women too. They had too, for the benefit of all mankind, for the propagation of the species. They especially learned the hard way to protect pregnant women the most fiercely. If necessary, they put themselves between the predators and their women, to protect them.”

  Paul swept an arm at the sky above him. “They’ve seen it. Those stars. They’ve seen our history. All of it. It’s written in our genes. Those early men that failed—their children died in their mothers’ wombs, with their mothers. The ones that survived were those that their men protected. Fought for. Sometimes died for. No. It’s written in our genes. Protect our women. Especially when they are pregnant. Especially then.” He glanced back at the Scottie. “Understand?”

  “Yes, Dad, I do. And I understand something else too.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Your name is mud when she finds out.”

  Paul nodded sagely in total agreement. “That too is written in our genes.”

  Ω

  Orders went out that night and the Scotties began arriving in the early morning hours in huge numbers at three separate locations. Ziggy 386 (Quantum Leap) and his II Corps gathered at the Fairfax County landfill, an open field of nearly 300 acres south southwest of Washington, a perfect place from which to stage his part of the attack. Jarvis 186 (Ironman, Avengers) with half of his 1st Division, with 1st Brigade under Dorian 223 and 2nd Brigade under Andrea 32 (Star Trek) were dropping in on an empty beach north of the town of Claiborne, Maryland, along the eastern side of the Chesapeake Bay.

  1st, 3rd, and 4th Brigades of 2nd Division, I Corp, under Lenore 86, arrived via portal in an empty grassy field just east of Harrisonburg and west of the Massanutten Ridge, with Paul and Daneel 1 bringing up the rear.

  Paul stood in the tall fescue, a gentle cool breeze blowing in from the north down the valley. Around him floated nearly 10,000 Scotties and their unit commanders: Daneel 7 of 1st Brigade, Twiki 586 (Buck Rodgers in the 25th Century) of 3rd Brigade and Alpha 505 (The Flash, the first series and Power Rangers) of 4th Brigade.

  “Daneel 1, set us up a conference with all the Corps, Division, and Brigade commanders by way of holographic projections via microportals,” Paul ordered. Since Daneel 1 was expecting that command, it took only a few seconds to arrange, the images of the Scotties in remote locations displayed on large view screens hovering in mid-air.

  As Paul looked around, he marveled at the sight of 10,000 black cubes floating in the air around him, the images of their Scotties on top of their cubes, together with the faces of Scotties in the two remote locations displayed on nearly a dozen view screens. It sobered him to see all of their smiling faces patiently waiting for him to speak.

  “Commanders,” Paul began. “The attack is set for 2000 hours tonight, local time. All of you know the plan, since you helped create it. Roberta 300, Irona 222, the two of you have the most to do to get your troops ready.”

  “We’ll be ready in time, I promise, Dad,” they replied, in unison.

  “And Vincent 286, you have the most distance to travel,” Paul reminded him.

  “No sweat, Dad. Just a milk run,” he boasted.

  “Alpha 505, your approach to the battleground will be the trickiest,” Paul cautioned him.

  “We can handle it,” Alpha 505 pledged.

  “Gort 737 with the 4th Brigade, 1st Division, I Corps, and Arcee 77,” (from the 2007 film Transformers) “with the 4th Brigade, 1st Division, II Corps will act as the reserve,” Paul informed them. “Gort, Arcee, your Brigades will be with me at the Manassas Regional Airport, south of the city. We will go in first, a few minutes ahead of the attack. In some ways, your job may be the hardest, since you must be familiar with everyone else’s plan of attack and stand ready to jump in anywhere to help out.”

  “We’ll have ’em covered,” Gort 737 assured him.

  Paul looked at all of their countenances on display in front of him, a deep feeling of pain in his heart. “People, I am not going to kid you. I am worried about how this will go. I want you to get with your troops, warn them again that Errabêlu is up to funny business here and to be on the lookout for disappearances of other Scotties during this battle. If that starts happening, I want that information transmitted to Daneel 1 as quickly as possible. It will be his job to determine what we are up against. If wholesale disappearances start to happen, like maybe whole companies start to vanish into thin air, I want everyone in your Corps to pull back. Is that clear to everyone?”

  “Clear,” they all responded in concert.

  “There will be nearly 38,000 of you in the first wave of the attack,” Paul reminded them again. “With Gort 737’s and Arcee 77’s 6,000 in reserve and another 3,000 in Washington DC in case we need them. It’s virtually all of the Scotties except what is with Mom in Africa, so this constitutes a huge gamble.”

  “We understand.” Once again, they all responded in concert.

  Paul was touched by their willingness to march off to battle. Was this what it was like for eighteen and nineteen-year-olds headed off to war in America’s history? His heart felt heavy. He looked at their smiling expectant faces on top of their cubes and he instantly realized that he couldn’t just give them a pat on the back and wish them well. For a moment, he regretted never having served in team sports or in the military. Right now, what his Scotties needed was a pep talk—and he didn’t know how to do that. But he also knew that he had to try to give them one anyway.

  He bowed his head, trying to find the right words.

  “I want you all to know how proud I am, how proud Mom and I both are, of each and every one of you. Of what is in your heart, of the type of person that you are. And yes, you are people, even though you don’t wear a body of flesh and blood, you are human.”

  He looked back up, into their eyes. “You were born for this day, you know. For this specific day, right here, right now.” He let his voice rise some. “Throughout history, there have been many pivotal moments, events that have shaped and changed the world as a whole, sending the whole planet in a new direction. The Renaissance. The Gutenberg Printing Press. The discovery of electricity. The American Revolution. World Wars I and II. The nuclear bomb. All of those and many many more.

  “This is another one of those moments and you are the pivot point now. On you hinges what happens to the world for the next thousand years. On you hangs life, liberty, a
nd justice versus slavery and death. Right now, the bad guys have the upper hand. They are in control. But you have advantages over them that they are unaware of. You are smarter than they are, individually and as a team. You are better trained, better focused, and individually more powerful. But most of all—and make no mistake, this part is the most important factor of all—you fight for a better cause. They fight for power, money, and control. You fight for the human race, for liberty and freedom and righteousness. Yours is the better motivation by far. This is who you are. This is your time, here and now. It all comes down to today. Your heart, your character, your integrity, your cause. Fight with every joule you have. Remember the cost of blood and lives that the human race has paid for the last thousand years. Remember the goal you fight for today. This is your chance. Fight for it!”

  For a moment, the Scotties all looked at him in stunned surprise. Then Daneel 1 grew a set of arms and hands and began to clap. All the other Scotties present and in the displays quickly did the same. A cheer went up followed by a growing chant.

  “Victory. Victory! VICTORY! VICTORY!”

  Paul smiled and waved both arms in their direction, joining in with their voices, shouting at the top of his lungs. “VICTORY! VICTORY! VICTORY!”

  TWENTY-ONE

  Harrisonburg, Virginia

  Truck and Trailer rental facility

  Wednesday, 10:49 a.m. EDT

  June

  At a trucking rental firm near Harrisonburg, Virginia, not far from Interstate 81, four men sat waiting in the cheaply paneled lounge, watching an antique CRT color television as a clerk behind the chipped wooden counter prepared a set of paperwork on metal clipboards.

  From a grassy field just south of the Manassas Regional Airport, Paul watched a view of the lounge on one of a dozen large holographic displays hanging in mid-air in front of Gort 737, Arcee 77, and himself. The video was transmitted through a microportal strategically located in the upper left corner of the lounge of the trucking rental office, just below a ceiling tile.

  The clerk behind the counter finished stamping the forms and jerked his head at one of the waiting men.

  “We need your signature here, Mr. Idaho,” he said, waiting for the holographic image of Duncan 454 to get to his feet and approach the counter. “Please sign here, here, here,” he lifted two sheets, “here, here, and here. Then we will do a walk down inspection of the trucks, sign one more form, and you and your men can be on your way.”

  Duncan 454, aka Duncan Idaho (from the Frank Hebert Dune series), smiled crookedly in reply. “Thanks. Much appreciated.”

  The clerk waved it off. “I don’t think we’ve ever rented three semi rigs to the same customer on the same day before. Must be quite the emergency.”

  Duncan 454 nodded smugly. “Yep. We’ve never done that before either. Yes, you could call it an emergency. We have an important delivery to make by tonight. We’ll have the trucks back first thing in the morning.”

  “No problem,” the clerk replied with a smile. “Shall we go do the walk-downs?”

  All four men (well, one man and three Scotties in human disguise) went outside, where they did a damage inspection of the three tractor trailer rigs. The final forms were signed and the three Scottie human images—in cowboy boots, jeans, and white Texan hats—strolled across the asphalt lot, pulled open the doors and swung themselves into the cabs. In seconds, the three diesel engines kicked over with a rattle, sending brief gusts of black smoke out the tops of the stacks.

  “There are some that would call this stealing,” said Kitt 427 (from the Knight Rider TV series) to the other two Scotties over a WiFi link as they shifted the trucks into first gear, edging them toward the gate in the chain-link fence.

  “The trucks will be back in the morning,” said Olympia 402 (Jacques Offenbach’s 1881 work The Tales of Hoffmann). “And we did, after all, fill out their forms and pay the normal rental fee for a day’s usage.”

  “Yeah, but we sort of forged our identity papers,” observed Kitt 427, with a grin on his face.

  “Nobody is out a cent,” Duncan 454 replied. “And I can’t help it if some people on this planet are in love with paperwork. That’s their problem, not mine.”

  “Yeah,” said Kitt 427 as he drove his truck through the open gate. Olympia 402 was a very close second, with Duncan 454 third.

  “We will have these babies back before anyone spots any funny business,” promised Duncan 454.

  Paul chuckled at the Scotties’ comments and swung to check the progress of one of the other teams.

  Ω

  From Hagerstown in the north down to Staunton in the south; from Fredrick, Maryland to Charlottesville, Virginia; semi-trailers and trucks rolled forth from a variety of rental centers. Each one, driven by a Scottie in the guise of a human, headed for the nearest interstate and set a course for the same place: Exit 6 on I-66. All ten trucks.

  There was a schedule to keep.

  Ω

  At 6:30 p.m., with the sun hanging low on the western horizon, Vincent 286 of I Corps, 2nd Division, 3rd Brigade emerged through a small portal (one of four such) into the Gum Spring Road Quarry, a large stone pit in the ground just north of Sudley Springs, Virginia. Each of the four portals were just large enough for four Scotties to come through at a time. The size of the portals were kept as small as possible, to mitigate the level of magical energy being expended and thereby reduce their risk of exposure to the enemy. Fortunately, the stone quarry was beneath ground level, which helped to further shield the portals from detection.

  Vincent 286 waited impatiently while his troops emerged through the portals and gathered along the floor of the quarry.

  “Come on, come on!” he said over a WiFi link. “We haven’t got all day!”

  Ω

  Paul’s instructions to Ziggy 386 had been to leave one battalion in Washington DC as a rearguard, in case some of the Errabêlu wizards attempted to sneak around behind them and attempt some type of skullduggery in the nation’s capital.

  Airborne, the rest of II Corps left their start-off location at the Fairfax County landfill at 6:30 p.m. and traveled swiftly, as a column, at a mere altitude of thirty feet above the Ox Road, heading northwest. In order to remain unobserved by traffic on the road, the Scotties were cloaked.

  Fifteen minutes later, the lead unit swung further to the west and followed the Fairfax County Parkway. The rest of II Corps made the same turn, right behind their leader.

  Ω

  At 6:45 p.m., four small portals opened up near the southeastern end of the airstrip at Manassas Regional Airport, above the mowed grassy field. Gort 737 and Paul watched as the Scotties of I Corps, 1st Division, 4th Brigade began to pile through.

  Paul glanced upward again, checking on the deteriorating condition of the weather for the nth time since his arrival. The sky above him was now filled with dark grey clouds and the wind was blowing fitfully from the northwest. When he turned in that direction, there were angry black clouds above the treetops on the far horizon and an occasional burst of lightning in the distance.

  He grunted in fretfulness. “I saw the same sort of phenomenon at Devils Tower,” he grumbled to Gort 737. “All the magical energy being released over there is affecting the weather.”

  Gort 737 nodded and cheerfully predicted, “It will probably get worse.”

  The Scottie was likely right. Worry gnawed at Paul. There were elements at work here that he didn’t understand.

  Ω

  As the semi-trucks arrived at Exit 6, they pulled into a truck stop and fueled up, their drivers taking time out for a short break. A portal opened up inside the box of each trailer, disgorging Scotties until the inside of the trailer was stacked completely full.

  With the fuel tanks topped off, one by one the trucks pulled back onto the highway and headed east.

  It wasn’t quite a convoy, not with the trucks spaced thirty seconds apart. But 20,000 Scotties, with all their magical energy emanations shut-down, were on
their way to the battlefront, using the same avenue of approach employed by Longstreet and the Confederate Army to such devastating effect in The Second Battle of Manassas, threading through the needle of Thoroughfare Gap.

  Ω

  Ziggy 386 and II Corps, traveling along Fairfax County Parkway, reached I-66 and momentarily rose above the overpass before turning westward, the highway traffic below oblivious to their presence.

  Less than five minutes of flight time took II Corps past Centreville to Exit 52 where they “exited” the interstate and followed the Lee highway westward. As they approached the intersection with Bull Run-Post Office Road, the lead element, 1st Platoon, 1st Company, 1st Battalion, 1st Brigade, 1st Division, slowed slightly and hung a right. They were followed by every other unit of 1st Division. However, 2nd Division stayed on the main highway, maintaining a westward course.

  2nd Division did not have to go far, only a mile before reaching Stone Bridge, one of the most prominent landmarks in the area, spanning as it did, the small Bull Run. There the Scottie cubes stopped, setting down in a small grassy field along the north side of the highway. The time was 7:05 p.m.

  Ziggy 386 quickly called his unit commanders together.

  “We hold here for a bit. I’m sure by now that Errabêlu knows we are here,” he said, his holographic head nodding toward the west. He too was impressed by the angry black clouds and the sporadic bursts of lightning and thunder in the sky in front of them.

  “There seems to be quite a storm brewing,” he muttered sullenly.

  In the meantime, 1st Division, under the command of Roberta 300, sneaked 2.6 miles up the Bull Run Post Office Road and made their way westward across a wooded lot to the banks of the Bull Run. Without faltering, they swung to follow the river upstream, flying along just above the water and below the overhanging tree limbs, into the gathering darkness.

  Ω

  At 7:20 p.m., the first of the semi-rigs, the ones carrying Lenore 86’s 2nd Division, steadily made their way through the tight twisting turns of Thoroughfare Gap, heading eastward at exactly the speed limit. Eight minutes later, the first semi took the circular off-ramp at Exit 46B, heading away from Gainesville on the Lee Highway, approaching the Manassas National Battlefield Park from the west. Every thirty seconds, another truck took the same exit, all heading in the same direction.