Deadly Wands

by Brent Reilly

CHAPTER 12

  William kept the thirty thousand highest fliers for himself. Billy overtook them on their way to the Bering Strait. The nervous quads had a hard time showing their fear when Shorty, as they knew Billy, looked so giddy. And Willy, as they called the Baron, could not look happier.

  William sent Billy to warn him when the enemy crossed the Strait while his unit rested at a secret munitions depot that he had dug far north of the Khan’s invasion route. William depended upon Billy’s ridiculous endurance. When he convened a leadership meeting, the commanders seemed surprised they were not trying to stop the invasion.

  “It’s easier to kill Mongols where we live than where they live.” William laughed. “Genghis is about to lose a million of his best active duty quads!”

  When Billy finally arrived, William could not contain his excitement. Loaded down with bombs, that night they flew to an island north of the Strait that the Americans had never used before. They slept all day without cooking fires, then attacked the Mongol base camp on the Siberian side that night. The surprise was total. Genghis took all the warriors with him, so they fought two-wanders, support staff, and one hundred thousand air mules (quads who carried supplies -- not every quad was a warrior).

  Genghis needed so many air mules to bring him food and bombs, so killing them cut off his supplies. Even if Genghis pre-deployed food without the Americans noticing, or had ships offshore, he’d still have to forage. For a million mouths.

  Instead of attacking the armada right away, William had them air-hump all the Mongol food to their nearest mountaintop bunkers in Siberia. A week later, they stocked up on Mongol bombs and returned to Alaska to find the invaders.

  William sent Billy to destroy the Mongol supply ships that he assumed were now tracking the armada offshore. His endurance made him perfect for finding the ships, and his speed made him perfect for flying past defenders to sink them with fireballs. Alone, Billy sunk three supply fleets protected by a thousand quads each. One was so well protected that Billy dived underwater and used his wands to propel him close enough to puncture the keel with steel.

  William pounced on each division attacking the American fortifications. William not only got to use three divisions to surprise one, ten nights in a row, but each defensive line gave him bombs for the next drop, plus hot food and warm beds.

  The night they attacked the armada, William waited until the Mongol rapid-reaction teams chased an American battalion to the south. Then William came from the north, dropped thirty thousand bombs, and blasted them all night.

  Vastly outnumbered, the Americans at least held the high ground. But they still had to dive to shoot enemy units who showed them their back. Which gave the enemy the opportunity to catch them.

  Just before dawn, an enemy battalion dropped on the unit his mother led. Billy warned her by screaming at the top of his lungs and waving what looked like really long swords of fire.

  From all four wands.

  The battle paused for a moment, so Billy did it again. Except he let himself fall while projecting flame in the shape of an “X” to keep all eyes on him while his mother led her battalion back up to safety. Then someone raced up and flashed his own four fiery wands and the fighting stopped, by mutual agreement, so everyone could watch.

  Billy suddenly faced Genghis Khan in battle, while a million wands recorded them. They had even exhaustively studied each other’s duels, although the Khan didn’t know he battled the Boy Wonder.

  His father didn’t want Genghis dead because then the Mongols would lose under another leader, and assume they’d win if they could just find the right leader. In contrast, if they lost under Genghis Khan, they’d assume no one could have won.

  When Billy didn’t find this convincing, William tried another argument: “He can’t suffer if he’s dead. Only alive can we make his life a living hell.”

  Now that Billy found compelling.

  What William didn’t ever tell Billy is that he feared another leader would negotiate a peace. Genghis had three centuries of legacy to protect; a new Mongol Khan only had people to protect.

  Billy, who enjoyed a height advantage, rose in an arc and fell with his hands and feet pointing at the Immortal, blasting a volley every heartbeat like a thunderous drumbeat. Two fast fliers can close the distance surprisingly quickly -- to either their detriment or advantage. The Khan tried evading, without fleeing in front of his troops, but failed to anticipate the speed and size of the four over-lapping fireballs swallowing the sky around him.

  The Great Khan avoided the first ones, but no one on Earth could evade such huge, fast fireballs that originated so near.

  With no other option, he curled into a fetal position and used his wands to project four shields to protect him from the worst of the heat. He emerged with his hair singed and what felt like a full body sunburn. He couldn’t open his eyes yet, but he gulped down air because he had never held his breath that long before.

  Then a metal ball full of spikes whacked him so hard in the groin that it obliterated his penis, testicles, and manhood. Genghis Khan fell from the sky a ruined man. He lost so much of his inner thighs that, for the rest of his life, he’d walk like a man recently raped. He certainly felt violated.

  The Great Khan dropped from the sky for an eternity as his armada looked on. A veteran of a million fights, Genghis fought through the pain and regained control before his troopers rescued him. How embarrassing that would be. His entire force loudly cheered him as he landed at a medical tent. Unable to walk, he collapsed in the doorway and his fingers searched his trousers for his missing genitals.

  In the old days, before two air forces clashed, each would send out a champion who took on all opponents, one at a time. Genghis saw the enemy do this now, exaggerating the gesture so all could see it.

  Mongol super-quads accepted the challenge, but reached him just a few at a time instead of many at once. While doctors stripped his armor off, Genghis watched his best guys drop out of the sky like exploded fireworks. His nemesis beat one about every heartbeat. One minute slowly passed, then another as his aides peeled his undershirt from his back and applied lotion to his burns. His underclothes felt like they melted to his skin under his red-hot body armor. The other Americans used this distraction to disengage, leaving one guy to defy a million quad armada alone.

  The video of the Baron castrating the Immortal -- “sacking the Khan’s personal treasure” is how the bastard phrased it -- would spread faster than gossip and would smother Mongols like poverty. Mongol-haters would call Genghis Khan “Dick-less Khan” and joke about his immortal balls.

  The Khan ordered his highest-flying battalion to attack. For some reason, sending a thousand to attack one quad did not feel like overkill.

  More minutes passed while Genghis sucked his wands and directed their healing power to his wounds. He kept waiting impatiently for a thousand fireballs to light up the sky. Every Mongol he saw splatter the ground felt like a personal insult. Some even smashed quads on the ground, a two-fer.

  As the Americans disappeared over the horizon, Genghis wondered why his enemy didn’t kill him. He could have, easily. He couldn’t identify the motive, but it scared him that his enemy was not scared of him.

  A shadow passed through a white cloud on a dark night. The lone enemy put the super-quads challenging him between him and the high-altitude battalion. Or what was left of it. As the battalion circled around, so did the Baron, striking his challengers like notes in a song. It looked like someone was throwing bodies off a cliff.

  Genghis sighed and shrieked “attack.” Thousands of nearby quads looked at him confused. He gave the order again and half a million quads launched. A minute later the Khan saw that the battalion had broken into companies, which finally drove the bastard away. As a parting shot, he fired four fireballs at Genghis’ tent before venting one last primal scream.

  The Baron would soon release a video, in his deep
baritone voice, bragging that he killed a thousand Mongols that night. Genghis recognized juicy propaganda when he saw it, and couldn’t benefit by saying the Baron only killed half that many.

  As soon as half a million Mongols flew over the horizon to drive off the Baron, a few dozen American battalions appeared to drop bombs on the Mongols too tired to fly. They pounded the weak, wounded, and ill for the hour it took for the half a million to return. They found their supplies, tents, and comrades burned. What really alarmed Genghis is that they targeted his food stores.

  Not long after the Mongols landed to eat, drink, and sleep, even more American units bombed them from high altitude, then dived to shoot up whatever Mongols rose to contest the skies. Apparently those who just left landed to enjoy breakfast, knowing other battalions would attack the enemy at dawn. Together they stayed for several hours, denying the Mongols sleep, until other Americans arrived to replace them.

  Although always outnumbered, the Americans could fly higher, and then target any Mongols capable of reaching their ceiling. Then the next highest-flying enemies. Soon the armada lost everyone who could fly high, which let the Americans shoot them with relative impunity. This is why William wanted the highest fliers farthest north, to weed out the Mongols with the highest ceiling. As the armada crawled south, Americans with lower ceilings could still fight with relative impunity. The Americans owned the sky.

  Mongol divisions successfully chased some of the American battalions to their hidden bunkers. The battalion would fight from their bunkers and either wait for help or do it themselves after a refreshing nap. Without bombs, the Mongols couldn’t break through to flush them out.

  The armada pushed on, pounding Anchorage with savage glee. Unfortunately, Anchorage was built with punishment in mind, so this bombardment did little more than remind Mongols of the futility of striking the same target every year. An army of two-wanders controlled hundreds of bunkers connected by hardened tunnels, while a division of quads escaped from hidden openings to blast Mongols whenever they slept. Mongols would find no food, shelter, or safety near Anchorage. William would later fund its reconstruction as a much larger planned city with an improved harbor.

  Genghis had assumed he could forage, but the Americans had killed everything worth eating. It disturbed him to see his troops excited over spearing a rabbit. The burden of finding food turned their sprint into a stroll. William feared the armada would not even reach San Francisco.

  Genghis realized too late his invasion was doomed. They bombed him every night so the Mongols couldn’t rest, and harassed them from unreachable heights during the day. Tired troops travel slow and fight poorly. Unlike the Mongols, the Americans enjoyed warm shelter, hot food, and could sleep safely.

  As William predicted, the armada moved south along the coast. Genghis desperately needed to eat, so William’s three divisions hunted those units sent to hunt, fish, and forage. The Americans already evacuated every fishing village, leaving the Mongols nothing.

  When the Khan sent ten divisions after them, William lured them away by staying just out of range. After a few hours, the Mongols turned around, so William attacked, mauling them. Once the Mongols started flanking them, William retreated once more, but by flying higher so they could still shoot the Mongols, but the Mongols couldn’t shoot the Americans. At first, the angry Mongols kept attacking those above their ceiling, until finally the commander saw the futility and signaled retreat. But he waited too long. The American marathoners flew down the exhausted Mongols, picking them off like sharks on a beach.

  Billy found his father’s munitions ship, so William could resume bombing the armada as it crossed Canada. When it ran out of bombs, William sent it to San Francisco, where he had a shipload of food waiting. William had hired the entire local fishing fleet to fish off the Siberian coast, and hoped they got there in time to feed his own armada.

  By the time the armada reached California, Mongol scouts reported several million quads waiting for them in San Francisco. What they didn’t know is that most of those quads were untrained, short-range, and low-altitude. Exactly the quads that William refused to employ. Because the Mongols faced high-altitude, long-range quads ever since the invasion began, Genghis had to assume those protecting San Francisco were also trouble.

  William put himself in the Khan’s boots and foresaw his next move. He sent a messenger to San Francisco to warn them, sent others to get his battalions, then flew at night to hide his divisions between the enemy and the city. He grounded them and forbid fires. The next morning William called a leadership meeting.

  “Genghis cannot go home without bombing San Francisco. Yet most of his armada lacks the strength to fly that far, so he’s probably gonna send his best quads at night and hope to surprise us. Given the distance, he must leave before midnight, so that’s when we’ll double the sentries. Until then, eat and sleep.”

  Genghis actually spent another two days moving south, mostly fishing, making William wonder if he meant to attack with his entire armada. Or what was left of it. Then Billy pointed out the diminishing moon, and it all made sense. Genghis would attack when there was no moonlight to highlight his guys.

  Fifty thousand Mongols, dressed like Americans, left that night, but few returned. They flew individually, rather than in units, to help them blend in with the incredible mob that awaited them. This allowed enough Mongols to sneak through to fireball half the city. Most non-quad residents fled weeks before. The rest stayed to put out fires. It’s hard to kill someone faster than an eagle, but several million defenders somehow managed it.

  Stocked up on fish, the armada now flew north with a purpose. The American battalions still shot them up, but now several million angry quads chased them as well. They lost their fear once Genghis Khan fled. William had paid a tribe to turn an entire buffalo herd into beef jerky, so they had plenty to eat on the run. The Mongols, however, had to stay near the coast to find enough fish to feed a few hundred thousand mouths every day. Better preparations let the Americans fly faster than the Mongols, and that made all the difference.

  While William’s three divisions targeted Mongols fishing, and the battalions rotated turns blasting the enemy from above, waves of angry quads crashed into the armada without coordination or organization. Without the battalions running interference, the Mongols would have destroyed them with professional formation flying. But the battalions could fly higher, longer, and faster, and didn’t worry about being chased down by superior forces. Attacked day and night, the Mongols couldn’t sleep, rest, or eat. William had turned the world’s greatest military into zombies -- dead, but still hungry.

  Genghis apparently did the math and concluded his armada wouldn’t make it. So he divided the whale they just caught among the healthier half of his troops, clarified their tactical situation, and said everyone needed to get home as best as they could. He urged the sick and wounded to disappear in the vast Canadian wilderness, then escape before winter. He reformed the units, putting the best quads together. At midnight, the armada disintegrated, with some units fleeing north, others east, and some seeking refuge on distant islands. The sick and wounded tried hiding.

  At first, William didn’t understand what happened, but by dawn it became all too clear. He ordered his units north and urged the angry mob to follow them with all the food they could carry. Genghis had counted on the ten lines of fortifications to feed and shelter them, but instead William’s troops ate well and slept warm. The enemy broke into squads, so William did the same. All the way to Siberia.

  They knew some got away because they never found Genghis Khan. William’s battalions didn’t fly as far or fast because he loaded them down with food. At the first line of fortifications, William put his quarter-million troops in their old units to separate marathoners from half-marathoners. He left guides for the angry Americans looking for Mongols to kill. William had the two-wanders unbury the jerked beef they spent the winter co
llecting. His guys now carried it to the Mongol camp on the Siberian side of the strait. William sent Billy ahead to where the Siberians were suppose to be waiting for them.

  Thousands of civilian quads poured in every day. William had guides direct them west, where his troops distributed the food they brought. His quarter-million troops spent the week as supply mules, mostly carrying bombs from the Mongol camp.

  Denuded of a million troops, Mongolia lay on her back with her legs spread open. It was now summer, they had plenty to eat, so William and Elizabeth loaded up on gold and flew ahead to the summer games in northern Mongolia.

  Success depended upon surprise. Alerted, the Mongols could destroy them just as easily as the other way around. But Genghis didn’t dare reveal the destruction of his mighty armada, and it never crossed his arrogant mind that Americans would dare invade Mongolia. A sneaky sack of the capital to steal his gold, sure, but that was a one-time raid, not a lengthy invasion. Genghis assumed the few hundred thousand quads he abandoned in Canada would keep the Americans busy.

  While the location of the summer games changed every year, they always held it within easy flying distance of several cities. William and Elizabeth purchased the most ridiculously expensive clothes they could find, covered her in the gorgeous jewelry he always wanted to give her, purchased food by the herd, then bought out every liquor vendor.

  William and Elizabeth arrived at the head of ten thousand “liquor mules” -- quads with kegs strapped to their backs. They over-flew the crowd to get everyone’s attention. While the mules opened the barrels, William and Liz hovered above a growing mob and lied their asses off.

  He presented himself as the spoiled son of wealthy merchants who fell madly in love with the woman of his dreams. To celebrate their pending nuptials, they were buying everyone drinks for the next week.

  William became a hero to the very people he’d soon slaughter.

  They spent the afternoon buying out all the local venders, leaving them scrambling to bring in more booze. Word spread and every flier within several hundred clicks came to help the generous couple celebrate.

  “We should make it convincing. I’ve never had sex before a million people before,” Liz teased him.

  “I have,” William joked. “But mostly they just told me to keep my hand out of my pocket.”

  The happy couple finally enjoyed the unrestrained debauchery that their son’s presence prevented. Liz, who had never even seen a porn video, now starred in them. It’s ironic that children come from sex, because it’s hard to have sex with children around.

  By the time Billy found them a week later, the million people at the games grew into several million. And most of them quads, since easy flying distance is a long journey on horse.

  “We’ll be ready tomorrow night,” Billy told his parents. “If you’re ready to get back to work.”

  Using a quarter-million long-distance troops as mules and having Siberians stockpile supplies allowed over a million civilian quads to keep up. The stronger ones even carried supplies.

  They dropped half a million bombs an hour before dawn, then hovered to blast anything that moved. The weakest Americans attacked around the perimeter. Because they crept to just an hour flight away, the civilians had plenty of strength to loiter. Mongols hate feeling crowded, so they had spread out over a vast area. But still, the sheer volume of bombs felt like someone picked up the earth and shook it. Most of the bombs exploded the half million or so crowded huts. Everyone seemed stunned, deafened, and blinded by the shockwave, bright lights, and burning heat. Everything flammable, including many people, became a bonfire, destroying night vision.

  One million angry quads lived long enough to fly up, but did little damage because they were too spread out. The correct tactical move was to get out of the line of fire, mass together, then attack the enemy flank from above. But not even veterans think clearly when violently woken from a week-long drunken stupor to find the sky raining fireballs.

  The half-marathoners fireballed the closest cities while the marathoners and near-marathoners overwhelmed military units. The civilians took everything of value and destroyed the rest. They loaded down every wagon and pack animal and drove north, along with herds of horses, yaks, and goats.

  William had them record Billy doing his scream and fire dance in William’s suit, then cut to William, who explained to Mongols that they could end this today by simply renouncing never-ending expansion. If not, this would be the price they’d pay. Of course, William knew that three centuries of success had convinced Mongols of their own superiority, but he had to give them the chance to negotiate a peace.

  William made the most of his unexpected good fortune. The quarter-million long-distance quads had only militia and understaffed military bases to slow them down. He needed to give the wagons three months to get within easy flying distance of Alaska, so he sacked everything between him and the Strait. He needed every city within reach just to feed his enormous horde. The million civilians became golden mules, carrying loot north. Another million flew south to replace them. The only thing that stopped him from depopulating all of Mongolia was the threat of winter.

  The ten marathon battalions spread out to seek out larger enemy forces, each followed by a division of near-marathoners, who carried supplies. They killed and destroyed until confronted by superior forces, who they’d lead to their near-marathon division, who’d smash the exhausted Mongols. A few times they combined a few divisions to ensure numerical superiority. Mongols lost a few hundred thousand active-duty troops simply by not sending them in force.

  It took a week for word to reach the Khan in Peking, a month before he could gather a quarter-million quads, and another month before he reached the Americans. Genghis traveled only as fast as his slowest fliers, over learning his mistake from the previous year.

  Billy had the marathoners stockpile food and bombs every few hundred clicks in their path. Then he let Genghis pass a few of them before bombing the Mongol armada. They struck at midnight, hugging the terrain. Alert sentries sounded the alarm, but those waking up couldn’t see them because they were not highlighted against the night sky. At maximum speed, the Americans dropped on the Mongols frantically forming ranks, then soared up to battle their highest fliers. The marathoners disappeared before dawn to destroy the Khan’s forward supply base.

  Genghis naturally flooded his path north with patrols, who found nothing, since Billy was killing his air mules and enjoying his supplies to the south. The ten thousand marathoners skipped a night, then struck from a hiding place while the Mongols cooked dinner. Whereas the Americans slept all afternoon, the Mongols spent the day flying. The ten thousand beat the quarter million all night because they enjoyed height, wand, and energy advantages.

  The Americans bombed them most nights because they found millions of munitions at the air bases they overran -- so they had to explode them anyways. Enjoying twice the range let the Americans attack the Mongols without letting the Mongols attack the Americans. The specialty units sent after the marathoners were the first to get ambushed.

  The Khan assumed the Baron wanted to weaken his force to win a final confrontation, but all Billy wanted was to slow him down to give the wagons more time. Because Genghis misunderstood his opponent, the wagons got away and William’s troops got another month to sack cities. Genghis lost most of his force by the time Billy’s marathoners crossed the Strait.

  More Mongols died violently that year than in the previous three centuries combined. Not until the Baron released a video would Genghis Khan learn that this counter-invasion was planned before the capital was even sacked. The depth of the Baron’s foresight shook Genghis to the core.

  Battle forged links between warriors of a thousand Indian tribes who historically warred against each other. A few million Americans flew home rich, praising the Baron. Fear from a common threat brought them together, but joint victory made them blood family. Instead
of seeing themselves as Apache or Cherokee or Aztec, they saw themselves and each other as American. That change in psychology was vital to uniting against the Empire.

  William sent a ship full of coins, armor, and wands to the Free Europe Air Force with a video message from the Baron that summarized their victories and inspired hope for a continent.

  William rebuilt San Francisco bigger and better than ever. The entire city welcomed the quads as saviors and the festivities lasted longer than either invasion. American University used this time to put together an impressive public relations video that documented their victory in patriotic terms. William made sure they interviewed heroes from every tribe so everyone shared the glory. They eventually went home rich heroes, all singing the praises of the mysterious baron.

  But the warriors also spread a deeper message that William hammered home: Americans would never be safe as long as the Mongol Empire survived. That was the real gift that Genghis Khan gave William.