The Suns of Liberty (Book 1): Legion

by Michael Ivan Lowell

  The most important priority for a Council Guardsman assigned to this facility was protection of the merchandise. Failure to do so could get you shit-canned in a hurry. So the remaining ten Guards had no choice—they came bounding out.

  Ward was ready. So was Drayger. He hit them with paralyzing fear that made them stop short in their tracks. The hesitation was just momentary, though. To trained solders like these, even the most horrific nightmarish thought only slowed them down for a second, maybe two. But that was all Ward needed. He nailed five of them.

  The Revolution broke cover and sprinted toward them with a speed they’d never even seen. The big man tackled three at a time, knocking them unconscious with one blow, while the other two opened fire. The first Guardsman had a high-powered rifle. A dangerous, impressive weapon. It could rip a man apart at this distance. Against TO-4 however, its devastating rounds simply bounced off and shredded the concrete walls around them.

  A dart whizzed forward, stabbing into the Guard’s shoulder and he fell.

  But the last Guard was armed with something different. It was a pistol. Big, bulky, shiny silver. It looked a bit like a Desert Eagle. But it wasn’t. Revolution saw it just long enough to tell what it was not and then, his heart stopped.

  A yellow-green projectile shot out of its nozzle and headed right for him. There was nothing he could do. It was a torso shot, and he did not have enough time, even at full speed, to get out of the way. He lunged. But the bullet hit.

  For so long he and Leslie had theorized about what would happen if one of these luminized bullets struck his armor. She had posited everything from nothing at all to it might rip right through the armor and him and just keep on going.

  As it turned out, the reality was somewhere in between those two extremes.

  The bullet struck, and immediately the armor’s absorption unit went to work. The luminescence shot across the armor, but with all of the unit’s attention focused on the energy, there was nothing left to handle the kinetic force of the bullet itself. This would not have been a problem had the absorption process worked fast enough—the bullet would have simply bounced off like all of the others—but it didn’t.

  Instead, the luminescent energy helped to open up a hole just large enough for some of the shredded metal round to slice through. It burned into Revolutions’ skin just below his shoulder muscle and just above his heart.

  Too close.

  But the impact and the pain hit together and it spun him around, and to all of their horror, the indestructible man fell to the ground.

  At the same time, the Guard turned and fired three more rounds in the others’ directions, giving himself cover, and he leapt toward the wounded Revolution. This guy was good.

  He pointed the pistol at Revolution’s head and pulled the trigger.

  But at the last possible second, something stopped his finger. His muscles froze.

  With fear.

  Ward saw Drayger’s face locked in concentration, and he needed no other invitation. He aimed, spun the canisters to fire—

  And never got the chance.

  Sophia blasted the Guard with a beam of power that literally ripped his upper torso away from his lower and burned it into oblivion.

  The hideous lower carcass spasmed and plopped to floor.

  There was no blood. The severed body was instantly cauterized by her powerful propulsors.

  “Compañeros, you’ve got less than ten minutes until the eyewall hits,” Lantern told them over their coms.

  The Revolution rose to his feet, blood dripping out of his chest, but he seemed to have recovered. And that was because inside his armor, the painkillers were flooding his blood stream like a tsunami. He peered around the room calmly, appearing to take in the situation with statesman-like clarity, but the truth was he needed the moment to clear his head of the drugs.

  Lantern crackled in his HUD. “Sir, the Hollow has located Stealth. He can lead you to her.” The Hollow burned to life right in front of him.

  Revolution pointed to the hologram. “Spider, Neuro, follow it to Stealth. Get her out of there. You have two Guards at her door,” he said, looking at the feed coming in from Lantern’s Hollow.

  “And, Lantern, we’re blown here. So blow it out of the sky,” Revolution said.

  “Yes, sir.”

  Lantern was invisible in the night sky, but he had a clear view of the USS Delaware on the horizon. It was a good ten miles away from him and it still appeared huge.

  Lantern hit the button on his RDSD and sent the digital detonation signal to all sixteen MagCharges that were spread out across the Delaware’s metal topside.

  They exploded as one. Sixteen simultaneous blasts, each capable of taking down a twenty-five story building—the most powerful MagCharges there were. The top of the great machine was simply blasted away in a giant starburst of flame as an enormous ball of fire shot up into the night sky, illuminating the rain in an awesome and terrible sight.

  The charges had been set according to an old plan originally drawn up by John “Saratoga” Bailey, who, of course, had gotten access to the secret design specs of the ship. Bailey had figured the Suns would go up against the Delaware sooner or later, and as was his usual habit, he had already devised a plan to destroy it.

  Bailey’s plan placed the charges across the top of the ship so that when the roof blew, it would send chunks of burning debris raining down into the lower compartments. Even if the initial blow was not catastrophic—and as Lantern peered out the cockpit window at the burning behemoth on the horizon, he thought it surely had been—the subsequent damage would do the trick. And, since the drones all exited the ship from the topside, they too would be taken out in the explosion.

  Just then a deep, ominous boom thundered out from deep inside the belly of the ship and Lantern smiled. He wished so badly that Bailey could have been there to see it.

  Ward and Drayger bounded out to rescue Rachel. They ran past the fallen guards, but Drayger stopped short just as they reached the door. He’d seen something none of the others had.

  The last Guard’s gun with the luminescent bullets.

  Revolution had simply assumed it had been obliterated by Sophia’s blast. But there it lay. Drayger snatched it up and ran after Ward, never looking back.

  He damn sure had a weapon now.

  Ward and Drayger stepped over the comatose bodies of the Guards, passed the stairwell, and headed down a long narrow hallway. The corridor turned to the left up ahead of them. The Hollow faded from sight, and in another second, they both saw a video feed from just on the other side of the bend in the hall. They could see the two Guards at the cell door where Rachel was being held. The Guards stood at the ready, weapons aimed in Ward and Drayger’s direction, waiting on them. As soon as the two Suns turned the corner, they were going to be blown to kingdom come.

  “Hold it,” Ward whispered. “Can you distract them somehow?”

  “No. But maybe that ghost-thing can.”

  “Right. Lantern, you catch that?

  “On it,” he said back.

  The feed in their HUDs suddenly lifted into the air, and they knew the Hollow was floating up to the ceiling, keeping its video feed on the two men. It passed over them and landed behind the two, who of course were oblivious.

  The Hollow remained invisible. And in this form, it could do only two things. It could send back video, and it could create and record audio. Not much of a weapon. But just what it needed.

  “Please help me,” it whispered.

  The Guards both turned toward each other.

  “What?” the Guard nearest the door asked the other.

  “Uh. I thought that was you.”

  “Nah, wasn’t me.”

  The Guardsmen scanned the area but saw nothing.

  “Please, I can’t feel anything. Help me.”

  This time the voice was loud and right behind them, so they spun. And there in barely visible translucent light was the Hollow. A perfect replica of Lantern.


  The men looked at each other in shocked bewilderment, but before they could say anything, they were seized by overwhelming fear. And then they were seized by darkness—and the fleeting awareness of a small sting in the small of their backs.

  “Nice shooting. Again,” Drayger said.

  But Ward was already sprinting to the door.

  Drayger followed him and saw Rachel on the other side. There was a code lock on the door. Ward moaned his frustration.

  Drayger pointed the pistol at it, but Ward waved him off.

  “I’ve got it.” It was the Hollow. It floated past them and reached its ghostly hand into the keypad. Ten seconds later, the numbers lit up and the door opened. Ward charged in, and he and Rachel embraced.

  For once, Rachel Dodge didn’t have a smart-ass comment.

  “You’re hurt,” Ward said, peering down at her raw wrist.

  “It’s nothing,” she said.

  Ward grabbed up her cloak. “Let’s get you out of here.”

  They made for the door.

  Rachel glanced over at Drayger. “Who’s this?”

  Drayger shot her a long, appraising gaze that said he liked what he saw.

  “Five minutes,” Lantern’s voice said over the coms.

  CHAPTER 26

  Von Cyprus was messing with the video reception. He was only the most brilliant scientist in the country—you’d think he could fix bad reception. Finally the screen cleared up and he saw the Guard’s battling with the Suns.

  “Shit!”

  He knew exactly what was going on. He looked over at the metal sleeves he had worn earlier in his interrogation of Rachel Dodge. He bounded over to them and strapped them on his arms.

  “Doctor, we’ve got company,” the Guard commander’s voice shouted into his ear. “The Suns of Liberty are on the premises.”

  “I see them on the monitor. I’m heading down there,” Von Cyprus said, flexing the metal gloves.

  “No, don’t risk it, just...” The commander’s voice trailed off.

  On the other end of the line, a skidding sound caught the commander’s attention. In the communication room where he and his twenty remaining Guards waited, something small and metallic slid across the floor.

  “Hang on just a second, Doctor,” the commander said.

  At first, most of those who noticed it thought it was probably one of the other guys fooling around and they were waiting to hear the punch line. But a few recognized it for what it was.

  A bomb.

  Boom!

  The Revolution had tossed the grenade into the room and waited in the hall. A thick cloud of smoke followed the thunderous bang and flash of light. Revolution and Sophia stepped through the door. They had both activated their protective gear that allowed them to breathe underwater or in toxic air. All twenty of the Council Guard lay knocked out by the gas. The grenade was really just a high-powered tear gas canister filled with a chemical agent that would knock everyone out for hours.

  They scanned the room just to make sure everyone was out and then headed back to the main room to meet up with the others.

  When the five had reunited and seen that Rachel was little worse for wear, Revolution ordered them to get to work.

  “Destroy it all,” he said.

  Sophia did the heavy lifting, blasting away with her bracelets. Ward took up the slack with his disablers. Revolution fired his cylinder grenades at the far corners of the room to minimize any shrapnel coming the way of the others.

  As such, it left him isolated and nearest one of the stairwells. His parabolic hearing caught a sound, and he stopped and turned toward the stairwell.

  It was then that the Revolution saw something that should not have existed on this Earth. Long veins of lightning arced across the room, seeking him out, barely missing. Except they weren’t lightning. In fact, they weren’t even light. They looked just like bolts of electricity except they were black as coal. And despite that, they seemed to glow. A black glow.

  Being so close to them gave him a chill. His stomach lurched. Dizziness hit. He thought he might vomit. What the hell were these things? Where were they coming from?

  Revolution sought out their source.

  Von Cyprus.

  Revolution recognized him instantly. It was no secret to the Resistance that he was the head of the Council’s science division.

  The scientist was taking aim for a second time. The black bolts erupted from the long metal sleeves on Von Cyprus’s arms and snaked straight for him. Revolution dove out of the way just in time to see the drone and its building station behind him dissipate from existence, dancing in the black electricity before burning into nothing.

  The power was immense. Revolution hadn’t seen anything like it since the Fire Fly.

  The Dark Patriot bounded behind another drone station at full speed, aiming his own weapon—a concussion grenade—at the scientist. The cylinder spun out from his own armored sleeve. Unlike Von Cyprus, Revolution had a laser-guided aiming system. The grenade was deadly accurate.

  At this range, Von Cyprus didn’t stand a chance. The grenade would kill him for sure.

  But Von Cyprus fired the bolts again, and just before the grenade could reach its target, the energy detonated the cylinder. The blast erupted—but then, as if surrounded by a black hole, the force from the explosion was sucked into some kind of vacuum created by the bolts of lightning. The blast took Von Cyprus off his feet and threw him to the ground. He clanged and grunted.

  But he was very much still alive.

  Revolution moved. He sprung forward, sprinting behind another station only fifty feet from the scientist, using the explosion as cover. In his 360 cam he saw the others bounding up behind him.

  The cavalry.

  “Stop right there!” Von Cyprus shouted. “I may not be the best shot, but I don’t have to be. This is a matter displacer. The first of its kind. Imagine a combination of dark energy and anti-matter working together to negate normal matter. All I have to do is expand its range and it will eliminate everything in its path from material existence. Including you and your friends.”

  “I think that thing’s done for, Eric. Give up and come with us,” Revolution said. Revolution’s scan wasn’t reading any more electrical activity coming from the sleeves. He could only hope the impact had taken them out.

  Revolution shot forward to the next station, and Von Cyprus aimed the blasters. And just as Revolution had thought—

  Nothing happened.

  He peered back at the other Suns and waved them on. All five of them stalked toward the scientist, who rose to his feet and scrambled back, slamming into the far wall, fear gripping his face.

  Ward watched the man frantically attempt to revive the strange metal sleeves, but they were done for. This mission is falling into place, Ward thought.

  “One minute and twenty-seven seconds,” Lantern warned over the com.

  “Everything set out there?”

  “Right on schedule, sir.”

  “Goodbye, Eric,” Revolution said.

  “Looks like the only toy you’re going to be playing with tonight is your own, fucker!” Rachel said, glaring at him.

  With that, they tromped up one flight of stairs to the ground floor and exited through the front doors.

  Rachel slipped into the flight suit that they had hastily gathered for her, put her cloak into the now empty backpack, and strapped on a pair of vortex engines.

  Sophia bear-hugged the Revolution, who did the same to Drayger. It was an odd arrangement, but Sophia had the power to hold onto both of them when augmented by the H3 power. She let the bright blue power form a thin sheen over her entire body and when she grabbed hold of the Revolution, he could feel it coursing through his own armor.

  No, she’s not going to have any trouble holding onto the two of us, he thought.

  Ward hugged Rachel and found himself disappointed when she had no snarky or suggestive remarks about his legs being wrapped around her, or something
like that. Then they all blasted off into the air with the far wall of the hurricane churning right behind them.

  The flight through the eye was easy. Nothing launched from the facility in Trenton, and no drones from the Delaware were waiting for them. As they reached the hurricane wall again Revolution wanted to make sure he knew what was coming at them from the other side.

  “Lantern, status report.”

  “Big Bird is blown. Chicks falling from the nest, though. Be careful.”

  Sophia and Ward began to let go of their passengers as the swirling gusts of the storm gave power to the vortex engines strapped to Revolution’s, Drayger’s, and Rachel’s hips. Revolution peered over at Sophia. “Here we go.”

  Ward had kept a tight hold of Rachel and let her body slide against his until he only had hold of her arm and then finally her hand. He leaned over to Rachel and lied, “Just do what I do and it will all be fine!”

  They entered the wall of the massive storm for the second time. It was like crashing through a concrete barrier that instantly morphed into a high-powered whirlpool. They were whisked in the fury of the storm and slung into the grey.

  They could hear nothing but the constant roar. Not even their own screams.

  CHAPTER 27

  A giant swirling grey vortex had swallowed them. It was all they could do to just hold onto each other.

  Finally, they gained their bearings. They formed a straight line across the sky, crabbing into the wind, as before. Ward breathed a sigh of relief.

  “You’ve got bogies headed your way. Too much static, can’t tell what they are,” Lantern warned them.

  At that very moment, the wind and rain in front of them began to glow a ghostly orange. It was so odd they just stared at it.

  And then...

  Something huge flew out of the grey wall of the storm clouds, flames raging out of the object. It zoomed by, blurred by incredible speed, shrouded by the foamy grey of the storm. It shot right at them, just above their heads.