The two from the south headed straight for the SUV. One ran back along the rampart. The fourth section commander remained and looked at Skye with a wide-eyed expression while fumbling with his rifle. “Did you say channel four?”
“Yes, and don’t worry. If you come under serious pressure, call me and I’ll be there.”
He nodded and headed back to his position.
Wind howled between the rustling trees, carrying distant cries. Jake, Trader and Ross climbed the stairs.
“Shouldn’t you two be working on the inner defense?” Skye said.
“The citizens know what they’re doing,” Trader said.
“He’s a bit annoyed that I’ve taken his team,” Jake said.
Trader shrugged. “He’s given the old man an easy job. It’s no skin off my nose.”
Ross didn’t say a word. He looked to be quietly seething until a single shrill scream came from the forest. Ross staggered back and nearly fell off the rampart. Jake grabbed his arm and pulled him from the edge. “If you’re gonna die, at least do it the right way.”
Ross shrugged off his grip and stared over the wall. Trader edged next to Skye and held out his pistol.
“You need to be getting back, Trader.”
“They’ve already started. Did you really think I’d miss out on the fun?”
Shouts grew louder in the forest. Weapons clicked along the rampart. Skye caught a brief glimpse of vague movement through the trees.
The shouting grew into a single booming chant.
Two words repeated.
Sky Man.
The name that haunted her since childhood no longer held the same fear. The nightmarish creature that haunted her dreams was now flesh and blood. A dream was bulletproof; Alexander Finch wasn’t.
Somewhere in the forest a whistle blasted, and the shouting stopped. Skye and her fellow strongholders silently waited on the wall. The invaders did the same outside. Skye’s team began to gather below the steps. Ten of them so far. That would have to be good enough.
“I’m going to brief the team at the gates,” Jake said. “Back in a minute.”
“What’s that?” somebody a few yards along the wall said.
Jake stopped and pushed next to Skye. She peered into the forest. Something flapped through the air and slowly came toward the wall.
A single figure appeared from the gloom, waving a white flag.
Alexander Finch dropped the pole and spread his arms.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Finch stood in front of the walls of Omega, his walls, and lowered the red handkerchief from in front of his face. Like a Monarch butterfly, his bright display of talents proved enough to warn off the predators from the other strongholds until he could hatch his plan. If they dared to try to eat him, they would quickly find out about his toxicity.
The rampart bristled with weapons. Maggots jealously glaring down at a superior being that would bring them justice. Behind him, five thousand wastelanders waited in the forest. Caterpillars that would chew their way through the strongholds before changing into his perfect creatures.
Patience brought this moment. Years of hiding his revulsion at the sick society. Stasis transformed him. He evolved and transcended during his period of metamorphosis. Now it was time to stamp out the predatory Neanderthals and lead the world into a new era. No more trivial trades. No more dealing with pathetic issues. No more pretending to like the backward species that plagued Earth.
Ross, Skye, Trader and Phillips stood on the rampart by the gate. Even if they formed into a hive mind, and he wouldn’t put it past them, they still wouldn’t be clever enough to beat his army. He smiled and pointed at them. “You four. Get down here now and hear my terms.”
“We don’t negotiate with the enemy,” Phillips said.
Finch laughed. “You’re nothing but a dried-up relic. I used to be like you until my deliverance. I’ll give you two minutes to get your worthless asses down here.”
They had no choice but to surrender. He would send them north, away from their precious resources, and have them hunted to extinction. They didn’t care about the Xerces Blue dying out. He didn’t see why he should feel differently about them.
“We’re ready to fight you,” Skye said. “Give it your best shot.”
Finch shook his head. “What happened to that young sweet innocent girl that I took in ten years ago?”
“After killing my family? You’ve got some balls.”
He didn’t need balls to convince Skye to play along. Once inside the Omega system, he acted like a pitcher plant. People couldn’t resist his sickly sweet external juices and always fell into his trap. Her annoying parents resisted and paid the price. He already claimed the piece of skin on her cheek for his new display cabinet, and planned to cut it from her corpse. That particular trophy would remind him of the suffering he went through in Omega.
She aimed her rifle at him. Ross grabbed the muzzle and pushed it to one side. Once an obedient fool, always an obedient fool. Even now he had him wrapped around his antenna. The only thing he could never work out about Ross was that as a spider, he should’ve acted differently. Nature worked in mysterious ways.
“This is your last chance. Come down and hear my terms, or I launch five thousand wastelanders against you, and they will kill every man, woman and child inside.”
“We’ve got the populations of Kappa and Zeta here,” Trader shouted. “We outnumber your forces and have the whole wall covered.”
He knew the fools wouldn’t understand that he’d already anticipated their clumsy strategy. He had enough guns spread behind him to keep the ramparts occupied while the rocket launchers smashed open the gate. Hundreds of wastelanders would be cut down during the assault, but enough would break in to slaughter those inside. Weak citizens didn’t have the experience of hand-to-hand combat. Wastelanders were raised to fight with axes and spears. A diversionary attack on the south side would keep the stronghold forces split.
Finch checked his watch. He decided to give them the time it took his second hand to complete a full revolution.
Somebody fired from the rampart. He felt a searing pain in his left arm. Blood dampened the arm of his purple turtleneck sweater. He gritted his teeth and looked up.
Phillips lowered his rifle. He failed to transcend in his stupid ship, and now he dared take a jealous shot.
Finch pointed at him and walked backward toward the edge of the forest. “You’re first, caveman. I’ll skin you alive.”
Skye raised her rifle. Ross didn’t stop her this time. Finch turned and ran for the cover of the trees. A round hissed over his shoulder, nicked his neck, and snapped off a small branch in front of him.
He dived behind the nearest tree. Time for the bastards to pay the ultimate price. Finch waited a few moments to catch his breath before moving deeper into the forest.
The first wave of wastelanders waited, panting in angry anticipation of taking what was rightfully theirs. Half the front rank carried the rifles he liberated from the bunker, the rest gripped their spears and axes. The jagged and rusting blades were a pleasant sight. Nothing would give him more pleasure than to see them plunging into the bodies of Skye and Phillips.
They would never be capable of seeing the genius of his plan.
The local wastelanders spoke with the ones just south of the strongholds. In turn, they passed the information further south, and so on, communicating in increasingly broken English until even the savages who were incapable of decipherable speech got the message. Finch’s offer fanned down hundreds of miles, and he received the required response. All he had to do after that was direct them to their salvation.
This was their moment. An opportunity to take the rich, unsoiled land denied to them by the snobby cretins who still tried to hang on to the old world. He would no longer be the only sane person in the stronghold asylum.
Two of the accomplished wastelander speakers gathered around him. His newly appointed generals. One looked at the wou
nd on his arm. Finch kept a straight face. He refused to show signs of pain.
“Take a thousand south and hit the stronghold in ten minutes,” Finch said to the ugliest caterpillar. “Don’t commit everyone. It’s just a show of strength to keep their forces from concentrating on the main assault. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Sky Man. I go now.”
Finch patted him on the shoulder. “Good man.”
He left to organize his troops. Finch wiped his hand on his trousers. If the wastelanders proved themselves today, the glorious battle would continue. More bunkers lay to the north, and possibly more settlements. Testing his theory about an all-out assault proved successful ten years ago when he crushed Tom Reed. Nobody would stand in his way once he spread his wings.
“We are ready to charge, Sky Man.”
“Take half of our rifles to the left flank. Fire at the pillboxes and lead the moths to the light. I’ll command the rocket launchers and main body. When I attack, sweep round and join me through the gates.”
The general frowned. “Who are the moths?”
Finch squeezed his eyes shut and rubbed his temples. “Just take half of the rifles to the left and attack. Do not let your men charge until we have established a hole in their defenses.”
“I follow your command.”
“Excellent.”
The general trudged away and directed a group to join him. Some of them looked confused but eventually followed. Wastelanders weren’t used to being coordinated, but they were learning. After seeing the value of his leadership, they would only follow with a greater resolve and smash everything in their path.
* * *
Finch stood in front of the main body of wastelanders. He waved the ten forward who were armed with rocket launchers. Teaching them how to use them had proved a painful experience, but destroying the infrastructure inside the western bunker during the early hours of this morning would give him a sense of satisfaction. It wouldn’t match the feeling of watching the people inside meet their end, though.
He spent ten years in that godforsaken place after waking. Ten long years, without any help from his supposed colleagues. Their sleeping bodies in the stasis pods mocked him. They looked so stupidly unaware that a man translated to a higher level watched them every night, thinking about how to end their lives.
He followed a scouting group back to Omega after seeing them on the loading camera doors. Destiny presented itself in the form of a stallion standing outside the original stronghold gates. He would be a Trojan horse and bring about the destruction of the inferior race. The rest was easy, and he expected nothing less. If any of the maggots had half a brain, they would recognize the symmetry of his planning. Like two beautifully colored wings of a Sunrise Monarch flapping the devolved humanity to their judgment, the ten years in the bunker matched the ten years between his assaults on society.
Finch crept between the trees until he had a clear view of the gates. The dust storm gave him the perfect cover to get the launchers close enough to score direct hits. Whoever had transformed him probably sent the storm as a gift.
Wastelanders lined up behind the trees either side of him. He held up his hand, and they primed their weapons.
He looked over his shoulder at the advancing army between the trees. An unstoppable force once he created the breach. Every stronghold would regret the day they met Alexander Finch. Sky Man. The Butterfly King.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Jake scrambled down the steps to brief the forty guards behind the gates, and collect his mobile team. If the wastelander army managed to blast through, the guards would provide a crucial first response and would have to hold firm for the initial onslaught. An open breach would lead to chaos. The force on the rampart would have to fall back if that looked likely. Being drawn to a single area of the wall would create gaps elsewhere for the enemy to stream over. He would join the gate defense with his men and hoped the rest of the wall followed the command instructions.
Trader had done as asked and positioned two of his team at either end of the extended lines with rocket launchers. The rear guard formed up fifty yards behind the entrance, behind a roadblock of SUVs.
The gates were an obvious target, although it was impossible to second-guess a deranged lunatic like Finch. He had some nerve walking up to the walls like that. It wasn’t the actions of a cautious man who thought he would lose or face a difficult fight.
Jake stood in front of the men and scanned the expectant faces. “You already know what’s behind those walls and what they want to do to you. If they smash the gates, the outcome will rest on your shoulders. I will join you with my team, and together we will show them what we’re all about. Finch will only win today over my dead body. Hold your nerve, and we’ll pull through.”
A few gave him a determined nod. He returned the gesture and jogged over to his group, who waited for him by the base of the wall. Skye’s team waited there too.
She approached him. “Where do you want us positioned?”
Jake looked around the defenses, walls lined with guards disappearing into the haze in both directions. Other than the gate, he couldn’t think of another obvious weak point. Geographically splitting the teams so they could quickly support any hot areas made the most sense. “Cover the southern section. I’ll stay here. Keep in touch and call me if needed.”
“Okay. Good luck,” Skye said.
“Same to you.”
He waved his team up the rampart. “Let’s go, guys.”
Jake positioned them to the left of the gates to increase the firepower. Citizens and guards stood around them, shoulder to shoulder in quiet anticipation. Two thousand were armed with conventional weapons. Two thousand more had improvised weapons like tire braces, hammers and bricks to throw at the invaders. They were instructed to take the rifles or pistols of any fallen comrade.
“Any sign of the enemy?” he said to a man in an Omega royal blue jacket.
“Nothing since the governor.”
Finch was no doubt briefing his cohorts after his terms were refused. Jake couldn’t detect a single movement in the forest. A strong breeze continued to whip dust across from east to west, and the storm showed no signs of easing.
Trader and Ross had left to finalize the organization of the inner ring. The last line of defense if they lost the wall. They were busy smashing up five houses and sharpening improvised spears out of the shattered planks of wood.
A collective roar came from the forest. Thousands of feet pounded against the ground, along with the noise of hundreds of branches being snapped out of the way.
Jake shouldered his rifle and scanned between the trunks through his sights.
Gunfire erupted to his right. They were attacking the former site of the stairs in front of the barracks. People on the rampart returned fire. A few threw bricks at the forest, but they all fell short. His team of sixteen, crouching behind the first line of defenders, looked at him for direction.
“Hold your position,” Jake said. “Finch is an idiot if he thinks we’ll pull people away from the gates. The pillboxes will do their job.”
A spear arced out of the canopy and thudded into the ground in front of the wall. An eager Omega guard fired into the gloom.
Jake grabbed his shoulder. “Conserve your ammunition for a clean shot. You’ll have plenty of opportunity.”
If wastelanders were going to use the launchers, they had to move further out of cover to accurately hit the gate. To get a straight shot, they would need to either stand on the road leading up to Omega or fire from the edge of the tree line. Without experience, firing through a cluster of trunks would be high risk.
The sound of gunfire echoed from the southern section of the wall. Clever, Jake thought, but not that good. Finch bragged about the number of wastelanders involved in the attack. He didn’t have the numbers to successfully attack from two fronts. He felt confident that Skye could organize a defense against a probing maneuver.
Jake switched his rad
io to the command channel. “What have you got at the south?”
“Enemy firing from cover,” a crackly male voice said. “No immediate danger.”
Two wastelanders sprinted onto the road leading to the gates, with Allied rocket launchers on their shoulders. Nobody required prompting. Shots rattled from either side of Jake. Both of the enemy collapsed to the dirt. Two more wastelanders broke out of the shrouded forest and attempted to retrieve the weapons. They met the same fate.
A flash of light and loud explosion boomed between the trees. A plume of white smoke belched out of the canopy fifty yards away. Jake hoped it was a wasted enemy rocket and checked the increasingly darkening sky for projectiles.
Gunfire continued in the area around the demolished steps. Finch, being a commissioned facility manager, only had basic combat training because of his support role. His madness probably magnified his own ability in his stasis-fried head. Jake felt confident that Finch could only dictate terms by weight of numbers rather than tactical genius.
A shot split the air closer to his location. One of the guards cried out and collapsed backward, clutching his chest. A citizen knelt by his side.
Twenty wastelanders darted behind trees close to the edge of the forest. They aimed rifles around the trunks. Rounds peppered the wall and whizzed above it.
The rampart returned fire, taking single shots as instructed. If Finch only had the weapons and ammunition from the bunker, he would run out before the stronghold. But nobody could confirm if he shipped out more to co-conspirators beyond the recovered cache in Zeta.
Jake aimed at a wastelander. Before he had a chance to fire, a rifle cracked to his side and the bearded man’s head flipped back. He dropped to the ground with a twist.
The war cry from the forest grew louder. Hundreds of savages charged toward the edge. The front lines, extending a hundred yards in length, burst into the open and carried fifty wooden ladders toward the wall. The rampart cracked with deafening gunfire.
Wastelanders dropped to the grass and writhed on the ground. More followed out of the forest in a constant flow. They threw axes and spears, and picked up the ladders of their fallen comrades.
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