by Erik Hanberg
“How many did they launch?”
“Ten.”
“And we have…”
“Fourteen.”
Shaw considered it. “Launch ten missiles to counter,” he finally said.
“Launching.”
Shaw listened to the scream of the missiles as they left Rome and headed southeast to meet their counterparts.
“The cartel has just launched another three,” Ignatius said.
Shaw looked at Ignatius with surprise. “What are they playing at?”
“They now have more missiles than we do,” Ignatius said. “The same way they’ve burned through our drones and bot swarms, they want to empty our missile reserves.”
“That would leave Galway feeling like she could destroy the Walden with no consequence to the army on the ground, wouldn’t it?”
“Very likely,” Aquinas said.
“If we launch three missiles, that leaves us with just one,” Shaw said, thinking out loud.
“And the cartel would almost certainly launch at least one more missile, to see if we would use it.”
“And then…”
“And then we would only have our army. And the shielding that protects Rome from the space-based lasers,” Ignatius added. “We’ve won the first couple skirmishes, but it’s taken everything we have. I still don’t see how we win the endgame.”
“But if we don’t respond, and we preserve what we have—”
“Then the missiles they’ve already launched destroy their targets.”
Shaw grimaced. “You told me earlier they were going to target Brother Florian’s lab?”
“That is still their target, yes,” Ignatius said.
Shaw assessed the field of battle. The opposing army was still regrouping. He had a few more moments before he’d be called into action again. “How is Florian’s research coming?”
“The cartel’s AI now gives them a five percent chance of success. Up from one percent earlier.”
“So they’re getting closer to finding a way to destroy the Lattice, but it’s still a long shot.”
“That’s correct.”
Shaw thought again. “Launch three missiles to counter.”
“Launching.”
He listened to the missile launch and then waited expectantly for Ignatius’ next words. They came. “The cartel is launching a single missile,” the saint reported. “Again, targeting Florian and his team.”
“Time to target?”
“Twenty-nine minutes, thirty seconds.”
Shaw nodded. “That’s it then. Let’s see if we can wrap this up.”
“You don’t want to counter the missile?”
“We have thirty minutes before we’re forced to make that decision. If we can defeat the Northerners on the battlefield in the meantime, we might find we have more options.” He turned his attention back to Saint Peter’s Square.
“They’re reforming the phalanx,” Ignatius reported unnecessarily—it was clear that they were reforming rows and putting their shields back in place.
“Of course they are,” Shaw said. “Without any missiles left to use on them, they’re betting we won’t come up with any more tricks up our sleeve.”
“Do we have any more tricks up our sleeve?” Ignatius asked.
“You know as much as I do,” Shaw replied. “More, obviously. Is there any sign that the Northerners are going to try slipping in the back?”
“You mean through the Vatican gardens? No, Grand Master.”
“Then pull the troops out of Saint John’s Tower and bring them to the front lines. We’ll need them here, I suspect. You said they didn’t want to miss the battle, right?”
The phalanx began its march down into the gully. It was smaller than before, but no less effective for it.
Shaw stared at it, trying to come up with an order that would counter their attack. He was coming up empty and he could feel the first signs of despair. Things had seemed to be going so well, but that had masked the truth of the situation. That was the problem with lopsided battles. No matter how many clever maneuvers, the stark reality of the situation meant that at some point he would run out of ideas. And when that happened, the cartel would still have missiles. Would still have more troops. Would still have Ellie and Jane in their sights.
Shaw tried to hide a sigh. He was already feeling defeated. What had Fassino said? The plows had cut through his clever schemes and now he was just worried about his wife and daughter. “You sound like the kind of enemy I’d choose to fight any day,” Fassino had crowed. It wasn’t true when he’d said it, but now… it felt about right.
“You must not lose hope, Grand Master,” Aquinas said.
“And do you have any recommendations?” Shaw asked. “Any weapon that will pierce the shields?”
“Sustained laser fire has proven effective against the nitrogen diamond in the past,” Ignatius said.
The vanguard of the phalanx began its ascent up the hill.
“Put ten lasers on the center shield,” Shaw ordered.
Within a few seconds, ten red beams of light were concentrated on the first shield. It took several seconds but eventually the shield exploded. There was a cry of pain, and Shaw knew the man carrying it was dead. Someone else stepped into place. The phalanx hadn’t stopped moving.
“You tell me, can we defeat the phalanx that way?” Shaw asked.
“No, Grand Master,” Ignatius conceded. “We don’t have enough lasers, or enough time.”
Outgunned. That’s what it came down to. No matter the lofty ideals, the enemy had the bigger bankroll to buy the troops and the arms that had made the outcome of this battle close to inevitable. It had been a fool’s errand. What had he even been thinking by throwing in his lot with the Catholics? It had made some sort of sense at the time, but standing here facing an oncoming army that was likely to penetrate his defenses and wreak havoc despite all his best-laid plans showed the truth of it.
But facing that oncoming army was, no matter how demoralizing, also clarifying in its way. Because there was the army. Right there! Shaw stood a little straighter. Whatever got him here was beside the point. There was still a fight to be had and they were nearly equally matched for troops. All was not lost yet.
Shaw tried to give himself a mental pep talk. He had the advantage of the high ground. Soldiers on the roof, soldiers behind the embankment. He’d worked hard for the position—literally carving it out of the city to make it for himself. Yes, his troops couldn’t pierce the phalanx, save for a lucky shot here or there. So ten soldiers might die, but more than a thousand would live to overwhelm his position. But he had the position, and that wasn’t nothing.
He leaned forward.
The phalanx was barely firing. Every soldier holding a shield, and that was most of them, was defensive. Shaw suddenly realized he had been in this situation before. He had lived it.
The vanguard of the phalanx was nearing the top of the embankment, and the rear guard was almost entirely in the square, just at the bottom of the gully. There was no better time.
Shaw turned to the saints.
“We’re going down the hill. The right and left flanks starting their charge first, and the rest of us following. Like two… swinging doors. Pass the word down the line.”
Shaw waited a few seconds for the order to reach everyone under his command, his face projecting calm. He felt the doubting questions begin to bubble up in his mind. Was this lunacy? Was this the last desperate act of a desperate man? How familiar these questions were! There was no time for such thoughts, though, and Shaw pushed his doubts aside.
“Over the embankment!” Shaw called.
While the soldiers from the far sides of the right and left flank jumped over and began to swing the door, Shaw thought one more word: moat.
The saints had said they would hold a drone back to sever the water mains under the square and the roads. But had it been used in the first drone assault? He couldn’t be sure.
The two
sides of his army swung around and charged at the phalanx. The long and narrow column of Northerners became surrounded as his men neared it. And then suddenly it was his turn to go up and over the barricades. He was the hinge of the two doors, and he clambered up and over the embankment to face the vanguard.
As he ran forward, rifle ready in front of him, he saw at the base of the hill that muddy water was quickly seeping into the gully. It was already a couple feet deep and would soon fill to the crest of the gully—which was at least five or six feet deep, Shaw remembered. It would cut off any chance of another escape for the Northerners.
That sealed it then. Either they would be defeated, or he would be.
Near him, he saw a few soldiers fall as bullets or lasers from the Northerners cut them down, but most of his troops were able to make it to the shield wall of the phalanx on three of its sides—the two long sides and at the vanguard.
Shaw himself ran right for a shield. He picked the center of the column. After just a few strides at his fastest pace, he was nearly at the shield wall. He didn’t slow. Instead, he let the shield stop him. Slamming into it, Shaw heard a grunt from the other side. There were guns poking out from between the small holes between the shields—but they couldn’t reach him in this position. He pushed his rifle into the same hole and pulled the trigger. All around him, soldiers were doing the same, and soon the shield wall protecting the phalanx had entirely collapsed.
The fighting was now in close quarters. Many were still shooting, but some were already resorting to punches, wrestling, and hand-to-hand combat. They were using their rifles as clubs and shields as battering rams as the fighting raged.
Shaw threw a punch of his own, and when the Northerner hit the ground, Shaw could see into the former center of the phalanx. There, Fassino was trying to order his men around, but it was no use, everyone was fighting for their own lives.
Fassino finally saw Shaw, and he gave up trying to give orders. His red face glowered and he went into a crouch, ready for battle. He lunged at Shaw, a scream in his throat. Shaw parried to the side and Fassino missed, landing unevenly on the ground. Shaw turned his rifle, but Fassino was already there. He kicked a leg out from under Shaw. Shaw collapsed and his rifle flew out of his hand.
Fassino was on top of Shaw in an instant, his hands trying to get around Shaw’s throat. Shaw was a boxer, not a wrestler, and he knew there were moves to get out of this position. He just didn’t know what they were. He struggled against Fassino, but he couldn’t get any leverage. Suddenly Fassino’s thumbs were on his windpipe, and Shaw’s air was cut off.
Fassino’s eyes were mad with rage, and Shaw knew that he would die in a few seconds if he couldn’t free himself. He kneed Fassino in the balls with enough force to shock any man. Fassino’s grip slackened, but only for an instant. His anger kept him there.
From over Fassino’s shoulder, Alberto suddenly appeared. The right side of his face was covered with blood, matting his hair to his scalp, and he looked disoriented and ferocious all at the same time. But despite his evident head wound, Alberto jumped on top of Fassino’s back and tried to pull him off of Shaw.
One of Fassino’s hands slipped away from Shaw’s throat long enough for Shaw to take a half-breath of air. It was enough to prevent blacking out, but his lungs were still in pain. Shaw only had a few seconds of air left.
Fassino was not going to be pulled from his quarry so easily either. In a matter of a few seconds, he re-adjusted his grip on Shaw’s throat so that he was only pinching Shaw’s windpipe with one hand. He used his now free hand to reach up onto his back and pull on the nape of Alberto’s neck. With something close to ease, he pulled Alberto off of his back and drove him hard into the ground. Wounded and never built to fight, Alberto crumpled into a fetal position next to Shaw.
Shaw still hadn’t gotten any more oxygen after the half-breath, but with Fassino distracted he was able to put one hand on Fassino’s own windpipe while the other hand searched the ground for his rifle. He didn’t get anything more than a loose grip on Fassino’s neck, and that was nearly lost as Fassino brought his other hand back to Shaw’s throat. As for the rifle—there was nothing within reach except mud. Mud and a piece of sharp metal that sliced Shaw’s finger.
His vision was going dark—just as it had when he was being cut out of the probe that had landed him in the middle of the Colosseum and this fight to begin with.
With his remaining strength, Shaw’s right hand gripped around the piece of metal his fingers had discovered. With his left hand, Shaw abandoned Fassino’s windpipe and shifted his fingers to Fassino’s face.
And then he shoved the bit of metal up toward Fassino’s waiting head.
The metal—what turned out to be a blade from one of the fallen drones—plunged through Fassino’s neck. Fassino’s expression contorted in pain. His grasp on Shaw’s neck went limp instantly and Shaw drew a grateful breath. Blood oozed from Fassino’s neck and onto Shaw’s hand, and with all the energy he had left, Shaw heaved Fassino off of him before the blood dripped into his open mouth and choked him again.
Shaw lay on his back, heaving more grateful breaths. He was keenly aware that he was in the middle of a battlefield, and that any other Northerner who came upon him would have no trouble killing him. Shaw struggled up to his knees… and found the scene to be a changed place from what it had looked like before he had gone down.
All over the square he saw Northerners with their hands up, and his own troops encircling them. The sudden appearance of a moat had cut them off from a retreat, and the narrowness of the phalanx’s column meant that the individual soldiers in the middle had had to choose whether to turn right or left to fight, even though there were enemies on both sides of them. Whichever side they chose, someone was close enough to come up behind them and fight.
It was already over.
Shaw’s troops were mopping up, removing weapons from the hands of the Northerners and securing them in groups on their knees.
Shaw heaved another breath, this time of relief. He noticed the four saints were hovering near him. “See to it that every one of them—our troops as well as the Northerners—gets proper medical attention. No more of them die today.”
Aquinas nodded his assent.
“You followed in the footsteps of Joshua Chamberlain,” Ignatius said. “That was his swinging door maneuver from the Battle of Little Round Top.”
“I had two swinging doors instead of one, and I didn’t have bayonets exactly. But yes,” Shaw acknowledged.
“You were in a jump in Chamberlain’s mind the day the raiders first attacked the Lattice,” Ignatius added.
“I was on the can and in a jump back to the Civil War,” Shaw said. “And seeing that battle in the Lattice firsthand… it’s how I realized that I was in a very similar situation today. It saved my life.”
“The Lattice saved your life? Or you saved it by seeing the connection?” Aquinas asked.
Shaw stared at him.
“It’s an important distinction,” Aquinas said.
“We don’t have time for that now,” Shaw answered. “How long until the missile reaches Brother Florian?”
“Seventeen minutes.”
“I hope it’s enough. See if you can get me Zella Galway on the line. We need to save him. And my family.”
Part Three:
Spheres
Chapter 10
“You should know I’m through playing games,” Zella Galway said mildly, though Shaw could tell there was a hot anger behind her eyes that matched Fassino’s murderous rage.
“It’s never been a game to me,” Shaw said. “Not with these stakes.” They were in a chat room together, designed to match the conference room where the cartel had voted to destroy the Walden with one week’s notice. If Galway had planned to unsettle him, she had miscalculated. Shaw had already grown weary of these chat rooms designed to remind him of troubling moments from his past.
“And yet you’ve played it, just the same a
s I have. Look how you and I have squabbled. Me trying to score a ‘public relations victory’? Whatever that means. You—ha!—you trying to win, but not so brutally that I might kill your wife and daughter in revenge. These are games we’ve been playing. And I’m letting you know: I’m through.”
Shaw sat with that. “What does that mean exactly?”
“It means death, Shaw. To Florian and his team of researchers trying to bring down the Lattice. To Wulfgang Huxley and to Taveena Parr especially. It means death to you. Death to your wife. And death to your daughter. As I said, I’m through with games.”
“How much time do I have to try to save them?” Shaw asked through clenched teeth.
Galway waved the idea away with a toss of her hand. “Nice try, but that’s just another game. And you clearly aren’t listening to me.”
“When?” Shaw asked, though he couldn’t bear to hear the answer.
“As soon as possible. After this chat, I suppose.” Galway was studiously playing up her casual tone.
“And why bother telling me? Why not just rain fire down on the Vatican and kill me now?”
“Because I am enjoying watching you sweat far too much,” Galway said, a malevolent smile suddenly on her face. “After all this, after all you’ve done to me and to Dvorak Systems, I wanted to see your face when you found out that you were out of options.”
“Isn’t this just another game then?” Shaw asked. He immediately regretted it when he saw Galway’s face redden. Worried she might leave the chat room, he quickly tried a new tactic. “If you back out of a deal you made, won’t you hurt yourself and your company in the long run? There are still five days until the deadline you set to destroy the Walden. You lose nothing by letting the clock run out,” he said. He could tell his voice was shaking.
“Do you think I care?” Galway shouted, rising from her seat. She recovered and calmly sat back down.
As she composed herself, Shaw ventured, “It’s not just Dvorak. The entire cartel voted—”
“I told you, I am through with games. I don’t care how or what the cartel voted. Power politics between me and Grace? Because she wants to be the cool one, even if she’s more ruthless than I will ever be? Who needs them? If the cartel won’t support this, then Dvorak Systems will finish this work alone if we have to. This nonsense has gone on long enough.”