by West, Kyle
“Toad, huh?” I asked.
Anna shrugged. “Some people just infect your brain with what they say. I’m literally dumber for having listened to that idiot.”
I chuckled. “We can’t just start a war by offending people.”
“Something tells me there’s going to be a war, no matter what I say.”
I wondered why Augustus parked his spaceship on top of the airport terminal building, rather than in front of his camp, which seemed much safer to me. Maybe it was just a way for him to show Black that the airport was under his control, and that he wasn’t going to be confined to the small area around his camp.
Five minutes later, we arrived at the gates of Augustus’s camp. The wooden walls were at least ten feet high, with watchtowers along their length. The army must have carried a lot of its supplies with it, and it was hard to imagine how they could have built such fortifications in a short length of time.
The gates squealed open, revealing the bustling camp within. We walked inside and I took in my surroundings. Now, with dusk, many of the legionaries were cooking and eating around campfires. Horses were tied up in stables, and we even passed a pen filled with pigs. Merchants and shopkeepers had supplies displayed on tables in front of their tents – anything from food to boots to trinkets. I realized then that it wasn’t just an army here. An entire community had followed the soldiers in order to make a few batts.
Augustus’s eyes seemed content, even reminiscent, as he watched the camp.
“When I was a young man in Mexico,” he said, “Ragnarok had just fallen. My people were afraid. I knew we had to be the strongest if we were to survive. To the north was Old Mexico, the Federal District. They fought us in those days, even though the world had ended. That was my first campaign. I took my soldiers, went north across the mountains in the springtime. It seems so long ago. The Federalists fought to the last man. Now, Federal is one of our biggest provinces.”
Augustus told this story not in a proud way. To him, it was just a story, one of the many great things he had done in his life.
“I remember entering the Presidential Palace in victory, and how the President, old even then, dropped to his knees. A man who had chased and attacked me for so many years, before the Rock fell, was expecting my judgment.” Augustus smiled in memory. “He was a brave man and he met my eyes with such hatred. I told him not to kneel like some warlord or barbarian – many of whom I had crushed. This man was a rival worthy of respect. So, I told him to fight for me. He agreed. I let him keep his kingdom, his estates, his women and children. We conquered much together – Jalisco, Oaxaca. He died, twenty years ago. I spared no expense for his funeral, and gave games in his memory at the Coleseo, newly constructed then.”
Augustus sighed, as if he knew those glory days were now past and never to be reawakened. Our war was different from all his others, because the end goal was not wealth and power, but survival. The glory years were gone.
It looked as if Augustus was going to say more, but instead he remained thoughtful. We walked on.
I didn’t really know why Augustus told this story, but I think it was intended mainly for Ashton. Some things only made sense to old men. Old memories from an Old World didn’t mean much to me. Augustus was a drug lord in his youth, one who had fought the government so much that he had even formed his own country, and that before Ragnarok came down. Augustus was a warrior, much more than he was a builder. For centuries he would be remembered. Stories would be told of him, and children would be named after him.
That was, if we survived all this.
Even with Augustus’s power, it would be a while before he got his fight. If the Empire and the Reapers were still allies, then there was no force in the Wasteland that could oppose them – besides Askala and the Radaskim. The Wasteland resistance had failed, so the only two important powers left were the Empire and the Reapers, and having them share the same city with no one to fight was a disaster waiting to happen.
“Will there be war?” I asked. “I mean, between the Empire and the Reapers?”
Augustus shook his head. “I must do whatever I can to stop that. There cannot be war until the Great Blight is dealt with. Carin knows this as much as me. I don’t think Carin will attack, but he’s getting restless. He’s making more demands. I have more soldiers, but he has better weaponry, hoarded over the years from the nearby military bases. All the same, I fear he might be planning to use the Radaskim as the anvil, and himself as the hammer, while not realizing the foolishness of such a move.”
Augustus’s speaking about the Radaskim, using that word, made me realize he was up to speed. Ashton had probably updated him at some point while we were in the sky.
“Do you really think he’s going to pincer you between the two sides?” Anna asked.
“I hope not, Anna. I know Black is getting desperate. How could he not be? He has an army of twenty thousand men at his doorstep. The best-case scenario for him would be killing both us and the Radaskim in a single stroke.”
“But Askala will only attack again,” I said. “Even if he did win, it would only be a matter of time.”
“But does he know that? That’s what we need to convince him of, Alex. Remember, he doesn’t know what we know about the Great Blight. To him, this attack might just be a onetime occurrence. It’s our job to convince him otherwise.”
Augustus stopped before a large tent that was probably his own; it was larger than the rest, and two guards stood in front of the entrance. The Emperor turned to face us.
“Black needs to hear it from you,” Augustus said. “I need you at that meeting with me to convince him.”
“Why would we do that for you?” Anna asked. “Maybe we let the Radaskim attack and kill you all. Why would we help you when you locked us up for three days?”
“I wasn’t going to risk your escaping,” Augustus said. “I know how capable you are – not only did you escape the Coleseo back in Nova Roma, but you escaped my Praetorians. I wasn’t going to take any chances. And as for why you should help me, I think we both know the answer to that. Besides me, no one can help you stop the Great Blight. I’m the only one with an army. At the risk of sounding crass, you are alone. Your friends are dead, so if you still want to have a chance, then you must accept my offer of friendship – which I gave earlier. Give me your word of honor, and we can work together, for the good of the Wasteland.”
The Emperor gazed at us, an infectious energy in his brown eyes.
“Besides military aid,” Augustus said, “I have another plan for you three – contingent upon your acceptance of this alliance. Of course, I have Orion in my possession, but as a gift I would offer you Perseus.”
The three of us stared at Augustus in shock. Anna was the first to recover.
“You’d trust us with a spaceship?”
“Why not?” Augustus asked. “In exchange for helping me with Black and the Radaskim, you can keep it. I really don’t fear your attacking me with it. You have nothing to gain. We would be working together, something that is necessary if any of us are to survive this.”
We did need a spaceship. We could find Makara and the others. We could begin to evacuate Bunker 84, perhaps reinforce Augustus’s troops with our own, before Los Angeles was attacked.
Maybe an alliance with the Emperor wasn’t a bad idea. If he was serious about giving us Perseus, it could solve all our problems.
I looked at Ashton, wondering what he was thinking. Ashton was weighing Augustus with his sharp blue eyes, while Augustus did the same to Ashton. The two men had once been enemies. Could they ever be friends?
“So you want us to talk to Black?” Ashton asked.
Augustus nodded. “We need him to work with us. Do this, and lend your aid in the coming battle, and in exchange, you can have Perseus.”
“What if Carin Black attacks anyway?” I asked.
“That might be the case,” Augustus said, “but if that happens, at least I know I have you three at my side. None of
us are going to survive the coming storm unless we unite.”
With those words, I remembered the Wanderer’s own warning: that we had to get everyone working together. Augustus was right. Maybe the Emperor was after power, but in the end, survival was more important than whoever got to rule at the end of the day.
“Where is Perseus?” Anna asked.
“It’s still in Bunker Six. We can rescue it once we are done speaking with Black. Getting Perseus out shouldn’t be too difficult.”
“He’s right about that,” Ashton said. “I’ve been in and out of Bunker Six several times over the years. It’s built into a mountain far above the Great Blight, so there aren’t too many monsters there. Still, it’s dangerous. With Orion, it will be easy to access the hangar.”
“Okay,” I said. “So if we help you by speaking to Carin Black, you’ll let us keep the spaceship?”
Augustus nodded. “The main thing is getting Black on our side for good. The longer I wait here, the more suspicious Black becomes.”
It looked as if Augustus had all his bases covered. That was to be expected, though. A man didn’t grow to rule an Empire unless he knew how to plan out every outcome.
“We’ll do it,” Ashton said.
“Good,” Augustus said.
A courier approached Augustus, bowing low.
“Speak,” the Emperor said.
“Black is here.”
Chapter 4
Augustus and his Praetorians escorted us back to the encampment’s gates. The portal opened upon our arrival, revealing the abandoned airport ahead. The top half of Orion was visible above the edge of the terminal building, from which jutted boarding tunnels. Ten of the Reapers’ black Recons were parked in a line to the left of the building, facing toward us. They were distant – maybe a quarter of a mile away. A line of men stood in front of the Recons, far across the flat expanse of dirt and runways. One of these men had to be Carin Black.
We marched forward to meet with the Reapers and their Warlord. We were finally going to meet Carin Black, the terror of Los Angeles. This man had ruined thousands of lives when he overthrew the Lost Angels in 2055, enslaving or killing any who resisted. The only beneficiaries of the violence had been his own gang, the Black Reapers. I didn’t know what was going to happen at this meeting. Neither Augustus nor Carin trusted each other, so I felt anything could happen.
After a few minutes, we were near the Reapers. I saw Carin Black now. He was a tall man with pale blue eyes. They did not look like the eyes of a man who had done so much evil, and it was hard to believe that his toad-like son, Onyx, was his. He was probably forty years of age, and at first glance, he definitely seemed to be someone of intelligence and ability. His dark hair was cropped close, and his pale muscled arms held various tattoos – on his left biceps was the skull and cross-scythes that seemed to be the gang’s emblem, while a red, fiery snake ran down his left forearm. His right biceps was dominated by an intricate tattoo of a grim reaper bearing a scythe. The reaper himself was swirling in darkness, and had glowing red eyes within his shadowed cowl. The Warlord of the Reapers stared at us with those crystalline blue eyes, his thin, bloodlike lips horizontal. That gaze was like a rush of cold wind.
At last, we halted before him. The Praetorians made a line, flanking us on either side. For a long moment, the two sides stared each other down. The moment dragged into minutes, each leader refusing to speak first.
Finally, Carin Black raised a hand.
“You said the prisoners had something to tell me.”
Augustus waited a moment before nodding toward Ashton. Ashton gave the Emperor an annoyed sideways glance. I could tell he’d rather Augustus do the explaining, but we had to do our part of getting the two forces to work together. We needed that spaceship, after all.
Ashton summed up the basics of what we had learned about Askala and the Radaskim in about five minutes, a telling that should have taken five hours. He concentrated mostly on the science of it: how the xenovirus basically worked, the two opposing sides, composed of Elekai and Radaskim, and how we had to destroy the Radaskim side by infecting Askala in Ragnarok Crater. Carin Black would have been familiar with perhaps just the viral aspect of the monsters, but everything else was probably new information.
When Ashton was finished speaking, Carin shifted his focus to Augustus.
“I would ask if this was a joke,” Carin said, “but it’s obvious he meant every word. So what do you propose we do about it, Emperor?”
“We have to shift our focus,” Augustus said. “The Wastelanders no longer pose a threat. In fact, I have convinced them to ally with us. The swarm that destroyed them is coming to destroy us.”
“They are all dead, then?” Carin asked, arching an eyebrow.
Augustus nodded. “There is but a remnant left. These are the only ones I found. They also know how to destroy Askala, which is the only way to stop the swarm.”
“How long before these...Radaskim....arrive?”
“A few days, at least. We must secure the eastern portion of the city and man the fortifications. When the horde is defeated, we can plan the counterattack.”
“And where will we be attacking?” the Warlord asked.
“Ragnarok Crater.”
Carin went quiet at that. I realized how ridiculous it sounded. Ragnarok Crater was almost two thousand miles away, an unfathomable distance, especially when considering the Great Blight.
“Of course, we wouldn’t be directly attacking Ragnarok Crater,” Augustus said. “We would be advancing toward it, hopefully drawing the attention of the Radaskim. This would give the Wastelanders an opening to attack the Crater, if it has been emptied.”
“You sound like you don’t know if this is going to work,” Black said.
“There are no guarantees,” Augustus said. “The only guarantee is our mutual death should we do nothing at all.”
Carin appeared to be deep in thought. I noticed his son, Onyx, among the ranks of Reapers. His dark eyes glinted as if he knew some secret that would change everything, if only we knew. That made me distrust Black. There was something he wasn’t telling us. Anna stared at the Warlord with open loathing, but Carin did not seem to notice, or care.
At last, Carin gave a small, superior smile. “And so we find ourselves caught in our enemy’s net.”
Augustus frowned. “What do you mean?”
“I’ll not play the bait,” Black said. “What is to stop the Wastelanders from allowing Askala to do what they cannot do themselves? We will be destroyed, Augustus, while our ‘friends’ escape.”
“Nothing’s stopping you from doing the same,” Anna said. “How do we know you’re not planning to let us die?”
Carin’s cold eyes turned on her. “If you are suggesting that I would betray my ally, then you have misjudged. If there is any betraying to be done, it won’t be on my part.”
“Then why not work together?” Augustus said. “The original purpose of our alliance has ended. The Wasteland is already ours, as all of its players have been taken over by Askala. If we are to keep our gains, we have to destroy her. Surely, you see that.”
Carin Black frowned. “Is there any Wasteland left to own? Supposing we are victorious, we will only have the coastline of California left. The rest will be covered in Blight. And my concern, Emperor, is that you did not come here from Nova Roma to do us a good deed. No, you want to control all of the Wasteland. And if you do not want me dead, then you’ll at least want me to kneel at your feet.”
“Come now, Carin,” Augustus said. “Whether my army is here, or in the south, you will not be able to contend with my strength. After all, a small country cannot contend with a great. The few cannot contend with the many. And the weak cannot contend with the strong.”
Carin’s face darkened. His men looked nervously at one another, waiting for their leader to respond.
“You call me weak, Emperor?”
Augustus, aware of his advantage, pressed on. “I call you for
tunate, Carin, that I even allow you the opportunity to serve the Empire, because the many men who have taken your stubborn stance are no longer standing.”
Carin went quiet, staring at the Emperor with his glacial eyes.
Augustus continued. “What is your decision, Carin? You have two roads before you. One leads to survival and peace. The other to death and destruction. The Radaskim will be here in days, and she will not care about our petty differences. Will you join me on the field of battle?”
“I will join you,” Black said. “I will join you, only if you leave this city afterward, never to return.”
“Very well,” Augustus said. “Los Angeles will be left in peace, but I do hope, for your sake, that you won’t be completely closed to communication in the future. For the sake of our continued friendship.”
Black’s face reddened. “That is my condition. I know you need my help as much as I need yours. You won’t convince me otherwise.”
“We will work together then, my friend,” Augustus said. “Victory will require sacrifice, on both of our parts. I am willing to pay my dues in order to help you defend your home. I hope, in the coming days, you will think on what you can do to help me.”
Carin gave a weak smile. “Very well, Augustus. You have your agreement.”
“Good. We will meet again tomorrow to coordinate our battle plans.”
Carin nodded. “I’ll be preparing my men for the defense. We might need to fall back behind the walls.”
“Yes, the walls will help,” Augustus said. “But bravery is an even stronger defense. These monsters have a way of breaching barriers, and they have flyers. The spaceships will help, but there might be too many for me to fight alone.”
“Then you are going through with your plan?” Black asked.
“Yes, as I have told you,” the Emperor said. “Tomorrow I’m taking the Wastelanders to Bunker Six to liberate Perseus.”
Carin nodded. It was hard to read those eyes, whether something was hidden behind them. In the end, though, the Warlord of the Reapers gave a slow nod, reaching out a hand.