Revolution: Book Three of the Secret World Chronicle

by Mercedes Lackey

  The streamers, now affixed seemingly harmlessly to nearly all of the entrenched Thulian troopers, were all high-efficiency conductors, specifically tuned to the frequency of the Echo broadcast generators. Most of the Thulian troopers were cooked in their suits; some even exploded, blown apart by gigavolts of electricity. Dozens of her own soldiers commenced fire; the main part of the Nazi force were still advancing and untouched by their secret “electric mortars,” and returned their fire.

  There were some patches, however, where the Nazis were being cut down with . . . suspicious ease. Saviour frowned. At the battle in Red Square, they were impermeable to damage until they were heated to the glowing point. Here . . . and there . . . and there—mere rifle fire and rocket fire was taking them down, without the Krieger armor having been made vulnerable prior.

  For a moment, she suspected some trickery. Fake suits with nothing in them? But no . . . no, they were writhing and dying there.

  She pulled down a visor, ignored until now. “Overwatch,” she said in a commanding voice.

  “Da, Commissar.” It was Gamayun, not Vickie, that answered.

  “Am seeing odd patches where fashista are taking great damage for no good reason.”

  “Checking now.” There was a mixed babble of Russian with a touch of English as the Gamayun consulted with someone on another channel. Saviour’s visor lit up with a battlefield overlay. “This where you’re talking about?” The patches glowed with red light.

  “Da.”

  “Those places are within five hundred yards of an Echo Broadcast unit. Each one.”

  Before the Commissar could ponder this revelation, the Thulians made a push. They were moving forward, and taking heavy casualties; but with so many hundreds of them, they could afford to. She made a snap decision. “Molotok, Chug, Soviette, on me! Davay, davay, davay, comrades!”

  “Sestra, is wise for field commander to put own head on chopping block?” Molotok mocked. “Then again, is not much of a wise head up for the chopping!”

  “Commissar,” Soviette interjected. “Ja ostanus’ v tilu chtobi pozabotit’sja o ranenih. Mi sobrali mnogih. I’ll being hang back, to police wounded.” An explosion punctuated her sentence. “We are accumulating many.”

  “Da, fine! Rest of you, davay!” The Commissar broke from cover, leaping over and then kicking off of the large boulder that she’d previously been using for cover. She flew straight for a point where she’d intercept the Thulians; they wouldn’t be expecting a charge to counter their own. Saviour shot a powerful blast at the nearest cluster of three Thulians; it exploded the ground in front of them in a marvelous shower of hot gravel and dust. Molotok had bounded nimbly down after her; he speared through the air, tumbling into a group of Thulian troopers. Coming up in a roll, he immediately began to chop, punch, kick, and elbow at them. His superstrong body, his metahuman gift combined with years of unparalleled martial arts expertise, began to cut through and knock down the armored suits. Chug plodded after his comrades, bellowing his rage at the foes that had hurt his friends in Moscow. The rockman inelegantly smashed into the Thulians, hammering them with his fists. The Commissar had to look twice when she saw him literally rip one in half, breaking the suit over his knee and ripping top from bottom. Both halves spurted blood, sparks, and hydraulic fluid into the desert soil. Confusion played over his craggy face for a moment before he bellowed again and moved on to the next foe.

  Of course. We are within five hundred yards of a broadcaster . . .

  Saviour kicked off into the air again, charging her fist with her own dangerous metahuman energy. She caved in a Thulian helmet with a satisfying crunch of crushed metal and bone; the Nazi clunked to the ground like a sack of hammers, utterly dead. The Commissar stole a glance over her shoulder. Soviette dashed from behind a boulder half covered in flaming debris, deftly jumping between metahuman combatants. One of the rocket teams from the ridge was still alive. Jadwiga wove her way through the fighting as if she was merely running an obstacle course, dodging explosions and energy cannon fire, stopping short of a knot of Thulian suits, and then running again to miss being crushed by a Nazi trooper. Saviour stopped, staring, her mouth falling slightly open with disbelief. Sovie reached the barely moving metahuman, hooked her hands under his arms, and began to drag him to cover. It was one of the most amazing displays of bravery that Natalya had ever seen from anyone, let alone from her friend and comrade Soviette.

  Not wasting any time to dwell on the miraculous feat, Saviour screamed a hellish battle cry and launched herself at another pair of Nazis, fists charged with more destructive energy.

  * * *

  Movement on the screen caught Verdigris’ attention. He glanced at it sharply. The Seraphym was on the balcony outside Belladonna’s office.

  There was a brief flash of blue beside the fire. Then both of them were gone, shooting straight up like a missile, moving too fast for the camera to track.

  He could only stare at the monitor and grit his teeth.

  * * *

  Vix wasn’t answering hails on the comms, and that was very bad, in the grand scheme of things. Which was saying something, considering Bulwark’s team was pinned down at an intersection by two groups of Thulians.

  Bulwark shouted, “Grenade out!” Red manipulated his ear drums to close against the blast and pressure, saving him the trouble of having to stuff his hands against his head. A Thulian staggered away from where the grenade had gone off; Red dropped him with a burst from his rifle.

  “We need to get out of this cave, and soon! This place is shaking apart!” It was the gravity drives; one of the primary objectives for the CCCP infiltration team was to plant charges in strategic places around the base. Apparently, they’d managed to do the generators right.

  “I know! Keep firing! We’ll have to punch our way out!”

  “Which way’s out?” That was Matai. He had a point. Without Vix to guide them—

  Red closed his eyes; he had to remember how the corridors had felt on the way in . . . what turns they’d made. This wasn’t the first time he’d had to retrace blind. It wasn’t even the first time he’d had to do it while being shot at.

  It was, however, the first time he was having to do it during what felt like an earthquake, with gunfire and explosions going on around him.

  That way? Maybe. Probably. Hell, any way was better than staying there. “This way!” he yelled, and made a break for it.

  He made it just past the first intersection, when an armored trooper stepped out from around the corner. Between him and the rest. An armored trooper with functional energy cannons.

  How the hell did he fit in there? Red wondered, as he stared in petrified fascination at the business end of the cannon. There was a sort of whirlpool of dim fire in the barrel as it ramped up—

  Red got body-slammed by the armored trooper as Bull’s force field rammed into him, literally kicking him down the corridor.

  He actually glanced off the hurtling trooper, getting slammed into the side of the corridor as the unguided “missile” went past.

  He was still lying there, trying to get breath back in his lungs, when his comm went live again.

  “Infil One, Infil One, do you read?”

  That was a voice he knew . . . but not the one he expected. Fortunately Bulwark was able to respond. “Roger, we copy . . . Bella?”

  “Vick’s down. I don’t have her magic, but I have your HUD feeds, I have her map, and I have your position on it. One hundred feet, right, right, right.”

  Red coughed. “Darlin’, yer an angel.”

  “Angel’s next to me. Move your buns, people. I think you have incoming. And that trooper’s getting up.”

  “Motu! We need you, brother!” The two brothers nodded, then leaned forward, touching foreheads together momentarily. Motu threw a grenade towards the direction where they needed to go, rolling into the hallway seconds after the explosion. He dropped his rifle to the ground. Red could swear he saw the rifle warp, bend, and then
coil from the floor and up Motu’s leg. The Samoan concentrated, and more debris gathered to him; pieces of Thulian weapons and armor, shell casings . . . the entire hallway began to creak. It wasn’t from the growing earthquake, signs that the generators were going critical; this was localized. The metal plating buckled around Motu, as if he had his own personal high-gravity field. Lighting panels and electrical conduits ripped free from the walls and ceiling, spraying out tremendous showers of sparks. Entire sections of the plating deformed, rent away from the walls, torn to fit to Motu’s body. The brave, beautiful bastard actually roared, and looked like a nightmarish scrap heap come to life. The dazed Thulians finally recovered enough sense to try to shoot at him.

  Covered with the very materials they’d used to make their base, he was protected from any harm they could do him. But they had no such protection from him. Motu began blindly battering and crushing the Thulians that had taken position behind the team, more plating from the hallway replacing his armor wherever it was damaged. Then again, the corridor was narrow enough that he didn’t have to see to hit them. “My brother will cover our retreat! Let’s get out of this damned place!”

  Red caught Bulwark’s eye again, and nodded. Bulwark nodded back.

  “That’s the turn. Right, right, right. I’m taking you out the way you came in, start praying no walls have caved in.”

  “Is our ride still there?”

  “So far. You better get there before someone jacks it.”

  * * *

  John was grateful that Unter had memorized their route; he was too out of it to remember. The hallways all looked the same: scrambling Nazis, electrical fires, and other assorted chaos. This entire place is going to go up. Hope we didn’t do our job too well, an’ become toast with it. John whirled to his left, snapping off a burst of rifle fire at a Thulian that had raised a pistol. The man crumpled, dead before he hit the floor.

  “We are getting close, Murdock; there are more Nazis.” Unter grunted, pausing to fire several long bursts from his rifle. “Many fashista.” The team kept running. John could see his vision going black around the edges; he shook his head to try to dispel it, but to no effect. This is it. I’m runnin’ on empty. Christ, they’re gonna have to carry me soon enough.

  “Infil Two, Infil Two, do you read?”

  Unter responded. “We read—Victrix? What is happening?”

  It was Belladonna Blue’s voice.

  “Vick’s down, I’m on the comm. I have her map with you and your path on it. Right, left, right, then up the stairs on the right again. You’re about to meet up with Infil One. Don’t strafe each other.”

  The team came to the intersection, everyone taking a sector and covering it with their rifle. Mamona shouted, “Look!” John heard a lot of gunfire: rifles, same model that his team was carrying. He could also see the glow of Thulian energy weapons being discharged, the ambient light splashing off of the hallway panels. Bulwark’s team careened around the corner and into the intersection; several members from both teams leveled rifles at each other, lowering them an instant later when recognition registered, or Bella yelled at them.

  John coughed, more blood coming up onto the back of his glove; he wiped it off on his pant leg, nodding to Bulwark. “Good to see y’all are still alive.”

  “You aren’t going to be if we don’t get you out of here,” Bulwark said grimly, looking at the blood trickling out of the side of John’s mouth.

  John nodded, shouldering his rifle. He gestured with his off hand. “Blue says that the exit is thataway. Shall we, gents?” Motu was still at the mouth of the corner where Bulwark’s team had come from. The Thulian rayguns were firing almost constantly, picking at his armor. The hallway reacted to his powers, tearing itself apart to replenish his protection.

  “WILL YOU MOVE YOUR BLOOMIN’ ARSES?” Bella shouted. “This is no time for a tea break!”

  The team responded by running as fast as possible, while allowing Motu’s bulky form to provide them with a moving shield. They reached the hangar bay without having to kill too many more Nazis; few of them were willing to put enough effort into fighting, as opposed to saving their own skins. John surveyed the situation in an instant; there were a few officers ineffectually shouting orders, and even fewer people listening to them. Almost all of the base personnel were trying to find a vehicle, or running with a weapon. “So, straight up the middle? Kill anybody in the way?”

  “Straight ahead, your ride is parked at your front left of the hangar. Uh, your ten o’clock?”

  It seemed as if the entire base bucked sideways like an angry bronc, right then. Everyone hit the floor, their footing taken out from under them, with Motu being the exception. “Base is giving out,” John said, hoarsely. “If’n we’re goin’, now’s the time.”

  “Copy that, Vick’s sensor packs are all redlining. You don’t have long.”

  He looked to Mamona and Silent Knight. “Care to give the opposition somethin’ to think ’bout?”

  Both of the metas nodded. Mamona bent down at the entrance to the hangar, closing her eyes. Silent Knight braced himself, being careful to point his helmet with all of them behind him. Bulwark tapped them both on the shoulder at the same time saying, “Now.” Dozens of Nazis doubled over instantly, puking their guts out or going into seizures. Those still in armor vibrated; the Knight was using either a frequency too high to hear, or too low; whichever, maybe both at once, it was rattling anyone in metal to pieces. Sparks flew from the joints as the armor malfunctioned.

  “Move it!” John shouted, lurching forward and almost tripping over his own feet. The base was shaking itself apart, the vibrations were so violent now. Explosions sprayed shrapnel and debris everywhere, and those Thulians still able to stand were scrambling frantically. Some of the Nazis noticed the teams running for a Death Sphere. Most didn’t care, but a few were well-trained enough to try and shoot at them. Soviet Bear took a plasma blast in his left arm; he spun with the impact, leveling his PPSh at the offending Thulian and unloading the rest of the drum magazine into the man. “That was being made by genius of Soviet science, kulak!” His mechanical arm melted to the deck, cut off at the elbow, and he kept running.

  Matai took a conventional rifle round through the thigh; he didn’t even have time to fully crumple to the ground before Motu had scooped his brother up in a fireman’s carry, shielding him with his massive form. John switched his rifle to his off hand, chucking a grenade with the other. The explosion had satisfying effect on a group of Thulians trying to take cover behind a stack of weapons crates.

  Djinni’s hands grew long claws, and he launched ahead of them, grimly slashing at unarmored troopers.

  Luckily, the area immediately around their transportation was clear of threats. Untermensch and Djinni were the first into the Death Sphere. There were two Thulian troopers, their plasma pistols on the floor, at the controls prepping the craft for flight. “Good afternoon, fashista,” said Untermensch. “Thank you for preparing our escape for us.” The two metahumans leapt for the Thulians, impervious hands and wicked claws removing the opposition before the Nazis had time to reach for their own weapons. The rest of the team scrambled onto the ramp of the Thulian sphere, throwing the Nazi bodies out. Motu hefted his brother into the craft; his armor sloughed off with a clatter. He ducked below a plasma blast, inches above his head, clambering into the hatch just before it closed.

  Bulwark plopped down into the pilot’s seat, his arms reaching into the control sleeves; he didn’t even bother to attach his safety harness. “Bella, time?”

  “GO!” Bella screamed. “It’s going crit in there!”

  The Death Sphere lurched forward, no pretense of being damaged. Bulwark gritted his teeth; they clipped several support struts for the hangar, bouncing off of another fleeing orb as they shot out of the hangar. The orb shot forward at incredible speed. John’s vision was going out. He felt a cold chill creeping over him, and fought for breath. “Are we clear?” he managed to choke out.

/>   “Yes—CRAP!” A massive shock wave slammed into the orb. John felt weightless for a moment, and everything slowed down. He saw Mamona’s face, drawn tight and pale. He could see the blood from Matai’s leg seeping through his brother’s fingers. Untermensch looked unconcerned, and Pavel looked like he was having the time of his life. Time sped back up, and everyone was thrown forward, crashing into each other. John blacked out.

  * * *

  Natalya panted for breath, the dust and smoke thick in the air clinging to the roof of her dry mouth. So damned many of the swine. She collected her strange energies, blasting the head off of a Thulian that had left cover too soon. Since the Nazis had slowly awakened to the fact that they were taking more casualties than they should, they had pulled their numbers back to cover. Their advance was stopped, but the fighting was still brutal. Most of her forward rocket teams were dead—overrun or blasted by Death Spheres. The toll was not as bad as it had been in Red Square, or in Atlanta, but any loss was one too many.

  Without the furthest rocket teams, the orbs had been getting closer; one had chanced to try to drop a squad of troopers directly on top of Saviour’s team, behind their lines. Luckily, due to the proximity to the Echo broadcaster, they were able to finish the assaulting Nazis before they could do too much damage, collect too many kills. The Commissar called the Blue Angels off of Close-Air Support, retasking them to focus solely on making runs against the orbs. The decision had probably saved the entire valley from getting a thermite bath.

  “Sestra,” Molotok called, throwing an armed grenade with fast-ball accuracy. “Might be thinking of doing something about our party guests, da?” His question was punctuated by the exploding grenade; a chorus of Thulian energy cannons answered, splitting the air and pulverizing boulders around Molotok’s cover. “At least they can’t shoot. Being hard when your targets shoot back, nyet!”