Ironshield

by Edward Nile

  The military had been laying sandbag bulwarks around the fort’s perimeter for the past hour, ever since Ivan’s rebels repulsed the first few soldiers who’d ventured toward the complex, raking the ground at their feet with machinegun fire.

  A knock came at the open washroom door behind James. “Are you ready?”

  He turned. Tessa stood in the doorway, decked out in full Industrialist garb, a heavy automatic rifle slung across her back. Her hair was tied back in a short tail, stray tresses tucked behind her ears. She’d cleaned up for the occasion.

  “Just about.” James took his own black officer’s coat off the hook and threw it on. He had it half-buttoned before he paused, feeling the embroidered Gearsword within the Ironshield symbol on the breast.

  “Hey.” Tessa closed the distance and fastened the last buttons. “It looks good on you. Looks right.” She gave his beard a tug. “So does this.” She was smiling. They were about to die, and Tessa was smiling. She was scared too, James could tell, but there was resolve, even a hint of excitement in her big, bright eyes.

  Little Tessa, who’d climbed into Ironshield to fight two Warsuits on her own. Who’d crawled through the fiery workings of a Kaizer Engine and made it out, scarred but alive, at the other end. Tessa Kolms, who’d loved James, here and ready to fight by his side. It was everything he had ever wanted and everything he’d tried to stop from happening, all at once.

  “Sorry our drink got interrupted.” He teased a lock of her hair loose with his finger. “I’ll owe you a bottle, when this is done.”

  Tessa kept her grip on his beard. Her smile turned somber. “Yeah,” she said. “When this is done.” Something lit up in her eyes, a determined glare furrowing her brow.

  James felt a hard, painful tug on his chin. Tessa pressed her mouth against his.

  His initial surprise gave way, and James melted into the kiss. In an instant he was kissing back with even more force. Pulling her against him was awkward with Tessa’s gun in the way, but James made it work.

  Tessa mashed her lithe form against his, crushing into him, one arm snaking around his neck, the other grabbing him by his belt.

  James stumbled backward with Tessa still glued to him, until his backside knocked against the sink. Their tongues wrestled against one another, fast, eager, frantic, years of longing allowed to take control at last. Every now and then, Tessa punctuated her kiss with a sharp bite on James’ tongue or lip, each time sending a fresh thrill that threatened to overwhelm him.

  Finally, when James wasn’t sure he could take it anymore, when he was ready to drop to the floor with Tessa and take her, right there in the cold, concrete washroom, she broke for air.

  They gasped in each breath, chests heaving together. James was all too aware of her breasts, pushing against him with each heavy exhale. Her cheeks were flushed, and sweat plastered wild strands of hair to her brow. James brushed the hair aside and kissed her again, gentler now. He didn’t trust himself to do more without becoming lost.

  Tessa laid a hand on his cheek. “Damn,” she breathed, somehow melting further into his embrace. Beneath the smell of motor oil and ground steel, James could smell her. He wanted to stop everything and breathe in that scent forever.

  “James, Tessa," Na’Tet stood outside the door, careful to look anywhere but at them. "Na’Tet apologizes, but the enemies..."

  "We're coming, 'Tet. One minute."

  The tribesman nodded and left them.

  From out on main floor, metal clanked and men shouted as they prepared for what was about to come.

  "Ah hell." James rose and pulled her up with him. "We'd better survive this, somehow, or by the Savior I'll find you, Tess. Even if I have to knock God's teeth out to do it."

  Tessa giggled -actually giggled!- and nuzzled into James' chest. She stood on the tips of her toes and kissed his neck. "Not if I find you first."

  James squeezed her tight. Reluctantly, he released his grip. "Alright," he said. "Time to face the music."

  She beamed. "Yes, Sir!"

  The Warsuits were lined up, with the Krieger modeled after Ironshield at the head of the column, just in front of the garage door.

  "That one's for you," Tessa said.

  Ivan Kolms finished tightening a bolt on another machine and chuckled. "Not like it'll work for anyone else."

  "What do you mean?"

  Ivan jerked his chin toward the Warsuit. "Take a look." He was also dressed in his finest uniform, everything ironed and pressed, medals gleaming. Leave it to the Kolms to treat a battle to the death like the party of the century.

  What kind of family am I getting myself into? James thought.

  Seeing Tessa smile and wink at him as she prepared to climb into one of the four-legged crawlers, he knew it was worth it. Assuming any of them lived to see another day.

  James grabbed hold of the Krieger's rungs and climbed to the open cockpit, stepping onto the hatch. He ducked inside and looked at the pilot’s seat. It looked standard. More confined than a Kaizer's pit, but that was to be expected on such a relatively small machine.

  "Hold on a second," James muttered. There was only one control handle, the left one. On the right there was...

  No way... James shook his head. "You guys didn't."

  "Tess snagged it a few nights ago," Ivan explained. "Told her not to, but good luck trying to stop her."

  James ran his fingers along the flat top of the metal cylinder. Ironshield's ignition cradle, the one that matched James' saber.

  "Did you just install this now?" He poked his head out to look down as Ivan.

  "Put it in as soon as I was done giving Tessa hell for risking her neck. That was days ago."

  "But... why?

  Ivan shrugged. "Guess I just had faith you’d come back."

  "I... thank you." James didn't trust himself to say more. Now wasn't the time to get all choked up.

  "Nah, kid, thank you." Ivan inclined his head toward Tessa, who was too preoccupied checking over the crawler to notice. "Thank you for coming back. Now fire Buckler up and get ready for a fight."

  "Buckler?"

  "It's a kind of small shield," Ivan explained. "Seemed clever at the time."

  James chuckled. "I like it."

  "Looks like they’re taking aim!" Roy called.

  "Ivan Kolms," came an amplified voice from outside. It was muffled by the bunker's thick walls, but that didn't prevent James from recognizing who spoke.

  "Ivan Kolms, this is Samuel Mutton. We have your facility surrounded. Please, give yourself and your men up and hand over the fugitive James Edstein. Do this and you have my word no one will be harmed."

  "Like I'm gonna believe anything that backstabbing cur says," Ivan growled. "Fire on them! Fuck their codes, make it count. Jim, you ready?"

  James was frozen in place upon recognizing Samuel Mutton's voice. The last time he'd heard it was when the senator had announced himself from Redstripe's loudspeaker just before him and Retribution opened fire on the inhabitants of Quarrystone. Just before he'd almost killed Tessa.

  "I'm ready."

  The cockpit hatch clanged shut, cocooning James in familiar darkness. His eyes adjusted to the faint red light given off by the engine panel. By that bloody hue, he drew his father's sword, its straight blade glinting, elucidating the jagged key groove down its middle. The Ironshield crest was nearly black in the sparse luminescence.

  Hope I still know what I'm doing, he thought, brushing his fingers along the ignition cradle in a reverent gesture. Father, I'll make you proud. James raised the saber and slammed the blade home in its slot. Then, he turned the handle one-hundred- eighty degrees, listening to the components inside click and rattle.

  When the Warsuit's engine roared to life, it was like a second heart sprouted inside James, beating a savage war cry in his breast. Powering a Krieger took less energy than a Kaizer engine produced, but the Krieger's smaller frame shook more violently than James was used to. Maybe that was a normal trade off. Maybe the susp
ension on this rig was just shit.

  It didn't matter. James grinned even as he bit down on his leather mouth guard. One by one he flicked switches across the Krieger's panel. Chthunk went the sounds of weapon safeties being released and joint breaks unclamping. His whole body shaking with the machine, James pulled the periscope visor down and planted his face against it. Fuel and pressure dials wavered below his magnified view of the rising garage door. James heard the muffled sound of machine gun fire as his rebels engaged the enemy from the bunker's gun ports. Flexing his fingers on the control handles, he put his feet to the pedals and walked Buckler out into daylight, feeling more alive than he'd ever felt.

  A pile of scrap, held together by an ideal. James was the Ironshield. He would die as the Ironshield.

  Chapter 31

  "I repeat, surrender, and you will not be harmed. You are promised a fair trial by the Arkenian—"

  Guns blared from narrow ports cut into the stone along the sides of the concrete structure.

  Samuel wasn't in the line of fire, but could see those who were fall back behind their sandbag emplacements as bullets raked across their positions.

  So much for the diplomatic approach. Samuel put down the microphone. He'd come here for a fight, and the Industrialists seemed more than happy to oblige. It's their own damn funeral, then.

  Mobile field pieces were driven forward, their barrels lowered to bear on the squat walls of the gray bunker. Meanwhile, machine gun nests opened suppressive fire to pin the rebels down as bullets chewed the concrete around their gun ports. Snipers went to work as well, popping off shots whose targets Samuel couldn’t see. They had no idea how many Industrialists were holed up inside. Those among Matthew Kaizer’s men who talked claimed the other group sported a sparse few dozen, if that. Samuel had brought five hundred effectives and twenty field guns.

  Even if every man and woman in that rat’s nest keeps up the defense, the bunker will be ours by nightfall. That much would be true without the use of heavy guns. No, this would be finished much sooner.

  Perhaps it was simply an attempt by Samuel to rationalize, but on the trip here he’d grown to doubt Edmund’s theories. After all, what was more likely? That Salkirk was trying to have Samuel killed in the middle of an election he was already losing? Or that James Edstein’s Industrialists, their hatred of him spurred by Salkirk’s lies, had made their play for revenge against the Butcher of Quarrystone?

  No, it’s not a coincidence. Samuel leaned forward against his bulwark, seething as he watched his men overwhelm the enemy’s limited firepower. James Edstein did not just happen to resurface at the same time as men with the Gearsword symbol tried to kill me. The pieces were falling into place. This, this was where Samuel needed to be. This was the snake in the grass he had to rout out. He’d been blinded by his anger at Salkirk, so much that he’d allowed himself to forget everything Edstein had cost him.

  Samuel took hold of his radio and yelled over the rattling gunfire. “Hit their east wall with the hundred-fifty!”

  He watched men scramble out of the cannon’s way as it swung down to fire, a six-barreled monstrosity of field artillery.

  “Blow them to hell, damn it!”

  “They’re opening their door, Sir.”

  “Hold!” Samuel slammed the radio on top of a sandbag and took hold of the mouthpiece to his truck-mounted loudspeaker instead, ready to give the surrendering Industrialists an ultimatum.

  Instead of disheartened rebels with white flags, a Warsuit stomped its way clear of the open door.

  It was an ugly thing, am amalgamation of various parts, few of which looked like they were designed for the purpose they currently served. But the overall shape those parts had been hammered into, the design…

  It was a much smaller copy of Ironshield. And from a pole jutting from between its engine block and its head, the Industrialist Gearsword flag hung.

  That’s him. Samuel leaned forward with one hand braced on the barricade, gripping his sheathed saber with the other. The idiot boy wants to die. Something in Samuel cringed at the notion of killing Heinrich’s son, when he himself had pushed Redstripe to its limits trying to get the original Ironshield out of the path of a Xangese missile. He took hold of that reticence and shoved it down deep. That is not my friend’s boy. That is not my ally, no matter what notions Leanne tries to fill my head with. He gave all of that up. James Edstein spat in the face of my mercy. There will be none for him today. Today, I will have one less enemy to look over my shoulder for.

  But as it turned out, Edstein's ad-hocked Warsuit wasn't the only machine the rebels boasted. No sooner had the miniature Ironshield's engine smoke dissipated in the machine's wake than more Kriegers exited the fort behind it, each stranger than the last.

  "Commander?" said a soldier behind Samuel. "I don't think they're surrendering."

  Samuel took hold of his radio. Unlikely as it was from this distance, he felt like Edstein was looking at him through the lens of his Warsuit's periscope.

  This is what you wanted, Edstein…

  Samuel breathed in deep, thumbed the transmitter button on his mouthpiece, and shouted. "Open Fire!"

  A corner of the Industrialist bunker collapsed under a booming blast from the hundred-fifty-millimeter cannon's multiple barrels.

  The enemy Warsuits didn't hesitate to answer the challenge. Edstein's Krieger lifted its arm-mounted gun and launched an eighty-eight-millimeter round at one of Samuel's gun emplacements while the other rebel machines fanned out in the clearing in front of the bunker and raked troops with cannon and machinegun fire.

  The ground trembled and the air became thick with smog and the bitter taste of sulfur and diesel. All other noise fell away beneath the deafening symphony of guns that made Samuel feel as though the world would be torn apart any moment. One quarter-mile stretch of land shouldn't have been able to hold such carnage, but here it was.

  Samuel tried to focus in on the fuzzy chatter attempting to be heard from the clunky radio as his men scrambled to return the enemy's attacks in kind.

  A four-legged Krieger stomped toward one of the gun emplacements at top speed, crashing through the sandbags. A barely audible scream crackled over the radio and was cut off.

  All around the Warsuits soil flew into the air in fiery explosions that hurt Samuel's ears even from two-hundred yards away.

  Sparks struck off steel carapaces, the Kriegers fighting through the return barrage.

  With no possibility for safe reloading or refuel, Edstein's troupe of Warsuits were careful with their movements and their aim, placing each shot for maximum effect.

  Samuel saw young soldiers, soldiers Nicholas' age, go flying into the air, limp and torn by their own prematurely exploded ordnances. Soldier’s he’d brought to their deaths.

  His ears rang with the constant pounding and cracking of guns, the pealing thunder of ammunition rolling over itself in a manmade storm of lead and fire. Engines roared and men screamed amid it all. Everything Samuel saw took on a haziness around the edges of his reality, blurring in this sudden return to the nightmare of war he'd thought himself awoken from for good.

  A series of blasts from Edstein's machine decimated a barricade and left a young gunner slumped over his cannon, his blank face streaked red.

  "Sir, what are you doing?!"

  Samuel didn't heed Ostreman. Grabbing a rifle, he vaulted over the sandbags and ran, head down, toward the newly unmanned field piece, saber bobbing at his hip. His knees protested at the screaming pace he took over tremulous earth, and his head pounded with the ubiquitous booms of discharging weapons. He was too old for this work.

  Luckily, he wouldn't have to do this again.

  We've got the ammunition and the manpower, Samuel told himself. They can fight all they want. The day will be ours. Still, he'd be damned if he watched his men be killed without firing a shot himself.

  Bullets zipped around him in bright flashes, sending loose ammo cannisters and shell casings tumbling about am
id showers of sand.

  To Samuel’s left, a tree burst into a mass of splinters from a miscalculated enemy shell, leaving nothing behind but a blackened stump sticking from the earth, a jagged spear forged by a madman.

  Samuel dove to the ground as gunfire homed in on him. His vision still a haze, he pulled the slide on his rifle and aimed down its iron sight.

  Warsuits weren't the extent of the rebel strength. In the open entrance to the bunker, several black and gray-uniformed Industrialists held positions alongside either wall and behind crates and improvised metal shields, taking shots at whatever they could from their limited vantage.