Emergence (Eden's Root Trilogy Book 3)

by Rachel Fisher

“We already sent a bunch of colonists to join the Wall,” Sara said, ignoring Asher’s battle-addled brain.

  “Good, that’s good,” he said, nodding. “I think General Zelinski and Julius have the military actions under control. The main thing we have to do is shut down that gun and I think we’ll have them.”

  “So what are we waiting for then?” Sara said. “Let’s find that thing and shut it down.”

  BOOM!

  “Dammit,” Asher cursed, as dirt and snow pelted them. “I’m getting pretty sick of that thing. I just wish I could tell where it’s coming from. It seems like the blasts are coming straight down.”

  “Sara and I’ve been all over this side and the south, Ash,” Fi said. “It’s gotta be on the other side of the settlement, close to the armory.”

  “Ok, Sara, take a group and go find Sean. The last time I saw him he was helping the Seekers and protecting the wounded.”

  Fi’s heart leapt at the word “wounded,” but there was no time for fear, or leaping hearts. Sara selected eight colonists and was about to take off, when....

  BOOM!

  They hit the ground as the shell hit forty yards to the west, sending up a mushroom cloud of dirt and cracking a young pine in half. It fell, crushing a Truther cabin.

  Sara looked up first. “Ay, ay, Cap,” she yelled. “Let’s go troops. We have soldiers to protect!” She raced away with her group before Fi could say a thing. For a moment she was frozen, trapped by the image of Sara’s disappearing silhouette. They’d been together twenty-four hours a day for weeks…Sara was her other half now, practically.

  “Fi!” Asher’s voice roused her. “We have to take out that big gun.”

  She nodded, driving after her husband into the swirls of smoke. “Let’s go,” she called to José and others.

  ----------------- Sean ------------------

  Sean pushed forward, grunting, as his staff crushed the Lobo’s wrist. The Lobo howled and Sean swung around, feeling the crack as he connected with the man’s skull. The Lobo dropped and Sean stood over him, gasping for air. Every breath burned like fire from the tear gas and his eyes were streaming.

  “Sean!”

  He heard a woman’s voice and turned. His knees went weak as Sara appeared from the billowing smoke, a small group of colonists in tow.

  “Sara!” He rushed to her, embracing her and then pushing her back by the shoulders and shaking her. “What the hell are you doing here? You shouldn’t be here!”

  “Incoming!” a voice shouted.

  BOOM!

  They hit the ground as a chunk of cliff to the west exploded

  “That’s what I’m doing here, Sean,” Sara said. “Fi and I missed that gun. We have to shut it down.” She stood and raised her daggers to the smoky heavens and shouted. “You hear me, Carter? We’re going to shut you down!”

  Sean jumped up beside her. He knew that look. Sara was ready to hunt. “All right, then. Let’s find that thing and take it out.”

  She grinned. “Now you’re speaking my language, baby.”

  They plunged into the darkness to the east and made their way about twenty paces when the battle screams were pierced by a different sound. A repetitive, snarling, snapping…barking!

  Sean’s head spun and he spotted a golden glint in the firelight. Two shadows wrestled beside a body while a small girl screamed and beat at one of them.

  “Kill him, Titan!” she shrieked. “Kill him!”

  “This way!” Sean called, changing course. Sara and her flock followed, but he was racing ahead, leaping bodies.

  Little Hannah Lemly was there, laying protectively over Darryl’s body and screaming. “DON’T TOUCH HIM!”

  Titan had a Lobo pinned. He was whipping his head back and forth, his jaws locked on the man’s arm. The Lobo was screaming, but he reached for his gun with his free hand. Just as he grabbed the gun, Hannah lunged for him.

  “Hannah, no!” Sean screamed, sprinting.

  The gun bucked. POP! POP! POP! POP! Sean leapt in front of Hannah and felt a series of tugs in his side, like he was a hooked fish. He fell, confused, as fire lit him up.

  “SEAN!” Sara’s scream hung in the air.

  His hand reached for his side. What happened? He must have caught a branch…or a rope…was there a rope? His hand came back hot and wet. He stared down at his dark fingers in confusion.

  “No, Sean!” Sara scrambled to his side, holding him as he fell. Her eyes were wild.

  “Hannah?” he murmured, blinking. His eyelids were so heavy…so heavy. He blinked again and Sara faded. The smoke faded. The screams faded. It was peaceful. Quiet.

  Relieved, he let go.

  ------------- Fi ------------

  Fi’s group took off and she felt a new rush of adrenaline as they headed deep into the chaos of the battlefield. The “big gun” felt like her responsibility. Somehow, she and Sara had missed it. Unfortunately, crossing a battlefield wasn’t a simple run from point a to point b. It was an exhausting pick over burning terrain littered with the wounded and dead. They’d “lost” most of the colonists who’d joined her by now, sending them back with the injured on their backs, or slung between them like a hammock, one hand per limb.

  Now she was huddled with her remaining group over a fallen Army member, trying to protect him long enough for the medic to stanch his bleeding. A Lobo charged them and she stood. Bam! Bam! She squeezed off two rounds and the Lobo screamed and fell, clutching his bleeding leg. She stepped on his chest, her gun centered on his head. “Thank you for your surrender. Now shut up and stay still! If you move, I’ll kill you.” She turned back to the medic, who was soaked in sweat and blood. “You good, Rollins?”

  Rollins twisted the cord of the tourniquet, while Asher and José held the screaming soldier down. “Yes,” he started to say, when another Lobo raced in and tackled José.

  The Lobo tried to pin him, but José kicked out and flipped him onto his back. Asher’s blade was at his throat in an instant.

  “Surrender!” Asher hissed. “Be the big winner tonight.”

  The Lobo snarled and reached for his machete, before drowning in a bloody gurgle as Asher opened his throat. “Wrong answer,” he said. “You lose.”

  José shoved the Lobo’s body off his leg. “Thanks, man.”

  There was a strange sound in the distance, like a WHUMP.

  “Get down!” Asher yelled.

  They dropped just as a shell whistled overhead.

  BOOM!

  The ground rocked as the big gun found a target to the east. Asher sat up, squinting through the smoke. The sun had climbed higher and they could now make out people and buildings in the distance. “There!” he said. “I see it now. They mounted it on top of the storage shed, but on the lower level, behind the roof. That’s why we couldn’t see it before.”

  Fi followed his gaze and saw the gun and the shadows guarding it.

  “Let’s go, let’s go,” José said. “Time to finish this thing.”

  They ran, crouching, behind the south wall of the Main Cabin. When they reached the corner, they stopped and examined the target. Two crouching Lobos dropped a shell into a tube and then turned away.

  WHUMP! The shell shot from the tube and into the distance.

  “Mortars!” Asher cried. “I knew it was something like that. Some goddamned RPG or whatever. Shit.”

  In addition to the two Lobos operating the mortar, two others were positioned beneath. All four had guns.

  “How can we get close if they all have guns?” Fi said, frustrated. “I think I could get at least two of them before they could figure out our position, but then…”

  “…The others will mow us down,” José said. “But I think I could take out a couple from here if we could come up with a distraction.”

  Fi found it hard not to laugh. The air was filled with smoke and screams, and José thought what they needed was a distraction. And then it hit her. She’d forgotten that the Lobos still thought she was Marie. Even in her
current outfit, they would be confused for… Hopefully for long enough.

  “I’ve got it! Here.” She unstrapped her buck knife and handed it to Asher. “In about two minutes, they’ll all be looking to the east instead of the west. Make a break for the shed then, ok?”

  “Fi, what are you going to do?” Asher asked, grabbing her arm.

  “I think that ‘Marie’ deserves an encore, don’t you?” She kissed him on the cheek and turning, snuck her way from the Main Cabin to the armory. As she reached the corner of the building, she stared up at the mortar and its operators. Ok. Here goes nothing. She hid her gun behind her back and stepped out into the open.

  “Aaaaaaaauuugh! My baby! My baby! Where is he? They took him! Those animals!” She shrieked like her hair was on fire, and two of the Lobos left their posts. Though she didn’t look up, she was certain that the two on top of the shed had turned to her as well.

  “Marie? What’s wrong?” The two who’d broken away ran to her.

  “Stop right there,” she said quietly. Her .22 was trained right between the eyes of the closest Lobo. Their faces turned into matching round “O”s. One started to raise his pistol. “Don’t!” she warned, and he froze. “Don’t make me shoot you. I really do hate shooting people.”

  “Marie?”

  She snickered. Most Lobos weren’t the brightest. “Drop your weapons and kick them to me. Now!” They removed their weapons, cursing her. There was shouting behind them, followed by screams. One of the Lobos spun as a rock caught his skull and he fell off the shed. José’s next shot caught the second Lobo in the gut and Fi’s captives whirled in time to see José climb onto the shed and raise his slingshot in victory.

  “Now who’s got the big gun, pendejos? Nice job, Fi,” he said, smiling down at her “Now what do we do with the ones who surrendered?”

  “I’ve got that covered,” Asher said, waving a handful of cable ties. “Game over, boys. Time to have a seat, with your hands behind you, of course.”

  Fi smiled as Asher secured the wrists and ankles of her captives. He’d listened to her. Every kill he made was given a choice first, and each one who surrendered was a victory, as far as she was concerned. One less soul on her love’s conscience.

  The smoke in the air was clearing and the sun had risen high enough that the entire scene was now visible. A cheer rose from the Army of Eden when they saw José standing on top of the shed, the mortar array hoisted over his head. All over the settlement, soldiers, Army members, and determined Seekers were cleaning up the last Lobo combatants. As Asher had suspected, the mortar was the lynchpin. Any Lobos with fight left in them gave up when they saw that it had changed hands.

  “Now for the finale, Fi,” Asher said quietly, and she nodded. She waved goodbye to José.

  As she and Asher made their way across the settlement to the radio room, they passed the barrier line of the Army of Eden. She hadn’t given it proper credit in the darkness. The “Great Wall” formed a giant ring three people deep. They held hands firmly, man, woman, and teen alike, and Fi saw that the ring continued down the hillside and around the lake, where the Eden colonists formed its southern boundary. The huddled Truthers inside were a mixture of terror and outrage.

  “What do you want with us, Liars?” A man screamed into the passive face of a thin, older man wearing a headband with Eve in its center.

  The Army man didn’t blink. He didn’t budge. “We only ask that you listen.”

  “What?” the Truther wailed. “Why do you keep saying that? What does it mean?”

  “We only ask that you listen,” the Army member repeated, as did the women and men to his left and right.

  Suddenly, a voice rang out over the settlement’s loudspeakers. Carter’s voice. Only it wasn’t the warm honey to which Fi had grown accustomed. This was a frightened screech. “Let me go! This is an outrage…”

  The Truthers looked up at the speakers, their eyes wide.

  “Showtime,” Fi said, pulling Asher forward. “We have to hurry before they get too restless.” They headed toward Carter’s cabin and found a broad-shouldered older man in uniform, flanked by two soldiers, barring the door.

  “Mrs. Grey.” The older man saluted her, and held out his hand. “General Zelinski. It’s an honor to finally meet you.”

  Fi’s mouth dropped open. Though she’d known the General was here, meeting him in person snapped her imaginings into stark reality.

  “I believe there’s someone else who has yet to meet you both,” he said, with a glint in his eye. He opened the door behind him, and Carter’s protests burst forth as Fi slipped through.

  “I’m telling you, the followers won’t tolerate…” Carter stopped. “Marie?”

  Fi heard the name ring out over the loudspeakers behind them just before the General closed the door. She shivered. This day had been a long time coming.

  Revelations

  ------------- Fi ------------

  “Hello, Carter.”

  His mouth dropped open when he saw the gun in her hand. “Marie…What? Who?” His eyes widened as his gaze shifted to Asher and his sword. “You!” He turned back to her, his face twisting. “No! No, Marie! You’re a Truther. You can’t be one of the…Seeders.” His voice dripped with disgust. “How could you betray me like this? After I was so good to you and your sister? Wait, is she even your sister?”

  Fi saw his mind racing and let him work it out. Asher fingered the edge of his sword, his eyes narrowed.

  Carter Lawson’s eyebrows lifted. “The girl with the daggers. Of course. Tall. Dark hair. Sara’s the girl with the daggers, right?”

  Fi nodded and he slumped against the wall. “I can’t believe it.” His voice was plaintive for just a second, and then he straightened up again. “Well, it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter who you and your rabble really are. The followers are going to rise. They will defend me and the settlement. We can call upon people from far and wide, and believe me, we will rise.”

  Fi circled him, placing the radio array at her back. She took a quick look, just to be sure. It was definitely turned to broadcast. She slid one hand behind her back and turned the volume up. Perfect. “I don’t think so, Carter. You see…they’ll only rise if they believe in you, the head of the Truthers…the man who speaks Truth and not Lies, right?”

  Carter blanched to nearly the color of his beard. “They’ll never believe you. Everything that you say is lies, Marie.”

  His sneer sent a fresh, white-hot spike of rage through her. He thought he was soooo clever. Her .22 shook in her hand and she startled, surprised to find that she still gripped it. Without a thought, she raised her weapon, training it between his eyes as she’d imagined so many times.

  “Fi.”

  She ignored Asher’s warning. Truth be told? She didn’t even hear it. She didn’t hear a thing once she raised that weapon. It was just like her dream. It was all happening. “You know how many times I’ve imagined this moment, Carter?” She cocked her head. “Maybe you should do the math. How many days has it been since your men took our people…took my sister, away?”

  Carter was silent.

  “How many days?” she shouted.

  “Ninety-four,” he murmured.

  “Then I’ve imagined this moment ninety-four thousand times. You know how it always ends?”

  She strode forward and centered the barrel of her gun against Carter’s forehead and he squeezed his eyes shut.

  “Fi!” Asher’s warning snapped in the taut air.

  “Open your eyes!” she commanded.

  “Fi, don’t.”

  Her hands began to shake, desperate to pull the trigger. This sniveling, whimpering, lying sack of shit was the cause of all this trouble. People had lost their homes, lost their hope, lost their lives. He’d nearly taken her life. And Kiara’s. And Luke’s. She breathed hard, pressing the gun barrel into his skin. “I said, open your eyes, Carter.”

  Her enemy opened his eyes and stared at her. Yes, she thought. Just
like my dreams. But what she saw there wasn’t the fear she craved. Instead his eyes burned with hatred so raw it took her breath away. And she knew that he saw the exact same thing in hers.

  Someone has to be someone, Ash. The memory rushed through her, and she gasped and stepped back. Trembling, she holstered her weapon and closed her eyes. I choose to be someone, she thought. I choose life. “This is the part,” she said wearily, “where you realize that we’re the good guys.”

  “Which begs the question,” Asher jumped in, to her relief, “what are you, Dr. Lawson? You know, I find it interesting that you chose to keep the ‘Dr.’ part. I guess you thought it made you sound like someone who attended seminary. But you didn’t attend seminary, did you Dr. Lawson? You got that nice title when you got your Ph.D. in Psychology. Hey, wait a minute…isn’t that a science degree?”

  Carter squirmed, unsure.

  “That’s right, Carter,” Fi said, “we know that you have a degree in science, and we even have proof.”

  “So what?” He fired back, reddening. “So I once had the same ill-conceived notion as all of your precious colonists. I repented. I sought the Truth as God intended it.”

  “Really?” Asher interrupted. “And when did this amazing transformation take place?”

  “What?” Carter was taken off guard. “What do you mean ‘when’?”

  “He means,” Fi said, gritting her teeth, “when was it that you changed your mind, Dr. Lawson? What could possibly cause a man who worked for a decade toward a profession to suddenly change his mind?”

  Fi waited, watching her enemy’s flush deepen as he struggled for words. “It…I…You see…”

  “No, I see,” she interrupted. “In fact, I know exactly when you changed your mind. It was the day that you found out that Diaspora I had cut you from their colony!”

  “That’s not true!”

  “Oh, no? Then was it the day that you snuck back into the Diaspora colony and opened the seals, scattering your former colleague’s…your former friends’ lives, and hopes in the deadly breeze?” She was rolling now, her rage finding form in words.