“I'm ready to do,” Tardo replied, “and ready to die.”
32 – THRESHOLD
The Hometaker drove along the cliff road at the top of the Dune Burrows, making straight for the Rift, while the battle continued to rage in the plains down below.
They came within firing distance, and Brooklyn parked the vehicle.
“It is time,” he said. His finger hovered over the button.
Suddenly Lorelai struck him on the back of the neck with the butt of her gun, knocking him out. He slumped down and fell from his seat.
“What are you doing?” Jacob cried.
“Back away!” she responded, aiming the gun at him. “All of you, out!”
Alex needed no encouragement. He leapt outside, pulling Whistler out with him. Jacob stayed behind.
“I don't understand,” he said.
“This plan is a mistake,” she replied. “If you topple him, who will help us find the cure?”
“We can help you.”
She shook her head. “I wish it was that easy, but he's our only chance.”
“So, what, you're just going to let this war keep on going?”
She bit her lip. Her eyes watered. “You don't know what it's like, that disease.”
“Then tell me.”
“I can't. I can't begin to describe what it's like, to see someone you love fall apart, until there's nothing left of them. To have to lie to them to tell them they'll be okay, that they'll get better, that the pain will go away. He promised us a cure, Jacob, and when we ran out of iron in Mes Marana, and there was not enough Hope left to treat my son, I promised him I would find a cure. I didn't find it in time for him, but I still have to look. It's why I came here as a Pilgrim, and why I have to see this through.”
“And what if it doesn't end like you thought it would?”
“Well,” she said with a sigh, “it'll end, at least.”
“I thought you were supposed to save people, not hurt them.”
“I'm trying, Jacob.”
“And what if he's not? I said it before back in Blackout. What if he's not looking for a cure? What if that's just to string you all along, keep you placated while he takes over another world?”
“But what if he is looking,” she replied. “I can't take that risk. He's far from perfect, but he's the best chance we've got. If anyone can find this cure, it's him. I know he's looking. He has to be.”
“Why?”
“Because he's got it too.”
“He looks fine to me.”
“Many of us look fine, but we're dying all the same.”
“You know I have to stop you,” Jacob said.
“I was hoping you wouldn't say that. I don't want to hurt you, Jacob.”
“Well, too late for that. You know I kind of trust you.”
“I'm sorry, Jacob, but you've got to put yourself in my shoes. Now, go. Get out.”
He would not budge.
“Please, Jacob. I will shoot you. I don't want to, but I will. I've been trained to do it. It's in my blood.”
“Come on, Jacob!” Whistler called from outside.
“Don't be a hero,” Alex added.
A year ago, he was anything but a hero. Now, he felt like he did not have a choice.
He reached for the firing button and slammed it down, only to grimace as she fired a bullet at his hand. The missile launched, zooming across the sky, while Jacob pulled his bloodied hand back, stifling a scream. She kicked him in the chest, knocking him out of the vehicle, just as the missile struck the Rift and exploded, starting a chain reaction that began to widen the portal.
“You fool!” she roared, and he prepared for another bullet, but she did not fire.
The doorway to the other world continued to open, until finally it was big and close enough to step through from the highest pinnacle of the Dune Burrows, that same plateau where the Iron Emperor sat in his open-top warwagon, watching the battle unfold. His attention was now seized by the Hometaker and the Rift. He issued orders to his commanders, and they got inside the warwagon and drove through the portal.
“Haven't you wondered what you'll find?” Jacob shouted up at Lorelai, who still kept the gun pointed towards him.
She looked at him and then at the Rift, and set the vehicle in motion. Jacob clambered up and grabbed a hold of the side of it, but fell off a few feet further up as she gained speed. Regime soldiers fired upon the missile launcher, but she broke through all the barriers, until she passed through the final one of them all and entered her home world for the first time in fifteen years.
33 – A GAME OF GENERALS
Rommond's landship platoon continued its advance, with the general's own vehicle in the lead.
“It looks like they have the carrier,” the gunner said.
“That doesn't matter,” Rommond replied. “Brooklyn's not in that one.” He had seen the missile launcher racing across the highest cliff of the Dune Burrows to the dwindling doorway to the maran realm. “We need to keep this army here, away from the Rift.”
“What about the others?”
“They'll have manage without us.”
Rommond picked up the radio microphone. They were built into all the landships, but seldom used, thanks to the Regime's constant listening. Radio was one of the Regime's great successes, helping them organise, aiding their surveillance and propaganda. He hoped, in time, it would be their downfall.
“Desert Hawk here,” he spoke into the microphone. “Formation Arrowpoint.”
Outside, the platoon shifted until they formed an arrow, with Rommond being the stabbing top. It was a classic formation, tried and tested, a kind of fallback in uncertain times. It would strike hard in the centre, pushing straight through, diving the enemy in two. It had the power to break morale, to route forces, to force surrender, but only if the enemy was not prepared for it.
* * *
The combined forces of Ertalak and Leadman were initially assembled in a long strip, but on hearing Rommond's voice over the radio, they knew exactly how the Resistance leader would deploy, giving them time to react in kind. Even before they saw the finished product of Rommond's formation, Ertalak issued his counter with Formation Arrowshield, a rectangular block in the centre, designed to take the brunt of the central push, to, as it were, blunt the tip of the arrow. They would advance as well, shield pushing out to meet arrow, to blunt it all the quicker.
Ertalak laughed. “You do know we're listening, right?” he called into the radio, picking the frequency the Regime spies knew the Resistance used.
There was no reply for a moment, and Ertalak imagined that Rommond was panicking. He hoped to hear his voice, to hear that waver, that hint of doubt. When the enemy general eventually answered, just as the arrow point was coming close enough to strike, there was none.
“I'm counting on it,” Rommond replied, as assured as ever.
Ertalak then felt a moment of doubt of his own, the kind other general had told him about when they faced him on the battlefield, and a feeling he was glad he had never felt, thanks to his role as the “Stay-at-home Strategist.” Now it was his turn, and he only hoped that Rommond's apparent confidence was just a bluff.
Then, as the turrets readied for their first tremendous volley, Rommond's platoon suddenly split apart. The arrow vanished into the haft, and the haft itself divided in two, spreading out wide enough for the opposing force to drive straight through. All of Ertalak's first turret shots missed, hitting the empty air between, and the force of their acceleration kept them moving through, even as Rommond's forces halted and turned on the spot, with Brooklyn's enhancements making them turn much more quickly than their Regime equivalents.
The end result, with Ertalak could barely comprehend, for he was in the thick of it, was two strips of landships on either side, pointing in, and Ertalak and Leadman's forces driving
straight down the middle of it, every single one of them showing their vulnerable sides, and not a single one of their turrets pointing at an enemy vessels. They could not even stop or turn, for the only unblocked path was the route ahead, that tunnel of death they had driven straight into.
Then Rommond's platoons fired. Shells tore through the Regime landships, incapacitating them, starting fires and boring holes. The path ahead became even more deadly, for landships in the middle now crashed into the stalled vessels of their comrades, and then those behind them, until there was a pileup of vehicles, and others swerving and dodging, their frantic gunners falling around inside. A few of them managed to turn their turrets to make a paltry answering shot, but few of Rommond's landships fell, and when they did, there was another behind it, and it drove forward, pushing the ruined hull into the already narrowing path of the Regime forces, before sending yet another round of turret fire into the fray.
Ertalak was caught amongst it all. He barked to his lieutenants, screamed into the radio, and pleaded to whatever god he prayed to. No amount of shifting gears or firing of sponson guns would help. He too went up in the blaze that consumed his vehicle.
The few landships at the rear of the shield formation who had not yet advanced into the tunnel turned in place and tried to flee. One of these was Leadman, in his distinctive bulldozer landship. It was then that Rommond broke off from his group with a handful of others and began their chase. They followed them out into the desert, and around high stone formations in this obstacle-ridden part of the world.
At one point it seemed they lost them, for they turned sharply around the edge of a plateau. When Rommond pursued, he was caught off guard, for Leadman had stopped fleeing and was parked there, ready to face him. He advanced, crashing into the side of Rommond's landship, knocking it to its side. The other Resistance landships fired on it, while the remaining Regime vehicles continued their flight from battle. Though punctured by gunfire, Leadman backed up and charged again, turning Rommond's landship onto its roof. He was about to come in again when a final shell from a turret tore the tracks off one side and set the bulldozer landship alight.
As Rommond broke free through the escape hatch of his vehicle, Leadman leapt out of his own and made a dash into the desert.
“Really?” Rommond called after him, before lining up a shot. He could have went for the head or the heart, but he chose the leg. Leadman slumped into the sand with a cry.
Rommond strolled out after him, finding the other general attempting to crawl through the desert.
“It's a long way back to Copperfort,” Rommond said.
Leadman halted and rolled onto his back. “Damn you, Rommond.”
“Damn me? You're the one who sold your soul to the Devil.”
“You were never going to honour our agreement.”
“Honour?” Rommond asked. “You shouldn't use words you don't understand.”
“You could have won this war with my help.”
Rommond scoffed. “You could have been a decent person, but this is how the dice fall. You can't keep re-rolling if you don't like the result.”
“My choice kept the citizens of Copperfort safe for years.”
“And my choice,” Rommond said, as he pointed his gun, “will keep them safe for many years to come.”
34 – GO BIG ...
The battle continued in the Dune Burrows, and the Behemoths finally joined the fray. Their great limbs stomped on landships, and their great tracks flattened others like a steamroller. Inside their angular hull, machine gunners prepped their weapons, and then unleashed the sputtering gunfire through small hatches dotted along the surface. The chassis of many Resistance landships were buckled and then rent, but it was the exposed flesh of the Dust Riders, Oxen clan, Copper Vixens, and even the Iron Guard that took the brunt of the bullets.
Whatever good the Resistance forces and its many reinforcements had done on the battlefield, halting the landships and Moving Castles of the enemy, was undone in moments once the Behemoths arrived. These monsters of machines could not be halted or chased away, and what little damage was done to them with turret fire was multiplied a thousand times in reverse.
All looked grim for the Resistance, but they had another ally in the Coilhunter that the Regime had rarely faced before.
Nox sped along the battlefield in his monowheel, aiming straight for the nearest Behemoth, dodging gunfire, evading blasts, even narrowly missing exploding shrapnel and tumbling vehicles. He zig-zagged between the iron ruins, wound his way through spreading fires, and fired one of his many rifles to clear out some other obstacle, be it metal or flesh.
He aimed straight for a half-submerged Regime landship that had been caught in the Behemoth's path. Its nose was buried in the sand, as if to hide from the battle, and its rear stood sky-high, providing the Coilhunter a makeshift metal ramp, which he rolled up and over with ease. The monowheel sailed high, just high enough to land on the thin platform extending around the middle of the Behemoth's hull. He kept rolling, swaying a little on the edge, and fired through the open hatches as he passed them, casting aside an empty rifle for another not yet emptied.
Then the Behemoth shook, even more violently than it did before, and the hull lifted up a little, seemed to seize in place, then lifted suddenly again. Then it began to turn. Nox was caught off guard, and the monowheel slipped off the edge. He had just enough time to leap from the seat, grasping the edge of the platform as his vehicle fell into the sand.
He clambered up, finding Regime soldiers coming out of doorways to tackle him, only for him to throw them off with ease. He heard a loud ping behind him as a bullet bounced off the metal plating on the guitar strapped to his back. He did not even glance over his shoulder, just rested the barrel of his pistol on his shoulder and fired at the attacker behind him. He heard the man's cry, and his slipping boot, and his thud into the sand below.
Then the fire came. Grates opened at various points on the Behemoth, and flamethrowers erupted through. These cast jets far longer than the fire-flingers who worked on foot, for the furnaces of the Behemoth were huge, and dozens of slaves laboured and sweat inside to keep them burning. Tankards of oil were piled high inside, fuelling the many flashing flames outside.
Nox stepped back as he neared one of these grates, feeling the hot air, and shielding his eyes from the blinding burst of flame. He waited for a moment until the jet ceased, then raced across just in time before the next blast came. His long coat was edged with embers, and his eyes glittered with the reflection of the fire.
He came to another burning grate, but this one seemed to be fuelled forever, and Nox grew impatient. Yet before he could do anything, the hull of the Behemoth shook again and began its full rotation. The platform he stood upon was not part of this movement, so he did not move with the fire. The fire came towards him. The Coilhunter had just enough time to back away from the approaching flames, only to feel the heat of the vent behind him. He turned and was caught between the two shifting flamethrowers, taking a step forward here to avoid the one behind him, and trying not to step into the one ahead. He could have kept this up for some time, but as the hull turned, he found the ledge he was on growing slimmer all the time.
“Sorry, guys,” he said, taking the last remaining orb from his belt and holding it up to his face. Then he lobbed it towards the belching fire, and it cracked open, producing a dozen clockwork butterflies. Though the flames caught them, and some tumbled down like tiny comets, the others dived through grating, sensing the movement of the soldiers inside. They released their tiny vats of noxious gas, knocking out the makers of the flame.
Yet the fire still came behind him, and he had no more pets to summon. He took his neckerchief and wrapped it around his right gloved hand, before grasping the scalding grate with it and reefing it out of its socket. It clanged off a landship below, and he clanged off the metal floor inside the small flamethrower room
when he dived inside.
He stood up, did not dust himself off, but took off the wrapping and glove from his hand, revealing the tender red beneath. It was lucky that was not his good hand. He could shoot just as well with both.
He stepped over the slumbering bodies of the soldiers, and stepped on the fallen remains of a clockwork butterfly, hearing the crunch of its little cogs. He knew he could have done with more of them, but he would have to content himself with unmaking soldiers instead.
The interior of the Behemoth was bleak. The light was dim, and everything looked like black or grey metal. It made it difficult to be stealthy, as his boots clanged as he walked. The Regime must have heard him, because they came out of their rooms in force.
As he passed one opening door, he grabbed the soldier that emerged in a headlock, while firing with his pistol into the room, then down the corridor at two more men coming out of a chamber further to the right. He snapped the man's neck, then let him drop to the ground as he continued his stroll through.
The thuds of his boots summoned more, and then the cries and shouts and gunshots did the rest. Soldiers came out by the dozen, and half of them fell to gunfire, and the other half became a pile of broken bones in meat sacks when he finished the battle with his fists.
He emerged into a larger room, which looked like the centre of the Behemoth. Railings extended up three levels overhead, and soldiers trotted across them, racing to their stations as the battle continued to wage outside. Some of them were given new stations: standing at the edge of the rails with machine guns pointed at him.
He swiftly pulled the guitar from his back, holding it up before him, where the metal plating on the back acted as a shield. The bullets pelted off it, bouncing off in all directions. He placed the barrel of his pistol between the curve and lined up a shot, and then another, taking out the machine gunners one by one, with not a bullet wasted, while theirs littered the ground around him.
Hometaker: A Steampunk Dystopian Action Adventure (The Great Iron War, Book 6) Page 14
