Knight's Justice_Age Of Magic_A Kurtherian Gambit Series

by P. J. Cherubino

  Oscar pulled a lever and the driver’s cabin doors hissed shut. He shouted into the back compartment, where all the factory workers were jammed. “Is everyone in?”

  “Everyone who made it,” a voice shouted back.

  Gormer winced as he engaged the drivetrain by pulling back hard on a long lever coming up through the floorboards. The Porcupine lurched forward and he quickly reached for another lever that made the thing go fast or slow. He wanted it to go fast, so he pushed the lever forward as far as it would go.

  The metal-clad wheels spun and the Porcupine bolted forward faster than something that size had a right to move.

  “Pull back the throttle!” Oscar yelled as the Porcupine blasted through the corner of the warehouse.

  Gormer stomped the brake pedal with both feet and the Porcupine stopped inches from the covered walkway.

  “Reverse, reverse!” Oscar yelled. A clever system of mirrors aimed through slots in the doors and nose let Gormer see soldiers and guards coming at them from all directions. The images showed on magnified mirrors mounted on the forward bulkhead.

  It took him a few seconds to figure out that another ingenious set of mirrors let him see behind the vehicle. And when he looked, Liesel and Yarik were running across the courtyard.

  “Hang on!” Gormer bellowed. He let off the throttle and engaged the reverse gear.

  He eased off on the throttle this time, taking careful time to aim. The armored vehicle simply pushed its way through the other corner of the warehouse. Part of the roof collapsed on it, but the impact didn’t disturb the machine at all.

  The passengers in the back screamed at the crash.

  Ting! Ting! Ting-ting-ting! The sound battered the hull like some kind of demonic rain.

  “They’re shooting at us!” Oscar hollered.

  “Just calm down,” Gormer said slowly, concentrating hard. Determined to hit his target, he quickly learned how to steer in reverse. The wheel felt perfectly natural in his hands. “Here we go!” He had a clear shot, so he threw the throttle halfway forward.

  There was a blood-curdling scream and a soft bump as the Porcupine found its first victim. Gormer turned to the forward-facing image mirror to see Liesel waving her hands above her head and wailing. The crushed body of her father lay at her feet.

  He smiled as he casually put the metal monster in gear again and eased the throttle forward. Liesel had her rifle in hand again, but she didn’t aim it. Instead, she worked some controls at the side—and she wasn’t getting out of the way.

  “Oh,” Gormer said, “that doesn’t look good.” His eyes turned white and he saw what she had in mind.

  Gormer whipped the wheel to the right just as Liesel’s shot put a big glowing orange hole in the driver’s cabin above his head. His hair was singed and his eyebrows were gone.

  “Wow!” he screeched, laughing like a madman. Oscar’s face was a caricature of fear, which only made Gormer laugh harder as the Porcupine mowed down soldiers who had no concept of how fast and far a motorized vehicle could move.

  The tank merely shook a little when it plowed through the keep doors that some guards were foolishly trying to close. He watched their bodies slam to the ground in his rear-view mirror.

  “You got anything to fix this hole with, Oscar?” Gormer asked.

  Oscar thought for a moment. “You know, I just might. I remember them talking about repair kits underneath, but we’ll have to stop to do it.”

  “That’s not going to happen,” Gormer growled. He pounded on the bulkhead between the driver cabin and the rear compartment. “Can you hear me back there?”

  “Yes!” someone shouted.

  “Do you have weapons back there?”

  “We have…” the voice answered. “A lot. A whole lot!”

  “Are you ready to shoot some dickwhistles who desperately need it?”

  “Yes!” many voices shouted back.

  “Is there a way to get from this cabin to the back?”

  “Not from here,” Oscar answered, then pulled open the door and climbed out.

  “Are you crazy?” Gormer bellowed.

  Oscar’s head appeared upside down from the top of the door frame. “You’re asking me if I’m crazy?” He disappeared again.

  Gormer drove the Porcupine across a fallow field and out onto the toll road. He hoped he was going the right way. He was pretty sure he was.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  Battle

  Astrid could see over the heads of the staggered columns of soldiers who were hunkered down behind their shields. The enemy was close, but they needed them to get closer.

  Astrid had seen the rifles fire so she knew they were in range. It felt like the enemy wanted the advantage as much as she did. It looked as if they also wanted this to be over quickly.

  She used her spyglass to check the crossbow soldiers in the hills and realized the rise wouldn’t give them as much an advantage as she had thought. The enemy was moving forward carefully, deliberately, and inevitably.

  It was time. She raised her hand above her head and shouted, “Flanks, fire at will!”

  The order took nearly a minute to travel down the designated relays, who were the first charges of each unit. She hoped the order wasn’t premature. She guessed that the enemy was just within range.

  She was right. The first fusillade rose into the air, hung there like a cloud for a moment, and hurtled back down to the ground. She wasn't close enough to hear the crossbows’ sounds, but she was close enough to hear the screams when the bolts pierced heads, arms, and chests.

  It was an ugly business that went on for round after round. The enemy kept marching forward even as their ranks were decimated.

  Finally some unheard leader gave the order and the rifle troops took a knee despite the withering rain of bolts. Every enemy who fell was replaced by another. There were so many.

  “Take cover!” Astrid bellowed. The troops around her pulled their shields in tight to their bodies and waited.

  Hundreds of thunderclaps sounded at once and an instant later her horse screamed. The smell of burnt hair assaulted her nostrils; there was now a black hole in the mare’s shoulder.

  Astrid’s eyes turned black, then crackled with blue electricity as the Well filled her. The impacts of the rifle bolts hit her all at once.

  Of course they would aim for her.

  She was weightless. More bolts hit her as she flew, blue flashes blinding. The pain of broken ribs and arm bones was nothing compared to the rage that coursed through her. The Well healed her injuries before she hit the ground running.

  The thunderclaps of magitech rifles continued to sound and now hundreds of her soldiers lay dead or dying on the ground. They could withstand one or two hits on the shields, but once they were off-balance the bolts of energy took heads, arms, legs, and feet.

  People were screaming as Astrid charged forward with her rope dart whirling above her head. She jumped to avoid the dead and injured as she ran. Her time in the air increased as she picked up speed and blue sparks crackled between her feet and the ground.

  Astrid smiled and twirled the rope dart above her head faster than ever before. When the time was right, she swung it forward. The dart made a thunderclap of its own as its momentum carried her over the heads of the crowd.

  Astrid broke enemy bodies when she crashed into them on the way back down. She didn’t know how many; she only knew that she was among them when she rolled across the ground and ended up on her feet again.

  She plowed her way through the rifle-wielding troops to get to the Movers. She was after the head of the beast. Take out their leaders and end this was the fevered mantra in her head. Magitech bolts simply stung her and made her skin glow brighter blue.

  The first Mover she encountered hit her with a touchless strike across the forehead.

  “Don’t get personal!” Astrid bellowed, although hits to the face were always personal. It cost the Mover her life. Astrid tore off her arm with the rope dart, then
snapped her neck with a forearm.

  Another Mover slashed at her with a sword that broke on her forearm as she blocked the strike. His look of shock and horror was a mere flash in her mind as she ended his life, then went on to the next Mover.

  She wasn’t sure how much time had passed, but Vinnie was there beside her, and Moxy too. Tarkon was late to the fight, but he took out Movers by conjuring fire into his pistols again and again.

  The Dregs cleared the way for the regular troops, who were now fighting hand-to-hand. Magitech rifles weren’t much good up close, so those who clung to them wound up dead in a hurry.

  Still, it was not enough. A battle this big was a numbers game, and Astrid simply didn’t have enough. She couldn’t gain ground. The enemy simply poured in to close the gaps she and the Core Dregs made.

  Then a red flash immolated the body of a Mover who was pounding on Astrid with touchless strikes. Someone close cut fighters down with a red-hot sword. Jiri? A compact bearded muscular man whirled through the crowd, cutting and slashing.

  More people with flaming swords pushed forward, and as the enemy fell back she began to see more allies beside her than hostiles.

  In the frenzy, Astrid had no idea how long it had been. It didn’t matter. This was the time of truth, and she would only stop when she achieved death or victory. The battle was an impressionistic blur of blood, screams, and magical energy.

  She was conscious of only killing until one voice rose up over the thinning crowd.

  “Astrid!” a woman’s voice shouted. She was a Mover, and there were two first lieutenants beside her.

  One of them had a burned face. They stood apart from the battle that raged behind Astrid, who stepped forward to meet them.

  “Hello again, Wilfred!” Astrid shouted. She broke an attacking Mover who tried to intercept her because he thought she wasn’t paying attention over her knee. “I haven’t had the displeasure of meeting the other two of you.”

  “My name is Hagan,” the Mover said. “And this is Morgon.” She pointed to the tall muscular man.

  “Wilfred, I never thought I’d face you again. Not that there’s much there to face anymore.” Astrid wasn’t above taunting when the moment was right, and that one she just couldn’t resist.

  Wilfred’s face twisted into a portrait of rage. He brought his hands up in an instant and blasted Astrid with everything he had. The Well energy that rose up to counter made her ears ring and her nose bleed, and a bright blue flash momentarily blinded everyone within fifty feet.

  Astrid took a knee when the blast hit and her left foot dug into the ground. “My turn,” she growled, then jumped forward so fast the air where she’d stood snapped back onto itself.

  Her shoulder splintered his ribs and pulled his spine apart; he was dead before he hit the ground. Around them, the battle raged as the Dregs fought hard.

  “It’s over,” Astrid shouted. “Drop your weapons and leave this place forever. This is your last chance.”

  Hagan just smiled. “Are you sure about that?”

  That was when Astrid became aware of a rumbling sound. Within the rumbling, there was clattering and a high-pitched whine.

  Two black oblong objects on wheels barreled down the toll road toward them. While Astrid was momentarily distracted, both Movers hit her with touchless strikes that sent her flying.

  What Kind of Chase is This?

  “They’re behind us!” Oscar shouted. He had opened the doors again.

  Gormer knew there was another Porcupine, but he hadn’t thought about it in his rush to get away and hopefully get into the fight before it was too late. Liesel, however, did think about it. She had loaded up the vehicle with as many troops as she could and taken off after them. Gormer could feel her seething hatred and rage behind them.

  “Is it me or is their Porcupine much faster than ours?”

  “You’re definitely not faster,” Oscar answered. “The thing behind us might be, though.”

  Gormer couldn’t tell if he was being facetious.

  “Why did I have to rescue a smartass?” he shouted, though he knew Oscar couldn’t hear him.

  The man just would not sit still. He kept climbing out onto the roof of the vehicle with rifles. He had tied two of them together so he could fire both at once—which seemed to work, since the pursuing Porcupine repeatedly pulled to the side of the toll road to avoid well-placed blasts. Still, he was pretty sure Oscar had completely lost his mind.

  The former assembly-line workers also seemed to be getting off some pretty good shots. The problem was that Liesel’s rifle could hit them with enough strength to do real damage. The hole in the metal above his head spoke to that. He had no idea if she had another shot like that left in her rifle. Maybe she was saving it for one decisive blast.

  Now crazy Oscar was back in the cab, wild-eyed, sweating, and spattered with mud. The Porcupine was blasting through puddles in the road, sending spumes of mucky water well over the roof line.

  “Try not to hit any more puddles,” he said, oddly calm for the look on his face.

  To give Oscar a nasty look, Gormer took his eyes off the forward image mirrors that didn’t really work much anymore because of the mud. Shit. He flipped the mirrors up, then threw a lever that opened two tiny windows in the nose that let him see very little of the road ahead. Oscar climbed out once again.

  “Stop doing that!” Gormer shouted as the Porcupine hurtled down the road.

  They were very near the battle now. He could see flashes of blue and red. Gormer pushed forward on the throttle lever and just hoped Oscar could hang on. Thankfully the increased speed brought him back in.

  Oscar threw himself down onto the hard wooden bench and finally closed the doors.

  “You’re getting mud in here,” Gormer said, trying to keep the massive wheeled thing on the road. Why did he care about mud in the driver’s cabin? He had no idea why he’d said that. Things were just weird.

  Speed seemed to make the steering much lighter. The vehicle drifted all over the road.

  “Going too fast to hang on up there.”

  That was when Gormer noticed something. “Where are your rifles?”

  “One of them started smoking and shooting sparks, so I threw it. It exploded”

  “What?”

  “Yeah. I think if you fire them too much something happens… I guess.” He shrugged nonchalantly. “I threw it at them, but it blew up too far away.”

  The battle was coming up fast and Gormer could see details. Supply wagons blocked the road and troops waited behind the lines for their turn to fight or die. He had a moment to decide whether to pull back on the throttle to slow down or just keep going.

  He kept going.

  The passengers in the back screamed as the Porcupine lurched and jumped. Wooden cargo wagons turned into fragile playthings destroyed by a careless child. The contents of those wagons flew everywhere, along with the bodies of the soldiers who got in the way of the debris.

  Gormer stopped trying to fight the steering wheel that had nearly broken his wrists and managed to pull back the throttle, but the Porcupine still spun around once, then halfway around again to end up facing its sister. Liesel had applied the brakes in time, and now the doors of her vehicle sprang open and she hopped down calmly.

  Gormer still had his rifle. He’d managed to keep it on the seat beside him. Oscar saw it after he looked through the small forward window slit. He let out a wild-animal scream and yanked the door-opener levers.

  He opened all the doors and bellowed, “There she is! That bitch who would have worked us all to death!”

  The commotion of rushing feet filled the driver’s cabin like the drumming of insane percussionists. Liesel was no longer calm. She tried to get off a shot, but ended up running away as at least twenty angry former slave workers blasted away at her with the very rifles she had forced them to build.

  “Gotta love the irony,” Gormer remarked. The smile was agonizing given his swollen face, but he couldn
’t help it.

  Blue flashes filled the cabin and light and sparks flew from the open doors as magitech rifle bolts hit.

  Looks like they regrouped, Gormer thought. He tried to get the doors closed, but the lever was jammed. He planted a throwing knife in the forehead of a soldier who tried to climb into the cabin.

  The tiny forward windows were enough to see that blind rage and adrenaline were not enough for the untrained factory workers to prevail. They ended up hiding behind the other Porcupine as soldiers advanced on them.

  “Shit!” Gormer exclaimed, then put the thing into gear and headed for them.

  Some crowded into the cabin and the rest jumped in the back.

  “Is that everyone?” Gormer shouted.

  “Yes!” Oscar was back in the cab, sandwiched between two women. He closed the back doors.

  “Hang on!” Gormer screamed. “It’s going to get bumpy!”

  He pushed the throttle forward halfway and the Porcupine surged into battle again.

  A few seconds later somebody yelled, “She’s behind us again!”

  “Damn it,” Oscar exclaimed. “That woman just won’t die!”

  “Hey, Oscar?” Gormer asked as he swerved through the enemy army. “You remember when I first met you and you thought you were going crazy?”

  “Yeah,” Oscar shouted over the crashing calamity all around them.

  “Well, now you really are fucking crazy.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  Battle, Part 2

  Astrid tumbled to the ground after hanging in the air for what seemed like minutes, then ran back to where she had stood against Hagan and Morgon. The Movers were nowhere to be found. She killed a few unfortunate lower-ranking Movers who tried group attacks to stop her; they were merely distractions.

  The rumbling and loud metallic sounds grew disturbingly close and she remembered the strange vehicles coming down the road. When she turned toward the sound, she discovered two huge wheeled vehicles bearing down on her.

  She was filled with dread, realizing that they had more of those self-propelled weapons. Then she realized that one of them was deliberately running down enemy soldiers.