Jack Strong and the Last Battle
Book 5 of The Jack Strong Chronicles
By Heys Wolfenden
Copyright 2019
Contents
Jack Strong and the Last Battle
Previous Titles
Prologue One
Prologue Two
Chapter One: The Scourge
Chapter Two: Gladiator
Chapter Three: Decimation
Chapter Four: Reign of Terror
Chapter Five: Downfall
Chapter Six: Inferno
Chapter Seven: Subterranean Homesick Blues
Chapter Eight: Butcher’s Bill
Chapter Nine: Fight or Flight
Chapter Ten: Awakening
Chapter Eleven: Paths of Glory
Chapter Twelve: Blood Brothers
Chapter Thirteen: The Watcher
Chapter Fourteen: The Last Living Boy in the Universe
Chapter Fifteen: Old Friends, New Horizons
Chapter Sixteen: Putting the Band Back Together
Chapter Seventeen: Payback
Chapter Eighteen: Judgement Day
Chapter Nineteen: Fight or Flight
Chapter Twenty: Space Storm
Chapter Twenty-One: Storming the Gates
Chapter Twenty-Two: Awakening
Chapter Twenty-Three: Reunion
Chapter Twenty-Four: Executive Decision
Chapter Twenty-Five: Home Truths
Chapter Twenty-Six: New Avenues
Chapter Twenty-Seven: The Pentagon
Chapter Twenty-Eight: Arlington
Chapter Twenty-Nine: New Realities
Chapter Thirty: War Games
Chapter Thirty-One: Walls
Chapter Thirty-Two: The Hunt
Chapter Thirty-Three: Last Supper
Chapter Thirty-Four: Initial Maneuvers
Chapter Thirty-Five: The Battle for Pluto
Chapter Thirty-Six: Deception Point
Chapter Thirty-Seven: Between Dark Matter and a Hard Place
Chapter Thirty-Eight: A Way Out
Chapter Thirty-Nine: Battlefield Earth
Chapter Forty: Ground Zero
Chapter Forty-One: The Black Sludge
Chapter Forty-Two: Terms of Surrender
Chapter Forty-Three: End Game
Chapter Forty-Four: Hidden Dangers
Chapter Forty-Five: Last Goodbyes
Chapter Forty-Six: Aftershocks
Chapter Forty-Seven: Last Embers
Chapter Forty-Eight: Last Rites
Chapter Forty-Nine: The Last Battle
Epilogue
Previous Titles
Jack Strong and the Red Giant
Jack Strong and the Prisoner of Haa’drath
Jack Strong in Dreamland
Jack Strong: Dark Matter
Prologue One
The girl slipped on something wet. What looked like a river of gold coated her hands, spacesuit. Blood, she realised.
A knot of arms lifted her to her feet. The ground shook violently. She heard a loud popping sound, followed by the dull screech of tearing metal. The lighting in the corridor flickered intermittently; from somewhere far off she could hear screams, moans.
She glanced through the viewing screen to her left. A thousand glittering flowers filled her vision. Each one of them an exploding starship.
A loud popping sound went off behind her and suddenly she was falling again, the space station shaking like a child’s rattle. Fewer hands than before dragged her back up, their pace quicker now, more insistent. Then there was another explosion, followed by another and another. She could smell smoke, flames danced in front of her vision.
And then she saw it. A silver tear dangling in space.
So small…
And yet so great, said a voice that echoed in her mind.
The responsibility is hers now…
No. It is theirs.
Another explosion. Flames licked at her skin, coughing now. More screams. The sound of running feet everywhere.
But I don’t want to leave you… my home…
Is gone, said her father, as a brilliant white light filled the space around them.
What was that?
The End…
She glanced through the view screen as a hail of black spears skewered their fleet of ships. Explosions pierced the vacuum, sparks spitting like Roman candles.
Her mind swirled with a billion panicked voices for a few brief moments and then were gone. She slumped to the floor, defeated, empty. Dead, so many dead… The last of her family, of her people… burning.
When the girl opened her eyes again she was somewhere else… silver flooded her vision.
The spaceship…
Yes, said her father. It’s time…
You remember the parameters? said her father a little quicker than before.
She nodded her head feebly. She thought that she would be braver than this, stronger, more adventurous. How little we truly know of ourselves…
List them. Weaker now.
To respect the sovereignty of the crew.
To put their lives before my own.
To remain impartial no matter the cost.
To take no unilateral actions that would jeopardise the first three rules.
To preserve my own life only in the absence of the crew.
It’s time, said a woman’s voice, streams of gold streaking down her face.
Mother…
But not for her. Her father nodded, shook his head. She remembered that image for the rest of her life.
She opened her mind to say something else, to tell them that she loved them, missed them. But suddenly she was drifting away through the blackness of space, her mother, father and the space station disappearing in a swirl of flames. Then a bright orb appeared before her, surrounding her, encompassing her vision, filling her pores with light and energy and now circuits, systems, engines.
R’lan felt her heart, lung, brains disappear from the three-dimensional universe. A torrent of electricity and data surged through her.
Fused.
Prologue Two
The man started to scream, yell. The swirl of lights was drifting away, skimming across the ice. For a half a heartbeat it flicked back his way, only to peter out amongst the clouds.
Darkness.
The blizzard seemed colder now, more raw. Snowflakes raked at his eyes, nose; his hands went numb, blood vessels freezing one by one.
Suddenly the sky exploded with light again and Sanctuary once more came into view. It looked like one of the Star Trees on New Year’s Eve. Before the ice came and murdered them all. Like so many things…
He raised his head and his one good hand, begging it to see him, to rescue him… to rescue them all.
A shadow obscured his vision.
He was saved. Finally. Thomy and Tomen too.
He tried to rise, couldn’t. His limbs were on fire, infection flaring where the ice bears had mauled him. Behind the figure Sanctuary was rising-up into the night sky, its exhaust vents trailing behind it like a chain of glitterworms. In a flash it was gone. No…
He looked up into the black gulf. He saw its skin then for the first time, it looked like one of the old shield volcanoes, with streams of lava rippling down its rocky surface. Before they were buried under the ice. He looked into its molten eyes; ash, pumice flaking off its cheekbones.
Death came for him.
Chapter One: The Scourge
The space station exploded in a bloom of fire.
Molten metal was flung in every direction, the sun reflecting off a blizzard of shattered glass.
For half a second Vyleria saw a scarred pink face, a
rms waving in terror, before its eyes crumbled and its skin turned as black as the vacuum around it. Others followed. She felt sick, nauseous. There had been two hundred people on that space station. How many more were going to die?
A satellite exploded next, followed by a relay station, then one of the orbiting space hotels. Ten thousand guests at peak times…
Vyleria would have vomited, but there was nothing left in her stomach. She hadn’t eaten in days. Not since Jack had died. The Scourge had even taken Gaz Finch from her. Grief and loneliness ate away at her like cancer. How long would this go on for?
Sometime later – it could have been minutes, hours, or even days - she looked-up at the viewscreen. She saw a planet full of bright shining lights and an impossibly green ocean shimmering away in the distance. Clouds swirled like foam in a coffee cup. It looked absolutely beautiful.
“You’ve brought me here to watch, haven’t you?” said Vyleria.
The first sonic cannon rounds punctured Elaria’s crust soon after. Clouds of earth and smoke belched into the atmosphere; buildings toppled, fires began to spread.
“A ringside seat? Is that what you think?” said Lava man, towering over her. Rivers of fire rippled under his charred black skin.
“Why else would you bring me here?” said Vyleria as a flurry of Elarian fighters erupted before her eyes.
Lava man smiled wickedly. It was the kind of smile that sent whole families to their deaths. “Going to war Vyleria, is a little bit like fine dining. First, you start with the appetizer - cold of course,” he said, gesturing towards Elaria, red blooms of fire covering the planet like an infestation.
“And then?” said Vyleria unable to take her eyes from the carnage unfolding before her.
“And then you move onto the main course,” said Lava man, eyes flashing a violent red.
There was a brilliant flash of light and then everything went dark for a second.
When Vyleria opened her eyes, she was at street level. There were people running everywhere, a violent cascade of bodies. The noise was incredible, like a war and a football riot all rolled into one. It sounded like terror, desperation. People were slipping and falling, being crushed, stamped on. One young girl – her face the colour of blueberries – slipped under the throng, never to be seen again. Vyleria was making her way towards her, desperate to help and render aid when she heard the first explosions.
She looked upwards immediately, towards the towering spire of a starscraper. Suddenly it ballooned outwards in an explosion of steel, metal and masonry. Chaos rained down around her in lumps of jagged glass, burning metal and thundering concrete. People were hit on the head and killed outright; others were wounded and lost limbs, left to wail by themselves on the street or else stamped to death by the panicked hordes.
Vyleria winced as a huge chunk of cement ploughed towards her, its ugly face mottled with glass and steel.
The last seconds of her life never came.
When she finally looked up, she saw the rubble suspended above her, as if levitating on an unseen current of air. How?
“You didn’t think I’d let our dance end so soon, did you?” said Lava man, eyes burning like atom bombs.
“I…”
“This symphony is going to last a long long time, my sweet,” said Lava man, his pumice-lined face briefly turning into that of Jorge, the blonde-haired boy they had rescued from the ocean planet. The boy who…
The chunk of masonry suddenly exploded, scattering the street with a deadly hail.
Vyleria turned around, saw the bodies. The street was littered with them, with limbs, body parts… guts. A few – too few – moaned for what felt like forever, then were silent.
She turned towards Lava man. “You’re a monster,” she said, trying to stop her voice from shaking, trying to control the fear.
“Yes, but I’m your monster,” he said, Jorge’s face turning to ash. “And you’re my prey. Look up.”
Vyleria did as she was told. She could do little else. A large metal sphere pierced the clouds, ploughing through the tops of several starscrapers. More explosions, more falling masonry. Death. Death. Death.
Just as the sphere was about to hit the street it exploded into a million tiny metal fragments. Figures were raining from the sky now. Their features becoming clearer, more distinct… more metallic.
Dreadnuts…
Chapter Two: Gladiator
Grunt’s sword flashed through the air. The Xenti’s body flopped headlessly to the ground, a black river gushing from its neck.
Another shadow darted in from the side, its mace-like weapon swinging wildly. In one fluid movement, Grunt ducked, rammed his sword through its sternum and out between its shoulders. A fountain of blood and gristle. Then he spun round and decapitated the other Xenti that was approaching from behind. More blood. More death. Good, good…
WE HAVE A NEW CHAMPION! Boomed a voice that came from everywhere at once, to roars from the crowd. PREPARE TO BE CHALLENGED!
Grunt turned around and faced the rusty iron gates near the far end of the arena. Several figures were huddling near the bars. Why weren’t they approaching?
Grunt bounded towards them, a long-pronounced roar echoing from his chest.
“I sssurrender!” hissed the first Xenti, his jagged knife dropping to the black sand.
Grunt impaled him through the neck, the gurgling sounds lasting as long as it took him to wrench his sword free and slice through another Xenti. Everything became a whirl then, a tornado of hate and killing, as Grunt launched himself at the Xenti. He killed with his sword, the blade turning as black as the arena, and when he lost that he turned to his hands and fists.
ALL HAIL GRUNT! THE FIRST CHAMPION TO LAST AN ENTIRE DAY!
Grunt looked at what he was holding. A skull smashed to pieces, a brain turned to mush. He scanned the arena. There were bodies everywhere. There had to be over a hundred. Not all were competitors either, some looked to have been spectators, some were no older than children, no wonder the crowd was quiet.
Good, he thought, anger surging through his veins like poison. Let them weep. They were going to pay for what they did to his planet, for what they did to his people. One beaten, bloody Xenti at a time.
Chapter Three: Decimation
The dreadnuts descended like iron rain.
There had to be hundreds of them, thousands. The insect-like buzzing got louder and louder, until they crashed into the tarmac, cement and masonry spraying into the air.
Then the shouting started, followed by screams.
People that she hadn’t seen before, that had been hiding from the onslaught, began to run away, shepherding friends, loved ones.
They weren’t quick enough.
The dreadnuts were on them in no time, sniffing out their scent like bloodhounds, grappling them to the ground.
Vyleria ran after one and jumped onto its back, the girl that it was on top of flinching away in terror.
The dreadnut spun round immediately, its weapon arm pulsing with laser fire. It locked its angry eyes on her and…
Nothing.
Its eyes glazed over for a half a second, then it turned its back on her, stomping off towards the girl.
Why wasn’t it trying to assimilate her? Where were its nanobots? It could have injected her with thousands in a heartbeat…
The girl was screaming again, tears streaming down her face like a flood. Vyleria picked up a block of cement and hurled it at the back of the dreadnut’s head.
Its skull collapsed in a chaos of bone, blood and metal.
She rushed over to the girl at once, desperate to save her, to do something.
She stopped in her tracks.
Her tangerine face was now littered with lead. Metal wires were spreading through her scalp, warping her features. Her right arm was spasming uncontrollably, what looked like a large muzzle and a sharp blade poking out where her fingers used to be.
Vyleria looked around her. Up and down the street bodies were r
ising to their feet, one half living tissue, the other mechanized death.
They turned towards Vyleria, eyes flashing a murderous red, only to about face and head down the street.
From perhaps half a mile away what sounded like a laser rifle began to recoil, followed by the steady percussion of compression bombs.
There was resistance after all. She picked up a piece of steel piping and ran after the dreadnuts, the sounds of slaughter getting nearer and nearer.
All she found was desolation.
Suddenly there was a loud whirring sound, followed by a deafening roar, as a huge black shadow ploughed into the middle of the dreadnuts. Fire bloomed, smoke billowed, blood and limbs were strewn around like confetti.
Vyleria ran over to the charred remains of the space car, but the pilot was already dead, her head lurching at a horizontal angle, spinal fluid leaking between her shoulder blades.
She could hear popping sounds now, like a firework display on New Varda Day, and what could only be screams. They sounded far-off, but she had to try and help them. There was no other option. It was either that or acquiesce in the extinction of her species.
She began to run.
Vyleria dropped to her knees. She was out of breath, exhausted. How long had passed? Days certainly… weeks? Trails of smoke twirled into the sky like ironic party-streamers. A few – too few – bodies littered the ground, most of them children. The Scourge have no use for them, she thought grimly. Not strong enough, not enough bio-chemical energy for the dreadnuts to become effective killing machines.
New Varda was silent now. All the lights had gone out, all the machinery of life had ceased to function. The End.
Then she heard the buzzing again, like a swarm of mechanical bees. She looked up.
Twenty Billion Elarians stared back at her. All of them dreadnuts.
Vyleria thrust her head in her hands, knuckles bare and bloody. She wiped her eyes furiously.
“Do you think this is it?” sneered Lava man, stepping up from behind her. “The end?”
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