by J. N. Chaney
Thousands of humans, Remboshi, and the Rung present didn’t seem to care that I was on a knee petting a dog. If anything, it made them cheer louder.
When the shouting died, I gave Mutt one final ruffle of his ears and climbed into my suit.
“Seek See Nay!” Jezra shouted.
“Seek See Nay!” the Remboshi army answered.
“Seek See Nay,” Jezra screamed again.
“Seek See Nay!” the Remboshi and Rung returned.
“It means ‘as one,’” Tong interpreted over the comm unit in our suits.
The human survivors from the Orion soon joined in, filling the air with the alien war chant.
I turned my gaze on Legion now, who shifted from one foot to the other. All hope for the Remboshi and Rung to turn on one another was gone. He understood there was only one way this was going to end.
I started a light jog forward with Stacy on my right along with the four new Rung armor units. The craft that had dropped them off was already on its way back to get four more suits. The battle would be over before it could return, but at least the Rung were doing everything they could to help.
To my left, the Remboshi advanced with their convoy of predators, and behind me the survivors of the Orion prepared to do battle once more, hopefully for the last time.
My jog turned into a full sprint as I planned to hit Legion as hard as I could in my armor. I was going to get through to that lightning rock and the main plant that held the spores if it cost me my life. In that moment, I was ready to sacrifice everything. In that moment, I believed I was the Chosen One and that this was why I was here. I was going to fulfill that prophecy. Otherwise, everything that happened up to this point had meant nothing.
Weapons fire ripped forward from Legion. Rockets and grenades streaked through the air at the power armor units while smaller caliber fire was aimed at the Remboshi and humans.
On our side, we let loose with a volley of laser fire so intense, hundreds of infected fell by the second.
I didn’t bother trying to run and shoot the blasters on my shoulders. I was of a single mind. Get to the lightning rock.
A rocket streaked by my head, and a grenade went to my right, causing me to stumble but not fall. Then I was among them. Infected grabbed for me, those with bladed weapons or clubs striking my armor.
I ignored them all, swiping the long blade on my right arm like a scythe through wheat. I made the mental decision to separate what I was actually doing, which was cutting down the bodies, to nothing more than a simple task.
Get to the rock, I told myself. Get to the rock. All you’re doing is getting to the rock.
Warning lights flickered on and off in my armor suit. I wasn’t familiar enough with the tech to tell what was going on, but I knew it wasn’t good.
“Dean, watch out!” Stacy screamed through the comm unit.
I was fast enough to see another massive alien beast with the three horns approaching like a laser beam from my right. It trampled other infected as it made a beeline for my location.
Oh, this is going to suck, I thought as I lifted my arms up to defend myself too late.
Right before impact, a Rung piloted suit slammed into the beast, changing its trajectory just enough to send it past me. It reeled into the infected horde, trampling many of them flat.
The suit opened fire on the beast, making mush out of it.
“Thought you could use a hand,” Dama’s voice said through the comms. “Come on. We can’t be far now.”
“Thank you,” I said, letting a long exhale of air escape my lungs. “I owe you one.”
“You owe us a few power armor suits as well.” Dama chuckled. “We can talk about it after we defeat Legion.”
I didn’t argue with her there. For what felt like an eternity, we waded through the mass of infected. Legion threw everything at us, from infected Rung and humans to various animals of the planet Genesis.
The Remboshi on the predators to my left were experts with the vehicles. While half of them maintained a steady line moving forward, the other half commenced destroying the infected, both running over them and cutting them down with the high-powered Blood Shots on the rear of the vehicles.
The way they maneuvered the predators through the lines of infected was amazing. I had no idea a predator could move so quickly. I would have to get a lesson from them after this was over.
Elon led the humans behind us as a sort of a cleanup crew from the wreckage the six power armor suits left in their wake.
Before long, I could see the lightning bolt shaped rock appear above the dense jungle treetops. Legion’s brain was within striking distance now. Only a bit farther.
The distance wasn’t the problem at the moment, but rather the level of damage my power armor suit had taken. Apparently, I was hard on my toys. Half the screen in front of me was blacked out, thanks to some kind of injury sustained to the cameras on the exterior of the suit. My left leg dragged behind me and a shower of sparks cascaded down my vision from where the helmet of the suit sat on top of the chest.
“Keep moving forward!” I yelled as my own suit shut down on me. “He’s desperate now. We’re almost there!”
I opened the hatch on my suit to jump down. Just because I wasn’t piloting a suit anymore didn’t mean I was out of the fight.
Legion must have sensed we were on the verge of overrunning his position because a scream straight out of a nightmare ripped from the collective throats of the infected. With one final push, they came at us in a wave of bodies.
22
Nightmarish images of the dead missing legs and arms advanced on our position. Early in the fight, the word had been passed down to either attempt headshots or induce so much brain trauma that it was rendered useless.
We didn’t expect to see what Legion did next.
“What’s that?” Elon asked via the earpiece I still wore. “Behind the latest push of infected, others are carrying something black.”
“The spores,” Jezra warned. “They’re the Legion spores. Don’t let them come near you!”
I went down to a knee, grabbing the Judge that rested on my hip. I pulled the trigger in rapid succession, tearing into the newest wave of attackers.
Elon and Jezra were right. In a last-ditch effort to win the battle, Legion was sacrificing the first wave of infected while the second wave ran toward us, carrying armfuls of thick black vegetation that gave off tiny puffs of ebony powder with every step.
I took one infected down with a series of shots to the chest before working my way up to its head. Another I had to spend two missed rounds on before a third found its skull.
“Going to have to work on that aim sooner or later,” Boss Creed said, coming up on my left. He carried a heavy blaster and unloaded on a group of infected sprinting at us with arm loads of the black spores.
“Dean,” Ricky said, joining us. He handed me a canister with a hose on the front. “Take it. You’ll need it to kill Legion.”
I knew what the flamethrower was. I nodded, strapping the canister on my back. The hose itself I slung over my shoulder. I was ready to do some damage.
“We have to make a move now!” Stacy shouted over the comm. “Legion’s raising the dead!”
All around the battlefield, reports started flooding in through the channel. Legion’s tactic wasn’t only to infect the living but to infect our own dead to rise and fight on his side.
Humans and Remboshi were being brought back via the virus to fight for Legion once more.
To my left, a Rung power armor unit went down under a volley of rocket fire. Another stumbled and fell, only to be swarmed by dozens of infected carrying the spores. They shook the plant, trying to get it into the power armor unit’s cracks and crevices and infect the pilot inside.
“No! Sulk!” Dama screamed as the power armored suit went down like a larger insect under a swarm of ants. “Sulk!”
“Keep fighting!” Sulk said as though he was being strangled from inside his
suit. “Never give up! Never—”
Sulk’s voice disappeared. It didn’t take a mind reader to figure out what had happened to him.
“We have to do something now.” Jezra’s voice was calm and clear amidst a cacophony of screaming panic. “Dean, it’s time.”
I had no idea what the crazy old bat was talking about. I had given it my best shot and I wasn’t going to give up, but the way she worded it was like I was supposed to know what she meant.
“Yeah, that’s not really helpful right now,” I said. “If you have a plan or something that will get us through Legion and to the brain plant, I’m all ears.”
A predator skidded toward us so fast, Ricky had to jump out of the way or turn into a speed bump.
Jezra was behind the wheel. She popped off her white helmet and gave us a rueful grin. I waited for her words of wisdom, hoping they weren’t couched in mystical terms that held ambiguous meaning. I was really not in the mood for riddles.
“It’s time to make the final assault on Legion,” she said as if she were telling me we should go for a walk or sit and have a nice cup of tea. I couldn’t argue that the words weren’t simple enough, though.
Screams and the sounds of wounded and dying around her didn’t seem to faze her a bit. The smell of charred flesh and the acrid odor of so many weapons discharging didn’t affect her at all. Her face was smooth and serene, and her body poised and relaxed.
Despite the madness in her calm, there was an intensity in her eyes that couldn’t be denied.
“You told me the Orion would fall again,” I said, remembering her prophecy. “Will it?”
“I told you what you needed to know at the time,” Jezra said, patting the seat beside her. “Are you coming or not?”
Boss Creed didn’t hesitate. He jumped on the back of the predator, manning the Blood Shot. Ricky went next, hopping into the passenger side seat and pressing the earpiece in his right ear.
“We’re about to do something crazy here. Anyone still able, cut a path for us to the lightning rock. We’re going to end this,” Ricky shouted.
Ricky scooted over just enough for me to be able to hang off the side of the predator.
Jezra slammed on the gas as Stacy, Elon, Dama, and the others still in the fight coordinated, covering our assault.
The predators still running swept in from the west. There seemed to be far too few of them still in working condition. Smoke fumed from their engines, and a few were even missing tires.
Stacy and Dama, along with the third suit that was still working, sprinted in front of us, creating a funnel in which to follow.
Boss Creed, Ricky, and I fired like wild men at whatever we could hit. In front of us, the jungle began to clear. Trees and bushes that were once vibrant green before now turned ashen and black. Spores permeated the air and appeared on every blade of grass, flower, and tree.
It was only then I realized Ricky and Boss Creed weren’t wearing anything that could filter out the spores.
“Jezra, stop!” I shouted. “Let them out. They aren’t wearing—”
The predator’s left tire blew out in a shower of hard rubber. The vehicle went end over end through the air. I saw ground, sky, and then ground again as I came crashing down.
The wind was forced out of my lungs. Pain exploded in my back and neck. I thought I had broken something, bruised something for sure. My armor kept the worst of the injury at bay, but it still didn’t feel good.
I blinked, trying to focus and understand where I had landed. The predator was on its side, a fire already burning its belly. I couldn’t see Jezra, Ricky, or Boss Creed, but I could see the remaining three suits, including Stacy’s fighting the few infected that had stayed this far back.
Out of nowhere, a spray of weapons fire cut through one of the three remaining power armor units.
“What was tha—” Dama never got a chance to finish her sentence.
A Rung’s unit covered in black spores with its center piece hanging open charged into the battle, slamming into Dama’s power armor unit. With a herculean crash, it sent them both into the jungle floor.
I only got a brief look at the Rung that piloted the unit. I couldn’t make out Sulk’s exact face, but it was clear he was infected.
“Go!” Stacy screamed, looking at me from her war-battered unit. “I’ll help Dama. Go!”
I jumped to my feet, only realizing now where I was. The predator had thrown me to the very base of the lightning rock formation. I stood in a field of the dense foliage covered in black spores. A hill shielded in the stuff rose behind me where the lightning bolt rock formation stood.
I was finally here. I had made it. I reached behind me for the flamethrower strapped to my back, only it wasn’t there anymore.
I looked around, panicked, searching for the weapon I so desperately needed to end Legion’s reign here on Genesis. I fell to my knees, groping through the dense black foliage.
Black spores puffed into the air as if they were reaching for my face. My helmet’s filtration system kept them at bay for the time being. Still, I didn’t want to rely on that longer than I had to. I rose to my feet, putting distance between the spores and my face.
What are you going to do now, Dean? I asked myself. What are you going to do now?
“Looking for this?”
I turned my head to where I heard the familiar voice. Legion, still using Captain Ezra Harold’s body, on which the head was now mysteriously reattached, stood on the peak of the hill right beside the lightning stone.
In his right hand, he held up the flamethrower.
I knew it was a trap. Somewhere in my head, I knew Legion was smarter than to take me on in a one-on-one battle. He knew my capabilities as a fighter. Still, what other option did I have?
I slowly ascended the hill toward Legion. With each step, I kicked up a puff of black spores. It was only as I traveled higher and higher that my vantage point became better and I understood.
I saw exactly how much of the jungle was covered in the blanket of blackness. It made my stomach churn. In all directions from the rock formation, the jungle was ebony for about a kilometer or more.
We now stood at the base of the stone in the blackest part of the jungle.
Legion held a sardonic smile on his lips as I approached. He waved at the ruined foliage with his free hand.
“Amazing, isn’t it?” he asked, taking in the black spores infecting the area around us. “To think it ends here now where I chose to sleep in hibernation so many years before.”
I was close now. No more than a few meters away. I could spring on him, take him out, and regain the flamethrower.
“Ah, ah, ah,” Legion said with a wave of his finger. “I recognize that look. You’re thinking you want to kill this body right now and grab your flamethrower. I would suggest you look behind you and rethink that strategy.”
I exhaled slowly, hating myself for having to do it, but turning nonetheless.
My mouth went dry.
Boss Creed and Ricky stood at the base of the hill knee deep in the tainted foliage of the jungle. Each one of them looked up at me through black eyes. Black liquid oozed out of their mouths, noses, and ears.
As one, they reached for the base of their own skulls, ready to snap them at a moment’s notice.
“No, wait,” I said, lifting a hand. “Just wait, just wait a minute.”
“Is that all you have, Chosen One?” Legion cackled. “‘Just wait’? You’re going to have to do better than that. Frankly, I’m disappointed. You must be disappointed in yourself at this point. I expected so much more.”
“Let them go,” I said, tearing my eyes away from Ricky and Boss Creed. I knew my words were a waste, but I needed time to think. “What do you want? You want to infect me? Is that it? I’ll take off my helmet and you can have me, but please don’t kill them.”
“Interesting offer, but what’s to keep me from killing them once I have you?” Legion cocked his head to the side in thought. “You
must see the failed logic in your request. No matter. On your knees, Chosen One.”
I slumped down slowly and resignedly, still trying to buy time to think. Maybe I could grab the flamethrower and take Legion out, but not before he ordered Ricky and Boss Creed to snap their own necks. I couldn’t do that to my friends, especially if there was a way this virus could possibly be reversed.
Think, Dean, think, I thought, unable to come up with a solution. There’s a way out of this. There’s always a way out.
“Now take off your helmet and breathe,” Legion said with a look that said he had already won. “Breathe deeply, Dean. When I have you, you will be my new mouthpiece. You can rest assured that even in your death, you will serve a purpose.”
I lifted my hands to the clamps on the underside of my helmet.
23
“Just Dean.” Jezra’s voice came through my helmet’s comms so quietly, I almost thought it was my imagination. “Get ready.”
I hesitated.
Legion caught my hesitation and looked around, alarmed.
“Now!” Jezra screamed, this time not through my comms but from somewhere behind me.
I twisted around in time to see her spring from the foliage behind Ricky and Boss Creed. Somehow, she had wormed her way unseen through the thick brush infected by Legion.
She slammed a heavy stick against the side of Boss Creed’s jaw, knocking him out cold, then turned to Ricky to do the same.
As much as I wanted to sit there and see if she succeeded in stopping Ricky, I knew my time was short. Jezra had given me the opportunity I’d needed to get back into the fight and I couldn’t waste it.
I sprang to my feet, launching myself at Legion, who was still trying to get over his shock. I head butted him in the face, grabbing for the flamethrower. We went down together, vying for position on the ground.
Legion released his hold on the flamethrower and went for a knife tucked into his belt. He stabbed upward before I could stop him, sending the blade into the soft spot between my helmet and chest piece.
I should have been dead or at the very least bleeding out. The knife pierced the synth suit I wore under the armor but came to a stop against something hard around my neck.
