Speaker 1: Chapter twenty Rowland, that looks like them, Sasha whispered into
Speaker 1: his ear. The three of them were stationed on the
Speaker 1: third floor of an old office building that overlooked the
Speaker 1: Kingdom's vehicle pool. Based on the posters and decorations inside,
Speaker 1: the people in this office had once helped coordinate for
Speaker 1: a string of restaurants supply stores. Roland suspected the coming
Speaker 1: of the war might have been a relief to the
Speaker 1: people who'd been stuck working here. He was positioned by
Speaker 1: the window, sitting down so only the edge of his
Speaker 1: face would have been visible to any one looking in
Speaker 1: from the outside. Manny had elected to take a nap
Speaker 1: out of view behind one of the desks. His ability
Speaker 1: to fall asleep any time anywhere marked him out as
Speaker 1: a true expert and war zone survival. Sasha had situated
Speaker 1: herself on the other side of the window frame. Roland
Speaker 1: had warned her to keep her head out of view
Speaker 1: until he saw new arrivals to the vehicle depot. He'd
Speaker 1: called for her eyes six times already and gotten six negatives.
Speaker 1: Now it seemed their target had arrived. Are you sure,
Speaker 1: he asked? Pretty sure, she said, and nodded. The driver
Speaker 1: walks with a limp. One of his legs is shorter
Speaker 1: than the other. I think it's a birth defect. He
Speaker 1: must have come from some part of the continent where
Speaker 1: those still happened. Good eye. Roland was genuinely impressed. The
Speaker 1: girl had potential. So what do we do now, she
Speaker 1: asked you, rouse manny, I'll keep an eye on things.
Speaker 1: When they depart, I'll carjack them into unconsciousness and bring
Speaker 1: back the uniforms. And that's more or less how it went.
Speaker 1: The garden driver departed in a jeep. Five minutes later.
Speaker 1: Roland bounded down from one of the rear windows and
Speaker 1: landed on the hood as they took a right hand
Speaker 1: turn out of view of the vehicle depot. The guard
Speaker 1: did not do his job title proud, Roland slammed his
Speaker 1: face into the dashboard and knocked him out. He also
Speaker 1: knocked out most of the man's teeth, but his hind
Speaker 1: brain told him the guy's odds of a fatal brain
Speaker 1: hemorrhage were only about six percent acceptable. He broke the
Speaker 1: driver's job with a right cross, took the wheel, and
Speaker 1: steered the vehicle to a stop. While he was still
Speaker 1: hanging outside it. Roland tossed both men in the back
Speaker 1: the jeep and pulled into the office buildings underground parking lot.
Speaker 1: He stripped them both and cursed when he realized that
Speaker 1: the guard's bleeding face had stained the neck of his
Speaker 1: uniform shirt. He found some bottled water in the trunk
Speaker 1: and managed to wash out the worst of it, but
Speaker 1: the stain would still be visible to anyone who really
Speaker 1: took the time to look. Still, it'd probably be enough
Speaker 1: to get them through the door of the jail. He
Speaker 1: stashed both men in a janitorial closet and dragged an
Speaker 1: old metal dumpster in front of it to wedge the
Speaker 1: door shut. Someone would probably find them before they starved
Speaker 1: to death. He felt a pang of guilt for how
Speaker 1: little he cared about what happened to those men. I
Speaker 1: should feel worse about this. Roland knew the battle drugs
Speaker 1: had suppressed his conscience. He knew that the longer they
Speaker 1: stayed in this dangerous place, and the more fighting he did,
Speaker 1: the more tempted he'd be to kill outright. Roland leaned
Speaker 1: against the dumpster and closed his eyes. He tried to
Speaker 1: force himself to take long, slow breaths and meditate on
Speaker 1: the flow of air in and out of his lungs.
Speaker 1: He helped taking a breather would prompt his system to
Speaker 1: reduce the drip. Instead, he found himself flashing back to
Speaker 1: more violence. Red siren lights screeched and blinked on walls
Speaker 1: of institutional White men and women in lab coats ran
Speaker 1: and screamed and died, died, died as he squeezed the
Speaker 1: trigger of his sig Sour Roland kicked at a loft
Speaker 1: door and the metal buckled inwards, revealing a room with
Speaker 1: giant glass organ filled vials. He shook his head and
Speaker 1: tried to banish the memories. He'd started flashing back to
Speaker 1: this place when they had rescued Manny. But the memories
Speaker 1: had kept coming even once the violence subsided. Please, Roland,
Speaker 1: the old woman begged through blood stained teeth. He looked
Speaker 1: down at the hole in her gut, the red blood
Speaker 1: on her white lab coat. She slid backwards on the
Speaker 1: tile floor until her shoulders hit one of the racks
Speaker 1: of that grown organs. Please don't do this, Roland shook
Speaker 1: his head. He didn't know why this was happening exactly.
Speaker 1: It was likely just a glitch, some unforeseen interaction between
Speaker 1: the wet wear of his hind brain, the procedural memory
Speaker 1: stored at his DNA, and the battle drugs that flowed
Speaker 1: through his system. He questioned again whether he really wanted
Speaker 1: his memories back. This wasn't the time to ponder that question, though.
Speaker 1: Roland headed back upstairs to grab Manny and saw. He
Speaker 1: led them down to the garage and handed Manny the
Speaker 1: unbloodied uniform. Dude, that's really obvious, Manny pointed to the
Speaker 1: bloodstains on Roland's own uniform. They're going to notice that,
Speaker 1: you think so. Roland was so used to normal humans
Speaker 1: not noticing much of anything, he sometimes underestimated their senses.
Speaker 1: I've got an idea, Sasha said, pop the hood. Roland
Speaker 1: and Manny were both a little surprised, but he popped
Speaker 1: it for her. The girl stared at the engine, reached
Speaker 1: for the dipstick and pulled it free from its slot.
Speaker 1: She rubbed her hand down the shaft and it came
Speaker 1: away covered in sticky black grease. She rubbed the grease
Speaker 1: onto Roland's collar, coated the dipstick again, and repeated the
Speaker 1: process two more times. When she was done, he looked
Speaker 1: like he'd been working on an engine rather than beating
Speaker 1: a man half to death. Fucking brilliant, Roland said. Manny
Speaker 1: nodded his agreement. Then he said, all right, let's go
Speaker 1: abducted doctor. The abduction itself was easy. Doctor Brandt lived
Speaker 1: in an undamaged mansion about two miles away from downtown.
Speaker 1: As one of the kingdom's few medical professionals, Doctor branded
Speaker 1: A apparently earned himself some luxury Sasha hid in the
Speaker 1: trunk so the doctor wouldn't notice anything was off until
Speaker 1: he entered the vehicle. Where's Jerry and Samuel, doctor Brandt asked,
Speaker 1: as he opened the door and sat down inside the jeep.
Speaker 1: Many gunned the engine and peeled away. Roland put a
Speaker 1: hand on doctor Brandt's thigh and squeezed just hard enough
Speaker 1: for the man to feel like his thigh bone might shatter.
Speaker 1: I stuffed him in a closet somewhere, he explained, with
Speaker 1: a smile. My name is Manny, the fixer said. The
Speaker 1: guy who's about to break your leg is named Roland.
Speaker 1: We're kidnapping you, ah, said doctor Brandt. Roland had to
Speaker 1: give credit where credit was due. The doctor endured the
Speaker 1: pain with a stony face and without any signs of panic.
Speaker 1: We need you to help us get into the jail.
Speaker 1: Manny continued, where those negotiators from Rolling Fuck are being held.
Speaker 1: Doctor Brandt grimaced, either from the obscenity or just due
Speaker 1: to the continued pain of Roland's iron grip. And what
Speaker 1: makes you think I'll give you any aid? There was
Speaker 1: a bit of strain in his voice now, but the
Speaker 1: doctor's features stayed decidedly neutral. I may be a doctor,
Speaker 1: but I'm no us prepared to die for my kingdom
Speaker 1: than anyone else here. You might as well just go
Speaker 1: ahead and kill me. Roland relaxed his grip. The doctor's
Speaker 1: sighed in relief. Yeah, we thought you might say something
Speaker 1: like that, said Manny. That's why Roland and I prepared
Speaker 1: an alternate proposal. Roland drew the guards stolen side arm
Speaker 1: from its holster. He gripped the pistol in one hand
Speaker 1: and then crushed it in his grip like he was
Speaker 1: bawling up a piece of paper. The doctor's eyes widened
Speaker 1: in shock and horror. So Manny said, my friends, just
Speaker 1: full of chrome, high grade stuff. He could walk right
Speaker 1: through a tank if he wanted. You're an educated man,
Speaker 1: you know what people like him can do. The doctor
Speaker 1: nodded but didn't say anything. Our offer is simple. You
Speaker 1: help us out and we'll leave with our people. You
Speaker 1: refuse to help, and we'll get our people anyway. Only
Speaker 1: Roland here will take a little detour to burn half
Speaker 1: the city to the ground. I see Roland could smell
Speaker 1: the fear wafting off doctor Brandt now, but the man's
Speaker 1: expression didn't change. You wouldn't be a doctor if you
Speaker 1: didn't see value in human lives. Manny's voice was soft,
Speaker 1: reasonable tone, wouldn't have been out of place in a boardroom.
Speaker 1: If you refuse to help us, we won't hurt you,
Speaker 1: won't harm a hair on your head. But my friend
Speaker 1: here will break this city and a few thousand of
Speaker 1: the people in it. You'll be hail and healthy, so
Speaker 1: you can pick up the pieces, and you'll know that
Speaker 1: every ounce of that suffering could have been prevented if
Speaker 1: you just helped us out. It's true, Sir Sasha spoke
Speaker 1: up Doctor Brandt. Stiffened, she sat up from her hidden
Speaker 1: position in the back. The doctor was a smart man.
Speaker 1: He put together that she was not being held as
Speaker 1: a prisoner. His eyes narrowed in contempt Sasha. Doctor Brand's
Speaker 1: voice was cold. I'm sorry to see you in such
Speaker 1: poor company, sir, I'm really sorry, but but nothing, he snapped,
Speaker 1: and now the anger showed on his face. Have you
Speaker 1: been a traitor this whole time? Or did your will
Speaker 1: simply fail Sasha? Manny spoke up. We really don't have
Speaker 1: time for this, Roland disagreed. His hind brain estimated Sasha
Speaker 1: and the doctor could afford a solid eight minutes of
Speaker 1: emotional closure before they got too close to the jail.
Speaker 1: Is eight minutes a lot of time for you people.
Speaker 1: Everyone stared at him, their individual disagreements forgotten for a moment.
Speaker 1: Roland realized late that he had spoken out loud. Sorry,
Speaker 1: he said, I was just supposed to be in my head.
Speaker 1: They still stared. Well, now you only have like seven
Speaker 1: minutes and forty seconds, Ignore that, said Manny. He's a maniac.
Speaker 1: That's why you don't want us to let him loosen
Speaker 1: your city, doctor Brandt. Sasha added, I know you're a
Speaker 1: good man. The Lord put you on this earth to
Speaker 1: save lives. This is your chance to do that. The
Speaker 1: doctor needed the bridge of his nose with his hand,
Speaker 1: hated an admirable job of not giving too much away
Speaker 1: with his body language. But Roland could smell the truth.
Speaker 1: The scent of stress wafting off the doctor faded. It
Speaker 1: was a sign the man had made a decision. There
Speaker 1: was something about choosing that calmed the human soul. You
Speaker 1: are correct, of course, Sasha. I never approved of us
Speaker 1: holding those women in the first place. It was foolish
Speaker 1: to antagonize things like him. He nodded towards Roland. If
Speaker 1: I can avert a massacre, I will, But I sincerely
Speaker 1: hope you planned to escape with them, Sasha. I won't
Speaker 1: hide to protect a traitor. I'll leave, Sasha said. The
Speaker 1: doctor gave a somber nod. I won't be able to
Speaker 1: get you out of the jail with those prisoners, you know,
Speaker 1: he said to Rowland. I can get you inside, and
Speaker 1: I can probably get them to send the prisoners into
Speaker 1: an examination room, but the guards won't let them leave
Speaker 1: the building. I'll take care of that part, Rowland promised.
Speaker 1: I'm real good at making doors. Rowland was aware of
Speaker 1: the old saying no plan survives contact with the enemy.
Speaker 1: For some reason, his hind brain remembered the original version
Speaker 1: of the quote from an old Prussian general named moltkea
Speaker 1: no plan of operations extends with any certainty beyond first
Speaker 1: contact with the main hostile force. People who observed Roland
Speaker 1: and Battle tended to think he just sort of winged
Speaker 1: it and ballsed his way through on violent potential alone.
Speaker 1: But Rowland was at his core a planner. Having a
Speaker 1: plan was essential to take maximum advantage of the way
Speaker 1: his hind brain worked. A plan was nothing more than
Speaker 1: a clear set of tactics meant to accomplish a concrete goal.
Speaker 1: In this case, the goal was free the prisoners and
Speaker 1: take his new friends to safety. The plan he constructed
Speaker 1: to achieve that goal was based mainly on Sasha's recollections
Speaker 1: and his own espionage on the jail. He knew it
Speaker 1: would change once the shooting started, but the fact that
Speaker 1: he had a rubric would give his hindbrain something to
Speaker 1: focus on while it zeroed in on the best tactics
Speaker 1: for the evolving situation. At any rate, the plan Manny
Speaker 1: and Sasha had cooked up actually did survive. First contact
Speaker 1: with the enemy, Rowland and Manny had posed as guards
Speaker 1: and followed doctor Brandton Sasha right through the door. The
Speaker 1: martyrs inside were all used to seeing the doctor and
Speaker 1: his assistant, and they didn't pay a different set of
Speaker 1: armed guards any mind. When doctor Brandt requested they send
Speaker 1: all the prisoners into the examination room, the officer in
Speaker 1: charge didn't even blink at the request. The only thing
Speaker 1: that had seemed off to Rowland was an odd scent
Speaker 1: of anxiety in the air. It wafted off the guards
Speaker 1: and hung in a thick cloud above the entrance room.
Speaker 1: The Odor reminded Rowland of countless hours spent sitting with
Speaker 1: nervous men in the cramped belly of an a PC
Speaker 1: or a drop aircraft. He assumed this had something to
Speaker 1: do with a giant explosion he'd caused earlier, or his
Speaker 1: escape from the training facility. Of course, these guys are
Speaker 1: unhigh alert, he thought. Some nut fuck monster man blew
Speaker 1: up a factory this morning. Doctor Brandt led them into
Speaker 1: a large waiting room and closed the door. He let
Speaker 1: out a long nervous sigh and slumped back against the wall. Okay,
Speaker 1: you'll have your prisoners soon enough, and no one else
Speaker 1: will need to die. Right, he looked straight at Roland. Right,
Speaker 1: Roland said, and then added, until you Fox invaded Dallas.
Speaker 1: I've gotten years without killing anyone I'm actually pretty good
Speaker 1: at it. The doctor did not seem comforted by this fact.
Speaker 1: Roland opened his mouth again, but Manny put a hand
Speaker 1: on his shoulder. No, he said, and Roland nodded. I
Speaker 1: could have avoided so many violent misunderstandings with this kid's help.
Speaker 1: Roland mold this over and wondered if Manny might be
Speaker 1: interested in an adjoining mountain top shack. Just then the
Speaker 1: door opened, a guard entered. He was followed by the
Speaker 1: three prisoners, and then two more guards. Rolling Fox negotiators
Speaker 1: are all handcuffed to each other. Roland had been shown
Speaker 1: pictures of all three captives before they departed the City
Speaker 1: of Wheels, so it wasn't hard to recognize Marigold, Tullie,
Speaker 1: and Rick. But they all looked different. Marigold's bright purple
Speaker 1: hair was limp and greasy. The sockets on her augmented
Speaker 1: arm had been filled in with some sort of resinous substance.
Speaker 1: Toulli bald in her pictures, now had a head full
Speaker 1: of peach fuzz. Her necklaces and amulets and rings were
Speaker 1: all gone. Of course, she looked pale and deflated. Roland
Speaker 1: could see the ghost of an old black eye likely
Speaker 1: earned during the initial capture. She walked with a limp,
Speaker 1: but otherwise looked healthy enough. And then there was Rick.
Speaker 1: His wounds were fresh and extensive. He was covered in bruises,
Speaker 1: and it looked like his guards had cut into him,
Speaker 1: writing over several of his scarified tattoos with a combat knife.
Speaker 1: His left eye was broken and looked dead. Roland could
Speaker 1: tell the man's orbital bone had been shattered, and with
Speaker 1: the slow, juttering way his good eye looked around the room,
Speaker 1: it was likely he'd suffered at least one concussion. Doctor
Speaker 1: Brandt sighed and went right to the injured young man.
Speaker 1: Have the other sit down, he told the guards. He
Speaker 1: started to examine Rick, his jaw clenched, his eyes narrowed.
Speaker 1: Roland felt the doctor's heart rate accelerate and anger. You've
Speaker 1: been at him again, haven't you, Doctor Brandt sounded angry.
Speaker 1: I told you all this had to stop. He's clearly concussed.
Speaker 1: You could have killed him. The lead guard shrugged and
Speaker 1: rolled his eyes. One of the other guards snickered. Roland
Speaker 1: could tell by the look of fury on the doctor's
Speaker 1: face that he was not used to being treated this way. Soldier,
Speaker 1: I am the senior medical doctor of this entire kingdom.
Speaker 1: I will bring your superior into this and I will,
Speaker 1: Roland heard, and then smelled six new men into the jail.
Speaker 1: His mind rocketed downstairs, away from the petty argument and
Speaker 1: started to analyze the new arrivals. There were soldiers, he
Speaker 1: could tell by the sound of their footfalls and the
Speaker 1: strong smell of gun oil and powder that wafted off
Speaker 1: of them. One of them smelled familiar. He'd been present
Speaker 1: when Manny had been abducted to the factory. Roland guessed
Speaker 1: this was the guy Sasha had told him about during
Speaker 1: their impromptu rescue mission. Huh, Roland said out loud. Manny
Speaker 1: was the only one who seemed to notice what Manny asked,
Speaker 1: in a voice low enough that the guards wouldn't hear
Speaker 1: it over the sound of doctor Brandt dressing them down.
Speaker 1: That guy, Alexander, he just entered the building with a
Speaker 1: squad of armed men. What does that mean? Uhh, Roland shrugged.
Speaker 1: Probably an ambush. Roland was a bit embarrassed that it
Speaker 1: had taken him this long to piece it together. That's
Speaker 1: why the guards had been so accommodating of doctor Brand's
Speaker 1: unusual request. It's why they'd smelled so nervous. Somehow the
Speaker 1: rescue attempt had been spotted before it had gone down.
Speaker 1: The soldiers of the Heavenly Kingdom must have assumed the
Speaker 1: doctor was a traitor too. Roland stood up. He knew
Speaker 1: that violence would need to happen here. There were too
Speaker 1: many decent people's lives at stake for anything else. The
Speaker 1: instant his forebrain made that decision. His hind brain started
Speaker 1: pouring adrenaline and battle drugs into his synapses. He felt
Speaker 1: the electric crackle of chemical glee start deep in the
Speaker 1: back of his neck. It spread out to his shoulders,
Speaker 1: down his arms, to the tip of his fingers. Roland
Speaker 1: fought back against the building euphoria. While he analyzed the situation,
Speaker 1: the world slowed down around him. He had plenty of
Speaker 1: time to watch as the guards started to reach for
Speaker 1: their side arms. The word ambush had keyed them in,
Speaker 1: but it didn't matter. They still moved too slow to
Speaker 1: effect anything. His hind brain calculated that Manny and Sasha
Speaker 1: were relatively safe. No one had a gun on them
Speaker 1: just now. The prisoners were his priority. Then they were
Speaker 1: exposed both to the door that enemy reinforcements would soon
Speaker 1: rush through and to the guards already in the room.
Speaker 1: Doctor Brandt was a tertiary responsibility. He seemed like a
Speaker 1: decent enough guy in spite of it all. Alexander and
Speaker 1: his men are two point oh four seconds from the door,
Speaker 1: maybe faster if they dropped into a dead sprint. Roland
Speaker 1: stepped forward into the lead guard. He grabbed the man
Speaker 1: by the hair, lifted him into the air, and slammed
Speaker 1: his skull hard into the second guard's face. Bone cracked
Speaker 1: sixteen point three and twenty eight point seven percent chances
Speaker 1: of fatal hemorrhage, respectively. Roland dropped the first man and
Speaker 1: plunged his fingers into the third guard's eyes. He gouged deep,
Speaker 1: stopped just short of the man's brain, and then pulled
Speaker 1: his hand free. The man staggered back, opened his mouth
Speaker 1: and started to scream. A surge of battle drugs hit
Speaker 1: roland synapses at just that moment, and in a fit
Speaker 1: of gleeful piaque, he grabbed the man by the jaw
Speaker 1: and pulled. His intent had been to yank the man's
Speaker 1: head into his knee, but he pulled a little too
Speaker 1: hard and ripped the whole jaw free. The man fell back,
Speaker 1: gurgled bled. Huh my bad, Roland said to no one
Speaker 1: in particular. He shoved the jaw into his front pocket,
Speaker 1: figuring it might make a useful weapon when the reinforcement
Speaker 1: showed up. In the meantime, he set to work ripping
Speaker 1: the prisoner's manacle chains apart. It'd have taken too long
Speaker 1: to remove the manacles, but at least with the chains free,
Speaker 1: they'd all be able to move with what are you,
Speaker 1: Oh my god, Roland, What doctor Brandt, Manny, and Sasha
Speaker 1: finally reacted? Roland had to remind himself that their brains
Speaker 1: wouldn't have been able to properly process what he'd done
Speaker 1: while it was happening. The whole altercation had lasted barely
Speaker 1: a quarter second. To Manny, Sasha, and Doctor Brandt, the
Speaker 1: violence had been disorienting and almost unintelligible. The three negotiators
Speaker 1: from rolling Fuck we're not stock sapy in. They'd reacted
Speaker 1: faster and gone to ground almost as soon as he'd
Speaker 1: rushed the first man. At least the women had. The
Speaker 1: young man was too dazed and battered to react much
Speaker 1: at all, so his friends pulled him down and shielded
Speaker 1: him with their bodies of the other three. Manny was
Speaker 1: the first to react. He grabbed Sasha by the shoulder
Speaker 1: and shoved her down below the window line. Roland was proud.
Speaker 1: He would have said something about that, but everything went
Speaker 1: disastrously wrong a fraction of a second later. Roland had
Speaker 1: known Alexander and his men were rushing the door. He'd
Speaker 1: estimated a solid one point four seconds before they breached
Speaker 1: the entryway. That's why he'd occupied himself by checking on everyone.
Speaker 1: He'd trusted his senses and trusted that the Heavenly Kingdom
Speaker 1: didn't have any gear he hadn't already seen. That proved
Speaker 1: to be a mistake, because, unbeknownst to Roland, two men
Speaker 1: in powered armor hung off the outside wall of the building,
Speaker 1: directly underneath the window. Their suits were bleeding edge stealth
Speaker 1: technology utterly absent from Roland's pieda bites of memory. His
Speaker 1: passive sensors had missed them entirely. Roland first realized they
Speaker 1: were there and that he'd air it terribly when they
Speaker 1: opened fire. Close to a hundred thirty caliber slugs tore
Speaker 1: through the wall of the jail at roughly forty two
Speaker 1: hundred feet per second. They were fired at such close
Speaker 1: range and with such total surprise that Roland was unable
Speaker 1: to dodge or prep his subdermal armor for impact. Nineteen
Speaker 1: rounds hit him fifteen in his center of mass, one
Speaker 1: in his left thigh, and three in his right shoulder.
Speaker 1: Two hit Manny, ripping a hole through his left hand
Speaker 1: and another through his kidney. Doctor Brandt, who had only
Speaker 1: half turned to face Rowland at this point, was torn
Speaker 1: apart in a fusillade of steel. Rowland also registered hits
Speaker 1: on their not yet rescued captives, one in Tullie's left
Speaker 1: butt cheek, one that severed Rick's index finger, and another
Speaker 1: in the young man's shoulder. Roland staggered back from the
Speaker 1: impact of the rounds just as Alexander's point man burst
Speaker 1: through the door. The coordination between the two teams was impressive,
Speaker 1: as was the fact that the suited man hadn't hit
Speaker 1: their allies on the other side of the door. On
Speaker 1: a normal day, Roland would have ripped the shotgun out
Speaker 1: of the point man's hands and castrated him with it.
Speaker 1: But this was not a normal day, and Roland's brain
Speaker 1: was occupied with a damage to his body. The point
Speaker 1: man fired twice and sent one ounce tungsten slugs through
Speaker 1: both of Roland's knees. He dropped, rolled, moaned, and then
Speaker 1: the rest of the team was in the room. They
Speaker 1: moved well, not like vets, but like men who'd trained
Speaker 1: a lot for entries like this. They all wore heavy
Speaker 1: body armor. It wasn't powered, but it provided solid protection
Speaker 1: against small arms fire the mostly packed auto shotguns. Smart choice,
Speaker 1: Roland thought, when fighting post humans, go for tissue damage.
Speaker 1: He was hurt, nothing fatal yet, but the loss of
Speaker 1: momentum and control had cost him dearly. Now six men
Speaker 1: had a beat on him with weaponry powerful enough to
Speaker 1: do some real damage. Roland listened as one of the
Speaker 1: stealth suit smashed the remainder of the window in and
Speaker 1: crawled inside the room. This armor was much more subtle
Speaker 1: than the standard Air's pattern power armor. Aside from plating
Speaker 1: at the chest and shins, it didn't look like it
Speaker 1: added a substantial amount of protection. But the suit was
Speaker 1: covered in high definition display panels. The man was hard
Speaker 1: for Roland to see. He would have been nigh invisible
Speaker 1: to a normal human. Shit Roland's bat blood and looked
Speaker 1: up just as a very satisfied looking young man stepped
Speaker 1: into the room. He was tall, handsome, and well built.
Speaker 1: He wore the same armor as his men, but lacked
Speaker 1: a helmet. Instead, he had a red beret with a
Speaker 1: lacquered gold cross pin to the front. Roland took one
Speaker 1: look at the boy's prominent jawline and well tanned skin.
Speaker 1: He grudgingly agreed that it would have been a crime
Speaker 1: to cover up that face. How new were those fucking suits,
Speaker 1: he asked the fancy man. The Republic had some very
Speaker 1: choice gear in its armory. The youth replied, My superiors
Speaker 1: will be happy to hear how well it worked against you.
Speaker 1: He sauntered into the room like a conquering king, waving
Speaker 1: his pistol lazily at the captives. Hello, Sasha, he said,
Speaker 1: with a smile and a cheery wave of his free hand. Alexander,
Speaker 1: she replied, in a tone as cold as ice. The
Speaker 1: young man Alexander stopped in front of Rowland, peered down
Speaker 1: and grinned the ship eatingst grin in the history of
Speaker 1: eating shit, you know, he said, it was rather easy
Speaker 1: drawing you into this trap. Once you played your hand
Speaker 1: at the training camp, we knew you'd come here sooner,
Speaker 1: Oh lady, I was rather surprised to see you involved, Sasha.
Speaker 1: He looked up at her, a wonda. Was this your
Speaker 1: plan all along? Or are you merely an opportunist clutching
Speaker 1: to these men because my proposition injured your ego? He
Speaker 1: laughed prickishly. Roland wanted to hit him, but the situation
Speaker 1: merited further analysis before action. Much of the damage done
Speaker 1: to him in the ambush had already healed, and none
Speaker 1: of it was substantial enough to impede his deadliness. But
Speaker 1: his position was rather tenuous. The second armored soldier crouched
Speaker 1: at the window, adhered to the outside wall. The first
Speaker 1: stealth suited soldier had one gun trained on Manny and
Speaker 1: another aimed at Roland. Alexander's men all had him dead
Speaker 1: to rights, shotguns leveled in fingers on triggers. He could
Speaker 1: perhaps move fast enough to take out one or two
Speaker 1: of them, but the others would do a significant amount
Speaker 1: of damage in the meantime, and more to the point,
Speaker 1: Roland could do nothing to insure Sasha and Manny's safety.
Speaker 1: He considered their deaths unacceptable. I really am a bit disappointed,
Speaker 1: and how easy this owl was? The young fuck continued,
Speaker 1: I thought, we'd be infomo of a fight here. I
Speaker 1: guess the stories about your kind were exaggerated after all,
Speaker 1: I suspected, so no amount of scientific tinkering can replace
Speaker 1: the blessings of God Behind a righteous man. Roland sensed movement,
Speaker 1: not from Manny. He was frozen still next to Sasha
Speaker 1: under the gun of one of the power armored troopers.
Speaker 1: It didn't come from any of Alexander's men either. It
Speaker 1: was Marigold. The woman had gritted her teeth and inched
Speaker 1: her hand towards the body of the guard. Roland a
Speaker 1: dee jawed he watched she wrapped her hand around the
Speaker 1: grip of his side arm. Alexander stepped around him and
Speaker 1: headed towards Sasha. The other soldiers still had their weapons
Speaker 1: trained on Roland. They didn't seem to have noticed Marigold.
Speaker 1: I warn't you, didn't I, Sasha? Alexander asked, as a
Speaker 1: smile played across his lips. I'll warn't you what came
Speaker 1: of defying God's will? And then you allied yourself with
Speaker 1: a baste whose very existence is a sin against a
Speaker 1: heavenly father. If Christ had intended, Roland never got to
Speaker 1: hear the rest of that sentence because Alexander never got
Speaker 1: to say it. He was interrupted by Marigold, pulling the
Speaker 1: pistol free of its holster and swinging it up towards
Speaker 1: the groin of the squad's point man. She fired twice,
Speaker 1: switched targets, and pumped two more rounds into the unarmored
Speaker 1: belly of a second man. Roland was up and off
Speaker 1: the ground. Between the second and third shot. He swung
Speaker 1: his fist hard into the face plate of the nearest
Speaker 1: soldier's helmet. The plexiglass shattered, and Roland's knuckles pushed shards
Speaker 1: into the man's cheeks and eyes. The martyr screamed and
Speaker 1: fired a shot that went wide because Roland doved the
Speaker 1: left as he retracted his fist and pivoted to rush
Speaker 1: the power armored man holding a gun on Manny and Sasha.
Speaker 1: There were no good options here. Marigold's intervention had given
Speaker 1: them all a chance, but Roland had been forced to
Speaker 1: make a choice between going after the armored men and
Speaker 1: saving his friends, or taking out the entry team and
Speaker 1: saving Ari Golden her friends. He heard her fire two
Speaker 1: more shots and heard them impact, but then his attention
Speaker 1: was consumed by the two men in powered armor. They
Speaker 1: recovered first, and both men opened up on Roland as
Speaker 1: he charged. There was no dodging at this distance. It
Speaker 1: was barely possible to mitigate the damage in any way.
Speaker 1: Roland took thirty high velocity rounds to the face, neck, shoulders,
Speaker 1: and upper chest. Some of them were stopped by his
Speaker 1: subdermal armor, most weren't. He felt, holy shit, real pain
Speaker 1: for the first time in what felt like years. Roland's
Speaker 1: wired nervous system rewarded this with a flood of chemical bliss.
Speaker 1: As he charged, he smiled and whooped like a sixteen
Speaker 1: year old. Railing his first line of blow, he dove
Speaker 1: into the first man hands first, grabbed his enemy by
Speaker 1: the neck, and then bum rushed him into the man
Speaker 1: hanging outside the window. This knocked the top of the
Speaker 1: second man's body free from the wall and sent him
Speaker 1: reeling half back into open air. The man's feet were
Speaker 1: still attached to the building, but his body flailed free.
Speaker 1: Roland kept his grip and focus on the first armored man.
Speaker 1: The martyr's neck armor had hardened to resist crushing strength
Speaker 1: of Roland's grip, so he shook the man's head back
Speaker 1: and forth and slammed it into the frame of the
Speaker 1: building as hard as possible. The soldier pumped another dozen
Speaker 1: rounds point blank into Roland's body. He saw red, he
Speaker 1: felt red. He was numbly aware of the tremendous amount
Speaker 1: of damage being done to him, but none of it
Speaker 1: had yet rendered him unable to throttle this motherfucker, so
Speaker 1: he continued to squeeze until the armor's neck seals failed, cracked,
Speaker 1: and Roland's fingernails bit deep into the meat of the
Speaker 1: man's throat and crushed his windpipe. Roland tossed the body
Speaker 1: aside and went for the second man, still flailing outside
Speaker 1: the window. He was interrupted when Alexander fired a slug
Speaker 1: into his temple. The round impact at his reinforced skull
Speaker 1: and ricochet off, but the impact the force of the
Speaker 1: blow itself made him seize stars it hurt Roland staggered
Speaker 1: back into the side. Then several things happened in very
Speaker 1: quick succession. Marigold fired another round, her last. It was
Speaker 1: followed by the sound of the two remaining guards opening
Speaker 1: up with their shotguns. Roland heard as she was torn apart.
Speaker 1: Just as his eyes started to focus again, Alexander fired
Speaker 1: two more shots directly into his head. The man on
Speaker 1: the wall finally found his grip again, and Roland felt
Speaker 1: the power armored soldiers steady himself to open fire. Roland shaken,
Speaker 1: hind brain advised him that going for the armored man
Speaker 1: was probably his best decision, so he surged forward, less
Speaker 1: steady than before and hunched his shoulders in anticipation of
Speaker 1: taking another slugger for to the brain pan, but that
Speaker 1: didn't happen. For the second time to day, Roland was
Speaker 1: surprised by the actions of a normal human. This time
Speaker 1: it was Sasha. She'd gotten up from where she and
Speaker 1: Manny had taken shelter from the gunfight and crawled over
Speaker 1: to the body of the first guard Roland had disabled.
Speaker 1: He'd been dimly aware of this in the semi conscious way.
Speaker 1: He was aware of the traffic passing outside his brain
Speaker 1: had opted to not focus on it, since the heavily
Speaker 1: armed men were a more pressing concern. But then Sasha
Speaker 1: had removed the unconscious guard's helmet and rushed towards Alexander.
Speaker 1: She swung first for his gun hand. Roland heard her
Speaker 1: knock the pistol free of his grip. Then she hit
Speaker 1: him in the face over and over and over again.
Speaker 1: Roland felt the urge to banker, but just then the
Speaker 1: power armored man became a concern again. The fucker managed
Speaker 1: to get off three more shots before Roland ripped the
Speaker 1: weapon free from its forearm mount and used it to
Speaker 1: cave in the armored face plate. Blood spurted out, and
Speaker 1: the man fell limp back out the window. His feet
Speaker 1: continued to adhere to the outside wall while his jerking,
Speaker 1: bleeding body dangled in the breeze. Roland turned just in
Speaker 1: time to take another two slugs from another two shotguns,
Speaker 1: but then the men were empty. They pumped most of
Speaker 1: their rounds into Marigold's body. They fumbled to reload, panicked
Speaker 1: and clearly unused to carrying out the task in a
Speaker 1: combat situation. Roland could smell the terror as it wafted
Speaker 1: off their bodies. Their fear hit his nervous system like
Speaker 1: an ounce of crystal meth. He loomed towards them, and
Speaker 1: for a second, the only sounds in the room were
Speaker 1: his footsteps and the dull thwap of Sasha pounding her
Speaker 1: helmet into Alexander's now shattered skull. Roland whipped his left
Speaker 1: arm out. A massive blade not unlike a straight razor,
Speaker 1: tore through the flesh of his inner forearm and locked
Speaker 1: into place. The men screamed. One dropped a shotgun and
Speaker 1: tried to run. Roland tore into him first, using the
Speaker 1: blade to sever the fucker's arms. Battle drugs and pure
Speaker 1: liquid satisfaction flowed into roland synapses. His dick went hard,
Speaker 1: and he screamed in wordless joy as he slashed downwards
Speaker 1: and sliced off the man's face. The poor bastard fell away, burbling,
Speaker 1: and Roland turned towards the last soldier. He died an
Speaker 1: equally terrible death, and then it was done. The battle
Speaker 1: was over. Quiet reigned. The only sounds audible to a
Speaker 1: normal human would have been the blood spurting from dead
Speaker 1: and dying bodies, and the sound of sobbing. Tully sobbed
Speaker 1: for Marigold, Sasha sobbed for Roland, guest her lost innocence.
Speaker 1: And then out in the city beyond came the sound
Speaker 1: of a hundred sirens. The martyrs were coming for them. Hey,
Speaker 1: I'm Robert Evans. I hope you enjoyed this chapter. I
Speaker 1: hope you enjoyed the chapters to come. You can find
Speaker 1: the free e pub of every chapter and eventually the
Speaker 1: whole book at a t r book dot com, complete
Speaker 1: with illustrations. If you want to support me in writing
Speaker 1: the sequel, you can crowdfund me at After the Revolution
Speaker 1: the Sequel at go fund Me. Just type and go
Speaker 1: fund me after the Revolution the Sequel. Um. I'd like
Speaker 1: my books to always be free, so I'm just going
Speaker 1: to try to crowdfund the next one and see how
Speaker 1: that works. So After the Revolution the Sequel on go
Speaker 1: fund Me. You can also find the community of fans
Speaker 1: of this book online at our slash after the Revolution
Speaker 1: on Reddit. So After the Revolution the Sequel on go
Speaker 1: fund me and our slash after the Revolution on Reddit.
Speaker 1: A t r book dot com for the whole book. Thanks,