That Nietzsche Thing

  Chapter 22

  We hit the Fed’s battle line like a wave breaking on the shore. They made their stand at Second and James, a spot that gave their vehicles room to maneuver, but also allowed me to concentrate my attack.

  I gathered at least three thousand behind me before I launched my assault, waiting over half an hour, under the guns of the waiting Feds, to form a phalanx.

  All the while they blared orders from megaphones and bombarded us with teargas. But my Genie army held firm, unconcerned with their threats or the stinging effects of the pink gas. We carried no weapons, had no need for them. We were Cain’s weapons. Our lives were unimportant.

  When I felt that I’d gathered together enough, I charged.

  Had the Feds not reinforced their numbers during the day with a regular army battalion from Fort Lewis, the battle would have been over in minutes. Instead, behind the riot shields and water cannons of the riot police, we met Browning machine guns and Stryker LAV’s.

  That first attack at Second and James put an end to the pretense that the Feds were trying to quell a civil disturbance. Once my Genies overwhelmed that line of riot cops, we were officially in an all-out shooting war.

  When the machine guns barked to life, Genies started dying.

  It made no difference to me. I just readied the next wave. I knew their ammunition couldn’t last forever.

  And I had all the cannon fodder I’d need.

  After less than twenty minutes of fighting, the Army’s blockade at Second and James collapsed. With it went what little control over the Genies that I had. I had no means of commanding my force beyond the range of my voice. Whatever orders I gave to the grungy, blurry-eyed Genies, they obeyed without question, but once my forces scattered into the streets of the city, chasing down what fleeing Feds they could find, I no longer had any direct control.

  So my assault floundered and turned into a running, gunning door-to-door battle with the splintered Army ranks. The loss of momentum allowed the Feds to regroup and counterattack.

  By 2 a.m., the tide had turned. I was caught down on First, as the maneuverable Strykers began to herd random groups of Genies into a crossfire. They were laying into us with small arms, tearing us apart, when Tebor came to our rescue. The air, again, filled with screeching bats.

  The swarm filled the sky, blocking out the street lights and sending the soldiers cowering for the cover of their armored vehicles. The bats descended on a single point in the street, gathering together and forming into the outline of a gargantuan man. There was a split second when the bats seemed to freeze in mid flap, then Tebor erupted from their cocoon.

  He picked up a Stryker by its front fender and flipped it onto its back. Rifle fire peppered him from the murder holes of a second Stryker, and in a blur, Tebor sprang across the road and planted his shoulder square into the armored car. He knocked it back through the storefront beside the road, and over onto its side in the rubble of the building.

  When the dust had settled, Tebor was the only figure left standing. He stalked in a slow circle, like a lion looking for prey. But none dared attack the beast-man.

  I pulled myself up out of the dirt and the blood.

  “Thanks,” I said meekly. I knew I was lucky that Tebor hadn’t torn me in two, along with the Strykers.

  “Focus,” Tebor growled. It was the first word I’d heard him say, and now I knew why. He was almost unintelligible. “Focus on the Town Hall,” he said, and suddenly vanished into thin air. A new swarm of bats appeared, as if from a running faucet, spewing like a tornado in the sky.

  I did as instructed. I gathered together the few stray Genies I could find and sent them to gather more. By 3:30, I had a good force of eight hundred to a thousand concentrated in Westlake Park.

  I was running out of dark. It was only a few hours before dawn. If there was going to be a last-ditch, Alamo attempt by the Feds, I wanted it to happen while Cain and the others were still aboard in town. If the Feds held out until daybreak...well, they’ll have all day to peck away at the Genies before nightfall. No, I wanted the battle to be over before they got that chance.

  I began to lead my new army south down Fourth, heading for the Town Hall and Constantine’s mobile HQ. If I could destroy that, the war would be over. Seattle would be mine.

  The occupation would finally be over.

  The Army, however, had other ideas.

  The Abrams TUSK sat, waiting for us just north of the Central Library. Without ceremony, its turret turned to welcome are advancing line and belched forth with a hail of AP fire from its main cannon.

  The centimeter tungsten ball bearings tore into the Genies, decapitating and severing arteries. I was at the point of the advancing force and only survived by throwing myself face first to the concrete. The tank’s automated machine gun started to fire as the main cannon reloaded. Bodies fell as Genies leapt for cover.

  The second blast from the cannon swept the street clean. What Genies escaped the meat grinder, including myself, took cover in the hotels at Fourth and Spring.

  The tank had us pinned down.

  An hour passed slowly into two as the tank sat in the center of Fourth Avenue. Any movement was quickly answered by a salvo from the automated turret.

  Dawn was rising. I could see it off to the east whenever I dared raise my head from cover. I tried to send a runner to get help, but he didn’t make it twenty feet before losing a leg to the .50 caliber.

  All I could do was sit tight.

  Just after 5:30, the tank seemed to acquire a target north, up Fourth. It squealed on its tracks, shifting to a better position, then its turret angled for a shot. The cannon fired, and the ground shook. I had no vantage point to see what it was shooting at, but it seemed to hit something.

  The shot was answered by a deafening thunderclap. The rubble of the old hotel crashed down all around me. The tank seemed to stagger back, as if hit by an invisible shock wave. It rolled forward a few feet, then stopped, then rolled forward again, listing to the right.

  It turned ninety degrees and its turret came swinging about. The turret did a full rotation, the barrel of the long cannon drooped toward the pavement, followed by muffled screams of pain. Then silence.

  I risked climbing up from behind cover.

  The tank sat, still. I stepped out though the blast hole in the brickwork and took a step toward the tank. Just as I did, a hatched popped open. I staggered back. But no solider in battledress emerged. Instead, Vivian pushed up out of the hatch, throwing out her handbag and slinking her curves out of the confinement of the tank. She leapt clear, landing in her high heels on the blacktop and smoothed out her dress.

  “How’d you do that?” I asked, as Vivian’s heels clicked past me, heading back up Fourth.

  “Do what?” she paused.

  “Get inside that tank?”

  “I’m good in tight spots,” she smiled and continued on up the avenue.