The Dragons of Men (The Sons of Liberty Book 2) (73 page)

Please, God,
Adam implored as he trudged forward.
Let them be alive. Let me see them once more before the end.

“Tyler!”

Adam looked to his left as a woman ran forward, trailed by a one-armed man and another soldier.

“Nadia!”

The woman ran up, falling in beside Tyler as she attempted to kiss him and assess his injuries at the same time. Adam and Marc halted and set Tyler down.

“How bad is he hurt?” Nadia asked.

“His leg is shattered and he’s bleeding badly,” Adam replied. “We need to get him inside immediately.”

“Wait,” Tyler said, reaching up to pull Nadia closer. “Where are the women and—”

“Everyone’s right where they need to be,” a familiar voice cut in. Adam looked up, his heart nearly stopping as Eric trotted forward. “You’ve done enough, Tyler. It’s time to—”

“Eric!” Adam shouted, standing to face his old friend.

Eric looked over at Adam, his eyes growing wide with complete and utter shock. For a brief moment, Adam thought Eric might actually pass out.

“Adam?” Eric finally whispered, breathing heavily as Guardsmen began to yell intangibly from the wall.

“Eric,” Adam began, “where are—”

With a sudden flash, as Adam gazed intently at Eric Corsa—oblivious to the men shouting and leaping from the wall a hundred feet behind them—Adam Reinhart became aware.

He was aware of the abnormally loud cannon fire in the distance. He was aware a split second later as the wall behind them exploded, fragments of steel and wood flying toward them. Adam closed his eyes tightly as a wave of light and air struck them, throwing Eric into Adam. As he tumbled to the ground, screaming as a concussion of heat passed over him, Adam was aware of the sinking feeling that he might not actually get to see his family before he died.

“Get down!”

Judah shouted as the five tanks that had roared onto the battlefield fired. The wall to the right of them exploded while three shells struck the dorm one hundred feet to the left. The building trembled violently as it began to crack and break apart, the half that had been hit crumbling to the ground. Judah grabbed Jimmy by the arm and hauled him to his feet.

They ran outside into the hallway and Judah glanced down the corridor, dust and smoke from the collapse cascading down the long hallway before engulfing them. Judah covered his face and made his way toward the corner stairs as best as he could. Other survivors abandoned their posts, stumbling into the darkened hall. Some coughed, others screamed, and dozens cried out in fear and pain. Another boom and the building shook again, this time a direct hit on the floor above them.

Judah had known the end would come the moment the wall fell and death himself arrived to say adieu. With the inner wall breached and a mass of thousands charging forward, there was now nothing left standing between chaos and those he loved, nothing but Judah and the men beside him.

Your battle isn’t over
, Judah thought.
Alexandra still lives.

“Everyone, follow me!” Judah shouted, hefting his gun as he began to rally the disorganized snipers. “We’re not done yet!”

Maria pulled the mask free and took a deep breath, flinging the water from her gloves. Her dress was plastered tightly against her body, her dark hair matted against her face. She was an absolute mess, a wet rag soaked with apprehension and murky river water, and it was not at all how she had wanted to meet the man who now sat across from her.

“Take your time,” the man said with a hint of ire as the tiny submarine cut through the water. The four Marines who had assisted her sat to her left. Another—the driver of the craft—sat in front of her, concentrating on a computer-assisted screen as he guided the vessel through the bottom of the Potomac. The man across from Maria raised a glowing Stonewall device similar to the one Maria had hidden in her purse, examining the small globe with satisfaction. “You were quite right, Miss Brekor. These are handy.”

“If you’ll forgive me,” Maria began as she wrung water from her hair, “I am not entirely in the mood for speaking right now.”

The man paused before setting the device down beside him. He was a hard-looking man, not quite forty though gray had begun to touch his temples. He stared at Maria quietly, his face calm and unreadable. Maria shifted uncomfortably, glancing over at the other men who also gazed at her silently. Maria suddenly felt powerless, a strange sensation of which she was not accustomed.

This was your doing,
Maria thought, taking a deep breath to try to compose herself.
You wanted this. You asked for it. You are free.

The man across from her finally smiled, shaking his head and clearing his throat.

“We risked a lot coming to get you,” the man finally said. “To sneak a sub this close to DC wasn’t easy. Our commanders didn’t know at first whether or not to trust you. Me…I’m still not convinced. I suppose I’m not the voice that matters though; I’m just a soldier, following orders. But you see, I risked not only my life, but the lives of these five men in here and the three men waiting with the stealth Blackhawk at Point Lookout State Park. I trust my commanders and I know they wouldn’t have approved this operation had they not thought the reward justified the mission.” The man leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees as the smile disappeared from his face. “You are the reward, Maria. What knowledge you hold behind that disfigured face of yours is the reward. I know what you’re going through must be quite traumatic compared to life with the man that plunged this world into war, so please feel free to take a breather. However, I can and will assure you…you will speak and soon.”

Maria inclined her head slightly before nodding. It had been part of the bargain—her detailed knowledge of Lukas, the Imperium, and the Patriarchs—everything she knew in exchange for their help to escape. But Maria hadn’t simply been motivated by a desire for freedom.

She loathed Lukas Chambers.

Maria hated the self-righteous man he had become and the empire he had begun to build. She wanted to see both fall beneath the onslaught of titans. For that, she needed powerful allies, and she could not think of any more suited for the job than the men she had covertly contacted.

“Indeed,” Maria finally said, reclining as a hint of her famous composure returned. “You have your weapons and I have mine. Still, I can assure you that I will do whatever it takes, speak endlessly for days if necessary, to see my husband fall. It is my one and only dream. I simply hope you and your commanders share that passion.”

The man’s smile returned and he glanced over at the other Marines. After a pause, they all chuckled—giving her a nod of approval. The man across from Maria leaned back, shaking his head as the laughter subsided.

“Maria Brekor,” the man began, “I can guarantee you they do. Welcome to the Republic of Texas.”

The control room far beneath the White House erupted into bedlam as the feed winked out.

“What happened?” Lukas demanded, falling back to his chair.

“We don’t know yet, sir.”

The Battle Marshal ignored them all as he shouted at his men, doing everything he could to get the picture back up. Lukas slowly shifted his gaze across the room, breathing heavily as his sanity wallowed in the chaos.

“Strike Seven, report!”

“I want a SITREP on all major coastal cities: New York, Boston, Baltimore, Norfolk….”

“I’m getting nothing from the Gulf.”

“Any eyes on Sigmund?”

“What the hell is going on?”

“Lukas!”

Lukas turned, watching as a Sovereign Guard quickly shoved his way through the pandemonium.

“What is it?” Lukas demanded.

“We found the guards who had escorted Maria.”

“Tell me you found her too?” Lukas asked quickly, leaning forward in his chair—his eyes watering with a choking anxiety.

“Not yet, sir,” the guard replied.

“What the hell do you mean?” Lukas bellowed, earning him a few glances from those who shouted throughout the room.

“Her guards were murdered. We’re searching the area and analyzing all available data, but it appears there was something interfering with surveillance. So far, we have yet to discover any footage that recorded her whereabouts.”

Lukas’ shoulders rose and fell as he drew unsteady breaths, the beginnings of a panic attack creeping upward. He fidgeted for a moment before forcing his lungs to draw in a deep breath. He paused for a moment—a rollercoaster on the cusp of descending into madness—and purged his frustration in the form of a primitive roar. This time, everyone looked his way. His heart pounded, beating like a war drum inside of his ears. Finally, he inhaled and exhaled in a steady rhythm, those gazing at him slowly returning to their bustle.

“Keep searching. Do not give up until she is found.” The agent nodded, turning quickly and accelerating into a sprint as he left the room.

This can’t be happening,
Lukas thought as he glanced up at the screen.
This can’t be happening!
He turned to Clark, his wrath boiling over as he snapped again.

“Where the hell is the picture?”

“We’ve got nothing on the ground,” the Battle Marshal replied. “I can’t—”

Radio static suddenly filled the speakers in the command room.

“…command…Spectre One…copy….”

“Isolate that frequency,” Damian bellowed, stepping forward. “Get me a live image right—”

Before he could finish, Spectre One’s video feed filled the screen. The gunships had been ordered to return home once the Praetorians had infiltrated the city. They were seventy miles east of Breton Sound. Despite the distance, the image was clear.

A thick mushroom cloud slowly billowed over New Orleans.

Silence and the stillness of awe filled the control room. Those standing by quietly soaked up the image of the radioactive thunderhead, knowing the war they had been waging had changed with a brilliant, unforeseen flash.

“My God,” Lukas finally whispered. “They’re gone. The Praetorians, the Yellow Jackets…they’re all gone.”

“As are the Patriarchs, my Sovereign,” Jacob said, turning to Lukas.

“But we lost everything!” Lukas shouted in return.

“No, you rid yourself of the Patriarch’s strong hold. You did what you had to do and gained the world because of it.”

“Did I?” Lukas replied. “My entire fleet of drones and my greatest strike force gone while Sigmund still lives?”

“New soldiers can be trained. Additional drones can be manufactured. Sigmund might have escaped, but I can assure you it has cost him more in the end than the price you’ve paid. The nations will learn of what he has done and we will have time to place the blame for the world’s woes at his feet.”

“But I—”

“Lukas, my boy, trust me when I say that your victory here was worth more than you yet know.”

Lukas glanced up at Jacob and slowly nodded his head. His wife was missing, Sigmund lived, and his mightiest warriors were now nothing more than infinitesimal motes drifting with the tidings of a toxic wind. Despite Jacob’s words of assurance, Lukas couldn’t help but dwell on how much his victory felt like a crushing defeat.

Adam coughed the dust from his throat as he slowly rose to a crouch. Eric lay next to him, breathing shallowly, eyes closed. All around men either ran, hobbled, or crawled away from the burning breach. Nadia cried out for help as she dragged Tyler across the grass, a thick shard of steel sticking from his stomach—his eyes wide with shock and pain. Details that mattered little to Adam now. The final barrier between the multitudes and his family had been destroyed.

Soon, they’d all join the fallen in the endless forevermore.

Adam glanced back at the wall. A breach fifteen feet wide bored through the center wall where the gate had once stood proudly. Behind the gap, the distant roar of a thousand terrors grew as the masses thundered forward—barely a thousand feet away.

He looked to his left as a group of soldiers ran from the smoldering dorms—eyeing the hole that ensured their demise. They sprinted away from the battle, running toward a large building at the other end of the inner campus.

Maybe they can get them out,
Adam thought.
Maybe….

Adam growled as he rose to his feet, a primal snarl that awakened a ferocious beast within—not a black dragon, but a sacrificial creature of light that shouted into the abyss,
you cannot have them!
He looked around on the ground for a gun, but all he found among the corpses of American soldiers was a discarded hatchet and a blackened machete. He reached down and seized them both, breathing heavily as he turned to face the running multitudes, now only eight hundred feet beyond the breach.

“Come on!” Adam bellowed as he slowly advanced toward the gap.

Seven hundred feet.

“You want me? Try to take me!” A righteous rage washed over him with a strange numbness—purifying him with a valor he had never felt before.