CHAPTER 32

Kaboom!

The tank at the front of the army’s cavalcade fired at the phoenix. The bird spun in a fiery spiral and dodged the cannon shell. It turned away from the enclosure and shrieked as it sliced through the air. The army vehicles were now on the menu.

“All right,” I said. “If those idiots want to fight the phoenix, let them. It’ll give us time to grab a wraith and get the hell out of here.”

Renfro slid Cannon 15 to a stop outside the city’s last remaining enclosure. As soon as I got out of the truck, people flooded out of the enclosure’s front door, running to their cars and speeding away as fast as they could. I tried to flag down a few of them, but they only bathed me in their headlights before veering out of my path, ash flinging from their fleeing hover-thrusters.

I spotted Ted Sevier fumbling for his keys outside a burgundy coupe.

“Where are you going?” I grabbed him by the arm.

He looked like a cornered animal, eyes red, face covered in sweat, trembling inside his navy blue blazer. “We’ve lost control. The other enclosures have fallen. You’ve got to do something. I’m getting the hell out of here.”

I didn’t understand the gibberish coming out of his mouth. “What do you mean you lost control?”

The walls of the enclosure shook as something very large and very heavy slammed against the other side of it. The wraiths inside the walls attacked the glass, slashing it with their claws and even attempting to bite it.

I turned back to Ted. “Did everyone get out?”

“Yes. Yes, I think so.”

I released him and he quickly got into his car and drove off.

Radioing the other ash kickers, I said, “Something’s gone wrong with the enclosures. If we’re going to–”

“Tamerica!” Naveena’s voice blasted through my helmet. “The phoenix is heading right for you!”

I turned and looked skyward. The firebird dive bombed toward me like a loosed arrow.

As I flattened myself against the ground, the phoenix’s scorching wings sailed overhead. It cruised to a stop just in front of the enclosure and hovered there, staring at the ghosts trapped inside the glass.

With a heaving flap of the its wings and a squawk for good measure, every wraith inside the enclosure exploded into flames. The walls now contained an inferno. Then, like gunshots in the night, cracks began to ripple through the enclosure’s glass.

“Renfro!” I shouted into my helmet. “Set up the cannons right now! This enclosure is about to bust. Everyone, we need to take the defensive. Surround and drown. Don’t let any of these fucking scalies get past us!”

I turned back to put eyes on my crew. Instead I found an army spider vehicle gliding over the ash. A turret gun rose from its top, and then fired two rapid blasts. Blue laser streaks flew over my head. The first shot passed just under the phoenix’s right wing and slammed into the enclosure wall. It shattered, billows of glass and flames. The second shot hit the phoenix in the middle and sent it hurdling through the fire, into the enclosure.

I covered my face as shrapnel pelted my helmet and power suit.

“You fucking idiots!” I shouted.

“We didn’t do anything!” Afu said over the radio. I’d meant it for the army and their careless-ass attack, but I realized only my crew could hear it.

Multiple angry roars came from behind the smoke and flames. A scaly foot broke through and landed just in front of me. I looked up to see a white, crystalline dragon head looking down at me from at least fifty feet up. Training and adrenaline kicked in as I fired a few rounds at the scaly, the lasers striking the translucent spikes protruding from its cheek bones. My efforts only chipped off a few pieces of the spikes and made the dragon flinch slightly, as if the lasers were houseflies buzzing around its face.

Then, with a snarl, the dragon opened its mouth and showed me a sparkling blue light at the back of its throat.

Well, you don’t see that every day.

Still flat on the ground, I hit my suit’s power jump. The thrusters threw me across the ground. I didn’t go far but it was enough to dodge the scaly’s attack which came out as a blinding cone of cold energy.

“It’s a fucking ice dragon!” Naveena shouted through my helmet. “Get out of there, T!”

I scrambled onto my feet and ran for the cannon truck as the ice dragon slammed another foot where I’d been lying.

“Shoot it!” I said between huffing breaths. “Shoot it, goddamn it!”

“Which one?” came Renfro’s voice.

Movement to my right.

I looked over to see a lindworm stampeding alongside me, seemingly unconcerned about my presence and just happy to be sprung from jail. At my left, poppers sailed in and out of the ground like cresting dolphins. The sky above me, dark already from the fledgling night, darkened even more from the mass of flying monsters filling the air with their flapping wings.

The phoenix flew over, carrying a small drake in its talons and zooming fast and far ahead of the horde of flying scalies. They were all heading for the heart of Parthenon City.

When the lindworm reached the army spider vehicle, it jumped on top and began biting at the metal and shooting blasts of flames. It took only seconds for the dragon to rip away the top hatch of the spider like a ragged can of tuna fish. A man’s screams came from inside and continued when the lindworm dropped into the vehicle and thrashed so hard, it looked like it would topple over.

“Lower the cannon, Renfro,” I said. “Get back in the truck. We’ve got to get downtown.”

Renfro hurried to lower the cannon as Afu chugged his huge legs and jumped back into the truck.

I climbed into my seat as an army tank rolled up and shot at the ice dragon. The booming tank fire made me cover my ears, but it didn’t seem to do shit to the giant scaly, besides making it stumble a bit and then roar almost as loudly as the cannon. A blast of ice covered the tank and when the freezing light had subsided, what remained was a frosty tanksicle.

The ice dragon took a single flap of its icy wings to leap into the air and came down right on top of the frozen tank. The metal shattered as the tank flattened under the ice dragon’s weight. It would have been bad enough for the dragon to call that the end of it, but it grabbed what remained of the tank in its claws and flew off toward the city.

Renfro jumped into the driver’s seat, nearly chomped by a passing electro scaly’s snapping teeth.

“Drive!” I said. “Follow the dragons.”

“Where are they going?” Afu asked.

“They’re following the phoenix. And the bird is going to be heading for the convention center because those PC First fuckheads are going to put our orange wraith on full display. And that wraith is the only thing we have left to kill the phoenix.”

Over my helmet radio, I called for a full response to the city, every damn smoke eater we had, no matter if they were on another call or off duty and halfway through a bottle of whiskey. I told the propellerheads to keep sending out the emergency response calls until every smoke eater in Ohio acknowledged that they were on their way.

A dragon that looked like a rhinoceros bullfrog slammed my side of the truck. Renfro twirled the steering wheel to keep us all upright, but we were skidding hard and plowed into a group of wyverns. Scaly blood and guts splattered across the windshield, but Renfro, being the consummate professional he was, simply turned on the windshield wipers and smeared the gore into a thin paste across the glass.

Several thumps racked the top of the cannon truck. I tried to look up from my window but could see nothing besides the edge of a heaving bat-like wing. The truck heaved and for a moment our wheels weren’t touching the ground.

“Can you shake this thing off of us?” I asked Renfro.

“Hold onto your butts.” He whipped the steering wheel to the right.

The force threw me into the door, then Renfro pulled the same maneuver to the left and my seat belt nearly choked me. Poor Afu in the back was being tossed around like a marble in an empty soda can.

“Damn it, Afu!” I shouted. “How many times do I have to tell you to put your seatbelt on?”

“Dragon still has us,” Renfro said.

Again, the truck lifted off the ground for at least two seconds before the wheels touched back down again.

“On second thought,” I pointed to Afu, “get on the roof and chop this fucker’s legs off if you have to.”

Afu nodded, secured his laser axe to the back of his power suit and moved to climb out of the window.

“Wait!” I stretched myself toward the back of the cab and grabbed Afu by the metal collar of his power suit. I kissed him, kissed him like I’d never kissed him before, and like I never would again.

When I pulled away, Afu was grinning as wide as a Cheshire cat.

“Now get the hell up there,” I said. “I’ll try to cover you with some laser fire. Stay in radio contact. Renfro, try to stay smooth, but don’t let up on the gas.”

My driver nodded and my smoke eater climbed out of the window.

“Holy Jesus!” Afu’s voice crackled over the radio. “This thing is huge.”

“Don’t worry about killing it,” I said. “We just need it off our truck.”

I lowered my window and began to lean out. The ground surged a few feet away, launching a popper out of the ground. I blasted the dragon with a few lasers and dropped it midair. Our truck’s rear dual wheels ran over the dead popper, and the ensuing bump tossed all of us like ragdolls. Seeing it from my side mirror, the dragon burst into yellow embers in our wake.

“Fuck, man,” Afu said. “Watch your driving!”

I placed my ass on the open window and looked toward the truck’s roof. Afu clung to the emergency light bar. Above him, the blue dragon I’d seen galloping in the enclosure flapped its massive wings, eyes focused on the city.

“I’m going for it,” Afu said. “Keep her steady.”

On wobbly legs, Afu slowly began to stand. He reached over his shoulder and brought out his laser axe. The sound of the laser must have caught the dragon’s attention, because it roared and tried to lift the truck again.

Fight or flight hit Afu hard and, thankfully, he chose to bury his axe in the nearest scaly limb. Blood misted across Afu’s face and helmet but he kept hacking until the dragon let go with its claw dangling by a thin strand of flesh. In its retreat, the scaly attempted to snap its teeth at Afu, but I was ready with my haymo grenade.

Streaks of blistering light sliced through the dragon’s neck and Afu leaned away to avoid being cut by the haymo’s propellers. The blue scaly burst into embers before it ever hit the ground, and our speeding cannon truck made it look like we were releasing an armada of fireflies off our roof.

“Ouch, ouch!” Afu slapped at his power suit. “Hot shit!”

“All right,” I said, giving Afu a thumbs up and a smile. “Get back in here.”

I had Renfro slow the truck to let Afu climb back in and then it was back to speeding after the dragons and the phoenix.

“Where’s Naveena?” I asked.

“We’re over here,” her voice said.

I leaned forward to look past Renfro and saw Naveena’s Slayer truck tearing across the ash to get on the road behind us.

“Dear God,” Renfro said as he looked ahead. He was able to see the horror better than all of us with his red eyes. But even I saw more than I cared to.

Parthenon City was lit up like a glistening jewel in the night, and roaring, clawing, and flapping their way between us and nearly a million innocent people was the largest stampede of dragons I’d ever seen in my life.