Deadly Wands (64 page)

In fact, Genghis received a report every day,
and just this morning he saw a video of Grandma at the Baron’s
bedside with the distinctive Los Angeles city and many thousands of
marathoners behind them. What he didn’t know is that this would be
the last messenger that Team Red would let through.

Genghis organized two million quads into four
groups: he had half a million at the Bering Strait; four groups of
fifty thousand around Peking; half a million opposing the Koreans,
Japanese, and Taiwanese; and the rest near his border with China.
The Russians, Persians, and Turks kept their air units far from his
borders, so he redeployed those troops to oppose the Chinese.

What Genghis didn’t know is that Europe
started attacking a week ago. The Khan’s sack of Krakow scared
them, and Jack constantly reminded them that they’d never be safe
as long as the Mongols survived. The Russians spent the winter
pre-deploying supplies and the marathoners carried heavier loads so
the rest could travel farther.

To help the Chinese, Billy paid the Indian
Air Force to attack the Mongols facing the Chinese from behind
while the Republic of Northern India cleansed the Tibetan Plateau
of Mongols.

In the Khan’s favor, the Baron’s raids
motivated Mongols to join his air force. Widespread persecution in
former territories succeeded in motivating several million other
Mongol descendents to move home -- something that Genghis himself
repeatedly failed to do. The Baron’s threat to the homeland
motivated several million more to temporarily defend their
ancestral homeland without actually moving there permanently.

Apart from a million new quads joining his
air force, and a few million more flying in just to protect Mongols
in case the bells rang, Genghis hired a million foreign mercenaries
with bullion he buried centuries ago.

Besides training millions of two-wanders,
Genghis spent heavily to give away conventional weapons -- swords,
bows, and spears -- to millions of Mongols who couldn’t use wands.
The generals facing the Americans, Chinese, and those in Korea
spent months preparing for every conceivable scenario, building
defenses, and stockpiling supplies. If the enemy attacked, these
troops would trounce them.

If bells rang across northern China, several
million people on each side would start slaughtering each other.
Plus the four million quads in professional air units.

Genghis tasted victory already. Without the
Baron and his quarter-million marathoners, the Americans and the
Chinese Air Force won’t attack, which presented him with a
delicious irony. Genghis waved a messenger over and gave the order
to ring the city bells after the ceremony. He’d much rather fight
the enemy now without the Baron.

With his two million quads without enemy
armadas to occupy them, he could deploy them against the Chinese
civilians and foreign tourists shooting Mongols. With the homeland
empty of traitors, he could then retake southern China.

Or, he thought with a smile, put pleasure
before business and wipe out the Americas. There couldn’t be more
than one hundred million of them left. That’d be just the therapy
his traumatized spirit needed.

What a beautiful morning! He personally
didn't like Peking because dust clouds from the Gobi practically
buried it. And the dust triggered his hacking cough, which
inevitably reminded him that he once had to crawl through a million
headless bodies covered in shit. But since the Baron destroyed his
roving tent palace, he only felt safe within the Forbidden City in
Peking.

Music started and the three champions flew
out. The Indian landed on the highest post, with Jirko winning the
silver and a Tatar prodigy the bronze. Then Genghis gave an
inspiring speech that he spent an unusual amount of time on,
knowing the world was watching. The Empire's national anthem
followed while the arena played a montage of video clips of the
duels that the audience witnessed over the last month.

Genghis Khan could not remember when he last
enjoyed himself so much.

CHAPTER 81

What Genghis Khan didn’t know is that the
Battle for Northern China, as it’d soon be called, actually began a
week ago because it takes that long for his relay messengers to
reach him from the Bering Strait. Billy timed the American attack
so that Genghis would not learn of it before Billy killed him. As
it was, a messenger -- flying at maximum speed -- was only an hour
from Peking with news of the epic battle.

Billy had been planning this attack for a
decade. He had the Americans eliminate everyone in eastern Siberia
and Manchuria the last few summers, sent his commanders to learn
the future battleground terrain, and sent munition ships to the
coast so his marathoners could stockpile bombs.

Days before the Khan’s spy even left Los
Angeles, Billy’s marathon divisions flew a thousand clicks to his
first fleet. Every thousand clicks they’d use either an island or
another fleet as stepping stones until they reached Korea. Billy’s
marathoners traveled from Los Angeles to Peking faster than the
Khan’s relay messengers, and were still rested enough to fight.

The marathoners were still crossing the
Pacific when half a million Americans began the Battle for the
Bering Strait. The Americans had slept all day, then bombed them
after sunset. The Mongols had been awake all day, then spent all
night defending themselves. Both sides numbered half a million, but
the Americans averaged twice the endurance, and so could keep more
quads in the air. They also had better wands, greater motivation,
and the initiative. Munitions ships sailed near to save time, and
hospital ships to save lives. Supply ships set up temporary bases
along the Alaskan coast, providing food, beds, and medicine. They
literally did the heavy lifting.

The first day they fought at parity, but with
each day the Americans fielded more and better quads. Within the
week they turned air superiority into air supremacy, and had to
position several divisions just to catch the Mongols who fled
before the inevitable. It’d take another week to clear the bunkers,
but it was so worth it to see Genghis Khan lose another half a
million quads.

The reason the Khan put so many quads there
was to prevent Americans from entering Siberia. What he didn’t know
is that one hundred fifty thousand near-marathoners island-hopped
down the Aleutians, then flew every five hundred kilometers to a
ship, until they reached the Siberian coast. They raced down
Manchuria until they reached the supply ships waiting for them near
Korea.

The day before the marathoners struck Peking,
the near-marathoners bombed the Mongols facing the Koreans,
Japanese, and Taiwanese in Korea. The Mongols had practiced against
every possible threat.

Except getting attacked from behind.

CHAPTER 82

Genghis didn't know how long he had been
looking up when he noticed others staring at him. Then he realized
he heard something really faint, like a musket shot fired from the
moon. Now he heard it, regularly like a heartbeat: someone was
shrieking a friendly greeting from high altitude.

Warnings rang from multiple patrols and
everyone suspected they had another suicidal -- some idiot eager to
ruin the party. They’d barely feel a blast fired that high up.
Still, he looked around for hidden dangers, and noticed his
Imperial Guard doing the same. They had multiplied patrols for a
few thousand kilometers out to detect large air units, but lone
wolves still posed risks. One hundred thousand of the world's best
quads, like those in the stadium, couldn't stop a single flier.

What the Khan didn't know is that 1) Billy’s
fleet just anchored over the horizon; 2) that four fake Barons
lured his big air units away; and 3) that two hundred fifty
thousand marathoners were about to end the Olympics with a
bang.

Dayan, his head of security, put a hand on
his shoulder, something that few others dared. "You know the
rules," he said harshly to deter an argument. Genghis grunted
impatiently -- he didn't want to hide in his panic room during this
incredibly important publicity event. "Why build an escape room if
you won't use it?"

Still, Genghis hesitated. Then Dayan looked
up, alarmed. The greeting not only kept coming, but grew much
louder. Too loud for an ordinary suicidal. "Go!" Dayan barked at
the greatest conqueror in history while opening a hatch below
them.

Genghis reluctantly went, climbing down the
stairs and hoping nobody noticed. Except that damn Indian in the
arena. While everyone else searched the skies, the Indian's eyes
never left him. The Indian cursed, covertly stabbed the silver and
bronze winners in the back, then fired at Genghis while pretending
to help Jirko.

“No!” the Khan cried out in despair. He just
lost the most powerful Mongol he had left. Except maybe for Jirko’s
prodigy son.

Dayan, facing the wrong direction, never saw
the blast coming. Genghis yelled a warning, then dropped down the
chute just before a huge fireball vaporized his most trusted
descendent. Genghis bounced off a wall and smacked into compact
earth.

So much happened so fast that he didn't even
get the chance to use his wands to control his fall. When he
finally got on his feet, he screamed in pain. He sprained an ankle,
or worse. He didn’t even know if he could fly.

Genghis heard a familiar primal scream and
climbed up to a spy hole to see the Indian face off against a guy
in a bright red suit. No! The Red Baron here? Challenging the
dueling champion? The bastard even spoke to the crowd before bowing
to his opponent like in ancient honor duels. As well he should
because one hundred thousand pairs of wands tracked him. The Baron
wasn’t going to leave this arena alive. Oh, how Genghis would love
to see two hundred thousand fireballs consume the Red Baron! His
hatred of the man felt as immense as the vast grassy steppe.

The duelers positioned themselves in a
fighting stance, then the Indian charged, shooting rapidly. The
crowd swooned. Genghis, unable to believe his eyes, could not stop
watching, even though he knew something was terribly wrong.

The Red Baron avoided the first blasts by
flying up while flaming all four wands. Genghis still had a hard
time believing it, but his hands wands extended fire for
twenty-three meters. His personal best was thirteen and a half
meters after hearing reports that Subodei reached thirteen. To get
even that he had to kill thousands of tied up prisoners,
transferring their wands while they died. But that was centuries
ago. The best he could do lately was eleven meters.

Unimpressed, the Indian attacked aggressively
until they slashed at each other with blades in the very center of
the huge arena. Higher and higher the battle took them. The fight
captivated the stadium, despite warning shrieks from distant
patrols. Suddenly the Baron saw a shadow in the sky and released
his infamous scream. Instead of fighting, the two duelers popped
up, not three meters from each other, and engaged the Mongol
patrols above them. Two guys attacking two hundred while two
hundred thousand fireballs flew at them?

What the hell? Nothing made sense.

Then a series of explosions shook the arena,
knocking Genghis back down his bolt hole. Thousands of explosives
under the stadium stands detonated nearly as one, each many times
larger than the contact bombs dropped by fliers. Millions of scrap
metal flew in all directions as the Chinese who lit those fuses
raced for cover. The earth shook so hard he bounced into the air.
His ears ringing, Genghis had never experienced such a heavy
bombardment before. He looked up from his hole deep in the bedrock
to the thick metal walls above him. He flew to the ceiling and
locked the heavy steel hatch from within.

I'm safe, he told himself, not quite
believing it.

Hundreds of quads monopolized the skyscrapers
with views of the arena. They were told to record the Khan at all
times in case the Red Baron dueled him, yet were still shocked when
the Baron actually showed up. From that distance, an Imperial Guard
blocked their view of the Khan when the champion fireballed him,
but he clearly had not flown away when the stadium blew up. And the
Immortal certainly would not have survived the bombers who dropped
serious tonnage onto the survivors. Much less when the attackers
stabbed everyone in the arena.

They looked at each other in shock: Genghis
Khan was dead!

As one, the witnesses flew off to report to
various Chinese, Japanese, Taiwanese, Korean and Mongolian
generals. Soon thousands of Chinese flew out across China to spread
the video of the Khan’s death. The stadium explosion was like a
rock thrown in a pond, as a wave of quads flew out in a circle to
share the news. Bells rang nearby, and thousands more would soon
clang across China. Every Mongol within a thousand clicks would
have to fight for their lives today.

The largest battle in history began. Several
million Mongols and their supporters fought several million
enemies. Plus those in military units.

The arena survivors, ears bleeding and heads
throbbing, barely noticed a dark cloud above that dropped thousands
of bombs. Fifty thousand marathoners dived to finish them off and
transfer their wands. Five divisions set up a perimeter to
intercept Mongol rapid reaction teams, militia, and local police,
while the rest struck targets in and around Peking. Billy knew
thousands of Mongols would fly up in a mad rage at the invaders,
which only made his job easier.

Prince led Billy to where the Khan escaped
and explained, once again, that he saw the Khan descend into
something. Quickly enough they found a wooden chute and, below
that, a large metal box. Prince thought his twenty-year old
brother-in-law may have a heart attack, he looked so distraught.
Billy started babbling to himself, his eyes glazed over, so Prince
slapped him, then backed up, not a little afraid.