Spirits of the Earth: The Complete Series: (A Post-Apocalyptic Series Box Set: Books 1-3) by Milo Fowler (paper ebook reader .TXT) 📕

abruptly, shifting kilometers away to focus on a lone figure stumbling awkwardly through the dead of night, casting furtive glances in every direction. Scared and alone. Exiled.

“Focus, woman.” My hand tightens on her throat.

“He will not survive out there.” She clenches her jaw. “Lemuel’s blood is on your hands!”

“And yours could be as well, whore.” I shake her until our vision returns to my two cloaked men. “Now give them this message: Take the UW scouts, dead or alive. Move in now.”

Victoria frowns as I loosen my grip on her. Of course she would wonder about this sudden change in tactics. Until now, my two warriors have been told only to follow the UW scouts. Keep their distance, and do not engage.

Nevertheless, she does as she is told.

“Move in on target,” she relays my order, using her gift from Gaia to speak telepathically across the distance between them. To their ears, it would sound as if she is whispering to a lover. “Take them. Dead or alive.”

“And bring their bodies back to me.” I nod as she sends the message.

Then we watch. It is as though Victoria and I hover behind and above the two cloaked men as they shoulder their weapons and prepare to close the distance between them and their quarry. I am reminded of the films I watched in the Sector 15 bunker so many years ago. Our current perspective is much like a camera angle used to film battle sequences. All I need is some popped corn.

I almost smile. A protein or vitamineral pack will have to suffice.

“Now what?” Victoria shifts uncomfortably, but her hands remain on my ears. The child in her womb no doubt has something to say about her remaining in one position for too long—pressing against her bladder when she least expects it. Will she relieve herself right here as a way to get back at me?

I scowl as our vision jitters in and out of focus. “What’s wrong now?”

“Nothing.”

Our view sharpens into crystal clarity. We watch as an unidentified figure charges through the night, straight for my two tribesmen.

“Who’s this?” Victoria’s attention no longer wavers.

“One of the UW scouts.”

“What’s he doing?”

My frame tightens as I notice what the UW soldier carries: an assault rifle, the goblyns’ weapon of choice.

“They’re armed?” Victoria says in disbelief. “But you said—”

“My men are armed as well.” Nevertheless I grit my teeth, unsure about this turn of events. “Tell them to fire at will.”

She nods, relaying the command. But my warriors seem confused. “They don’t see him. He must not be in range.”

“Tell them to prepare for attack—”

“They don’t hear anyone approaching.”

I curse under my breath. “Gaia help them then,” I mutter, already planning ahead, deciding who I will send after the UW scouts once these two incompetents fail me.

I can only watch as the UW soldier closes the gap, lumbering awkwardly in his unwieldy armored suit, hurling himself forward. A man on a mission, but one who will soon tire from the exertion.

“Tell them to find cover. Do not engage.” Time for a new tactic, now that an automatic weapon and combat armor are in the picture. “Repeat: Do not engage. Observe target from cover.” No reason for them to be slaughtered outright.

Victoria sends the command twice for good measure. “They have him outnumbered and outflanked,” she says. “They would easily subdue—”

“A trained, armed man encased in reinforced Kevlar? With four others right behind him? The last thing our men should do right now is engage.”

“So we fall back.”

Interesting. She seems to have a vested interest in this endeavor.

“We wait. And we watch.” I want to gauge this soldier’s fatigue level once he reaches his destination. How difficult is it to move in that suit? I also want to be certain he is acting alone. It makes no sense, but at present he appears to be making a solo attack.

“Our men have taken cover.” Victoria points, taking her right hand from my ear briefly to do so. In our shared vision, I see her hand with its index finger extended.

For a moment, I am deaf in that ear, unable to hear the night winds whisking through the sands where my two warriors hide themselves. An odd sensation, even as I hear the hull of the ship creaking around me, cooling with the night. It is strange to feel as though I am in two places at once.

Her hand returns to my ear just as the UW soldier stumbles across the level stretch of sand where my men stood moments before. Swinging the muzzle of his rifle to and fro, he wavers, unsteady on his feet.

“Where are you hiding, you sons of bitches?” he demands, out of breath. He sprays rounds into the air with no targets in sight.

Victoria and I cringe instinctively. For a moment we feel exposed, but the fool is only wasting ammo. And we are beyond his reach.

“Show yourselves! Why are you following us? Who are you?” The soldier takes a moment to catch his breath, nearly doubling over with the effort. “C’mon, man! What are you —cowards?”

I groan at that. It is never wise to question a warrior’s courage.

One of my men emerges, rising like a phantom from where he buried himself in the sand, unseen and unheard.

“Do not engage!” I repeat the order, but even as Victoria relays it, I recognize the futility.

“That’s Markus,” she says. All the explanation needed.

The UW soldier staggers backward in his cumbersome suit at the warrior’s sudden appearance and now trains his weapon on him, the red laser sight jittering across Markus’s wide chest.

“Where’s Vincent?” Victoria scans the scene before us for any sign of the second tribesman.

“Still in hiding—for now,” I mutter. Thanks be to Gaia, at least one of them has the sense to follow orders and keep a lid on his pride.

“Put your hands where I can see them!” the soldier barks.

Markus stands with his arms out to the sides, staring down the armed UW scout, and seemingly with no weapons of