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

zoom in to focus. “But they are winning. Even Cain’s swiftest warriors are being torn apart.” She pauses. “Literally.”

“We go in with guns blazing,” Samson booms, perspiration soaking his head covering and tunic. “Nobody will be expecting us.”

Once we are within a kilometer of the city ruins, Luther asks Shechara to estimate the distance between us and the UW troops approaching from the west.

“I don’t see the ground assault teams,” she reports. “But there are more than a dozen aircraft headed this way. It looks like they’re…burning the ground ahead of them as they approach.”

“Hoping to avoid what happened to Bishop’s chopper,” Samson says. “Smart.”

“Burning it with what?” I ask.

“Liquid fire.” Shechara shakes her head. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“Sounds like napalm,” Samson replies.

We press onward. By Shechara’s count, Cain has already lost nearly twenty warriors. Whatever Willard did to augment these daemons, it worked. According to Luther, they are nothing like the variety that met him, Shechara, and Samson in the tunnel leading out of Eden. When Willard trapped them, forcing them to fight for their lives, those daemons were frail and emaciated. Samson with his massive strength disemboweled most of them by hand, stacking the corpses to hold back the onslaught.

I don’t see that happening this time.

“Is Cain falling back?” Luther asks.

“He’s still inside his vehicle,” Shechara says. “It’s plowing straight into the horde. The daemons are climbing on top, trying to break in, falling on top of each other.”

If we’re lucky, all of them will be otherwise occupied by the time we arrive on the scene.

“Everyone ready?” Luther calls back.

We raise our weapons. I carry a spear, preferring hand-to-hand combat, but Shechara insisted that I take a handgun as well. So a semiautomatic is tucked into my belt.

“Guess you can’t carry a crossbow anymore,” I tell Rehana.

“We’ll do our best to confuse your enemy while you slip inside. May the Creator bless your efforts.”

Nothing at all like the Rehana I knew, who never believed in a higher power. But I nod to show I heard her and prepare myself for what’s to come. Bloodshed, I’m sure, and plenty of it.

I’ve killed my fair share of daemons over the past year and a half; I don’t fear them. Even this new breed doesn’t frighten me. What makes me nervous is the thought of rescuing the unborn children. How will we possibly get them all out of Eden safely? And even if we do, how will we take care of them in the Homeplace with no power, no running water, no heat? Wouldn’t it really be better to let the UW troops take them?

My thoughts are cut short.

The stench of fresh carnage approaches as Luther leads us at a dead run into the battle’s northern flank. The daemons are raging, wild and powerful, tossing Cain’s warriors through the air and overturning their jeeps. The ones on top of the Hummer rock it side to side, intending to capsize it. Their gnarled fists pound the windows, unrelenting yet unable to break the bulletproof glass.

Cain’s faster warriors whip through the daemon throngs leaving splashes of black blood in their wakes, blades slashing with flashes of sunlight. The fighters armed with rifles down the daemons with headshots, leaving close to a hundred lying in pools of their own blood. But there is no end to this horde. Daemon upon daemon lunges forward with hungry snarls and yellow eyes bulging hatefully, their steel collars blinking red. I avert my gaze from a pair at the periphery as they tear a warrior’s body into bloody pieces and gobble up the slick organs like they haven’t eaten in weeks.

Luther has his shotgun at the ready, slamming the stock against daemon skulls in his way, saving ammunition. Samson brings up the rear, sending any daemon stupid enough to approach him flying backward through the air, cut in two. The Rehana-spirit stirs up the dust at our feet to cover our approach, blinding the enemy to our presence until it’s too late for them.

I plunge my spear through the throat of a daemon lunging my way and down it instantly. Jerking the black spearhead free, I sprint after Luther, keeping up with his advance. We race toward the parking structure where we first encountered Willard and his men.

That seems so long ago. A lot has changed since then.

By the time we reach the first sublevel, we’ve lost six from our group. Samson tells us he saw them fall without a chance to fire a single shot. He dispatched the daemons responsible, and the black blood drooling down both his arms is proof he did so with extreme prejudice. But there is no time to claim the dead.

The underground parking garage is as dank and silent as I remember—eerily so, with the abandoned vehicles sitting right where they were the last time we saw them. As if no time has passed. We remove our head coverings, goggles slid up onto our foreheads or left to dangle around our necks.

Sudden gunshots explode like bombs going off, echoing throughout the structure. Daemons foolish enough to follow us inside fall dead, thanks to the rear guard. Luther leads us downward until we reach a tunnel that doesn’t look familiar. I remember why: I didn’t get this far before. The evil spirit possessing Milton took me topside and left me in the middle of the street instead.

Clunking along behind us, Samson mutters a curse at the sight of the tunnel. He remembers it all too well.

With no daemons now to contend with, it’s clear that Milton and Bishop are in charge of Eden. They must have called off Willard’s dogs from this area once they spotted us entering the parking garage. Estimating the distance to Eden’s central dome to be two or three kilometers through the tunnel, we pace ourselves, moving as a unit in a steady jog. Samson does well keeping up, lunging from one leg to the other in long, awkward strides, the clanking noise drowning out the sounds