Anthony DeCosmo - Empire

A painting of Armageddon; a gruesome recollection of the day when the hellish gates opened on the Earth. The day when humanity went into hiding.

The second painting was so well done that the emotion of its vision poured from the colors. This one showed a mass of downtrodden people surging forward with their hands outstretched toward the point of view of the artist. Despair, yes, but also hope in the eyes of the people, an expression Trevor saw often during those first months when he found survivors. Survivors like Sheila Evans, the first person he actually rescued.

In that painting were a hundred Sheila Evans’ rushing to whoever promised them salvation. They huddled together like refugees while in the background flames of destruction licked the sky.

A third depicted yet another group called forth. Trevor recognized this group, too: a thick line of canines of many breeds marching in strict obedience to a master.

However, as the line of dogs stretched from left to right across the picture, the animals changed. In the lead, rows of sturdy, proud K9s but as the march progressed the dogs warped becoming first shaggy, then weak, then diseased, and then pitiful creatures snarling, collapsing, and turning to bones

“The doggies, father,” JB stood on his tippy-toes and touched the image. “They’re in pain.”

He gave Jorgie a comforting hug even though he had little comfort to give, particularly when he saw the fourth painting. By the time he understood the image it was too late to warn his son away.

Again, perfectly crafted in vivid colors, mainly red.

People torn asunder, impaled on edged weapons and eviscerated by monstrous talons, grabbed by the extending maw of a Jaw-Wolf, decapitated by the claws of a Devilbat.

The carnage played out in front of a collection of buildings-most small but one a mansion-burning and collapsing.

Trevor recognized the scene. He saw it many times in his worst nightmares, an image of his greatest fear: an image of failure.

“Father…”

“Look away, JB.”

But Trevor realized JB had moved on to the fifth, final painting.

“I’m afraid, father.”

In the background, a large homestead of obscure but essentially Victorian style with a second floor balcony overlooking a lake. In the foreground, two people: one older, one much, much younger.

This fifth painting clearly depicted Trevor and Jorge Benjamin Stone in front of the estate where they lived.

Next to the painting, the artist had etched two messages into the wall; the first message contained a solitary word: Germanitas.

A second, simpler message appeared to have been written more recently due to a shiny gleam in the letters of the three words.

SEE YOU SOON.

“Let those who have been fighting against their brothers and relatives now fight in a proper way against the barbarians. Let those who have been serving as mercenaries for small pay now obtain the eternal reward. Let those who have been wearing themselves out in both body and soul now work for a double honor. Behold! On this side will be the sorrowful and poor, on that, the rich; on this side, the enemies of the Lord, on that, his friends.”

— From a speech by Pope Urban II circa 1095 AD calling for a Holy Crusade

In less than forty-eight hours, General Jerry Shepherd’s 1 ^ st Mechanized Infantry Division raced more than one hundred miles from Raleigh to Wilmington without any engagements against the Hivvans who, for their part, slipped more and more into a nicely forming pocket in eastern North Carolina.

However, Shep’s race did include other entanglements that nearly slowed progress. Two trolls jumped the vanguard south of Newton Grove, injuring three soldiers. Fortunately, small arms fire dispatched the trolls without causing the army any significant delay.

In contrast, they did suffer a substantial hold up from a ‘Green Proto-Mass’ nesting at a Holiday Inn outside of Warsaw the morning of the second day. The single-celled organism blanketed a twenty-meter circumference but constantly expanded and contracted making any accurate measurement impossible and quite dangerous.

A big wad of acidic slime one relation away from the “Blob” of Hollywood fame, they were known as “Green Pudding” among the rank and file

It absorbed bullets like a fat kid eating candy. Try running it over with a car or an APC and it would work its way through the air vents or up the gun barrel and suck out the crew like that same fat kid going for the creamy filling in a cupcake.

Flame proved the best weapon against a Proto-Mass. While waiting for a flamethrower team to move forward, the Green Pudding killed two men and scattered several squads at the front of the column.

However, despite this delay, the advance retained an impressive pace, especially considering that most of Shepherd’s fighters walked in worn sneakers and loafers and carried their gear not in official weatherproof army sacks, but back and fanny packs better suited to strolling a shopping mall than marching into battle.

Along the way, he left small groups to hold key intersections and observation points outlining the bag in which the Hivvans would soon be stuck.

According to reconnaissance, the enemy remained disorganized and-generally-moving south and southwest in clusters ranging in size from squads to regiments. Aerial surveillance noted a number taking refuge in the small city of Clinton where they would face a colony of gigantic, dangerous, and highly territorial spider-ants, not to mention predatory razor-cats certain to inflict a fair number of casualties.

More of his reptilian adversaries continued southward on Rt. 701 in a raggedy column of artillery pieces and supply wagons while still more vacated an adhoc hard-point in Salemburg and retreated along Rt. 242 south.

Judging by their actions, it seemed to Shepherd that the Hivvans had not yet established reliable communications between their scattered formations and did not know where and how the human army deployed.

A communique from Gordon Knox detailed Intelligence’s opinion that the best opportunity for the Hivvan force to regroup would come if the smaller bands coalesced at the Bladen Lakes State Forest, roughly in the center of the pocket humanity hoped to box them into, and a scenario that appeared highly likely.

That suited Shep just fine. Hopefully by then the 1 ^ st and 2 ^ nd Divisions will have reached their objectives and cut off the enemy supply lines, lines already searching for their dispersed comrades.

Once those two depots fell to Shepherd and Stonewall, the Hivvans would be trapped and they would either starve or strangle in a tightening noose of artillery and air power.

As rosy as the plan sound, General Jerry Shepherd faced a bear of a problem that Sunday morning.

While Trevor and JB Stone flew south toward Blacksburg, Shep waited on the tarmac of Wilmington International Airport and contemplated his next move. The idea of investing the port city a short distance to his south did not sit well in his belly.

By all accounts, Wilmington stood in much better shape than most cities, in that it did not include an organized alien garrison and the worst of the extraterrestrial predators prowling its streets did not seem as nasty as those found in places like Pittsburgh or Philadelphia.

Indeed, Gordon Knox’s intelligence teams made contact weeks ago with a group of humans who carved out an existence on Masonboro Sound along the coast.

Nonetheless, going through downtown would slow his boys and invite pest attacks from all manner of bad things.

Besides, Shepherd saw a real chance to reach Conway before Stonewall hit Dillon. That would make for great fun at the next military meeting.

Those considerations led Jerry Shepherd to a major decision certain to cause waves. He had authorized the use of two C-141 Starlifters (taken after liberating Andrews Air Force Base last year). Those transport planes sucked aviation fuel even more greedily than fat kids eat candy or take to cream filling. Considering all the air power deployed to befuddle the Hivvans (nearly 50 sorties a day), it meant Southern Command gobbled about seventy-five percent of ‘The Empire’s’ jet fuel and around 90 % of available pilots.