Scorched Earth: A Future History of Planet EarthPetrovic, Walter D.
Science
Scorched Earth: A Future History of Planet Earth
Petrovic, Walter D.
Science fiction
Rising up behind the Blue Mansion were the two men on their eagles,
riding on the base of the eagles' necks. They circled overhead,
surprisingly unnoticed by those below them, and they were soon joined
by Zoro, circling with them. Boyce was pleased to have Zoro near him,
as luck.
Orren ordered more criminals to be killed and a dozen more men fell
and were thrown into the freight cars as if they were piles of
excrement being shovelled into a pit.
There was aloud cry that came from the midst of the crowd and everyone
turned to it.
"DEATH TO ALL AT HALLS - DAMN THE ARCHBISHOP!!"
The cry was coming from Mingo and he began to fire his
electrophore-laser towards Orren.
Orren was hit a few times but wasn't hurt, the chromium armour
protecting him from the blasts. He was astonished to see that this
man, who he recognized as the thief, Mingo, possessed that kind of
weapon.
Soon, several more blasts were heard and Mingo fell dead, along with
his brother. The others charged Orren, creaming death-cries, but Orren
swung his horse around and brandished his sword at them, cutting them
down, too.
"Get their weapons!" Orren ordered the nearest guard and the guard
fetched them, but when he reached the dead men, there were no weapons
at any one of the five bodies.
"Everyone here will die if those weapons are not recovered!" he
threatened.
Above him was heard a ridiculous cawing and Orren looked up to see
Boyce and Lloyd, in battle dress, gliding down towards him, with that
wretched crow beside them.
Lloyd screamed down to him. "Will you die as easily by my hand, as did
your father?"
Orren's eyes studied the two men's battle garb and he saw Boyce's
feather-like, black onyx epaulettes. His attention, however, quickly
focused upon Lloyd. An instant hatred overtook him at Lloyd's
admission of killing the Cardinal Allen, his father.
"You will die, whoever you are and whatever devil had sent you here!"
"It is obvious that you are a progeny of a whore and a mad dog,
Orren!" Lloyd screamed down at him. "Get on your knees before the
son of Brook Scullion-Blue." Lloyd yelled to him and pointed at
Boyce.
A buzz rang through the crowd but it sounded both panicked and somewhat
pleased. This caught Orren's attention, immediately.
"I kneel to no man!" maintained the Cardinal.
"You do when you kiss the ArchBishop's anus!" Lloyd taunted Orren and
Zoro cawed in a frenzy.
"You will die, scum!" declared the Cardinal.
"We will see, little man -- and my name is Lloyd Bartlett!"
When he heard the name, Orren knew that this was the son of Harvard
Bartlett, and he was indeed the one that killed his father.
Lloyd brought forth the rifle from his leg holster and shot at the
Cardinal, toppling his horse out from under him and sending him into a
pile of corpses heaped beside the shock wall.
Orren got to his feet and ordered the guards to shoot them down but,
Boyce took his eagle and flew to the east, over the butte.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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