The Game Called Revolution, - [ebook reader 8 inch .txt] 📗

(or minutes) later, he found himself lying on top of someone, with a crippling ringing in his ears. One of the soldiers had broken his fall, for which he was grateful.

The deck seemed to be mostly intact, only missing sections of railing. Everyone waited a minute to see if there would be another explosion, or if the whole thing would collapse under them. When it didn’t, they all got to their feet, friends and enemies alike.

Pierre was now in the deck’s center. “Is everyone all right?” He asked, although he was not really sure why since he was mostly surrounded by enemies. By now the ringing had died down for the most part.

“Unh. I think so,” Victor said from across the deck. He was rubbing the back of his head which bled slightly.

Lefebvre’s men, it seemed, were no longer in the mood to fight. “I can’t believe that bastard! He really fired on us—his own men!” one of them said.

“We should have never followed his orders,” agreed another.

A third one said to Pierre, “I think…we owe you an apology. We were fighting for the wrong side today.”

“I guess we can’t really blame you,” Pierre said. “We’ve followed our share of orders over the years. I’m just glad we don’t have to fight anymore.”

He looked towards the blackened area where Lefebvre had been standing. The steam cannon had exploded, leaving twisted metal and blackened ash all over the place. There were charred pieces of what looked like body parts strewn about, but Pierre couldn’t be sure what they were.

Suddenly Victor cried out, “Hubert!” Pierre ran over to the starboard side where Victor was leaning over the edge, looking at something down below. When he got there, the sight of the giant’s massive form on the ground bleeding profusely from many wounds greeted him. Hubert’s tree trunk-like left leg was bent at an unnatural angle, probably from the fall.

“He must have gotten knocked off when the shell hit us,” Victor said.

Pierre and Victor lowered the ramp and went down to check on Hubert. Pierre knew it was pointless; the giant had clearly lost too much blood from injuries made much worse by his fall. Still, they had to do something so they could at least say they tried when Jeanne came back and wanted to know what happened.

As they both expected, they found no pulse on the big man. What Jeanne had feared had now come to pass. “He saved all of us up there,” Victor said.

“Yeah.”

“He’s a hero.”

“I just wish he could go home and tell everyone that himself.”

The two of them carried Hubert’s body up to the deck. Everyone up there—even Lefebvre’s men—paid their respects to the deceased giant.

Celeste then poked her head out of the hatch. “Is the fighting over?” Her glasses were cracked and one of the lenses was missing.

“For us, at least,” Victor replied.

Pierre walked over to her. “That shell should have destroyed us. Why didn’t it?”

She shrugged. “The only thing I can think of is that our attack must have slowed it down just enough so it didn’t have the velocity.”

“Doesn’t matter to me how we lived,” Victor said.

“Come on, Victor; we have to get over to the Tuileries and help the Commander,” Pierre said.

“I wouldn’t recommend that,” Celeste said.

Pierre spun around to face her, shocked by what she had just said. “‘Wouldn’t recommend’ it? It’s the Commander we’re talking about! We have to help her.”

Celeste shook her head and pointed to the central tower. “With all due respect, sir…I don’t think we can.”

Pierre turned around and looked at the tower. By now the electrical currents completely covered it; crackling blue energy ran the complete length of the tower and was even striking the ground around the palace.

“If we try to go in there, we’ll get electrocuted,” Victor realized.

The young engineer’s eyes were getting moist. “The Commander is my idol. She’s everything I want to be,” she said. “But you all are also important. Please don’t throw your lives away.”

As much as he wanted to, Pierre couldn’t argue with her logic. Trying to save Jeanne would be a suicide mission. He could only hope that Farahilde would see her through this.

It was at that moment that a single drop of rain hit his head. “Time’s running out,” he said, despair creeping into his voice.

11

 

 

 

 

Tussaud’s scythe created sparks as it traced a horizontal slash along the wall where Farahilde’s head had been a split second before. Farahilde ducked the attack and slashed at her with her gauntlet.

But once again, Tussaud proved to be just a step faster, and sidestepped the attack while simultaneously bringing down her blade in an attempt to split the young Austrian in half. Farahilde barely managed to get out of the way; the scythe gave her collarbone a superficial cut.

This is one fräulein I really cannot stand. Her oversized blade has not yet managed to find its mark, but she keeps getting closer and it’s only a matter of time. Meanwhile, I haven’t been able to cut her at all. Meine gauntlet simply doesn’t have the range to get to her…Wait a minute! I just thought of something.

Farahilde dashed to the opposite wall with Tussaud right behind her. While running, she frantically (and painfully) grappled with one of the blades on her gauntlet.

When she reached the wall, she grabbed another chair with her gauntlet hand and threw it at Tussaud. The blonde woman, however, wasn’t about to fall for that again. She easily pirouetted around the piece of furniture and readied her scythe for another swing at Farahilde.

However, for a split second Tussaud was open, and Farahilde wasted absolutely no time taking advantage of this, throwing the blade she had pried from her gauntlet into her enemy’s midsection. She didn’t have time to aim—she simply let it fly. The razor-like object imbedded itself just below Tussaud’s left breast.

Tussaud staggered back, but—true to form—not a sound escaped her lips.

“How did you like that, weibchen?” Farahilde crowed. Her right hand bled from having grabbed the sharp implement directly, but she could deal with the discomfort. “Still want to continue?”

Tussaud stared at the blade sticking out of her body for a few moments, then casually grabbed it and ripped it out. Her head flinched slightly at the pain, but otherwise she showed no aversion to the act she just committed.

Dammit. The blade was too slippery from meine own blood for me to throw it with full force. Well…I’ve still got another blade on meine gauntlet, and this woman should be hurt enough to have lost a step.

Not quite.

Tussaud dropped the small blade and resumed her attack with full force. Farahilde tried to jump out of the way, but it seemed her luck had finally run out. The scythe carved a serious gash down half of her upper body.

She suddenly felt cold, as if Tussaud’s curved blade had somehow sucked all the warmth from her body. She fell to the ground at Tussaud’s feet, being able only to weakly put out her right hand to break the fall.

“Good. Your face is undamaged,” Tussaud said. Her voice still conveyed no feeling.

She gripped the handle of her weapon to pick it up…but found she couldn’t. The blade was imbedded in the floor again, and her right hand was wet with blood because she, too, had grabbed the sharp edge of Farahilde’s makeshift projectile when she ripped it from her midsection. Thus, she couldn’t get a good grip on her own weapon, and it remained stubbornly resting in the floor.

This presented an opportunity—her enemy was presently unarmed—but Tussaud might as well have been on the moon for all the good it did her. Farahilde was shaking from the cold caused by the blood loss, the shock, or both; how could she possibly take advantage of this.

“You will make a good death mask, just like the queen,” Tussaud said.

Had she heard that right? “What did you just say?”

“The queen. This one made a death mask from her severed head. It was still bleeding.”

The coldness suddenly left Farahilde. There was no longer any pain—only a furious desire to cut flesh. Summoning all the strength she had left (while possibly creating new strength), she began to rise. First to one knee, then to the next. Then to one leg.

“Stay down,” Tussaud said. Farahilde ignored her and made it to her feet. However, the young Austrian’s energy failed her, and she collapsed onto the handle of the scythe, which Tussaud was still clutching. She held on to it to remain somewhat upright. “Do you see? It is fruitless. This one will kill you in the name of Lord Robespierre.”

Upon hearing his name, Farahilde found herself with one last burst of energy. Seizing, it, she roared and plunged her remaining blade into Tussaud’s heart. While she couldn’t see most of her face behind the mask, she could feel the homicidal French woman’s surprise.

Tussaud coughed up fresh blood, most of which was blocked by her mask. “No…must get…mask.” With that, she fell backwards onto the floor, which was being painted a fresh shade of crimson beneath her.

“Der Teufel wartet auf dich,” Farahilde said. The devil is waiting for you. She then sat down against the nearest column.

What was she to do now? She had won her battle, but she didn’t feel like her work was finished yet. She knew she wouldn’t have enough energy to go into the central tower and get her revenge on Robespierre. She’d be lucky to get out of this room alive. If I ever want to get back to meine Austria, I’d better lay low and try to find someone—a doctor, maybe—to heal me. That might be difficult, but I’ve gotten through worse situations.

That would mean forgoing her revenge on Robespierre, but what the hell—Jeanne had just as much right to kill him as she did.

Although there wasn’t much time left, part of her hoped Jeanne would kill him slowly.

12

 

 

Jeanne struggled to gain the upper hand on Robespierre atop the cylinder in the central tower, but it was a futile effort; he was nearly as skilled as herself, and every inch of his body was covered by armor. At this rate, she didn’t see how she could defeat him in the precious few minutes she had left.

“I’m merely playing with you, you know,” he said from behind his demonic visage as he lunged at her with his rapier. “I don’t even have to fight you at this point. It’s not like you can even hurt me.”

She deftly performed a fencing technique called a pasatta-sotto, hitting the floor with her hand and ducking under his attack. She thrust at his torso, but as she expected, her blade could not penetrate his alchemically-created armor.

He laughed at the pointless exercise, and then retreated into en garde position. Under other circumstances he would have been a fool to not take advantage of his opponent’s mistake, but time was on his side. Jeanne had to defeat him; he did not have to defeat her.

She wasn’t in the mood to trade words with him at this point. Instead, she initiated an attaque au fer, pressing her sword against his. She pretended to try and match him in strength, but in actuality this was a coulé, a feint. She slid along his rapier, gaining her leverage which she used to force his blade downwards. She ended this with a savage kick to his armored stomach, sending him reeling backwards