"I'm thinking it will definitely tenderize them a bit, wouldn't you?" I asked.

"You'll have anything you need to test this and get it rolling," Stratton said. "What else can we bring to the party?"

"I've got some ideas on some ground pieces, but they'll have to wait a bit. I'm thinking we need the air power more at this stage. The thing I need the most from ground troops will be pulling out any civilians and wounded. We can use a lot support in that area. And I could use someone who knows tactics, old style tactics. Infantry, Heavy Cavalry, things like that. We've got a group of Mages working on something like the Heavy Cavalry was used for back in the old days. Soulguard hasn't seen much of the open battlefield in nearly a thousand years."

Both generals were nodding and jotting down notes.

"There are some facilities I would like to put together up by the Gateway. Perhaps you guys would know who I need to meet to get these started as well?"

"What sort of facilities?" Polomo asked.

"I want Guards there when they come through, I'm thinking of underground facilities that I will place a shield around. Something large enough for a good sized force to stay in for a relatively long span of time."

"That can be done, but what are you talking about with shielding?" Polomo asked. "Do you mean like the two spots out near the Gate? You created those?"

"Yeah, we needed somewhere to stage our fight from so I built a shield."

"It's amazing what you people can do," Stratton said. "And they say anyone can become a Soulguard?"

"With the right mental skills, yes. Not everyone can become a Mage, though."

"I foresee a lot of guys coming in from the various Military branches to volunteer for the Soulguard," said Polomo. "If I was a little younger, I might try it myself."

"Age isn't an issue," I said. "If you want to join, anyone is welcome. What happens when you become a Guard can actually reverse the aging process."

"You're serious?"

"Absolutely."

Chapter 18.

Hillsboro was a small town north of Newton. One of the main features of the small town was the college campus, Tabor College. It wasn't a huge campus, but it had several buildings and a football field. It also had a few tennis courts, and a place for soccer. We had set up in the rec center on campus since the whole campus had been completely evacuated not long after the attack.

Most of Hillsboro had been relocated as a matter of fact, and we were using the abandoned town to house our forces until the facilities could be finished nearer the Gate's location, which was just north of town. The place really bore very little resemblance to the town that had been here before our invasion.

Other towns in the vicinity were evacuated as well, and the idea of evacuating Wichita was being kicked around too. I, personally, thought that was an excellent idea. We may not be able to hold them, and a huge population center like Wichita would be easy targets for the Demon hordes.

"Where are we on the evac of Wichita, Ric?" I began, and turned toward the man walking on my left.

Something slammed against my head, and I flew forward to the ground. Everything was foggy and I heard voices from a distance.

"..under that car!"

"..water tower!"

"Boss!" Rictor was hovering over me, "You hear me?"

My vision was clearing, and I felt a lot of blood running down my face.

"Still here, buddy," I muttered.

"Thank God," I heard him say. "Prada! Clear that building! I've got the tower! You gonna be ok, Boss?"

"Yeah," I said, "go get 'em."

They pushed me up against a car out of the line of fire of the snipers. Ric then sprinted toward a water tower. He launched himself hard enough to crack the asphalt he had been standing on.

Prada also took off in another direction with much the same effect. Then I felt them both Pull, and my head throbbed. That's about the time it sunk in that someone had just shot me.

I heard footsteps, and glanced up to see someone approaching me. He held a very large pistol, and his Soul was the ugly color of one of the Demon blood. My mind was jumping all over the place. I felt sadness, pain, hate, joy, and many more emotions slamming into my thoughts. He pointed the pistol at me, and I saw his finger tense on the trigger.

Then the rage erupted, and consumed all of the different emotions being projected at me. I lashed out with that rage like I had done with the Senator, and the world seemed to stop as my focus was returned. I was moving at Guard speed as I pushed off of the car hard enough to cave in the door I was leaning against. Before he could shoot, I was next to the man.

Before I could even think about it, I had plunged my fist completely through the man, and ripped his spine out of his back in an explosion of blood. I looked around to find a large group of them incoming from all around me. What escaped my throat wasn't quite human, and I was moving.

I Pulled and in moments, there was nothing left but blood and ash, mostly ash.

My vision was now clear, and I was looking around for more of the ugly Souls, but all I could see were the Souls of Guards moving toward me at high speed. The former water tower was a twisted lump of metal, and one of the college buildings was a pyre of flame. The area around me was charred black, except where the first one had met his grisly end.

"What the hell!?" Ric asked as he rounded the car to see me standing with Soulfire burning all around me.

"A couple more showed up," I said.

"Boss," he said, "that was a professional hit team. They set us up to leave you unprotected. That type of precision isn't cheap."

"They were Demon blood," I said, "It wasn't a paid hit. They were doing what their masters ordered. Looks like I need to talk to the ex-Senator again. I need to know how many of these Demon blood are out there."

"Should we have him shipped down here?" he asked.

"No," I answered, "I think I'll go up and bring him down here, personally."

"Not before you have that wound examined," Prada said, looking closer at my head, "The bleeding has mostly stopped but you need to have it checked. It was a graze, though, so it could have been much worse."

"Gonna have to start keepin' the shield up, Boss," Ric said, "They consider you public enemy number one. They'll send more, you can count on that."

"It does tell me one thing," I said.

"What's that?" he asked.

"They haven't given up," I said, "They will be back."

"We always knew that."

"We always believed that," I corrected, "Now we know it."

"True enough."

Chapter 19.

We were met by a small group as we exited the jet in Montana. The first person who met us was Lyrica. She walked up and looked closely at the wound on the side of my head.

Her fingers touched it softly, and then she hugged me. I watched the play of emotions rolling through her aura- worry, anger, relief, frustration, and love.

As I hugged her back, I realized something that should have been obvious to someone who could read emotions in others. Lyrica had loved me since that day in Tennessee when I had driven up to that country farmhouse. But it had never even occurred to me until now, she was in love with me as well. And that is a totally different thing.

And it was something to be handled at a different time than now. Now I had to talk to that putrid bastard, the ex-Senator.

Lyrica stepped back and said, "Every time I let you out of my sight, you pull some stunt that nearly gets you killed."

"In my defense," I said, "I didn't do this one. It was done by someone else. And I intend to find out who that someone else is."

"You better," she said, "because it's time to put an end to humans killing humans. We have much bigger fish to fry."

Sometimes it's hard to remember that Lyrica is only seventeen. She was raised with the realities of our war with the Demons. There was never a time when she wasn't aware of them, since the day she became aware of the world at all. Something like that makes you much older than your years. I can attest to that, personally. I was raised the same way.

Next in line was my mom. She greeted me warmly, but there was a great deal of worry in her aura as she also looked closely at the fresh scarring.

"That was a close one, Son," she said softly.

"Very close," I said. "I had just turned my head, or it would have been dead center."

"We've got to work on some extra security measures," she said. "We aren't used to being out in the open. We've not been targets like this before."

"I'm working on that," I said. "I've got someone in mind to take up security for us."

"Good," she said.

The next one was Paige, "There's more than you knew about before you left the ground in Kansas."

"What?" I asked with a sense of dread.

"A high ranking Mage in China named Chou Lin was killed a few hours ago," she said, "Chou Lin and fourteen Guards were massacred by men with guns. Several witnesses said that Lin and his Guards fell over with spasms, and ten men stepped from cover and shot them all."

"Son of a bitch!" I said, "I could guess what happened, and I'd probably be right. They were humans like the Senator. They have Demon blood and telepathic abilities."

"Looks that way," she said, "and even worse, the ex-Senator, when asked about the situation, freaked out. We couldn't get much from him except he kept mumbling about shadows."

"He'll talk to me," I said.

"Why?"

"He's more afraid of me than them," I said simply. "I should get to it."

I looked at the other member of our welcome committee, Gregor Kherkov, "I'll give you both a full report as soon as I speak with him."

Heltor looked up to see me as I entered the room, and fear rolled across his aura. I hadn't come to interrogate him before now. I had hoped that the fear he learned from our first encounter was enough. I really don't like the side of me that enjoys tormenting others.

I walked over to the camera, and unplugged it. His fear spiked higher.

"I'll only ask you once," I said. "How many of you are here? You told the others there were only ten or so, and I warned you about lying to us."

"Th..There may be as many as fifteen," he stammered.

I was across the room and grasping his shirt front in less than a second, "Then explain how thirty of you attacked me yesterday in Kansas and ten more in China."

His face went completely white, "Oh no, dear God, they've sent the Shak'Tar."

I cocked my head to the side a little, and released my hold on his shirt. He eased back into his seat.

"And who are these Shak'Tar?" I asked.

He took a deep breath and began, "I've been here for forty years. Fairly soon after my group was experimented on, the Kresh decided it was too costly in their Human resources to make people of the Blood that may or may not do their bidding. So the program was ended."

I nodded for him to continue.

"A new experiment was begun. The Kresh have never been much on the use of technology, so their experiments were ugly and brutal. They would inject their blood into pregnant women. The women died but the children, sometimes would survive. A lot more would survive than the numbers in our own groups did. They began using these children to build a force of Humans loyal to them."

My outrage was apparent because he paused, and his fear was growing again.

"These children were raised to use against other Humans," he said, "You see, their telepathy doesn't work on pure Humans. But the telepathy of the Blood works on Humans and Kresh."

"It works on them?"

"Yes, but the Blood doesn't have the sort of strength that the Kresh do. Except, it seems, for you."

He could see the question on my face before I could even ask.

"I've never felt a Lash as strong as the one you hit me with, from Kresh or Human."

"Lash?" I asked, "Is that what you call that?"

"Yes, we call the forcing of emotion or thought on another, the Lash," he answered. "Worthington had a strong Lash, but for long term jobs the Lash can't be used. She was an expert of manipulation using minute amounts of the Lash added to what was already present in her victims. She was quite skilled."

"She almost took down the Soulguard," I said, "I know what to look for now though. I recognized you as soon as I saw your Soul."