Scenes from an Unholy War Read online

  “How’s it going?” Gil asked anxiously.

  “At fifteen hundred feet, zooming in—okay,” Palau said with a nod. It seemed the camera had begun broadcasting the scenery below to his eye. “They’ve got some serious armament. One triple-shot missile launcher, an old-fashioned, fifty-ton intelligent tank like they used back in the Nobility Wars, and a ten-shot, fifty-millimeter laser cannon. Plus three heavy machine guns, ten light ones, a shitload of automatic rifles—”

  Gil’s look became one of delight as he said, “Then no village could hold them off, no matter how tight their defenses. We’ll take ’em out starting with the biggest guns first, Captain, just as planned.”

  “Just as planned,” D said, his eyes still on the fire and figures ahead. “What about guards?”

  “One each on the four points of the compass. They’ve got short-range radar, too. Effective at maybe fifty yards? No surprise here, but the missiles, tank, and laser cannon each seem to have about five guys posted on ’em round the clock.”

  “In other words, it’s gonna be tricky trying to get in without being noticed,” Gil said, tilting his head to one side. “Got any suggestions, Captain?”

  “I could lay into them with this. One blast, and it’d be complete havoc. What do you say to running in, then?” Josh asked, slapping the antitank rifle on his back.

  But Gil ignored him, gazing at D with searching eyes. He wasn’t so much judging D’s strength as he was simply trying to be disagreeable.

  “We’ll use a diversion,” D said quietly. His voice was like steel reciting poetry in the depths of a dark and moonless night.

  The Hunter reached with his left hand towards Palau’s face. The light from the man’s electronic eye was hidden as the palm of D’s hand covered it.

  Josh reached for his knife.

  Quickly pulling his hand away again, the Hunter said, “They’ve got a makeshift ammo dump set up behind that farmhouse. I’ll take that out.”

  Gil inquired incredulously, “How do you know that? What’s the story, Palau?”

  But the scout with the electronic eye nodded. “Pretty boy’s right. How’d you access what was in my eye?”

  “Synchronize watches,” D told them. “I’ll take out the ammo dump exactly four minutes from now. As soon as it blows, we’ll get the missiles, tank, and lasers, in that order. You’re on the tank and lasers. I’ll handle the missiles.”

  “You don’t seriously intend to haul them out of here, do you?” Gil asked, the intrigue plain on his face. “Because if you’re not careful blowing them up, not only will those guys get blown to pieces, but we will too! What are you thinking?”

  D turned around and looked at the roughneck. Their eyes met. Though it was a pitch-black night, the Hunter’s dark eyes seemed to glow. Gil suddenly felt as if they were going to swallow him. Before he could fight it, he was falling into the depths of the darkness. Something came into view—and the instant he realized what it was, he cried out.

  It’d been a dream. He trembled as his two comrades in arms stood watching him. A black-gloved hand was covering his mouth. The darkness remained still.

  “Did you see?” D asked. His voice fell from high above. Gil didn’t bother looking up. For all eternity, he wouldn’t know what the Hunter was asking. But someone had loomed before him, oh, so black and oh, so high, challenging the heavens.

  Gil mumbled something.

  The black-gloved hand came away from his mouth.

  “Not a thing,” Gil repeated. “I didn’t see . . . anything . . .”

  As if nothing had happened, D said, “You have four and a half minutes to get it done. We’ll meet back here in five minutes.” The figure in black spun around, but none of the other three noticed that his left hand was missing from the wrist down.

  —

  The house was filled with the stench of blood. It had seeped into the very cores of the roof beams, the logs of the walls, and the floorboards, rotting them, and even if the house were razed, the area would retain a cloying smell that would keep any living creatures from drawing closer. Until this evening, it hadn’t been that way. The former residents had been very good about getting rid of the smell, which posed the greatest threat to their self-control. But at present, the floor was covered with blood-red plastic. Bags of plasma for medical procedures, each containing 100 cc, were spread across the floor. However, that wasn’t the source of the stench.

  The fluid of over a hundred of those bags had been emptied into his body, and the blood now clung to his flesh and bones and organs. When he opened his eyes, it began to slosh, and when he got up out of bed, it eddied wildly in him.

  “He’s coming,” the leader said, barely able to squeeze those two words from a body that felt as dirty and heavy as mud. “He’s coming. Yes, here he comes!”

  A sword gleamed in either hand.

  “Oh, come! Please, come to me! You’re the one who can kill me. Zeke, Bayon, Kronos—are you all set? Are you ready to sing the songs of death? Better think of some words to beg for your lives. This time, we’ll be up against a formidable foe!” He bellowed like a wild beast, whipped up by a dark desire even he couldn’t fully comprehend.

  A black glint zipped to the wall. Striking the logs, it laid waste to the caulking between the thick trunks and shot through. After zipping along the ground for another twenty yards, it stabbed into something, and the instant it did, a low groan came from beneath it as something crept along, black and spiderlike. The ammo dump shielded by vinyl and reinforced plastic lay just ahead of those five painfully struggling “legs.”

  —

  II

  —

  The missiles were mounted on a steel truck. The five men didn’t move a muscle as they scanned their surroundings. It was easy enough to approach them. D’s feet didn’t make a sound, and his body melded with the darkness. On a night when even the stars weren’t out, he could stand right in front of a person without them even knowing it. Avoiding the watch fire, the Hunter glided toward the man guarding the rear of the truck. His gait wavered unexpectedly as vertigo suddenly assailed him. The bats’ venom hadn’t left him yet. Dropping down on one knee, he put an arm out to brace his upper body as it doubled over, but his hand was missing.

  These sounds didn’t escape the guard. “Who goes there?” he shouted as loudly as he could, turning the flashlight he wore on his hip in their direction.

  Even though he lay in the beam of light, D didn’t respond immediately. This time the venom was having a particularly strong effect on him.

  In response to the man’s shout, the other guards came running with their firearms or longswords drawn. The air of malevolence that enveloped them was channeled through the looks they gave D, but it vanished with shocking ease. Merciless and malevolent faces acquired embarrassingly stupid expressions of rapture, for they had looked at D’s face.

  This strangely amicable state between friend and foe existed for exactly one second. It was D that shattered it. To the men, it probably looked as if the gorgeous intruder had spread black wings and taken off. His talons were a blade crueler than any they’d ever known.

  —

  The tank in particular had a great many watch fires around it. The computer within it could navigate the vehicle, pinpoint enemies, and launch attacks that would destroy the defensive walls around a village. Its 150-millimeter cannon could reduce to dust anyone who resisted, while the four machine guns would turn them into hamburger. Three and a half inches of high-polymer armor were capable of deflecting any and all attacks by the enemy, making this tank essentially invincible out on the Frontier.

  “He’s late. What do we do?” Josh asked Palau in the depths of the darkness about thirty feet away, having crawled over to the other man like an insect.

  “Damned if I know. We’re running outta time. Do we do this, or what?” Palau said. Quickly he got to his feet, holding a small automatic pistol in either hand. Each had a silencer resembling a sausage on the end of it. “Cover me.”
>
  He dashed away.

  He came into the light of the fire. Spotting him, two of the guards raised their rifles. There were two faint phuuuut! sounds, like whispers from the spirit world. Shot right between the eyes, the guards flew backward.

  Palau swiftly circled around behind the tank. The remaining three guards jumped out.

  “What the hell?”

  Two of them were wearing bulletproof helmets, masks, and body armor. Reconnaissance from the air hadn’t shown their gear.

  “Seriously, what the hell?”

  Phuuuut! Phuuuut! Phuuuut! Phuuuut! Phuuuut!

  Spent casings of gold flew through the air, and one of the men fell after being hit ten times. One of the men in body armor was shot through the neck. The other one managed to deflect all the bullets as he brought his rifle to bear.

  A report that was nothing like that of a handgun split the night air. The element of surprise was lost. The whole encampment awoke at once.

  “Damn it—die when I shoot you!” Palau cursed as the massive round from the rifle scored a hit on his solar plexus. It left an entry wound the size of a grown man’s head. But flesh rolled into the wound like mud, filling it up again. Two more slugs hit him in the chest. And the same thing happened with both of them.

  “Truth be known, I was born for shootouts—see, I’ve got this regenerative ability.”

  Taking aim at the throat of the dumbfounded guard, he fired off ten shots, two of which found their mark.

  Bending back like a longbow, the man fell. From behind him came shouts.

  “We’re under attack!”

  “It’s over by the tank!”

  “Don’t let ’em get away!”

  The voices and footfalls barreled closer.

  Clucking his tongue in disgust as he changed direction, Palau fired indiscriminately. After two or three shots, the slide remained back.

  “Oops, out of ammo. Some pro I am!”

  As he stood bolt upright, something howled past his chest. Twenty yards away, flames exploded among the figures headed toward him.

  “Consider yourself covered!” Josh called out in the distance.

  “Took your sweet time about it!” Palau spat as he raced over to the tank, took an explosive charge and timer from his belt, and pushed them into the tank treads.

  There was a mechanical whir.

  “What the hell?”

  The turret of the tank was turning.

  “Don’t tell me it’s gonna fire that thing,” Palau said as the barrel of the gun swung over his head. He let out a sigh of relief, then cried out.

  Right in front of his face was the smaller muzzle of the machine gun mounted beside the tank’s main gun.

  —

  A roaring sound and flames made Gil turn and look.

  “That’s Josh’s antitank rifle. That idiot!”

  It was time to prepare for a fight. Judging from the location of the explosion, the outlaws would probably figure the laser cannon was in danger too and come running.

  “Took ’em long enough.”

  Crouching down, Gil ran. The bodies of guards lay all around the laser cannon he’d rigged with explosives. The men who came running to the scene wouldn’t even have time to be surprised. In fact, they wouldn’t have time to notice anything. There were two minutes until detonation.

  Grunting, Gil halted. His enormous frame brimmed with tension and impatience.

  A figure stood there.

  Is that D? he thought. The height and build were both quite similar to D’s. But it wasn’t him. Even the Hunter’s shadow was gorgeous. This guy was—

  Time was too precious for him to give it any further consideration. Gil channeled his strength into his “gaze.” It was something he’d been born with, and family members, teachers, and friends who’d been exposed to it had died. If he concentrated, he could knock insects out of the air, make a person’s heart explode, or make plants wither with just a look. Fish would drown and bob to the surface. Classmates he didn’t care for would fall, and policemen dropped dead. The next thing he knew, he was doing it for a living. It wasn’t until several years later that he learned the nature of his power and how to control it—after taking nearly two hundred lives.

  Clutching his chest, his foe toppled forward. That was the usual reaction, and Gil was satisfied. Quickly turning around, he was just about to leave. But a pained voice detained him.

  “If you’re going to hit me in the chest, you should at least do it with a stake.”

  The man rose from the ground, as strong as a mountain. He was in the midst of drawing the twin longswords that were crossed on his back. Clanging them together, the man charged forward.

  Gil focused his gaze for all he was worth.

  Just then, the ammo dump exploded. Josh’s antitank rifle was no more than a bottle rocket in comparison. The shock wave and shrapnel instantly killed twenty of the outlaws, and all of the rest were injured. Flames leapt wildly, trying to consume the encampment, and all told more than thirty of the men were charred to the bone.

  —

  The explosion could be heard and the flames seen from the village of Geneve.

  “Looks like they pulled it off,” Lyra whispered to the sheriff up at the top of the watchtower.

  “It’s even bigger than I expected. You think maybe those four didn’t . . .” Rust said anxiously.

  “I can’t say about the other three, but D will probably be coming back,” Lyra told him.

  “I sure hope so.”

  “Want to send someone out to meet them?”

  “No, I wouldn’t want to risk them running into any scouts the enemy might have out. We need every last pro we’ve got here.”

  “That’s the right call,” Lyra said in a tone that suited her frosty nature, if not her lovely countenance. “Our responsibility lies right here in this village. What kind of Black Death spies do we have sneaking around? Who was it that killed one of their men? Maybe they’re one and the same. Then again, maybe they’re not. There’s only one thing we do know—they’re a poison pill that could wreck this village. That’s what should concern you and me both.”

  “We’ve checked the village register. Only four people have moved into the village in the last decade: Codo Graham, Sergei Roskingpan, Stejiban Toic, and Miriam Sarai.”

  “With one exception, they all seem pretty upstanding.”

  “Check. All except Old Man Roskingpan, right?” Rust said, the wry grin that flitted across his lips betraying his partiality to the man he’d just named.

  Through the window behind them, someone shouted, “Heeeeeeey!”

  “Speak of the devil. It’s the old man.”

  Scratching the back of his head, Rust walked over to the window and looked down. The wrinkled face of the man who stood at the entrance to the stairs in a straw hat and worn jacket was turned in the lawman’s direction. Seeing that it was Rust, the old man raised the bottle of liquor in his right hand, saying, “Bless your hide for burning the midnight oil. Brought you a little something. I’ll run it right up.”

  “No, that’s okay. I’ll come down for it,” the lawman replied, not wanting the drunk to interfere with what they were doing.

  For a second Old Man Roskingpan looked peeved, but apparently he got over it quickly enough, saying, “Okay, okay! I’ll leave it right here, then. This here’s the very finest champagne, which I happened to buy off a liquor vendor from Argo City. One swig of this and you won’t be able to drink the swill they serve in this town anymore!” The old drunk punctuated the remark with a hiccup.

  “Okay, I’m sold. I’ll be right down!”

  “No rest for the weary,” Rust heard Lyra remark snidely as he started down the five-story watchtower’s narrow staircase.

  The old man wasn’t outside anymore. Where he’d stood, only the bottle of liquor remained. Picking it up, the sheriff saw that it was the kind of dirt-cheap champagne only the very worst of liquor sellers even bothered carrying.

  “That
lying old coot,” he said with a smirk, looking both ways down the street and finding cheerful humming flowing back from the darkness to his left.

  Letting out a good-natured chuckle, Rust returned to the stairs. He casually glanced at the bottle. It’d struck him as odd at first that it was left open, but that had slipped his mind while he looked for the old man. Scanning the ground, he soon located the cap.

  “Old man, I didn’t want your backwash.”

  Though Rust had thought that might be the case, it still irked him a little.

  As he reached down to pick up the cap, his fingertips brushed the ground. It was wet. Taking a pinch of dirt, he brought it up to his nose. It smelled like champagne. Really cheap stuff.

  “Looks like he spilled some.”

  Eyeing the bottle, he saw it was still about 70 percent full. Giving it no further thought, Rust headed back to the watchtower with the bottle in hand.

  “That’s his big present?” Lyra said, a cynical look in her eyes.

  “Yeah, the cheapest shit they make. You probably shouldn’t drink any of it.”

  “I wouldn’t drink it either, if I were you.”

  “Well, I’ll just have a sip.”

  Lyra didn’t say another word as the sheriff put the bottle to his lips and took a big swallow. She knew better than anyone how much he liked to drink and how well he could hold his liquor.

  A second later she realized he’d made a fatal error. Crying out as if something were stuck in his throat, Rust clutched his belly and doubled over.

  —

  III

  —

  The bottle broke when it fell to the floor. Though the lawman had only intended to have a mouthful, not a drop of its contents remained.

  “Huuuuah!”

  Rust vomited. But it wasn’t alcohol he brought up. A deep red mass of blood hit the floor, spreading wide.

  “Rust!”

  “Stay back!” the sheriff told her, sounding like he was about to suffocate. “This thing . . . just slid down into my belly all of a sudden—oof! Oof!”

  His fingers, which had been pressed to his solar plexus, dangled limply now. Beneath them, Lyra glimpsed a bloodied blade. It had begun slowly sawing in a line along his stomach. The flesh split open, and his fingers fell off completely. Blood poured from the lawman like a waterfall.