Vampire: The Masquerade is owned by White Wolf Publishing. Our use is in no way meant to challenge their copyrights. This piece is not intended for any profit on the part of the writer, nor is it meant to detract from the commercial viability of the aforementioned or any other copyright. Any similarity to any events or persons, either real or fictional, is unintended.
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Authors' Note: This story is intended to be one part in a continuing series, and as such will not be as satisfying if read as a stand-alone story. We're attempting to do what we can to make it readable as a stand-alone, but there's a lot that came before that simply cannot be suitably condensed as referenced back-story. Further complicating the matter is the fact that this story builds on the events of two stories by Icy Mike Molson, neither of which has been posted and only one of which has even been written. Events of a third story, also unwritten, are peripherally important and we're reasonably certain we can work around them.
(Note from the Chief Molsonite: The aforementioned written, but not posted, story is on the way. As soon as I figure a title for it and force myself back into revisions. I hate line by line editing.)
The shortest (and we use that word loosely) way to catch up is to read Icy Mike Molson's Sleight of Hands and Nevermore's On the Road to Recovery. Those stories have many of the same characters dealing with the most relevant continuing story arcs that develop into the action herein. However, like it says above, we'll do our best to make this enjoyable as a stand-alone.
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Escape From New York
by
Icy Mike Molson and Nevermore
I – Reassigned
"He'll be with you shortly." Wong's tone is passive and even, his expression as inscrutable as ever. Having no hint as to why he's been summoned -- or what to expect when his sire is finally ready to see him -- Johnny Yashida allows himself to ponder Wong's term of service. The ghoul has been Siras Telemon's retainer for well over fifty years, almost the entire time that Siras has been kindred. Through the years, Wong has proven himself loyal, capable, and admirably discreet. Johnny has never had anything but good things to say about Wong, and so even now he's finding it difficult to direct his anxiety and ire at the ghoul. And that brings him back to his biggest question.
Why the hell am I here? he wonders, not for the first time. Three days earlier, while negotiating a service contract with the prince of Little Rock, he'd received a call instructing him to take his team out of the field, put them on standby, and return to headquarters immediately. Johnny thinks it bad enough that the Telemon, a young clan of kindred mercenaries, likely offended the prince of Little Rock when they awkwardly withdraw from negotiations with barely an explanation, but what made it inestimably worse was the fact that Johnny hadn't received any more information than anyone else.
Johnny Yashida is young by the standards of the kindred -- commonly referred to as vampires by the mortals -- but an unlikely set of circumstances has allowed him to acquire far more influence than most kindred of any age could ever dream. His sire, Siras Telemon, originally brought him into the world of the kindred in 1973. At the time, Siras had been on the run, driven by paranoia as he skulked in shadows, fearing reprisals from his own grandsire for crimes he rarely discussed and never fully explained. All Johnny knew in the beginning was that he had to keep a low profile and be prepared to dash from one side of North America to the other on a moment's notice. This vagabond existence had only ended when Siras and Johnny happened upon a Delta Forces soldier who'd just left the service. Siras embraced Marcus Dietrich immediately, and everything had changed.
Siras had been a soldier in World War II, and Marcus was a special forces operator who'd seen action all over the world, constantly training or taking part in covert operations. Marcus, like Siras and unlike Johnny, was more than able to mix it up in a fight, and his presence convinced Siras that maybe, for the first time in decades, it was safe to stop and settle down, if only for a short while. At that point the trio was in State College, Pennsylvania, a college town that was home to over fifty-thousand people during the school year and which was ostensibly Camarilla-held, almost equidistant between the Sabbat strongholds of Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. Siras earned favors when he and Marcus put down Sabbat interlopers, and he cashed in all of those favors when he made a play for the town. It took less than two years for Siras to become prince, and he held his position by recruiting from the local ROTC and hiring out his young neonates as mercenaries, providing shock troops in the Camarilla's war against the Sabbat.
Early success led to notoriety, and Johnny, who'd been left on the outside looking in during the fighting, finally found himself useful. Once again he traveled across the country, but now as the ambassador of the mercenary clan, Telemon, rather than as a young kindred running for his life.
Johnny has recently heard that the phrase, "The prince just called Yashida," has come to mean that a Camarilla prince has inquired about hiring Telemon mercenaries. Despite his current anxiety, that thought brings a smile to Johnny's face. He knows Siras was initially uncomfortable about using his scandalously casual, physically unimposing childe as his representative to the princes of North America, but Siras's early faith has been rewarded.
I did everything he could have possibly wanted, Johnny reminds himself, wondering why he's so nervous. Sure, I didn't expect to be called in, but that doesn't mean I'm in trouble. He has almost a whole hour to make a mental list of all the things he's done to help his clan, and by the time Wong finally emerges from Siras's office to usher him in, he figures he's worthy of a medal, if not a movie-of-the-week.
"Johnny," Siras says, his face every bit as unreadable as Wong's. "Have a seat." Johnny's sire is seated in his customary leather armchair, leaning back comfortably, leveling his imposing stare on his childe. His hands are folded in front of him, and something about Siras seems almost pensive, as if he's still contemplating how he would like to handle this meeting. Johnny isn't fooled by appearances, though. He knows his sire well enough to realize that all of this is part of a well rehearsed presentation. Siras never has a meeting without knowing in advance how it will play out. He hates surprises, and so Johnny is left to wonder why his sire thinks it important to appear as if he may be second-guessing himself at the last moment.
"Sir," Johnny replies. He doesn't bother with a salute -- he doubts he'd get it right, anyway -- and nods toward Marcus Dietrich as he warily sits down in one of the large leather armchairs in front of Siras's English oak desk. Marcus's presence is unexpected, and Johnny again starts wondering what this all about. His best guess is that the clan suffered some sort of terrible reversal in one of its sieges. Probably Boston, he decides. We have more invested there than anywhere else. I'll bet Siras needs me to go around and try to draw down some of our troops from some of our other contracts, maybe try to get princes to agree to a brief redeployment. This is gonna cost us. We'll be in debt to our eyeballs, countless favors and obligations that'll hang over our heads for decades. Maybe centuries.
Several more moments pass in silence before Siras finally sighs heavily and locks his stare onto Johnny. "You're being relieved of your duties, effective immediately," he says.
"Huh?" Johnny asks, stunned.
"You're relieved," Siras repeats, speaking the words slowly, as if he's addressing a child. If Johnny's sire has any idea of the effect his words, he isn't showing it. "When you leave here, I want you to put together a comprehensive report on your activities," Siras continues. Now he's looking away absently, as casually as if he's discussing the most recent ills of his favorite football team, the Chicago Bears. "Danny McLaughlin is taking over your duties."
"Sir?" Johnny asks.
"And I'm breaking up your team," Siras adds. "Mel is going back to Sam Carson in Boston; he can do with her as he pleases. Mason is being reassigned to Brett's team; he'll report in at Miami. Uiko will wait out in Little Rock for McLaughlin to arrive; she'll stay with our diplomatic team, continuing her own training as she brings McLaughlin up to speed."
"Why?" Johnny finally manages. He turns to face Marcus, hoping that his blood-brother will at least look at him. But Marcus's eyes are turned toward the floor. He, at least, understands what this is doing to Johnny, though he isn't doing anything to stop Siras's unexpected actions.
"I don't need to explain why," Siras answers with a shrug, "though if I wanted to, I could ask you about your misadventures in Tennessee and how you made an enemy of a bishop who ended up bringing his vendetta to my doorstep."
"That was over two years ago," Johnny points out.
"You spend your time dealing with princes and primogen," Siras points out coldly. "You of all people should understand that it can be countless years before you suffer the consequences of your actions. By kindred standards, this is rather immediate."
"Fuck you," Johnny spits, rising from his chair. He glares down at his sire, wondering if he can draw his pistol and get off several well-aimed shots before Marcus gets out of his chair and tears him to pieces.
"Sit down," Siras commands. "Now."
"Fuck. You," Johnny repeats. He turns and walks out, then hops on his Kawasaki and starts speeding toward downtown State College. He's there in minutes and finds the streets crammed with the late-night bar crowd. He parks and starts walking toward Zeno's, a small pub where his last surviving ghoul waits tables. He's rounding the corner, pushing past an annoying throng of fraternity boys yelling to some friends across the street, when he's hit with a blinding blast of light and heat.
The world is spinning before Johnny Yashida's eyes, and he's struggling to climb to his feet. He's dimly aware that there's been an explosion, that he was close enough that he's lucky to be in one piece. He allows himself a moment to take stock of the situation, realizing that he's flat on his back, lying on grass. I must have been blown clear across the street, he decides. He thinks he's gotten control of his legs again when something heavy lands on top of him, pinning him to the ground.
"Stay down," a voice mutters.
"Let me up," Johnny protests. He tries to prop himself up on his elbows now, struggling to gain some degree of leverage, but even with the confusion in his head, he knows he's failing.
"Stay down," the voice repeats. "The boss went to a lot of trouble to arrange this. Don't go spoiling it by letting people see you walk away."
"What?" Johnny asks. "What the hell do you mean? Who the fuck are you?"
"My name's Bill Hudson," the man tells him. "I'm the man who just killed you, Sir."
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The building, an old, crumbling warehouse on the forgotten industrial waterfront of Detroit, is silent and dark but for a few scattered pools of sodium illumination leaking in through grimy, broken windows. Rotting pallettes and musty, derelict boxes create winding alleys and foreboding cul-de-sacs along the walls, while the center of the filthy, paper strewn floor is left wide open. Occasionally the sound of a squeaking rat or a distant car breaks the silence, but inside the warehouse the air hangs heavy and still.
It's not exactly a new situation to K.T. Corben, but the Gangrel mercenary still doesn't like it. In the past, such warehouses have been the homes of anarchs or Brujah rebels, a challenge at best but nothing that K.T. didn't think he could handle. He's stalked through dozens of warehouses, more often the hunter than the hunted, and he's collected on a number of contracts by bringing down those anarchs and rebels.
Tonight, just like every other night of the past month, he's not sure if he's the hunter or the hunted. There is only one other vampire in the warehouse with him, but that vampire is old, fast, and thoroughly lethal in a way that no vampire K.T.'s age can hope to be. The vampire he's trying to find could practically be next to him, or maybe three floors up and watching him through the holes in the floors on the upper levels. All K.T. can do is keep himself silent and in the darkness, hopefully out of sight of the old Assamite long enough to wear down his patience.
But then again, if Hassan really is as old as he hints, K.T. doubts he'll have enough patience to outlast someone who measures his age in centuries rather than years or decades.
It is wrong to say he hears something off to his right, beyond the wide open space in the center of the warehouse. It's more like he feels it. In a room that has not seen life in decades, movement, however silent, seems to interrupt the tomblike peace of the place, sending waves out across the stillness. Quickly K.T. considers his options. He'll have little, if any time to trace Hassan from his gut feeling, but crossing the open space is something he will not do. If he can feel Hassan, then the Assamite likely will know if he tries any kind of move, and throwing himself out into the open is the surest way to a swift end. Quickly the Gangrel ducks back through the boxes, skirting ghostlike across the edge of that yawning void in the room's center. He makes no sound as he moves, and calls upon his discipline of Obfuscate to enhance his natural stealth. He doesn't know if the Assamite will be able to see through his discipline's limited power, but every edge he can take in this fight is an edge he'll desperately need.
There is sudden movement in front of him. Emerging from the darkness is a silent, lethal figure, shrouded in dark robes and turban and wielding a long, gleaming scimitar. The scimitar moves lightning quick, sweeping in at his neck, but K.T. somehow manages to get beneath the curved blade and slide quickly out of reach of the dangerous weapon. The Arab moves with him, spinning low and trying to cut off the Gangrel's legs. K.T. manages to tumble over the blade, somersaulting to his feet even as blood begins to ooze to the surface of his right palm. The Gangrel continues to backpedal away from his attacker, forcing himself to the limits of his celerity-enhanced agility, but even then Hassan's blade strikes a long, shallow wound across the Gangrel's stomach through his heavy duster. The mercenary stumbles but maintanis his balance, throwing his left forearm up just as the Assamite's blade sweeps in at his neck. A loud, metallic clang rings out through the darkness as Hassan's blade finds the improvised shield that K.T. has made up just for times like this; at the same instant the Gangrel lunges forward and slaps Hassan across the cheek, leaving a bloody handprint for only a brief instant before it absorbs into his foe's skin. K.T. follows the momentum of his strike and dives forward, finally growing his hands into claws, but even as he turns back to his enemy Hassan is on him, the scimitar missing but a long, slim dagger piercing deep into K.T.'s shoulder. There is a searing pain that no ordinary weapon can cause, but the Gangrel is already far too familiar with the agonizing pain of an Assamite's blood poison. Growling in pain but refusing to give in to the Assamite, K.T. pulls away, the dagger still embedded in his arm.
"Enough!" Hassan snaps suddenly. K.T. is ready to pounce, but stops at the words. Slowly the Assamite examines the mercenary, regarding the dagger in his shoulder. "Take it out," he orders sternly. K.T. does as he's told, pulling out the weapon with a wince of pain but refusing to show any further discomfort to his mentor. For a long moment the two simply watch each other through the darkness, until Hassan roughly takes hold of K.T.'s left hand and pushes the torn sleeve of the duster back. Underneath the coat, six slim steel rods are tied over the top half of the Gangrel's forearm from his wrist to his elbow. As the Assamite looks from the crude shield to the mercenary, the Gangrel allows himself a derisive smirk.
"Hope I didn't hurt your toy," K.T. says. Hassan snorts out a cold chuckle.
"Just because I use a blade, does not mean all your quarries will," Hassan states sternly.
"I thought I should know my enemy before I attack," K.T. retorts. The Assamite pauses for a long moment, his face emotionless, before rubbing his cheek where K.T. had slapped him.
"Your ability with Quietus, however laughable it may be, is increasing," the Assamite states. "Perhaps there is hope that you will overcome the innate weaknesses of your mongrel blood." He pauses, looking around him for a moment. "Do you know why I chose to fight you here?"
"Because it's dark and there's a lot of hiding spaces," K.T. replies sarcastically. K.T. barely sees Hassan's hand move, but the resounding slap across his face nearly snaps his head back.
"Because this place is dead," the Assamite corrects him sharply. "In a place where nothing moves and all is dead, the slightest disturbance creates an echo. You felt it just before I attacked you. Your eyes went directly to where I was."
"Gut instinct," K.T. counters, unwilling to agree with his mentor. Hassan knows the act for what it is already, and allows himself a scornful laugh.
"Call it what you will," Hassan says, "but remember it. An elder's haven will feel much like this place, cold and dead. And in such places, echoes carry far indeed. Your pitiful senses may be able to notice rank neonates hiding behind light poles, but even your miserable companion's pathetic comprehension of auspex can never hope to penetrate the powerful webs of Obfuscate that many elders create. You must feel the echoes or you will die before you ever know your quarry is near."
"I'll keep that in mind, then," K.T. grumbles. At this moment, the only elders the Gangrel has any inclination of hunting are the ones that dragged him into this personal hell of training missions and forced contracts. Hassan glares at the mercenary for a moment, but then nods to the distant doors behind him.
"Then go," Hassan states. "Feed, and heal yourself. We are done for the night."
"Then I'm done, period," K.T. says. "That's it. One month in Detroit finished this session. Peakes is dead and I'm in the clear."
"And where will you be going?" Hassan inquires.
"Home," K.T. answers, shaking his sleeve back down over his arm as he turns away from the Assamite. "When I wasn't out hunting down that dumbass Ravnos of yours, you've been stabbing me with blood-poisoned weapons for a month. I'm tired and I'm going home."
"You aren't done," Hassan states. K.T. whirls back on the Arab, his blue eyes locking onto the far older vampire behind him with a cold glare.
"I'm done," the Gangrel declares. "I've spent the last three months letting you beat the ever loving shit out of me, tracking down your problems for you, and answering your every beck and call. Now I've been promised time for myself, and I'm taking it."
"We have a new assignment for you," Hassan states, ignoring the mercenary's furious glare. "Something has come up in an area you may still be familiar with."
"It'd better be Kansas," K.T. mutters. Hassan allows himself a derisive chuckle.
"It is Brooklyn," the Assamite states. K.T.'s eyes widen in shock. "Coney Island, to be exact. You are to investigate rumors of a new, independent group of vampires there. Apparently, the local Sabbat has taken casualties against an undetermined foe."
"So send your lackeys in there and take them out," K.T. says. "You don't need me for this."
"You are the lackey we're sending in," Hassan states sternly. "A strike team composed of the Sabbat Hand is inappropriate if this new presence is to be evaluated for possible use. Such a group would also destroy the last shreds of secrecy in the area, something that cannot be allowed. I would think you, of all people, would understand the importance of maintaining what little is left of your so called Masquerade in New York City."
"It's not my problem," K.T. states angrily. Hassan nods down to the gleaming blade of his scimitar, still held at the ready.
"Yes, it is," the Assamite corrects.
To be continued………………………………