Courtney Collins

Time: 0800 hours

Location: Ohio, America

Date: Independence Day, 2022. The day of 'Pearl Jam,' the lesser known sister operation of the Pearl Harbor attack, where Japanese terrorist set off suicide bombs in the center of a proxy-concert run by international conspiracies to control oil and A.I. technology through clone-parasite implanted super soldiers enhanced with gene therapies to make them into the perfect child soldiers.

Location, again: A small suburban house painted red. It is midday. A young woman with a short bob of curled blonde hair dusts her floury hands off on the apron that protects her red and white polka dotted dress, knee length, and calls out the window to the two young boys in the middle of the street. The boys are playing catch.

"Cookies are in the oven, boys!" she beams. "Come back inside in forty five minutes if you want 'em fresh!"

They ignore her, but she knows they heard. Amused, the woman takes off her apron and hangs it up, then swipes her magazine off the kitchen counter. She sits daintily in an easy chair to peruse Housewives' Quarterly. A few minutes pass, and then her rosy ears pick up the sound of a car pulling over on the side of the road. The boys shouts have gone silent. The woman's face goes blank. She folds the magazine into her lap and clasps her hands together in front of her. Her hands are shaking as she listens to the footsteps come up the walk. It can't Robert: he's due back from his tour any day now, but they boys would be shouting for joy if it was him. But the step is military.

The doorbell rings. She jumps out of the chair and rushes to the door, not wanting to prolong the agony of waiting any longer.

"Ma'am." A man in a black suit, sunglasses, the shine of a cybernetic implant visible above his right eye—he's too bulky to be fully human under the suit. Pinned to the lapel is a red symbol—Desperado's red splash. And in his hands is a note.

Her hands go to her mouth. The man sees her expression, and bows his head, extending the letter. No more need be said, but it is.

"I'm sorry, ma'am."

"Is it—" she begins, but cannot finish.

"It's what you think, ma'am."

She takes the letter from him with both hands, holding it out in front of her as if it were a severed head, staring, unable to see through the sudden tears. The boys are standing in the driveway watching, baseball bat forgotten rolling off the sidewalk. The man is staring at his shoes.

"Get out." It is more like a plea than an order. The man looks up. "Get the hell out of here," she says, firmer—firm enough. He understands. He goes. The black van turns the corner and is gone, taking the world she knew with it.

With trembling fingers, there in the doorway, she opens the letter.

Deah Mrs. Khamsin,

It's ta my great sorro to tell ya that your beloved husband, Robert Khamsin, passed away yesterday durin' ah highly vital but classified operation. If it is any comfort tuh ya, he did pass away in the company o' his pardner and friend, hoss Samuel Rodriguez, whose phone numbah I have attached to this letter in case ya want to ring him up—ah am sure he would be happy to answer any personal questions you might have about your husband's last moments. Ah am confidant that Robert was thinkin' o' ya in those moments. If there is any-thang me or the rest of his colleagues can do to help, please don't hesitate tah get n' contact with us.

At the bottom of the letter were a set of nonsense signatures. A blocky looking plain-text reading 'Sundowner,' whatever that meant, and an extremely loopy scrawl that looked like it began with an M, and had at least one heart-dotted 'I,' but was otherwise illegible. In the corner it looked like someone had begun to sign 'Mon—' but then had suddenly switched into trying to fit as much of the text of Darwin's Origin of the Species into the margins of the letter in terribly crabby hand writing, all in caps.

She turned the letter over. There was an inky paw-print on this side, and a piece of paper stapled to the back with several phone numbers on it.

The paper fell out of her hands as her children came up the walk, looking slow and terrified.

"What is it, mommy?" asked Daniel. "Is it about Dad?"

The younger Tim was clinging to his brother. They had been fighting a few minutes ago about some rule in the game, but now their faces were pale, drained, just like hers must have been.

"You're daddy is fine," she said, her voice by some super human effort remaining unbroken.

"Then why are you crying?" asked Daniel.

"Because I'm so happy you're okay. Come here, baby." She encircled them in her arms. "It's going to be okay. Let's go inside. I'll make us all something to eat. I'll make daddy's favorite."

"Cheeseburgers?" asked Daniel hesitantly.

She kissed his sandy hair. "Cheeseburgers, honey. I love you."

Samuel stooped over the wreckage that had been Khamsin's mech. With two fingers he reached down and closed the single eye still set into the fragment of Khamsin's skull that had been broken off in the explosion. There was no lid, so his fingers just squished the eyeball so it was looking down. Sam sighed, then gently picked up this last piece of his partner and carried it carefully to the small grave he'd dug in a flower bed in front of the mansion he and Khamsin had come out of. There he set these last earthly remains, then pushed the dirt back into the hole and set a beacon on it so that it would not be forgotten once the clean up crews arrived; the man would get a proper burial back in America, his home.

"Anyone want to say a few words?" he asked over the radio.

"Sam…" ventured Bladewolf. "I am not human. I am not capable of fully comprehending the extent of your emotions. But it appears that you thought of Khamsin as a valuable ally in the same way that I value you."

"It's not your fault," said Sam. "Don't blame yourself, poop."

Bladewolf paused. "…Yes."

Sundowner cleared his throat, sounding reluctant. "Look, Sam, I know you guys were close—hell, we'll all miss him—"

"I won't," said Mistral.

"—but you've gotta keep movin'. There's a whole city to neutralize out there."

"I know, dammit." Sam sighed. "I just wish there was something I could say."

Monsoon exhaled over the radio. "Perhaps…a song is in order, to commemorate the man."

"Good idea!" Sam brightened. "How about the—"

"HERE I STAND BENEATH THE WARM AND SOOTHING RAAAAIN!

THE DROPLETS FALLING GENTLY DOWN ON THE TERRAIN!

WASH AWAY THE SOROW ALL THE STAINS OF TIME!

BUT THERE'S NO MEMOR IT'S ONLY DR INSIIIDE!

MY DRRREAMS DISAPPEAAAR!"

"Okay, time to go." Sam sped off down the street, turning off his radio with one hand while keeping his katana at his side with the other. He sprang with super human strength—enhanced by his cybernetic body suit and cybernetic head—across a bridge, spinning in the air and cutting down with a deadly swipe at a pair of hippie buskers playing for change from passers by. He cut them both in half. A squad of grad students immediate converged on the area, outraged by his gentrification of this local color. Sam countered their pamphlets and spoken-word poetry protests by cutting their bodies into hundreds of tiny pieces, then punching them into the sky where they were eaten by birds.

"That one was for Khamsin," he said as the wind carried the confetti of the bodies away. With grim resolve, Sam turned towards his next objective: a larger bridge that linked the city to the industrial area.

"Sam." It was Sundowner's voice on the radio. "Satellites just picked up a helicopter circling your position. Heavily armed. Looks like they've got some heavy equipment on board—cyborg, big, white, some big bald sunnuva bitch. Heh, look at this fat loser sittin' there typing on his computer. What's he doing up in the helicopter anyways?"

"I agree," said Bladewolf. "Sam, I do not think you will have to concern yourself with this new potential threat; he appears to be too useless to venture onto the ground. But I suggest you proceed with caution in any scenario."

Mistral agreed with giggles. "Took zee words right oot of mon bocca, mon loupe. Zis fat peese of sheet would rather sit pretty in his heli-coptor zan go down and fight his battles like a real man, like you and Samuel."

Everyone laughed, even Monsoon—or he would have if Sundowner had not cut him off the channel again.

"Well," said Sundowner after they had all calmed down a bit. "Looks like that boy ain't no threat to you, hoss. Why don't you head on into the industrial district, eh?"

"Will do." Sam set off across this new bridge at a jaunty pace. It was a large one over a river, quite a drop down. All seemed well until he heard the buzz of wings approaching in the distance. He spun around just in time to see two huge missiles heading straight for him! Sam jumped, avoiding the blast that split the bridge in half. It was all he could do to run fast up the collapsing side of the structure, even as behind him a great black bird of death swooped down and opened fire with machine guns. Sam used his sword to cut the bullets in half—he had to reach around behind his back to do so. Furious and panting, he just managed to clear the bridge before it collapsed into the water. With a roar, Sam leapt to the side to avoid another missile, which shot past him and collided with a large set of stone pillars in the public park behind him. As he flew through the air, Sam spun expertly, aiming a kick at the next missile that came. As it flew past him he hit in the side, causing it to veer around off course—and seek heat straight for its own shooter! There was another blast, a ball of fire, and the chewed debris of the helicopter careened into the ravine to join the wreckage of the bridge it had destroyed.

Sam jammed a finger into his own ear.

"Sundowner, what the hell! I thought you said the helicopter wasn't coo-ming any where near me!"

"Ah don' understand, hoss!" exclaimed the Texan with equal consternation. "I'm still lookin' at it right now! The bastard's just sittin there in the helicopter with his pants down screamin' at his laptop! Wait a minute—"

There was a long silence on the line. Back at the command center, Mistral held a Zirnoff Ice to her lips and waited. In the city behind Sam, Bladewolf stopped digging a hole in the middle of the road and perked up. And Monsoon was drowning in a bowl of soup.

"Err—well, looks like that heli cleared out!" Sundowner's voice was practically sweating. "No need ta worry about it now!"

"So you're saying it wasn't the same helicopter?" queried Sam in confusion.

"Ah, no. Not the same. Just another one. Gone now, though."

"And good riddense!" spat Mistral. "I hope ze coward aboard zat shitty berd never shows hez fat, baby face again—if he doez, I am sure mon gran and mon loupe will show heem what a real man can do with a sword!"

"I have to agree," said Sam sourly. "And we got all worked up about fatty—when he wasn't even the one on my butt. Next time keep an eye out for two helicopters, boss."

"Ah. Uh…will do, hoss." Sundowner licked his lips. "Will do."

Sam proceeded on through the abandoned park. He had to fight off a few graduate students, but they were not difficult to deal with; the next real challenge would no doubt be whatever sick-minded individual this enemy PMC (Peace Motivated Collective) would throw at them next. First the black man with the coffee cups, then the Russian dancer—but most of all, Sam was excited to get another crack at the beautiful white ninja woman wither her pale skin and silver hair. Almost too excited—blushing a bit, he stepped out of a roof access door and found himself confronted by a stretch of forest. In the distance was some sort of processing plant.

"Sam." It was Bladewolf on the private channel. Sam switched over to it.

"Yes, poop?"

"I do not defecate, Sam."

"Huh?"

"…It is nothing. I have been running calculations. I believe that Sundowner was looking at his own—"

"Hold on, poop!" Sam held up a hand, and with the other he touched the side of his face. Inbuilt binoculars popped out of a hidden panel in his cybernetic head and slipped over his eyes, giving him a good look at what was going on atop a large oil tank. A woman in a blue shirt with tied blonde hair, glasses, and a dark skirt with heels was talking to a fat, short, bearded man. The man was one of Desperado's clients! He didn't recognize the woman, though.

"I'll be," said Sundowner in awe. "Hoss, do you know who that is?"

Sam nodded grimly. "Yeah. One of our top payers. Joseph Stalin."

Mistral spat out her Mike's Hard Lemonade. "Egadz! Do you zink he haz betrayed oos?"

"Hold on." Sam watched in trepidation as the woman, who looked straight out of an office, suddenly produced a coffee cup. He let out a hiss. "NO!" But Stalin was too far away to hear. As Sam watched helplessly, the woman accidentally let the cup slip from her fingers. It broke, splashing hot coffee all over her victim's feet. The man screamed. Sam watched as smoke rose around Stalin's melting legs. In mere moments the poor bastard had been reduced to a puddle of goo, the incredibly hot fair-trade coffee having claimed another victim. Suddenly, the woman turned towards him, looking right into the binoculars! And she held up a piece of paper for him to see—it was a restraining order for stalking and voyeurism!

Sam gasped and ducked behind a rooftop radiator.

"Mon gran, mon gran!" It was Mistral. "Wot has hoppon?"

"I just dodged a bullet." Sweat beaded on his forehead, but it came away with a quick swipe of the hand. "I've got to get down there and put a stop to that mad woman."

Bladewolf cut in. "Await my arrival, Samuel: I am only a few kilometers away. We can face this threat together. As…" the UG hesitated, surprisingly. "As allies, Samuel Rodriguez."

"No time for that," said Sam distractedly as he ran down through the woods, deforesting the entire area with his katana to make a path. "I have to catch that woman before she escapes alive!"

With a mighty leap he made it all the way to the top of the oil tank. The woman hadn't moved. She was still standing there over the puddle, wiping her glasses carefully with a wet wipe. When she saw him, a smile crueler than the ocean was evident.

"Well, well. What is everyone's favorite Brazilian Samurai doing here?"

"I'm here to stop you." Sam pointed his sword at her. "You and your 'peace.'"

"Stop us?" The blonde threw her head back and laughed, arching her back and pushing forwards her modest and realistic breasts. "Why would you want to stop peace, him? What harm has peace ever done anyone?"

Sam snorted in disgust. "Tell that to Joseph Stalin."

"That poor fool?" The woman chuckled throatily and ground her short and reasonable high-heel down on one of Stalin's remaining fingers, which had not been dissolved yet. "Thought he could cut a deal—go white hat, without paying for his atrocities. Well…he got his peace prize."

"Listen to yourself." Sam circled her, hefting his sword guardedly. "You've gone mad with progressivism."

"That's what you would say," retorted the woman, following him with sultry strides, her small and average buttocks barely discernible through her skirt as she moved. "You and your little sword, you little man, selling your sword to the highest bidder. Tell me, Sam, what do you even believe in. What are your ideals?

"Ideas?" Sam hesitated. "I…exploit the weak. We make a profit off of people's fear, I guess, destabilizing war torn countries."

"Ha." She smirked knowingly. "Petty lies to hide a man enforcing a societally racist society. Tell me, Sam, do you even think that Black Lives Matter?"

"I don't understand the question," shot back the Samurai. "Are you implying that only black people's lives matter?"

"HA! Just what I thought you'd say, you racist, misogynistic, cis gender homophobic hetero normative FART RAPIST!"

The trap had been sprung! Sam reeled back, waving his sword wildly to deflect the tidal wave of outrage rushing invisibly towards him through the internet. In his helicopter, Sundowner was thrown back against the bulkhead by an explosion of comments on Desperado's twitter account calling the company insensitive and gynopathobic, and communications were instantly shut down at Desperado HQ by millions of anonymous phone calls demanding that Samuel Rodriguez be fired for being a racist sexist homophobe.

"Ah, masculinity…" drawled the blonde as she swung at Sam with a stack of graduate essays on gender identity. "So fragile."

"No!" Sam cut the papers in half with is katana, but he was being forced to the edge of the tank. The woman kept after him. The constant onslaught off 3rd wave feminist hashtags was almost too much to bear. With a smirk, the blonde battler produced her most deadly weapon yet—an essay by Judith Butler! She flung out her hand with a laugh, sending the transgressive ideas aboard the paper scything towards Sam's eyes to be read. At the last moment, Sam jumped into the air: the essay slashed through a nearby phallic pipe. Bright white mist shot out of the pipe and sprayed onto the woman's face! She screamed. It was ice cold, freezing her skin right off. Sam took the opening: with a mighty slash he separated head from neck. What might as well have been a snowwoman's skull tumbled to the ground and exploded in a puff of white, and the rest of the half-frozen body followed suit.

Sam alighted on the ground. He was utterly out of breath and shaking. Suddenly, his codec crackled to life. A raspy voice tickled his ear drums.

"Cis…scum…"

"Who was that, Sundowner?" he asked.

Sundowner had by then recovered from the twitter spam. He was looking at Wikipedia. "Courtney Collins. Diversity consultant for dozens of start-up companies. We had ah file on her before, but we had no ideah she was in this deep with the PMCs. She must ah been here ta assassinate Stalin."

"We keep losing people," groused Sam, staring at the puddle that had been the man.

"Troo," crooned Mistral. "But so do zey, mon gran. Why don't you come on back to ze HQ and unwind a boot? I sink I have at least one gross manly dreenk in my cooler. Zat whas not a euphemism of some kind, by ze way. I am being literal. But please do knock on ze door first if you stop by my room. Also, peek up some batteries on ze way over here."

Sundowner shook his head. "'Fraid he can't do any of that, Mistral. Look at this: her last job was with an orphanage in Mexico. You've got another trip ahead of you, hoss."

"An orphanage?" Sam stroked his chin thoughtfully. "What could our friends be doing over there?"

"Nothing good," said Sundowner. "Bladewolf, I want you to meet Sam back at the park for extraction. Luckily, we won't need to work out a new identity for Sam; he'll fit right in."

"Why do you say that?" asked Sam.

There was an awkward pause over the codec.

"Well…" began Sundowner. "You're, uh, of Spanish descent, ain't ya, hoss?"

"Brazilian, my friend. Not the same thing." Sam wiped the blood off his katana and sheathed it. He looked for a ladder to climb down the tank.

"Oh. Uh. They ain't?"

"Ooo" crooned Mistral. "You are baaad, mon chocon. Baaad."

"She sounds intoxicated," said Bladewolf from behind Sam. He had approached in silence as the Samurai spoke to Sundowner. Sam gave him a pat on the head, then turned his attention back to the codex.

"No, boss. Spain and Brazil aren't the same. Neither are Mexico and Brazil."

"You ain't Mexican? Then where's Mistral from?"

"Argentina," said Sam. "Right?"

"Mon grannn…where is The Destroyer, mon grannn? 'Ave you stolen it from me? Baaad. You are all terrible people."

Sundowner sounded utterly baffled. "Huh. Now don't that beat all."

"I fear that Mistral may need medical intervention," said Bladewolf to Sam.

"Her liver is fine," said Sam.

"I was referring to the psychological variety."

"She's probably joost bored, being stuck back at HQ. Wasn't she supposed to come along on this mission?"

"She was. But she was unable to pass the physical beforehand."

"Physical."

"Yes," said Bladewolf hesitantly. "She…had difficulty walking. And sitting down. This has been a problem ever since she began ordering adult novelty items over the internet. I know this because she makes me pick them up at the store for her."

"I know, poop. Stop whining about it. Get it—whining? Like a dog."

"I am not whining, Sam. I am an intelligent being. I am not a UPS truck."

"Hey, it gives you something to do, right? Nothing like a dog with a bone."

"I find it humiliating. Perhaps someone less intelligent would be more suitable to the task. Such as Monsoon."

"Well, if bothers you so much, I'll talk to her aboot it."

Bladewolf paused as they neared the edge of the tank. "Really, Samuel?"

"Yes." Sam grabbed the ladder and hoisted himself over the side, calling back: "As soon as we get back from our trip to Mexico, amigoooo—"