Chapter 14
Claymores mentioned in passing, I do not own 'Claymore'.
George finished attaching the photos of Mia's growing baby bump to their email and hit "send" Half a world away her family would get the email and could see the pictures and read about their adventures in America. As always, he included an invitation for her family to join them in America. Mia sinuated into the room and announced, "Your lunch is ready, dear. Eat it before I do, after all, I'm eating for two now!"
He rose from his chair and squeezed her gently before heading out to the kitchen for his lunch. The nursery was nearly finished now and soon, would receive its first tenant, their first child. As he ate, Mia sat on her coils across from him and ate her own lunch. Or rather, she ate her own, then happily stole half of his lunch, that which he didn't just share with her anyway. Mia glanced at the calendar and remarked, "Rachel's picking me up tomorrow to see Doctor Sims, what are your plans?"
George replied between bites of his sandwich, " Tomorrow? I'm gonna meet with Tom Burroughs about where to put in a few more fruit trees or date palms on the off chance we can finally prevail on your mom to move here. I figure that if there is a place of her liking for her to move into, then maybe she'll listen to reason."
Mia smiled and absentmindedly caressed her growing baby bump as she said, "I want my family here for this, maybe if we have an oasis of our own waiting for them, they'll want to come here." George grinned at her and replied, "That's why we've been planting all the fruit trees and have the garden area all finished up. It'll save us a lot of 'driving into town' time for certain."
Mia grinned and said happily, "That means you'll be with me more, right?"
George grinned at her and nodded a 'yes', Mia squealed and slipped her long tail around him to pull him closer. After a slow, sweet kiss, their lips parted reluctantly and Mia carried George into their bedroom for the rest of the day.
The next morning, Rachel pulled up in front of the house and got out, Mia came out of the house with her holding bag slung over her shoulder and a big smile on her face. George was already out with Tom Burroughs looking over areas to plant more fruit trees and a couple of finish carpenters were putting up the newly delivered cabinets and counter tops for the nursery.
Rachel had a bulky manila envelope under her arm, Mia glanced at it and Rachel commented, "It's work related, sorry!"
Mia frowned slightly and said ruefully, "I was wondering when he would have to go back to work. I'm grateful for the time I've had him all to myself, but now I have to share him again."
Rachel grinned and remarked, "He's not going out of this country anymore, not unless it's family related. This assignment is stateside and not too far from here actually."
That evening after Rachel brought Mia back from her doctors appointment and Mia had insisted on having Rachel stay for dinner. George opened the bulky envelope, inside were photos of some blonde haired athletic looking women and several pages of notes.
George glanced at the items briefly and asked, "Okay, what is this all about? Who are these ladies and just what is a 'claymore' aside from an anti-personnel mine, a really big sword or a legendary warrior?"
Rachel grinned at him and replied, "For starters, these ladies are some of the 'claymores' or at least that's what they were called at one time. Your assignment is to discreetly monitor their activities, in particular, this one."
She held up a photo of a tall blonde walking alongside a much shorter, Asian woman.
"Her name is Sheila Ericcson for now, she has gone by many names over the years. Lately, she has become friendly with this woman, an author named Anna Karlsen. Her real name is Anastasia Karloff."
Rachel held up another photo showing Sheila Ericcson talking to a slim blonde wearing loose clothing and a very big hat.
George looked at the photos and the notes laid out again and asked, "These people don't look very mysterious to me, why is there such an interest in them?"
Rachel grinned at him and said, "Anna Karlsen is a 250 year old vampire and Sheila Ericcson is about 7,500 years old, give or take a century or two. Vampires and the surviving claymores have no history of conflict and have largely stayed away from each other. For these two to have become friendly is a bit unusual, we're just curious that's all."
George gaped at the numbers Rachel had stated and declared, "7,500 years old?! How is this possible? None of the vampires I've ever heard about are much over 2,000 years old!"
Rachel smiled at him and said pleasantly, "Many of your questions will be answered in the notes I gave you. You will pose as a telephone repairman and will simply monitor their communications."
George raised his eyebrows and asked, "You just want me to listen to their phone calls? No first contact, no establishing a contact? I'm a little confused here."
Rachel replied, "We have been working with both the vampires and one of the claymores, but not both at once. Our bosses are wondering about the activity between the Ericcson woman and Anna Karlsen. The connection between them seems to be from a woman named Susana Basa who is an avid reader of Ms. Karlsen's books." Rachel tapped her finger on the photo of Sheila Ericcson and the small Asian woman for emphasis.
George shrugged and said, " Okay, when do I start?"
"We'll wait til the new lamia housing gets further along here, Tom and his people will be doing the work so Mia won't be alone. In the meantime, read the notes and familiarize yourself with the eavesdropping equipment." Replied Rachel.
During the day George would help out with the construction of lamia suitable houses near their house and with the remodeling of the bathroom on their own house as well. The bathrooms would have a large tub for soaking in and special toilets added for the use by a lamia. While Mia enjoyed the outside hot tub for soaking in and it saw regular use in that regard. It wasn't really appropriate for bathing in and as the weather got cooler with the approaching winter, it would get covered up.
At night, he was studying up on the materials that Rachel had given him on the claymores and the vampire kingdom. He also worked with the eavesdropping equipment he would be using during his assignment. Mia was starting to really show her pregnancy now and was wearing looser maternity clothes for comfort.
The slinkier clothing she had bought for George's sake would have to wait until after the girl was born. They were now sending letters and photos to her family on a weekly basis along with progress reports on the houses being built for her family. Roger Tate was also sending regular reports on how her family was getting along and on local fundamentalist militia activities.
That news wasn't encouraging, foreigners were being watched closely and Roger was definitely a foreigner. Henri Du Valliere at one point, nearly had his Antonov confiscated, fortunately when they had come for his plane, it was during an overhaul and the plane was in bits. His Algerian wife graciously served them some really strong sweetened coffee and they went away for the time being.
The sudden French invasion of Mali a few weeks later took all of them by greatly increasing Islamist activity in the remoter parts of Mali had become of great concern to the French. Henri DuValliere being a former French airforce reservist and having recently lost his Antonov to the Islamists had immediately reported for duty. The French air force appreciating his experience in flying over the Sahara, happily gave him back his commission and an airplane. Roger Tate was arrested as an undesirable foreigner and firmly escorted out of the country of Algeria.
He promptly contacted Rachel, George and Henri via a Skype conference call and declared, "If we're going to get Mia's family out, we'd better do it really soon. With all that's going on in Mali? A chinook helicopter taken for a joyride shouldn't be noticed! Henri? Does your pilot's training cover helicopters?"
Henri could be heard to chuckle and he replied, "Ah, but of course! And I have a commander who is, how do you say it? Unconcerned about what I do with his aircraft, so long as he doesn't hear about it!"
Roger laughed and said cheerfully, "I'm gonna book a flight to Mali and hook up with you Henri, and we can explore the possibilities!" Henri grinned at the webcam and remarked, "And I will alert my long suffering wife to hide the silver!"
Roger grinned and retorted, "Don't tell me she's still sore about that?"
Rachel keeping the conference on track noted, "There's a new moon in about four weeks, let's shoot for that, shall we?"
George remarked, "This gives me about a week or so to eavesdrop on these ladies we're so interested in and see if there's anything we need to be concerned about."
Roger looked at them through the webcam and asked, "How is my girl doing, George? How's the baby coming along?"
George grinned and said happily, "We just found out, we're having twins! Mia is over the moon about this and I haven't told her folks, so keep yer yap shut!"
The remainder of the web conference was a torrent of heartfelt congratulations delivered to a blushing George Bryce, field agent for the Museum of Cryptozoology.
That morning, Rachel drove him to the airport where he caught a short flight to Van Nuys, California. There he would pick up the surveillance van from an employee of the phone company. Mia had accompanied them to the airport and they held each other closely before kissing good bye, George watched Mia's amber eyes welling up with tears as they drove off.
His heart feeling heavy, he got in line to board the flight and held in his feelings. He would get this assignment over with as quickly as possible and get back to his precious bride and the babies growing inside her body.
The most recent ultrasound had revealed twins. The news had stunned Mia and at first, Rachel and George didn't fully understand her reaction to the news.
When she finally found her voice, she declared, "Lamias don't have twins, it has never happened before, so far as I know. Mom will be shocked as much as I was."
She looked thoughtful until finally, she laughed and said gaily, "That explains why I've gotten so big! I'm carrying twins!"
She grinned happily and said conspiratorially, "Let's not tell mom just yet, I wanna see the look on her face when she hears the news!"
That evening, George was sitting in the utility van near the nondescript house in the Sherman Oaks part of the San Fernando Valley. He was posing as a telephone repairman, but actually eavesdropping on the events unfolding inside the modest stucco structure.
The trio of blonde amazons had entered the house and his best microphones were picking up tantalizing bits of the conversations inside, he'd heard the term "Claymore" and "Your Majesty" several times now and was adjusting the signal strength to hear better when the door to his van opened suddenly, and strong hands hauled him outside the van and quickly relieved him of his pistol and identification.
A bulky man with feral eyes spoke in a voice that was little more than a growl, "The Queen will see you now!" Moments later, with little dignity left, a rumpled looking George Bryce found himself standing before the queen of the hidden realm. Her Majesty, Queen Henrietta Maria.
Author's comments: I hope you have enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it. George Bryce was introduced in an earlier tale I had written and I decided to 'flesh' him out a bit. This is the result. The world they live in also has other fantastic creatures living in it. Aside from the usual vampires and werewolves, there are also frost giants and arachne as well. I have written about them and will, depending on how this is received, post these tales at a later date. Thank you for your time in reading this effort.