"Hell is worth all that, natural habitat
just a rhyme without a reason
Neverending maze, drift on numbered days
now your life is out of season
I will occupy
I will help you die"
"Master of Puppets" - Metallica
15 August 1999
Edinburgh, Scotland
Alan Ottenbreit's fingers moved rapidly across his computer keyboard. The moment was at hand and he did not want to delay it much longer if he could help it. He and the other leaders had gone over their plans again as Matzel had suggested and, as the Ranger had foreseen, weaknesses had been found. Weaknesses identified and overcome. Now it was time to send the message out to the subordinates and initiate the campaign.
Ottenbreit was a lover of technology. He had found it to be an enabler or, as Matzel called such things, a combat multiplier, for all things they did. Now, thanks to a small program on this computer, he would take advantage of the short message service capability on the cellular phones of all the loyal Watchers under his command to begin their work. There would be no lengthy phone trees or radio calls. It would all be done with the punch of the Enter key from his computer. How glorious.
Leaning forward, Ottenbreit typed two words onto the monitor and then sat back to review them. He grinned coldly. There was such power in those two words, the ability to unleash hell upon all Immortals in Europe. They would even pick off a few in North America, just as a bonus and, per Matzel's suggestion, a diversion. Ottenbreit licked his lips as he read the words again.
"Cleanse Europe."
Ottenbreit hit Enter. It was done.
xxxxxxxxxx
15 August 1999
Aachen, Germany
Dieter Frei strolled slowly down Elisabethstraße on his way to lunch. There was a nice place on Friedrich-Wilhelm-Platz just two blocks away that he quite enjoyed and he had plenty of time to get there. The joys of owning your own business. Of course, some would see the downside being that he worked until late hours, often until eight or nine in the evening, but the work was fun and so were the people.
Frei waved at Fraulein Metter as he walked, saying a few pleasantries as they passed. He must remember to ask her for more than how her day was sometime, perhaps if she was seeing anyone or if she was interested in a coffee. What was her first name? Oh, yes. Alexa. It would be good to remember things like that. He made a mental note to try chatting her up when he passed by here tomorrow.
Turning right onto Hartmannstraße, Frei cleared the few meters to Friedrich-Wilhelm-Platz in only a minute and turned left. His mouth watered as he imagined the smells of the restaurant only a block away. He decided to quicken his pace, but only somewhat. Why rush too much?
The traffic on the street to his right was light and he made note of the passing vehicles. It was a mental game he played, just counting the cars or trying to identify them. Sometimes making a mental image of them and looking them up later. Just to keep his mind occupied. There was a grey BMW sedan, last year's model. Nice. Over there a Peugeot. Not so nice. Going the other way, an American Ford and a Honda Civic.
Hmm. A white Toyota panel van. That's a bit odd. And it's slowing down.
Frei looked about him, searching for potential passengers nearby the van might be seeking to pick up. He saw nobody. He was confused, then on edge.
The van stopped just in front of him and its side panel opened as he came alongside it. Involuntarily, Frei paused. Inside the van, he saw two men dressed in black. Their faces were concealed by balaclavas. It was not their faces that concerned him, however. In the hand of one was a .45 caliber pistol fitted with a silencer; the other man held a drawn machete. Frei gasped and took a step to run.
Too late. He heard the slide of the pistol kicking back and the sonic clap of the pistol round. An instant later, he felt the burning, ripping sensation of the high caliber bullet boring into his side. Another round punched into his right knee. He fell. Other pedestrians, unfamiliar with the nearly silent sound of the pistol, looked with confusion as he dropped to the pavement. One even moved to assist him but the sight of the machete-wielding man emerging from the van stayed him.
Frei tried to rise to his feet, but his leg would not obey him. He mentally inventoried his pockets for any sort of weapon, anything he could use to defend himself. His shoulders sunk. He had nothing. Who would expect such a thing as this?
"Hilfe!" (Help!) he called to the nearby pedestrian. "Stoppen Sie diesen Mann." (Stop this man.)
The pedestrian took a step closer. The man in the balaclava pointed the machete at the pedestrian. "Komm näher und du bist der Erste." (Come any closer and you're first.) The pedestrian took two steps back.
Das kann nicht echt sein, (This can't be real,) thought Frei. Werden sie das wirklich vor all diesen Leuten tun? (Are they really going to do this in front of all these people?)
xxxxxxxxxx
15 August 1999
Perugia, Italy
The Bar Pasticceria Della Pescara was a well-lit, pleasant establishment and enjoyed by all its clientele, usually, for its fine pastry selection. That was not solely why Gabriele Mantovani came here, however. He also liked its wine. So much, in fact, that he had spent many an hour these last several days here enjoying both several of the large pastries and many bottles of its best red wine to go with them. Mantovani's sizeable girth gave evidence to his favoritism for both sweet food and drink.
Dovrò fare qualcosa per questo peso, immagino. Mi sono lasciato andare negli ultimi cinquant'anni o giù di lì. Questo non lo farà. Sto iniziando a sembrare un americano. Ah, bene, una volta uscito da questa routine finanziaria, tornerò anche su un buon regime di fitness. (I'll have to do something about this weight eventually, I suppose. I've let myself go these last fifty years or so. This just won't do. I'm starting to look like an American. Ah, well, once I crawl out of this financial rut, I'll get back on a good fitness regimen, too.)
Mantovani smirked to himself. He admitted that his concept of a financial rut was still, compared to the vast majority of people, still quite well off. How else could he afford the wine and the past month's rent at the Accogliente Monolocale just behind the patisserie? No, he was not doing badly when he compared wallets with others, but with his past. Oh, yes, he was certainly hurting when he looked at that. Ever since he put his lot in with that crackpot Il Duce he had not done well at all.
Avrei dovuto ascoltare quell'ufficiale di Fallschirmjäger, Anton Schultheiss, quando mi disse di mettere i miei soldi altrove. (I should have listened to that fallschirmjäger officer, Anton Schultheiss, when he told me to put my money elsewhere.)
Pushing aside his empty glass with a belch, Mantovani dropped some bills on the counter and stood shakily. He waved at the proprietor as he made his way to the door, saying he would return tomorrow. Stepping into the sunlight, he was suddenly glad he did not have far to walk. The dizziness which struck him was overwhelming.
Ooh, troppo vino. (Ooh, too much wine.)
Mantovani staggered north up Via Fonti Coperte. He put a hand over his eyes and squinted, wishing he had worn a hat. The light was blinding. He'd do better tomorrow. For now, he just had to make it to his rented flat, empty his bladder, and go to bed. After a long night's sleep, even though it was only late afternoon right now, he could begin again, in the morning.
Tanto per quei piani per migliorare la mia forma fisica, (So much for those plans on improving my fitness,) he thought as his breathing became labored from the walk. He was halfway to the hotel now, just past the patisserie and in the area of the car park behind the hotel. So focused was he on simply putting one foot in front of the other and keeping the sunlight out of his eyes that he did not notice the three men come up behind him until they shoved him between two parked cars.
"Co…" (Wha…) he gasped, banging his head on a bumper as he fell on his side. That was his last uttered word before the men fell on him with drawn blades.
xxxxxxxxxx
16 August 1999
Almeria, Spain
Despite the fact that he had considerable wealth, somewhere in the neighborhood of one hundred million U.S. dollars the last time he had cared to check, Darren Dublin chose not to live like a millionaire. He kept the money for emergency purposes and preferred to live the life of his roots, a blue-collar man…with a few perks now and then. Besides, most of that money, in his mind, he had not earned anyway. It had come in the way of gifts or outrageous salaries from his friend, David Ashton. So he just let it ride in investments or other vehicles that he could tap when he needed it. He made enough from whatever work he was doing at the time - and kept enough in cash - that he could do whatever he wanted when he wanted.
Today, the print shop had closed early so the management could have some sort of "getting in touch with your feelings" training or another so all of the minions, like him, had been let out at noon. Since he had been having an incredible urge for pizza, Dublin had decided to walk in a direction other than that of his long-term rental flat and try out a pizzeria he had noticed during one of his morning runs. Now he was glad he had. Buono, as it was called, turned out to be excellent.
As a bonus, at least in Dublin's mind, the establishment offered outside seating and a view of the ocean. He sat now sipping tea and enjoying the last slice of his large pepperoni and mushroom. The owner had remarked how such a skinny man as Dublin could put away such a pie. Dublin had simply grinned and replied that he had a high metabolism and often ate quite a bit. The owner had laughed and brought him a complimentary basket of breadsticks as a surprise. Those had also vanished quickly.
The breeze of the ocean was a welcome relief from the midday heat. Not that Dublin minded the heat. He had grown up in a cold country and enjoyed being warm whenever he could, but a little air movement was nice, too. There was something charming about Spain. Dublin thought he might, just might, stay here a little bit longer. He'd only been here for two years. A few more wouldn't hurt, would they? He was a wanderer by nature, but settling down now and then wasn't a bad thing, either.
I should drop a note to David in one of our dropboxes sometime soon. It's been a little while. I guess that's a bit old fashioned, but it's habit, too. I could just give him a call. I haven't talked to him or Jonny in a couple of months. It would be nice to hear their voices. Maybe I could convince them to come visit. I do enjoy seeing old friends.
Dublin's pleasant musings were sadly interrupted by the electric tingling of another Immortal's presence. He set the remainder of his pizza on his plate and took a final sip of his tea to clear his palate. Looking about, he tried to locate the potential opponent. The timing was not good. Except for the sgian dubh hanging at the back of his neck by a necklace and a pocket knife, he was unarmed. Before he forgot, he slipped some bills under his glass to cover the bill.
It took only seconds to find the other Immortal. He was walking across the sand of the beach in front of Dublin. The man made eye contact with him only momentarily but kept walking, obviously not interested in a fight. Dublin recognized him. Javier Lucas. They had met a few months before in a pub. Even shared a few friendly drinks and stories about past lives. Now the man seemed only interested in treading as swiftly as possible across the sands to the pavement. Almost as if he were doing Dublin a friendly courtesy - or a warning - he made a minute gesture with his head. It was practically unnoticeable, but Dublin caught it. Someone was following Lucas. Four someones.
The men were about fifty meters behind Lucas. They were good. Their pursuit was measured and spread out. Only an experienced observer would notice what they were doing. To anyone else, they completely blended into the rest of the daily crowd.
Dublin did not react visibly, only moving his eyes at first to watch the men. He wondered where they received their training in surveillance and pursuit. A memory flickered in his mind, something from seventy years before. What had Ashton called them? Watchers? Mortals who observed Immortals? If these were Watchers, why were four of them tailing Lucas? Another memory emerged, a time when a Watcher had actually contacted him. This was getting surreal.
Lucas reached the Paseo Maritimo Carmen de Burgos thoroughfare and turned northeast, away from Dublin. He continued to walk quickly. It took the four men less than a minute to reach the road and speed up their pace. They were more obvious now. With their backs to him, Dublin stood. Keeping himself fifty meters behind the strange men and doing his best to mix in with the other pedestrians, Dublin followed the followers.
Lucas walked for one hundred meters before coming up to the Calle Jerez building. The four men were only ten meters behind him now. Lucas turned to the left and walked into the alleyway between it and Duque de Mar. The four men began to run as soon as he began his left turn. So did Dublin.
A gunshot shattered the relative peace of the afternoon. Passersby screamed in fright. Some of them froze in mid-step, one of them in front of Dublin. He collided into a wide-eyed brunette before he could stop himself.
"Lo siento," (I'm sorry,) he said to the woman, helping her up quickly and making sure she was unhurt before leaving her in the middle of the sidewalk. He pulled the pocket knife as he turned the corner, extending the blade as he came to a stop. It would have to do. It was the best weapon he had. And it was completely useless. He was already too late.
Dublin stood over the body of Javier Lucas, his severed head nearby. Against the wall of the Duque de Mar building rested the pistol Lucas had used a moment ago in an attempt to defend himself. Before him was a spattering of blood. Dublin could clearly make out the two indentations in Lucas' chest where a taser had incapacitated him prior to the decapitating blow. A trail of blood showed where the four men had gone after the killing.
A chill ran through Dublin's body. This was not the way an Immortal was supposed to die. Not like this. It should be at the hands of another of his kind, not having his lifeforce wasted by mortals. Dublin took a deep breath and folded his pocket knife. Suppressing a shudder and running the way he had come, all he could think was, What the hell is going on?
xxxxxxxxxx
17 August 1999
Lausanne, Switzerland
Todd Wolf made himself ready for an early morning run. One benefit, he had decided, in being a Watcher, was that keeping tabs on an Immortal often meant doing what the Immortal did. Since his Immortal, Dario Eckstein, was a fitness buff, and liked to start the day with a ten kilometer jog around Le Denantou, then so did Wolf. He would even exchange a few words with Eckstein on occasion, just another runner out for the morning. Sometimes he even picked up another bit of information for the Immortal's chronicle that way.
This morning, though, Eckstein was going a little faster than Wolf so the Watcher was happy just to keep about one hundred meters behind the man, if he could. Besides, it was pleasant just to watch the sun come up this morning. There was no sense getting too stressed out. The day was just beginning after all. After the run, Wolf would go back to his flat, shower, have breakfast with the wife and kids, and then link up where he knew where Eckstein would be and continue his day. Just the normal routine.
Wolf continued east down Quai d'Ouchy, the familiar sight of Lake Geneva on his right. He soon reached the Haldimand Tower and swerved left. Briefly, he regained sight of Eckstein in the distance. The man was just now turning left onto Avenue de Denantou, heading west. Wolf knew that stretch to be a longer length of roadway so perhaps he'd be able to eventually catch up. Again, no rush. After less than a minute, he was making his own turn.
The roadway had a lot of overhanging tree branches so Wolf had to pay more attention to his feet and possible trip hazards as he travelled. He didn't notice the problem until he was about seventy meters away. It looked like Eckstein had fallen over. Had he tripped over something himself? Whatever it was, it looked like two or three men had already gathered around him to assist him. The Swiss were very courteous people. Only seconds later when he was twenty meters from the men and had slowed to a walking speed to offer his encouragement to them, did he see one of them raise a short sword over his head and bring it down sharply. While the men may have not noticed his approaching footfalls, they did hear his gasp of shock.
"Scheißkerl," (Son of a bitch,) cursed one of the men. The three men gathered around the fallen body and looked at Wolf. He could not make out their faces in the shadows.
Realizing he was in an unfavorable predicament, Wolf took a step back. "Tut mir leid. Ich wollte gerade gehen," (Uh, I'm sorry. I was just leaving,) he said.
"Nein, bitte bleib, Todd," (No, please stay, Todd,) replied one of the shadows.
Wolf paused, confused. He recognized that voice. "Nolan?" he asked.
"Ja, guten morgen," (Yes, good morning,) answered the voice of Nolan Schudel just before his silenced 9mm pistol fired. Todd Wolf's forehead received a metal punch and he entered a black void.
Half an hour later, another jogger found the two bodies and alerted local police. The scene was the worst the local constabulary had seen in decades, one man beheaded and another shot through the head, both within minutes of each other. No witnesses. No motive. Only the footsteps of three men and a single shell casing from a 9mm pistol. There were not even any fingerprints on the casing. The ammunition was Soviet-made. The footprints were from boots so generic that tracing them was pointless. The chief of police pontificated that this may have been another flare up of old Cold War scuffling like the old days. That would explain the ghostlike - and ghastly - nature of the scene. What other reason could there be?
xxxxxxxxxx
18 August 1999
Westminster, England
"Alright, Mike," Sather seethed into his phone. "I don't need to listen to my people in England. I've heard enough from the rest of the continent to know damn well what you had Correll doing in Scotland. We've had five Immortals killed in the last three days: Gabriele Mantovani in Italy, Dieter Frei in Germany, Javier Lucas in Spain, Dario Eckstein in Switzerland - and his Watcher, Todd Wolf, I should add, and, just this morning, Marcell Gulyás in Hungary and a near miss on Gregor Minosovic in Greece. None of them died because of other Immortals. It was Watchers. Cut the cloak and dagger shit with me, Mike. You had Correll, a former CID agent, investigating a potential Hunter cell. Am I right?"
Michael Walker sighed into his phone. "Yes, Devon, you're right. I didn't want to admit it because of the problems we had the last time they reared their heads in America a few years ago. Remember how bad that was? No, you wouldn't. That was before your time. It was horrible. The North American wing of the Watchers almost fell apart. They're still in turmoil over it. We're still trying to purge the ranks of the Hunter remnants over there."
"Well, Mike, I think what has likely happened, if we check the records, is they've quietly transferred themselves over to Europe over the last several years. All it is going to take is for the wrong person to be attacked over here and you could have something far worse than what you had in North America."
"What are you saying, Dev? You don't even know what happened back then."
"I'll read up on it later. I know Immortals and I know human nature. People have tempers and some of them can explode. You push the right one too far and you can set off a powder keg. No one expected the Archduke Ferdinand assassination to become World War One until it did."
"You're saying a few dead Immortals could blossom into a war?"
"It might, if we're not careful and don't act preemptively to stamp this out right away."
"I think you're overreacting on this, Devon," replied Walker. "We just need to locate the Hunters and stop them. We know they're headquartered somewhere in Scotland. That's a start."
"A start, yes, but their manpower is dispersed throughout Europe. We have to stop that, as well."
"True, that will be the harder part." Walker paused. "Head of the snake?"
"Kill the head and the body will die? Maybe. If we knew exactly where the head was. Correll never said, did he?"
Walker sighed again. "No, he didn't. He said he was moved around a lot and never brought to their actual headquarters. Or, if he was, he didn't know it. He was brought to some important locations. We know that, but not much else."
"Send me what you've got."
"You'll have it in your email soon."
"Thanks, Mike."
"Not a problem. You do bring up an important point about their manpower dispersion, though. In the past, even with the last time they sprung up, Hunter uprising have always been a localized occurrence, usually in one city. We've never seen them initiate a campaign across an entire continent before. The fact they've killed so many Immortals, and so soon, is also a concern. There is definitely a lot of planning and coordination behind this."
Sather sat back in his chair and tapped his fingers on his desk. He chewed the tip of his tongue for a moment as he stared at the ceiling. He smirked to himself. "This might sound a bit crazy, but it almost sounds like they've got a military guy as part of their planning group. Set out generalized goals at the highest level of operations, then lower level objectives that must be completed right away, and so on. Each cell, no matter how remote, has its own set of tasks it must complete by a certain time. After that, it has a new set of tasks."
"Hmm…that sounds like a feasible assumption. Maybe some of the people Max identified will match up with your theory. I'll send you all his notes."
"Thanks again. I'll look them over and let you know what I think."
"For now, Dev, keep this stuff on close hold. Let's not have this information spilling out to the rest of the organization just yet."
"Will do, boss. Out here."
