Falling Down
The day had started like any other day. The sun came up, although it was hidden above the clouds. Those clouds carried a horrible storm into the city, drenching Seattle in dark grey tones and bleak, oppressive shadow. Max stared out over the city through the window she had broken so long ago. Her thoughts drifted. She remembered the night she first met Logan.
"You're a thief?" He had asked. She could honestly not remember a time when anyone had been so relieved to find out they were being robbed.
"Girl's gotta make a living." She smiled.
"Thank God," Logan said. She snickered. Again, she realized something… she realized she had never laughed, legitimately laughed, while someone pointed a gun at her. She knew then he would never allow harm to come to her. It was a strange feeling.
"Never heard that one before," she replies. He had smiled then, well, it was almost a smile, but he was obviously relieved.
"Things are a little tense around here right now," he explained.
"Guess you weren't expecting the pizza delivery guy…" she quipped. He glanced down at the bag. She had more than ample opportunity to get to him, but for some reason, she knew she was in no danger. She got that vibe from him. It was like he had been waiting for her to show up. When she did, something had fallen into place for both of them.
"You have good taste," he commented. "French, 1920s, attributed to Chitaris,"
"Whoever that is…" She smirked.
"Oh… what? You liked it because it was shiny?" He challenged her. She knew he was doing so, and in that challenge, she realized he didn't fear her as much as he should. She knew right then and there something was different about this man. This seemingly ordinary guy was no longer concerned with his weapon and only concerned with the woman in front of him. He had turned on the charm and wit, and damned if she didn't like the feeling that had suddenly washed over her. She chose to play the game
"NO. Because it's the Egyptian Goddess Bast, the goddess who comprehends all goddesses, Eyes of Ra, protector, avenger, destroyer of life who lives forever…"
Then security came, and she jumped out of this window. The same window she was now leaning her head on, letting the rain running down the smooth window be her tears. The front door opened, and she thought again about security even though she knew it was Jondy.
Max didn't move, just listened to her sister walk through the apartment and stop a few feet away from her.
"Max," Jondy said. She waited for Max to respond, but there were no more words. "Listen, we've got the information we were waiting for. Biggs and Alec are verifying it right now. We expect to hear from them in about three or four hours." Jondy paused, waiting. Still, Max said nothing so she continued. "Skywalker says they have put together a plan and Bennett has OK'd it. Brin has committed her platoon to the operation. That's 115 ex-Manticore black ops and 65 X-soldiers. Brin has deferred to Bennett and Skywalker on lead for the mission…"
"What if we had stayed?" Max interrupted.
"What do you mean?" Jondy asked. "Stayed at Manticore?"
"I've thought about it a lot lately. I know certain things would have happened differently. I know this for a fact. Logan would be dead. Bruno would have blown up his hospital room because I wouldn't have been there to save him. I would never have known him. I would never have met him, so he would never have meant anything to me. We would be the soldiers we were meant to be. Tinga would be alive. Ben would be alive. Zack… well he'd just be Zack, but he'd still be our CO and we would be happy, brainwashed, but happy," Max said.
"You wouldn't want that. You couldn't have handled that. None of us could have, Jondy replied.
"How do you know? WE wouldn't have escaped. Manticore wouldn't have retrained or simplified us. There would have been no need."
"Do you really believe your life would have been better?" Jondy asked, walking up behind Max and putting her hand on her sister's shoulder.
"I don't know, but a good man like Logan…"
"You know what I see? I see you wallowing in self-pity because Logan was able to rescue you, but you can't rescue Logan." Jondy said. Max turned fast and faced Jondy. The look in her eyes frightened the redhead. She had never seen such an black emptiness in her life. It was as if everything that had been was still there, but none of it held meaning.
"And what if I am? He's a great man and because of my screwed-up life, he's stuck in some hell I can't even fathom. He willingly took my demons away from me and put them on himself to protect me, but I don't even know where to look to take his away. Everything I do is useless. Logan knew how to make headway against the evil out there. I'm just taking potshots at it and hopefully coming up lucky. I don't know either way. He was the master at this game. I'm nothing without him."
"Max…" Jondy started, but Max shoved past her. She didn't wait for a reaction. She just headed through the office and out the front door. Jondy stared after her, but the phone rang so she answered it, figuring Max needed her space.
"Yeah," Jondy said.
"You've got Original Cindy here."
"Oh, hey," Jondy repeated.
"Where's my girl?" OC asked. "She was supposed to meet me at Crash tonight."
"She's not here. She…" Jondy paused long enough for OC to pick up on something.
"What happened?" OC asked. "Who do I need to smack around now?"
"It's not like that." Jondy smiled. Max didn't need anyone to put a smackdown for her, but it was good to know that OC was around. She did know Max better than anyone, maybe even Logan. "She's blaming herself for Logan. She thinks she could have done more."
"She blamed herself for Logan's paralysis for over a year. She takes it hard. Where is my boo?" OC asked.
"She headed out a little while ago. She wasn't exactly talkative. I'm going to try and find her," Jondy said.
"Come get me first, I know where she might be," OC replied. "Maybe we can talk some sense into her."
"I'm on my way. Meet me outside, boss thinks I'm sick." Jondy laughed.
"I got your back, girl," OC answered, before disconnecting the call. When she got to the parking garage to get her bike, she noticed the Aztek and the Ninja were still parked side-by-side. Max had walked. Jondy took her own Ninja anyway, knowing she could cover more ground quicker that way.
She pulled up into the street and looked around, already knowing that Max was lost in the rainy night somewhere. Jondy pulled out and headed toward the checkpoint on the way to Crash to pick up Cindy. If anyone could find Max, OC could.
Max didn't want to be found. She wanted to be alone, and in the penthouse that would be impossible. It had become Transgenic Central since the situation with Cale industries and the influx of ex-Manticore soldiers over the last month. If someone wanted to make Seattle a power base, they only had to win over Eyes Only and his mini-transgenic army. If only Eyes Only was here. Everything could be normal.
The way things are now, Max thought, the universe didn't even remotely seem like it was on schedule. It seemed more like this was some twisted alternate universe where all lost souls go to fend for themselves. Max hated each day as it came to her.
She stopped and looked up at the sky. The rain chose that moment to unleash a torrent upon the city. She stood there, being pelted by the thick, heavy drops. The rain was so thick, it was almost impossible to see her standing there in the middle of the road.
A car narrowly missed her as she started walking again, ignoring the rain that was apparently following her in drenching sheets as she headed toward the docks. Her thoughts ran to recent events. Dubin was dead. His dockside gambling club and warehouse smuggling operation had been crushed. It hadn't taken much, just two transgenics with an uncanny understanding of shadow and stealth.
His partner, the man called Jaerko had died in a small, soundproof room deep inside one of Eyes Only's abandoned warehouses. The associate Alec and Biggs brought in to handle the interrogation, an ex-Manticore tech with a deep understanding of how to make anyone talk, had been too zealous in his need to cause pain and Jaerko had died. He gave up a name though, a name Bennett Cale was all too familiar with.
Max pulled her cell phone and dialed a number.
"Skywalker," said the voice on the other end.
"This is MaxI need to know where I can find Parker."
"What? Why?" Skywalker asked.
"Tell me!" She commanded. Skywalker was silent for a few minutes.
"At this time of night, we would assume he's at his home," Skywalker said finally. "But he may be out at the base organizing the troops. We're certain he doesn't know about Mr. Cale's plans to send in troops tomorrow evening, but we're not sure just how prepared he is for such an attack."
"What's his address?" Max demanded.
"1280 Montgomery," Skywalker said. "Why?"
"Just getting some recon," Max answered. She had no intention of getting recon. She was looking for answers. She would stop at nothing to get them.
"Max, you don't want to do that. Captain Parker has Phalanx guards on him at all times. We've got people on it, but his home is surrounded…" Skywalker tried to explain, but he was cut off when Max disconnected the call and turned her phone off.
She glanced up at the broken arch above her head. The main road into the docks was quiet. Two guards in the small shack at the checkpoint into the sector were watching her, but had not come out into the rain to confront her. She looked at them. They looked at her. She waved before turning and heading in the opposite direction. Her new destination was on the other side of town.
The Space Needle was somewhere in between.
It was a long, wet walk to the Needle, and the climb to the top was tiring for some reason. Max could feel it all the way up. She felt it to the very core of her being, and for most of the trip, she understood something that Logan had told her.
"I went home. The sun came up and the sun went down. I just sat there." He spoke the words in a tone she knew reflected the way he had felt when he thought she had died.
Ultimately, though, he hadn't given up. Original Cindy had been there for him then, and she was here for Max now. There was something between them, something between Max and Logan that OC had always seen, but the two of them had not been able to admit to themselves. Eventually, they had gotten there. They had found that place where they were comfortable with each other and didn't care what anyone else thought. They were happy.
It had all been in vain. Max walked out onto the main room of the Space Needle and looked out over the city. She couldn't make out much but the dull, grey glow of lights throughout the city. They were blurry and distant in the miasmal storm that covered the once-great city of Seattle.
Things had changed. They just had, and there was no denying it. An already-dark world had become suddenly darker and more evil than ever before. Chaos was winning. Max felt it in every fiber of her being. Even with her bizarre family and all of her skills, she knew she wasn't going to win this round.
An old can of paint caught her eye. She reached down and picked it up, giving it a shake. It still held paint. She walked to an interior wall and sprayed a short red line down. Before she realized it, she had spray-painted the word "DUTY" on the once-blank wall.
She knew immediately what it meant. She knew what memory it pulled up from the back of her mind. She knew where it would lead her. She watched as she sprayed another word on the wall. Mechanically, her hand worked the can as if it had a will of its own.
The second word hung there, taunting her. It was laughing at her.
HONOR
She stared at the word on the interior wall of the Space Needle. She could see it just fine, but in the flash of lightning, the streams from the paint running down the wall appeared to be something else.
She lifted the can and held it in her outstretched arm. She waited for only an instant before spraying the third word. When she was finished, she carefully set the can down. It had become something sacred to her. It had become a connection to the past and a symbol for the future.
She stepped away from it and watched the wall, waiting for the lightning to illuminate the word she had just sprayed. The streams of thickly sprayed paint ran down the wall, presenting her with the effect she had expected. She turned without smiling and headed into the lower level of the former restaurant, where the kitchen and coatroom used to be.
A sound caught her ears. Someone was coming up the steps. Two women Max knew. It wasn't hard for her to figure out. Original Cindy and Jondy had followed her here. She knew she couldn't let them see her. She knew them too well. They wouldn't let her do what had to be done. It required her to shed all that she become and be only what she was.
A soldier. A hunter. A killer.
They couldn't be involved anymore. No one could. It was on her. It was only her. She had failed Logan one time too many and only she could fix it. Her path was chosen. She ducked into the nearest shadow and waited.
No thought. No sound. She stepped into the darkness that was always there. It enveloped her like a lost sister returning home.
Jondy was the first one through the door. OC followed closely behind. They walked past and headed up the steps, toward the main deck of the Space Needle. Max stood motionless and listened to their conversation as they walked.
"What about it?"
"I've given it some thought, but I'm really one of those loner types," Jondy said.
"Girl, you're just frontin' because of that barcode thingy you have, but I know you. You're just like my boo and fast becoming one of them. There ain't no way I'm letting you try to pull the same thing Max tried to pull on me." OC said.
"What do you mean?" Jondy asked.
"Did I ever tell you how Max and I met?" OC asked. Jondy shook her head. "Well, I was in this Jamestown hittin' on this little hottie when the biker she was with failed to understand Original Cindy's intent. There was a fight…" She told her story.
"Let me guess, you laid down the law and smacked him around." Jondy laughed.
"And he had a weapon in his hand, but we ain't gonna get into that. It was pretty small." Both girls laughed. "But I left him laying there on the pavement."
"And the hottie?"
"Gone like the wind," OC said. "But later in the bar, the biker turned up with a bunch of his friends and tried to extract revenge, but you can't get blood from a turnip, you know what I'm sayin?" She smiled. "Only they were intent on trying. I fought off a couple of them, but they pinned me to the floor and started pawing at me." OC paused and looked around the lower level, resting her eyes on the darkest shadow in the room. She stared, hard trying to see something that didn't want to be seen. She shook her head and continued following Jondy up the short flight of steps.
"What is it?" Jondy asked.
"I don't know," OC said. "Something, maybe nothing... Anyway, this dark little creature, finer than a month of spa visits in Paris, strolled right into the middle of everyone."
"What happened?" Jondy asked.
"She moved so fast. She was like a dust devil on speed. A whirling dervish if I ever saw one…" OC said. The voices trailed off as Max, a single tear beneath her left eye, silently stepped through the door and never looked back.
Up on the main deck of the Needle, Jondy and OC both stopped in the middle of the broken furniture and floor where water from the drenching rain storm had been collecting for hours now. Jondy noticed the wall first in a flash of lightning, but OC was able to adjust her eyes and see what Jondy was suddenly staring at.
Three words were spray-painted on the wall. The paint was running beneath the words in ever-thicker streams, resembling blood in the bleak glow of a lightning-streaked night.
"Oh my God," OC said. Jondy looked at her.
"What does it mean?"
"It means she's slipping," OC replied. "She told me once about our brother Ben. He had gone insane and was hunting humans. He was killing them for sport. It was like a game to him. She told me he had spray- painted three words on the wall in an old, abandoned factory on the south side. 'Duty,' 'discipline,' and 'mission' were the words.
Max stood beneath the Space Needle. She glanced up one last time before disappearing into the rainy Seattle night. She looked up at the sky as she walked, letting the heavy downpour wash over her face. Her thoughts were with Logan.
"Do not attempt to adjust your set. This is a Streaming Freedom Video bulletin. The cable hack will last exactly 60 seconds. It cannot be traced, it cannot be stopped and it is the only free voice left in this city. This is Eyes Only speaking to Gerhardt Bronck. You are holding two of my operatives, Mr. Bronck. I want them back. You will be contacted." She remembered that broadcast as if it were yesterday. With Bling's help, and her-near perfect memory of watching Logan run cable hacks, she was able to completely destroy Bronck's attempt to build an empire.
Unfortunately, it had almost cost Logan and Detective Sung their lives. She had recorded the phone conversation and taken a chance when she heard the foghorn. Wharton Airfield was her destination. She had arrived just in time.
She had scaled the outside of the building and come in on the second floor. No one had heard her, but as she glanced down on the scene below her, she noticed a thug pointing a weapon at Logan's chest. She had almost been too late.
She wasn't and Logan was safe. She had things to go on then. She had resources she could tap and someone to back her up.
She had none of that now. She had only herself. Relying on others wasn't part of the plan. The plan had involved Logan from the beginning. Logan wasn't around now. The plan had to change. Almost to the day of her return from Arizona, there had been a buildup of Phalanx soldiers in Seattle. It was as if they had known that Eyes Only had disappeared.
Thinking was something Logan did. Max was about the action. Logan planned and Max executed; that was the plan from the beginning, and without Logan to make such plans, Max was left to make it up along the way, but wasn't that what she did best?
She wanted to believe he was out there, trying very hard to get back to her. She needed to believe; after all, didn't he come into Manticore alone to save her? Why would he just give up? It wasn't in his nature to quit like that. He was stronger than that. No. He would never give up. She knew Lydecker was the key. She knew the doctor would lead Syl, Krit, and Zane to dear old Deck. Eventually, they would bring her home and she would extract everything she needed to know from him, one blood drop at a time.
That process would take a few days. The waiting was the problem. Logan had pointed out on several occasions that she wasn't the most patient person around. She liked getting results to her actions. She liked being done with the job, coming home, and relaxing with a good meal, a nice glass of wine, and her man. Now, not even hanging at Crash with OC and the gang was interesting anymore.
No. The universe wasn't on schedule anymore. It was completely whacked. She had no choice now. She had to do something to expedite the process and make this thing go away.
She had to confront Parker.
Getting to Montgomery without being seen was the easy part. Getting across the checkpoints into the wealthy districts was a snap. Getting to Parker's home was simple. The problem was getting onto the property. The grounds were littered with soldiers walking very intensive and thorough patterns.
Max scouted the entire area, avoiding the main compound and two neighboring homes before she found her way in. Even in this heavy rain on a dark night, she was still surprised to see as many guards out and about as there were. She counted ten on the east side of the grounds alone. They were buffered by overlapping troops from the north and south sides, walking similar patterns in their areas. It would have been next to impossible to get in, but Max found the loophole in the pattern.
A small stand of trees, stretching along a stream running through the back yard, led to a small lake. The lake bordered the property near a small pool house. The pool house was well lit, but poorly guarded, and deep in the far end of the pool was an underwater swim tunnel into the house, attached to an indoor pool in a large room completely engulfed in steam. It was the only way, and she knew she would be able to hold her breath long enough to make the short swim.
She headed back out and around to the neighbor's yard, where the stream came from. Dropping into the water, she moved along the stream, silently catching every shadow along the way. No one noticed her as she half-floated, half-crawled through the four feet of water toward the pool house along the small lake.
One guard stood at the entrance to the gate, smoking a cigarette. He was not paying attention to her as she dropped silently into the large outdoor pool, and with a deep breath, began her swim through the tube into the house. It was a longer swim than she had first thought, but she made it without any difficulties. Soundlessly, she slipped her head up out of the water and searched the steamy room for any signs of activity. There was none. The pool room was completely empty. Only the gently rolling clouds of steam moved around the room, giving off a freaky feeling that that it was alive somehow.
Towels hung on the wall near what was obviously a doorway into a shower area. She toweled herself off before continuing into the house to search for Captain Parker. It wasn't that she was worried about tracking water into the lavishly decorated home, but a dripping wet cat suit would make noise that she didn't want to deal with.
Somewhere Else
Approximate time…
The door opened. A gray-robed monk stepped through the doorway, ignoring the self-closing door as he headed down the hall. He hadn't paid any attention to the brown-robed monk standing near the door, waiting for him to exit.
A quick hand reached out and pulled the gray-robed monk back by the throat and into the chamber. The robed monk made short work of the elder, snapping his neck cleanly and dropping the body to the ground. He then removed the gray robes and wrapped the body in the carpet on the floor. There was a furnace just meters away, so the body would be easy to make disappear. It could wait though. The brown-robed monk needed to search the elder's quarters and find any clues that he could.
He started with the computer sitting on the desk. "Okay, Jack. Let's see what you're made of," he mumbled. His fingers began their dance back and forth across the keys as information passed over the screen in rapidly opening and closing windows. Window after window accessed information until he hit a particular file. He had hit the jackpot.
"Everything you wanted to know about Project Manticore but were afraid to ask," Jack laughed to himself. He would soon learn why the conclave feared this relatively small number of genetically engineered soldiers.
The files weren't that extensive and he couldn't help wondering why he felt he knew more than everyone in this place. There was a folder on some guy called Sandemann who seemed to be the anti-everything around here. There was a folder on Colonel Donald Lydecker, the lead officer and director of the project for many years. That particular folder made him physically shudder. He felt like he was going to throw up when he saw a picture of the amazingly unremarkable-looking man.
A third folder was marked "priority." It was pass-protected and locked behind decent, but not unbreakable encryption. It took the better part of five minutes to get into the file, and then it spilled out more than a gig of information on a group known as Fifth Column. They appeared to be the subversive group within the cult that had plans on taking over the power structure worldwide. Their only known goal was complete domination over what they called "The lesser species of man" and their kind.
Jack read, skimming the pages until he reached the list of known operatives within the conclave itself. Directly on top, leading the entire deep cover operation, was the name Bob Jackson. His buddy was part of the resistance he had heard about. He tagged the new folder and went on to the next.
"Joe" was the name of the next folder. Not much was in it, except for a location that was no longer marked as valid, and a description of a man, once apparently part of a special project within the Phalanx. A subsequent folder with the "Joe" folder was marked with a note – "Project Terminated." Jack opened the folder, but it was empty.
One last folder caught his eyes as he was backing out of the files and preparing to burn off the information. It was marked with one word– "TWO." The file was locked behind mountains of encryption that would take hours to crack. Twenty minutes after starting, Jack had only succeeded in cracking the first three levels of encryption. He decided to copy the entire hard drive as a backup file on discs and get out of there. It would be dinner time soon enough, and offer the opportunity to travel freely through the catacombs with the new information. He could easily peruse the info back in his quarters.
The hall was clear half an hour later when the backups had been made. He looked around the room one last time, but saw nothing of interest. Making his way into the hall with the wrapped corpse over his shoulder was easy enough, and he found himself standing outside of the furnace just ten minutes later.
Quickly, he dumped the body in the furnace and headed for the assigned cafeteria to meet Bob for dinner. The gray robes had been stashed where he could retrieve them when he needed them. While he walked, he contemplated the possibilities that had just opened before him.
On one hand, he could use the information gathered to gain a better standing within the conclave by exposing the Fifth Column. On the other hand, he could just as easily protect this information and slowly work his way into the Fifth Column to help them in their goals.
Either way, one side or the other would destroy the conclave, but for some reason, he couldn't figure out why he wanted that to happen so much. Ever since meeting Ames White, he knew it was the only reason he existed now. He had to destroy that man by any means necessary. It had become his only goal. This place had to be destroyed.
The cult had to be broken.
Dinner went smoothly. There was no unnecessary chatter and the food was typical. Jack passed on an opportunity for seconds, and headed out into the catacombs to wander for a bit before turning in. Bob was running to catch up to him shortly after he turned down a side tunnel.
"Hey, Jack!" Bob called.
"Yeah," Jack called over his shoulder.
"You were awfully quiet in the mess and you disappeared after leaving the lab this afternoon. What's up?" Bob asked. "You haven't been going back to Terminal Arena again, have you?"
"And if I have? You going to report me to Phalanx officers?" Jack demanded. His voice was sour and defensive.
"Not at all, but you know what will happen if they catch you in there." Bob reached out and grabbed Jack's shoulder. Jack moved fast, faster than Bob had been expecting; his arm was yanked up and twisted out.
"There are times when a man should be left to his own devices. It is in those times that he excels and becomes more than he has ever been, or he falls, never to be heard from again." Jack glared into the darkness of Bob's robes. He knew the other man from the computer lab had not been expecting the action.
"Sorry, buddy. I won't grab you like that again," Bob stammered. "I just wanted to get a straight answer."
"Straight answers are for men like White and the priestesses. We deal in 'what ifs,' and if those 'what's' don't add up, then the whole system breaks down." Jack turned and walked away, having already forgotten he had been grabbed, so heavy were the thoughts racing through his mind.
Bob didn't follow at first, but his curiosity got the better of him and he walked along behind Jack, keeping his distance, but staying close. It didn't take long to figure out where Jack was headed. He was going to Terminal Arena.
"I can't let you do this, buddy," Bob said. He ran up and stepped into line alongside of Jack. "You are living on the edge."
"The edge of what?" Jack asked. "The edge of a sword? I saw that movie and read the book. It was one of my favorites as a kid. Or am I the snail crawling along the edge of a straight razor? It's not a dream or a nightmare because I can't distinguish between the two anymore. All I know is the gypsy girl, and she's just a vision I cannot even begin to understand. There is no hope or honor in what I did today."
"What the hell are you talking about?" Bob stepped in front of his friend and put his arms up to stop him. Jack sidestepped him and Bob had to use a quick two-step to get back in front of the man. "You don't want to throw down against me," Bob said. "You would lose that fight."
Jack's hood bobbed ever so slightly, and with only a hint of a second in the pause, he spoke to Bob. "No. I wouldn't," he stated, with a smirking tone to his voice. "Let me in or get out of my way."
"What are you talking about?" Bob asked.
"You know what I'm talking about," Jack said. "What's the date today?"
"The fifth… why?" Bob asked. He realized the moment he said it what Jack meant.
"That is exactly what I'm talking about." Jack smiled. He knew he had won this round. He knew that Bob was at a severe disadvantage. "I handed information over to a man who intends to kill young men and women, teens, and kids. White may be able to live with that, but I can't. You have twenty-four hours," Jack said as he walked away.
"Twenty-four hours for what?" Bob asked.
"Wait until tomorrow and find out, I don't care." Jack said, but he turned down a hall and was gone. Bob just stood there. He was confused, but impressed.
Down the hall, Jack breathed a heavy sigh. All the bets were now in and he had called. Half an hour of aimless wandering later, he found himself in the darkest shadow of Terminal Arena.
He felt at ease there. It was as if he belonged there, a part of the void that would never hold light of its own. It warmed him to be in shadow, looking out. He could feel her there in the deepest dark of the arena. The soldiers outside of his personal space could not see him here. They didn't feel his presence, and even on those rare occasions when one would look toward his void, they would see nothing. It was as if they did not understand the benefit of being one with the shadows of the world.
He laughed to himself. They needed to be out there on the floor of the arena hurting each other. He needed to be in here, hidden, but right in the middle of the most danger. He felt it here. He felt her here. The gypsy girl was watching over him as he slept, but when he came here and crossed over into shadow, he was watching over her.
It was an odd feeling that rushed over him when he came here. It was as if something had connected him to the combat on the dirty floor several rows down from his position. A circle of soldiers was gathered, male and female. They stood around, watching and waiting for openings to attack. They would attack singularly, or in groups of two and three, trying to gain the upper hand in a twisted game of "king of the hill."
Jack watched them, but his mind was elsewhere.
A slight figure moved through a heavily guarded house. The shadows welcomed her as she watched two armed guards walk mere feet away from her. They didn't even attempt to look into the shadow as they passed.
Jack watched closely as two men moved from the circle and passed by the small, wild-haired woman in the center. They didn't seem to see her as a threat. They passed through the center, and attacked another man moving from the other side of the ring. The woman stepped, unnoticed, back into the circle, and Jack lost track of her.
In the main hall, the two guards met up with a third, and talked quietly for a couple of minutes before all three went their separate ways. The small raven-haired beauty did a quick and efficient scan of the immediate area and located her next shadow. She could hear voices, but could see no one. She moved remarkably fast, phasing almost from one shadow to the next. She was nothing more than a blurry vision that would only register to the subconscious through peripheral sight, had someone actually been watching.
There in the center of the ring, the three men joined in combat and fought viciously before two were knocked to the ground. Others grabbed hold of them and pulled them back into the circle, leaving the third still standing in the center. This type of free fighting was common in Terminal Arena, where the weakest were usually left to die at the end of the day. It was cold and cruel, but only the strongest would be allowed to fight for the Phalanx. The weak were no good to anybody. Jack watched as a large blonde-haired man stepped into the ring and waited for an attack.
The shadow breathed out, and a smooth face calmly pushed from the darkness, revealing a dark eye set perfectly above full pouting lips. The eye, barely exposed on the edge of the shadow peered down the hall. A large guard was standing there, watching closely for any activity out back on the patio. He did not move. He only breathed and stared out into the darkness of the yard. She would have to get past him to get to the target location.
Jack watched as another soldier stepped up behind the big man. She was small, but appeared to be very strong. Her body was tight and toned, and she would be a formidable opponent. She scanned the ring and watched, waiting for her moment. The third soldier checked his stance before his attack. The big man waited for the attack to come. When the third soldier attacked, the woman made her move.
The dark creature stepped from the shadows, moving low and silent across the hall toward the big man. She stepped into a small but embracing patch of darkness near him. Just as she ceased all movement, a woman stepped onto the patio and drew the big blonde guard's attention. He stepped to the patio door, and left the rear hall to speak with the woman on the far edge of the patio. They stood with their backs to the inside and spoke quietly to each other. The kitten couldn't believe her luck, and stifled a giggle as she phased in a blur of motion down the hall toward the study.
Jack had been expecting the big man to handle the attack, as had the third soldier left from the previous battle. The smaller man had not paid any attention to the woman as she moved around the outside rim of the ring. As if on cue, the smaller soldier quickened his pace toward the larger soldier, set in his attack. The larger soldier did not attempt to stop the attack, and just before the smaller man reached his target, the woman, unseen and quiet until now, flew in from the side and took out the third soldier from the previous battle. He was slow in getting up from the floor, but the other two had stepped toward the perimeter of the circle, leaving the ring for someone else to take.
Another shadow welcomed the feline creature as she waited for something to happen. The couple was still discussing unknown subjects on the patio, and the hall inside seemed deserted. She risked movement and headed toward the three doors at the end of the hall. One was her destination. She listened at each of the doors until she was certain there was no one in either of the side rooms. She could hear noise from inside the end room.
Another man stepped into the circle. Jack noticed his stride. He was confident. His muscles rippled with each movement, no matter how slight. He secured his place in the circle with a simple punch to the head of the struggling man, leaving the useless opponent unconscious on the floor. A second soldier stepped into the ring and the confident one made short work of him. He was followed quickly by a third, then a fourth, and finally a fifth. The man was damn near a machine.
The side room on the left seemed to present the best opportunity. She opened the door and ducked inside just as the hall burst with activity. Three men stepped from the end hall. She could hear more inside, arguing over how best to handle the situation at hand. One wanted to move immediately. One wanted to secure more bases of operations in each sector. One wanted to get it over with and just take out all resistance in the business community, since they were so close to gaining control of local law enforcement. Their people were in place. They were awaiting orders. The man in charge was silent.
Not a sound issued forth from the machine running the show. Soldiers attacked. Soldiers fell, and he did not make a sound, nor move much from his central location. Bodies crawled and rolled, and were carried to the perimeter as soldier after soldier attacked and failed. Jack noticed her then. She had been moving around the outside of the ring, and had pushed her way into the circle again. Her eyes were watching the warrior's every movement. She was searching for her opening. She was trying to find his weakness. She did not notice the priestesses moving into Terminal Arena with their books and bags in hand. She was determined to win, no matter the cost.
The door opened and a man stepped in, followed by another. The kitten had been listening at the wall and not paying enough attention to the door. She dropped behind the chair and cursed her own ignorance. The two men walked to the opposite side of the room and went for a drink at the bar along the wall. She saw her opportunity and took it. Moving with inhuman speed, she was across the room instantly, her hands locked on one head, twisting and snapping the neck. With one hand, she lowered the body quietly to the ground, while simultaneously sending a shot to the throat of the second man who had turned to face the attacker. She silenced him with the shot and immediately grabbed his head. She lowered the second body to the floor and went back to the far wall. The end table near the window offered access to the vent between floors.
Jack watched as the woman stepped into the circle. Several men and women were lying around. Some were broken. Some were unconscious. Some were stupid enough to stand up and continue the attack. A few were not even moving. The circle was diminishing rapidly. The machine stood still, unmoving and stoic in the center, taking all attackers in stride. He did not notice the small woman stalking him from the perimeter of the circle.
She moved silently through the vent and peered into the office at the end of the hall. The room was deserted, save two men. They were discussing their options on a military base north of the city. She knew which one they spoke of. She knew what they had intended and were planning at this time. She knew an advantage could be gained right here and now if she succeeded. One man turned with a nod and left the room. The other man stepped from his desk and headed over to the window.
Jack was impressed with her movements across the floor. She had managed to pace the entire circle without being seen. She was now behind him, preparing her attack. Jack leaned forward, as if encouraging her with his thoughts. He wanted to see what she was made of. She moved slowly taking three short steps…
The kitten dropped to the floor silently. She set the vent panel on the floor and moved closer to the target standing in the window. She held no thought in her mind. She had no care for anything but her target. She moved around the desk and prepared her attack…