Chapter Nine:
Ardente
"Oh no." Mireille stared at her, her palms prickly with apprehension. The situation felt frighteningly familiar. "No."
Kirika was unfazed as she made her gun spin around her hand. "Computers and monitors were all turned off. There was no one there. There's no one anywhere; I can't even find the old man. Just thought you'd like to know."
"You did all that in thirty seconds?" asked Mireille faintly, feeling the prickles spreading up her extremities. "Are you sure?"
"Take it or leave it."
"The old man must have radioed everyone to evacuate this place the moment he saw us. Schwarz has profiles of us distributed among his men, I'm sure."
"What would be the point of that? They're supposed to capture us, remember? Besides, an evac of a few hundred men in minutes without one of us seeing a thing? You know that's impossible, even for professionals." Kirika's eyes followed the muzzle of her twirling gun. "I checked the control center; no one had been there in days. This was too convenient - they knew we were coming. This was bait."
Mireille's voice had grown louder. "But I distinctly saw people in the laptop feed just hours ago before we left the inn. This place was full of them!"
"Then someone was lying."
"We have to get out of here."
"All the doors are locked, even the windows. I checked. Had a hunch."
"They may be watching us from the outside." Mireille could hear her heart thundering as if it would explode. "They have us where they want us to be."
"The best way out is from the roofs." Kirika finally caught her gun into an upright position and made a move to leave. "They won't expect us to come out there. Come on, we don't have much time."
Mireille attempted to follow her, but she only felt herself lean against the small door limply, her gun almost slipping off from her hand. She felt as if she was about to be torn apart by the questions and the guesses.
"Come on," repeated Kirika urgently.
Mireille had closed her eyes, whispering, "I'm tired of this."
"What?" Kirika's eyebrows shot up. Her voice was controlled but she was clearly exasperated. "What are you talking about? You're the one who got us into this!"
"You think Kinomoto lied to us too?"
"We'll have much better chances of finding out if we stay alive." Kirika had grabbed her wrist, dragging her towards the stairs. "Let's move!"
"Lies. It's all a pack of lies. What's the point?" Mireille voice was close to trembling as Kirika began to push her up the staircase. She was helpless, with no control whatsoever. Many times in many hits, the truth had been hidden from her, but not twisted and distorted in so many ways and so many times. Her eyes rove across the wet, pebbly courtyard and the small stone bridge that arched over a gurgling pond. Kirika had brought her up the second and top floor, and from her vantage point she could see the dragon's head. There they were supposed to press the two bronze eyes simultaneously and a trapdoor would open, leading them to an underground bomb shelter that had been built during the Second World War in preparation for the air raids. Mireille had never actually seen Schwarz in person in the bugs' feed, but she had seen many comings and goings there from the laptop's older records and she gathered enough that if there was ever a hideout, it would be there.
"We'll have to scale up the woodwork," Kirika was saying. The girl had already taken off her jacket and had slung it around one of the vertical wooden supports. She hoisted herself up the railings. "Come on!"
"What do they want from us?" Mireille dug her fingernails into her palms to feel the pain and keep herself from going out of her mind. "Do you hear me?" she found herself shouting at a dead surveillance camera. "What do you want from me?!"
"Hey!" Kirika was halfway up the post, rappelling herself upwards with the jacket. "Let's get going!"
"What for?" Mireille laughed bitterly as she took off her own jacket in jerky movements. "Maybe they'll just have the roof collapse before we even get there!"
Kirika reached the intersection where the roof and the crisscrossing posts met and she pulled herself up the shingles and onto the roof. "One more quip like that and you're on your own."
"All the same to me. I've been on my own for these past few days."
There was a silence. Kirika was crouched at the edge of the roof, gazing at the blonde who was struggling to haul herself up the rickety support against a backdrop of paper doors. Then she reached out an arm, her palm open. "Grab my hand."
Mireille did, scrabbling some of the shingles which fell down to the floor and smashed into debris. On the other side was a panorama of rolling green hills under a twilight sky. It was a long drop down and the full moon was bright.
She stared at the thick grass below, tinted blue in the night. Something glinted behind the trees. Binoculars, no doubt. If Kinomoto had lied to her, then what was the whole point of the escape from DreamHub and the siege at Kinomoto's place? Or his death? Or had that been feigned too? Where did the lie end and the truth begin? What were they doing here?
"Do you hear that?...Hey." Mireille felt Kirika nudge her by the ribs, waking her from her stupor. "Helicopter."
Kirika was pointing at the horizon. Mireille could barely make out the sight of a black Chinook emerging from the stars, sixteen meters long, its two three-bladed rotors propelling the helicopter speedily towards the pavilion.
"I can't do this anymore."
"Get a grip and your gun out, Mireille." Kirika had already lifted hers. "The ground troops must have called it when they realized we're not going out the conventional way."
Mireille took a deep breath and let her eyeballs roll backwards, feeling the earth-scented breeze clear her mind. She clenched and unclenched her shaking hands, trying to steady herself. Kirika was right, as usual. They had already passed by the point of no return long ago and to give in now would be nothing short of suicide. She had to focus, even for its own sake, just to keep her alive.
I am not going to die in a trap that I had so blindly walked into...
Something cold touched her and her eyes met the butt of Kirika's pistol upon her arm. The Japanese girl's own eyes were away as she said a little awkwardly, "It'll be all right."
Mireille thought she heard something familiar in Kirika's voice but she pushed the thought out of her mind. "Thanks." She felt nonetheless warmer. "What do you see?"
"It's fitted with M-134 six-barrelled guns and an M-60 machine gun, not to mention enough space inside for two Land Rovers. Schwarz' troops armed long-range, I'm guessing."
"What do you suggest?"
"We're no match for the helicopter's firepower; it's going to decimate the place. We'll have to get inside it. Or I could just aim for the rotors when it comes close enough and make quick work of it."
Mireille stood at the roof, feeling the pulse in her jugular vein racing and the sharp breeze making her cheeks numb. The stars winked above her and she tensed. "If we're ever going to get rid of them, we'll have to ride it to wherever Schwarz is."
"Hijack?"
"Sounds good to me."
The incoming Chinook was making the high grass flail wildly in the wind, the sound of its propellers deafening. It looked like a giant black bumblebee of doom from where Mireille and Kirika were standing and it was coming closer, unwavering.
"And for a change, let's do something they won't expect us to do." There was a strange light in Mireille's eyes. "Passive resistance."
"And that works in this case - how?"
"Rather simply. First we are passive, then when the time is right, we become resistant."
"When is the right time?"
"When we get some answers. Or when we're at the brink of certain death. Whichever comes first."
Kirika pocketed back her pistol. The helicopter had arrived, loud as thunder, large as life, the side hatch open and swarthy gunmen packed inside gazing at them, shiny muzzles trained. As the Chinook hovered precariously over the roof, a rope ladder was let down followed by one of the gunmen, his rifle strapped across his back.
"Mireille Bouquet and Kirika Yuumura?" He spoke in English and was swathed in navy-blue from top to toe. Even his voice was muffled with the covering of his mouth and the only thing visible about him was his bright blue eyes.
None of the girls answered. Two more men slid down the ladder as the first one began frisking Mireille. Kirika threw her the beginnings of a frown but Mireille replied in an almost imperceptible shake of the head. The first operative had already pulled out her Walther, motioning the others to do the same to Kirika. Before long, their guns were confiscated and their wrists were slapped with handcuffs behind their backs. They were tossed over the shoulders of the men and hauled into the helicopter as it began to move away.
Mireille saw no expression in Kirika's eyes as they were thrown into one of the benches that ran on the two sides of the Chinook. She could hear someone radioing their status at the controls. They were squeezed in between more ranks of padded gunmen who stood or sat, numbering to forty, and the one with the blue eyes stood in front of the girls with a roll of duct tape in his gloved palms.
Mireille eyed it. "At least tell us where we're going."
"Please purse your lips together so it won't hurt when we take it off." He took the edge of the tape and ripped a strip off.
"Are we going to Schwarz?"
The man regarded her in silence as he knelt down and taped her lips together and proceeded to do the same to the motionless Kirika. When he had finished, he stood up and said, "No."
Mireille felt the blood rush up her face as Kirika grew taut beside her. Then as the man began to take his seat opposite them, Mireille, in the gentlest and the most indiscernible manner possible, pressed her elbow against Kirika's ribs.
It was like a spring being released after eons of being coiled. Kirika immediately leaped up and smoothly slid her body and her legs over her manacled hands in midair like an acrobatic escape artist. By the time her feet touched the metal floor, she had tugged an automatic from the blue-eyed man's belt and was holding it against his forehead. In an instant, everyone else had stood up and had directed their guns at her, the clicks echoing across the body of the helicopter.
In the confusion, Mireille had bent down and slid her arms down her ankles and lifted her feet backwards consecutively. She ripped the tape off her mouth with her knuckles.
"Gentlemen!" and Mireille felt some of them turn and poke their muzzles against her back, reminding her to be diplomatic. "Gentlemen. We are not attempting escape. We only want one thing - to turn this helicopter around so we could see Mr. Schwarz face to face."
The one nearest to her barked in heavily-accented English, "We had distinct orders to transport you to the laboratory directly. You will not see him there. We were also ordered to neutralize you if you fail to comply."
Mireille processed this information before continuing, "And my friend can put a hole into the back of your commanding officer's head, something I also don't wish to see. I assure you, gentlemen, merely change course and we will be at your disposal. That is all. We are still your prisoners."
Kirika had also ripped off the tape plastered on her mouth and the one beside her narrowed his eyes at Mireille. "We came prepared to die."
Spoken like a true Soldat minion, Mireille thought but she refrained. "That is needless," she said aloud, glancing over the clusters of men around her. "You shoot and my friend will shoot and in this cramped space we will only end up shooting ourselves. A stray bullet will find the pilot and we shall all crash and become tomorrow's headline. All we ask is a change in course and an escort to your boss under your complete supervision. C'est tout. No one needs to die." Her voice lowered. "Do not be so quick as to forget who you are dealing with, gentlemen."
Eyes shifted. The lieutenant looked at his officer, who nodded once. Guns and jacketed arms went down swiftly, except for Kirika's. Her handcuffs clinked against each other as she moved her left palm to rest below the butt of the gun. She stood like a statue, the mouth of the automatic steady.
Her hostage lifted his eyes to look at Mireille. "She cannot hold out like that for so long until we arrive at the lighthouse."
Mireille had nestled comfortably back to her seat as she felt the helicopter make a ninety-degree turn. "Try her."
The lighthouse was striped red and white and towered fifteen meters, built upon a breakwater that jutted out from one of Hokkaido's isolated shores. The sea was as dark as the gunmen's uniform. Mireille bit back a yawn and looked at her watch anxiously. Nine in the night. She hadn't eaten anything since lunch and she was already feeling an incredible urge to curl up and go to sleep. Her joints felt sore and the fatigue was overwhelming.
She looked enviously at Kirika, who had not moved a muscle.
The helicopter slowly descended onto a helipad on the shoal located some meters away from the lighthouse. The men filtered out of the side hatches first, their boots clanking in unison, until only their captain and the two girls were left aboard. They broke into files, making two human walls that led to the entrance of the lighthouse, rifles raised, safety catches flicked off.
"Red carpet treatment." Mireille stood up and gazed at the height of the lighthouse until her eyes stopped at the top where the beacon should be, surrounded by glass panes and a platform. "Let me commend you on an impressive squad, Monsieur Capitaine."
The captain stood up as well, with Kirika's wary eyes upon him, and silently moved towards the hatch, jumping down. A gravel path led the way to the lighthouse.
Two plainclothes sentinels opened the steel door for them and two of the captain's men followed the three inside. The swirling stairs were caked with rust and the corrosion scratched against Mireille's boots. She looked at the cylindrical cement wall that surrounded them and ominously bounced five pairs of footsteps upon metal back and forth.
The captain reached the trapdoor at the top and pushed it open, his head disappearing into the top floor. Kirika followed him and Mireille was the last to pull herself up.
The room was sparse. The floor was wooden and there was a bedstead with a thin mattress on and some sheets and a pillow. A desk in the middle was piled with papers and a computer terminal and behind it sat Wilhelm Schwarz, flanked by four unarmed guards in blue jumpsuits.
Mireille felt a stream of words rushing across her head and fighting to come out of her mouth but she controlled herself. He didn't look any different. He was still wearing that white laboratory coat she had last seen him in and his beard was still as grizzled.
He was the first to speak, lifting his eyes from the computer engagingly. "Ms. Yuumura, I think you can let poor Pietro go now."
Kirika finally dropped her arm and the captain's shoulders relaxed.
Schwarz had propped up his right arm on the desk, placing his chin on his knuckles. He had an interested look on his face. "Pietro, please be so good as to liberate these two beautiful ladies, if you will. They are my guests now."
Mireille felt anger rising like a red flood up her neck as Pietro unlocked their handcuffs and disappeared into the trapdoor with them. His gun was still gripped in Kirika's hand and Kirika's muscles were contracted as tight as the ropes in a boxing ring, ready to let fly at any signal.
"I hope that it is clear that you are allowed this little detour only by virtue of my own curiosity." Schwarz's refined, European voice was still pleasant but Mireille noted how a little excitement had already crept into it. "And I am...very, very curious, to say the very least." He lifted a coffee mug to his lips, his eyes glittering. "This was not expected indeed, giving in to my men without even an attempt to fight. And to think that things had been going so well. Most troubling, most troubling. If I had known otherwise, I would say that the indomitable Noir spirit has finally been broken, after so many centuries of tradition."
Mireille reviewed her words in her head before saying them with the most frost that she could muster in her voice. "Akira Kinomoto. The pavilion. Explain."
The man's eyes crinkled and he let out a guffaw, almost spilling some of his coffee. "Is that all, Ms. Bouquet? I was half-expecting some pronouncement of doom and then a dazzling dance of death or some other. Really, you are not acting yourself today at all."
Kirika looked at Mireille. Mireille was silent.
"Very well, if you must know. It is the least I can do to clear the name of poor, naive Akira Kinomoto - bless his soul, wherever it is now." Schwarz lifted his hands patronizingly, a smile lacing his lips. "I suspect he's been chatting with you. And he did not mislead you, Mademoiselle Bouquet, nor did he set you up for a trap. However, the three of you, as well as Remi Graipaul, were terribly, terribly overconfident. There was a small oversight on your part, and it proved fatal. Small oversights often do." He folded his arms and leaned forward. "Somehow, no one had thought of the possibility that I may have in my possession a wiretap system."
Mireille felt her heart stop.
"We like being certain of all the communication that goes through all our locations, you see, and once again this precaution has worked another wonder for me." He lifted an index finger with the air of a schoolteacher. "Let me give Remi credit: his spies were very good. We were not aware that bugs had been installed in our territories. That is, until my wiretap people began picking up unauthorized transmissions being broadcasted from inside. We intercepted the signals, processed them, and saw that they were audio-visual feeds of, of all things, us." He shrugged. "This was six months ago. At first I was tempted to fully disable all the bugs that had been installed, but then something whispered to me, why not use it to my advantage? This can be of use, Wilhelm, I said to myself. And so we traced the bugs, and in one brief moment of beautiful Soldat sychronization and timing, replaced their transmissions with two-year old video feeds from our own numerous surveillance cameras with the most similar angle as possible. There was a slight break in transmission as you would see in your files, I'm sure, but it was less than a second, and you could have easily attributed it to a superficial technical difficulty, which happens often. I ordered my men to evacuate and I made this lighthouse my refuge in case DreamHub was breached."
Mireille's hands were shaking.
"So you see, Mademoiselle Bouquet, Kinomoto is quite innocent. Too innocent even, I think, and too readable, as you are," Schwarz was saying sympathetically. "After you bolted from DreamHub, I knew you would take the most logical recourse - my pavilion in Wakkanai. All we had to do was wait for you."
He lifted his hand and the guards in the blue jumpsuits behind him stepped forward.
"These men will escort you to the helicopter that will take you to the laboratory; I'm sure you want this unpleasant business to be over with as much as I do."
Mireille still had not said a word but her eyes were smoldering with blue fire. When the guards got a hold of her arms, she tightened and would not comply.
"And so it has come to this." Schwarz leaned back serenely. "I suppose it would only be fair to tell you that these six are the 'beta' products of my little innovation, as one would say. They are just as Noir as you are, Mademoiselle Bouquet; it has been done. Their physical bulk may prevent them from being as agile as you, but their strength is beyond your capabilities. I would suggest some discretion on your part."
"Male Noir?" Mireille finally spoke and her voice was disdainful. "Is nothing sacred anymore, Schwarz?"
"Nothing has been sacred for a very long time, Mademoiselle; I don't see you working for the purpose that Noir was originally created to fulfill either, do I?" He shrugged again. "This is the Modern era, where people live by the gospel of gold, having done with God. You, of all people, should know that - you who peddle yourself to the highest bidder, you who kill for money." He finished his coffee with relish. "A piece of advice, Mademoiselle - don't be so preposterously self-righteous. It doesn't suit you very well."
Mireille's elbows rammed into her captors' solar plexuses like sledgehammers. As their grips relaxed in pain, Kirika had already twisted her own captors' wrists and had slipped away from their grasp, her eyes silently screaming danger at Mireille. Mireille was halfway leaping onto Schwarz desk. Then she felt a sharp pain on her leg and the ground below rushed towards her, the side of her head making contact. Neurons exploded. White everywhere.
When the fog cleared, Mireille lifted her throbbing head, the world spinning before her. One of the Noir guards had grabbed her from behind and had brought her down with amazing speed. She could taste blood where she had accidentally bitten her cheek.
"Mireille!"
Only one gun between them. No extra bullet clips. They would have to be prudent.
Mireille rolled sideways, kicking the guard's face with her shoes. He fell back and she painfully struggled to get up on her feet, her arms aching. Schwarz was midway in the act of disappearing quickly into the trapdoor. Kirika was crouched in front of the windows, eyes narrow, lips pursed, gun directed at the retreating scientist, who was being covered by the three other guards closing in on Kirika.
Mireille swore, berating herself for distracting Kirika when the girl already had a clear shot of Schwarz earlier, and dove for the trapdoor as it shut on her face. Before she could pick herself up, a hand with the grip of an excavator seized her neck and hoisted her up, making her legs dangle in the air. Mireille felt her breath rush out from her lungs and bright spots appeared before her eyes as she came face to face with the guard she had kicked. Blood was pouring out of his nose but he did not seem to be aware of it.
Three gunshots rang out but she heard only one bury into flesh. Gasping from her constricted throat, Mireille clawed on her captor's hands and swung her legs hard. Her shin connected with his crotch. She saw the look of agony cross his face, a look she had seen many times, but before he crumpled to the ground, he swung his arm and released her.
Mireille was airborne, hurtling across the room. Before her body crashed into the windows, before the night wind greeted her as she fell from the tower fifteen meters away from the water below, she saw Kirika surrounded by two guards and a body, staring at her, her eyes wide and the gun limp in her hands.
"Mireille!"
The glass shattered.
ardente, end