by K. T. Tomb
“Let me tell you something, Chyna Stone,” Lana said, pushing her away from her so that she could look into her eyes. “Now you’re the person that is riding in to save the day. You and your kick ass team. You… We don’t need anybody else to come riding in, we are it. Seriously, IT. So, you take the reins, you keep a tight hold on that bit in Anthony Stewart’s mouth and you make this happen. We’ve got this.”
“Maybe you’re right,” Chyna admitted.
“Pshaw! There’s no maybe to it.”
“Thanks, Lana. You’re…”
“Stop it. We’re a team; a family. We all take care of each other.”
“Tony just got out of the cab,” Antoine called out.
“He’s a little bit early,” Chyna said.
“Don’t sweat it. His flight probably arrived early and he cleared customs quicker.”
“Or he changed his flight at the last minute.”
“If you had the Illuminati on your ass, wouldn’t you?”
“Relax and run this team, Chy. That big blonde wolf out there has your back and so do eight other people.”
“I guess I better go make my drop,” Chyna sighed.
The drop Chyna was referring to was the means by which the crown and All Seeing Eye were going to get into his hands without blowing Tony’s cover. Tony could neither come up to their suite nor could they go down to his without arousing some suspicion, so they had made arrangements to put the canvas bag with the two items on top of the left side elevator car, where Tony would retrieve it and leave the identical canvas bag that he’d carried in with him in its place.
Taking Thorin with her out into the hallway, Chyna pressed the elevator call button and waited for it to arrive. When the car arrived, Thorin held the button to keep the door open and watched her as she climbed up onto the handrail, pushed the ceiling access hatch open, placed the canvas bag on the roof, closed the hatch, hopped down, pressed 4 on the panel and exited the elevator.
She and Thorin went back inside the suite and waited about ten minutes and then returned to repeat the process, except in reverse. Receiving the canvas bag that was stuffed with paper was evidence that the switch had been made.
“I guess we’re a go,” she said as she examined the contents of the bag.
They started back to the suite.
Chapter Eighteen
Diary of the Queen
14 July 1789
Today was a dark day in the history of France. It is in no way helpful either that it has come on the heels of Louis taking some decisive action. The deed was necessary. Necker had made a huge blunder and misrepresented his monarch and country. But as is commonly the case, the people saw it differently as they will always choose to side with others over their king.
They stormed the Bastille fortress, killed many soldiers and helped themselves to the vast stockpile of munitions kept within its walls.
During all of this, Governor Marquis Bernard de Launay was beaten, stabbed and decapitated; his head was placed on a pike and paraded about the city. This, despite having ordered the ceasefire that prevented the mob from being massacred by the military forces there. They saw only weakness.
When Louis heard of what was happening in the city he was visibly alarmed and decided that he should tread lightly and proceed with his handling of the financial ministry more tactfully. I see only weakness.
Perhaps both he and de Launay should have stood their ground.
Marie.
***
“Tony is with the goons,” Chyna announced into her mic.
They were divided into two teams to tail and two other teams were in reserve. Chyna was paired with Thorin and Lana was paired with Antoine. Sirita and Mark were still working alongside Oscar in search of an identity for Louis, but they were also monitoring the situation and prepared to come in as two backup teams. Sirita was to be paired with Demetri and Mark would pair with Simon (one of Thorin’s wolves). The last wolf stayed put with Oscar.
Antoine had put a special ops team from Interpol on alert, but without a specific destination, they could only wait on standby. Everyone hoped that they would not be necessary.
Tony had been equipped with one of Oscar’s tracking devices in the soul of his shoe, as had the other team members. As long as they kept their shoes on and didn’t go beyond range or under something that would block his ability to receive the signal from the transmitter, Oscar could stick to them and provide a feed to the monitors of the two tailing teams.
As soon as they were able to come up with an ID on Louis and narrow down a location, the two tailing teams could make a move to snatch Tony, the crown and the All Seeing Eye away from the goons. That’s why Mark, Oscar and Sirita had stayed behind to keep working on their computers.
Sirita continued to follow search leads. She had made a probable connection to Countess Sophie Botta and had been moving forward in her search. “Whoever this dude is, he must have adoptions and abandonments all through his family history.”
“Abandonment!” Oscar exclaimed. “What do you do with abandoned children?”
“They put them in an orphanage,” Mark responded.
“Have either of you checked the orphanages in and around Belgrade?” Oscar asked.
They both shook their heads.
“Neither have I,” he responded. “Let’s go there and cross reference with our Serbian officer list.”
“Bingo,” Mark called out a few minutes later.
“Tail One,” Oscar said into his mic. “We might have an ID coming.”
“Copy. Just be sure, cowboy.”
“What you got, Mark?” Oscar asked.
“We have an Oliver Branko, who fits all of our categories. Wealthy, high ranking military officer and…”
“Don’t do me like that, Mark,” Oscar warned. “Do we have an ID or not?”
“We have a double bingo,” Mark came back. “He was expelled from an orphanage that was operated by the Eastern Orthodox Monastery Rakovica. That same orphanage was purchased and made into a private residence by one Oliver Branko.”
“Where was this orphanage located?” Oscar asked.
“South east of Belgrade, just outside town,” Mark replied, moving over to look at the tracking map that Oscar had up on his monitor. Sirita slid over to join them.
The tracking blips were headed southeast.
“Tail One,” Oscar announced. “We have location and ID. Go ahead and bag your goons.”
There was no response.
“Tail One. Do you copy?” Oscar asked. He waited several seconds and repeated his call, looking up at Sirita and Mark with wide eyes. After three more times without a response, he made the call to the Interpol standby team, giving them the ID and location coordinates.
“We’ve lost com with our tail teams. I will go in with a high-powered tracker to help guide you in. Let me know when you have a lock on my frequency.”
Mark, Sirita, Demetri and Simon were already geared up and getting ready to head out by the time Oscar disconnected the call and started gearing up to go with them.
“What are you doing?” Mark asked. “You’re supposed to stay here.”
“I’ve got to take this transmitter into wherever they are,” he said.
“One of us can do it,” Sirita responded.
Oscar ignored them and headed out the door. “If you guys are coming, you better get your butts moving.”
***
The cars had come out of nowhere and were coming at them head on. It had happened so suddenly that Thorin had barely had enough time to swerve away from a head-on collision. In spite of his driving skills, the maneuver had been executed at the perfect moment and in a perfect place and he’d been forced onto a steep shoulder that turned the car over, rolling it several times before it came to a stop.
Chyna was dazed and had some cuts and bruises, but she was mostly unhurt. Thorin had taken a heavy hit in the rollover and was unconscious. She shook him to try to revive him.
“Thorin.
Thorin. Come on, buddy, you gotta come to,” she called out to him.
She reached for the mic beside her throat and realized the both mic and earpiece had been damaged in the rollover, and her radio was crushed. She reached over to search for Thorin’s radio and then froze in place as she felt a cold, steel barrel being placed against her head. She didn’t need to understand the words that were being spoken to her. She raised her arms up near her ears and slowly slid out of the open door of the car.
In some situations, Chyna might have considered going on the offensive, but with six automatic weapons held on her, she decided to cooperate instead. She was forced to her knees and her hands were secured behind her with heavy duty zip ties.
She was simultaneously lifted and dragged up away from the wrecked car and, not so gently, tossed into the back of a waiting van. A few moments later, four men struggled to shove a still unconscious Thorin in as well.
“I hope you made that ID, Oscar,” she whispered under her breath.
Chapter Nineteen
Diary of the Queen
5 October 1789
I hear them screaming, shouting, pounding at the gates. They have come for us and demand that we go with them to Paris and remain at the Tuileries until the revolutionaries decide what is to be done with us. I fear for my children, but at least Du Polignac and De Lamballe are with us. Louis seems dazed. He has hardly said a word since the crowd arrived. I think he is stupefied. The poor man has done everything he thought was good and within his power but there is never any prize for the good in politics, is there?
Seven thousand women have led this march to the gates of Versailles. That in itself is an irony of monumental means. They have brought with them weapons with which to kill us or force our removal to Paris; cannons and a variety of smaller weapons are being brandished at the gates and against us.
Twenty thousand National Guardsmen, under the command of La Fayette, have responded so as to keep the peace, and yet still, members of the mob have managed to storm through the palace gates, killing several guards in the process.
I was by no means surprised when La Fayette himself arrived in the throne room of Versailles to begin persuading Louis to meet the demand of the crowd that the monarchy relocates to Tuileries.
Marie.
***
“I’ve got a larger audience than I expected for this evening’s performance,” Louis laughed. “All captive as well. Two men and two women whom I hadn’t expected and my very willing accomplice, who was kind enough to secure all of the powerful talismans that I will be using this Solstice Eve.”
Louis moved in close to one of the women, widened his eyes and spoke in a very excited voice. “You’re going to get to watch me harness all of the feminine energy of the universe. Maybe even your own. Isn’t that exciting?”
“Not really,” the woman replied.
He moved away, making use of a long stride to rapidly scoop up a chair and move it to a place in front of his five guests. He looked at his watch and then back at his guests, crossing his legs and folding his hands upon his thighs. “We still have a few hours. Why don’t we get to know each other better?”
He was partly interested in them, but mostly he was mocking them. The one man who had been brought in by Luka and Jovan had, no doubt, been the one with whom he had been in communication and who had the All Seeing Eye and the Jeweled Crown with him. He decided to address him first.
“I have to thank you for acquiring all of the items that I needed at such a bargain price. Now, I did expect that you would have help, but, of course, you can already see that I made arrangements to deal with that. Pretty clever of me, don’t you think?”
The man he was addressing only glared at him without speaking.
“I guess I expected more from someone so highly placed within the Illuminati. Though they pale in comparison to what I’m about to pull off. You know, I’d considered just letting Luka put a couple of bullets in your brain and leaving it at that, but I’m glad that I have the opportunity to share this evening with you. It’s only an added benefit that you brought guests along with you.”
He rose and walked in front of the large blonde man and squatted, careful to stay back away from him. “This gentleman is a particularly magnificent specimen. You must be descended from the great god, Thor, huh?”
He received the response he was expecting and then backed away, chuckling. It wasn’t every day that one was allowed the opportunity to taunt a captive group and then become omnipotent. He decided to enjoy it to its fullest.
“I descend from a great lineage; from the daughter of Marie Antoinette. She is the one who actually wore the crown that you brought to me. I’m going to place it on my head later, which will be a great thrill for me. However, I’m not going to do that until I have consolidated all of the feminine energy of the universe into that crown, thereby making myself an omnipotent being.
“Comments? Questions?”
He waited with a satisfied smirk on his face and then continued mocking them. It felt good to be able to mock them with impunity. He’d always wished to have that chance when he was a boy living among those orphans.
“You know, I lived up in that house above where we sit right now when I was a boy. I was the smartest and most adroit of all of my peers. I never fully understood why until I discovered who my ancestors were.”
“Marie Antoinette wasn’t all that great, you know.”
The attractive woman with the long, black hair had actually spoken, surprising him. He moved over in front of her and squatted. “I wish I knew your name so that I could address you properly.” As he spoke, he reached out and surprised her with a backhand across her mouth. He held a bony finger up in front of her face and shook it. “Do not speak of the queen in that way again.”
He noticed that the large blonde man was growling and struggling wildly to get free of his bonds. “It’s a good thing that they used four of those bands on you,” he laughed. “You would snap two of them without even straining.”
“I’ll kill you for that,” the big blonde growled.
“I’m afraid you’ll never get the chance.” He returned to his seat on the stool and resumed the position he’d been in before.
“Where were we?” He frowned momentarily and then started up again. “Oh, yes, I was telling you about my superiority to my peers. Now, here is the most fascinating part of it all. The queen’s mother was a particularly fertile woman, given that great gift because of her own great power. That power came not only from her ancestry, but from a secret society to which she belonged. Would anyone like to guess the name of that society?”
He waited for a response. He’d hoped that his captives would be a little more lively with their conversation. So far it had only been the two comments. He sighed heavily.
“Very well, I’ll tell you, but I really don’t have a lot of time to waste sitting here and chatting. Marie Antoinette’s mother was a priestess in two orders, actually, the Egyptian Order of Re, which was a precursor to your Illuminati and the Holy Roman Order of the Unconquerable Sun. So, it’s really not difficult to understand how I came to be superior to my peers, something that has only grown stronger as I’ve aged, even more so since I realized my true identity.
“You see, a nun named me Oliver Branko, but the gods named me through my lineage. Tonight, you will be privileged to witness the coronation of Louis the Twentieth.”
“There’s already a Louis the Twentieth,” the second woman countered.
Louis rushed at her in a fury. She attempted to shrink away from him, but he kicked her hard in the ribs anyway. That stirred up all four of his captives into soundly cursing him, threatening him and struggling against their bonds. He waved Luka and his men over and they trained their automatic weapons on the group.
“It appears that there is to be no civil conversation with you imbeciles!” he shouted. He smiled on last time and lowered the tone of his voice to just above a whisper. “No matter, in a few hours, you’ll hav
e a front row seat to witness the power of the universe coming down to me.”
He turned and strode away from them, putting them out of his mind and thinking only of the preparations that lay ahead.
Chapter Twenty
Tuileries, 18 June 1791
My dearest Comtesse de Polignac,
Do not worry about us. It seems that the chiefs of the Assembly want to behave more softly. Talk to my parents about foreign approaches to the problem at hand. If they are afraid it is necessary to come to compromise with them. Burn all that is left which could be used as evidence and send the remainder of the letter to Monsieur von Fersen. He is with the King of Sweden.
Marie.
***
“This is one I couldn’t get you out of, boss,” Thorin grumbled after Louis had left them sitting against the wall of the cavern that he’d had hewn out of the stone beneath his house.
“How’re you doing?” Chyna asked. “You took a pretty good bump on the head when we rolled the car. You were out cold for quite a while.”
“I was still seeing stars until that son of a bitch slapped you. They all cleared up pretty quickly after that.”
“Does anybody have any brilliant ideas for getting us out of this mess?” Lana asked.
“I hope that Oscar does,” Chyna replied. “He called just before those cars came flying right at us. He said he thought he had an ID.”
“I doubt they came up with anything,” Lana responded.
“I can’t believe you are underestimating the same team that you told me could work miracles earlier today,” Chyna countered.
“I just don’t think he’ll come through, that’s all.”
Chyna had a response on her lips that she was ready to deliver, but she swallowed it. There was no point in arguing with her.
“If he does come through, I’ll kiss him right on the mouth.”
