Yet as Jin made a break for the next closest target, a blast of gunfire cracked through the air, and he felt a hot piece of metal whiz by his cheek. Ducking behind the nearest target, Jin held himself still and took a series of deep breaths to resist the adrenaline now pumping through his blood.
“Your aim’s gotten worse, Hox,” he jeered. “Five years ago that shot would have gone straight through my ears!”
“Is that so?” Hoxie called back. “Well how do you know I didn’t miss on purpose?”
Jin strained his hearing to pinpoint where Hoxie’s voice was coming from.
“After all,” Hoxie said, chambering another round into his rifle, “the hunt is so much more enjoyable when your quarry can actually fight back!”
“Even when that quarry is a dragon?” Jin asked, readying his handgun.
“Especially when it’s a dragon!” Hoxie replied, a grin of sadistic enjoyment splitting his lips.
Jin sneered. “Your funeral!”
Extending his hand beyond the safety of the metal target, Jin fired off a pair of shots from his Desert Eagle. Hoxie immediately ducked behind the cover of his deck’s stone railing, and Jin stepped out from behind his cover to fire three more shots before leaping forward and ducking behind another target.
“So, Hoxie,” Jin asked. “Got a question for you. Would you rather be buried or cremated?”
“Cremated!” Hoxie answered. “Not that you’ll live long enough to make use of that knowledge.”
“Perhaps, but it’s still good to know. I’ll be sure to pass that along when I deliver your corpse to the mortuary!”
At that, Jin ran out from his cover and sprinted up the field, firing the last four rounds from his gun as he did so. He managed to cover a significant amount of ground, bringing himself to within twenty feet of Hoxie’s balcony. When Hoxie emerged from his own cover, rather than duck behind another target, Jin hurled his spent Desert Eagle at him. The weapon smacked into Hoxie’s forehead, causing him to reel backward and buying Jin the time he needed to climb up onto the deck.
Horrified at Jin’s sudden proximity, Hoxie tried to raise his sniper rifle, but Jin kicked it out of his hands with his right leg. Hoxie then moved for his silver pistol, but Jin kicked that out of his hands as well before smashing his left fist downward into the right side of Hoxie’s face. He fell face first into the cold stone floor, and Jin raised his right leg, preparing to stomp on Hoxie’s back and snap it like a twig. However, Hoxie knew how prone he was and swept his legs across the floor, taking Jin’s legs out from under him. Jin fell back first to the floor but almost instantly threw himself back to his feet. Hoxie had just gotten back to his as well, but Jin lashed out with an upward reverse roundhouse kick. The blow connected squarely with Hoxie’s jaw and sent him sprawling back to the floor. Jin reached inside his coat for his second Desert Eagle just as Hoxie hopped back to his feet. Hoxie threw a vicious punch toward Jin’s temple, but Jin whirled around and kicked Hoxie hard in the stomach. Hoxie doubled over with the force of the blow, only to look up and find Jin’s gun leveled squarely at his forehead.
There was a moment’s pause as the two men stared at each other – the air between them tight and silent. Then the tension snapped as Jin fired a shot from his pistol, and Hoxie threw himself to the right to dodge it. Jin’s bullet pinged off the ground, and Hoxie snatched up Jin’s other, discarded, Desert Eagle. He surged to his feet and snapped his arm up, pointing the gun straight at Jin’s face just as his opponent did the same.
Hoxie grinned with savage glee and pulled the trigger.
The gun clicked – empty.
Jin grinned.
Hoxie’s face turned ashen.
Another blast of gunfire rent the still night air, and Hoxie Johns fell to the floor, dead, with a smoking red hole between his eyes.
With a somewhat smug look on his face, Jin holstered his gun and walked over to Hoxie’s corpse to retrieve the other Desert Eagle. Prying it from Hoxie’s dead fingers, Jin ejected the spent magazine and slapped in a fresh one.
His guns reloaded and his target dead, Jin jumped off the deck and ran back to the wall at the far end of the range. He could hear Hoxie’s guards calling out in the distance, trying to determine what had happened, as he clambered back up and over the wall before sprinting off into the night.
One down.
Four to go.
Chronicles of the Apocalypse
--<(0)>--
Part 1: Revenge, Everything is Nothing
Chapter 5: Mordechai’s Life
It was unusually sunny outside. The rays of bright morning sun filtered through the numerous windows of Mordechai Krueger’s Manhattan flat. It was not the most modest of places, though it was not garishly decorated. The most prominent feature was the gaping living area, whose ceiling was almost twenty feet above the floor. In the center of this living area, the floor was set deeper than the rest of the flat, with a pair of stairs flanking it on three sides; the fourth side was against the wall. Just off the living area lay the kitchen on one side, and the master bedroom and bathroom on the other.
Separating these two rooms was a wide hallway that ended in a pair of large wooden doors. Beyond those doors lay the staircase that led down to Mordechai’s antiques shop. Then on both sides of the hallway, where it opened to the living area, was a pair of wrought iron spiral staircases that led to the second floor.
Back down in the kitchen, Mordechai himself stood by his coffeemaker waiting for it to finish.
As he watched the glass pot fill with the blackish liquid, he silently mused over his current situation. Jin’s murder of Hoxie the previous night had surprised everyone. They had been expecting him to go after Dorigan or Victor first, and Mordechai had been counting on it. With Dorigan dead, the Black Dragon Clan would have been thrown into disarray, giving Mordechai ample cover to slip out the back door and whisk his family off to safety. But with Hoxie dead instead, the Black Dragon Clan would constrict; close down on itself to make it that much harder for Jin to attack them. And, consequently, make it nigh on impossible for Mordechai to slink away unnoticed.
The coffeepot filled, and Mordechai pulled it free of the machine to pour himself a cup.
He knew he wasn’t strong enough to fight his way out. Though he was a formidable fighter, he lacked the animalistic savagery of Jessie Wise. Nor did he possess the brute strength of Victor Malakai, and he entirely lacked the fierce brutality that Jin Sakai held within him. As for Dorigan, Mordechai couldn’t draw a bead on his abilities, which was in and of itself cause for deep concern. He intellectually knew that Dorigan was Jin’s equal in combat, but he carried himself with such regal frailty that Mordechai didn’t know what to believe.
It chilled him to the core to think about what Dorigan could actually be capable of.
He took sip of his coffee to warm himself, and as he did, a loud buzzing noise broke through the silence. Coffee cup in hand, Mordechai walked over to the wall, pressing a finger against a button on the intercom.
“Yes, Alexis?” Mordechai asked.
“Martin is here, and he says it’s important.”
“Send him up,” Mordechai said evenly.
“Yes, sir,” Alexis answered, and the intercom clicked silent.
Mordechai sipped his coffee again, composing himself into his typical demeanor of icy indifference. He took another sip and left the kitchen to lean against the hallway wall. A scant few moments later, there was a series of knocks upon the door, and Mordechai walked forward to open it.
“Master Dorigan,” he bowed. “Thank you for coming.”
Dorigan nodded curtly.
“Please,” Mordechai said, opening the door farther. “Come in.”
Dorigan stepped inside and Mordechai closed the door behind him.
“I hope this is as important as you made it seem, Mordechai,” Dorigan said, but not unkindly, as Hoxie lead him to the living room. “As you well know, the Black Dragon Clan has a very…pressing issue that ne
eds to be dealt with.”
“Yes, Master Dorigan, I know. I apologize for what inconveniences this might cause, but it is something that must be done.”
“And that is?” Dorigan asked as he sat down on Mordechai’s couch.
Mordechai sighed. “I must leave the Black Dragon Clan.”
Dorigan flinched, a spark of panic turned into a surge of electrical rage that tensed every muscle in Dorigan’s body.
It took Dorigan a minute to respond.
“Oh,” he said simply.
“I know it comes at an inconvenient time, Master Dorigan,” Mordechai explained. “But Jin’s return is the exact reason that I must go.”
“Mordechai,” Dorigan began. “You can’t simply leave…”
“But I have to, Dorigan. You don’t have a family; I wouldn’t expect you to understand.”
“If you’re worried about your wife and son, Mordechai, we can protect them!”
“No,” Mordechai said, with such firmness that Dorigan was taken aback.
Mordechai sighed, and reigned in his emotions.
“I don’t want my son to be exposed to the world that we live in. He deserves a clean slate.”
Mordechai downed the last of his coffee, and Dorigan cast him a severe look.
“Doesn’t he also deserve a father who tells him the truth?”
Mordechai turned his head sharply to look curiously at the B.D.C’s leader. Something stirred behind his eyes; a dark shadow of creeping maliciousness that made the hairs on Mordechai’s arms and the back of his neck stand on end. There was a demon behind those eyes lurking just beneath the surface, and Mordechai suddenly understood just what made Dorigan so dangerous.
The man had a black hole where his heart should be.
Suddenly Mordechai’s desire to leave the B.D.C increased seven-fold.
“Yes,” Mordechai answered evenly. “And when he’s older, I will tell him everything. But just now, he deserves to live a normal childhood, and I’m going to let him.”
There was an undercurrent of challenge in Mordechai’s words, and Dorigan picked up on it instantly.
“Do you think you can simply walk out on us?” Dorigan challenged back. “Leave us alone against Jin’s wrath?”
At this, Mordechai released a great peal of laughter.
“Come on, Dorigan, you and I both know that I am no match for Jin. He’d tear me apart before I even got my guard up! The most good that I could possibly do is provide a moment’s distraction. In the handful of moments it would take for him to kill me, you, Jessie, or Victor would have a clear shot to take him down. Forgive me if that’s not what I want my life to boil down to.”
There was a strong moment of silence between the two, and Dorigan went rigid. Mordechai saw the muscles in the man’s jaw pull taut; his eyes seemed to widen and narrow at the same time, and his whole body seemed to become strangely loose. When Dorigan finally spoke, his voice trembled with either rage or fear, Mordechai could not tell which.
“So…you are set on this…matter?” he asked, looking at Mordechai with icy eyes.
Mordechai nodded. “I am.”
Dorigan took a long, steadying breath. “Very well then.”
He stood up in one fluid motion and walked over behind Mordechai. Mordechai relaxed ever so slightly and sat down on his couch, but when the song of a blade leaving its sheath rang through the air, his entire body seized itself with sudden fear. The cold steel blade of Dorigan’s own katana pierced the thick leather of the couch disturbingly close to his Mordechai’s right side, and Mordechai could feel Dorigan’s murderous glare scorching a pair of holes in the back of his neck.
“If you desert us, if you betray us,” Dorigan said, his voice frigid cold and hard, “Jin Sakai will become the least of your problems.”
“I would expect nothing less, Master Dorigan,” Mordechai said calmly.
Dorigan snarled and tore his sword out of Mordechai’s couch. As Mordechai heard Dorigan’s retreating footfalls, he sucked in a gulp of air, and when Dorigan slammed the doors, he let it go.
Well, Mordechai thought, that went as expected. Now I can only hope that Jin gets here before Dorigan’s men do.
Mordechai stood up and walked back to the kitchen, chuckling, for he couldn’t help but appreciate the irony that his only hope lay in the hands of a man who would stop at nothing to kill him.
In the kitchen, Mordechai rinsed out his coffee cup, dried it with a towel, and then reached for the phone next to the sink. Pressing the speed dial button, Mordechai held the phone to his ear and waited for the call to be picked up. After three rings, a gentle female voice came through the speaker.
“Hello?”
Mordechai smiled as the sound of the voice warmed his heart.
“It is so good to hear your voice again, Alexandra.”
“Hey, Mordechai,” his wife replied. “How are you?”
“I’m…hanging in there. How are you and Jonah?”
“Oh, we’re fine. We miss you though.”
“Well then, I guess it’s a good thing that I’m coming home tonight.”
“You are?” Alexandra replied, shocked. “I thought Dorigan…”
“Dorigan and the others don’t need me for this.”
“So, when will you be home?”
“Soon. I’m leaving now.”
“Okay, bye, Mordechai.”
“Bye, Alex.”
Five minutes later, Mordechai was stepping off the elevator into the back of his antique shop dressed in blue jeans, a white shirt, and tan windbreaker. Sitting at the front desk, Alexis, Mordechai’s assistant, brushed an errant lock of blond hair out of her face and greeted her boss.
“Morning, Mr. Krueger.”
“Good morning, Alexis. Can you watch over the shop for today? I’m going to visit my family.”
“Sure thing.”
“Thank you.”
That said, Mordechai turned on his heel and walked out the front doors. Turning left, he walked down a nearby alley and came face to face with his silver Audi R8. He pulled his keys out of his pocket and unlocked the door before sliding into the driver’s seat. Closing the door with a satisfying thunk, Mordechai keyed the ignition and drove off.
--<(0)>--
As Mordechai and his Audi drove away from the back of his shop, a black 2004 Mustang parked across the street from the front of it. The driver’s door popped open, and Jin Sakai stepped out into the street and moved back onto the sidewalk. As Jin compared the building across the street to the picture in the PDA, he breathed a sigh of relief. Even with the address, and the help of a few locals, Mordechai’s antique shop and been a pain in the ass to find.
And it didn’t help that the punk with the skateboard sent me in the wrong direction, Jin thought bitterly.
Still, he was where he needed to be, and there were things he needed to be doing. The traffic was barely moving, and Jin walked across the street, gingerly picking his way through the slow-moving vehicles.
The shop’s bell tinkled gently as Jin pushed open the door and looked around to make sure Mordechai wasn’t there. Finding that he wasn’t, Jin entered the shop in full as he assembled the mask of an antique enthusiast. He strolled merrily amongst the assortment of various artifacts and examined them each in turn. Between pieces, Jin examined the layout of the shop, etching it on the walls of his mind and storing the images for later use.
“Excuse me, sir. May I help you?”
Jin turned around and saw a somewhat short woman standing there.
No more than five foot two, the pantsuit and sharp glasses the woman wore told Jin in no uncertain terms that she was a high-powered individual. Her golden hair was tied back in a tight bun, and her arms were folded behind her back. Jin could tell that this woman wouldn’t be one he could play games with.
“Yes actually,” Jin said brightly. “I’m looking for Mordechai Krueger, is he here?”
“No actually, you just missed him. May I ask why you’re looking for h
im?”
“Oh, of course. I’m looking to sell him a sword of mine.”
“Ah,” the woman said. “Well, if you give me your name and phone number, I can have him call you.”
“Umm, that’s not really going to work for me. Is it all right if I just leave it upstairs with a note for him? I’ve got it in my car.”
“I’m sorry, sir, but Mr. Krueger’s private flat is off limits to customers.”
“Oh, I see.”
Jin fell silent, mulling over his options. He could always knock the woman out, but that would certainly lead to more trouble than it was worth. He could ask for the bathroom, but he knew he would be gone long enough as to arouse suspicion from the woman in front of him, which would again lead to more trouble than it was worth. Then there was option three, come back at night.
“Well,” Jin said, settling on option three. “Thank you for your time, miss, and I wish you well.”
At that, Jin gracefully bowed out of the shop, already planning his next move.
--<(0)>--
Later that day, as a setting sun painted the sky with fire, Mordechai Krueger eased his Audi into the driveway of his house. It was a modest home, certainly not one would expect an assassin of Mordechai’s ilk to own, but it suited him just fine. But the thing that really made this house a home, unlike the flat above his shop, was sitting on the porch.
As Mordechai got out of his car, his six-year-old son, Jonah, practically flew from the porch and into his father’s arms.
“Daddy home! Daddy home!” he cried.
Mordechai hugged his son tightly, smiling as he did so.
“Hey, Jonah, how’s my boy been?”
“Good,” Jonah replied, smiling too.
Chronicles of the Apocalypse: Revenge, Everything is Nothing Page 5
