Occult Assassin 4: Soul Jacker

by Massa, William

  Yasmine slipped out of the bedroom and left the apartment. Her unit was located on the ninth floor, and her steps reverberated in the desolate stairwell as she descended. Only a few weeks earlier the building had bustled with life. The elderly would play cards in the downstairs lobby over cups of hot tea, while teenagers would roam the passageways of the various floors, shouting and hollering and doing their best to make their presence known. She missed the energy that used to course through the building. Rakan had turned the tenement, which housed over eight hundred units, into a ghost town. The punks still haunted the floors, but now they did so in unnatural silence. The young men’s faces were masklike whenever they ran into her, their blank gazes following her with hostile intent. The wild abandon of youth had been replaced with a robotic, inhuman creepiness. Thinking about these changes made her clutch the Fatima necklace her grandmother had given her. She had no idea if it could actually ward off evil forces, but she felt safer wearing it than not.

  Shaking off her disturbing thoughts, she reached the lobby without incident and walked briskly away from the tenement, which cast a long shadow in the grey morning light. Another rainy day awaited her. How she wished it was already summer. Even the weirdness unfolding in her building would seem more palatable if the sun could chase away the thick, grey clouds. She wished she could leave the tenement for good, but where could she and her grandmother go? The woman was sick, maybe even dying, and where else would they find a government subsidized dwelling? They were trapped in this neighborhood, trapped in that infernal building.

  She arrived at the flower shop and welcomed the chance to throw herself into her work. Anything to get her mind off her troubles. The job could be monotonous, but the beautiful flowers distracted her and she tried to have fun with her arrangements. It turned out to be a busy day, and time passed quickly. Around five o’clock Yasmine’s mood darkened. All too soon she’d have to set foot in her building again. Her small steps lacked energy as she returned to the tenement. Fog clung to the deserted structure, and the few people she spotted in the mist walked past her in silence, features locked. There was something about the intensity of their quiet looks that wasn’t quite normal. Somehow she’d have to find a way for her and her granny to move out of this neighborhood before they became like everyone else.

  With a heavy heart she entered her building and tried to avoid a run-in with a gang of teens. She was about to sidle past them when one boy spoke up. Hearing a human voice after the days of silent stares silence made her flinch.

  “Your time has come, Yasmine.”

  The gangbanger held up a vial with a clear liquid and a strange symbol engraved on its surface.

  “Let us lift the veil, Yasmine.”

  The chilling words galvanized her into action. She burst into motion, turning on her heels and running as fast as her legs could carry her the other way. She reached a second staircase, made sure she was alone, and tore up those nine flights of stairs as if she was being chased by the devil himself. Breathing heavily, face masked with sweat, she stumbled toward her unit…and paused. To her horror, the door to her apartment was open. Nerves frayed, her mouth went dry as she gingerly stepped into her dwelling, driven by one thought.

  Granny.

  She considered all the missing elderly people and cold terror gripped her. The dark apartment amplified her steps. Once inside her granny’s bedroom, her worst fears became reality. The rumpled, sweat-stained bed was empty. Her grandmother was gone.

  Sounds behind her made her whirl, and she came face to face with the punks from the lobby. They crowded the doorframe. No further words were necessary. She knew why they were here.

  Your time has come, Yasmine.

  There would be no escape. No one ever did. As these thoughts tumbled through her mind, another noise broke the silence. This time it wasn’t a terrified scream, thank God. Instead sirens filled the night.

  The police.

  But would they arrive on time?

  Two men grabbed her by the arms. She fought them with all her might, but her resistance ceased the moment a fist connected with her face. Her head snapped back, and the coppery flavor of blood filled her mouth. What did they want from her?

  A moment later she received her answer. One of he punks leaned closer, glass vial in his hand. “Open your mouth.”

  She tightened her lips, teeth clenching down hard. If she swallowed the substance in the vial, she too would become like the others. A shadow of her former self. One of Rakan’s soulless drones.

  The leader of the group twisted her right index finger until she heard the bone break. Her lips parted with pain, and a tasteless liquid hit her tongue. A second punk pressed a flask of water against her lips, which made it impossible to not swallow the drug. She grew limp in her attackers’ arms, her will to resist swept away as the unholy concoction burned its way down her throat—and into her soul.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  THE RAID TEAM charged up the tenement’s two main staircases in a single file. Samia and Pierre followed, weapons ready, eyes alert. Glass crunched under her shoes, and she realized the vials of the mysterious new drug littered the ground.

  The inside of the boxy tenement building was hollowed out and contained a large atrium that spanned the height of the construction. Thirty stories worth of apartment units grew before her in each direction. It felt like she was standing in the courtyard of a prison, she thought. Balconies decked out with satellite dishes ringed the floors—a lifeline to Arabic programming. The pervasive graffiti only increased her growing feeling of dread. Making matters even worse was the tenement’s sense of spooky desolation. The heavy police presence would motivate many residents to stay in their units, but curiosity should’ve gotten the best of at least some of them. There had to be at least eight hundred apartments in a building this size. So where was everyone?

  Voices of the ascending team members crackled over her earpiece, amplified by the building’s unnerving silence. She picked up the mounting tension in their exchanges; they all sensed the growing threat. Had Rakan and his crew taken up position on the top floors? Were they perhaps keeping hostages?

  She craned her neck toward the upper floors. Shadowy figures flitted through the thickening layer of condensation. Was she looking at the RAID team or the enemy? The mist was now descending to the atrium at an accelerated pace, swallowing one floor after another, erasing the human silhouettes from view.

  A strange banging sound suddenly drew her attention. The tip of a machete poked from a roiling cloud of fog about ten stories above the atrium. The man wielding the weapon kept rhythmically tapping the tip of the blade against the balcony’s metal railing.

  Again and again.

  Mist devoured the blade, but the unnerving sound continued unabated. It echoed and grew in volume. Phantom figures in the fog were joining the unholy chorus. At least ten knifes and machetes were striking railing and walls now like the drumbeats of an approaching enemy tribe. Any moment now the advancing RAID team would make contact with the machete-wielding locals. Knifes seemed no match for bullets, but these hooded gangbangers had the home turf advantage—not to mention the concealing power of the almost supernatural fog.

  Pierre was clearly struggling to keep his growing panic at bay as the eerie fog kept expanding. Samia had never seen anything quite like the incoming cloud. It was almost as if the mist was assisting the enemy. Her heart hammered in her chest, but the firearm somehow remained steady in her hands.

  “What the hell is happening here?” Pierre said. “Have you ever seen anything like this fog before?”

  Samia shook her head and palmed her mic. “Captain, how are things up there?” Hissing static greeted her question.

  The silence stretched.

  She peered up again, hoping to see what was going on, but realized it was hopeless. All movement erased by the insatiable fog.

  The incessant banging of machetes continued.

  Suddenly a figure appeared out of the mist. The man was
of average size, of Algerian descent, and wore a hoodie over a pair of gym pants. He was a stranger, but he regarded Samia with an unnerving sense of familiarity. What he said next shook her to the core.

  “You shouldn’t have come here, kanz.”

  Only one man had ever called her kanz—Arabic for “treasure”—and that had been a long time ago. Before she could counter with a question of her own, the hooded man vanished back into the fog.

  “Freeze!” she shouted, but the mist had already engulfed the stranger.

  “What was that?” Pierre wanted to know, but Samia found herself beyond words. A second later, gunfire shredded the atrium, followed by shouts and cries. There was a rush of air as something tore past her, and a RAID guy splattered against the atrium floor. Empty eyes peered at infinity through a mask of blood.

  She backed away, gun trembling in her hand. Pierre wasn’t faring much better. He was taking a few steps back when a hoodie-wearing figure burst from the condensation, an axe clutched tightly in his hand. There was no time to shout out a warning before the axe came down on Pierre’s head. Blood sprayed, and her partner was reduced to a twitching mass.

  The killer regarded her with empty eyes. Gore dripped from the axe in thick strands. Once again, she couldn’t quite shake the sense of familiarity in the long stare. This man knew her…

  As he raised the bloody axe Samia centered her sights on him. Bullets flung the figure backward into the fog. At the same time, a volley of gunfire rained down from the fourth floor. Her training took over and she dashed toward the stairs, running in a zigzag pattern, trying to make as poor a target as possible.

  More sounds behind her. Incoming footfalls. A crowd surged through the building’s main entrance, gangbangers armed with guns and machetes.

  No way she could stop them all. She had only one option.

  Escape.

  Legs pumping, she barreled into the nearest staircase, leaving the open space of the atrium behind. The fog was making it impossible to spot friend or foe. She had to catch up with the RAID team. Their best odds were to present a united front. The image of Pierre’s cleaved skull haunted her, and it took all her self-discipline to cast the memory aside. She would mourn him later—if she was lucky enough to experience a later.

  A sound made her turn as another attacker materialized in the narrow staircase in front of her. Two-hundred pounds of muscle and bone barreled into her. Her pistol slipped from her grip as she was pinned against the wall. The gun hit the floor and she staggered away, legs caving in, dazed from the brunt force of the attack. She peered up at her massive attacker. He sported an icy expression as he raised a machete over her head.

  You shouldn’t have come here, kanz.

  No, she shouldn’t have.

  The machete came rushing down.

  ***

  Talon watched the RAID team, trailed by two plainclothes officers, vanish through the main entrance of the ugly apartment tower. A fine drizzle pricked his face while he crouched behind the cars parked across the street from the tenement, observing the unfolding events in grave silence. The heavy police presence left little doubt as to whether he’d come to the right place.

  Talon debated what his next move should be. Originally he’d hoped to reconnoiter the building and get a better sense of this new enemy. He still had no real idea what he was up against, and rushing into battle without intel was a guaranteed way to end up in a body bag. Unfortunately, the arrival of the authorities made it difficult to remain in the shadows. Maybe the cops could handle this problem on their own, but most likely they would be in over their heads if occult forces were truly at work here.

  Pounding footfalls jolted Talon out of his thoughts. A quick glance to his left revealed an advancing gang of punks. They were marching toward the parked RAID van, heads held high with ruthless determination, expressions fixed into cold, hard stares. The eyes of the van’s driver widened as the gang closed in.

  A split second later, one of the attackers raised an AK-47 and pumped a burst into the van. The windshield shattered and the driver’s head snapped back. The attack unfolded with such lethal speed that there was nothing Talon could’ve done to save the officer’s life. He cursed under his breath as he smoothly unholstered his Glock. The enemy still hadn’t spotted him, and he planned to use the element of surprise as a way of overcoming their superiority in numbers. They might not be trained soldiers, but these gangbangers were heavily armed and didn’t seem to care about their own survival—always a dangerous combination. Their empty expressions reminded him of the punks who’d offered him the drug earlier. Who knew how the drug affected its users? He was reminded of the video Casca had shown him. The attacker had kept coming despite being riddled by bullets. Caution was in order. Talon waited for the hoods to disappear inside the structure before he started moving.

  As he swiftly crossed the street on his way to the building, pops of automatic gunfire detonated. His pentacle radiated waves of searing heat as an unnatural fog descended on the building like a poisonous cloud. Black magic had to be in play here. The RAID team had walked into a paranormal trap. Under normal circumstances the team’s superior training would have left no doubt as to the outcome of the battle, but other forces were at work here. Superior training and tactics were worthless if one couldn’t see the attacking enemy. And Talon somehow doubted the fog would handicap the bad guys in the same way.

  Throwing all caution aside, the blood thrumming in his veins, Talon picked up his pace and rushed into the building. He shared a kinship with these officers. They were men dedicated to protecting their city and its people at all cost. They were willing to risk their lives to carry out their duty and deserved better then to be slaughtered like cattle. If there was any chance he could turn the tide of the battle in their favor, he had to give it a go.

  Guard up, finger on the trigger, he entered the building’s lobby and then stepped through a second glass door into the large, rectangular-shaped atrium. Twenty floors of apartments encircled him. How many people called this place their home? Now there was no sign of a living soul. Most of the units remained hidden behind a wall of spectral fog. Only the sound of automatic fire and the screams of the RAID team hinted at the life-and-death battle being waged above.

  Talon spotted two dead officers in a giant pool of red and his heart sank. For a moment, he was reminded of the scene of terror he’d faced at Omicron back in Silicon Valley. Would the bloodshed ever cease? He had no idea what the dark endgame might be here, but he swore right then and there he’d do everything in his power to put an end to it.

  A woman’s scream exploded from a nearby staircase and his senses snapped alert. He whirled and rapidly homed in on the voice. The second plainclothes detective was down and her attacker was wielding a machete. She must’ve dropped her pistol and was staring up at certain death. Yet there was no fear on those enigmatic eyes. Her legs scissored out and connected with her attacker’s knees. He let out a grunt, the maneuver buying her enough time to scoop up her firearm and bring it up with practiced ease. She blasted Mr. Machete and the man crumpled. She still hadn’t noticed Talon behind her and was stumbling to her feet when another gangbanger shot from the staircase. This guy sported an AK-47, and it was Talon’s turn to fire. Two quick shots drove the man back in a tangle of limbs.

  Aware of his presence now, she spun toward him, her pistol leveled, still not sure if Talon was a friend or foe. For a moment they regarded each other as the mist circled and undulated around them, guns leveled. He couldn’t help but take in the detective’s striking, exotic looks and jet-black hair.

  “I’m here to help,” Talon said in French.

  The words meant nothing to the detective and her guard didn’t waver, her eyes remaining narrowed into slits. Talon couldn’t blame her. In his baggy hoodie, he looked like just another gangbanger out on the prowl. Why would she trust a stranger? He needed to convince her that he was on her side, but how?

  A beat later he received his chance as two m
ore gangbangers burst from the fog. Talon took out the two men with military precision. More men appeared behind them as the next phalanx of locals surged into the atrium. It was almost as if the building was calling in reinforcements from the neighborhood, the gangbangers following some twisted siren call for murderous action.

  “Come,” Talon said, and this time the detective fell in step with him. They ran toward the staircase as clouds of condensation greedily wrapped around them. Talon whipped out his pentacle and held it up at the encroaching fog. The amulet radiated heat, its own inherent magic reacting to mystical fog. The clouds parted before them, clearing a narrow path. They still could only see a few feet ahead, but at least no enemy would be able to sneak up on them unseen.

  Five flights of steps later, Talon heard another group rapidly storming down the stairs. The heat coming off his pentacle intensified. Danger was closing in from above. His arm shot out at the detective, a clear signal for her to stop in her tracks. She eyed him curiously. He shook his head and pointed at the door that led out onto the sixth floor.

  “What if it’s the RAID—?”

  She broke off, having spotted the pentacle. He sensed another round of questions coming on yet knew this wasn’t the time or the place for long-winded explanations. He grabbed the woman’s arm and dragged her onto the sixth floor. Fortunately, she seemed to trust his instincts enough to go along with him. Talon had moved not a moment too soon as the group of gangbangers hurtled down the stairs.

  “Where are we going?” the detective asked.

  Good question, Talon thought. He truly was making this up as he was going along. A real plan could be formulated later. Right now, it only boiled down to survival. Death was approaching from every direction, and he was doing his best to stay one step ahead of the grim reaper.