Nomad Avenged

by Craig Martelle

“You tell me what you heard!” Gene demanded, pounding on the door frame. A family lived on the edge of town, maintaining a small garden and two horses that they used to travel back and forth to the real farms to the west.

  The young man looked alarmed while his children cowered in fear. Many in the community had never gotten used to Gene because of his size and rough manners.

  “What happened again?” the man asked, leaning away from Gene as if expecting a blow from the Werebear’s massive fists.

  “Colonel Terry has been taken by bad people flying an air vehicle of some sort,” Gene said in his heavy Russian accent. “It was not far. You heard something. You tell me now!”

  The man tried to shut the door, but Gene punched it. Aaron appeared behind him and tried to work his way in where Gene would see him before Gene did anything untoward.

  “I’m sorry, good sir,” Aaron said pleasantly, taller than Gene but a sapling compared to a redwood’s trunk. “If you heard or saw anything in the pre-dawn, we would really like to know.”

  “Nothing. We were sleeping,” the man replied, never taking his eyes from Gene.

  “The lady of the house? Maybe your children?” Aaron pressed.

  The man turned to look inside the aging structure. “Wait, what?” he asked someone within. A woman appeared, with straggly hair, brown eyes, and an expression of perpetual interest.

  “I heard something. One man yelling in the dawn. Usually, it’s so quiet out here, that’s what woke me up,” she offered in a faint voice.

  Aaron slapped Gene on the arm before the Werebear chased her away. “Only one man was yelling? No one else?” Aaron wondered.

  “Yes, only Terry Henry,” she answered.

  “You know it was him for a fact?”

  “Pretty sure.” She inched closer to the door with the greater interest that Aaron was taking in her words.

  “What did he say?” Aaron focused like a laser beam on her.

  “I couldn’t hear the words, not all of them, but there were plenty of F-Bombs. I’m sure of that!” she said proudly.

  Gene snickered. “Of course he drop fuck bomb. He did not go down without fight.”

  “Terry’s dead?” the man blurted, eyes wide as he tried to get his head wrapped around what the two were saying.

  “No!” Gene exclaimed, waving his hands wildly as the conversation wasn’t helping him and there were others in the area that he wanted to talk with. “He was taken by bad men with an airplane. You had to hear airplane?”

  “Nope,” the man replied, relaxing since Terry wasn’t dead. He, like everyone else in town, considered Terry Henry Walton to be invincible. If he were only taken, then they wouldn’t worry because he would not treat them kindly.

  “Bah!” Gene threw his hands up in disgust and stormed away, almost mowing Aaron down as he passed.

  “Thank you, both. Wish us luck!” Aaron said with a smile before walking away.

  The story was the same from the rest. Everybody heard something. No one saw anything. No one did anything.

  And that was how Terry Henry was taken. How many times in the past thirty years had Colonel Walton shown up and saved the day? It was his way. But when his time came, when he needed help, everyone slept soundly in the secure bubble that he’d created for them.

  He was condemned to fight alone.

  After the last house, Gene changed into his Werebear form so he could stand and roar his anger, demand vengeance, and beg forgiveness.

  Crashing through the brush, a graying face appeared.

  “Bogdan,” Aaron whispered. The two bears nuzzled, and Gene changed back into human form so he could hug his friend. The grizzly weighed in at nearly eight hundred pounds. He’d been with humans nearly his whole life, so he wasn’t a threat to them. The people of North Chicago looked at him as the town mascot. He and the elephant Jumbo held special places within the community.

  Bogdan wasn’t sporting the lean muscle of a wild bear, but he could hunt and take care of himself.

  Like the time he got into the Weathers’ cow pasture.

  “You are lucky you survived that one, my son,” Gene told him.

  “You need to get your clothes on,” Aaron said, averting his eyes from the big man.

  “What for? This is Grade A prime beef!” Gene bellowed, beating on his chest like a gorilla. Bogdan mirrored the big man’s motions.

  “Clothes!” Aaron insisted.

  Terry’s Prison

  Someone opened the door and entered. Without raising his head, Terry looked up from under his brow. He tracked the newcomer until the door closed, cutting off the little light from the hallway beyond.

  “I can smell you,” Terry whispered, listening with every fiber of his being. He could hear his own heartbeat. The newcomer moved almost as quietly as a butterfly, but the slight rustle of clothing gave him away.

  Terry leaned back against his chains, rotating his shoulder as he stretched onto his tiptoes. It popped back into the socket with an audible thump. He gasped, but already his augmented nanocytes were at work.

  Char, you are the best thing that has ever happened to me. You make life worth living, he thought as if in prayer.

  The newcomer stopped moving, becoming a hole in the empty space of the room.

  A Forsaken, listening in to Terry’s mind.

  Char, I love you so, Terry continued, letting his thoughts return to the sailboat and the open lake, two days away from North Chicago. They’d made love on the deck, sailed naked until they made love again. Under the cerulean sky on water so deep blue, it looked black, a light breeze flapping against the sail. They didn’t care to make any speed. They were where they were meant to be.

  “Char,” Terry whispered in the lightness of breath.

  He heard the creature only inches from his face.

  Terry lunged, driving his forehead at the Forsaken’s face. The Vampire was caught unaware; his nose shattered and flattened against his face. Terry pulled himself up until his legs were off the ground. He hooked the creature’s leg as it was falling backward.

  He dragged the Forsaken to him and stomped on its head. Mercilessly, he continued. “You don’t deserve to see her, not in my mind. Not anywhere.”

  Terry crushed the Forsaken’s head and kept driving his boot heel into it until its brains were scattered across the floor.

  The door opened and Kirkus entered. He turned on the lights.

  “A sailboat, very creative lovemaking, TH. I think we need to bring this woman to us. The sacrifice of this one, I think, was well worth those images, my friend. Oh, how those purple eyes sparkle,” the Forsaken taunted.

  Terry Henry glared at Kirkus and imagined all manners of ways in which he would kill the Forsaken.

  All manners.

  Kirkus stared back, refusing to be intimidated. The world was his to take, not Terry Henry Walton’s. Not a different Forsaken. Not anyone but him.

  Gilbert Kirkus planned years in advance. The world didn’t know who he was, but they would. Soon enough, they all would know. With purple eyes by his side, no one could stand before him. Then he’d make his move to take over what had been the United States, and then he’d expand to the rest of the world.

  He chuckled to himself. His plans were finally coming to fruition.

  Terry saw a wisp of madness pass across the Forsaken’s eyes. In an instant, it was gone, and the eyes were cold once again. It wasn’t time to challenge the creature.

  Terry looked at the stinking corpse on the floor. He’d seen worse, but not by much. He turned his attention to Kirkus. “Sorry about your minion, there, fuckstick, but not really. He was a fuckstick, too. As a matter of fact, you can’t swing a dead cat around here without hitting a fuckstick. It’s like a fuckstick farm--just when you harvest one, another pops up in its place. Would you look at that? Just when we thought we stomped the living shit out of a fuckstick, its twin fuckstick brother shows up. I’ll be damned.”

  “You will indeed be damned, Terry Henry Walton,
by me and me alone. Your living hell has only just begun.” Kirkus walked away casually, ignoring the body on the floor. He turned off the lights and shut the door slowly, darkening the room one agonizing inch at a time, until total darkness returned.

  Terry heard Kirkus laughing as he walked away.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Beijing

  Akio saw them clearly in his mind: five Forsaken and six humans, two of which were kept for their blood, although by Forsaken logic, any human life was forfeit if the Forsaken were hungry enough.

  Not today, Akio thought as he descended the stairs, silent as a ghost.

  The most dangerous Forsaken was on the top floor. Akio decided to forego the stealth approach and walked into the hallway and toward the room where his enemy would be found. The Forsaken was pacing.

  Akio opened the door casually and walked in. He was surprised to see a westerner.

  “My name is unimportant,” the Forsaken started with a dismissive wave. “I expect you are the famous Akio, slayer of my kind. A shame. We didn’t choose to be what we are. That decision was made for us, and we have to live with it, the best we can.”

  Akio didn’t reply. He kept his distance as he took stock of the room, noting the furniture, tripping hazards, possible traps.

  Despite his words, the unnamed one carried a long curved blade with an ivory grip. A filigree was engraved down the blade. Akio had only seen one other like it. A Mameluke, the sword carried by United States Marine officers in the before time.

  The kaleidoscopic color of the steel suggested it was a Damascus blade, one of the very best.

  Akio’s appreciation of his enemy’s steel was limited to what he needed to do to kill the creature and then move through the building to eliminate the rest. Akio still didn’t say anything because there was nothing to say. He gripped his katana in both hands as he approached, sidestepping without crossing his feet.

  He shifted from right to left, looking for the side that the Forsaken favored. The unnamed didn’t give it away. He smoothly matched Akio’s moves.

  The first blow came as each swung toward the head of the other. Akio turned his blade slightly to catch the cutting edge of the Mameluke on the flat of his blade, letting it slide the length and past his head. Akio ducked low and swung low, diving to the side as he saw the glint of a redirected slash.

  The unnamed barely missed Akio, but the master Japanese swordsman’s aim was true. The tip of his katana tore through the Forsaken’s thigh, slicing a notch into the femur as it passed. Blood spurted from the sliced artery.

  Akio returned upright and bounced away, ready for a counterstrike.

  But the Forsaken held his leg with one hand, backing up slowly. He twirled his sword in front of him, carving a figure eight in the air. Akio saw a door, and he ran at the unnamed.

  The Forsaken turned to bolt, but his leg betrayed him and he stumbled. Akio’s first slash removed the Forsaken’s sword arm. In less than a blink of the eye, the unnamed’s head was rolling on the floor. The body remained upright for a moment, then toppled.

  Akio looked at the blade on the floor. He picked it up and studied it briefly. A fitting sword for a man he would call a friend. Akio cleaned it on the couch, then drove it home into its silver and gold scabbard. He slipped it next to the katana’s saya and hurried into the corridor and toward the steps.

  Chicago

  “My! What brings you to my doorstep?” Jonas said warmly to the purple-eyed Werewolf standing before him. She was still in Were form. She dropped her clothes bundle and changed into human form.

  Jonas leered at her. “You decided that you needed a real man, that the human couldn’t satisfy you?”

  She stopped reaching for her clothes, frozen for an instant, before rotating and driving the heel of her hand into his chest. He flew backwards, crashing into a wall.

  Char didn’t bother with her clothes. She launched herself at him, pounding his face with punch after punch. She pulled him to his feet so she could step back and send a sidekick into his belly button that slammed him against the wall a second time. With a spinning roundhouse that caught him on the side of his head, he went down.

  She dressed while she waited impatiently for him to wake up. His eyes fluttered, and she pulled him roughly to his feet and slammed him against the wall.

  “You always were a limp dick piece of shit, Jonas. I should probably just kill you, but first, I need to know why you did it. Tell me!” she demanded.

  “What do you think I did?” he stammered.

  “Sold us out, you whiny bitch. I want to know why. And while you’re telling, I want to know where they took him.” Char emphasized her question by slamming the Werewolf into the wall.

  “Who did I sell out?” he asked, clearly confused.

  Char started to believe it wasn’t him, but she was certain he’d done something to deserve a beating. He always deserved to have his ass kicked.

  She let him go. “A dozen Forsaken flew in here and took Terry Henry prisoner. They escaped before we could get to them. I know you’re in bed with the evil of this world. You had something to do with it, because that’s the fucked up shit that you do.”

  She jabbed a finger into his chest hard enough to make him wince. She felt gratified seeing him in pain. She did it again, smiling at his anguish.

  “Although I’ll be the first to congratulate the sonofabitch that kills your husband, I had nothing to do with this. If you find them, let me know. Tell them the first round is on me,” Jonas sneered.

  Char had had enough. She turned into him with her arm raised, fist in hand as she rocketed her elbow into his face, crushing the bones beneath. She punched him twice for good measure. He didn’t go down until she kneed him in the groin hard enough to lift him off his feet. He landed in a crumpled pile, barely breathing but alive.

  He’d live. Char shrugged, removed her clothes, and changed into Were form for the long run to downtown Chicago in search of the Forsaken, Joseph.

  Terry’s Prison

  Terry didn’t know how long he had hung there. He’d put himself into a higher state of calm through meditation to give the nanocytes an easier path to do what they needed to do to repair his injuries. But he hadn’t eaten or drank anything for too long. His nanocytes needed the energy to continue their work.

  He thought about eating the shriveled Forsaken on the floor, but decided he wasn’t hungry enough for that, probably would never be that hungry.

  TH couldn’t remember the last time he’d been truly hungry. He remembered the last time he’d eaten too much. That was just last week. He and Char were visiting the ranch that Auburn and Kimber ran. They had bred the livestock over the past twenty-five years and had a massive herd, many produced with the longhorns that Eli had provided out of Wyoming.

  Kimber and Auburn. He remembered the day he saw them holding hands. She was eleven and he thought the Weathers boy was twelve at the time. They were friends long before they became adults and fell in love.

  “Auburn! Your brother Clemson isn’t even in the Southeastern Conference!” Terry shouted to the empty room. Terry shook his head, rattling the heavy chains attached to the shackles on his wrists. “Antioch. Even after you snagged your seat on the great rocking chair in the sky, you are still messing with me. Well done, my man, well done.”

  TH shifted, flexed, and stretched as much as he could. The nanocytes were working overtime. He was starting to feel more like his old self. Whatever they hit him with to get him into the pod, it was finally wearing off.

  “If you’re listening, Kirky-poo, I could use a drink of some agua fria. Being healthy will make your torture last so much longer. You don’t want me to die while you’re pleasuring yourself, do you?” Terry chuckled as he grabbed the chains and pulled, rocking back and forth, pulling, working at the eyebolts set into the wall.

  They didn’t move, but it looked like he had time. In the darkness, he strained against the chains. He flexed and pulled.

  Not bad for an eig
hty-five-year-old man, he thought. The cords of his thick muscles stood out along his arms and back. He grunted with the effort, but nothing moved.

  Not yet anyway.

  North Chicago

  Timmons ran into the motor pool. Resources were dwindling, but they were at the forefront of a second industrial revolution. The newest vehicles were better than a Model T, but the engineering was as simple. It was Timmons and Shonna’s design.

  They hadn’t had any problems with the engines and transmissions, but the tires were still giving them fits.

  Timmons looked at the newest four vehicles, which looked like an old Willys Jeep.

  Corporal Heitz leaned heavily on his cane as he limped forward to greet the engineer. First Sergeant Blevin joined him, walking gingerly but without help. The oldsters no longer ran the motor pool, but they had nowhere else to go, so they hung out and made life hell for the young mechanics.

  Timmons didn’t waste any time. “The colonel’s been taken by a mob of Forsaken. They took him away in an aircraft of some sort. Did any of you guys see anything?”

  “I’m lucky if I can see the sun rise,” Max Heitz responded coldly. “But if I sure as hell heard anything, I’d tell you. But I didn’t.”

  Blevin shook his head. The motor pool was on the other side of their community, opposite where Terry had been attacked.

  “We want to go,” Max stated, shuffling close to Timmons and looking up into his face. “On the rescue. You are going, right?”

  “We can’t get a hold of Akio, for some reason. I’m afraid we’re dead in the water, Max. We’re asking everyone if they saw anything. We don’t even know which direction they went when they flew away. We need to be able to start looking somewhere and we got nothing!” Timmons shared sadly.

  “Ain’t that a ballbuster? When you do go, we’re going, too. These babies will fit in those pods of yours. We can take one, haul our old carcasses around the battlefield. One last romp, eh, Blevin?”

  “One last romp,” the first sergeant repeated in an old voice.

  “Mount the fifty, Blevin. We’re going to war!” Max called in a freshly energized voice.