Darkest Before The Dawn

by Michael Anderle

William pursed his lips and enjoyed his new quarters. He was under so much rock that even the famed ArchAngel wasn’t going to be able to get down the long shafts and through the air-sealed chambers.

  He reviewed the schematics and knew that he probably was going to have to wait to get a couple more of his hidden exits dug out. However, he had enough right now for him to feel fairly comfortable.

  The team had brought down a table that would seat ten comfortably. The Duke tapped his fingers on it, thinking. Moments later, there was a knock.

  “Come in,” he said. Gerard stepped into the room and shut the door behind him.

  “We have news,” Gerard told him. William nodded.

  “There have been sightings of the ArchAngel, and rumors of him being the Dark Messiah. A ship landed in Frankfurt bearing his name. Our contacts in England have said that the blood-baggers have pulled together a team to try and capture him.”

  Gerard stopped speaking when the Duke started laughing. “They are going to try and capture Michael?”

  “Yes, their thought is to capture Michael, use his blood to ramp up, and then either capture or kill you.”

  “Peasants,” William spat. “Ignorant peasants. If I hadn’t needed those blood-baggers to keep down the vampire population, I would have killed them long ago.” He smiled. “But since this provides me an idea on how to lure Michael, I think I will hold off helping them and suffer with the knowledge that their deaths will support me in my endeavor to rule the world.” He sniffed. “I would have had to kill them sometime anyway.”

  “Yes, Your Grace,” Gerard replied.

  “We need a team of four mercenaries,” William told him.

  “Where would you like to meet them, sir?”

  “Here.”

  “Here?” Gerard’s eyes opened in surprise.

  “Well,” William waved a hand toward the ceiling, “up top. I want them to know where we are.”

  “May I ask why, sir?”

  “Yes, you may.” William smiled. “Because when they go to kill Michael, he will read the fact that these four have seen my face and where I was when I gave them the commands.” He stood up from the table. “Come, let me find my scientists and plan for the next phase of the project.”

  William opened the door and stepped through. Gerard had started closing the door when he asked his next question. “Did you find out how to turn on the power, sir?”

  “Yes,” William’s voice floated back down the large, man-made cutout tunnel, “but it isn’t something we have a lot of fuel to run.”

  Yokohama, Japan, Kashikoi’s Dojo

  Kashikoi returned to his seat, his back to the blacked-out windows on the street. Daylight streamed in from the skylights, softly lighting the space and the dust carried in the air.

  “Before you embark on this mission there are things you should know,” he told Yuko.

  Kashikoi’s tone was more serious than Yuko had ever heard it. She quietly sat back down on the cushion opposite him, and they waited for the last of the unconscious bodies to be cleared out of the dojo.

  The moment the door at the end of the training area closed, Kashikoi spoke again.

  “We know that there are a number of locations in China. When she had the pieces boxed up, she dispersed them across her realm so that they could never be used by someone who didn’t know their locations.”

  Yuko nodded, unsurprised, indicating to Kashikoi that this information was familiar to her—at least in principle, if not the details.

  Kashikoi continued, “Since then, what was left of the Chinese government has been trying to track these pieces down. They even tried to interrogate me at one point, thinking I had some knowledge of their whereabouts.”

  Yuko frowned, concerned. “But you didn’t?”

  Kashikoi carefully placed the stick he had been holding on the ground in front of him. “Not at the time.”

  “And now?”

  Kashikoi put his hands on his crossed legs. “Now I know that a map was made and the locations recorded. The Chinese government acquired this in the years following the WWDE.”

  Yuko’s breath became shallow as she listened intently to the Mysteries she had never been privy to.

  Kashikoi lowered his eyes to the floor in front of his crossed legs and cane. “We have since learned the rough areas of three of the pieces, but we haven’t the means to find the precise location or the resources to dig them up and protect them.” His thoughts drifted as he spoke. “Which is why we’ve merely maintained the knowledge.”

  Yuko raised her chin slightly, indicating her growing understanding.

  “The other challenge we face,” Kashikoi continued, “as I have always understood it, is that even with the pieces, being able to assemble and activate them would require knowledge of the Kurtherian language.”

  Yuko’s eyes glimmered with her secret, but she quickly lowered her eyes so as not to divulge what she knew. It wasn’t that she didn’t trust the old man. It was more that telling him would put him in danger. And the fewer the people who knew about the missing piece of the puzzle, the better chance they had at seeing this mission through to completion.

  She looked back up at him and saw he was studying her carefully. “It seems you have been holding knowledge of the Sacred Clan too,” he commented, hoping she would offer the information.

  “My friend,” she told him, her voice as even and respectful as ever, “there are things that we must keep from each other still if this mission is to be a success. Vallitseva tila,” she added, invoking the concept of maintaining the status quo for the good of all involved.

  Kashikoi nodded understandingly, although the boyish glee that had briefly inhabited his eyes was replaced with a mild disappointment. “Vallitseva tila.”

  Yuko felt the reversal of the tables in the information game and found herself wanting to share with her old sparring partner. However, circumstances made it impossible. “I suggest,” she offered instead, “that I return tomorrow for your chosen representatives to escort us on our mission. If you are in accord?”

  The old man agreed and bid her farewell until tomorrow. Yuko rose, bowed, and exited the training room, leaving the old man alone with his thoughts once more.

  France, the Duke’s Chalet

  Akio and Sabine found Michael in a large room, its ceilings twenty feet high. There was a long wooden table that had eighteen chairs around it. The one on the far end had a much larger back.

  Michael had pushed it back and was sitting on it with his feet on the table. There was a pile of papers on the table in front of him and he had a pair of round glasses perched on the tip of his nose.

  Akio snorted and Michael looked at him over the top of the glasses. “They are not prescription, merely decoration.”

  Sabine walked down the righthand side of the table opposite Akio, who had chosen the left. Michael turned his head and smiled. “I trust your target practice was adequate?”

  “Just barely,” she replied and pulled out the first chair to Michael’s left. She sat down, then considered her options and lifted the chair up to move it back. Finished with the chair, she placed one foot, then the other on the tabletop. “I take it we aren’t worried about messing up the furniture?”

  “Fuck it.” Michael turned back to his papers. “Since I don’t think this chalet will be here in a few hours, I’m sure I don’t mind a little breakage if you are feeling particularly vandalistic?”

  “This asshole,” she commented, looking at the numerous nice paintings on the walls, “has hurt a bunch of people. I’m thinking that destroying one of his hidey-holes will piss him off.”

  “Yesss,” Michael replied slowly, picking up one of the documents he had been reading. “I think it will annoy him to lose this residence, even though he is safely in another location. Anything to piss him off and push his buttons.”

  Sabine stood up and started walking back down the table, then stopped and turned around. “Are there any more traps?”

  Micha
el looked up and glanced over the glasses, a smile on his face. “There aren’t any more traps that I know of. But then, if you get blown up, the best I can give you is ‘oops.’”

  Sabine’s lips twisted, then she shrugged. “It isn’t like I’m not living on borrowed time right now anyway.” She turned and headed out of the large dining area. Moments later, they heard a loud crash from the front of the house.

  “I believe,” Akio commented, “that the bust of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart—”

  “An original,” Michael interrupted as he licked his thumb and removed a page, lifting it off his lap to set it upside-down on the table.”

  “The priceless bust of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart,” Akio amended, “is now in pieces.”

  “Irreparably destroyed, I do believe,” Michael agreed when they heard what sounded like a chunk of rock go crashing through fragile china.

  Akio smiled. “I fear we are turning her to the dark side.”

  Michael glanced over his glasses again, the small smirk on his lips telling Akio he was having fun playing with the spectacles. “Is she your first?”

  Akio’s eyebrows narrowed in confusion for a moment before relaxing. “Oh, you mean student.”

  “Yes,” Michael replied. “Why, what did you think I meant?”

  Akio waved him off. “Doesn’t matter DM,” Michael grunted and returned his attention to the paperwork in his lap. There was another crash, then what sounded like a rip.

  Michael spoke as his eyes scrolled down the page. “I think she just found the exquisite twelve-foot painting of Napolean. The last time I saw that painting it was on the wall in Versailles.”

  Another rip, then a crash.

  “There goes the gold-filigree frame,” Akio commented as a loud bang and more breakable plates and glasses crashed to the floor some distance away.

  Michael looked up, taking off the glasses and opening his coat to slide them into a pocket. “Tell me,” He scratched his leg, “you have the basic information to build Pods, but nothing that is going to help us go into space. Do I understand that correctly?”

  Akio pursed his lips. “Hai. We have the Pod technology to a large degree, but we don’t have anything I would trust to go to the moon and back too often. Although, remember I told you that Bethany Anne is supposed to be coming back.”

  “I understand that, Akio,” Michael replied, putting another piece of paper on the table as he reviewed the next document. “However, I am not going to wait around only to find out she ran into a problem.” His eyes glanced up, “Or she was late getting ready,” He looked back down. “Or she needed me, and I was still here on Earth, twiddling my thumbs waiting for a ride.” He moved another document to the table, putting the period on that discussion. “Back to my question about the technology. I sense a serenity inside you, so out with it. You have an idea,” Michael commanded.

  “The Sacred Clan has a ship.”

  “Spaceship?” Michael asked.

  “Yes,” Akio clarified. “A spaceship.”

  “But?” Michael asked, his eyebrows raised.

  “How did you know there was a ‘but?’”

  “There is always a ‘but’ involved; nothing can ever be easy. I’ve lived a long damned time, and anytime I thought I’d gotten out of a predicament without a ‘but,’ I just hadn’t looked hard enough.”

  Akio nodded toward Michael. “You are correct. The ship is in pieces.”

  Michael pursed his lips. “That doesn’t sound too bad.”

  “We don’t know where they are, exactly.”

  Michael raised an eyebrow. “How un-exactly do you know?”

  “They are within the area what we used to now as the country of China.”

  This time, Michael paused a moment before he finally asked. “The country? To be clear, you don’t know where the pieces are in the whole country?”

  “The pieces that matter are in at least five caches secreted by the Sacred Clan right before their future was destroyed.”

  Michael put up a hand. “Wait a minute,” he told him. “Are you telling me that they hid the parts of the spaceship that I now need almost two hundred years ago—”

  “Less than one-seventy,” Akio interjected.

  Michael ignored the clarification. “Right before the story you told me about Bethany Anne killing their Queen—”

  “Empress.”

  “Whatever.”

  Akio nodded. “She was a tad upset about your death.”

  Michael paused. “Did I receive a nice eulogy?” he asked, his eyes sparkling.

  “It caused people all over the world to shed tears,” Akio admitted. “Bethany Anne was very moving.”

  “Where was I buried?” Michael asked, amused to be talking about his own death and burial.

  “The sun,” Akio replied.

  Michael blinked a couple times. “The sun.” Akio nodded. Michael opened and shut his mouth a couple times. “The goddamn sun?”

  “She consigned your empty coffin, plus those of the others who perished, into the sun,” Akio repeated.

  Michael looked at the ceiling as if he could find answers there. “Remind me never to sleep in a coffin as a joke. I’d hate to be accidentally sent into the sun.”

  “It would hurt,” Akio agreed, and Michael chuckled.

  “Ok.” Michael moved the papers off his lap to the table and pulled his feet down to set them on the floor. They both could track Sabine by the continued sounds of destruction throughout the chalet.

  “I believe she is working out some anger.” Michael paused and thought for about ten seconds before he asked Akio, “Do you think she will lose her edge?”

  “For shooting?” Akio asked, and Michael nodded again. “No. I believe this is the worst we have to deal with. Sabine is not going back, no matter how much anger she gets off her chest.”

  The guys could hear female grunting as she struggled with something heavy. Both heads turned to look toward the other end of the room when they heard a grating of something heavy rubbing against the stair railing from the third floor. A moment later something slid off the rail. There was a humongous crash when a three-quarter-sized statue crashed to the marble floor outside the room. Some white dust blew in and Akio turned to look at Michael. “Donatello?”

  “I think so,” Michael concurred. “She is setting a new world record for ‘Most Priceless Objects Destroyed in a Single Afternoon.’”

  “I’m so proud,” Akio admitted and pantomimed wiping a tear from under his eye.

  Michael started chuckling. “You are getting the hang of humor.”

  Akio winked. “It is liberating.”

  “It can get you in trouble,” Michael told him. “And speaking of trouble, we have five pieces of an alien ship to find, then put together.”

  “Archangelsk.” Akio turned back to Michael. “Boris can help.”

  “Boris?” Michael flicked his eyes to the end of the room when he heard Sabine yell in frustration, then returned them to Akio. “He has the knowledge to put the ship together?

  “No, Lilith does,” Akio answered.

  “I’m fuzzy here.”

  “Lilith is a Kurtherian brain inside a computer.”

  “Another one?” Michael searched his mind. “I seem to remember…”

  Akio shook his head. “No, that was ADAM using a Kurtherian brain. So, not a Kurtherian brain inside a computer, but rather the opposite.”

  “True.”

  Michael held up a finger. “So if we find the major ship components, we know someone who can help put them together and probably help figure out how to fly it.”

  “Assuming the parts exist and they work.” Akio agreed.

  “Well, yes.” Michael shrugged. “If they don’t, we will create a company to R&D the technology.” He looked at Akio, his eyes granite-hard. “I will get back to Bethany Anne. I made a promise on my honor.”

  Akio bowed his head in understanding. “Hai.”

  “That leaves us needing people, resources, and
know-how to build the spaceship. Do we go to Japan for them?

  “They are the most advanced for the job, but I have issues with them.”

  “Such as?” Michael leaned forward and started moving the papers into an organized pile.

  “They are the most advanced and skilled people for the job. The issue is security.”

  Michael’s eyes went flint-black.

  Akio held up a hand. “The problem is that Japan is the most advanced, which was Bethany Anne’s point. She wanted a country that was mostly intact.”

  “So, the problem?”

  “They are the most advanced in stealing secrets as well,” Akio admitted, looking sheepish.

  “They are human, what do you expect?” Michael asked, knowing full well that Akio was asking the whole country to step up to his romantically remembered version of his people. “Never mind, I see it in your eyes.” Akio just shrugged. “You have been through the end of the world, Akio,” Michael pointed out, “so you have endured the worst that humanity has ever dealt with, excluding perhaps the last Ice Age.”

  “My people didn’t change for centuries.”

  “Yes, but for as long as I have known them, a sense of self-importance was always a temptation just below the surface.” Michael chuckled. “The Japanese have always been the elves in my version of European myths.”

  Akio’s eyes narrowed.

  “No, really.” Michael leaned forward. “Think about it. You have the body build, the long hair, and if we bleached your skin…”

  Akio made a face, but Michael spoke right over it. “If you had blond hair and pointed ears, with your personalities, you would fit right in with elves.”

  “I have no idea if you are being serious or playing.” Akio grumbled.

  Michael leaned back. “I guess you will have to figure it out.” He turned and grabbed the top few pages from the pile on the table. “So you are saying we need to use Japanese labor, but not be on Japanese land?”

  Akio pursed his lips and nodded. “Hai.”

  “Ok.” Michael looked in the direction Sabine had departed. “I don’t hear much in the way of destruction.”

  Akio stood up. “I’ll see if she has worked it out of her system.”