Allie's War Early Years

by JC Andrijeski

  Terian nodded. His amber eyes held a flicker of sympathy now, even as he stepped forward, stubbing the hiri he’d been smoking out in a heavy, glass ashtray.

  “Revi’, my friend,” he said. “Can I pour you a drink?”

  “No,” Revik said, making the negative sign with his hand. “No. Let’s just do this.”

  Raven’s voice burst out, as if she’d been restraining herself up until then.

  “You’re not just going to kill her, Dags!” Raven said angrily. “You heard what Galaith said!”

  Revik gave her a hard look.

  “Are you ordering me to rape her, first, Elan?” he asked coldly.

  Raven’s eyes glinted with fury. “You know that’s what he meant! He wants you to get past this, Dehgoies! Not whine about it like an adolescent girl for months on end... looking for other seers to blow you who happen to look like her!”

  “And raping her will ‘fix’ me. Is that it, Ray?”

  “You’ve been had,” she snapped. “Will you just get it through your head... this whole thing was a set-up. Just fucking admit it to yourself! Fuck her a few times so you can see her for what she really is... and so you can let it go.”

  He stared at her incredulously, feeling a fury in his chest that made it hard to think.

  “Dehgoies,” she said. “It happens to the best of us, okay? Even you, with all of your so-called worldly cynicism, can get scammed. Welcome to the damned club...”

  Revik felt his jaw tighten more.

  He opened his mouth to speak, then didn’t.

  “This is just about your pride!” Raven snapped. “You thought you were doing the hunting, and you got hunted, Dags. Just admit it, and stop being such a fucking baby. Or do you still believe that wide-eyed, innocent, kneeler crap she’s been using to pull on you... ?”

  Revik felt his anger flare abruptly, faster than he could stop it.

  “She has a mate, Raven,” he snapped. “Considering he could very well die when we kill her, we could at least do him the courtesy of not violating her, first...”

  “A little late for that,” Raven said coldly.

  Hearing her words, he stared at her, feeling that sickness in his stomach rear back up when the indifferent look solidified in her eyes. He looked at Terian, but the male seer only shifted his gaze away, bringing the glass of beer he held to his well-formed lips.

  “And by the way... bullshit, she has a mate!” Raven added scornfully. “What, she told you that, too? You really are a easy mark, Dags. You should be embarrassed of yourself...”

  “I have eyes,” Dehgoies snapped. He motioned vaguely over his own head, glaring at her. “Or did you really not see the telltale... in all of your infinite fucking wisdom, Ray?”

  Raven threw up her hands. “What makes you think that wasn’t part of her scam, you idiot? What makes you think that telltale was even real... ?”

  Stepping between them, Terian motioned sharply for Raven to be silent.

  A more conflicted concern touched his eyes as he looked back at Revik.

  “Leave him alone, Ray,” he murmured dismissively, without taking his eyes off the other male. “He was right about one thing. You are jealous. It’s making you act like a complete asshole...”

  “Fuck you, Terry...” she snapped.

  “I’d rather not,” the other seer said, giving her a harder smile over his shoulder. He looked back at Revik, that intent scrutiny back in his eyes. “Revi’, are you all right? We can help you, you know... with any part of it. You must know he’s right. This isn’t your fault...”

  “I’m not raping her,” Revik said, his voice low.

  Raven clicked at him sharply from behind Terian’s back.

  Terian held up a hand, not looking at her. “No one said you had to, my friend... certainly not me.”

  Revik frowned at the floor, but didn’t meet that amber gaze.

  After another pause, he shook his head, once.

  “Fine,” he said, blunt. “Let’s do this.” He glared at Raven then, his voice cold. “By the way. You and me? We’re finished, darling.”

  “What?” She stared at him, her turquoise eyes holding a disbelieving fury.

  “You heard Galaith. I’m leaving. Tonight. Without you.”

  “What makes you think I would––”

  “...If you try climbing into my bed again,” he added, cutting her off without a second thought. “I might just break something of yours... take that as your one and only warning.” His voice grew colder. “You’ll just have to find some other sucker to ride to the top of the Pyramid, Ray. Because you’re wrong. Sometimes I really do know when I’m being hunted.”

  Without looking at her again, he aimed his feet towards the bedroom door.

  He walked around the table covered by two bags of drugs and a broken mirror to get there, then reached for the door handle in a few more strides, jerking it open without preamble. He stepped into the darkened interior of the ripped up suite bedroom, not pausing to turn on the light as he swung the wooden panel inward, and gazed around.

  He just wanted this done.

  IT TOOK A few seconds for his eyes to adjust.

  He saw her then, and in the same set of seconds, he felt her light. Staring down at her, he felt his heart start to thud sharply against the bones of his chest. It happened without warning, without logic, almost before he could make sense of what he was looking at.

  They’d collared her, which might have been why he didn’t feel her right away.

  She knelt there, her hands and arms tied behind her back, her ankles bound with rope, a dirty rag tied over her mouth and pinning her long, dark, curled hair to the sides of her face. Her green eyes widened as she stared up at him, and she was completely naked, her breasts moving under heaving breaths as he felt the first pulses of her fear.

  He was hard in about two seconds.

  He was barely able to look at her once he was.

  Pain slid through his light in a sharp wave, cutting his breath, making his skin hot almost before his mind could catch up. He forced himself to look at her again, to meet her gaze, but at the look there, he flinched again, stepping back somewhat, even as he tried to force his brain to work, to remember why he was there. He was still standing there, unmoving, when Terian and Raven entered the room behind him.

  “Gods,” Raven muttered angrily. “Look at him... he’s about to have a coronary.” Turning to Terian with an angry toss of her head, she said. “Fifty US says he fucks her in the next five minutes...”

  “No,” Terian said, still watching Revik’s face warily. “No, I won’t take that bet, my friend...”

  Raven snorted, folding her arms. Fury exuded from her light.

  “I wouldn’t, either,” she said.

  Revik swallowed. He took a step towards the female with the green eyes, and away from the other two seers. Hesitating another second or two, he abruptly and smoothly bent his legs, so that he squatted roughly eye to eye with her. He winced slightly as he did it, conscious again of the pain that tugged at his light, at the erection that strained his pants.

  Studying her face for a few seconds, he cleared his throat.

  “Who sent you here?” he said.

  She shook her head.

  He felt her wanting him in her mind, to let her speak to him that way. She couldn’t do it from her side, not while wearing the collar.

  He stared at the gag in her mouth, the collar around her neck... then back down at her body. He found himself looking at specifics that time, including the bruises on her arms and her stomach and chest, blood drying from a cut on her thigh and at the edges of her mouth. Staring down at her breasts, he let his gaze trail below them, to the flat planes and muscles of her stomach which jerked and clenched at each breath. He felt his throat contract in a swallow.

  The pain worsened briefly, sharply, right before he averted his gaze.

  He couldn’t escape her light, though. He couldn’t.

  He found himself drowning in it, even w
hen he tried to keep his distance, to remind himself what he was doing here, what he had to do. He fought to shield, to keep her away from his aleimi altogether, but some part of himself kept letting her back in, tugging her into him, pulling her closer. He felt her fear as a tangible force, but not really for herself.

  He felt her fear for her unborn child.

  He felt her fear for her mate.

  Uye, he thought at her impulsively. His name is Uye?

  Yes, she sent, her thoughts trembling with pain. Yes, please... we are bonded. Please, if you kill me, he will die. Do not hurt him, please brother, please––

  But he shut her out, unable to hear that, either.

  He saw her wince from the collar as she tried to reach him, but blocked that too, staring down at her knees, seeing the bruises on them where she knelt on a rug on the hardwood floor.

  He didn’t want to ask her if they’d hurt her. He could see that they had.

  Feeling that harder pain pulse in his head once more, he closed his eyes.

  Dehgoies.

  Revik felt Galaith there, a warmth in his heart, reassurance.

  Dehgoies, my friend... it is all right. You do not have to hate her to do this.

  How can I not? Revik asked him, soft.

  She is probably a pawn... and thus a victim, too. But you cannot allow them to use her against you again... or against our cause. You must see her as a weapon, my friend, perhaps one not even wielded by her own will...

  Revik shook his head, fighting with what he felt in the other’s light, fighting what he felt on Galaith, on the woman with the green eyes, on Raven and Terian behind him.

  The pain worsened in him, even as the familiarity deepened. He found himself remembering what the woman herself had said, about how it wasn’t really her he was reacting to at all. That it was something else... someone else. Someone that the woman had reconnected him to, from that place beyond the Barrier.

  Her daughter.

  He would never meet that person, if he did this.

  The pain in his throat worsened. He found himself staring at the woman with the green eyes, fighting to see the face that wanted to emerge from the delicate planes of hers.

  Yes, she thought at him, when he again entered her mind. Yes... you see her. You know her, don’t you, Revik? You know her.

  He wanted to shake his head. He wanted to, but he found himself nodding instead.

  You know her, she sent, relieved. Tears ran down her face, clouding those green eyes, dampening the rag that cut into the sides of her lips. Oh, brother... please hear me on this. She loves you so much. I have felt this on her, again and again. She loves you... do not turn your back on her...

  Revik didn’t answer, he couldn’t.

  Even so, when he felt Galaith that time, hovering over his light, he found himself pushing the other man away. In the same set of seconds, he reached inside the faded military jacket he wore, fingering and then grasping the smooth handle of the gun that hung there, snug inside a leather shoulder holster. A Sig Saur 220, he’d had it for years, since the end of the last war, and the handle was worn smooth by his own fingers.

  He pulled it out, his mind utterly blank now.

  The woman in front of him saw it, and her eyes widened again. He felt her fear, even her acceptance, right before he climbed slowly back to his feet.

  He still wasn’t thinking anything when he stepped back, firing four shots, with barely a space between them.

  Only after he had, and stood blinking over Terian and Raven, both of whom lay on the hardwood floor, clutching wounds in their legs and shoulders, did he realize what he’d done.

  Terian only gasped, looking up at him, a shocked expression on his face.

  “Revi’...” he said, fighting to breathe. “Revi’...”

  Raven was less quiet in her appraisal of the situation.

  “You piece of shit!” Raven screeched, gripping her thigh, where blood already pooled around her fingers. “You shot me! You cocksucker! You fucking shot me!”

  Revik didn’t think.

  Using his light, he cut her quickly from the network, something he could do since she technically fell under him within the hierarchy.

  After scarcely a hesitation, he did the same to Terian.

  Once Raven and Terian were both free of the Pyramid, Revik knocked them out.

  Swiftly, and still without speaking.

  They both lay on the floor then, bleeding.

  Even unconscious, he felt their pain at the disconnection, and a harder, more intense reaction from Galaith somewhere in the background. Forcing up a wall between himself and the rest of the Org’s network, Revik realized he didn’t have much time.

  Galaith would have other operatives in Vietnam. A lot of them.

  He kept the gun out while he initially stood over them, checking them carefully with his light before he got too close. Then he re-holstered the Sig, kneeling beside Terian first. After checking the bullet wound in the other seer’s shoulder, he felt over the one on his thigh, frowning to himself, even though he was reasonably sure he’d missed any major arteries. Even so, he unbuckled the other seer’s belt, lifting him up to tug the strap of leather from around his waist. Once he got it free, Revik hooked the belt around Terian’s upper thigh, and cinched it as tight as he could, to cut off the flow of blood to the bullet hole the Sig’s 9mm rounds had left. Checking it a few times, he looked at Terian’s face, which had tightened in pain, paling to the color of chalk.

  “I’m sorry, old friend,” he told him.

  Rising to his feet, he walked to Raven, repeating the exercise, although he used his own belt that time. Making sure he’d tightened it enough to keep her from bleeding out on the floor, he moved away from her moments later, that time without speaking at all.

  Approaching the woman with the green eyes, he reached into his back pocket long enough to pull out a square knife in a hard, enamel cover. Flipping it open, he knelt behind the woman’s back, and began sawing through her the rope that held her wrists together.

  “I’m getting you out of here,” he told her roughly.

  That time, he didn’t look at her body at all.

  HE GOT HER to the river via a jeep he hijacked from a passing military convoy.

  Using his real rank within the United States military, rather than pushing the man from the Barrier like he normally would have done, and where it would be seen by Galaith, Revik got the driver to stop for them on the road. He then loaded the woman into the back and pulled himself into the front seat, next to the driver.

  He’d put on his uniform before he left the suite, which helped.

  He had the woman dressed in Raven’s clothes, so she looked more like a civilian contractor. Or perhaps a diplomat from some other country.

  Her name was Kali, she told him.

  Revik shielded his own light without letting the shield cause a flare into the Barrier itself. On the edges of his aleimi, he felt the woman, Kali, doing the same. Both of them had been staying out of the Barrier from the moment Revik dropped Terian and Raven to the floor of the hotel suite, and now he did his best to shield the human driver’s light, as well, hoping Galaith wouldn’t notice that the convoy had slowed, or that the driver was now talking to someone who, from the Barrier, didn’t appear to be there at all.

  Unlike humans, seers who weren’t actively in the Barrier were invisible from there.

  Luckily, the driver himself didn’t seem overly curious.

  He chatted to Revik about the heat, about the rumors of the protest that were coming that afternoon, about missing Halloween back home, and the fact that they’d been called over to the embassy to make sure things didn’t get out of hand after three o’clock. He talked to him about being hung over, about rumors that the Russians were planning bombing runs on South Vietnam, that the Kremlin was trying to provoke the Americans into doing something that would threaten the fragile balance of the cold war between the two superpowers.

  Revik only half-listened
to him.

  His eyes remained riveted out the window, staring at the line of boats along the river, watching as they transformed from pleasure boats to American military to commercial fishing boats to the smaller, local variety. After a few more clicks down the dusty road, Revik asked the driver to let them off. He helped Kali out from the back, since she was still moving pretty shakily and obviously still in pain, but still didn’t really look at her.

  His light had calmed finally, though.

  Seemingly from the moment he made up his mind, some distance had been inserted between himself and the green-eyed woman. Some part of him almost seemed to understand what he felt from her now, and even to not make it about her.

  He didn’t bother to tell her that, though.

  Instead, he stared out over the water as they walked, swiftly, towards the local docks.

  “Don’t tell me where you’re going,” he said, his voice a near growl. “...Stay away from anywhere with Americans. That means Manila, Bangkok... Singapore...”

  She gestured her understanding, her mouth tight with concentration, and likely physical pain.

  “I understand,” she said. She caught his arm then, forcing him to look down at her. “Brother Revik... you must do me a favor, too.”

  “What?” he said, barely hearing her as he scanned the pier for available boats.

  “Do not tell her about me. When you meet her. Do not tell her of this...”

  Revik turned at that, momentarily forgetting the boats. “Why would I need to tell her anything? You’re her mother, right?”

  “Just promise me that you won’t,” she said, her voice firm.

  After a pause where he just looked at her, he nodded, making the gesture for a formal promise with one hand. “I vow it,” he said.

  “Where will you go?” she asked him.

  “I’m not telling you that, either...” He hesitated then, looking at her again. “...But I have a feeling you already know. I’m hoping they follow me, anyway... not you. I have a feeling they will follow me, especially Galaith, but for the love of the gods, sister... don’t be stupid. Stay out of the Barrier until you’re well away from here...”

  She smiled at him, and he felt a pulse of warmth from her, so strong that it briefly stopped his breath, fluttering his heart in his throat.