by J. X. Evans
“You passed, I guess.” She was one of those people which were always way too pessimistic about their performance. So the ‘you passed, I guess’ probably translated to at least an eight point five out of ten.
“Nice, thanks again for letting me glimpse the answers.” Mark said, having just finished rolling another cig, putting the tobacco back into his jacket’s pocket.
“Don’t mention it, no problem.” Christiana said and paused, “Can I bum one?” she asked, pointing with an index finger towards the cigarette, hanging from the corner of Mark’s mouth.
Mark stopped moving, staring at her for a second, and then he continued with a smile “Certainly…not!” Mark replied, lighting the thing up with his silver zippo decorated with a single magnum pistol on each face, Perry’s present to him for joining the team a couple of years back.
“Don’t be a jerk.” She said, crossing her arms, turning her body just lightly to one side. Though Mark knew that she detested the habit.
Mark exhaled a thick cloud of smoke, “I would be a jerk if I gave you one. These things are bad for you. They kill you and before they do that they make your life cooler. Eh I mean worse. Like with coughing and phlegm and the whole being out of breath thing.” He grabbed the cig between thumb and middle finger gesturing at it as if the slowly burning dried piece of plant inside the thin gluey paper had just kicked a sick puppy and stolen its blind homeless owner’s money.
“Oh, let me guess. Your alveoli and artery walls are inlayed with golden lining I suppose. Maybe you should treat yourself and your body with a little more respect. Don’t you think so you hypocrite?” She asked with a wry smile as if her masterplan to lure him into her trap was a raging success.
“Something like that. Let’s just say that I have superhuman healing factor, kind of like Wolverine. It kills me just a bit for the tiniest fraction, and then it doesn’t.” Mark said with a straight face. He enjoyed hinting to the fact that he was not your everyday human. It made him feel like he was not lying about it, even though everyone always took it for a joke. And of course, he never corrected them. The Knights were a secret organization, hidden even in ancient years. Even if people back then knew of their existence. Eventually people stopped believing in monsters, the rise in their civilization did much to push a lot of scary things out of people’s lives, and the Knights became less needed and faded from memory and scriptures. But the monsters and the danger they posed did not fade from existence, so neither did the Knights. Their relationship was one of eternal action and equal and opposite reaction. People could not know of the existence of the Order, they would be considered monsters themselves. They were considered monsters themselves. And after all, the current arrangement seemed to be working sufficiently enough. Why steer the bottom of a lake for no reason at all?
“AGH” Christiana sighed roughly, turning her gaze towards the quickly darkening sky in an involuntary response to Mark’s alleged expression of the complex of invincibility, so common among the young and the foolish alike; and Mark was young and foolish enough in her pretty blue eyes. “Also, they are not cool. They make you smell bad and saying that makes you sound like a jackass!”
“Eh, shame on you Chris.” Mark laughed and got off the bench. “So, want to go home?” he asked, gesturing with an open palm towards the outer gate of the university grounds.
Christiana seemed to think about it for a second “Hmm, I don’t know. I think I am kind of hungry. Do you want to grab a crepe or something?” she asked him, rubbing a small hand over her flat belly, a byproduct of years of ballet dancing and a relatively low net caloric intake.
“Girl, I know I am hungry. I always am. Make that crepe a gyros and you have yourself some high quality company.” Mark generally did not like life in Greece, but he freaking loved gyros, plus he had lived in France for sixteen years of his life, so eating crepes in any other place on earth seemed subpar. He was originally from England, but after he had finished basic training at the Order’s HQ in France two years ago, he had been placed in Greece since there was urgent need for the spot to be covered and most of his preferred destinations had no open seats. Not that they could not use the extra help, but there was a certain way things were done. At least Robert and Pericles were pretty good guys, he liked them. And he liked Sir Paws, and the whole deal with the café. But most of all he absolutely loved the food, and gyros most of all. Maybe he would open himself a grilling tavern if the accountant thing proved to be as much of a bore as he expected it to be. He would not even have to be in the place. Simply open and run the business and eat there for free. They did have management classes… maybe it was not such a bad idea. Maybe a franchise...
“I was in the mood for something sweet but since you put so much pressure on me.”
“Pressure?” Mark lifted an eyebrow.
“You said gyros!” Christiana chuckled and they started walking.
Mark opened the shop’s door and both of the hungry students walked in, the smell of cooking meat on the spit making their mouths watery. Mark took a deep inhalation of the salivating smell that was accompanied by a loud grumbling sound, originating from his stomach; the damn thing was always lusting to be filled whenever its friends, the nose and the brain, suggested there might be something even remotely edible in the nearby area. They sat at a table towards the back end of the room. They both preferred a measure of relative privacy from strangers, a golden line between empty and crowded. Also the grills and fires were making the small room too hot near the front area, but near the back the place had been warmed to an ideal temperature, for a cold winter afternoon especially.
Mark ate three gyros accompanied by a small bottle of regular coke, while Christiana ate only a lonely single one, while sipping from a small can of diet coke; freaking diet cokes thinking they are better than all other cokes. They ate and they talked, but they mostly ate. And by the time Mark was wolfing down his third one, Christianna was daintily munching the last fifth or so of her single one, pecking at it, chewing at an irritatingly slow pace. Mark finished his meal and wiped the bit of mustard that his tongue was not physically able to lick clean with a paper towel, his stomach purring approvingly in a manner that reminded him of a pleased Sir Paws, just as Christianna was pecking at the very last piece of the very last French fry remaining in the bottom of the paper that her meal was wrapped in.
They conversed a bit, while sipping at their soft drinks and when they decided to leave, the big round clock on the wall was signaling only five in the afternoon, but it was already dark outside. Mark insisted on paying for the meal, as a small token of gratitude for helping him cheat on a test once again. Christianna did not want to hear about it and would not let him pay at first, but in the end she caved in to his never-failing tactic of annoying nagging and furiously fast talking. Mark payed with the twenty euro note that he had found in his jacket’s pocket earlier today.
“Where do you put all that food?! It drives me mad, I am so jealous of boys and their stupid metabolism.” Christiana declared shortly after leaving the warm, delicious smelling shop and walking down the dark, cold, mildly windy streets of carbon dioxide smelling Athens.
“You make it sound as if I don’t have to work at all for it.” Mark worked for it, but he kind of had all the advantages.
“Yeah I know.”
“A rigorous training regimen and an above average height helps a lot to tell the truth. Shorty.” He said patting her on the back, smiling snidely. Christiana looked at him crossly. Like most short persons she did not appreciate short jokes, in the same way that most blondes do not appreciate blonde jokes and so on. Mark knew it was unimaginative to begin with and that it grows stale faster than a nice yellow banana grows overripe and black, but he liked teasing her a bit. And that was not even a joke, only a statement really, making the comment that much less appreciate worthy. Only a mean comment really.
They walked to the subway station and the train arrived shortly after. They got on the wagon and sat down, side by
side, sharing Mark’s earbuds in comfortable silence, waiting to reach their destination.
7. CAN’T GET WORSE
Zora’s day certainly could not get any worse, or at least she could not imagine it getting any worse. She woke up at 05:50 sharp, like always. She run the usual twelve kilometers around the large park near her home, tossing a couple of sprints in the mix as well, and she was done until 7:00. She had a nutritious fulfilling breakfast of eggs, sausage, yogurt and fruit. And like always, she was once again being held back from the action, treated like a fucking child, like a fragile little girl, as if she was still foolishly running around the playground with her fucking pigtails flapping in the wind without a care in the world.
She was expecting to finally go on her first real mission today. She was to investigate the mysterious deaths happening on and off for a couple of months in a little town in eastern Serbia, and she was so excited about it too. It was about time for some action, long past it actually. She had completed all the paperwork and done a more than strenuous amount of research from reports, old tomes and the Order’s electronic library. But no…of course not, she was instead tasked with a mission of utmost importance. Fly to Greece, retrieve the ‘rare specimen’ and drive it back to Serbia, from where it was to be transported to France for ‘extended research’. The ‘rare specimen’ could apparently not wait in the freezer for a couple more days. No, no, they had to solve the puzzle of the minotaur’s spell resistant hide today! They barely had enough clues from years and years of work and now they were going to do the big breakthrough.
No one can dispute the importance of research and preparation, it can be after all the difference between life and death, victory and defeat. Or so they told her since she herself had not been in the field yet, ten whole months after her graduation from basic training. Well she believed it of course! It was common sense that knowledge is power and preparation is key. Her grandmother (the captain of the Order for the Balkan region) and her father (an indisputably highly successful and respected member of the Order) always told her to hone her fighting skills, perfect her magic, learn her lore and her time for field duty was never far away; but if anyone would ever think to ask her, that time was long overdue. She had honed her skills, she had learned her magic, and she had studied her lore. She had done all that while she was top of her class for sixteen years straight in the academy, and she was still training, every day! She felt like a swimmer in a dessert and she did not see no Oasis in her general direction, she had the skills but not the chance to use them. She was so hungry for some action, she almost wished her flight would be hijacked, even by some regular criminal if need be.
They did not even tell her about the change of plans until the very last possible minute. The reception informed her when she went to report for the mission. At first she thought it a joke, then a misunderstanding, and later she saw that it was her that had misunderstood the situation. She had never considered herself as a ‘cheerful’ person but well…from that point on, she had been furious.
It took her most of the day to reach Greece. The plane landed in El. Venizelos airport at 17:30, it was actually cheaper to fly to Greece rather than drive there and it saved time on top of it all. Unfortunately the flight was as uneventful as a flight can get, normal takeoff and normal landing, the flight assistants and the passengers were polite and quiet, no crying babies and no problems with any luggage…highly irregular. She even sat next to a regular, normal sized, normal smelling, normal mannered man that nodded politely when he took his seat and then left her at piece. Not like anyone in their right minds would complain about that, but her mood was already kind of irritable to say the least and the, oh so calm environment, messed with her emotions at a cellular level. She did not even have any kind of trouble at the airport when she showed her exactly-like-the-real-thing-yet-as-fake-as-it-gets sky marshal identification card, courtesy of the connections of the Order. She just walked right past the airport security, handgun at her belt, twin daggers, and a couple of regular military grenades hidden behind the small of her back, under her jacket. No matter what you expect, always be prepared for something worse. No one hijacked the flight, but hope always dies last…the airport was not attacked either.
She picked up the preassigned vehicle from the airport’s parking lot. The keys were duct-taped on the area above the back left wheel. It was a refrigerator truck, white with a red line running all the way around it, loaded with the cover cargo of about ten carton-boxes of Greek yogurt from a company that regularly exported to Serbia. She opened the hood to check the engine and then checked under the car for signs of tinkering. When she did not find any, she got in the vehicle and put the key in the ignition. It smelled of cleaned up sweat and cigarettes mixed with cheap car freshener, on the spicy spectrum of flavors…something at least was not going as well as it could, but it was the wrong something.
She drove to the designated address, being constantly honked at whenever she dared to stop at a half erased pedestrian crossing to allow people to cross the street. It seemed to her that people should be more respectful of traffic code. People going the wrong way, speeding at orange traffic lights and crossing with red, double and sometimes even triple parking, people turning without using their blinkers…it was kind of irritating to say the least.
She parked the truck in an alley behind the old building, frowning at the apparent lack of security and the fact that the only department of the Order in the country was also a coffee shop of all things! Meaning there would be civilians going in and out of the place for a big part of each day, which could definitely be potentially dangerous for them and for the local Knights as well. It definitely stated irresponsible behavior on behalf of the local Order’s department head. No way would this not be included in her report. It was a shock to her that her grandma had allowed something like this to happen in a department that she had under her direct supervision.
Zora went around the perimeter twice, checking the surrounding area and she noticed nothing peculiar, apart from the lack of sufficient video cameras and other safety measures. There were only two video cameras, checking the front and the back exit of the building and nothing else that she could notice, if there even was anything else, which she doubted. The sky started to drip a little bit, and she entered the building through the main entrance. She opened the glass door, and a small bell chimed softly. Apparently there to inform the employees that a customer just walked in; or that someone or something walked in at least.
The place was empty, which was good. It was Monday afternoon and most people would be resting from the weekend’s socializing, but then again some people could not get enough of the thing. Dim lights were creating a relaxing atmosphere, glasses still on some of the tables and a beer jug was left on the pool table on the right lower corner of the room.
A large black shadow darted from the top of a bookcase in the left side of the room, and landed almost on top of her feet. She jumped to the right, turning around in midair to take a look at her assailant, drawing her long daggers from the small of her back. The shadow turned out to be an unusually large black feline that now stood watching her, eyes narrowed, head a little lowered and mouth hanging open. Sharp white claws were evidently protruding from his furry dark paws, the thing was ready for a fight. Zora returned her daggers to their original place, in their sheaths, at the back of her belt and stared annoyed at the cat, feeling foolish for having been ambushed by such a harmless fur-ball. She was expecting too much and she would get too little, like always. It is what logic dictated after all, simple courier missions like that simply do not go wrong, they don’t have complications and they are as straightforward as an arrow. But in her opinion, it was far better to feel a bit foolish for a little bit rather than ending up unable to feel a thing because you were dead. Also, in her defense, cats can be pretty sneaky little creatures. The cat sheathed his own little daggers and he contemptuously turned his head away from her and disappeared into a dark corner of the room, blending
in perfectly with his environment. Maybe he was offended by Zora’s reaction to his warm greeting leap, and now Zora felt kind of bad. ‘Who cares?’ Zora thought, ‘it’s a cat’, and simply like that she had stopped feeling guilty. At that moment the door behind the bar opened and bright, white light filled the dim room. A less than average sized man with short black hair and a meticulously trimmed beard entered the room. He was dressed in jeans and a stylish purple shirt and a red tie, he had the complexion of a man from the Mediterranean and was carrying a tray with a cloth on it.
“May I help you miss?” he asked in modern Greek, putting the tray on the bar and placing his hands on either side of it.
Zora did not understand the man, she did not know the language. She must have been looking weird, standing in the middle of the room, staring awkwardly at a dark corner “May I use the bathroom, please?” she responded in fluent English, without any trace of eastern European accent, pointing towards the back of the room with her left hand, performing a hand signal for recognizing fellow members of the Order. Private sign language was useful for a number of reasons, one of which was that one could communicate in public without the risk of alerting random people who happened to be nearby.
“A fellow Knight? Here for the minotaur’s body? We were not expecting someone so soon. I made the call to Serbia myself less than twenty four hours ago.” He responded in the official universal language of the Order, a slightly modernized version of Latin that every single one of them was fluent at, since for the sixteen years consisting the basic training in HQ this was the language used for every formal interaction between them.
“Yes, that is why I am here. You know how these things are, urgent.” A minotaur really was important but any dead piece of meat can remain in the freezer for a little bit, it was not as if they were expecting a minotaur infestation or something. She could now see even more clearly than ever before what a ridiculous excuse this was for her not to be assigned to a real task in the field, and she felt a fiery ball of anger in her gut once again…she was top of her class for sixteen years straight dammit, only to get a desk job and be shunned and held back by her overprotective family? Maybe in the end of the day she should have selected to be stationed somewhere else. Someplace she would have more authority and freedom, somewhere she would not need to worry about asking grandma for permission. Her face though betrayed nothing at all of this internal monologue.
