by A. L. Knorr
“Exactly.” All eyes turned to Stewart, who frowned.
I stood outside the ring of armed men, not sure of protocol, much less what insight I could offer. Everything just looked like slaughter to me.
“Ms Bashir?” Stewart looked at me. “What do you make of it?”
Expectant stares pressed down on me. Swallowing roughly, I forced myself not to look at a patch where flies seethed, droning cheerily to one another. “Whatever happened here, it wasn’t Sark.”
“No?”
The question was asked without malice or accusation, but it wrong-footed me all the same.
“The uh … the bodies,” I gulped. “They’ve been shot. Sark wouldn’t need guns, and it probably would have been, uh … messier.”
Stewart’s team looked around pointedly, something like respect glinting in their steely looks.
“Damn place is messy enough,” one of them said.
“So what exactly happened here?” Stewart frowned, putting his hands on his hips. “The conflict looks internal, not external.”
A few of the team nodded, but my brow creased in confusion.
“I’m not following, sir,” I confessed.
“It’s Sergeant, Ms Bashir,” he said in a slow, frosty tone. “I actually work for a living.”
The significance of this invisible line of courtesy was beyond me, but I dipped my head in respectful acknowledgement.
“My apologies, Sergeant. Can you help me understand what you meant by internal?”
Stewart opened his mouth, but my earpiece gave a warning click before a sharp voice came over the line.
“Sarge, got a zed here, second floor.”
“Confirmed, on my way.” He moved toward a narrow set of stairs in the back of the room. “Let’s hope for answers.”
I watched him go, wondering if I was supposed to wait here or head back to the front room, when he glowered back at me.
“Double time, Ms Bashir, if you please,” the sergeant barked, pointing up the stairs. “Or the poor bastard will be dead before we get there.”
I didn’t miss the smirks on the team’s faces, but Stewart was a teddy bear compared to Adrian Shelton. Head up and my stride measured, I moved to the stairs.
The second storey was a single square room with large windows centred on each wall. There were two bodies by the southern window, one of the corpses maintaining a rictus grip on the lip of the windowsill.
Another form lay near the centre of the room where a member of security stood, weapon pointed down. Two tables fitted into an L shape stood behind the pair, bowing under the weight of monitors, computer towers, and printer-scanners. Scattered among the tangle of requisite wires and cords were several mobile phones, from modern smartphones to something that looked like a brick with an antenna attached. All was in disarray, and as we drew closer, I could see that they were covered in blood.
“Been secured?” Stewart paused two strides from the body.
“Yes, Sarge.” A soldier inched back from the prone form, a woman in a khaki romper and hiking boots. “She took a few, then hit her head when she fell.”
Three roses of blood bloomed on her chest. Her skin was washed out and waxy, in stark contrast to the pink stains smeared down one corner of her mouth. Her lifeless eyes contemplated the ceiling, and despite knowing the kind of people she worked for, I wondered who this woman was and what her life could have been if she hadn’t been shot.
“What makes her a ‘zed’?” I asked, doing my best to say the word just as I’d heard it.
The woman’s corpse gave a rattling cough, frothing at the corner of her mouth before the eyes slowly swung toward my face.
I lurched backward, heart bursting into a gallop, my rings raised in defence.
“That,” Stewart snorted, pleased. He squatted next to the mostly-dead woman, snapping his fingers to draw her gaze.
“What happened?” he asked in a soft, neutral voice.
The woman’s mouth worked a few times, strange clicking and sucking sounds issuing forth. She took a slow breath and coughed again, this time hard enough to twist herself onto her left shoulder. Stewart slid back a step, while the soldier moved forward, but the only danger was the woman smearing the sergeant’s boots as she retched and hacked.
She fell back, chest heaving one shuddering breath after another. She was still looking at Stewart, but her eyelids had slid to half-mast.
Stewart frowned and was halfway through repeating his question when her lips twisted into a lopsided smile.
“The beginning,” she wheezed, her voice low. “We are the first martyrs of the new age.”
Stewart looked at me, eyebrow raised in question, but I barely managed to shrug. Something compelling and disturbing glimmered in the woman’s fading gaze.
“Do you work for Winterthür?” Stewart asked.
A smile spread across the woman’s features, all the more ethereal for her unnatural pallor. Her gaze wandered back to the ceiling, and for a long moment, I thought she’d breathed her last.
“I am a slave no more!” she gasped, her neck arching as her body trembled. “I’ve been set free.”
Stewart’s scowl deepened, but when he spoke, his voice was the same gentle prodding.
“Who set you free?”
She looked past Stewart, her neck craning with an unsettling, almost puppet-like motion, to look directly at me. The smile widened maniacally until I thought her face might split. I recognised the look in her eyes now and something icy slid into my belly. This was fanaticism. The woman was a zealot.
“The Untarnished King,” she croaked. “He who was and He who has come again!”
Every hair on the back of my neck stood on end, and gooseflesh rippled across my arms despite the stuffy air. I wanted to run, to hide, but I stood transfixed by the madwoman’s dying stare.
“Ninurta returns, and He will make all things new! We have begun the holy work, but He will see it done. Those who stand in the way will join the forgotten dead!”
Two
“What is that supposed to mean?” Jody Marks crossed her arms as she stood next to the window overlooking the bustling Thames. “Aside from the apocalyptic theatrics.”
We’d left the smell of death in Morocco but the sense of impending dread in London was as potent as ever.
Stewart and I shared a look, his shoulders rising in a fractional shrug before he gave me an even slighter nod.
Thanks for the support, soldier.
“Do you want my best guess or only what we are certain of?” I shifted my weight and crossed my arms. “Because one slaughterhouse in Fes hardly seems like conclusive evidence of anything.”
Marks gave me a measured look, the reflected light of the city and water turning her grey hair into a silver crown. I returned the stare, feeling a prickle of disquiet along my spine. Was I being insubordinate? Did I care? So far, there was no clear-cut hierarchy, just Marks offering to let me be a part of things and me taking every opportunity she offered. We had yet to determine if we were allies or if I was an employee.
“Whatever you feel appropriate, Ms Bashir.” There was no challenge in her voice, but her watchful gaze never faltered.
Marks may have swooped in to save us when Daria came knocking at Museum Station, but neither of us were operating under the illusion that she didn’t have an angle. The question I still hadn’t answered was exactly what that angle was.
“My best guess is that in some form, Ninurta has woken,” I said. “That kind of fanaticism is one hundred percent cult of personality, and you can’t have that without a person to rally around. Some are falling in line, some aren’t, and that’s causing … issues.”
I remembered the buzz of flies and the smell of blood and had to repress a shudder.
Stewart’s gaze shifted to me.
“What do yeh mean, ‘in some form’?” His Highland accent was much thicker outside of the clipped communication in the field.
“They need a person, but that doesn�
�t mean Ninurta has physically woken up. Kezsarak could attack me in dreams, and he was imprisoned, so I can only imagine what a being as powerful as Ninurta could do. Possess a host, send out his spirit, who knows? I’m just saying his mummified body doesn’t need to be shuffling around for him to be a threat.”
“Clearly,” Stewart grunted, his expression incredulous.
I shook my head, hands raised, as I fought to keep irritation out of my voice.
“I’m not an expert in this stuff.” I pushed aside a pang as I remembered the one who was. “Just keeping our perspective broad, as it were.”
Marks nodded before turning smartly and taking three long-legged strides to her desk. She didn’t sit but bent to tap a few keys on her keyboard then swipe at her computer.
“Either way,” she said as she straightened. “It would appear that the Group of Winterthür’s operations are highly vulnerable at the moment, an opportunity we can’t waste. We took the intelligence you brought about Iraq and combined it with some operational data collections to come up with your next target. A brief is waiting in your ops folders for review.”
Stewart nodded, but I found myself confused.
“What ‘operations folder’?”
“That is something we need to talk about,” Marks said as she came around to the front of her desk. “However, I don’t think the sergeant needs to be here for that conversation.”
She nodded to Stewart, who gave a curt “Ma’am” to both of us before literally marching out of the office.
“If that man ever smiled, I think his whole face might crack,” Marks observed, eyes twinkling as she watched the old soldier depart. We shared a half-hearted laugh, a failed attempt to defuse the growing tension. There was a drawn-out moment as she studied me, and I did my best to look determined to wait her out.
She spoke the second before I cracked.
“Our relationship thus far has been … vague.” She leaned back on the front of her desk. “While I am eager to continue working with you, the reality is that I am part of an organisation, a hierarchy, and your role within that framework remains undefined.”
We were on the same wavelength after all.
“I thought we were allies.” My fists slid to my hips. “Partners in the fight against Winterthür.”
Marks nodded. “Ally? Partner?” Her manicured nails drummed against the desk. “Yes, but unfortunately, The Nakesh Corporation needs something more official, more concrete.”
On some clerical instinct, my gaze slid under her arm to spy an open folder where pages of typed text sat with tell-tale signature lines stretching along the bottom of the paper.
“A contract?”
“Yes.” Her eyes intent, her tenor unruffled. “A contract to secure your position and protection as an employee of The Nakesh Corporation. It would not change the objective, hunting Ninurta and the Group of Winterthür, just connect you more distinctly to the organisation.”
I kept my face neutral, though an intense curiosity to read the document surged to the fore.
She drew the folder together with one hand then held it out. “Please, peruse what we am offering you and consider what we could accomplish together. I understand a lot has happened already, but we are quick to retain the services of fantastically talented people. After all, Nakesh does present an extraordinary threat. Having extraordinary people is the solution.”
I took the papers, feeling her eyes on me. “May I ask a few questions?”
“Of course.” Marks broke eye contact as she moved to slide into her chair behind the desk. “Though I imagine some of your questions may be answered by what is in that folder.”
I laid my hands flat against the heavy, smooth stock, weighing my words carefully.
“TNC is a multinational organisation that combats a cabal of occult villains in a secret war worthy of a comic book.” I hoped the comparison didn’t strike her as crass. “Isn’t legal paperwork … I don’t know … mundane?”
Marks steepled her fingers.
“The Nakesh Corporation may be part of the fight to save the world, but we still have to file taxes, compensate our employees, and manage workplace conflicts. For such mundane realities, mundane paperwork helps the machine run smoothly. After all, that is why the bloody stuff was created in the first place.” She smiled.
Fair enough, but the minutiae of how to fund a corporation who spent its time and assets saving an ignorant world niggled at me. I set that concern aside for the moment and chose to use her words as a springboard to my next question.
“Speaking of employees and workplace conflicts,” my stomach twisted a little as I watched for her reaction, “Will I be an employee of TNC, and if so, do I answer to you?”
Marks nodded slightly, as though working her way toward a conclusion.
“Yes. And, after a fashion, yes.” Her tone was disarmingly matter of fact. “You would be an employee and operative of TNC, holding a generously compensated position. Again, read the contract.”
The folder suddenly seemed heavier and I had an itch in my fingers to see exactly what well compensated meant. I beat the urge back by doubling down on the remainder of my question.
“How would I be answering to you “after a fashion”?”
The steepled fingers intertwined and folded into a delicate collection of polished nails and well-moisturised knuckles.
“Every one of our operatives functions under strategic fiat and tactical fidelity. You choose the missions you participate in, but once a mission has commenced you must adhere to the methods and dictates of your superiors. This ensures two things: that our operatives only take missions they’re invested in and there is a clear chain of command. As the Director of Operations in this region, I am the one holding that chain.”
This seemed reasonable, and better than what most would have expected, but I couldn’t escape the reality of what she was talking about.
“So once I sign this, any mission we execute together, I’m on your leash?”
Marks’ eyes tightened, but then she threw me a dazzling smile and gave a short laugh.
“Very clever, Ms Bashir. I prefer to think of myself as a coordinator. I am here to make sure the best people for the job are where they need to be so that things get accomplished and everyone comes home safe. If that takes exercising authority, it’s a small price to pay.”
I was having a hard time not being impressed by the smooth and sensible responses Marks was offering, but I felt certain this next question was going to be the linchpin.
“What happens if I don’t want to sign?” I punctuated the question with a sharp tap on the folder.
Marks looked me in the eye for another uncomfortable collection of seconds before settling back in her chair.
“Besides my personal grief and sense of failure?” She shook her head to dispel the rhetorical flourish. “Immediately, nothing. You are welcome to stay in our facilities until your uncle and Ms Davies can be transferred to a long-term care facility, then we will provide you with transportation to wherever you would like to go.”
“And would I then be an enemy of TNC?”
“Of course not.” There was a hint of reproof in her tone. “You would be welcome to come back if you had a change of heart, but even if you never did, no one in the Corporation would bear you any ill will.”
Marks shook her head, another tight but knowing smile playing at her lips.
“We have enough enemies without making new ones of old allies.”
I searched her face for deception but came up empty.
“So you’d let us go?” I was openly credulous in a desperate hope to reveal some dark agenda. “Just like that?”
Marks nodded slowly and gave me what was perhaps the most sincere look of pity I’ve ever received.
“Yes, Ibby.” Her tone was gentle, but insistent. “It is not what we want, but as I said, we have enough work without going after those who share our interests. You are not our enemy, and we will only ever treat you with
respect, but let me request that you consider one thing.”
I waited for it.
“How well things were going in your war against Ninurta and Winterthür before we showed up.”
Three
“She’s not wrong.” I sank back in the chair as I held Jackie’s hand.
Her fingers were cold and limp in my grip, gone was the warm strength she’d always had.
During every visit I took her hand and spoke to her, told her whatever was on my mind. I wanted her to know that she wasn’t alone. My habit of talking out my worries and woes with my best friend wouldn’t be broken, even if she were in a coma. I chose to believe she knew I was with her, understood me, felt my presence.
“I know it doesn’t do any good to play what-if, but I can’t help thinking that you wouldn’t be like this if we’d met them earlier. If they’d showed up before we went to Pierre’s manor, or even before Sark … you wouldn’t be … well, it would have been different.”
The ventilator hissed and puffed in time with the rise and fall of her chest. Tubes sprang from her mouth and nose. IVs ran from her hands and wires connected the pads speckling her chest beneath the hospital gown. Machines gave incremental chirps as numbers and codes blinked from screens. My friend seemed less a singular person than a biomechanical ecosystem, her body the central host to a plethora of electronic fauna.
“Regardless,” I swallowed around the lump in my throat, “getting rescued last-minute is one thing, but signing up with Marks is another. The woman is formidable. If you could get over your suspicion of new people, you might even like her.”
The trauma and blood loss from Jackie’s injuries had been extensive, and though the facilities in the floors behind Nakesh’s public face were exceptional, there was only so much they could do. The trauma surgeon who had worked on Jackie told me the fact that Jackie was alive at all was a testament to her resilience. Even after working on her for hours, the best they could manage was a stop-gap. Jackie’s heart was beating, her brain showed the very barest signs of activity, but she wasn’t waking up, and she wasn’t breathing on her own.
