Owl and the Electric Samurai

by Kristi Charish

  “Or give them ideas,” Rynn whispered.

  There was a shove from behind. “Quiet, both of you,” one of the Zebras driving us said. I kept my mouth shut this time, but not because of the guard’s semi-empty threats. Beyond the sparse LEDs that now lined the cavern, ambient light from outside was trickling in. We were getting near the exit—as well as the fighting, from the sound of things. Confirming my suspicion, one by one the four mercenaries guarding us began taking off their night goggles. Though, still no sign of the . . . shit!

  I didn’t wait for the mercenaries to shove me onto the ground—I dove and managed to take Carpe with me as four bullets struck the cavern wall where our heads were a moment before.

  Jesus—those were awful close. “I thought the Chinese wanted to capture me.”

  Carpe shrugged. “Depends what your definition of capture is. From what I gather, they were pretty pissed about the terra-cotta warriors.”

  I flattened to the ground as another series of bullets struck overhead. The Zebras tried to line up their own shots amongst the gunfire, and we’d slipped to a much lesser priority.

  “What did you tell them exactly?”

  “That you were about to destroy what remained of the Kingdom of Guge in a massive explosion. Well, it worked. Didn’t it?” he added as my mouth dropped open.

  “You idiot. Before, they just wanted to toss me into a jail cell. Now?” I swore and ducked again as another round of bullets struck.

  “If you two wouldn’t mind?” Rynn whispered. “We did have something resembling a plan. I’d prefer it if we didn’t let it fall apart completely.”

  Right. I palmed the syringe Rynn passed me. My guess was he passed Carpe one that was about the same.

  The Zebras’ expansive collection of pharmaceuticals might make them immune to Rynn’s incubi talents, but that didn’t give them the ability to watch their pockets 24/7. I watched the guard nearest me, waiting for him to be preoccupied with the Chinese again.

  “Oomph!”

  I glanced beside me to see one of the guards Rynn was responsible for slump over. The one nearest me turned, searching for the noise.

  So much for perfect timing. I jabbed him in the leg with the needle and watched as the fast-acting sedative took effect. He crumpled to the floor.

  Hunh. No alarms raised, no screaming, no shouting . . . damn, this was actually going according to plan.

  The bullets were still hitting the cavern wall ahead. Since the LEDs had been shot out, I grabbed the Zebra’s night goggles and fixed them to my face before peeking around the corner. I rolled back as another round of bullets struck the cavern wall dangerously close to where my head had been. I grabbed Captain by the scruff and pulled him back before he could stick himself in the line of fire.

  Why was it I never had a carrier at times like this?

  I handed Captain off to Carpe, neither of whom was particularly happy about the arrangement, while I crawled back to the downed Zebra to rummage through his jacket pockets.

  “Not the time to loot the bad guys!” Carpe said.

  I ignored him while I searched. Right pocket? No, left. There it was. I found the small mirror I was looking for, unfolded the attachment, and angled it around the edge of the cavern tunnel toward the fighting—without risking my head being shot off.

  I swore under my breath as I caught sight of the black Zebra jackets tucked behind the crates, interspersed with the green, brown, and black on gray camouflage uniforms of the Chinese special forces—along with the assault rifles pointed at us.

  I ducked back. “How does it look?” Rynn asked. I passed him the mirror so he could look for himself.

  “That depends on what you think of the Chinese sending special ops after me. Apparently Carpe told them I was a budding antiquities terrorist in the making.”

  Rynn swore. “Your reputation precedes you. There’s at least fifteen of them blocking the cavern entrance and who knows how many others lying in wait.”

  “What are our chances of sneaking around?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “If I was on my own, maybe I could get past the ops, but I’m not arrogant enough to think I can get by the military vehicles that will be blocking all routes out, not even on a good day. We’re as good as pinned.” He then crouched back around the rough cavern wall as more shots were fired.

  He glared at Carpe. “Next time, leave out the exploding part.”

  “Both of you stop it,” I said, while I tried to work out something . . . anything . . .

  “We could let the Chinese take us. They’d get us away from the mercenaries,” Carpe started.

  I shook my head though. “The IAA has ties there too. If we let the Chinese take us, it’ll only be a matter of time before they hand us over to either the IAA or the mercenaries.” I felt the ping in the back of my mind. I recognized it now, the armor, influencing me, sneaking into my thoughts.

  Unfortunately, as much as I hated to admit it, I was pretty sure I agreed with the armor . . . or at least I sure hoped to hell it was still me thinking it was a good idea.

  Regardless, I didn’t see a lot of options coming my way.

  “Do either of you know your way back into the caverns?” I said.

  From the look on his face, Rynn figured it out first. “That’s not an exit, Alix—that’s a death trap.”

  “No, the Chinese special ops and the Zebras are our current potential death trap.”

  “Only if they catch us.”

  “Which they will if that’s the only exit.” I could see the indecision on Rynn’s face. “Look, you can berate me when I can’t get the portal open.”

  “If any of us are left alive.” Rynn cut himself off as he pushed me and Carpe into the dirt a hairsbreadth before more bullets struck the wall above us. “What is it they say about jumping into frying pans?” Rynn asked, his expression far from happy.

  “That sometimes things get real hot. Then you jump through a portal.”

  Rynn rolled his eyes, but he went back to watching the Chinese and mercenaries. The fight was winding down as the mercenaries retreated, leaving us to the Chinese.

  Rynn held up his hand and started counting down, folding each finger carefully. When he reached five he threw something round, metal, shiny . . .

  Oh shit.

  “Run,” he said as soon as it was out of his hands. We bolted back into the tunnels, both Carpe and I having the sense to grab the night goggles and torches from the downed mercenaries—fast—before following as fast as we could over the terrain. In my head I started counting.

  “Explosives?” I whispered at Rynn, in case any mercenaries were still lying in wait. “Are you out of your mind? When the hell did I become the reasonable one and you the reckless one?”

  He glanced back at me over his shoulder, not bothering to slow down, even with the uneven terrain. “You’re still the reckless one. Whenever you cause an explosion you have no idea what the hell you’re doing. Me? I know.”

  “Kettle and pots are both black.”

  We stopped as the cavern shuddered with the force of the grenade explosion. “Run,” Rynn said again, and shoved Carpe in front of him down an offshoot on the left of the cavern past the jail cells, going next himself and pulling me behind him, Captain close on my heels.

  The caverns shuddered again. I glared at Rynn. “You knew what you were doing?”

  “It hasn’t collapsed yet, has it?”

  I swore as the aftershock continued. The hillside was not happy. “And I was trying not to level the lost kingdom!”

  “Well, we can’t have everything we want, now, can we?”

  “And why the hell do I have to go first?” Carpe shouted back at us.

  “You’re the team canary,” Rynn said. “You’re testing the tunnels to make sure there isn’t anything nasty waiting.”

  �
��Canaries die!”

  “And it will be a cherished sacrifice for years to come. Now move, elf!” Rynn said, giving Carpe another shove. “The Chinese and the mercenaries won’t keep themselves busy forever, and that’s praying there aren’t any guarding the portal.”

  Carpe shook his head but continued down the cavern corridor. The decline steepened quickly, and the pull in the back of my head, like a voice egging me on faster, told me we had to be getting close.

  Worry about the armor once we’re through, Owl—

  I thought I recognized a passage up ahead, if not from my memory, then from my current dubious guide.

  There was shouting and gunfire behind us as the remaining mercenaries tried to deal with the Chinese and vice versa. It might have been my imagination, but I think they were getting closer.

  “That’s it,” I said to Carpe as I made out a fork up ahead where light escaped. “The one on the left.” I pulled off my night goggles as the light brightened.

  Carpe took it, and a moment later the ceiling widened as we spilled into the portal cavern.

  There was a sole Zebra standing in the center, looking at us, his walkie-­talkie in one hand and his gun in the other, as if he was not quite sure what to do with either.

  Rynn wasn’t afflicted with the same problem. He lost no time pulling out his own gun, then shot the guard.

  The Zebra picked out a blue-and-red feathered dart from his chest and looked at it, then us, before falling over.

  Voices were still coming through the walkie-talkie. Rynn grabbed it. After bringing it to his ear, he said, “Alix, not to rush you, but if we have any chance of escaping, you need to open that fast.”

  I swore and scanned the equipment that now filled the cavern. High-tech: computers, UV lasers, lights, digital cameras, monitoring equipment. “Someone’s getting serious help from the IAA.” Still, there was no indication which one to activate first—the mural on the floor or the mural of elephants and tigers that decorated the wall.

  I crouched down and searched for clues, any clues, that the Zebras might have uncovered. There were none.

  Last time, trying the wall mural on its own had been disastrous. The floor, then?

  I glanced up from the patterns at Rynn. He was manning the tunnel. “You need to be sure,” he warned. “A mistake could bring the entire place down.”

  Easier said than done. “I hate treasure puzzles,” I said, more to myself than anyone else.

  “That isn’t true. You love treasure puzzles—you always make me leave them for you,” said Carpe.

  “In a video game, not in real life!” I yelled.

  Carpe looked like he might say something more, but at that moment, a gas grenade dropped on the mosaic floor just outside the gate.

  Rynn grabbed it and threw it back out the tunnel. He was rewarded with more shouting and screaming.

  The floor or the wall? Something told me the floor was the place to start, with its lines of pink elephants and orange tigers—and if I was reading the manipulation right, so was the armor. Or it was my imagination trying to come up with a justification for an otherwise idiotic and completely unjustifiable action.

  “If you’re going to do something, Alix, do it now!” Rynn yelled.

  I was out of time. Damn, I hoped I was right.

  I took out the bottle of chicken blood and water and drew in my breath. “What do you think, Captain?”

  He meowed at me, but I thought maybe, just maybe, he looked at the floor. Trial by cat. That had to be as good as any decision-making skills I had at my disposal at this point.

  Time to see just how serious this suit was . . .

  I sprayed the designs on the floor and waited as the blood catalyzed the mural, spreading across the floor and animating the lines of animals as if they’d come to life. I held my breath and waited, but there was no explosion.

  There was the ping of metal on the stone floor.

  “Hurry, Alix,” Rynn called as he lobbed another gas grenade back up the tunnel.

  “I have it,” I said as the two murals began to intertwine, the lines of animals mixing until they were a three-dimensional work of art, no longer clear where either mural started or finished.

  I shielded my eyes as there was a shot of blinding light. When I looked, the murals were gone, a mirrored portal left in its place.

  “I’ve got it!” I called.

  Rynn abandoned his post and ran for us.

  Carpe glanced at me and arched a single eyebrow. “Here goes everything,” he said, and stepped through.

  Here went everything was right. . . . I grabbed Captain, who was sniffing at the portal’s edges, and held my breath. Then I stepped through.

  I gasped as I fell through the portal. It didn’t hurt, but it rattled me, not unlike being pulled in a tire behind a speedboat over very rough water: hold on and hope you don’t capsize or fall off. I tried to open my eyes but had to close them; there wasn’t anything to focus on, just blurred colors and half reflections. Then, almost as quickly as it had started, it stopped. Warmth like a summer breeze brushed against my skin before I slammed into grass-covered ground beside Carpe, with Rynn in rapid succession behind us.

  Captain ended up landing on his feet . . . on my back . . . because why not?

  I felt more than saw him hop away. “Captain? Stay!” I tried, though I’m pretty sure it didn’t come out quite that way. I lay where I was in the nice, friendly, warm grass and hoped my head would stop spinning. It wasn’t like fresh-cut grass—nothing that manicured—but it smelled soft, with a warmth that shouldn’t have been possible, considering the air didn’t smell or feel like summer.

  “Alix?” Rynn called from beside me, sounding worse for wear. There was a groan from Carpe as well, indicating he was as bad as, if not worse off than, Rynn.

  I pushed myself up to my knees and blinked rapidly, trying to clear the spots from my eyes.

  “Okay, I’m seeing more,” I said, and tried to push myself up to standing. My head rushed and my vision clouded with the movement. Apparently disorientation wasn’t the only affect the doorway had. I abandoned standing and settled for rolling over to get a look at where we’d landed.

  We were on a grassy hillside inside the main town, which I thought I recognized from the game—or the parts that I could remember.

  The mountains, the cool air, the sunshine, even the scent of the warm spring air—not too cold but crisp and clean, like a spring day, not the start of fall that it should be; it was all familiar, which made no sense, since I’d only seen it in a video game. Maybe I was having a stroke. That happened: your mind filled in blanks when you were having a stroke.

  The grass was so warm and inviting. I figured I’d just stay there and wait for my head and stomach to clear.

  Someone started to shake my foot. “Owl?” Carpe said, sounding like he was about to puke.

  “Leave me alone, Carpe. Five minutes, I swear, that’s all I need.”

  The shaking didn’t stop though. “You need to look. Now. I think we have company.”

  I turned my head. Oh God, I thought maybe it was me who was going to throw up . . . I noticed shadows moving in the grass near my face. I braced myself and lifted my head as far as it would let me.

  Shit.

  Two men were standing just inside the entrance to the courtyard. They were backlit by the sunlight streaming in from outside, but still I had a good idea who they were. The cowboy hat and the disparity in height left little to the imagination.

  They stepped out of the shadows until two pairs of very worn and patched hiking boots were directly in front of my face.

  I glanced up, shielding my eyes from the sun—or trying to. They wore matching unhappy expressions on their familiar faces; uncanny, considering how close they mimicked their game avatars, or was that vice versa?

  But that wasn�
�t what made me want to puke all over again. It was the double-barreled shotgun that did that. The one leveled at my face.

  “You just had to come through, couldn’t fucking leave it alone, now, could you?” Texas said.

  I lifted my head a few more inches off the warm, inviting grass. Oh, why couldn’t I have gotten five minutes? “Surprise?” I said, and even managed a wave.

  Texas didn’t look impressed. Then again, it easily could have been the spinning in my head. I closed my eyes and laid my face back down on the warm grass. I’d take what respite I could get; I had a feeling it was going to be short.

  15

  SHANGRI-LA

  Noonish, guessing from the height of the sun

  in the long-lost city of Shangri-La

  “I should have known,” Texas said as he poked me with the barrel of his shotgun. I rolled over, but that was about as much as I could manage.

  “Texas. Michigan,” I said, looking up at him. “How are you boys doing? Fancy place you have here, sorry to drop in unannounced.”

  “You just couldn’t mind your own business and meet us on our terms, oh no, you had to come barging in here.”

  I frowned at the barrel of the Browning. Why was he pointing a gun at me? More importantly, why did he keep poking me with it?

  I glanced over at Rynn and Carpe, who were both still on the ground just outside the closed portal. Carpe groaned, and though Rynn managed to push himself up, they were still both looking dogged. Note to self: supernaturals did not handle the doorway to this place as well as humans did, which meant I was the one on diplomatic duty. Yeah, nothing could possibly go wrong from that. . . .

  When Texas probed me with the gun again, I said, “Look, either shoot me or let me lie here on the warm grass in peace. Just for the love of God stop poking me.”

  I winced as Texas grabbed me by the collar of my jacket and pulled me to my knees. Not what I would have preferred, but at least he stopped poking me. “Hiboux, I presume?” he said. “You’ve got less than half a minute to convince me not to shoot you.”

  “Look, we didn’t crash your place on purpose—we were in a bind, and it was either this, mercenaries, or the Chinese army. As much as you two can be assholes, you won as the lesser of the evils. Congratulations.” We were also here for the armor, but I didn’t think we needed to broach that yet.