Stone Soldiers 4: Shades of War

by C. E. Martin

  Josie turned around also and handed Kenslir a pair of socks with one hand, while holding onto a pair of size 14, tan leather, desert army boots with the other. "But there has been a development."

  "Oh?" Kenslir asked, slipping on one sock, then the other.

  "Yep. They're waiting in the briefing room for you," Laura chimed in. She slid her chair over for the Colonel to sit in while he put his boots on.

  "What's up?"

  "Captain Smith said it was a Pandora Event..." Josie said. She didn't know any details beyond that, and judging from the look on Kenslir's face, she wasn't sure she wanted to.

  "Head on upstairs," Kenslir said, quickly putting on his boots and tying them. "I want to check on Victor first."

  CHAPTER FIVE

  It hadn't taken long to fly south to the United States. Even battered and weary from the trek north on foot, this new body was still able to channel enough power for very rapid flight. Not as fast as his own body had been, but fast enough.

  He began to decrease altitude, feeling himself drawing ever closer to his target. Breaking through the clouds he looked down at the quiet neighborhood below, bathed in the light of the full moon. All was peaceful.

  Landing so lightly he made less noise than a footstep, he touched down in the backyard of one very specific, two story home. It was only a few years old, with bright, fresh paint, and clean vinyl siding. A suburban family's modest accommodations.

  The back door was locked, but the mechanism slowly gave way to the irresistible force he applied to it. Metal sheared, but so slowly almost no noise was made. He swung the door in and crept inside.

  The interior of the home reminded him of his own childhood. In fact, it was eerily similar, with the carpet and walls the same color. Even the arrangement of the furniture was the same. He was surprised. He hadn't thought the connection with his target was that strong.

  His target- sleeping upstairs, in a king sized bed with his wife. Sleeping soundly without any care in the world beyond going to work and making the next mortgage payment.

  He moved to the stairs and floated above them, rising silently to the second floor. On the off chance the hardwood floor here might creak, he continued hovering, right to his target's door.

  No lock barred his way this time. He glided above the floor, through the open bedroom door, and over to the side of the bed.

  The sleeping woman there was thin, with long flowing hair. Even without makeup, she appeared very beautiful. He felt oddly attracted to her. His target had chosen well. But he had no time for that sort of fleshly concern.

  He reached out slowly and delicately wrapped his fingers around her thin neck. Then he squeezed it suddenly.

  The cracking of the shattered vertebrae was louder than he had thought it would be. His target snored briefly at the sound of his wife's murder, but just rolled over onto his back, his deep slumber otherwise undisturbed.

  The intruder slid the pillow out from under the dead woman's head. He wanted this body as intact as possible. He pressed the pillow down on the sleeping man's face

  James Monroe Trumball's eyes snapped open as his head was forced back into his pillow by the pillow pressed over his face. He immediately recognized the smell of his wife's perfume on the pillow suffocating him. He tried to sit up.

  While he felt no weight on him, the force holding the pillow down did not budge one bit. It was as though an elephant were holding it on place- just hard enough to blot out any sight or any breath.

  James struggled with his hands, reaching up. He felt the bare, hairy skin of a man leaning over him, holding the pillow. But despite his best efforts, he could do nothing to the man. His panicked clawing did not move the man's arms or hands in the least. He was frozen in place, holding that pillow over James' face with a strength as unyielding as a mountain.

  James squirmed and kicked and thrashed, trying to get free. His felt his hands knock over the nightstand beside his bed. He felt his wife's body beside him, still warm, but strangely limp and unresponsive.

  James Monroe Trumball had been born into a rough life- suffering some unknown trauma as a child that was so terrible he had blocked out his entire childhood. He had been adopted by loving parents who had helped him recover then put him through college. Parents that loved his wife as much as he did. As his life began to slip away, James felt sadness for his parents. And for his son.

  ***

  Jason Trumball awoke with a start in his room. He had heard something. A crashing sound. He heard more noises. From his parents' bedroom.

  "Oh, god," the fifteen year old said, his face flushing red. They were at it again. He was surprised he was an only child.

  The sounds continued. Despite his own inexperience with women, Jason suddenly felt these weren't the right sounds. Not that what his parents did in their bedroom could ever be considered right sounding. But no, this was something else.

  The hairs on the back of his neck rising, Jason crept out of bed. He didn't really want to see his parents doing... their thing. But he just felt like something wasn't right.

  When he opened the door to his room, Jason was sure something wasn't right. He could tell instantly that his parents' bedroom door was open. The sounds coming from the room were too loud for it to be closed.

  "Mom? Dad?" Jason asked, walking toward the open door down the hallway.

  When he stepped around the corner of the doorframe, the sounds stopped, Jason was absolutely positive something was wrong.

  First, his mother, laying on her side, facing the open door, had her eyes wide open. They appeared glassy and unfocused. And she had no pillow- her head was tilted at a strange angle, laying on the mattress, with her tongue hanging partially out.

  Secondly, and far more importantly, a stranger was standing on the other side of the bed, holding a pillow down over Jason's father's head. And his father was no longer moving.

  "Dad?!"

  The stranger turned toward Jason, surprised to see him. He wore heavy winter boots and winter pants, but was naked from the waist up. A thick, full, blonde beard hid most of his face and his head was covered in a mop of tangled blonde hair.

  The stranger stepped back from the bed, letting the pillow fall to the floor. This revealed a look of open-mouthed horror from Jason's father. Who was clearly dead.

  "Dad!" Jason screamed, tears welling in his eyes. He charged forward and tackled the intruder, just as he'd learned to do in football.

  The fifteen year old was by no means small. As tall as his father and weighing nearly two hundred pounds, he was a strapping young man who even though he hadn't stopped growing was every bit the size of the average adult male. But when he struck the intruder, he might as well have tackled a building.

  Pain swelled in his shoulder as he crashed into the unmoving killer. But something else did too. A nearly-burning sensation that felt oddly... good.

  Jason fell back onto the floor and started to reach for his shoulder. But it no longer hurt. And he somehow felt stronger.

  The stranger lunged forward, grabbing Jason by the throat. His fingers closed with the force of a hydraulic press. Jason batted the hand away with ease- much to his surprise.

  The stranger now showed shock and disbelief. He watched as Jason stood, apparently unharmed. He punched the boy.

  The blow knocked Jason off his feet, propelling him back, against and through a wall. Like a human cannonball, he smashed through one more wall and then felt himself falling. He landed on the wet grass outside his home.

  He had been struck hard. The brief contact with his chin had hurt, but the pain was almost immediately gone. As was a large section of the side of the house. He had exploded through it as though it were paper. His pajamas were torn here and there from the jagged edges around the hole, but he otherwise appeared unharmed.

  Jason got to his feet once more. And was immediately knocked down.

  The killer in his home had rocketed out of the same hole Jason had- flying at him like a torpedo, with both fis
ts outstretched.

  Despite his newfound strength, the blow hurt Jason, and sent him flying back once more. He crashed into the side of a car parked on the side of the street. The door of the car crumpled under the impact and glass exploded from all the windows. The car's alarm began to sound and its lights began flashing.

  Jason climbed to his feet and felt the pain from the double-fisted blow fading. His attacker stood in the front yard, watching him closely.

  Lights began coming on at the neighbor's homes.

  The killer looked around, noticing the lights, then back at Jason. Then he fell to the ground.

  Jason had no doubt the man had simply died. His body hit with full force- completely limp and as lifeless as a ragdoll. Then something truly amazing happened.

  A black shape emerged from the body.

  It was the size and shape of a man, and made of the darkest blackness- like ink or the deepest shadow. Even though it had no face, the form seemed to stare at Jason for a moment, then it rocketed back into the house, flying through a solid wall as though it were a bank of fog.

  Jason stood there, stunned, not knowing what to do for several seconds, staring at the bearded body on his front lawn. Something about the dead, gray eyes on that face seemed so familiar.

  Then he heard a crashing sound from his home.

  Jason looked up in time to see a figure streaking away into the sky, having just exploded from the roof of the home. It was a man, and judging from the pajamas he was wearing, he was Jason’s father. His dead father, flying up into the night sky and vanishing from sight.

  CHAPTER SIX

  He was back to normal now. His new normal. He was powerful and confident once more- no longer the scared, skinny weakling he had been most of his life. He was once more a man of living stone.

  The process had been the same as the first time he had been turned. A variety of injections, then a cut from a blade drenched in werewolf blood. Then the sun had set outside and the pain had begun.

  The curse of the werewolf had acted fast, twisting and transforming his muscles and even his skeleton- reforming him in the image of a hideous beast. But the Fountain stopped that.

  Just as before, he had been lowered into the water, feet-first. The warm waters had spread over him, pushing back the pain and filling him with peace and calm. His body stopped contorting and resumed a more human shape.

  Then he had been told to look into the box. A small, metal box on the end of a long, robotic arm. Maneuvered into place by a female technician standing on the platform beside him, protected from the Fountain's waters by hip waders.

  Inside the box, two glowing yellow eyes pushed back the warmth of the Fountain waters, filling Victor with cold. One was the reptilian eye of a basilisk. The other was human-looking- the eye of Medusa. Both poured out their evil energy, directly into Victor's eyes and brain.

  His tissue quickly petrified, the effect spreading out from his face to his extremities until his whole body was stone.

  The platform was then raised slowly and the manacles that had held Victor to the operating table were removed. He sat up and swung his stone legs over the side of the table, quickly readjusting to this more powerful, nearly indestructible body.

  "Welcome back to the club, kid," Captain Smith said, handing Victor something small and shiny when he walked off the platform.

  It was a coin- roughly the size of a silver dollar, but emblazoned with the one-eyed head of Medusa on one side and the unit's seal on the other.

  "Club?" Victor asked, confused. He hadn't gotten one of these before.

  "Military tradition- challenge coin," Smith explained. "Colonel's not too partial to the idea, but I say if you die for your country, you deserve something special."

  Victor looked back at the coin and wondered what to do with it. The tight, synthetic fabric shorts he was wearing didn't have any pockets.

  Smith seemed to read his mind and pointed to a table. There was a set of black, military fatigues neatly folded on the table and a pair of boots.

  "Are you giving out those damn coins again?" a familiar voice asked.

  Victor turned toward the blast door on one side of the Fountain chamber. It was standing partially open, with Colonel Kenslir coming through it.

  "Sir!" Smith said, saluting and smiling broadly. His stone lips parted to reveal the stone teeth in his stone mouth.

  Kenslir returned the salute and walked over. "Well, don't just stand there, Hornbeck. Get dressed."

  Victor nodded affirmatively. "Yes, sir. Good to see you again."

  "C’mon, c’mon," Kenslir said. “They're waiting for us in the briefing room.”

  Victor hurried to the table and quickly slipped on pants, t-shirt, fatigue shirt then socks and boots.

  "Uh, why do I need socks if my feet don't sweat?" he asked.

  Smith answered. "Because it's cheaper to replace socks then boots."

  Seeing absolutely no comprehension on Victor's face, he explained further. "Our stone feet are like sandpaper, grinding against the boots and wearing them out."

  "Oh," Victor said, lacing up his boots.

  When he was done, the three super soldiers made their way out of the chamber. They walked down a long hallway toward the freight elevator leading up, into the black glass and steel office building that served as their base of operations- and which also conveniently hid the Fountain of Youth from so many modern day seekers.

  "I hope you learned something in Mexico," Colonel Kenslir said as they rode the elevator up.

  "Uh..." was all Victor could think to say.

  "That you're not indestructible," Smith said, shaking his head. "We're tough, but we aren't like him." Smith pointed to the Colonel.

  "Lucky number seven, right, sir?" Smith asked.

  "Not sure which I like less- burning or electrocution," Kenslir said. "I'm hoping I don't have to repeat either for at least a few decades."

  Victor watched the two men talking. Both he and Smith were now very large, bulging with muscles and their shoulders widened by the curse of the werewolf. But they were still relatively average in height.

  Colonel Kenslir was much larger. At six foot four, he was nearly a head taller than them, and had the same broad shoulders and over-developed muscles from his own curse. A Herculean figure. Even though Victor was made of living stone and was once again very possibly one of the toughest soldiers in the world, he felt inadequate and puny around Kenslir.

  "Finally," the Colonel said as the elevator stopped. He seemed oddly impatient- a trait Victor had never noticed in the Colonel in the few months he'd known him.

  When the doors opened, Kenslir strode purposefully out, toward the briefing room. Smith gestured for Victor to go next, then fell in step behind him.

  The briefing room was a like mini auditorium, fifty feet across with a huge table in the middle and TV screens hung on the walls above desks that ringed the room.

  Seated at the table were Josie, Dr. Olson, Major Campbell in his dress uniform and two more stone soldiers- Colonel Chadwick Phillips and Jimmy Kane.

  "Where's Pam?" Victor asked, looking around for his former FBI handler and now FBI liaison to the detachment. The tiny, big-chested blonde was nowhere to be seen.

  "In Washington, coordinating things at that end," Major Campbell said. He was a fiftyish career Army officer with salt and pepper hair and a crisp dress uniform. He stood and began slinging folders across the polished table for everyone like a casino dealer passing out cards. Colonel Kenslir liked old-fashioned printouts, or they'd all be reading tablet computers right now.

  "Welcome back, Vic," Jimmy said from across the table. He was sitting next to Josie and reached out and held her hand, possessively. Like Victor, he was an average-height young man, with a shaved head and muscles increased by the curses that had enabled him to become a man of living stone.

  Victor was glad he couldn't blush in his stone body- he still was embarrassed at Josie seeing him nude. And he sincerely hoped Jimmy didn't know abo
ut that- as much as he liked Josie, Victor knew all too well Josie and Jimmy were a couple.

  "This will be the first Pandora event some of you have had," Campbell said as everyone opened their folders. "They are classified as Pandora events due to the severity of the event-"

  "Like opening Pandora's box?" Dr. Olson asked. "I thought all this code names and spy stuff went out with afros and bell bottoms in the seventies."

  "Welcome to the world of military intelligence," Phillips said opening his folder. Young looking despite the stone transformation, Phillips carried himself differently than Victor or Jimmy. The most recent addition to the team of stone soldiers, Phillips had been around for a long time. He had served with Kenslir during the early days and until only a month ago had been a crippled old man, rotting away in a nursing home.

  "The CIA and NSA operate a project where precognitives record their visions and those visions are analyzed to predict major calamitous events," Campbell continued. "The more severe the event- the more people who experience it- the more powerful the psychic backlash. And also the better and more precise the visions of our precogs."

  "Precogs?" Jimmy asked. "No offense to Vic, but how accurate can that be? I mean, isn't the future always changing?"

  "They're very accurate," Colonel Kenslir said, looking up from the file he had been reading. "They successfully predicted the attempted assassinations of Kennedy, Reagan and the Pope and the attempted September hijackings in 2001."

  Jimmy was impressed. Being a follower of conspiracy theories on the internet, he was fully versed in each event. Especially President Kennedy's dodging of an assassin in Texas in 1963.

  "This says a civil war re-enactment?" Josie said, also looking up from her folder. Like Kenslir, she was reading ahead.

  Major Campbell frowned, noticing everyone was reading ahead in their folders. He missed the discipline of an all-military unit. Teenagers and a vampire were anything but disciplined.

  "Yes," Campbell said. "That is what we determined. And based on the phase of the moon during the vision, we have narrowed it down to four possible sites."