Black Ops

by Alan Baxter

  As the Squad crouched, ready for the enemy to rush forward, a door on the far side of the courtyard slammed back.

  “Hey, motherfuckers!” Smoke, grinning like the Cheshire cat, lobbed something in a high arc.

  “Fire in the hole!” Boss yelled and the Squad hit the deck.

  Smoke’s grenade sailed high and dropped into the midst of the massed ninjas even as their voices shouted warnings to each other. They began to scatter, some leaping away in time, but the concussion of the blast whined everything to silence for a moment as bright light flashed out. Body parts rained down among chunks of earth and stone.

  “That should even the odds a bit,” Smoke called.

  The massed group of rezzed ninjas had been spread wide by the blast. They yelled at each other over the following silence, trying to regroup. Even the necromancer looked concerned.

  “Engage!” Boss hollered, and Dark Squad sprang into action.

  They sprinted in different directions, ensuring the rezzers couldn’t regroup. Raven headed for a clutch of three, jade dagger in hand. These were definitely not the mindless, broken things from the forest. The way they moved, communicated, readied themselves, showed them to be every bit as alert and dangerous as an enemy could get, only far harder to hurt. At least the dagger gave her a distinct advantage.

  She heard Smoke’s high-pitched laughter as she engaged the first assailant, then nothing existed but her own fight. The ninjas were fast, faster than any enemy she’d met before. The first kick came at her so suddenly it clipped her ribs before she could dodge fully, forced most of her air out. The shock of being hit so easily winded her more than the impact, but she managed to swipe the dagger across and felt it drag through flesh. The ninja put his foot down and his leg crumbled, sent him tumbling to the ground. She was already past him, blocking a furious flurry of blows from the next, barely twisted as the third threw another kick. The one she had cut was up on one leg already, hopping expertly to re-engage. She was hurt and still all three faced her.

  Raven took a deep breath and whispered the word to her samjok-o. She asked for help and the three-legged bird stepped into the air again followed by a cloud of other shining black avians. They swirled and mobbed the ninjas, interrupting their approach. Raven let her mind slip into the state of wu wei, a Taoist concept of non-being. Her mind removed itself from her actions and she let pure training and instinct take over. No longer trying to learn or emulate, she let her magic flow as she danced with the flock of ravens, knives in hand, a lyrical, swirling display of athletic grace and deadly accuracy. As the birds dipped, she rose, as they fanned out, she dove in. The rezzed ninjas scored hits here and there, but she put off that pain for later. She felt the occasional searing burn of a blade strike and ignored that too. Her own dagger swept and flew, shattered flesh raining around in musical accompaniment to the dance.

  Once her three assailants were gone, she moved with her cloud of birds across the courtyard, engaging wherever there was movement not of her Squad. Howls and shouts, cries and slaps of flesh on flesh, and then stillness.

  Arms out to either side, the dagger held low in one hand, hair come loose and hanging over her eyes, Raven stopped moving. Statue-still but for the fast rise and fall of her chest, the rasp of rapid breathing. She let the emptiness drain away from her, slowly raised her eyes to look around.

  Boss and Taipan stood side by side, hurt but smiling. Smoke strolled across the courtyard towards them. Raven’s eyes fell on Jet, sat back against a fountain, bleeding and bruised, one eye already swollen shut. Jet gave a shaky thumbs up as she hauled herself to her feet.

  The Squad regathered and stood before the protective circle. In its centre, the necromancer looked shaken.

  “What’s next?” Boss asked.

  “You people are tenacious,” the necromancer said. “But let’s see you face this.” He began chanting, knotted his fingers into complicated signs and mudras.

  “He’s summoning something,” Jet said, slightly slurred through swollen lips.

  Smoke tilted his head to listen. “A demon, I think,” he said with a smile.

  Raven’s eyes widened. A demon? Seriously? And why were they all so casually amused about that.

  “Oh ho,” Boss said. “This’ll be fun.”

  As the necromancer’s words gained strength, rapidly blurring together, Boss raised his arms as if in supplication. With a rush of burning hot air, he faded and vanished. Before Raven had drawn a shocked breath, Boss reappeared inside the protective circle, standing right before the necromancer.

  The necromancer’s eyes went wide, his mouth fell open. “What the hell?”

  “You really should consider,” Boss said. “If you plan to summon a demon, it’s best to know who’s already around, otherwise what you expect to appear outside might already be there, and then your spell simply reverses itself.”

  Boss whipped his hand around, grip tight on the hilt of his machete, and the necromancer’s head sailed up off his shoulders, spinning over and over, still wearing its expression of shock and disbelief. The body crumpled to the floor at Boss’s feet.

  Boss looked down at the body for some time as the magic of the protective circle drained away, then he turned and strolled back to the Squad. “There we go then.”

  “You’re a fucking demon?” Raven asked. Her heart beat faster at this revelation than all the fighting up until this point.

  Boss shook his head, slipped his machete away. “It’s really not as simple as all that. Perhaps I’ll try to explain it to you one day. Bad luck for him though, eh?”

  Raven looked around the group. They all smiled and she felt like they were all in on a joke to which she wasn’t privy. It was frustrating, but she supposed there was an awful lot to learn about these people.

  Boss turned to look at the raised dais with its ring of carved sigils. “That’s big enough for a chopper to put down, don’t you think?”

  “I would say so,” Smoke agreed.

  Boss turned to Jet. “Call it in, please. Tea and crumpet time.”

  * * *

  They were taken to an Armour base in Berlin to have their wounds taken care of. Taipan needed to wear a patch for a few weeks but was told he had been lucky and would retain his sight. Other than several dozen stitches between them and a few set bones, they weren’t in too bad shape. Some of the Armour mages used a few less than natural techniques to hurry their healing along.

  By the time they were in a comfortable lounge being fed, it seemed to Raven that the whole encounter had been weeks ago instead of hours.

  “It’ll be good to get back to New York,” Taipan said. “There’s a young man I know there who’ll be very impressed with my eye patch. I’ve got this whole story about defending myself from a mugging to earn his sympathy.”

  “Don’t you ever think about anything but sex?” Jet asked.

  “I think about fighting a lot.”

  She laughed. “Fair point.”

  Boss crammed in the last of a sandwich and stood. “Right, I’m going to Paris to debrief with Commander Giraud. You lot head home, I’ll see you in Manhattan. Except you, Raven. You’re with me.”

  She frowned. “Everything okay?”

  “Yeah. I want him to know how well you did, and for you to see a bit more of Armour operations.”

  It wasn’t too long a chopper ride to Paris and the Armour HQ there. They went through a command centre with computer banks, busy personnel, a large round desk in the middle with holographic projections hovering over it.

  “It’s like the bridge of the fucking Enterprise,” Raven said.

  Boss laughed. “Armour has been around since the Crusades, fighting evil and gaining wealth and power. Come on.”

  He went along a hallway to a door marked Commander and knocked.

  “Come.”

  Inside was a large office, filing
cabinets and a sofa on one side. Behind a large mahogany desk sat a short man with dark, intense eyes and jet black hair. His face was deeply wrinkled, showing age that seemed to go beyond any mortal lifespan. Raven had no idea why, but she sensed immense power about him. It would take some experience and skill to be an Armour Commander after all, she supposed.

  “Aha, Boss, please sit,” Giraud said. His French accent was strong, but something else was in there too. Something Slavic maybe. “It all went well?”

  “It wasn’t easy,” Boss said. “But you know us. We prevail.”

  “You hit some tough resistance?”

  Boss nodded slowly. “We really did. The enemy were immune to Jet’s voice, fire barely slowed them down, it’s almost like they were the perfect thing to throw at us. Especially without Blinder and his skills. But like I said, we prevail.”

  Giraud smiled. “Indeed you do. You are a very reliable squad.”

  “Almost too reliable?” Boss asked.

  The air in the room electrified, a sudden tension that put Raven on edge. She had no idea what had just happened, but the friendly greeting seemed distant as a new, icy atmosphere rippled up.

  “Too reliable?” Giraud asked.

  “You really didn’t expect us to make it back, did you?” Boss said. “I mean, those were some pretty massive odds.” He gestured at Raven. “Without our new recruit here, we would have had some serious trouble.”

  Giraud nodded, flicked a quick smile at Raven. “I must admit, I didn’t know you had replaced Blinder already.”

  “Yeah, I thought not. I find it helps to play my cards close to my chest, even with the people supposedly on my side.”

  “Supposedly?”

  Raven saw Giraud’s hand move surreptitiously and press at something under his desk. Her own hand drifted close to the jade dagger.

  “Why didn’t that necromancer bleed when I took his fucking head off, eh?” Boss asked.

  Giraud’s eyebrows rose. “Didn’t bleed?”

  “You think I wouldn’t fucking notice a small detail like that? That the necromancer supposedly behind all this was a fucking rezzer?” Boss’s voice rose in volume with each word.

  The door behind them opened and two large Armour operatives stepped in. Giraud began to rise from his chair and Boss’s hand came up with a Magnum .44 and blew the Commander’s head into mincemeat. It burst like a melon, spraying the wall behind the desk with blood and bone and brains.

  Shocked shouts and movement erupted outside the office. As Giraud’s body collapsed back into his chair one of the operatives who had come in fell to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut. The other, reaching for Boss, paused, staring open-mouthed.

  Boss raised both hands and let the Magnum clatter onto Giraud’s desk. “He was the real necromancer,” he said loudly as people crowded into the room. “The fact that one of his rezzers dropped when he did is proof of it. Now I realise there’s a lot of paperwork to do, but let’s all just calm down, yeah? No one else needs to get hurt.”

  Tension drained slightly, giving way to shock. Hurried conversations travelled out across the base like a wave.

  “Better get the Deputy Commander in here,” Boss said.

  The operative who had come in with the rezzer nodded. “I’ll go and make the call.”

  Raven looked from the Commander’s corpse to the dropped rezzer operative, mind reeling as she figured out the course of events. Her eyes finally reached Boss to find him smiling at her.

  “You see why I brought you along now, then? Give you a better idea of our role in all this. You can see why we’re needed?”

  She smiled. “Black ops within black ops?”

  Boss laughed. “None more black.”

  SONS OF APOPHIS

  Christine Morgan

  “You are asking us to betray our king.”

  “I am commanding you to save Egypt.”

  It will be, when it is finished, a great and glorious city, a shining palace-temple, a fitting home and place of honor for the one true eternal shining ruler of the land.

  Sefut-Aten.

  The Bronze Fire of the Sun.

  Where Pharaoh will rule his people in benevolence and peace. Where the waters will flow as honey, the land give forth its fertile bounty, and rich treasures be rewarded for both this world and the world beyond to those who serve with loyalty.

  At the moment, the great city might be a jumble of clay and hay and scaffolding, but will soon rise anew in its full splendor. The statues lifted, the cut stones placed, the murals painted. In cool courtyards, pools will ripple. In gardens, bright birds will sing.

  Over Sefut-Aten, day will never end and night will never come.

  Teb smiles to think of it.

  Those who serve with loyalty.

  Rich treasures. Rewards.

  This world and the world beyond.

  Such thoughts keep him brave through the dark hours. Though born to humble farmers, facing a life of planting and the plow, now here he is, entrusted with this most sacred and dangerous of duties, standing watch against the outer reaches of the night.

  When the city is finished, when the sun no longer sets, when he and his fellow sentries have well done their duty, they will have fine houses. Plump wives. Many children. Lives of pleasure and ease. Respectable tombs.

  Such promise is well worth these lonely watches as the sky stretches black and the stars cut sharp. He listens to the breeze-stirred rushes, the croak and plop of frogs, the distant cry of a jackal, and sleep-sounds from the workers’ camp.

  Further on, a single light blazes in the tower shrine where chosen priests hold their own late vigil, tending the sacred sun-flame in its bronze brazier, catching of its rays in polished mirrors so as to not let them all be swallowed up by darkness. Teb touches the miniature sun-disk amulet he wears. Though the metal is cool beneath his fingertips, a warmth goes through him. He feels his chest swell with pride, and smiles again.

  He, Teb, who came from mud and dung… whose parents were superstitious peasants, little better than slaves… is here. Will be here to see the everlasting dawn—

  A sudden loop drops over his head, a heavy length cinching tight against his throat.

  Teb gags and chokes. His spear falls to the dirt as he brings both hands to claw at the strangling constriction. His mouth forms screams, shouts alarms, but only the thinnest whistle of air emerges. He feels his heart-pulse thudding like the pounding of bull’s hooves. The night sky’s star-sharp blackness seems to sweep over his eyes.

  As his nostrils flare, inhaling desperately, a strange scent fills them… something earthen and oily and coppery and cold. The breeze-stirred rushes whisper louder than ever, hissing cold and harsh in his ears. The frogs have fallen silent.

  He lurches forward and is yanked back. His sandals kick and scuff. He can get no purchase on whatever is twisted taut around his neck. He cuts the pad of his thumb on his own sun-disk amulet’s edge—

  Ut-Aten!

  Seizing it, he uses that edge to slice and saw, frantic, hardly caring how he slices and saws his own skin, hardly caring as blood runs down his body… blood, blood is nothing, it is breath, breath he needs!

  Roiling turbulence fills his head, stormclouds in evil colors of yellow, grey, and green. Portending rains of poison, portending floods and death. No life of ease, no fine house, no plump wife to give him many children—

  Then a sense of give, of fray and loosening stretch, of snap—

  —and fall, the ground leaping up to strike Teb in the face—

  —a grunt from behind him as if of surprise—

  —wheezing and gasping, miserly air, miserly breath through throbbing bruise-meat, sobbing-throbbing breath—

  —his spear, his spear crossways under him, he’d landed atop it, scrabbling to clutch it in his blood-slicked hands—
>
  —something seizing him, seizing him by the shoulder, heave-rolling him onto his back—

  —the sight, a glimpse, a looming shadow outlined by sharp white stars, a man-like shape but scaly-hairless-sleek-supple—

  —the spear, grasping it, bringing it with him as he rolls, bringing it with him and swinging it—

  —sweeping the bronze tip in a wide, wild arc—

  —slashing it through scales and flesh—

  —another grunt, not just surprise but shock, but of pain! Yes, good, praise Ut-Aten, pain!—

  —a scraping of bronze on bone, a stumble, the looming shadow, the man-like shape a weight falling—

  —Teb wrenching himself sideways with all his strength, his draining fading strength, what strength? and driving harder with his spear, a rupture a puncture a gush and a thump—

  —the spear shaft jarring from his grip, its bronze head buried, embedded—

  —the stench of bowels, of bladder, of death—

  —as he crawls, crawls through sticky-wet dirt, through mud—

  —mud and dung, he had come from mud and dung and now was here again—

  —but a brightness grows, a brightness and heat… shining and brilliant, warming, eternal… the sun, the sun rising in the middle of the night…

  …to be swallowed whole by darkness.

  * * *

  “Will you take refreshment?” Neferisu inquired. “Wine and bread?”

  At his nod, she did not gesture for a servant but went to the side-table and poured from the jug herself. The salon was cool and private, shaded, secluded amid garden courtyards and behind walls. Cats lounged, a tame white monkey picked at bits of fruit, a harpist strummed the strings, and her maids kept a discreet distance.

  When she turned, a tray of alabaster drinking cups and dishes in her hands, Khemet’s expression of discomfort at being so waited upon was such she could not help but laugh.