by Myke Cole
Jawid cut in, speaking quickly. Schweitzer could faintly hear Eldredge’s voice in the background and realized he was hearing through Jawid’s ears. We know about that. That doesn’t mean we know who exactly did the deed or why. We’re working on it. You of all people know how networks like this operate. There’s no way to do it quickly.
The words gave Schweitzer pause. He had always been patient as a spider, sizing up dangers, stoically accepting hard realities, taking the time to plan. Pushing like this wasn’t him.
He turned his attention back to Ninip, noted the jinn’s increasingly frantic scratching at the channel linking them to Jawid, a cat pawing at a sliding glass door. He recalled his reaction to the slaughtering of the dog. He was losing the bubble. When his guard was down, he was making the jinn’s ways his own. Not good.
He took a moment to center himself. Okay. An op. By the numbers. That was the best way to slow down and do a thing right.
What’s the op? Schweitzer asked.
KC, Jawid answered without any hesitation. He hadn’t needed to translate for Eldredge that time, which meant that either he’d been prebriefed or all the ops the Operators were sent on were Kill-Capture missions.
Target? Schweitzer asked.
Schweitzer felt Jawid push deeper in, and his vision dissolved to white, then resolved to a closer view of the wall of screens. Seeing through Jawid’s eyes. He still felt himself, could still see his own surroundings in his peripheral vision, as if Jawid had turned his perspective into a set of binoculars Schweitzer could peer into.
The center screen was a pastiche of photographs, all showing a bald man with a wide jaw and deep-set, kind eyes. He had the look of a man who spent a lot of time frowning, but in concern rather than anger. A politician, or an aid worker. The only full-body image showed him to be thick around the middle, and in the corporate uniform of blue button-down shirt and khaki slacks. Painfully nondescript.
This target was nominated by the code name JACKRABBIT, written across the bottom of the screen.
Your target is a cultist. Jawid was translating again. He leads a group of people who believe him to be the second coming of Jesus Christ. They walk the border between religious and terror group. They poisoned a meat shipment last year. Seven people died.
Schweitzer remembered the news story. He flashed the memories toward Ninip, but the jinn batted them away, entirely focused on Jawid.
They are currently planning an attack on a subway system, Jawid added. Gas.
How much time do we have? Schweitzer asked.
We don’t know. Not much.
Okay. Where are we hitting him?
The pictures of the man vanished and were replaced with an image.
Ninip had at last grown frustrated with his stalking of Jawid. Schweitzer could feel the jinn rifling his memory again, grasping at touchpoints that explained what he was seeing, stumbling down the web of concepts that linked to it: satellites, photography, space travel, computers.
The image was a satellite view of a building on a waterfront. Schweitzer had seen shots like this in briefings for scores of ops. Large structure, corrugated steel roof, piers leading up to the walls. Dockside warehouse or fish-processing plant. Another building stood across a wide avenue, air-conditioning units, water tower, and elevator mechanism on the roof. Probably residential. Industrial and residential this close together meant a major city. The superdense Western architecture gave it even odds for New York or London.
This is the location, Jawid said. We have eyes on, and will insert you once we know Jackrabbit is inside.
What else is in there? Schweitzer asked.
It doesn’t matter, Jawid replied.
Of course it matters! You don’t hit a target blind.
Ninip finally stirred at this. What does it matter? He is a target.
Schweitzer felt the seductive thrill of the bloodlust, struggled with it before forcing himself to say, No way. I’ve never run an op with this lousy a targeting package. This isn’t sufficient detail to go on. I need a lot more. What assets do we have? What’s around that building? What’s the layout?
Schweitzer could see Jawid speaking to someone out of view, then arguing with Eldredge. At last he came back. He is a criminal. He has killed many people. You will have a map. There is no need to worry about your surroundings. Just remain in the building.
He’s alone? Schweitzer asked.
He will have his supporters. Other criminals.
How many? What are they packing? Where are they located? This is bullshit.
Jawid sighed, then spoke slowly and deliberately, careful to deliver the message verbatim from Eldredge. You do not understand what you are. This is the reason for the Gemini Cell: to hit targets where we don’t have the intel to risk a team with homes and families who’ll ask questions. We need a ghost to materialize out of the darkness, push this button, and vanish. That’s why you’re here, Jim. That’s who you are.
The words stopped Schweitzer cold. Ninip shook his head. You still cling to life. You are more than that now. We do not need to know what faces us because nothing can stop us. We need not fear death, because we are death.
Schweitzer had been caught up in the old preop battle rhythm. It had been a touch of the familiar, an anchor to the life he’d lost. Jawid’s and Ninip’s words rekindled grief in him, and he gave himself a moment to acknowledge it before squashing it. Lock it up. Dead or alive, you’re still a SEAL.
Still, it was stupid to go in unprepared. He couldn’t resist another question. What about squirters?
If anyone runs, we will see to them. We’ll have eyes on from the air, with limited cover.
No team? Schweitzer asked.
You are the team.
Ninip exulted. The primitive love of combat, the glory-seeking, was as infectious as the jinn’s bloodlust. Schweitzer fought it down. He might be a possessed corpse, but an op was an op, and cold professionalism was what was needed. Let me review the map.
You can review it in the air, Eldredge answered through Jawid. We’ve got a short window. We’re going now.
—
The helo, the weapon, the weight of tactical gear, all were notions of the life he had known, reminders that Schweitzer’s new world wasn’t total strangeness. He trotted out along the flight line, his first steps in the outside world since his . . . reawakening? Rebirth? Animation?
The moon was bright in the sky, blotting out the spray of stars, shining like crushed glass farther out. A warm breeze rocked thin pines, carrying the scent of box elder. He was definitely still in the Mid-Atlantic, and probably still in Virginia. Another handle on his old life. Another reminder that he was still James Schweitzer.
He could feel Ninip’s contempt for the idea. In the beginning, I was the same. That man is dead. The sooner you accept that, the sooner you can start being what you are.
No way. They brought me back because I’m supposed to be a god of war, right? Ninip grinned at the expression. Well, that comes from my memories, my training. Those things are part of me. You want Jim Schweitzer the SEAL? You get Jim Schweitzer the man, the whole package.
Ninip was silent at that, and Schweitzer turned his attention to the helicopter.
Two men sat in the cabin, feet dangling out over the side. They held the now-ubiquitous flamethrower and fire axe, insurance for his makers should he decide he wanted to stray outside mission parameters. Ninip snarled, the expression reaching their shared face, contorting the stretched surface into a twisted horror. The men slid inside the helo, weapons at the ready. Ninip’s killer’s litany began to flash through Schweitzer’s mind, and he fought it down yet again. Save it for the op.
The men scooted out of the way, crowding as far as they could against the far cabin wall as Schweitzer leapt in easily, ignoring the rattail and carabiner one of the men offered him. He slid to the cabin edge, dangled h
is legs over the side. The rotors spun up, and the helo began to rise. One of the men called out to him. “Sir, I need you to come inside. You’re not clipped in and we can’t risk you fa . . .”
Schweitzer raised one shared hand, and the man’s voice died. Schweitzer turned his attention to the ground, beginning to broaden in his vision as the helo rose. He could feel the shared thighs and abdominals tightening with inhuman strength, keeping them perfectly balanced as the helo banked. They could have stood tiptoe on the edge of the cabin floor and not fallen out. Ninip’s power was amazing.
The ground blurred beneath them as the helo leveled off and picked up speed. Death hadn’t taken Schweitzer’s internal compass, and he judged them heading east before the woods gave way to coastline, and the helo beat out over the ocean before turning north.
New York, then.
Schweitzer could feel Ninip watching through their shared eyes, awestruck. It was one thing to read Schweitzer’s memories secondhand. It was another thing to experience it. We are flying.
Schweitzer shrugged. We’ve been at it for over a century now. Not all it’s cracked up to be, honestly. You should see our delivery vehicles.
He smiled as Ninip retrieved the memory of the submersible, parsing the weight of the water pressing on his wet suit, the dull throb of the motors as the vehicle propelled his team along the ocean floor, fish scattering out at their approach. Ninip’s awe was palpable, his presence pulsing with it.
An hour into the flight, Schweitzer realized he could barely hear the rotors. The usual roar was a dull patter, even quieter than the modified helos he’d roped out of his entire career, quieter than the machine that had delivered the Body Farm’s hit team to his door. He fought against the surge of anger, but Ninip stoked it, forcing it on until Schweitzer could feel the rage pulsing in his glycerol-filled veins.
Ninip caught the idea. Let this be our blood. It will serve.
“On target in five!” the crewman called to him. “We’ll set up a pattern and extract you in twenty minutes. If you get slowed down, give us a call.”
Ninip grinned. We will not be slowed.
Schweitzer watched the ground rise as the helo banked again, slowed, descended, the picture from the satellite image slowly matching up to the reality unfolding beneath him. Schweitzer felt the old familiar thrill, the anticipation before the drop, the sudden calm and focus.
“Throw ropes!” one of the men behind him shouted. Schweitzer could hear him muscling the thick hawser into position. Schweitzer stood their shared body up, toes out over the edge, put out a hand to stop him. He heard the man freeze, the dull thud of rope dropping to the deck.
Ninip didn’t bother to speak, his lust a silent rising in all of Schweitzer’s senses. The building’s roof looked impossibly small, a postage stamp in a field of gray.
“Sir . . .” the man began.
Schweitzer jumped.
Ninip’s instincts leapt into control of their shared body, beating down Schweitzer’s effort to go belly down, pointing their toes, flexing their hamstrings until their thighs rose above their pelvis. Instead, they folded in their arms and legs, bent their head, and arced through the sky, an arrow racing toward its target. Schweitzer knew he should be frightened, but Ninip’s confidence suffused him. He felt alive with the heady power of the creature at the top of the food chain. They would strike that building headfirst, split it in half, and rise laughing from the rubble.
Ninip unfolded them at last, angling their body outward. Schweitzer felt them slow, the roof speeding toward them, the draft against their body moving them in at an angle. He overcame the instinct to shut their eyes. That was for the living.
Their core muscles engaged again, their feet cutting through the racing air, slicing through the pressure as if it were nothing, getting their soles underneath them just as the roof arrived to embrace them.
They hit.
Schweitzer felt the muscles in their legs tense, taking his weight, sending tremors up through their shared skeleton. He felt Ninip’s presence focus inward, coiling around the fragile bones, holding them together by sheer force of will.
The corrugated metal surface didn’t fare as well. Their boots punched through, the cells of fluid in the armor hardening at the impact, locking around their ankles. The concrete beneath receded, sending a spiderweb of cracks spreading out until they disappeared beneath the whole surface of the steel above.
And then they bounced out, heels ripping the rents wider, tucked their head, and somersaulted until the momentum was spent, coming up into a crouch just before the freight elevator housing. Schweitzer asserted himself, smacking down the jinn’s bloodlust. Let me drive! Ninip growled, but acceded as Schweitzer popped the carbine up into the sweet spot, getting on the sights as they rose, scanning the roof for threats.
You got infrared on these guys? Schweitzer sent up to Jawid. We must have made a pretty loud bang when we hit.
A loud bang on concrete with fire-retardant foam, Jawid sent back. We’re not seeing any indicator they heard it. The building has central HVAC. It’s pretty loud.
Schweitzer turned his attention to the outside world, could hear the loud humming of the climate-control system, the elevator mechanism, the gantry cranes. I think you’re right, he sent. Looks clear, we’re moving.
Pent anger flared in him. He knew this target wasn’t responsible for his family’s death, but it didn’t matter. It would feel so good to do something with all this . . . Stop, he told himself. That’s Ninip talking. You’re a professional, and this is a job, nothing more.
But the jinn’s influence could not be denied, and he felt the carnivore lust in the back of their throat as he moved to the elevator-housing doors, swelling their tongue, lengthening it until they were forced to open their mouth, let it slap against the helmet’s faceplate.
Report, Jawid said. Status?
Ninip sent a feral growl back up the link, and Schweitzer felt the Sorcerer’s fear traveling back down.
On deck and in position, Schweitzer managed. Entering the elevator shaft.
Jawid tried to link Schweitzer to his vision, give him a look at the map, but Schweitzer was pulled along by Ninip’s eagerness and rejected the image. That shaft leads to the . . . Jawid began.
Shut up, goatherd, Ninip growled.
Schweitzer reached out, their fingers brushing the seam between the doors, their fingertips responding, claws extending, prying between. Schweitzer couldn’t hold back the growl as Ninip engaged the muscles of their shared arm, peeling back the three inches of steel as if it were cardboard. The metal shrieked, opening just enough to admit them, and Schweitzer slid them into the cramped, dark space beyond.
Their vision compensated instantly. In life, his NODs had lit the darkness with a pale green hue, a tunnel that distorted distance and depth. Now he saw in red, the outlines and details of his surroundings as clear as if it were broad daylight.
The giant metal cylinder of the elevator’s mechanism dominated the room, thick steel cables wrapping around it to descend through the floor. Schweitzer brushed past the controls on the wall, and Ninip immediately moved them into a squat, clawed fingers prying at the machinery’s base.
Dude, Schweitzer said. Chill. There’s a goddamn hatch. He forced their head to turn to see it, thin outline barely visible at the machine’s edge. Ninip’s feral impulse almost turned him back to the machinery anyway, but Schweitzer pushed them back to the panel, allowing the jinn to rip it from its moorings, hurling it over their shoulder.
Whatever floats your boat. We’re not going to surprise anyone this way.
Warriors do not skulk like thieves, Ninip answered.
With the prospect of battle so close, Ninip was becoming harder to control, his influence so strong that Schweitzer found himself swept along. All this power, locked into one tiny body, it was only fair to let it out to stretch its legs.
They dropped through the hatch, landing on top of the elevator on the balls of their feet, silent for all Ninip’s efforts to throw caution to the wind. The jinn ripped open that hatch as well, dropping them into the elevator below. Their vision compensated again as they fell into the lighted space, a single uncovered fluorescent bulb washing all in harsh white.
We’re making a lot of noise, Schweitzer sent to Jawid.
I know, Jawid replied. So far, so good.
Before Schweitzer could process their surroundings, Ninip was clawing at the seam in the elevator doors. The metal came apart, scraping loudly against the housing. Their swollen tongue found the seam between faceplate and helmet, forced through. Schweitzer could see it lashing the air before them, gray and impossibly long.
This was not the SEALs’ way. The clumsy noise of their entry was an affront. They had paired him with Ninip to bring his years of training to bear, but it was buried in the jinn’s raw eagerness for blood.
Status? Jawid asked again. Ninip’s eagerness overcame him, and Schweitzer felt himself pushed to the very edge of his own body, his presence shrinking as Ninip’s enlarged to fill the darkness they shared. He felt the boundary of his own corpse, felt himself slipping across it. Cold washed over him, biting deeply. He heard distant screaming, the chorus of billions of shrieking voices tangled together. Schweitzer clung to their shared space, forced his way back into it.
Are you on the second deck? Jawid again, urgency in his voice. We need your position. Schweitzer could not answer, his energy funneled into the fight to cling to his corner of the ground he still held in his own corpse.
He felt Ninip give grudgingly, a fraction of their shared space opening to him. He slid gratefully into it as the jinn ripped the elevator doors from their moorings and leapt into the hallway beyond.
Schweitzer managed to get the carbine coming up, head down on the sights. They were already moving, the painted cinder-block surface of the walls sweeping by them, spaced by green metal doors at regular intervals.
Status! Jawid said. Where are you? The Sorcerer again forced the floor plan of the building down the link between them, but Ninip batted it aside again, picking up speed. On the second deck, passageway outside the elevator. Moving to junction on north side, Schweitzer sent to Jawid.
