by Barry Reese
Keane nodded, digesting that information. “Thank you, o spirit. You may now depart.”
The demon vanished in a wisp of smoke, leaving behind no trace of his existence.
“I wish you hadn’t traded away part of your life,” The Peregrine said.
Keane stepped from the pentagram and offered a shrug of his shoulders. “If you had a list of all the demons I’ve offered portions of my life to… you’d have an amazingly long list. I plan to take all necessary precautions to prolong my existence, Max, so I don’t think any of those demons will get to enjoy my lifeforce anytime soon.” Keane began to disperse the salt that made up the pentagram, kicking at it with the tips of his shoes. “Those names the spirit gave us—do they help you any?”
“Well, three of the girls he named make up that Furies group I told you about. The fourth one… Elsa… that’s a new one. And I have no idea about who Arthur is.”
Keane had opened his mouth to reply when a tremendous explosion suddenly shook the vessel. The ship dipped to one side so sharply that both Keane and The Peregrine had to grab the wall to keep from toppling over. A grinding sound filled the hold and, from somewhere else in the ship, they heard the unmistakable sound of rushing water coupled with the screams of the crew.
The hatch that led into the cargo hold was yanked open and the fishing boat’s captain looked in, eyes wide with terror. “We have been attacked!” the captain bellowed. “A submarine has just hit us with a torpedo! We’re going under!”
CHAPTER X
Death Trap!
Ascott Keane and The Peregrine were up on the deck within seconds, having sprinted up the stairs. The ship was capsizing quickly and the first thing Max saw as they reached the open air was that the crew was already readying the lifeboats. At the rate the ship was going under, they had only moments to do so.
The Peregrine fought his way to the railing, looking down at a partially submerged submarine. It was oddly shaped and bore no flags or colors that would identify its nationality.
“Who is it?” Keane asked, appearing at his side. The detective was clutching the railing so tightly that his knuckles were turning white.
“No clue,” The Peregrine admitted. “But whoever it is, they’re about to come out and say hello.” He pulled free one of his specially modified pistols and held it below the railing, out of sight of the sub’s crew. His guns were supposedly waterproof but he’d checked them thoroughly after being pulled from the sea.
Fritz scrambled past, jumping into one of the lifeboats when the opportunity presented itself. Max was glad that the kid was displaying more energy than before and he swore that if they all made it back to civilization, he’d find the young man some honest work.
A figure emerged from the hatch atop the submarine, dressed in drab gray uniform. He was of Oriental descent and had the bearing of a military man, though his uniform bore no direct signs of that. When he shouted, it was in English and quite fluent. “We will open fire on your life boats unless The Peregrine surrenders to us, with The Fourth Nail on his person!”
Keane and The Peregrine exchanged glances. “Boy, you were right about people coming after that thing,” Max whispered, a surprising amount of levity in his voice. Even though they were facing a far superior vessel, both he and Keane were so intimately familiar with such situations that they could laugh in the face of death.
The Peregrine addressed the mysterious figure, raising his voice so that he could be heard over the creaking of the dying vessel. “Who are you?”
“We are the ones who will kill everyone onboard that ship if you do not surrender to us!”
“Lovely fellow,” Keane said. “You can’t go with him, not with The Nail. We can’t risk it falling into the wrong hands.”
“Worst thing that could happen is they get saved, right?”
“And they’ll be immortal, unless someone does them physical harm.”
The Peregrine extended a gloved hand. He slid his gun back into its holster. “I have to take that chance. Hand over The Nail.”
Ascott Keane looked like he might argue the point but he looked around as the last of the lifeboats was dropped into the sea. Like The Peregrine, he wasn’t prepared to let innocent men die. With obvious reluctance, he handed over the sacred relic. “I don’t know if I’ll be able to save you this time, Max.”
“You won’t have to, old friend. Trust me, the people on that submarine are going to wish they’d never invited me onboard.”
Before Keane could respond, The Peregrine scrambled up on the railing and then launched himself into the open water. He landed with a splash and immediately began swimming towards the sub, pulling himself up with ease. The gray-garbed man seemed less self-assured now that The Peregrine was standing directly in front of him. He vanished down the hole and The Peregrine paused only long enough to offer Keane a jaunty wave before he dropped down after the Oriental.
The Peregrine’s feet had just touched the deck when an all-too familiar voice spoke up. “Ah, Herr Peregrine. We meet again.”
“Oh, no,” The Peregrine whispered. He slowly turned to face Mueller, who was now dressed in the same drab gray that everyone else in this crew seemed to be wearing. A bearded man wearing a dark military-style suit stood beside Mueller, with the unmistakable air of a commander about him.
“I can tell from your expression that you never expected to see me again,” Mueller was saying, the pleasure unmistakable in his voice. “It takes more than you to kill the likes of me.”
“I’ll try harder next time,” The Peregrine promised. He held The Fourth Nail aloft and a series of audible gasps filled the small chamber. “This is what all the excitement’s about, eh?” Looking directly at the bearded man, he asked, “So do you want it, too? Or are you just Mueller’s lackey?”
The man’s jaw clenched. “I am the captain of this vessel. My name is Felipe Melo and I represent an order of Christian soldiers. That object you’re treating so cavalierly is one of the most precious things in all creation. And you’re a lucky enough fool to be holding not only it, but also The Knife of Elohim. If you value your life, you’ll give both of them over to us. We’ll treat them with the proper amount of respect… and you can continue living your heathen existence.”
“And Mueller’s going to just stand back and watch me go? I don’t think so. I think you’re planning to get these objects and then turn me over to Mueller, so he can try to salvage his wounded pride.”
Melo held up a hand before Mueller could respond. “You think yourself very clever, don’t you? But the fact is, you’re in our power… I don’t need to make any bargains with you. I could simply take what I want. So you had best appreciate my attempts at being nice to you.”
“You’re so kind,” The Peregrine answered. “But let me tell you something.” He looked slowly at each person in the room, holding their eyes for a few seconds before moving to the next in line. “All of you are going to die unless you surrender your weapons. I’m going to leave each and every one of you lying on the floor in a pool of your own blood, moaning and crying like babies.”
Melo’s crew seemed somewhat unsettled by The Peregrine’s bravado but neither Melo nor Mueller batted an eye. Melo reached down to the holster at his hip, unsnapping it. He drew his pistol and offered it to Mueller, who took it with obvious gratitude. “I am now offended. Mr. Mueller, feel free to put a bullet in his brain—but try not to cause too much damage to the ship.”
The Peregrine moved so quickly that the men closest to him gasped in surprise. The Knife of Elohim appeared in The Peregrine’s hand and the golden dagger flew through the air, the sharpened blade embedding itself in Melo’s throat. Blood gushed like a fountain, staining the man’s black uniform as his eyes widened. Before Melo had hit the floor, The Peregrine was drawing his own pistols, dropping into a crouch and spinning, blowing out the bellies and knees of the men around him.
Mueller, momentarily stunned by the sudden shift in events, tried to draw a bead on The Pe
regrine but the vigilante threw himself forward, rolling in a ball until he came up on his knees directly in front of the Nazi. He pulled the triggers of both guns, ripping open Mueller’s belly and sending the man flying backwards. He crashed into a control panel, sending up sparks.
Mueller panted, one of his hands going to his stomach. It came away dripping with blood. “You bastard,” Mueller whispered. “How in the hell did you manage to do this?”
The Peregrine strode towards him, smoke curling from the barrels of his pistols. “You should have been glad that you survived the fall of The Valkyrie, Mueller. You could have gone on your way and enjoyed the rest of your miserable life. But you had to come after me again—and I never give second chances.”
Mueller raised his gun with a shaking hand. Before he could pull the trigger, The Peregrine swung a leg up and kicked it away. It clanked off the hull and landed nearby.
The Peregrine put away his own guns and began pulling off the glove that covered his right hand. On his middle finger he wore a ring adorned by a blood-red gem. The gem’s surface was marked by the image of a peregrine in flight. It had been forged in the heart of a powerful demon, a messenger to the old gods who existed before humanity crawled from the sea. “I’m going to kill you, Mueller, but not before I mark you.”
Mueller shook his head, feeling weak from the loss of blood. He knew what was coming, had read about it in the reports that had come back on The Peregrine. The vigilante had a habit of pressing his ring against the foreheads of his enemies. Somehow, the ring’s mystical origins allowed it to brand the flesh of evildoers, leaving the imprint of a peregrine on their bodies forever.
The Peregrine grabbed Mueller’s hair and yanked his head back. He brought the ring close enough that Mueller could feel the air sizzle around it. He then shoved it hard against the Nazi’s skull, causing Mueller to cry out in agony as his skin burned. Almost too quietly to hear, The Peregrine whispered his mantra, one that had become feared by all who faced him: “When the good is swallowed by the dark, there The Peregrine will plant his mark!”
* * *
Ten minutes later, The Peregrine had successfully canvassed the rest of the submarine, ensuring that none of the crew had escaped his notice. The injured and dying had been branded, one by one, and then dispatched to the next stage of their existence with a single bullet to each skull. Max didn’t relish killing, in fact he’d taken an oath against it more than once, but he also realized that sometimes death was the only way to truly end someone’s threat.
The Peregrine had gone through Captain Melo’s papers, enough so that he now knew that the mysterious Order was a worldwide organization that was willing to kill for its religious beliefs.
It also reaffirmed a decision that he’d come to shortly after killing Mueller. The Knife of Elohim was a weapon that had proved its worth in his personal arsenal again and again… but The Fourth Nail was a problem. By its very nature, it was something that men would covet… and he was already tired of protecting it.
The Peregrine found the launching area, where the sub’s torpedoes were sent out on their errands of destruction. He carefully strapped The Fourth Nail to the side of one of the torpedoes and then launched it at the wreckage of the fishing ship, which by now was settling to the ocean floor. The resulting explosion was unlikely to destroy The Nail but it would definitely make it harder for anyone to ever find again.
Max then set about using the periscope to check for Keane and the other survivors. Strangely, he didn’t see them, which could only mean that Melo had given orders for the submarine to proceed at high speed away from the area. Given enough time, Max was sure that he would be able to navigate his way back to them… but he wasn’t sure how much time he actually had. Sun Koh was on the loose, heading towards the Potomac. From there, he would launch his assault on the nation’s capital…
The Peregrine had contacts in law enforcement, most notably the mysterious Mr. Benson who had played such a large role in smoothing over Max’s own problems with the law. But would anyone believe him if he told them that he’d had a vision of death and destruction raining down on the city?
Deciding that the best way to help was to get there himself, The Peregrine changed the submarine’s course, plotting a direction that would hopefully take him somewhere close to where he needed to be. He would use the radio to contact any ships in the area, sending them towards Keane and the others. Piloting a submarine wasn’t something that The Peregrine was trained for but his expansive knowledge meant that he was able to recognize the basics of it all and get it to work, though it wasn’t easy running the entire vessel on his own.
When things seemed under control and he was able to finally relax, Max found himself drifting into a deep slumber. Given all that had happened in recent days, it had only been adrenaline that had kept him on his feet. He slept in the pilot’s chair, head tilted backward… and he dreamed.
* * *
The thin barrier that resided between the worlds of the living and the dead was a fog-enshrouded place. There was no landscape to speak of, only clouds of white and gray that extended as far as the eye could see. The air here was slightly damp and smelled like fresh earth after a heavy rain.
Max Davies was as familiar with this awful purgatory as any human being in the world. It was here that he sometimes came when his father wanted to speak face-to-face, as opposed to the way Warren Davies usually preferred: sending horribly painful visions that compelled his son to do what he wanted of him.
Warren Davies appeared through the mist, wearing the suit he’d worn on the day he’d died. There were dried stains on the front of his shirt, as if the blood that had once flown from his wounds had marred him even in death. Max suspected that his father could have changed his appearance if he’d so desired… but he knew the impact that seeing him like this would have on his son.
“Max,” Warren said, loving warmth coming through in the way he said his son’s name. “You’re doing well so far… but you have to pick up the pace. Sun Koh isn’t waiting on you.”
The Peregrine clenched his hands into fists, feeling once more like a little boy being berated by the man he idolized. Warren Davies had been a hero to everyone, including his son. He’d stood up to the criminal forces that had threatened his city and in the end it had gotten him killed. But even in life, Warren had been a stern father, always pushing Max to be the very best. And now that Max knew that his father had continued pushing and prodding, even from the grave, it made matters all the worse. “It’s not like I’m sitting around, doing nothing. There’s been the little matter of The Furies and The Fourth Nail.”
Warren moved closer but stopped just short of his son, as if he was afraid of any contact. Max felt the same trepidation. If his father were to embrace him, he wasn’t sure how he would react—would he shove him angrily away? Or would he bring down in tears? Either way, Max was too proud to want to find out. “I’m not condemning you, son. Things have a way of cropping up. I know that. But those visions of yours… they’re for real. Sun Koh plans to destroy the nation’s capital and then he’s going to drive a stake right through the heart of the Allied forces.”
“Do you have anything to tell me that might actually help… or are you just going to try and scare me into moving faster?”
Warren Davies didn’t seem to take any offense from his son’s tone. “The people that Sun Koh has surrounded himself with… they’re not nearly as loyal as the ones he used to travel with. This group is filled with divisions and there’s the potential for them to turn on one another. Use that, son! It may be the only thing that can stop Sun Koh from succeeding.”
The Peregrine looked away, wondering about his father’s words. He’d sensed some tension within The Furies whenever Sun Koh’s name had come up… the German woman seemed devoted to him, the Japanese less so and the Italian didn’t seem particularly inclined to follow him. And then, of course, The Peregrine knew nothing about the mysterious Elsa or Arthur.
“Tha
nks,” he said at last. “I’ll try and keep that in mind.”
“Son?” The Peregrine looked his father in the eyes and Max was surprised to something close to fear in the dead man’s eyes. “You’ve never fought a man like Sun Koh. He was designed… he was built… out of psychic energy. He’s specifically your opposite number. You’re as an American ideal as they come. You were trained to be what you are but anyone could have done it, if they’d have the nerve and determination. Sun Koh receives all of his gifts through genetics. His heritage and his racial characteristics define him. That’s the Nazi philosophy. When you two clash, it’s going to reverberate amongst people on both sides. It’s a war of ideologies, not just of men.”
“That’s an awful lot of pressure to put on me,” The Peregrine said with a hint of a smile.
Warren Davies returned the grin and then, with obvious hesitation, reached out and gripped Max’s shoulder. “I won’t see you again until this is over, one way or another. Take care.”
And then Warren Davies was gone, leaving The Peregrine alone in the void. He stood there, collecting his thoughts, until he felt himself slowly drifting back towards the world of the living.
* * *
Elsa Mayen had proven her worth to Sun Koh by the time they set down on the shores of the Potomac. Not only had she managed to evade detection by the myriad air defense systems in place around the American capital, but she’d also made amazing time while doing so. A large portion of the credit had to go to Elsa’s father, for having devised such an incredible aircraft, but Elsa had piloted it so well that one would have been hard pressed to believe she hadn’t been the plane’s creator.
After settling down, the group had stretched their legs outside the plane, setting up a small campsite near the water. The Furies were quite adept at this, having a lot of experience in dealing with the wilderness. Sun Koh allowed them to handle the bulk of the work, choosing to stay close to Elsa as she ran through a series of post-flight diagnostics. Elsa was nervous in his presence but eventually grew used to him and began to ignore him as she went about her work. In fact, she didn’t even notice when Sun Koh finally moved away to locate Käthe.
