The Legend of Banzai Maguire

by Susan Grant

  “I’ll drive,” Ty volunteered.

  “Good. You know how to handle these babies?”

  “I know nothing about babies,” he said to her apparent confusion. “But I can figure it out.”

  “So can I. At least I’ve seen it done.” She bent over, searching for the starter.

  “Fighter pilots,” he said dryly. “They always have to be behind the wheel.”

  She spoke without looking at him. “Not always.” He saw the mischievous little twist to her mouth. “It all depends who the driver is, and how good he is with the throttle.”

  He choked out a laugh, titillated. “I can teach you things about driving you never imagined, Banzai.”

  “Teach? What makes you so sure I’d be the student?”

  Before he could come up with an appropriate response to her challenge, the magcycle vibrated and Banzai let out a small whoop. “We’re good,” she said. “Hop on.” She twisted in her seat and tossed him the pistol.

  “Good woman,” he said. He released the safety on the pistol. “Making use of the available talents.” She’d drive, and he’d shoot—if fired on. He liked to believe Kyber hadn’t given the guards orders to kill him—yet—but in the dark and confusion, they probably wouldn’t be able to distinguish him and Banzai from the terrorists who’d put out the lights. And then there was the matter of the guard who resembled a badger. The goon with the beady black eyes who would be looking for an excuse to shoot, and shoot to kill. Remembering the hatred in the man’s face, Ty rechecked the weight and feel of the pistol in his grip.

  He climbed on, saw no hand-rests, so he slid one hand around Banzai’s waist. Her abdominal muscles contracted under his touch.

  “We don’t have helmets,” she said. “At least put your straps on.”

  “I’ll hold you.”

  She sighed. “I want you alive at the end of this, Armstrong.”

  “All right, then. That goes both ways.” He fastened his safety straps. Then he wrapped an arm around her. Ah, his Banzai, his sweet little prize. She was his at last. “Take me for a ride, Banzai.”

  “Hang on.” She twisted the handlebar and the vehicle moved forward. It went on that way for some time, slow and bumpy.

  “Is this the fastest it—” In a whoosh of forward velocity, the magcycle roared off.

  “Goes?” he finished. They’d achieved full levitation before he could finish the thought.

  The magcycle raced into the darkness, soaring a few fingers’ width above the track. He leaned forward. Banzai’s hair whipped his face. He pushed the strands out of the way. “Do you know where you’re going?” he shouted near her ear over the wind noise.

  “That was station six.” She hunched forward, the wind no doubt stinging her eyes. “We need eight.”

  He kept glancing back at their six o’clock position. No one was on their tail yet, but that could change.

  Another station passed by. “There goes five,” he shouted.

  “We’re going in the wrong direction.”

  The track curved. Banzai didn’t let up on the speed. They leaned into the turn. “Here comes four.” With the goggles, she had better vision. “Do you think it’s an endless loop?”

  “That’s my guess. Let’s see what we get after number one.”

  A light flared in the darkness, preceding the zing of a bullet. “Someone’s shooting at us!” Banzai shouted.

  No kidding. A hundred to one it was the badger, looking to bag Ty as his personal trophy.

  His arm tight around her waist, he fired in the direction of the attack. Bullets whizzed past them like angry bees. One shot hit the magcycle, impacting with a metallic ping. “Faster,” he shouted. They’d be out of range soon. Unless more shooters were stationed along the route. In that case, they might not escape so easily.

  Banzai ducked down and sped up. He could see why wearing helmets had been a concern of hers. If they cracked up now, at this speed, it wouldn’t be pretty. But then, neither would getting shot.

  Station three passed by. And then two. Finally, one went flying past. Let the next one be eight, he thought.

  “A station,” Banzai yelled. He saw it a few breaths after she did. Number eight!

  Banzai hit the brakes. Ty tightened his grip on her waist and pressed his thighs to the seat as if he were riding a newly broken horse. The magcycle decelerated and then bumped along the track before stopping. He and Banzai jumped off. “Where?” he asked.

  “They didn’t say. Do you see an exit?” She used her goggles to search out a door. “There!”

  They ran for it. The last of Ty’s newly issued prison slippers disintegrated before he reached the door. Now he was barefoot.

  He used his shoulder as a battering ram. They spilled out of the stuffy basement into the cool, crisp night. Falling, they rolled down a grassy slope. He did all he could to keep her head from hitting a rock or log. Now that he had his treasure in hand, he didn’t want a single scratch marring it.

  They landed at the bottom of the hill, limbs tangled, Ty propped over her in a push-up. She tore off her goggles. “We have to stop meeting like this,” she said, her eyes aglow with an incongruous mix of terror and mischief. But they seemed to have one thing in common: They didn’t shrink from danger; it exhilarated them.

  He grinned. “The atmosphere could use improvement, yes, but I have to say I like this.”

  She disentangled her legs from his. “If all goes well, Blue Eyes, we’ll have plenty of time for atmosphere later. Where are our shadows?”

  “Come on,” he said. Together, they ran for the woods. Blue Eyes? He grinned. He had to say he liked that, too.

  Ty threw a glance over his shoulder. No guards and no alarms, he noted—although the alarms would likely be silent. “Even if the entire palace security system was compromised, the system can come back up just as quickly. I don’t want to be anywhere close by when it does.”

  “Neither do I.”

  “Who are the ‘shadows’?” He remembered the graffiti in the cell, and what Rocket-man had told him. “Are they responsible for putting out the power?”

  “That’s my guess,” Banzai answered, breathless. “I don’t know what their goals are, but hurting Kyber isn’t one of them.”

  He heard the protective edge to her voice. He also remembered the way Kyber had looked at her during their dinner. The possessiveness. The interest. That night, when Ty had returned to his cell, he knew it wouldn’t be long before the prince charmed his way into Banzai’s bed. When he saw her a few days later, he’d tried to tell if the deed had been done, but couldn’t. And yet, here she was. With him! Ha. Go to hell, Kyber! Ty decided not to waste anymore time wondering about his treasure’s change of heart. Good fortune was like finding an unexploded grenade—if you analyzed it too closely, it could blow up in your face.

  They stopped running a few meters past where the trees began so they could keep the palace in sight, and yet remain hidden from it. Pine needles stung the soles of his feet, but the cold turned the sting to a more palatable throbbing ache. In the silence, they listened to their harsh breaths. Then, footsteps crunched toward them in the woods.

  “Well, well, UCE. I didn’t have to listen for you. I could smell you!”

  Ty squinted at the man walking toward them in the dark. He waved with a thick cigarette pinched between his fingers. In the background, fireworks exploded in the sky. The flares lit the man’s face in bursts of multicolored light. Rocket-man. Ty shook his head. “I don’t believe it.”

  “I told you to look for the shadows, didn’t I?”

  Ty’s goal of driving a fist through the man’s face fizzled with the knowledge that the guy was involved somehow in springing him loose from the dungeon.

  Rocket-man looked Banzai up and down. “I smelled you, too.”

  “Blame him,” she said, throwing Ty a withering glance.

  Ty shrugged. “What can I say? I wake up irritable.”

  Rocket-man had little to brag about, dressed i
n rags as he was. Looking around at the dark, palatial grounds, he smirked. “Worm,” he explained, drawing deeply on his cigarette. Tobacco laced with some other substance, Ty guessed, probably nanoadditives for a cheap high, judging by the smell. “Shadows put it in the Interweb. Took out the palace. Temporarily. That Kabul, he’ll get it fixed. Maybe soon.” He took another long drag of his smoke-stick and threw it on the ground, grinding it out with his heel. “You ready?” He turned and walked away.

  Ty flexed his hands and followed. Yeah, he was ready, ready to bring Banzai Maguire back to the UCE, where they’d welcome her as a returning hero.

  Banzai caught up to Ty, her expression wary, her eyes questioning. “You know him?” she asked under her breath.

  “We, ah, shared the dungeon for a time.” He refrained from telling her why the man had been there, and then figured, what the hell? “I call him Rocket-man. Any idea why?”

  She shook her head.

  “He fired the rockets at the balcony—at you and Prince Kyber.”

  Rocket-man overheard them. Without turning around, he raised his hand. “That would be me.”

  Banzai narrowed her eyes. “That was you?” Ty could tell that she, too, fluctuated between wanting to swear at the man for the rockets and thank him for showing up tonight. “What did you do that for?”

  “To get inside,” Rocket-man replied. “We wanted to see who the prince was hosting in his dungeon.”

  Ty regarded Rocket-man with new awe. He and his shadow people were willing to get arrested to accomplish recon? How long before Kyber realized they were outsmarting him?

  In the starlight, a dirt path shone. Then, Ty heard the unmistakable moo of a cow. Many cows. But he couldn’t discern the smell of manure from his own stink.

  They broke through the trees. Ahead was a livestock-type vehicle, hybrid-fueled and not meant for travel on mag-roads. Cows filled the rear compartment. I’ll take you as far as Freedom City,” said Rocket-man.

  “That’s only twenty-five kilometers from here.”

  Banzai touched Ty’s arm. “Once there, we can get where we need to go. We just need to get away from here.”

  But Rocket-man reassured them. “Another driver will take my place. The shadows will bring you all the way to New Seoul. There, you must proceed to the rendezvous point. I will give you the location.”

  “Joo-Eun told me where to find shelter for the night,” Banzai said. “Is that what you mean?”

  “No. I am handing you the next bead.”

  She shook her head. “Say again?”

  “Each of us holds only one bead in the necklace, you see. Joo-Eun, me, all the rest. None of us knows all—only our small part. As you pass from shadow to shadow, you will string these beads together. Go to the location Joo-Eun gave you, but the next morning, you must be on the southeast curve of the eighth radius of Bai-Yee Square at nine a.m. Don’t be late.”

  Ty memorized the directions. “Bai-Yee Square is arranged in circles that radiate outward from a statue of the first Han Emperor,” he explained quickly to ease Banzai’s confusion. “Eighth radius means the eighth circle from the center. It’s a street.” He gave Rocket-man a frown. “And why is this necessary?”

  “There, you will learn how to find the other one.”

  Banzai froze. “The ‘other one.’ Do you mean Cameron Tucker? You know where she is?”

  Rocket-man’s smile revealed nothing. “You will learn more then. Do not forget—the southeast curve of the eighth radius of Bai-Yee Square.”

  “Nine a.m.,” Banzai said. “We’ll be there.”

  As they climbed up into the livestock compartment, Rocket-man issued more directions. “There are clothes. In the sack, there. You’re a simple farm couple, returning home from Kingdom Day festivities at the summer capital—and too frugal to buy a mag-train ticket.” He pinched his nose and took a few steps back. “When you get to New Seoul, the first thing I’d do is take a bath.”

  Rocket-man closed the gate, locking them in with the cows.

  Banzai walked hunched over between the animals and found her way to the rear of the truck. She slumped onto a large platform of hay that stood above the cattle. It would keep them safe from stray hooves. Ty joined her.

  Rocket-man started up the truck. Then they were off, bumping along the rutted dirt path until they veered onto the road proper. The truck accelerated with surprising efficiency.

  Immediately, Banzai was up on her knees, opening a sack of clothing. “You...me...me...you…”

  She sorted through the garments, separating them into two piles. The wind whipped her damp hair around her face. All Ty could see was her chin with its little cleft and her nose, smudged with dirt. More dirt rimmed her fingernails. One of her knuckles sported a bloody scrape. She was real. Real! He wanted to pull her into his arms and laugh out loud; he wanted to hold her up in front of Kyber’s face and sneer. “You bastard, I’ve got her now,” he muttered.

  Banzai turned to look at him. “What?”

  “I said I was thinking of you. In fact, you’re all I’ve thought about the past few weeks—how I could finish what I came here to do, how to take you back. And you fell right into my hands!”

  She gave a soft snort. “Fell?”

  He laughed with the relief of it all. “Yes!”

  “Tyler—”

  “Call me Ty.”

  “Ty. I didn’t fall into your hands. I jumped. My wingman’s alive somewhere. And you’re going to help me find her.”

  Ty wasn’t certain that he’d heard right. “Say again?”

  “I need your help to find my wingman. Cameron Tucker. You couldn’t talk at the palace, so I got you out. Now you can tell me everything you know!”

  “That’s why you helped me escape? Because you think I know where your wingman is?”

  Fear flashed in her eyes. “Don’t you?”

  “I know where I found you,” he hedged. He couldn’t escape the disconcerting feeling that she’d return him to Kyber if she thought he wouldn’t be of any use to her. If he wanted her to stay with him, he’d have to make sure she didn’t stop believing she needed him, all while he kept both women out of Kyber’s hands. “I assume Cameron Tucker is in the same location.”

  “She is. She has to be.”

  “The cave is in a shambles. Three-quarters of the walls are down. Part of the ceiling, too. I wouldn’t have access to all the places her pod might be. I’d need extra men, explosives…” Before he realized what he was doing, the treasure hunter in him was pondering how to conduct such a complicated rescue on a shoestring budget while evading one of the world’s most powerful rulers. But he caught himself in time. “No. It’s impossible.”

  She tore off her travel pouch and threw it on the hay. “I’m 198 years old. Don’t tell me about impossible.”

  Then she turned to him, her arms open, her hands upturned and pleading. “You’re my last resort, Ty. I don’t know this world, but you do. I need a guide, someone capable. I need...you.”

  It pained him to refuse her, but he had to. “I can’t, Banzai. I can’t risk your wingman falling into Kyber’s hands.”

  “Yes, you can. A deal’s a deal.”

  “A deal? What deal? I never agreed to anything.”

  “It was a tacit deal. I freed you. Now you owe me.”

  He coughed out a laugh. Her logic was incomprehensible. No, it was nonexistent.

  “I read about you on the Interweb,” she said angrily. “You’re a SEAL. In my time that meant something. Never leave a man behind. Or don’t you believe that anymore?”

  Ty shoved a hand through his hair and turned his eyes to the dark countryside racing past. “I know what it’s like to lose someone in my command.”

  He hadn’t intended to say that out loud. He hadn’t shared the experience with anyone. Maybe she hadn’t heard him.

  But she turned to face him in the dark, the wind blowing her hair over her face. “Did it happen in combat?”

  He heard the carefu
l respect in her tone. She knew what it meant, that loss. “The Pirate Wars,” he began, with some reluctance. “It was our last major campaign, a crackdown on sea terrorism. We saw the loss of two military underwater vehicles—six men, all captured by the pirates. I led the mission to extract them. It was my first as a commander.” He’d had Lopez with him, one of the best combat soldiers he’d ever worked with, and a great team to match. “Two of my men were killed. It’s hard to accept, the first time men in your command die. And maybe that never changes.” He swallowed.

  “Did you find the captured crews?” she asked gently.

  “I found them, found them all.” He pushed aside the grotesque mental images burned into his psyche for all eternity. Jake, dismembered...Chance’s head on a stake... Not all battle scars were visible, he knew. He’d relive the experience of finding those men for the rest of his days. “They were mutilated. Their body parts on public display.”

  Banzai made a sound of dismay.

  “I blamed myself for not getting there in time. And I blamed myself for the deaths of my men. I did everything right. Logic says it wasn’t my fault. But logic is not always the reality of our conscience.

  “No,” she whispered. “It’s not.” Her suddenly anguished gaze lingered on his face. She looked as if she was about to reveal a nightmare of her own, but changed her mind.

  Her pain roused his curiosity. What did she hide beneath that tough exterior? It was strange to see his dream woman as flesh and blood...and pain.

  “So, you see,” he finished, watching her. “I know well the demons that drive a man to find those lost under his command. Or, her command.”

  “I admit I have demons, Ty. More than my share. But they won’t hold me back from what I have to do.”

  “No,” he said in a quiet voice. “Nor will mine.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Bree glared at Ty. He was as determined as she, she realized. Unfortunately, their goals were vastly different. “American Fighting Man’s Code of Conduct, Article Three: ‘If I am captured I will continue to resist by all means available. I will make every effort to escape and will aid others to escape.’ Aid others, Ty. I’m bound by duty to look for her. Even if she weren’t my friend.”