According to John, he’d finally had to kill the woman to get rid of her. He’d finish his story each time brushing his hand against the rapier hanging at his waist and mimic drawing it and plunging it into someone’s heart. Or face or even over their head, Reiji mused. The guy was freakishly tall.
Reiji wasn’t sure if that story was supposed to impress him, intimidate him, or make him like John. It achieved none of those things. When he wasn’t telling stories that stank of lies, he was good enough company, but Reiji would as soon collect a bounty on him as call him friend.
And now, there he was interrupting Reiji’s training.
Reiji nodded once, reached up, and gripped the data plug where it sat in the neural interface device implanted behind his right ear. The same that his father had used and his father before him. He closed his eyes again as he held onto it for a few seconds. Concentrating, he found himself back in the training hall with his ancestors.
The old man had removed his armor and stood as himself once more. Ancient and frail. Each one of the grandfathers had assumed their place in the line-up, the oldest on Reiji’s left and the youngest, his father, on his right. They demanded that respect be paid, and he would pretend to do so. Just as long as they still had something to teach him.
He knelt and placed his weapons before him on the mat and pressed his forehead to the floor. In the stainless steel bunk of the real world, he removed the data plug from the implant in his head and the scene faded away to nothing. Leaving him staring up at the ceiling of the transport and its dull yellow lights through the grating of the empty bunk above his.
He sat up slowly to avoid hitting his head on the next bunk. A mistake he would only make once in his life. His feet, still clad in his heavy boots, swung onto the floor and he stood. Stretching as he did so and brushing the ceiling of the transport with his fingertips.
He looked around for a moment, taking in his surroundings. The interior of the transport stretched in either direction. To his right, more of the same. Metal bunks and desks with a few chairs bolted to the floor. Dim yellow lights providing illumination and a few semi-private toilets spread evenly over the length.
It resembled nothing so much as the interior of a prison.
To Reiji’s left, more of the same and the back of the truck where a ramp descended to the ground outside. Darkness showed and men milled about at the edge of the light, moving away from the transport and out into…whatever lay beyond. More desert, Reiji assumed. The same as every day for the past two weeks.
John’s boots clacked as he walked down the ramp and joined the others. Reiji turned to go with them, then paused. He pressed his thumb onto the scanner embedded in his footlocker and it popped open. He reached inside and grabbed Kai and Little Brother, slinging the long sword over his shoulder and tucking the short sword through a loop in his belt. There was enough time for a few minutes of practice before dinner.
Dinner…more beans and dried, synthetic beef no doubt. A decent amount of nutrition to be had, but little in the way of taste. He’d accumulated a double share for the evening meal by skipping breakfast. Something he rarely ate anyways. It would be better to eat it all at once after he had practiced a little.
Reiji strode down the ramp and the still hot, dry air of the early desert evening washed over him. The interior of the transport was comfortable enough. Air conditioned, even. And a humidified for the sake of the passengers. The air outside was so different that it felt like setting foot on an alien world.
The fucking desert, Reiji thought as he stepped onto the ground. A great place to get yourself killed, whether by accident or design. Coarse sand crunched beneath the soles of his boots, with the pavement of the road hidden somewhere beneath it.
Twelve or so men milled about, some speaking to one another, most just looking around with no purpose. The truck had stopped and that meant it was time to eat and then sleep. The crew had fallen into the routine over the course of the past two weeks.
Travel during the day at whatever speeds the roads would allow, which wasn’t usually very much, and stop at night because driving at night was likely to disable the vehicle. Shitty roads and large stupid wildlife combined with blinding sandstorms that could lead the transport off of the road and into the sun-blasted rocks to ensure that travel at night wasn’t an option.
The twelve other men had grown used to Reiji’s nightly performance as well. It was part of the routine as far as they were concerned.
He moved past them, and paused a good distance away. He rolled his shoulders and stretched for a moment before removing his jacket and shirt. He folded them and laid them down on a nearby rock and then turned towards the night. Drawing both blades in one smooth motion and working through the movements he had learned in his training. The neural pathway was imprinted in his mind, but he still liked to perform the movements a few dozen times with his own hands in the real world to ensure that he had actually learned them.
The first night, it had been a spectacle worth mocking to some. The second night a few had even joined Reiji, bringing their own blades out and getting some practice. Amateurs at best, he concluded. But at least there were enough of them to potentially make up for it should they need to fight side by side.
The third night they had simply watched in silence as they ate. A few nights after that, a trio had begun providing commentary as if they were watching a sporting event.
“Oh my…the league is surely going to penalize that!” That had been the most popular comment judging by the amount of laughter it had produced and how often it had been repeated.
By the end of the first week the others simply ignored Reiji as he practiced. They ate, joking with one another and playing cards as he trained. When he was satisfied that he had truly learned the day’s lesson, then he would join them. Sitting with them physically, but remaining silent as he ate his double portion.
Despite the dry air, he worked up a sweat as he practiced. In his mind’s eye, the old man’s huge sword shot up at his midsection, intent on ripping his guts from his body. Both blades intercepted it, turned it aside, and then took the old man in the neck. Over and over.
After about twenty minutes, Reiji felt that he had learned the movement sufficiently. He sheathed his weapons and wiped himself with a small towel before returning to the men eating.
A long folding table had been carried out from the truck and two men who appeared to be along solely as cooks served hot potfuls of beans and dried beef. As expected. They hadn’t failed to produce yet. The two cooks slept and rode in a separate compartment further up the body of the transport, towards the front cabin and the massive truck that pulled everything.
Reiji sat at the table and took the bowl waiting for him, digging in with hunger if not enthusiasm. As he ate, the men around him talked. Mostly sharing their uneducated guesses as to where the transport was going and what waited for them when they finally arrived at their destination.
Tales of old vaults full of gold and guns were shared, laughed at and dismissed by the next man in line with his own hypothesis.
Reiji would feign that he didn’t care, but he wanted to know what was happening just as much as anyone else. It had been nearly three weeks since he’d found a group of men waiting for him in his darkened apartment.
They had been waiting for him, not to kill him, or to try to collect his bounty. They had been waiting to offer him a job.
Reiji had been hesitant to accept the offer at first. In fact his first inclination had still been to kill all three men and leave their bodies in the alley beneath his bedroom window. But he had listened to their offer, and the more they spoke, the more it made sense to him.
He was a wanted man, with access to only a tiny fraction of his assets. The hard drive he retrieved contained enough credits to pay off his bounty, but unknown to him the bounty could not be paid off.
Knowing how greedy and credit-hungry Cent-Sec was, it was a surprise to see the attempted payment refused. The only logical exp
lanation that Reiji could come to, was that someone had paid Cent-Sec more than the bounty to keep his name on the wanted lists. Someone wanted him dead.
And he had no idea who. But he did have a few suspicions.
The smoking man, waiting in his apartment for him, Gavin was his name. His two associates had been identified as Varg and Virgil. It was all too convenient for them to show up with a job offer that would carry Reiji out of the city for several weeks just when he became a wanted man. But that would be a huge gamble on their part that he would accept the job. A job in which he still wasn’t sure what was expected of him.
He had accepted and followed the three men to a large warehouse where the transport was being assembled. Other men, a few that Reiji recognized as bounty hunters had milled about, nervously exchanging glances and moving hands towards weapons when they saw him. When Gavin had told them it was okay, they relaxed, if only a little.
He’d given them a speech saying that he worked for a very wealthy man who had a significant interest in having a job completed by professionals such as the men who had been gathered. More details would be revealed as the situation demanded, but for now they simply need to know that they would be paid extremely well, and within the week they would be departing for a location in the western desert onboard the transport that occupied a large part of the warehouse.
Gavin had been scarce since that first day of travel. He had only been glimpsed a few times or his voice heard on a half dozen occasions. He remained in his own compartment, within the body of the huge truck pulling the transport.
So it was a bit of a shock when Reiji took his last bite of supper and Gavin sat down next to him, at the head of the long table. Flanked on either side by Varg and Virgil who remained standing.
Two men who looked like they were carved from marble, their features unmoving, and perpetually clad in long leather coats that looked to be armored. The way the coats moved, the way they hung to the men’s forms, was all wrong. They looked like they weighed a couple hundred pounds each, but the men who wore them showed no discomfort. Augmented perhaps. But it didn’t matter.
He looked back up to their faces. Reiji couldn’t tell them apart, though they might not have actually been twins. Perhaps brothers or cousins. That didn’t really matter either.
Bodyguards for Gavin was Reiji’s guess, though Gavin carried himself in a way that suggested he needed no such thing. He moved like a man sure of himself, and always ready for a fight. The battle sword he carried at his hip at all times had clearly seen a good bit of use in its day. Well cared for, but still showing the scars of many battles fought. There would be no mistaking it for an ornamental piece.
Yeah, Reiji mused, this one probably doesn’t need bodyguards. But he has them anyway. He dismissed further speculation on the subject and chalked it up to the eccentricities of the rich. And if Gavin appeared to be anything beyond an experienced and capable fighter, he appeared to be rich.
He had personally recruited every man gathered here, and given them a sizable up-front payment for the mystery job that lay ahead. And it hadn’t just been credits, but actual physical credits. An incredible rarity on Lexington over the past few decades.
Each was a polished disc resembling semiconductor wafers, and stamped and etched with intricate fractal designs. The designs weren’t impossible to counterfeit, but difficult enough that few if any fakes ever passed for the real thing. Months’ worth of pay for the lot of the men assembled. And so far, all for just taking a very long ride in Gavin’s transport, sleeping in bunk beds, and eating flavorless food.
Reiji doubted anyone present was naïve enough to think that was what they had been hired for. Though by the looks of a few men, they might have actually believed so.
His initial impressions of the men gathered there had proved to be fairly accurate. The more he learned about them, the more his notions were reinforced in his mind. Every single one of them a bounty hunter. Some were former soldiers that had served in the military arm of Cent-Com, others were career hunters. One had even been a relatively famous prizefighter, though those days were far behind him.
Rough men, good to have on hand and on your side if one had violence in mind. Less useful if the situation called for a delicate hand or an agile mind. Either way, Reiji suspected they would find out why there were all here soon enough.
“Good evening,” Gavin began and then paused to light a cigarette. He inhaled deeply and blew the smoke into the air. In the faded light emerging from the transport it was almost the same color as his hair. Gunmetal gray.
“I’ve got some good news for you, and some bad.” Murmurs passed through the assembled men, but no one said anything of significance. Varg and Vergil stared, stone-faced and unmoving.
“The good news first,” Gavin paused and took another drag, this time leaving the cigarette clenched between his lips and placing both of his hands on the table. “We’re getting drunk tonight.” As the last word left his mouth, he clapped his hands and the cooks returned carrying a portable refrigeration unit between them.
They placed it on the table and opened the lid. A wide variety of bottled alcohol peered out at the gathering. Eyebrows rose and one man whistled in appreciation.
“And, you get to sleep off your hangover tomorrow if you don’t have the appropriate pharms in your kit.” The cigarette stuck to Gavin’s lips as he spoke, clinging on for dear life against the movement of his mouth. Most of the gathered men smiled and began talking to one another in low voices, all with something positive to say.
“And what’s the bad news?” Reiji asked, his voice cutting through the other conversations like a razor through smoke.
Gavin smiled and the crow’s feet bunched around his eyes. Strange that a rich man wouldn’t have rejuvenation therapies to take care of things like that, Reiji thought. Maybe the man wasn’t afraid of aging. Or maybe he was so old that that was the best they could do for him.
“Always practical, it would appear.” Gavin began as he looked to Reiji. “One of the reasons I sought you out.” He stood and looked to the rest of the men, stepping in between Varg and Virgil.
“The bad news is that from her on out, we’re going to be traveling on foot. Or at least you all will. I’ll be riding my horse.” The happy noise of men passing out bottles and opening them came to a halt.
“Walking? Through the desert? We’ll be dead of heat exhaustion by the end of the first day.” John, the man who had roused Reiji for dinner, asked incredulously.
Gavin looked at him, cigarette hanging from his lips, silent for several seconds. Gavin’s silence seemed contagious, spreading over all gathered there and hanging thick in the air. Reiji could see the man was being melodramatic, possibly for the sake of humor. Others had a nervous tint to their faces, as if they suddenly expected violence.
“That’s why we’re only going to be moving at night. And you’ll each be carrying a pack that has been filled for you. Water, rations, that sort of thing. They’ll be passed out just before hitting the trail. We leave tomorrow night at dusk.” The cigarette sprang upright as Gavin took another drag.
“For now, enjoy the booze. We won’t be seeing any more of it for a while.”
THREE days into their trek into the desert, and found himself wondering why he had agreed to this. He knew the answer all too well. Desperation. But the question still remained.
Why the fuck did I accept this fucking job?
At night they marched, single file and quiet. Or at least as close to it as they could get. It had taken a few hours to get used to the night vision goggles each man had been issued, and Reiji had turned his ankle a few times. An annoyance at best. He would just have to suck up the pain and keep his place in line with the others.
Each man carried packs like soldiers on patrol or at war. Sticking to low ground and weaving between huge boulders and barren canyons. The terrain made it more difficult for them to move, but increased their ability to avoid detection. As if there would be anyone out
here in the middle of fucking nowhere to see them.
As brutal hot as it was during the day, it was equally cold at night. Winds that would have seared during the day, chilled to the bone instead in the dark. Either way, still sucking the moisture out of a man’s skin. His eyes and his mouth. The covering each man had been issued, apparently designed to hide a thermal footprint of the wearer, helped. But only a very small amount.
Gavin led them, riding some bizarre mechanical contraption that resembled a horse, but moved silently and seemed to hover a few inches above the ground. Reiji thought he might have seen one of its feet touch the ground once, but he wasn’t sure. The man at the front of the column was always accompanied by Varg. Or was it Virgil? Reiji still couldn’t tell them apart. With the night vision goggles each man wore while on the march, the two looked even more alike. Shit, he thought, everyone here looks alike through them.
Whichever it was, he moved just behind Gavin. His counterpart brought up the rear, in a position several of the others referred to as ‘tailgunner’. Though Reiji hoped very much that the mountain of a man did not in fact, have any sort of gun with him. He was far too close to Reiji for the latter to wish to test the abilities or resolve of Overlord.
The mechanical horse that Gavin rode provided extra water when a man needed to refill his canteen. Some internal mechanism pulled moisture out of the air and collected it for dispersal. Coupled with a canister of high pressure hydrogen gas and a small catalytic bed that would react that same gas with atmospheric oxygen to produce water, the horse was a very valuable asset to the group. Whoever had designed the unit either had a strange sense of humor or an even stranger fetish, Reiji decided. The water spouted from the underside of the horse, from a nozzle shaped like a phallus. The button that activated it was located between a pair of ornamental testicles.
Most had been hesitant to use the fountain until their own supplies started running low. There had been a lot of joking when the first man had gone to refill his canteen, but soon enough there was a line forming behind him.
The Way of Death Page 7
