The lower part of the stairwell leading to the twenty-second floor was filled with… vines, I guess I’ll call them. Tree roots, would be another close description. There wasn’t any actual foliage, just thick vines and roots, all tangled and twisted and matted together, making an impenetrable barrier to our progress down the stairwell.
“Could we cut through them?” Shifty asked.
“If we had a year to do it,” Dread said. “Look at how thick those roots are. It’d be like chopping down a tree with a pocketknife.”
“Not to mention the entire time we’d be doing it, Polonius would hit us from behind with something mean and nasty,” I said. “Trap us here in the stairwell with no way out and nowhere to maneuver.”
“I could maybe try burning them with this Trick I’ve been working on,” Peter said, then, when Shifty let out a little laugh, glared at him and said, “What?”
“What?” Shifty said. “Are you kidding?”
“Yeah, what?”
“Dude, you almost burnt off your own dick with that, like, two weeks ago.”
“That is not what happened,” Peter said. “I did not…”
“That’s exactly what happened! If I hadn’t been there to contain it, your twig and berries would’ve been crispy fried!”
“Shifty,” Peter said, “we agreed that we weren’t going to tell anyone about…”
“Guys, enough!” I said. “Even if Peter could get that to work, it would still take forever. That much mass of wood, it would be like waiting for a bonfire to finish burning out completely. And all the smoke from the fire would asphyxiate us here in the stairwell while we waited.”
“Yeah, jackass,” Shifty said.
I cut off the impending bicker-fest between Shifty and Peter by quickly saying, “We’ll have to cross the twenty-third floor, get to the other stairwell.”
“You know that’s what Polonius wants,” Dread said. “He put this here to force us to take a path of his choosing.”
“Yeah, but there’s no choice, so score one for the dead guy, I guess,” I said. “We’ll just have to keep our guard up and be ready for whatever he’s got waiting for us.”
We took a minute to shift ourselves around so that we could make a move onto the twenty-third floor. The whole time, I kept glancing from Tara's newly-healed leg to Stephen's neck.
Not in suspicion; I'd gotten past Distrust and was somewhere in the middle of Uncomfortable, but I couldn't keep my eyes off Stephen's black turtleneck, and couldn't help but wonder what sort of pinkish pattern was hidden there, where that neck wound had killed him a week and a day earlier.
I managed to shake myself loose of those thoughts and focus on the matter at hand when Dread blasted the door to the twenty-third floor off its hinges. It can be a real problem, zoning out on the quiet moments of an op. Your mind wants to cut the tension by occupying itself with something, anything, minutiae. Right now, I needed my mind to stay tense… I had a rogue Maestro to kill, and the battle had only begun.
***
The hallway past the stairwell door was as dark as night, and the team switched on the flashlights attached to their weapons almost as a reflex before moving out of the stairwell. As soon as she stepped onto the floor, Cass could feel a wave of heat hit her.
“Feels like we stepped into a steam room,” Shifty said. “A creepy, dark, steam room.”
Cass had to agree. The humidity was palpable, filling her lungs and pressing against her skin from all angles. Even worse, a thick mist filled the hallway, swallowing up the beams of their flashlights, making them almost ineffective.
“Can only see maybe twenty, thirty feet ahead,” Dread said.
“Yeah, he’s blinding us,” Cass said. “Be ready for close contact. Watch those doors on either side of the hallway.”
They moved forward through the dark, hot hallways, weapons covering every direction as they moved. Within minutes, Cass’s hands started to get slick on her weapon from the perspiration caused by the humid air.
Why all this? she wondered. The darkness and the mist, to blind us, that makes sense, but the heat and humidity? Does he really think that making us a little uncomfortable is going to stop us in our tracks?
She caught herself shaking her head in awe at how Polonius had created all this. First filling an entire floor of the building with water, now somehow changing the air here, all in defiance of the laws of physics. Even for someone who dealt with the extraordinary on a regular basis, it felt surreal to walk through the middle of the funhouse of horrors that Polonius had created.
Shake it off, Cass, she told herself. It was a common problem in her profession; getting caught up in awe of the powers that mages were able to harness… particularly the more powerful ones. It was easy to fall prey to the trap of overestimating your opponent when you could see them performing the impossible.
She’d seen it a million times. Some of her colleagues would overestimate their target, get spooked and move too cautiously from thinking that their opponent was omnipotent because they could toss a few Tricks around. Others would over-correct in the opposite direction, pushing forward in over-confident bravado in an attempt to wash away any latent fears of the powers that a mage could harness.
It was no easy task, to keep centered between those extremes. Respect for how dangerous a mage or Vive Job could be, tempered by the recognition that nobody was perfect, even if they were powerful. They were still only people. Still fallible. Still flawed. And if you could find those flaws, you could exploit them.
They had moved deeply into the hot, dark hallways of the twenty-third floor when Polonius’s next nightmare hit them.
It happened as they were moving through a four way intersection of hallways. There was the sound of metal scraping along concrete, and in front of Cass, two steel rods shot up from the floor and into the air like spears. One of them jutted upwards like a bony finger next to Dread, the other punched straight through the meaty part of his thigh.
Dread screamed, and his shout of pain was matched from behind by Mike, who had been impaled by a pair of steel rods as well. Mike hadn’t been as lucky; both steel rods had driven through his torso, and he dropped his weapon and grabbed at the bloody rods as if he thought he could pull them out himself, screaming in both agony and terror.
Cass and Stephen both rushed forward to Dread. The steel rod was rooted deeply into the floor, extending upwards through his thigh and extending another two feet before looping back on itself to form a hook. Blood was already running down the length of the rod to pool on the floor below him.
“Get Mike,” Dread said through clenched teeth. “I’m good.”
“You are not good, Dread,” Stephen said. “Let me…”
“I said, get Mike, goddamnit!” Dread roared.
They backed away from Dread. Stephen moved slowly at first, as if reluctant to leave him, and then turned to join Cass by where Mike was impaled on the far side of the hallway intersection.
“There’s two through him,” Cass said, shining her flashlight on the steel rods through Mike’s body. “One through the abdomen and one through the chest.”
“Fuck, get them out, get them out!” Mike said between screams, the words coming out with bloody flecks that stained his lips and chin.
“No, no, don’t move!” Stephen said to him. “Cass, hold him still, he’s ripping himself up!”
Cass tried her best, but Mike kept writhing in pain, struggling and screaming in a fruitless attempt to get himself free of the steel rods pinning him in place like a bug in a glass case. It was only after Stephen put his hands close to Mike, closing his eyes and concentrating for a moment, that his struggles and screams subsided and he stood still at last.
“What did you do?” Cass said.
“Dialed down his pain receptors,” Stephen said. “I’m sure it still hurts, but it should at least be manageable…”
Mike’s body slumped forward, held only by the two steel rods extending up from the floor. Just like Drea
d, the rods were deeply rooted into the floor, extending a foot or two past Mike’s body before curling back into hooks.
“Fuck, is he dead?” Cass asked, trying to hold him up.
“No, no. Passed out. Hang on,” Stephen said.
Once again, he closed his eyes in concentration, working his Healing magic over Mike’s body. After a few moments, Mike stirred slightly and came to, looking around wildly and starting to struggle once again.
“Don’t move! Don’t move!” Stephen said.
“I’m fucked, man, I’m… I’m…” Mike began to say.
“No, look at me! Look at me!” Stephen said quickly. “You’re not dying. You’re not.”
“Look at this! I’m fucked!”
“You’re not. I got you. Hey. Hey!” Stephen said, grabbing Mike’s face and turning it towards his. “How many times, Mike? How many times have I put you back together? I took care of you then, and I’m going to take care of you now.”
Mike seemed to calm down a little, stopping his struggles. “How?”
“Don’t move. Right now, those rods are sealing up the wounds, holding them shut. I’ve healed everything around the rods, so you’re not going to bleed to death, but you can’t move. Do you understand? The more you move, the more you rip yourself up from the inside.”
Mike started to cough, blood once again coming out with the air.
“Hurts to breathe, right?” Stephen said. “One of the rods is through your left lung. Take shallow breaths. That will minimize the damage.”
“Cass,” Mike said, with a desperate stare at her.
“I know,” Cass said.
I’m terrified, Mike’s stare said, but she knew he’d never say it out loud. She pushed down hard on her own rising panic, stuck in place in the dark with two of her people trapped and wounded. As gruesome as Polonius’s trap was, she was sure that this was only part of what he had in store for them.
The Maestro had clearly picked this spot for a reason. Pitch dark, mist all around them keeping them blind, hotter than hell, with two causalities that couldn’t be moved. All this, while they were stuck in the middle of a four-way intersection and could be attacked from any angle.
“I know,” she said again. “We’re not leaving you, Mike. But Dread’s hit too and we have to check on him.”
Mike’s eyes darted around, settled on her, and he nodded almost imperceptibly.
“Tara? Stay with him,” Cass said. “Stephen?”
“Dread, right,” Stephen said. “Let’s go.”
Dread was facing away from them, keeping his weapon pointed down the hallway in front of him to cover that angle of approach. When they reached him, his jaw was clenched tight against the pain and his eyes were steady as they stared down the hallway, but a cold sweat was pouring down his face and he was starting to look pale. There was a sizeable pool of blood where the steel rod met the floor, and more blood continued to follow the length of the rod to add to it.
“I’m going to dial down your pain…” Stephen began to say.
“Don’t.”
“Dread…”
“Don’t. It might slow me down. Just do what you can. I’m good.”
Stephen traded a look with Cass and shrugged. “All right. You’ve lost a lot of blood, but I got you. We can deal with it.”
Once again, Stephen closed his eyes and focused. Dread’s body seemed to uncoil a bit, and he straightened up a little. His jaw was still set from the pain but his face was no longer pale. The flow of blood running from his thigh down the length of the rod slowed to an almost imperceptible trickle.
“Same thing as I said to Mike,” Stephen said. “The rod’s sealing the wound, so don’t move. As long as you don’t move, you’re good.”
“I don’t think I’m going anywhere,” Dread said, nodding down toward the steel rod through his thigh. “Look at that thing.”
Cass followed the length of the rod with her flashlight to get a better look at it. It looked like steel rebar, the kind used in reinforced concrete, perhaps a half-inch thick. It thrust upwards from the floor, through Dread’s thigh, and extended perhaps another two feet before curling back on itself to form a hook.
Dread was right. Even if they could somehow lift him up, that hook would prevent them from pulling his leg off the rod.
“Son of a bitch,” Cass said, looking back at Mike. The two rods impaled through his torso extended a foot out of his body before ending in hooks, just like with Dread.
“He wants to keep us here,” Stephen said. “Polonius. Trap us, keep us from moving.”
“Yeah,” Cass said.
She stole another look at Mike. Tara was talking to him softly, telling him he’d be all right, trying to keep his mind off the two steel rods that were shoved through his body. He looked like he was keeping it together, for now, but Cass had to believe that comforting words could shake off the terrifying reality of Mike’s situation for only so long before it all came crashing down for him.
Polonius was coming. Had to be. He’d set this trap for exactly this reason; to trap two of their people in place, and now, it was either abandon her people or be stuck here, fighting off wave after wave of whatever Polonius could conjure up to throw at them.
“Bolt cutters,” Cass said. “We have bolt cutters in one of the bags on the roof.”
“Bolt cutters?” Stephen said. “Are you kidding?”
“That’s rebar. Bolt cutters can cut through rebar.”
“Yeah, maybe if Dread’s using them. Besides, that may look like rebar, but it could be case hardened steel for all we know. We’d need an acetylene torch to cut through that.”
“So what are you suggesting?” Cass said. “Leave them here?”
Stephen looked at Mike, looked at Dread, blew out a breath slowly. “Hear me out on this.”
“Stephen…”
“Just… hear me out. Even if the bolt cutters would work… in the time it would take to get to the roof, get the bolt cutters, and get back, we could push down to the twenty-second floor and kill Polonius.”
“There is no way we are leaving…”
“We are leaving them, Cass. One way or another. What, are we going to send one person up for the bolt cutters, alone? So that they can get picked off by something that Polonius might’ve conjured up to replace what’s on the floors above?”
Cass bit her lip.
“No. We can’t do that. We’d have to go in force. So we’d split up, probably, which ends up making us all vulnerable to attack. You know that’s what Polonius wants. Either trap us here, immobile, trying to defend an indefensible position in a four way intersection, or split us up trying to free Dread and Mike. Divide and conquer.”
“So what’s the better option?” she asked.
“Polonius is on the twenty-second floor. I can feel him there. The amount of magic he’s pumping out, I can sense his location. Not pinpoint, but he’s definitely on the twenty-second floor below us.”
“Shifty?” Cass asked.
Shifty shrugged. “Maybe. I can’t pinpoint him either. Maybe the twenty-second. Definitely either the twenty-first or twenty-second floor, though.”
“It’s the twenty-second,” Stephen said. “He’s right below us, Cass. Right below us. So yeah, it’s shitty to have to leave Dread and Mike here. It’s a shitty situation no matter what we do. But if we push down fast and hard, and kill that bastard, then this all ends. It ends and we have all the time in the world to get Dread and Mike free.”
Cass looked from Dread to Mike and back again. “And you’re sure the wounds won’t kill them?”
“As long as they don’t move. Dread will definitely be fine. Mike’s lung is a problem, obviously, but that will take hours to kill him. I could stay here with them if you want, but going up against Polonius, you’re probably going to want everybody.”
“You should do it, Cass,” Dread said.
“We don’t leave people behind, Dread.”
“You’re not leaving me behind,”
he said. “I’m holding this position and defending Mike while you maneuver to destroy the threat.”
Cass looked over Mike and Dread, around the open hallways around them, and then wiped at the sweat forming on her forehead from the heat and the humidity and the stress. There had to be another answer. There had to be another solution, but nothing was in front of her. Polonius had out-maneuvered them, first by pushing them onto this floor and then by pinning two of her people in place with his medieval trap.
Dread spoke up, breaking the silence that she was stewing in.
“Guess I’m lucky that one missed me,” Dread said, nodding toward the second rod extending up through the empty air next to him.
“How’d he do this?” Cass asked. “Polonius?”
“We probably hit a rune,” Shifty chimed in. “Boobytrap. He drew it on the floor, and once someone crossed it, the trap sprung.”
“Yeah, I know what a rune is, Shifty,” Cass said. “Peter uses them all the time on…”
She stopped in mid-sentence.
“Cass?”
“Peter,” she said, “could you draw an explosive rune on the steel bar? One that could cut through it?”
“Cass...” Stephen began to say.
“Shut up for a second, Stephen. Peter?”
“Yeah, probably,” Peter said. “But that would also end up blowing up whoever was next to it.”
“Can you dial down the yield on it, make it less powerful?”
“Sure, but if it’s going to have enough zing to punch through the rebar, it’ll still end up throwing shrapnel all over the place. Probably still kill him.”
“I’ll take that chance,” Dread said.
“Hang on,” Cass said. “We still have to deal with Mike.”
She thought it over for a few more seconds. “Shifty?”
“Yeah, boss?”
“When you make one of your Defense shields, the force fields, I mean… what shape can you make it into?”
“Usually, it’s a simple rectangular shape, like a wall,” Shifty said. “Easiest, simplest, fastest shape, to keep out everything on the other side. Why?”
Mage Hunters Box Set Page 10
