Do Or Die

by E.R. Baine

  Viktor kept his eyes trained on the toe of his grey, Versace, patent leather dress shoe and the inane thought flitted through his mind that he hoped the decorative lines of the shoe would not dizzy him. “I’m doing it now.” Viktor did not look up. “Everyone, stand where you are and do not move a muscle, do not even blink – and if you can help it, do not even breathe.” Viktor flexed his arm, gripping the club’s handle. He could hear the sound of metal clang as he was deftly in tune with his instrument of destruction. Only Viktor could hear it, only he could see the vibration of the ground, the heartbeat of each man he was to bring with him on his journey. There was the harsh sound of metal dragging slowly against steel as though a clammy echo of a creaking door had been opened, and then Viktor saw nothing but the black.

  They were gone. Grigori looked at his charge, sitting in the ergonomic chair, staring at him questioningly. And who is this kid? Grigori thought to himself as he stared at the young apprentice of Darksmith. Ahh yes, Grigori Rasputin: healer, supreme master of the mystic arts - errant babysitter. Grigori thought wryly.

  He clapped his hands together and wore an effectively bright smile commanding the attention of both children. “Okay,” he rubbed his hands together, speaking lively. “Who is up for some chocolate ice cream and some cake?”

   

   

  Kelly sat in the convertible. His red BMW drew stares from the locals, as it was clearly expensive. They must wonder who he was, but Kelly was not concerned about the attention he drew to himself. Dressed in a black turtleneck sweater, black overcoat, and slacks, he sat in the driver’s seat checking his emails on his smart phone – in that instant he felt an oppressive hand placed firmly on his shoulder,  making him gasp. He whipped his head to see who could have possibly caught him, Kelly Payne, off-guard. His eyes met blackness.

  Kelly started. His feet were no longer neatly tucked into the driver’s seat of his newly-refurbished car, but planted on a hard unseen ground. Kelly fell backward, and his derrière hit asphalt. He cursed. “Damn it Viktor, some professional courtesy is not only welcome,” Kelly said, picking himself up and dusting himself off, “It is advised.”

  Kelly stared at his employer’s broad, tensed shoulder and took heed of his stance. He automatically reached for the weapon secreted on the inside of his overcoat.

  “You are a thousand years ahead of yourself to be dictating to me, scrub,” Viktor snorted.

  Kelly sucked in a deep breath; his cheeks swelled with the torture of curbing his tongue rather than correcting Viktor on his wrongly-worded metaphor. He released a calming breath as he drew out his nunchucks.

  Kelly’s weapon of choice strayed from the conventional nunchaku. Far from the ones sustained by Bruce Lee, they were not made solely of wood, but were silver-gilded with gold.

  The top of the nunchaku were held together by a short silver chain; the body of each long silver-gilded stick was referred to as the shaft. Holding the batons’ top between his thumb and forefinger, he swung the nunchucks upwards, towards himself, catching it squarely in his palm.

  “Payne.” Viktor turned his head briefly to look back at him. Kelly’s head was bent. He did not catch the telling stare in Viktor’s eyes. “The level of concealment is limited and we’re heading into terrain where an ambush is highly likely.”

  Without looking up, Kelly acknowledged him with a short nod. Catching the nunchucks in the palm of his hand, as one slender shaft met the other, he lightly pressed a small mechanism that allowed him to freely control the many, rows of two-inch blades embedded in the weapon, which he incorporated into his fighting style. Spinning the nunchucks deftly between his fingers, the blades escaped through slits in their exposed surface. The blades did not all come out at once, but in a pattern only Kelly, and one other, were able to intuit: a unique, consistent pattern.

  “I’d also like to keep the blow-by-blow to a minimum.” Viktor was firm on this regard.

  Unbelievable, Kelly thought. He couldn’t believe that he was letting the misuse of all these common English idioms slide. Oh, to be Maleficent is a godsend, Kelly thought, his eyes trained on Viktor’s back as he now spun the nunchucks with such speed that it appeared to be one long stick, the blades coming in and out of the shafts in quick succession. A novice would have had several fingers lopped off at this stage. Kelly was no novice.

  Kelly’s mind vaguely wondered at the other occupants that shared this darkened place.

  Humph, Darksmith thought. Another pretty boy. Darksmith observed the lanky blond newly added to the group before looking back at Viktor. They were surrounded by – nothing. They were in a bubble, a vacuum, a minor dimension controlled by Viktor himself. Aside from the statue poses of the three little women who gave the faint whiff of dog to Darksmith’s sensitive nose, blondie, and Viktor here, there were no other markers to speak of.

  Darksmith gritted his teeth. His mouth pressed together in a sneer, he touched the long, thickly stemmed weapon at his side. I most certainly do not want to be here, he thought quietly to himself.

  “Kelly, process as many heads as you can, as quickly as you can. I want to know exactly where she is as soon as you know. Darksmith, cover Kelly, nobody touches him. Girls, you can let loose as soon as I’ve got Audrianna’s distinct position – understood?”

  “We want what you want,” one of them concurred. Viktor snorted in disbelief. They only kept themselves in check because of Audrianna. They were more unrepentant with him than their master.

  Viktor paused. “Hold back as much as you can.”

  Beep-beep, beep-beep. Everyone grew motionless. “What’s that?” Kelly’s voice sounded hoarse. He looked in Viktor’s direction.

  Viktor’s head was bowed. His attention appeared to be caught by something on the ground.

  Beneath Viktor’s stylish dress shoes lay his cell phone, the screen glowing. Almost out of juice, it beckoned its owner for replenishment. Viktor had used the device to acquire exact GPS coordinates to complement his mystical compass trajectory spell. It had worked, not for the first time.

  His foot was on his cell phone. Looking down, he stared at it. He stepped off the device, stooped down and clutched it. His hold only tightened as he stood up, placed the phone in his pocket, gathered his wits, and flexed the arm that held Hell’s Embrace.

  Hefty reasoning and the calculations of a purposeful raiding party became fogged by the fury that intensified with the stillness of every second they waited for the right moment to attack. A slender trickle of sweat escaped the furrow of Viktor’s brow to slither down the side of his nose. The perspiration was not due to fear. Fear, panic, derision of the enemy – these were all emotions that were scaled down to a level of inferiority that would be overshadowed by skill and due diligence in the time of combat. Trained in the method of combat science, the act that had been whittled down to a measured reflex when needed, he found himself displeased that he must struggle to find the inner voice necessary to soothe the rage that threatened to control his actions.

  Viktor closed his eyes and inhaled deeply. My time here, in this moment, is too crucial for me to allow my anger to take control.

  I must remain calm, now more than ever… I must prepare to protect everyone in my team from direct fire. I must cover all dead space…

  Beeb-beep, the phone went off again, beckoning Viktor’s anxiety. His eyes flew open. He exhaled roughly, his jaw muscle flexed. Twisting his neck to the side caused a small cracking sound to escape his muscular shoulders. He raised Hell’s Embrace straight up, directing the crystal crown overhead.

  “Now!” he yelled, blasting a spectacular stream of white, electric, luminous light towards the  top of their black enclosure.

  CHAPTER 3

  The black walls that surrounded the company of six slowly dispersed, puffing up vertically like plumes of smoke. The trajectory of the blast became visible. The inside of the transport helicopter exploded, and so too did the occupants as the force of their entry became e
vident. Their pocket dimension had been set up to emerge inside the man with whom Xin had placed the phone. Viktor had blown the dimension walls apart, along with the helicopter the man had boarded. They had landed from the inside out, causing a large explosion. Everyone in the man’s vicinity had been killed.

  The helicopter was a transport chopper; not fit for landing, it had a ladder and pulley at the entrance, presumably for hoisting an infirm patient for transport. The party of six fell to the ground on impact.

  The explosion had the effect Viktor had surmised of eliminating a number of combatants on contact. It also had the dubious effect of attracting everyone’s attention and did not make for an ideally stealthy approach. The eyes of everyone still on the rooftop fell on them. A screeching alarm blasted the silence, alerting all others to the intrusion at the base, and the six fighters were immediately under massive direct fire.

  Viktor turned; he was at the back of the line. Kelly was in front, using his numchucks to deflect bullets. Viktor cursed. He raised his club to fire – but a long, thin silver projectile appeared from the side, penetrating the stomach of an attacker. The force of the object did not end with the first impact, but continued, pulling the attacker off his feet and causing him to slam into a fellow combatant. The projectile, sinking into the flesh of the second combatant’s side before hitting a third, dragged all attackers backwards into the side corner of a wall. The wall broke off and all the enemies were heard screaming as they followed it over the side of the building.

  All stood and looked back at the direction from which the projectile had originated. Brighton Darksmith lay heaving with exhaustion, holding a long thin weapon that looked like a recoilless rifle. The stares leveled at him turned witless.

  Viktor walked over to him and offered him a hand up. Brighton took it and stood, righting himself. Viktor looked upon him, thoughtful, making Darksmith feel uncomfortable under the direct scrutiny before a bullet whizzed by, grazing the side of Viktor’s cheekbone. Specks of blood and broken skin splattered into the air.

  Two assault rifles. It was then Kelly brought out his second numchucks from inside his jacket, spinning both pairs in the form of X’s  with either hand so fast they resembled straight, golden batons. He deftly deflected all the bullets streaming toward them. The bullets flashed and sparked as they flew into each golden shaft.

  The two combatants stood side by side, effectively blocking the only entrance to the roof. Their accuracy was skewed, though, a tell-tale sign of their lack of experience in using the Kalashnikov. They decided to advance, believing a smaller gap would give them a better shot at him, in between the spin of the nunchucks. Kelly’s movement did not allow for breaks in speed. Their strategy amounted to futility, and closing the gap only allowed Kelly a better shot at them when deflecting the bullets. He parried both rifles with the ease and fluidity of a trained professional. He had sheathed the blades, and this had allowed his free-form tactics to become sharper.

  The rifles were on semi-automatic. The short bursts of gunfire veered off in either direction, due to the combatants’ stance in shouldering their rifles. Kelly used the brief reprieve from being in the direct line of fire to accomplish a change-up. He skillfully turned around, grinned at his counterparts as he flung both numchucks under his arm, caught them at the baton stick’s middle on one end, and turned once more to face the shooters. Lunging forward, holding both sticks in either hand, he swung both diagonally across in front of him.

  He effectively deflected a bullet, sending it flying to hit the AK-47 shooter on his left in the hand holding the gun’s grip. The shooter yelped.  Another bullet came at Kelly from the shooter on the right. Kelly swung both numchucks above to his chest in a criss-cross style, deflecting the other bullet into the other shooter’s head. The bullet shattered the skull, entering the brain, and the man slumped to his death.

  With his compatriot dead beside him, the man began to panic. The alarms still rung loudly, the clouds crackled, the rain started to drizzle steadily. The man began to fumble for the vertical selector lever on the left side of the AK-47. If he hadn’t noticed when one of the initial bullets Kelly had deflected earlier had ricocheted off the lever rendering it ineffective, he noticed its stub missing now.

  Before he could reach for the other safety so he could place the rifle in full-automatic mode, he felt a sharp, unbearable pain at his abdomen. He looked down to witness the unthinkable; a black hand had pierced his middle straight through. He then looked into the face of owner of such an arm, and it held the prettiest brown eyes he had ever seen. That was his last thought as his neck was caught between two inhuman jaws.

  CHAPTER 4

  The other young girl of African descent had semi-transformed into a wolf. With her head that of a large werewolf, her body grew into an oversized human. She had run up behind her sister and latched onto the man’s neck before spinning to a stop and spitting the head over the edge of the rooftop. She then transformed back into a small-sized human.

  Great, Viktor thought, as he absorbed the scene before him. Remnants of the blown chopper and body parts lay burnt, askew at their feet. The smell of burnt flesh and aviation fuel assailed their nostrils. Smoke from the blast also hung low about their ankles, held there by the cold night air. The rain would be pouring on them soon. Viktor advanced towards the entrance. No survivors from their entrance. He cursed.

  “I recall you saying earlier that you needed some alive?” Darksmith stood behind him, looking into the shadowy stairwell.

  “Not if direct fire doesn’t allow it.” But this was too much overkill, Viktor thought.

  “Right then.” Darksmith advanced into the corridor. Above the blaring sirens that called the men securing the property to arms, footsteps could be heard shuffling cautiously in their direction. Darksmith reached to his side and pulled out a bronze hammer, the head of which was shaped like a fist. Darksmith grasped the hammer tightly with both hands, lifted it above and over his shoulder. Its handle length appeared to increase by way of magic. The fist opened into a palm, and Darksmith then swung the weapon onto the ground with a dull clang. The floor erupted with waves that were visible to the naked eye, and also what seemed to transport a blue, flickering electric pulse down the floor of the corridor, turning the corner, out of their sight.

  A few moments after the disappearance of the wave, resounding screams of pain could be heard along the corridor. Viktor led the team round the bend to discover the bodies of men in bulletproof vests and grey security fatigues littering the floor.

  “Kelly.” Viktor crossed over the men walking further down the corridor. “Get to work.”

   

  * * *

   

  Xin glanced up at the twin full moons in the sky. Ahh, he thought, always a comforting sight. Eyes closed, he breathed in the dewy, cold night air of the tropical jungle that surrounded him. The crackle of thunder overhead disrupted his musings and his eyes fluttered open on a heavy sigh.

  The darkness of the jungle was no match for his natural, unimpaired night vision. He saw all, from the dark African violets more than fifty feet away behind him that grew in abundance round the white building that had come under Viktor’s attack, to the colorful, very venomous red and yellow coral snake nest that lay hidden beneath some loose rocks a mile in front of him.

  Crickets’ chirping in Trinidad was different than most. It was long and hard, matching that of a whistle being blown for hours at a time. There were many crickets in the Aripo Mountains, their high-pitched screech competing with the warning alarm that was triggered by Viktor’s crew blowing up the chopper.

  Xin looked back up at the two-story building that stood carved into the cliff face on an embankment, smiling at the broken propeller of the helicopter that lay dangling off the side of the roof. The bloody, burnt, smoking arm of a dead man hung off one propeller, which threatened to fall off the side of the building. At the very least Audrianna would not be ensconced at a secondary location.
She was as safe as she could be - for now.  

  Xin turned and looked ahead at the thin, disappearing path before him. The path was crooked, with jagged rocks jutting out of the ground, slippery brown leaves en masse to tread upon - it was not the most convenient terrain to get a comfortable foothold.

  The second-wave security team heading up the path to support the base operations staff could be heard two miles down the path. The sound of their feet trampling on soft forest mesh was amplified by Xin’s were-hearing.

  About twenty-three men, he deduced as he stepped back until his body was squarely hidden beneath some low-hanging palm leaves. He unsheathed his katana-gun. The moon beams’ glare travelled up the blade’s length as he brought the sword straight up, parallel to the centre of his body.  Xin grasped the hilt securely beneath the trigger guard. It was an uncommon attachment for a sword to sport. He quietly waited for the approach of the first combatant to the small clearing.

  The clearing was further hidden by overhanging leaves, which blocked the mouth of the passage. Anyone arriving would have to remove the hanging palms from in front of them before coming directly before Xin. Boulders that were almost level to Xin’s waist flanked each side of the passage. He brought his sword up and waited. His heart rate slowed and mellowed as his mind restrained his anxiety and shoved it into a recess of his mind that he would never acknowledge. Xin, eyes closed, braced his nerve with the will to react quickly to the first entry into his deadly trap. He kept himself quietly poised as he waited.

  He listened as the first armed enemy brushed aside the low-hanging palm leaf. And he waited…and then…he heard the armed man’s track into the clearing…Now!

  Xin brought his sword down swiftly, with such deadly force that the blade cleanly severed the head of the first man at the top of his neck. The force of the blow tossed the head flying into the air. The man’s body collapsed onto its knees as another man entered the clearing. Xin stepped forward further.  Facing the next man directly, he brought his katana sideways from left to right, effectively slicing the other opponent’s neck. The head was sent flying, blood splattered in the air . Blood spewed from the gaping wound at the apex of the shoulders, gushing like a minor spring as that body collapsed upon the first.