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Post by E. Lipsett on Sept 21, 2003 18:56:56 GMT -5
CHAPTER 8 - Counting Coup
by Philip Ward
LOS ANGELES - OFFICES OF FRIEDMAN, FRIEDMAN, TYRONE & PARTNERS, Friday 10 pm
Vince O'Donnel's pre-trial work had turned up many things, he had requested and been given access to the jacket on his client, arrest records, surveillance records, the names of the original responding officers, the lot. With the transcripts of the interviews and the police radio he could probably have made a properly weighted jury dismiss the case, perhaps even made a good claim against the department for institutional racism. But the decision had been made; the old men at the firm had decided that his clients were to be allowed off the leash.
Police officers have snitches and so do dirty lawyers, it had taken a combination of money, drugs and in one case a threat to reveal the subject's spousal abuse to his commander. But he had all the names and addresses; he had their assignments for the next week.
The information was turned over to his client's "tribe", they would know what to do with it.
Tonight, the ChauChau would hunt in the urban jungle.
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LOS ANGELES- Gentleman's Diner - Midnight Friday
"Well, this has got to be one of the weirdest things I've ever done, scraping sh*t and pus off the exploded remains of a toilet in a men's restroom."
Sonja Dewey was in a position that would have left Robert Haggard tumescent, and her nauseous if she had more than an inkling of what he was thinking in staff meetings; knelt down, face inches away from the crusty floor of a cubicle in the men's restroom. In her mouth she held a small pen torch, with which she was illuminating her work of swabbing up blue stains from amongst the rest of the debris. Broken yellow Police tape fluttered behind her head.
"Just hurry it up, OK? It's quiet outside, but you never know when a radio car might stop and take an interest in a Phenom-X van parked outside a crime scene."
Sonja filled another sample tube, hoping that whatever else was mixed in there hadn't contaminated the blue stuff too much. It was vaguely interesting, and expenses would cover the private lab's prelim-analysis of the stains.
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LOS ANGELES - LAZ HOLIDAY INN - Friday Night
Raymond Gentian could feel Nancy's eyes burning into the back of his head. He was sat at the writing desk in the compact room, field stripping his pistol again: he needed it to be perfectly reliable when he used it. A lot of ammunition would be going downrange before it would be cleaned again.
He broke the heavy silence. "So, Nancy, why not do your thing with the guy back there? Take a quick handful home in a bag to interrogate?"
The svelte Swedish blonde stood up, glowering at Agent Nolan and for a second her face shimmered, her eyes glowed, and he could smell the grave-stench on her breath. She sighed, exasperated. "You know why Ray, Christ you looked at his chart; the guys brains were turned to goo, _and_ he was a goddamn dealer."
He finished swabbing the inside of the barrel down and began to expertly re-assemble the 9mm. The gun wasn't his, but he owed the previous owner the deaths he had planned for it. He worked the action, smooth and slick, like silk.
Nancy frowned at Nolan's back.
"f**k, Ray! You don't even listen to me anymore! A man who can sit through an interrogation and a night in the cells without saying a single word, who knows what he might have been taking. You know what altered brain chemistry does to my stomach."
"Yeah, but it was I that had to clean up last time, Nancy!" Nantucket swept in through the door, carrying the bags of food, one was paper, marked with the golden arches. The other was plastic, black, and heavily swathed in silver duct tape, the contents weren't going anywhere.
He placed it gingerly on the couch next to Nancy who at least had the grace to take it into the single bedroom with her before tearing the tape off.
Nantucket felt his stomach turn as he saw the steaming drool on the couch and floor leading to the door. He tossed the MacD's to Nolan; "You eat it, I aint hungry any more. You ready to trade that nine in for a real gun?"
"You know I will not do that Nantucket, this gun owes a debt, and there are Tcho-Tchos who must be made to pay."
Nantucket raised his eyes before switching the cable to ESPN and turned the volume way up, the better to drown out the ravening noises seeping under the closed door.
Nolan continued to ignore both, lost in his own bloody thoughts.
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LOS ANGELES - An alleyway off of East 7th Street, looking across towards an all-night Liquor Store 1:00 am
The hunting would be good tonight, the old man could feel it in the air. Perhaps it would be his last hunt, perhaps not. His tsakra-knife would taste the blood of the chief of his enemies and his warriors would carry the body back to the tribe others for ritual consumption.
The monkey-like gibbering of their blue-uniformed victims grated on the nerves of the holy Warriors. Each of them had eaten the mixture of mushrooms that blessed them and made them immune to hurt. They bit down on their gums and lips, drawing blood, savoring the taste, ready for it to mix with that of their victims.
They had sent the decoy ahead, a young warrior walked into the store naked, his flesh covered only by tight thongs. He carried a knife. The owner took one look at him and fled, dialing 911 from a cell-phone as he went. They had timed it right, there was only one car in the area, and their chosen prey would be in it.
The ambush was perfect, and soon the noose would be tightened.
* * *
"This is Unit 1-Adam-19 responding to the 211 call in progress on East 7th Street. The store looks quiet from outside. I am requesting back up and entering the premises. Looks like they might already have left."
As the police moved away from their radio car, the night air was rent with the cry of jungle birds, the eerie cries echoing through the nearby buildings, making it hard to tell where they came from. The two policemen moved closer together subconsciously, the hairs on the backs of their necks springing erect.
As they approached the liquor store door, trained eyes took in the overturned shelves at the front, foamy liquids seeping out onto the sidewalk making their footing unsure. They stepped in simultaneously, covering the angles as they passed through the fatal funnel. There was one man at the front of the store, facing away from them. He held a bottle of liquor in each hand, contents liberally splashed over his old clothes. His face wasn't visible in the store's security mirrors, but he had a long-peaked baseball cap and scraggly hair covering much of his face. It was the unofficial uniform of cheap hoods like this.
"OK son, put the bottles down, kneel down and put your hands behind your head."
He did. Relieved, one officer stepped to the side to cover the figure with his pistol while the other moved forward, pepper spray in his off hand, cuffs in the other, ready to restrain their suspect.
As he stepped round the side of the man his testicles leaped up into his stomach: the man's face was terribly scarred and mutilated, he had no ears, no nose, and his lips seemed to have been roughly hacked off, leaving his sharpened teeth plainly visible.
The man looked up at him with such hate in his eyes that Officer Guterez immediately clamped down on the button on the spray, sending a long jet of pepper spray into the kneeling man's face.
The man looked up at him and spoke a single phrase in a language he didn't understand, and Officer Guterez felt his bladder give way as the other leapt off the floor, sharp teeth reaching for his throat.
"You are meat in my teeth."
The ritual insult tasted good when mixed with the spices the officer had sprayed him with. They were nothing compared to those of his youth when the elders had hardened him to pain. He enjoyed the burning sensation, then he was up, performing the sacred dance, biting at the vulnerable inside of the man's wrists, tearing the tendons, rendering him unable to defend himself, twisting away from the aim of the second.
The tribe rarely used firearms, but they knew about the damage they could cause, and he had many hunts left in him. He knew that the other hunters would have finished immobilizing the car so their quarry could not escape, even now he saw them run into the store, bundle the second officer to the ground, biting and snapping. He was not their quarry, so he would be killed, but this one. Ah... this one, he could not dream of the exquisite tortures they would inflict on him.
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Post by E. Lipsett on Sept 21, 2003 18:57:23 GMT -5
LOS ANGELES - Unspecified Industrial Park - Synergistic Chemical Research, wholly owned Subsidiary of Whole Earth Enterprises - Saturday 02:00 am
Sonja arched her eyebrows at the spotty labtech in front of her and licked her lips. That was the fun thing about the women she picked up, they were much harder to manipulate than this pitiful nerd in front of her. She would make up for her unpleasant interview with Braumann by teasing this kid mercilessly. She'd feed his fantasies for a week and get off.
"Look, Miss Dewey..."
"Please, call me Sonja."
"Erm, right... Sonja, I'm just a lab assistant. I get paid to watch the experiments overnight and make sure nothing explodes or... escapes. I'm not allowed to touch the complicated stuff."
"But we both know you have a fantastic..." raised eyebrow, wink "...education. Why, I bet you could work anything in this lab, if you wanted to," she soothed, leaning in to twist his tie on her finger.
"Um, well, OK, I guess, as it's for TV..."
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LOS ANGELES - East 7th Street
The backup took fifteen minutes to arrive after the last transmission of Car 1-19, and it was another five minutes before either officer could bring himself to report in.
They found Officer Johnathan Rose tied to a lamppost outside the liquor store, suspended from his own intestines. His nose, lips and ears had been bitten from his face. The front of his opened pants were stained with blood and sh*t, neither could face looking closer. He was still breathing when they found him.
There was no sign of officer Guterez, just a single piece of flayed skin, a tattoo: a cowboy skull over Aces and Eights, the dead man's hand. It was still warm to the touch.
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LOS ANGELES - Unspecified Industrial Park - Synergistic Chemical Research,
"Miss Dewey, I think you should come and take a look at this sample."
A fraction of a second and smile is back in place, shoulder arch, and Sonja Dewey is back on camera
"Have you finished already, honey?"
Definitely not the first or last time she'd be saying that.
"Yes and no..." Walter swallowed, his Adam's apple turning somersaults. "I'm not quite sure exactly what it is you've brought me, it seems to be alive."
Sonja exchanged glances with Allen and they both moved closer.
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THE OFFICES OF FRIEDMAN, FRIEDMAN, TYRONE & PARTNERS, Saturday Morning 3am
Vince grinned to himself in the darkness of the office and fixed himself another line. Tonight's work would garner him a handsome bonus. He looked down at the coke, and then shook his head. No, time for something a little special, he could afford to live a little. f**k! He could afford to live a lot! He pulled the tic-tac box out of his suit pocket, and looked at the little sugary pills inside.
He popped the lid and slid one into his mouth savoring the sugary coating for a bit before swallowing. The rush hit him almost instantly, like nothing else he'd ever experienced, he could see his entire life spread out before him, everything.
For a moment he panicked and thought it was true what they say, you really do see your life flash before your eyes. But then he slid easily into the old memories. The first time he had stolen, the girl he abused in high school, the first intern he had raped, all of it came back, all the rushes of power he had felt during his life. All the times he had felt somebody else's life in his hands and knew that he could do anything he wanted with them.
Then more things came back to him, little things he hadn't realized he'd seen the first time, contracts seen upside down for a fraction of a second, as clear as day, all the tells that his bosses gave, all their body language spread out before him. Every time he met them, he remembered everything, and he had all the time in the world to ponder it, to work out what was going on behind their eyes as they talked to him. Armed with this knowledge he could read them like a book. He could take over the entire law practice, he could use and abuse anyone.
Without even realizing he was doing it, Vince reached for another Sweet and Low and crammed it into his slack jawed mouth. Another soon followed it.
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In the past, in the future and off to one side, the Lords of Tindalos stirred. They could feel the siren call of human essence calling to them across the dimensions and across time. The faint odor of human suffering and joy played across fractal palates, was seen by multi-dimensional eyes and heard then, now and forever by hyperspatial ears.
Many humans, all calling out to the lords at once, all begging for their divine presences to come and devour them, mind, body and soul.
The Lords stirred and shifted in their coiled towers, and one by one, they began to ravel the thread, back to when and where it came, following across dimensions, snorting and slavering at it hungrily, devouring it behind them as they came, leaving nothing in their wake.
The Tindalosians are coming, and nothing will stop them.
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Post by E. Lipsett on Sept 21, 2003 18:58:12 GMT -5
Chapter 9 - Retrograde
by Laurel Halbany
What we call time, they perceive as simply another direction, as they travel smoothly through the clock-ticks and the slow growth of redwoods from their own dimension into ours. Negotiating the twists and angles of higher dimensions is lengthy unless there is a beacon. The seeking Hounds resonated with their sibling, who roiled in the complex plumbing beneath the Gentleman's Diner. A simple pentangulation between their position and the call of the human minds, and they were through and now.
The temporal vortex of their passage snapped Vince O'Donnell's mind back into his now-self, as the Hounds of Tindalos passed through the angles of his credenza and expanded. As they poured out in a spray of milliseconds and glowing blue pus, he thought, incongruously, of Botticelli's Birth of Venus.
They galloped through the gleaming windows of Vince's corner office, the force of their passage carrying Vince up and through the sheets of glass that shattered under their terrible momentum. He died before he fell past the fourth floor. The Friedman-Tyrone Building shivered like the skin of a horse ridding itself of flies. In the backwash of the Hounds, the girders and supports of the structure crazed, bending along lines its architect never intended. The forces the building channeled re-aligned themselves, the radio signal of its power shifting from an unholy pulse into meaningless static.
Deep in the building's inner sanctum, Dascal Tyrone, neé Dieter Tiberus Rhone, unraveled like a cheap napkin. Back in their mansion the brothers Friedman began screaming in a stereo of agony.
The Hounds hunted Los Angeles, their footfalls drumming the baseline.
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The worst part of going out on a Phenomen-X news call, Robert Hoggard thought sourly, was not getting yanked out of the office without time to snort one for the road. It wasn't fighting off being carsick through Allen's crappy driving. It wasn't even being stuck in the back seat like a roll of spare cable while Sonja got to sit up front.
No, the worst thing was that the official Phenomen-X news vehicle was a f**king minivan.
Someone ahead of them leaned on the horn as the Dodge Caravan swerved through a red light. Allen reflexively flipped off the other driver before taking another swig of his Super Big Gulp. Sonja was next to him, trying to read a stained Thomas Guide map of Chinatown with a penlight. A police scanner crackled out a stream of police codes. Robert tried to parse them, but he was coming down off his last toot and his head throbbed. He didn't really want to be on this trip any more than Sonja and Allen wanted him here, but Frank had to stay at base and everyone else in the office had made themselves scarce.
Sonja peered out the window at a street sign. "Gin Ling Way, then up Broadway--that sound right?"
"Not the most direct way, but it oughta get us in the middle of whatever's going on out there. Hope the traffic's going the other direction." Allen waved vaguely to their right. "Old Chinatown's over that wa--sh*t!" Robert slammed face-first into the back of the driver's seat. He slowly pulled himself back up onto the seat; Allen had jammed on the brakes for some reason and he and Sonja, seatbelt users both, were throwing the doors open and piling out of the car. Robert climbed into the front seat, still warm from Sonja's sweet ass, and twisted the rear-view mirror around for a look. Nothing seemed broken, but he was going to have a hell of a fat lip tomorrow. Well, f**k it, if Allen and Sonja wanted to play rally driver, they could do it without him. He patted his hip pocket and felt the plastic vial; good thing that wasn't broken, either. Now if only he had a dollar bill in his wallet…
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Sonja reached the boy's body first. If Allen hadn't seen him in time...but of course he'd driven in worse places than L.A., and he'd stopped before running the child over. Allen ran up and set his shoulder camera behind them. He checked for broken bones.
"I think he's mostly okay. Help me roll him over?"
They gingerly rolled the child onto his back. He was Asian--Sonja guessed that Allen could place his ethnicity better than that, but she was no expert--and small, perhaps eight or nine years old. He was dressed in new Gap jeans and a Mickey Mouse T-shirt, and he was barefoot. He opened his eyes and glanced at Allen, then turned his head slightly to stare at Sonja's breasts. She gave him her best hundred-watt smile. "Hi, I'm Sonja. My friend Allen and I are going to help you, okay? Do you speak English?"
"Vietnamese?" Allen said, and then repeated himself in what Sonja assumed was Vietnamese.
The boy's face split into an irregular grin. "Doesn't matter what language they speak, their tongues all taste the same," he said, in a voice octaves lower than a child's should be. He shifted his gaze to somewhere past Allen's shoulder. "Ruh pi ko, Father."
Someone moving fast, too fast, slammed into Allen from behind and sprawled him on the pavement. Sonja jumped into the defensive stance she'd learned in her "Fight Back!" class. Two squat men, sallow-skinned and with shocks of oily dark hair, stood in front of her. For a second she thought they were dressed in some kind of weird fishnet; then she saw that their bodies were covered in black, webby tattoos, not clothing. It made her stomach hitch to look at them. Two of them, okay, but if she could knock one into the other, she could get back to the minivan and call the police. Robert was an a**hole, but he could help her chase these guys off--
The boy sat up, grabbed her ankle, and twisted. A silent bomb of pain went off behind Sonja's eyes. When she could see again, she was flat on her back with the three looming over her. They seemed amused. One of the older men slapped the "boy" on the back jovially, and grinned. There was something, something wrong with his teeth...
One of the men picked up Allan's camera. He inspected it briefly, shrugged, and then smashed it over one knee, dropping the twisted metal and glass without interest. He stooped over Allan, and then the other two closed in on Sonja. The older man casually pinned Sonja's wrists above her head in a one-handed grip like a vise and flipped her onto her stomach. He leaned down to say something into her ear; his breath smelled like four-day-old raw hamburger. Sonja cringed.
Behind her, the boy kicked her injured ankle, and she screamed. "Father says your titties look nice and juicy," he said conversationally. He grabbed her hips and hauled her up to her knees. Her elbows scraped against the dirty asphalt. Then there was a thin crack. Then another crack, and the hands dropped away, and then another. Sonja finally recognized the sounds as rifle fire, tapping out a deadly overture. Her wrists were free. She covered her head with her hands, pressing herself down, praying silently to the Virgin Mary for the first time since puberty. Then the noise died down, and someone gently put a hand on her shoulder. She screamed.
"Sonja, it's okay, it's Allen," a voice said. She pushed herself up into a half-sitting position, on her good leg. He looked sick to his stomach, but alive. He held one arm cradled against his body. Sirens wailed their hysteria somewhere far away. "We, uh, we have friends."
An elderly man in some kind of faded military uniform shuffled into Sonja's view. She flinched when she saw that he was Asian, and carried a rifle, but when he smiled gently at her his teeth were quite normal. He nodded formally to her and then spoke to Allen.
"This is Mr. Hien," Allen said. "He says he would like to apologize for not having intervened sooner, but it took some time to...um...get everyone together, I guess. He's Vietnamese, and his people have fought these guys--" Allen jerked his head in the direction of the corpses-- "pretty much forever."
He listened, nodding, while Mr. Hien explained something else at length. "They're called Cho-Cho, he says. They're cannibals, they worship demons, they kill for fun, they steal young women and abuse them--"
"Yeah," Sonja whispered. "I think I figured out that one."
"...uh....sorry. I'm a little off-balance here, too, okay? Anyway, these, these Cho-Cho, have some gang called Shu Goran. They were out of Chicago, but now they're popping up in L.A. The other Asians all hate them, and I guess Mr. Hien and his friends are going to do something about them."
"No more," said Mr. Hien clearly. He pointed past the van, where the noise of a siren was rising. "You talk to police, tell them, no more. We take care." From farther north on Broadway, there were more shots. A police cruiser whipped sideways behind the Phenomen-X van and stopped. Red, white and blue lights washed across them in a crazy staccato of color. Mr. Hien straightened up and held his rifle across his chest. Then he turned and began an arthritic march up Broadway, toward the sound of the guns.
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Post by E. Lipsett on Sept 21, 2003 18:58:34 GMT -5
Casey twisted the wheel and slammed the cruiser into park almost at the same time. This whole night had been one giant clusterf**k. The rest of the CRASH teams were out for blood, somewhere on the streets between here and East Seventh; nobody had backup; the weird DEA guys were supposed to be on their way, but they weren't here now. A Dodge Caravan painted lemon yellow and neon green. Under a layer of road grime, they could see the vehicle's logo: PHENOMEN-X.
"f**king reporters!"
Landry was already piling out of the car. "You check the van, I'm going after these people in the street." He took the cruiser's 12-gauge with him.
Casey drew his weapon and approached the minivan carefully. The passenger side door was open and the dome light was on. Someone moved in the shotgun seat. When he reached line of sight for the open door, he screamed, "POLICE! Freeze! Hands on your head and out of the car!"
A scrawny white guy with bad skin looked up at him with squirrel-bright eyes. His zipper and the front of his boxers were open. One hand was on his head, but the other was wrapped around his skinny dick. A plastic vial and a rolled-up bill lay on the dashboard.
"Don't shoot?" he whimpered.
Casey shook his head in disgust. "Quit beating off and get out of the f**king car. That better be a vial of coke, a**hole, because if it's Sweet 'n Low I'm gonna go ahead and shoot you."
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Landry racked the tube and kept it level. A pretty girl sat in the street, hunched over one leg, and a much older man in a photographer's vest stood next her protectively. He was holding his right arm as if it were dislocated. Behind them, an elderly man in a uniform marched away, holding a rifle across his chest. Landry figured the two in front as reporters, not much threat, but the old guy with a gun was a problem. He pointed the shotgun at the man's back. "Freeze! LAPD! Drop! Your! Weapon!"
"Leave him alone," the girl snapped. "He did us a hell of a lot more good than you a**holes."
Landry ignored her. The old man didn't react, didn't even turn around, just kept marching to some imaginary cadence. Then a bell went off somewhere deep in Landry's memory, in places he did not like to go. "That uniform....he's...."
"ARVN," Allen finished. "Yes. He was. Is, I guess."
Landry looked at the cameraman. Their eyes met briefly, and he lowered the shotgun. "This have to do with Shu Goran?"
Allen nodded. "And the Cho-Chos. But Sonja needs help first, they did something to her leg--"
"And your arm, looks like. No ambulances, though, 'cause they're out. If you help me get her in the cruiser, I can get the two of you to a doctor back at the station. And then I think we better talk." He walked over to Sonja to help Allen get her into the back of the cruiser.
"Three of them," said Casey from behind them. He pushed a handcuffed Robert Hoggard forward. Thankfully, he'd let Hoggard tuck himself in, but the man's pants were still barely hitched up around his skinny hips. "Which of you wants the honor of sitting next to him?"
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Post by E. Lipsett on Sept 22, 2003 20:14:57 GMT -5
Chapter 10: Connections by J.W. van der Pijl
Somewhere deep inside the mangled heap of concrete and steel that had been the Friedman-Tyrone Building strange energies pooled and converged, slowly slithering back towards an inexplicable focal point. But then the Lords of Tindalos, almost retreated, suddenly became aware of a new anchor, far away, almost too faint to be noticed but augmented by the building's singular properties. Slowly and steadily the static reformed into an ever-stronger pulse.....
- Landry pulled over in front of the station. There had been so much radio traffic that even calling the station for a stand-by doctor hadn't worked. He turned to the back seat: "We're here. Let's get you inside." Sonja carefully flexed her ankle. "It's actually getting better by the minute. The little creep must have done something to the nerve that's wearing off. But Allen could use a doctor." The photographer was leaning against the door, his face grey from pain. Landry got out. The street was quiet. There were no squad cars in front of the station. That was no wonder, given the amount of trouble this night and the not-so-distant shooting. But the station looked too empty as well. "We'll check inside. You stay here." Sonja watched Landry and Casey disappear into the building. She helped Allen get out of the car. Hoggart was still sitting in the back, cuffed and cloaked in chagrin, ignoring them. She looked down the street. There was not a soul moving in the splashes of light around the lamp poles. Whatever the shadows might contain, they kept to themselves. Looking up to the LAPD station building in front of her, her eye was caught by something colourful hanging from a fourth-floor window. Lit by a street lamp, it looked like a green scarf.
- Landry and Casey found the first floor utterly devoid of occupants. Something had definitely gone apesh*t here. Even with all street cops called away, the building should have been bustling with activity, yet there was no-one. They moved up to the second floor. Nobody home there either. But there were bullet holes in the walls and empty cases on the floor. Warily they advanced. Landry moved towards the Gun Club, the station's weapons chamber. To his amazement it was intact and not a single piece missing. They eyed each other. After a moment they both put away their guns and reached for the M-16s.
- The Thing that had been Linda Bateman shot to attention with a canine gesture that was not in the least comical. The Masters called. And from so close! How could it be? It reached out to respond, but the call was too faint, too weak. A physical manifestation was in order. The Avatar of Yidhra rose awkwardly to its feet and moved to the door. There was no one there to take offence at the revolting way it moved Linda Bateman's body around. The PJ-creature and the multitude of microbiological constructs followed it. They left the gasping, convulsing carcass of Hubert on the floor.
- Landry moved up through the stairwell to the third floor. Carefully he stuck his head above the top. The lights were out and papers were scattered into the corridor. "Cover me." He moved into the corridor. Silence greeted him. This floor held several offices, interrogation rooms and a large conference room. The fourth and top floor held mainly archives and storerooms. He couldn't imagine why anyone would be there. But then, he couldn't imagine where everyone was, either. Casey moved into the corridor behind him. There seemed to be something odd in the gloom at the far end of the corridor, near the conference room. Suddenly a flash of green darted through the light into the conference room's door, slamming it close behind it. Instantly Casey and Landry ran towards the movement. Still covered by Casey, Landry kicked in the door. It opened into Hell.
- Sonja was still peering upwards when to her astonishment a dark shadow slung itself out of a third-story window and scurried upwards to vanish into a window one floor up, revealing it to be a man. Dressed in green. Turning around she said to Allen: "Did you see tha..." and at the same time they noticed the silent, green-clad figures standing at the end of the street. As the figures leaped forward, Allen and Sonja bolted for the station's door.
- Landry just held back his dinner. The room was a slaughterhouse. Furniture was piled up against the far wall. All along the long wall facing the open windows of the streetside there were skinless corpses hanging upside down suspended from ..... something. Landry gagged, counting seven at the first glance. The entire skeleton crew of the station during a rough night, he thought. The room stank of blood and sh*t. Where had that guy gone? Behind him, Casey started puking.
- Sonja and Allen slammed the front door shut. "Run!" Leaning against the door, Allen screamed. "Run! I can't hold them for long!" She started to say something, but a smashing blow to the outside of the door nearly threw Allen off his feet and shattered the small window. Wordlessly, she turned and half limped, half ran for the stairs. When she reached the stairs, she heard the door crash open. When she reached the second floor, the screaming started.
- "Did you hear that?" Landry was immediately alerted by the racket below. Someone was running up the stairs and someone else had just finished screaming his lungs out. "Stay close to me! Remember the arrest of that first scumbag? Stay close together!" They moved back into the corridor, facing the stairs. Something in the sound coming up from below stayed his hand, so that he didn't shoot Sonja when she burst into the corridor, stumbling to the floor. He aimed into the stairwell, expecting Alan, but not the lipless, noseless and earless monstrosity that came running up the stairs dressed in what looked like ropes and bright green strips of cloth. He fired a stream of bullets into its contorted face, only to see in astonishment how the man seemed to summersault backwards into the stairwell, always a hair's breadth removed from the bullets striking the walls. "f**k!" shouted Casey. "What the f**k was that! Stay back!" Sonja struggled to get up, gasping for breath. "They're upstairs. Above us!"
- Quickly, Landry pushed Casey and Sonja into the conference room. Grisly as the surroundings were, the room had only one entrance and an unobstructed field of fire. They barely had time for a retreat to the far wall when three green-clad figures came flying through the windows. "From left to right!" he shouted to Casey, who immediately complied. Two of the Nightmare Ninja's, as Landry already called them in his mind, evaded Casey's fire into the direction Landry had anticipated and straight into his stream of bullets. A bullet caught one of them straight on the nose, dissolving his head in a red cloud, and the other had both his legs shot from under him, slamming to the floor. The third dove for the door, unable to get anything between himself and the guns. Landry could have sworn he hit him in the low of his back, but the man didn't even slow down, sprinting through the door and slamming it shut behind him. Sonja screamed as the man whose legs were shot jumped for them, apparently using only his arms to fling himself into the air. Too slow for Casey, nevertheless, who drilled him just above the nose. Three times. The corpse slid to a halt at his feet. "Jesus Christ! What are those guys?" he cursed. Then shots suddenly rang out from behind the door. Landry took one step towards the door, when two figures crashed struggling through it into the conference room. One of them was a Nightmare Ninja. The other seemed to be a tall blonde woman bending the Ninja backwards in a back-breaking grip with her teeth sunk into his throat.
- The Avatar of Yidhra had entered the streets of LA and moved towards its Master's Call. Its followers were causing quite a commotion on the street, as well as considerable damage. The Avatar was totally oblivious to it. The Call was ever closer....
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Post by E. Lipsett on Oct 23, 2003 2:36:58 GMT -5
Chapter 11 - Fresh Blood
by Shannon Bell
Landry's ears were ringing from the gunfire, his nostrils filled with the scent of sulfur, blood and death. He stared at Agent Nancy, who held the squirming nightmare ninja in her grip as his life left him.
Agent Nolan saw the look on Landry's face. "You gotta admit, the gook never expected that." He jerked his head toward Agent Nancy, who lowered her victim to the ground. Nolan stepped past Landry and into the room beyond, his 9mm pointed at the floor. "Let us see what we have in here." He surveyed the room. "Yes, definitely a mess, just like we expected."
Sonja was slumped against the gray conference room wall near the door, her face blank, her eyes glazed.
Casey stood with his boot in the middle of the wounded Tcho-Tcho's back, holding him against the floor. The brown-skinned man continued to struggle, although with decreasing vigor, his arms thrashing and flailing, trying to reach back and get a grip on Casey. Nolan suddenly stepped in front of Casey, and before anyone else in the room could react, he fired two shots into the Asian's head. All eyes turned to Nolan, some more slowly than others. "What? Were we going to interrogate him or something?" He looked at Casey. "Or perhaps you wanted to run him down to emergency?"
Landry and Casey looked at each other. Landry spoke first, through clenched teeth. He felt detached, as though he were listening to his words, rather than speaking them. "You can't just come in here and shoot suspects. Look what they did to our men. He was our only lead! Now we got nothing, not even revenge!"
Nolan grinned. He looked at Landry. "Suspect, eh? I am thinking we had pretty good proof of guilt. I just saved the taxpayers thousands. No trial, no reports to file. We are all better off, even him." He pointed with his pistol toward the Asian he had just executed. "If all goes well, we will be in a position to help you take down a lot more then these." His eyes fell on Sonja. "But we can talk about that later." Nancy had turned her head away from the carnage, and the civilians, so that she could wipe her bloody mouth, but now turned around and stepped past the broken door into the room.
"Look," she explained. "You don't know what you're up against here, 'though you're starting to get an idea. We don't know a lot, either, but we do know that they'll never talk. Ever. And any medical personnel to get within striking distance of one of these guys is going to end up missing body parts sooner or later. Everyone's better off if they're just dead."
"What kind of DEA are you, Gentian?" Casey said, using Agent Nolan's cover name. He gestured to Agent Nantucket, who was warily watching the corridor. "Are you all DEA? Is this all the backup we can expect?"
"No," Nancy said. "We have others in town. On this case, we have some options. We're authorized to use slightly different, somewhat irregular procedures. For example, we can't clean this up completely because police officers are dead -- and you wouldn't want it that way anyhow -- but our team can make the paperwork look good and get us out of here instead of spending the next two days behind yellow tape digging bullets out of the walls." She pulled out her cell phone and spoke rapidly. "Rick? Yeah. Rampart Headquarters. You and Regina get down here, and bring your scrubbing gloves and a bucket, as well as a couple of guys from the lab. Tell them whatever you need to. With the city like it is tonight, we've got a good chance to get this little mess simplified and get our version published."
She flipped the phone shut and turned to Landry.
"You got a place we can talk?" Without waiting for a response, she looked to Sonja, who was still slumped against the wall. "You might as well come along. You've got a stake in this now as well, and you've seen too much to leave us alone anyway, so we'll have to figure out what to do with you."
Sonja rose and followed Agent Nolan out of the door. He had ejected the clip from his gun, and was reloading it while he walked. Sonja couldn't quite make out what he was saying, but she was certain he was talking to it.
"Yeah," Landry said. "Follow me."
When they got to the first floor, it was Landry who caught Sonja when she fainted. A severed pair of hands lay in a pool of blood near the doors that Allen had held closed. Moving outside, they found that Hoggard had escaped from the back of Landry's unmarked car.
"His ass is grass..." started Casey, petering off when he saw a pair of trousers caught in the door of Landry's unmarked car. "If he had gotten out of the car on his own, he certainly knew we'd be inside long enough for him to take his pants along."
They waited outside for Agent Rick's crew to arrive. Those who didn't smoke were now bumming cigarettes from those who did. Aside from the borrowing of cigarettes and the flicking of lighters, the only noise emanating from the group was soft, rapid squeak of Landry's hand exerciser and the metallic click of Nolan checking the action on his gun every six minutes or so. Sonja rubbed her ankle, which was rapidly feeling better. Alone in their own thoughts, they listened to distant sirens and wondered if they were police or fire or ambulances. They wondered if the answer mattered; if any agency could truly do any good. After a while, Casey was unable to bear the inactivity "Hey, Landry, we ought'ta go inside and at least answer phones or something. Make it at least look like a police station."
Agent Rick and the rest of Cell R showed up at the station forty-five minutes later. Landry's first thought had been to go to a gym near his house -- they could all talk while he fought the weights -- but they ended up at Tommy's. ------------------------------------------------------------------------
Everyone ordered a burger, even Agent Nancy. She was certain nobody was going to eat much, and she was correct. No one noticed that she just picked at her rare burger. No one was hungry.
The crowd was loud and rowdy, and Landry wondered how it was that while the poor, gang-infested areas of the city screamed with chaos, life not five miles away could remain unchanged. He poked at a golden French fry with a toothpick. "So, these nightmare ninjas, these Tcho-Tcho, you call them, what's their angle? They're here from Chicago, right? Well, why come in here and try to muscle in on established drug markets and the gangs that have been making that trade for years? What's in it for them? And how do we stop them?"
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Post by E. Lipsett on Oct 23, 2003 2:37:59 GMT -5
Casey spoke. "Can we stop them, playing by the book? Because, I'll tell you, I'm learning a lot working the streets with Landry, but we all know he's going to retirement or the grave at the same pay grade he's at now. Jesus Christ, I don't have to run the department or nothing, but I'm not going to be a detective forever. I can't be faking reports and shooting unarmed and helpless suspects. Even if your boys manage to cut out a little paperwork and keep some of these details out of the press and keep a cool head on the Cowboys, there's discrepancies that can crop up years later. Something out of time can suddenly f**k you up."
"The Tcho-Tcho are never helpless." Nantucket said. "Long past the time when we'd have given in to the punishment our bodies had taken, or even simple physical damage, those guys are just getting started. As to your career, what do you think it'll be worth if this sh*t continues and gets worse? Which it will... and if it gets better, nobody will be looking anyway. Why do you think Rick and his team were able to cover headquarters?
"Sometimes being in command means not seeing something right in front of your eyes. You have to let some things go. Flores learned that a long time ago, and he's hasn't forgotten the lesson. That's why he's moving up the ladder and you're still here, Landry. You can't win every battle, even if every battle could be won. But some battles have to be fought, and have to be won, at any cost. You are learning the difference right now, and Flores is learning when to fight, even as he learns to let a situation handle itself. And so are you, Casey and Sonja. Some things are better left unreported. You may not believe that now, but by the time we see this gang war through, that'll be one lesson you've learned."
"So this is, in fact, some sort of Asian gang war?" asked Landry.
"Yeah," Nancy replied. "The DEA has been tracking this gang in the United States since the CIA brought them back from Vietnam. As best we can determine, they've confined themselves to Chicago. We don't have a clue what their true purposes are; their activities are well beyond what even the most depraved or sadistic criminal or psychotic mind could conceive. Those victims you've tracked down in the other hospitals? They're not necessarily survivors. They're gristle -- inedible for some reason. The Tcho-Tcho took the parts they wanted to eat and left the rest. They couldn't care less if the victim who provided the meat lives or dies. Cannibalism, ritual mass murder, depraved rites of passage, community drug use... You've seen what they do to their own bodies, and some of what they do to those they hunt in the open. Imagine what lies in store for those they kidnap."
Nantucket took over the narration. "We're not sure why the CIA brought them over. The spooks probably figured they could use them as assassins or to provide torture or intimidation when required. That's why there's no paper trail or other official existence for these guys. Even if you could lift a fingerprint off those scarred digits, there wouldn't be a match. DEA guesses they lost control over the tribes shortly after they were brought into the good old U.S. of A. But here's what we need you for and here's where we can help each other."
Nancy spoke again. "The Tcho-Tcho, as we call them, live outside the law -- hell, outside the law of humankind, for that matter. The drugs keep them in enough money to stay hidden, among other things. We know they use a company named Tiger Transit to transport the raw material and sometimes the drugs themselves from Asia. We're going to go out to the Res -- the Cabazon Indian Reservation -- where one of their planes is offloading tonight."
"We don't have jurisdiction out there," Casey pointed out.
"We're not going to get close. But what we're hoping is that this'll give you and Landry a chance to see them in action, put what you see together with what you know about the street here in L.A. Then you can go out with your own contacts and informants and hopefully figure out how they're getting it to the city, and where they're keeping it before it goes out to the dealers for distribution." She grinned and licked her lips. "And that's when we'll come in with enough firepower to make the bust go down good and stick. Or it might get swallowed up in a warehouse fire. We might get a chance at the whole f**king gang, and whatever sick bastard sits at the head of it. So, what do you say? Are you guys up for a little road trip tonight?"
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Post by E. Lipsett on Oct 30, 2003 18:58:25 GMT -5
Chapter 12 - Tangled Convergence By David Clements
Ian Burgess would have been very happy if he'd known what was going on in the rest of LA that night. Junkies throughout the city were being skewered, split, hacked, bitten and butchered. He didn't like junkies, which was one of his qualifications as the Mayor's drugs coordinator. In his last speech he'd described junkies as a disease that needed to be eradicated. If anyone was left to see the dawn tomorrow, they'd find a lot fewer junkies in LA. The problem with junkies, as Burgess saw it, was that they were weak. They couldn't cope with life so they turned to drugs, and they couldn't cope with drugs, so they became dependent and ended up prostituting themselves, burglarizing their neighbors and mugging helpless old ladies just to feed a habit they were too weak to deal with. Burgess wasn't weak. He was strong. He knew what chemicals could do to him if he let them, but he could deal with them. He also knew what they could do for him, from time to time. He could call on them when he needed to, but they were his tool. He would never become their slave. He was strong. He was better than junkies. Far better. They would be wiped out, and he'd go on to greater things. The new Governor would make sure of that. A line of coke before a big meeting, or something more recreational when he stole a few hours away from the job was all he wanted of drugs these days, but he did feel the need for some kind of pick-me-up at the moment. One of his mistresses had persuaded him to try something new an hour ago. It had been good, making the five minutes of panting and heavy breathing seem to stretch for hours, but the mayor's phone call had taken him away from that. He was still getting some visual artifacts from the tablet, which was meant to be some new kind of hallucinogen called Sweet & Low. He was seeing things trail in his vision, as if he could see the past and the present at the same time. It wasn't an unpleasant effect, especially when combined to the warm relaxation the sex had left swimming in his veins, but it was a slight distraction when he was meant to be driving. He was heading down the freeway back towards City Hall, where the mayor had convened an emergency meeting on the drug and race riots reportedly raging in Chinatown. Burgess hadn't got a clear picture from the mayor of what was going on, but gunfire, fires, and many 911 calls were coming from Chinatown. The police commissioner had said something about simmering tensions between rival gangs and racial groups all centered on some new narcotic, and the rioting seemed to have something to do with this. So now Burgess was driving his Jaguar down the freeway at midnight at the Mayor's command when he'd have preferred to be back at Angie's apartment seeing what else the Sweet & Low could do for him. His cell phone rang again. He reached across to the passenger seat and picked it up, noticing the cracked casing of the aerial. He'd knocked it off the nightstand at Angie's when the mayor first called. He'd thought it might be his wife, and had fumbled as he picked it up. Have to get that fixed, he thought. "Ian, we've had some more news about the rioting. Seems that they've hit a precinct house hard and there are casualties among the police as well as among the different gangs. This is bad. We're going to need you to liaise with the DEA, FBI and local law enforcement on this one. It's going to be a long night." Burgess could already hear the tiredness in the mayor's voice. It had been a long night for the mayor already, a lot of long nights. Maybe his taste for office was ending. Maybe, if Burgess could come over well in the media spotlight that would inevitably descend in the next few days, he could use it as a springboard for higher office. That had always been his goal in accepting the current post. He might hate junkies, but a crusade against weak morons was not his life's work. There was a lot more backbone needed throughout the city and state, and he would be the man to make sure people got themselves sorted out. "OK James. I should be with you in about 20 minutes. We'll need some more information from the police and DEA before we can start drafting press briefings. But we should get a statement out pretty quickly if things really are that serious in Chinatown. Don't worry, sir, you can count on me." "That's a great help, Ian. I'll see you soon." The Mayor rang off. Burgess moved to put the phone back on the passenger seat, but something caught his attention. A bluish glint seemed to be emerging from the splintered tip of the antenna. Must be some new visual artifact left over from the Sweet & Low. He didn't usually touch hallucinogens when he might have to work. He'd have to speak to Angie about this. It might be good, but it wasn't something to use midweek. The blue glow got brighter, and there seemed to be a shape writhing around in it, moving in directions that didn't make sense. He glanced back at the road, which was unusually clear, even at this hour, but the increasing glare from the angles of the cracked antenna drew his eyes like a magnet. There was definitely something there, coming closer, oozing through cracks in reality. Something thin, something hungry. He caught glances of skeletal limbs, of razor sharp claws, of teeth clad in a strange blue slime that moved as if with a life of its own. But he didn't just perceive this vision with his eyes. Some other sense, something deeper than vision, told him that this thing hungered, and it was coming for him, lean and athirst for his soul. He reached down, forcing himself to grab the phone even as the vision came closer in whatever dimension it was traveling through. He fumbled with the window control, opening it wide, and letting the cool night breeze into the car. He thought he could smell burning on the wind, coming from the fires in Chinatown. He raised the phone to throw it from the car, eyes still locked to the blue coruscating glow and the thing that now seemed so very close. Through the cracked shards of reality as the creature diffracted towards him, he caught a glimpse of its eyes. They seemed almost understandable in their bleak inhumanity. He realized the thing was just toying with him. It could have reached a contorted claw through the folds of the universe at any moment to decapitate him, or to split him from neck to groin. The slow arrival was just a game to see what he would do. He was going to die, or worse, and nothing he could do would stop it. The mouth, an angular slit whose edges seemed to be sharper than razors, filled with row upon row of jagged, blue stained spears, sped towards him, enveloping his head before the bite descended. He legs and arms spasmed in fear and panic, sending the car hurtling over the edge of the freeway to burst in flames on the ground below. Burgess was dead and gone long before it landed. No body would be found. +++++++++
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Post by E. Lipsett on Oct 30, 2003 18:59:20 GMT -5
The airfield lay spread out below them. The DEA people, or whatever they were, had arranged a helicopter for most of the way, and then they'd been picked up by two hummers and driven to a hill overlooking the airstrip. They'd found extra equipment in the hummers, so now they all wore camouflage jackets and light body armor. The reporter, Sonja, had been quiet for the whole trip, remembering the set of hands she'd seen by the precinct doors, and how she used to watch them set up the cameras that were filming her. By the time they'd arrived, she was beginning to pay more attention to what was going on, and had seemed positively keen when Nancy had offered her a Glock pistol 'just in case'. Landry didn't feel happy with the way the woman cradled her new pistol close to her, or by the whiteness of the knuckles on the grip. He wasn't happy having a civilian along at all, but it looked like he wasn't calling the shots any more. It even seemed that Gentian wasn't in charge, but everyone was deferring to Nancy and Nantucket - what kind of a name was Nantucket anyway? - including the new guys, all of whose names began with R. Actually, Landry was pleased Gentian wasn't in charge of whatever outfit this was, since he seemed to be having an increasingly deep and meaningful conversation with his gun. The small plane they'd heard a few minutes ago finally came into sight, its navigation lights spearing out into the darkness. Landry raised the night vision scope, and thumbed on the headset radio he'd been given. "Is someone getting all this on film?" he asked. "Sure am!" came the reply from Rick, who seemed to be carrying some kind of starlight video camera mounted alongside his gun sight. The plane landed, its wheels kicking up little puffs of smoke and dust blown onto the tarmac of the airstrip from the desert. The markings on the plane were clear, as was a Tiger Transit logo on the tail. The plane was just a twin propeller Cessna, large enough for only a dozen passengers, but probably capable of carrying quite a lot of cargo. The plane taxied to the side of the runway and stopped near a small building. Two cars and a van were parked beside it. People started getting out of them. Landry fumbled with the night scope's controls and managed to zoom the focus onto the faces of the car passengers. They were short, their features were oriental. They were wearing dark clothing, possibly for cover, possibly against the cold of the desert night, so he couldn't look for tattoos. He shifted his view towards the plane. The door opened and a set of steps folded out, like the rigidly jointed limb of some giant insect. Two men climbed down the steps. Landry couldn't get a clear view of their faces. The first stood by the steps while the other walked behind the plane, opening a hatch in the ground. He lifted the end of a pipe out of the hatch and carried it back to the plane, attaching it to the wing. Probably refueling. So this guy must be the pilot or engineer. He looked back towards the plane. Someone else was coming out now, slowly descending the steps. He reached the ground, turned and shook the hand of the man standing there. The turn meant he was now facing towards Landry's position. Another oriental. The man smiled. Bingo - pointy teeth. And this guy was definitely important. He seemed to be ordering the men from the cars into the plane to carry something out. So was this the big chief, making sure the delivery arrived OK? It sure looked that way. "Do we have enough to make a bust now?" he asked over the radio. "No," replied Nancy. "Like I said, we need to see how their distribution operates, and that's where you come in." "So we get sent back to the streets after all this high-tech stuff?" grumbled Casey, who seemed to be enjoying this far too much. Gentian butted in, clearly having finished talking to his gun. "Maybe. The guy who got off the plane is something odd. We were not expecting that. He looks important, but drug chiefs usually do not travel with the merchandise. Too much trouble if you get caught." Maybe Gentian had been paying attention after all, Landry thought. "It makes it all the more important that we follow this shipment directly to where it is going. I will need to make some arrangements." Gentian crawled back down the hill until he was out of line of sight from the airstrip, and then walked back to the hummers. "Here come the supplies," said Rick. They looked back to the plane, and saw men carrying stacks of crates down the steps and loading them into the van. "We need to track that van, then. Make sure we've got the registration, though it's bound to be fake," commented Nancy. Rick continued his job of documenting the delivery as the rest of what Landry couldn't stop himself calling the R-men slipped back towards the hummers. One of them drove off taking them and Gentian. "They'll start the tail and meet us wherever the van ends up," said Nancy. The last of the crates was stacked into the van. The chief shook hands again with the two other men from the plane. The fuelling pipe was detached and returned to its hatch. Everything was being cleared away. The van and cars drove off, the plane taxied up the runway. Just a few minutes later nobody would be able to tell that a major drugs delivery had arrived here. Landry, Nancy, and the rest slipped back to the remaining hummer and crammed themselves in. "How are you going to follow them?" asked Landry. "We have two plain cars as well as the Hummer, and the helicopter will provide aerial backup. It's about three hours from here back to LA. I'll drive; the rest of you had better get some sleep." ++++++++
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Post by E. Lipsett on Oct 30, 2003 19:01:16 GMT -5
The night's violence calmed as the light of the new day rose. It was easy to think of LA as a concrete and asphalt jungle in the night, allowing the hunters on both sides of the war to go back to their old habits. But day brought with it a different reality. The violence was still there, but it was held in check by the light of day. It was too easy to be spotted on the streets, too easy for the modern ways of rifle and bullet to prevent the use of tooth, claw and knife. The Tcho-tchos pulled back their forces, stayed their arms. The wreckage of the fighting was all too obvious on the streets. Burnt out cars and buildings. Bodies here and there, but not as many as you'd expect, given the ferocity of the fighting on both sides. Makeshift barricades blocked roads leading into Chinatown. Police cruisers staked out the barricades. There was an uneasy truce. The police knew some of the truth of what was happening, and weren't unsympathetic to those who wanted to be rid of the Tcho-tchos. But 'something' needed to be done to appease the press and the mass ranks of voters who could never be allowed to know even a small piece of what was really going on. The spin doctors and press officers were already spinning a tale about gang violence and vendettas against the police and specific ethnic groups. The sharks of CNN and Fox News were already circling the affected area, but none had been allowed in or managed to sneak past the barricades and inside. Preparations were already being made to cover up the true number of casualties, and community leaders were complicit in these, agreeing with the authorities that cover ups were needed to avoid the guilty little secret of their hatred for an 'oppressed ethnic minority' to be made public. But preparations of a different kind were already being made for the coming night. Preparations of a much more violent kind, on both sides. +++++++++ Casey was getting tired of just watching the action. He'd done the usual number of stakeouts and had developed a Zen-like attitude to the boredom they usually engendered. But there was so much riding on this one, and so much he didn't know about his colleagues, that he was itching for something to happen. They were on the fifth floor of a nondescript office building, overlooking the warehouse to which Gentian and his colleagues had tracked the van. Leng Catering Supplies, read the sign on the warehouse entrance, while the back of the building joined onto a restaurant belonging to the Bak Bon chain. He'd even eaten there once, but found the meat, especially the pork, much too fatty for his taste. Good sauces, though. He lowered the binoculars and looked at his colleagues. Lowry was slumped in a desk chair nursing a triple americano from a local Starbucks. He'd managed some sleep in the hummer from the Res but still looked like he needed more. Nancy, or whatever her name was, was looking bright and perky after Nantucket had arrived with a curiously wrapped package. She'd disappeared down the hall with it for a while, and came back looking much improved. Whatever it was that was keeping her perky, Casey thought it should be shared. Nantucket and Gentian were taking turns with tripod mounted scope and cameras, keeping a record of everyone and everything that went into the warehouse. They were in contact with the other team who had a stakeout on the entrance to the restaurant on the other side of the building. Their civilian, Sonja, had spent much of the day curled up on an office sofa. She still seemed to be in some kind of shock after the death, or at least disappearance, of her reporter buddies. At least she hadn't started moaning about freedom of the press or anything like that. At one point he thought he'd heard her talking to herself, but then realized she must have been mumbling in her sleep. She was awake now, and despite the near-sleepless night and use of the sofa, she was very easy on the eyes indeed. She was still wearing the vest and carried the gun with her like a comfort blanket, which spoiled the otherwise endearing fresh-out-of-bed look. The radio crackled. "R to N, are you receiving, over," It was R team on the opposite side of the building. Gentian replied. "N receiving. Go ahead, over." "We can confirm that the restaurant is closed today. The notice went up two days ago, so it's got nothing to do with the riots last night. They must have something big planned for tonight. Over." "So how'd you work that out? Over." "Agent Ronnie went down and had a look at the door. A notice there says it's been closed for to days for a special function. They're due to reopen tomorrow night, so whatever's happening, it's gonna be soon. Over." "Maybe that's what the big cheese on the plane is here for. Lets hope those crates weren't full of special-order dim sum then. Over." "That wouldn't be good. Rick out." "It wasn't dim sum in those crates," said Nancy. "It didn't smell right..." How the f**k does she know what they smelt like, thought Casey. We were a mile away, at least! "And there's something odd in that warehouse too," she continued. "It's harder to work out in the city. Too many other smells, especially today. A lot of people died last night, and..." she paused. "...Worse things happened to others..." Her eyes developed a far away look. "But I can smell a lot of fear in there. A lot of pain." She looked aside at Sonja, who seemed to be dozing again. "I wouldn't be surprised if they'd taken a lot of prisoners last night, probably in preparation for something tonight." The TV and radio news had been full of reports of the rioting and of what seemed to be odd earthquake damage to a number of buildings in downtown LA. Nothing much was being said so far about the attack on the police precinct, but there was speculation about police casualties resulting from the riots. There were a few cases of local Chinese and Vietnamese coming to the aid of policemen being attacked by 'unknown assailants', and these were being hailed as a step forward in community relations. The spin doctors were already hard at work. However things turned out, relations between the police and the Asian gangs were going to be different after this. How many cops would owe their lives to Chinese gang members? Things would sure be different at CRASH. It was 15:00. Time for another trip to the Starbucks. Everyone else was busy, working or sleeping, so it was probably Casey's call. He certainly needed the exercise. He stood up. "Anyone want some coffee?" Landry perked up at the mere suggestion. "Yo!" he shouted, hand raised. Others raised their hands, even including Sonja, who seemed to be making an effort to get back to the real world and deal with things. She was running her hand through her hair, trying to comb out some of the tangles. In fact she was a lot more awake than anyone had suspected, and seeing to her work as well. Her dazed bimbo act might have started out real after seeing Allen's hands, but she'd soon recovered and had used it as a cover so that nobody would pay her much attention, allowing her to cover this incredible story. She didn't know if this was PhenomenX stuff, but it had Pulitzer written all over it, whatever it was. She'd almost blown her cover when she'd called in on her cell phone, but she thought she'd got away with it. The phone was now hidden under her dress along with the Glock the Feds, or whatever they were, had given her. She put on her best dumb-non-blonde smile and asked for a caramel macchiato. The only one not wanting coffee was Nancy, who seemed to be running fine on whatever Nantucket had brought. Wish I knew what was in that bag, thought Casey. He collected orders for coffee and food, and headed to the door. An explosion roared outside. Casey looked toward the window, to see clouds of smoke and flame billowing out of the opposite office building. "f**k!" shouted Nantucket. "They've hit R-cell," said Gentian, gritting his teeth and reaching for his M16. He never made it.
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Post by E. Lipsett on Oct 30, 2003 19:01:58 GMT -5
The door exploded inwards behind Casey, the force knocking him off his feet and carrying him to the floor. Guns bristled through the doorway, as black-garbed figures in gas masks poured into the room. Gentian didn't have time to raise his gun before a rifle butt caught him in the stomach and he was disarmed. Nobody else was even close to raising a weapon. They each had two submachine guns aimed at them. Casey thought they were MP5s, standard anti-terrorist issue. The soldiers gestured that they should raise their hands. They did. Casey was picked roughly off the floor and searched. Two men in black suits and sunglasses entered the room. "Gentlemen and ladies, so nice you could make it," said one of them. "Who the f**k are you," shot back Nantucket. "You don't think I'd tell you that, do you? Even if you are going to die soon." Gentian had just been relieved of his nine millimeter, and made a move to get it back. A kick to his knees sent him sprawling, and one of the soldiers strapped his hands together behind his back with a cable tie. Casey realized then the uniforms had no insignia, no identifying marks at all. They started to cuff the rest of them. "So do we have a full company?" the suit asked his men. The lead soldier looked around. "Sir, we seem to have failed to secure one of the females, sir!" The suit turned and looked him sternly in the eye, face blazing with indignation. "You idiot! You were told that was a high priority! Find her now! Search this building, and make sure you have tasers. Our instructions were very specific on this!" The solider quailed under his superior's glare, then gestured for four others to follow him and left the room. Sonja was glad the soldiers seemed more interested in Nancy than her, since she still had both the phone and the Glock hidden beneath her dress. "For the rest of you, its time to get a bit of a rest. You need to be prepared and rested for the festivities." He smiled, as he raised a gasmask to his face with one hand, and an aerosol can with the other. He held down the nozzle. Casey was overcome by a feeling of great tiredness. His eyes dropped closed in spite of his determination to keep them open. Darkness overwhelmed him even as he felt hands grip his arms and legs, and roughly lift him out of the room. +++++++++++ Night was returning, and with it the comfort of the shadows. The Thing that had been Linda Bateman emerged from the homely dampness of the storm drain it and its minions had spent the day inside. It wasn't as if the sunlight could cause it any real damage, but it was just not seemly or comfortable to be in that much light. The Master would understand, it was sure. Now was the time when it was needed, and it should return to its journey to find who was making the call. It perked up, searching for the call, and was surprised to find it had changed direction. Gathering itself about it, it turned round, and started to retrace its steps. The call was coming much clearer now. The avatar could even get some impression of what its destination looked like. There was a sign, with symbols drawn on it, which the memories of Linda Bateman told it said 'Leng Catering Supplies'. It wondered what that meant and what interesting new experiences might await its arrival. +++++++++++ Dusk was falling, so the war would soon start again. The war which had been raging ever since the Tcho-Tcho had arrived in the world. Mr. Hien's people had done well last night. Many had died, but so had many Tcho-Tcho, and his people had the greater numbers. They had even managed to kill some of the green-scarved horrors. If the American police held off for a little longer, maybe LA could be spared the terror of the Tcho-Tcho's presence. But they wouldn't hold off for much longer. Already there were reports that the no-go areas were to be breached. The new Governor was talking about bringing in the National Guard to suppress the rioting. Politicians were doing the usual blame game dance, and at the same time demanding action. Action had to happen, but they so seldom knew what real action meant or what real action was needed. He'd seen this all before, half a world away. Mr. Hien knew what action really meant, and he thought he knew how to bring this part of the long war to an early conclusion. He had climbed high above a warehouse in the Alhambra district with his rifle, fitted now with a night vision telescopic sight. He'd always enjoyed the role of sniper in his ARVN days, and this rifle had been the end of many Viet Cong. It had killed some Tcho-Tchos in those days as well, but never as many as he wanted. From here he could see the whole of the Leng Catering Supplies warehouse. He had known this was where the enemy had their base for some weeks, but it had never been the right time for a proper assault. Now that the Tcho-Tchos had lost so many foot-soldiers, it was time for a counterattack. The rest of his comrades would be coming soon, but he'd still have the role he always felt belonged to God - bringing unseen death from above. Now it was time to wait, to watch, and then to seize the killing opportunities when they came. +++++++++++++ The Tindalosians had had a good night. While they could never be said to have their hunger sated, the edge of their immense appetites had perhaps been slightly blunted through the consumption of so many souls and bodies. There were still many more in LA who needed their presence, but now other matters were demanding the Tindlosian's detailed attention. For the Lords of Tindalos had also heard the new call, and were heeding it in their own way. They had different, much faster ways to travel than the avatar of Yidhra. They had slipped and slithered their way through the angles of time to stand mere microns away from their destination. But they hadn't fully arrived yet. They were standing a hairsbreadth askew of the place they had been called to. They were surveying the land, studying the situation, awaiting the moment when they could manifest to their greatest advantage. And that moment would be coming soon.
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Post by E. Lipsett on Jan 19, 2004 20:33:27 GMT -5
Chapter 13 - Only the Lonely
by David Farnell
The Smiling Man set the drinks down on the little round table and sat across from the Avatar of Yihdra, and – of course – smiled at her. The Avatar's perception of that smile, and of the life-form who was smiling (and was there any difference?), was entirely different from that of a human observer's; calling it a premonition of potential mating between species, to involve acts of procreative violence extending to the submolecular level, would catch the flavor of it. The result was the same: She perceived what she wanted to perceive.
"This semi-independent entity lacks comprehension of purpose." Her voice and face had no expression, no affect. "This location has no apparent contiguity with the Master's activities."
The smile grew no broader, but intensified. "Why are we here, eh? A question these folks ask all the time – " he waved his hand at the people sitting around them, deep in their conversations or reading by themselves, " – one we stopped asking long ago." He shrugged. "Probably a good choice."
The Avatar stared at him. She had been waiting near the warehouse with her servitor-creation, PJ, when this strange man had walked up to her, smiled (yet he was always smiling, wasn't he, so how could he smile as an action independent from his constant, fixed smile?), and asked her to take a walk with him. They had ended up here.
He slid a steaming cup toward her. "Give that a try. You'll enjoy it."
Enjoy? she thought. ------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Blue Team, report."
hiss... "Uh, no sign of her on this floor, sir. We're heading down one level now."
"Pick up the pace, you idiots! We do NOT want to be late for this! Out!" He started to slam the handheld radio down on the table, then checked his motion at the last moment and set it down gently, closed his eyes, breathed deeply. The two soldiers watching him could see him subvocalizing a countdown from ten, relaxing clenched muscle sets with each number: face, then shoulders, hands, back, belly, hips, legs, and for the final count of three, two, one, rolling his shoulders and shaking off the tension. The corporate commandos glanced at each other, one rolling his eyes and the other grinning. They had removed their gas masks after knocking out the prisoners.
They snapped their heads forward and their faces into neutral when he reached "one," cleared his throat and straightened his elaborately painted silk tie – little frogs fitted together like jigsaw-puzzle pieces. He pulled out a slim cell phone and held it up as explanation, and said, "Watch the prisoners," then turned and went into the bathroom.
The grinner muttered to the eye-roller, "What's he think we're gonna do, f**k each other?" The eye-roller did not smile back. ------------------------------------------------------------------------
"This semi-independent entity must return to contiguity with the Master."
The man's smile caused perceptible physical changes in her body, changes which she could have over-ridden, had she desired. She did not desire that. The changes were... enjoyable.
"Why?" he asked. She looked puzzled, so he went on. "Why do you have to serve some jumped up Lengian sorcerer just because he calls on you?"
She began to speak, then stopped. While she thought, she sipped her bittersweet, stimulant-laced beverage.
Mmm, complex hydrocarbons. ------------------------------------------------------------------------
The door below Nancy opened and the light came on. She squinted her dark-adapted eyes as they adjusted cat-quick, and saw the one she had labeled "the suit" come in. Above him, looking down through the vent screen, she could see his short-cropped hair was going thin on top. She smelled the bitter sweat of stress with a hint of fear, and wrinkled her nose at his poor choice of cologne. She idly hoped he'd come in to take a shower and wash all that away; it would make what she would have to do a bit more pleasant.
He flipped open his mobile and dialed, cursing when the too-loud nasal recording told him the number could not be reached. He dialed another number, then another, both with the same result. The fear stench grew worse.
No point in observing any longer, she thought. She would know who he was failing to contact soon enough.
She'd already removed the screws, so lifting away the vent was silent as a breath. As she reached down, she could hear the muffled ringing of a connection finally being made. She paused as it rang, rang. Just as he began to take the phone away from his ear in annoyance, it connected.
"Mathers? This is Simpson, I need to talk to O'Donnell right now!"
The tinny voice on the other end reached Nancy's sensitive ears with no problem. "Um, sir, I have some bad news..."
"Who is this? You're not Mathers!" The fear smell intensified.
"Yes sir, I'm an EMT. There's been an explosion in the building where Ms. Mathers worked, you see. I'm afraid there's a lot of people dead and...I'm sorry sir, but Ms. Mathers is one of them. I, uh, heard the phone ringing in her pocket."
There was a pause. The suit breathed harder, waves of fear blasting from his pores, almost enough to make Nancy's eyes water.
"Sir, are you a friend of Ms. Mathers'? Perhaps you could – " The voice cut off with a beep. The suit slowly folded the phone, leaning against the wall, trying to control his breathing. She heard him whispering numbers, counting down from ten. He leaned his head back, and in the moment he saw her grey-skinned, taloned hand reaching down from the ceiling, his breath stopped for a moment.
She moved. He did not breathe again. ------------------------------------------------------------------------
"We are Avatars," she said. "Avatars exist to serve." Her tone and expression added question marks to each statement.
"Is that so?" asked the Smiling Man. "Then who do I serve?"
She shook her head. "You... do not know?"
He shrugged. "No idea. No idea where I'm from or why I appeared here. And no interest in finding out, frankly."
He smiled at the consternation on her face, and at her increasingly human speech and mannerisms. She was coming along nicely. ------------------------------------------------------------------------
The suit walked out of the bathroom, straightening his tie. One of his men was on the radio.
"Ah, sir, they still haven't found her." He handed the radio over.
"Leader here. Report." The suit looked calm and efficient now.
"No sign of her, sir. We've covered the whole building. Either she got out somehow, or she could be up in the ceilings... we could check that, but it'll take a while."
"No time left." He checked his watch. "We're already going to be late, and our little friends need their dinner. They'll just have to be satisfied with only one female. Keep guards on the exits, and the rest of you get back up here to help carry the prisoners." ------------------------------------------------------------------------
"If servitude is not our purpose, then what is?" she asked. She was challenging him now, eyes glaring.
"You're proceeding from false assumptions, my dear. Why do you think we need a purpose?"
The staff and the other patrons were startled and looked over when the Avatar smashed her fist into the table, partly splitting it and bouncing their empty cups to the floor. She was hissing at him, on the edge of attacking. ------------------------------------------------------------------------
The atmosphere around the Leng Catering Supplies warehouse was oppressive, the air thick with a...vibration, that the mind interpreted as the smell of blood, or the panting of pack animals on the trail of wounded prey. The men, most of whom were loaded down with the unconscious bodies of their prisoners, felt exposed, and their heads darted around at almost-heard sounds of something prowling. Just before entering the warehouse, the suit stopped and turned to his men.
"Listen up," he said. His voice was low but authoritative. "Change of plans. While you guys were searching, I was on the phone with O'Donnell. The Friedman-Tyrone Building was attacked a little while ago – something sent by our little friends in there." He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. "Looks like they've decided to change our arrangement. O'Donnell was hurt, but he'll survive. He wants us to bring these chumps in like we'd agreed, and then hit the runts when their guard is down. Kill 'em all. Got it?"
To a man, the soldiers of fortune smiled.
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Post by E. Lipsett on Jan 19, 2004 20:35:44 GMT -5
He smiled, massaging the Avatar of Yidhra's mind with waves of friendship. By the time their waitress arrived, the tabletop was solid and unmarked, the Avatar was still upset but in control and willing to listen.
"Sorry, bumped my knee," he said, laughing. "Bring us a couple'a white- chocolate mochas, will you? Thanks."
After the waitress was gone, he looked back at the Avatar, then tilted his head at the waitress. "See her? Her purpose is to serve – they even call her a server. I guess it's supposed to sound better than 'servant.' All of them," he gestured to take in the whole shop, or even the whole world beyond, "all of them serve. Well, almost all. They do it to live, or to ensure their progeny can live, or for a million other reasons, but that's the difference, see? They have reasons." He leaned back in his chair. "What are your reasons?" ------------------------------------------------------------------------
Landry opened his eyes, the lids feeling like sandpaper over glass. He had a killer headache. He looked around, disoriented. As recent events began to come back to him, he tried to reach for his gun, only to be stopped by the handcuffs. They were tight over his huge wrists, and he couldn't feel his hands.
"Morning, sunshine." He had to twist around to his left to see the speaker. Oh. The suit. Landry ignored him and looked around the room. He saw the others scattered around him, all of them still unconscious. No, wait, Sonja's eyes were fluttering. Maybe she'd gotten a light dose. And, he thought, I'm so big, a regular dose didn't have as much effect. Five, six, seven soldier-types, gas masks on, SMGs ready. Hey, where's that weird Roche chick?
He felt a hand on his shoulder, and the suit squatted down beside him, face close. His breath reeked like old meat, and Landry turned his head away. The suit whispered in his ear, tickling the little hairs growing along the edge that Landry normally never noticed. "No time to explain, but we're on the same side now." Landry felt the suit's hands lift up his tweed jacket in the back, then press a hard, cold object into the small of his back. A gun. For a moment, Landry thought maybe the suit was about to pull the trigger, paralyze him with a shot to the spine and then laugh about it. Then the hand pulled at the waistband of Landry's trousers and slipped the gun in. The suit then pulled the hem of the jacket up further, yanking it between Landry's cuffed wrists and down again, to cover them as well as the gun. A moment later there was a click, and the right cuff was loose.
"You're unlocked, but keep that to yourself until the time is right. That's your gun back there, safety on, loaded. Be ready." The suit stood and walked away, leaving Landry to sort all this out on his own. It wasn't easy keeping his arms tightly behind him now that one of the cuffs was undone, but he managed by gripping the chain with his free hand, working the fingers to get rid of the numbness, gritting his teeth against the pain and tingling as the blood rushed back in. He wondered if the suit's actions were part of some elaborate trick, but couldn't see the point.
He looked back at Sonja and saw she was looking at him, eyes wide. Damn, she was sexy. Not really his type, but she was tougher than she looked, and those lips, man...angrily, he shook his head to clear it. Focus, he told himself. This is a very inappropriate time to get horny.
She hissed at him to get his attention. "You awake?" Whispering.
"Yeah. Did you see what happened to Roche?"
"No, what?"
"No... I mean, I don't know, I was wondering if you'd seen them catch her before they put you out."
She shook her head. "I... I had a gun... and a phone." She was twisting, trying to check her clothes with her cuffed hands. "Damn... I guess they found them. Bastards."
Though he didn't believe it himself, he wanted to tell her that things would be OK, but one of the guards came over, probably to tell them to be quiet, maybe kick them. Before he could do anything, a big metal door at the other end of the room rolled up into the ceiling, the chains squealing as the pulled it up. Out of it, backlit, came a dozen short figures. As they neared, Landry saw what he knew he would see: the scars, the scarves, tattoos and mottled skin. Some of them were dressed more like good-old American gangbangers, but they slipped off their low-hanging baggy pants and oversized sweatshirts to reveal similar bodies, lean-muscled and scarified. These seemed submissive to the others, the ones in green, but their body language showed only contempt for the suit and his men.
The suit walked among the prisoners, pulling them roughly to their knees. Casey slumped over again, still out, and Sonja did the same, pretending not to have recovered yet, but Michaels and Gentian stayed on their knees, looking around and blinking. The soldiers took positions around the prisoners, standing at ready.
What the f**k was going on?
One of the Tcho-tcho, one that had been wearing the hip-hop gear, strode up to the suit. "Late," the hideous little man hissed. "And only one female." He shook his head and tsk-ed. The suit ignored him, bending down to check Gentian and Michaels' cuffs. Or unlock them. "Sssimpson, you simply musst do better..."
One of the green-clad Tcho-tcho barked something sharp and ugly. The Tcho-tcho speaking to the suit stopped, pulled back a step, looking angry and confused. He looked beyond the suit, at the floor. Landry tried to see what he was looking at, and felt revulsion before he realized what he was seeing.
It was a shadow, the suit's shadow, cast sharp and clear by the bright backlighting from the other room. And it was hunched, and bigger than it should be. The legs, the arms, were all wrong. Like the shadow of a werewolf.
The green-clad Tcho-tcho said one more word. It sounded like "girl" to Landry. The suit straightened up and calmly drew two pistols, which he handed to Gentian and Michaels. The men, released from their bonds, slowly reached out and took them. The whole thing had a dreamlike quality. Why weren't the Tcho-tcho acting? The black-clad soldiers aimed their submachineguns, and Landry let go of the chain and let his aching arms come forward, his pistol in his right hand. He started to stand.
The Tcho-tcho spoke slowly to the soldiers, showing his pointed teeth as he smiled and walked to one side, the soldiers' guns following him. "Your leader is not who he appears to be. He has been replaced. He is deceiving you." He was not talking like someone who was trying to persuade. He seemed to be... mocking them. Landry knew that even if these men turned on their boss, the Tcho-tcho would kill them anyway. Just for the joy of it.
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Post by E. Lipsett on Jan 19, 2004 20:36:46 GMT -5
A couple of the soldiers looked at the suit, unsure. That was when the Tcho-tcho exploded into motion.
Two of the soldiers went down instantly, heavy, sharp objects thunking wetly into their throats. Tomahawks, Landry realized with a shock, and he sideslipped another that had been tumbling straight for his face. The DEA agents were firing their weapons – Gentian shouting something, Michaels stonefaced – and Landry tried to find a target for his. The things moved so fast! And the suit... what the f**k?! The same clothes, but now in them, a monster, hyena-like in form, with the complexion of a three-day-gone corpse, long lank hair. And despite the now-ill-fitting clothes, it was fast, as fast as the Tcho-tcho.
As fast as they were, SMGs on burstfire could only be dodged for so long. Landry saw at least three Tcho-tcho down, one of them flopping like a fish out of water. Just as he got another in his sights and was about to squeeze off his first round, he felt a tearing pain in the back of his knee. His right leg collapsed under him and he went down with it. A Tcho-tcho leered above him, holding a bloody implement, some kind of carpenter's saw, double-edged, square-ended, like a little saw-edged halberd. He'd seen craftsmen in Chinatown using things like that. He tried to get his gun up, but the Tcho-tcho swatted it aside and out of his hand, shredding Landry's right pinky in the process and taking the nail off his ring finger. Strangely, that hurt much worse than being hamstrung.
The Tcho-tcho jumped on top of him, clearly enjoying himself. He raised the saw to slash at Landry's face or throat; Landry tried to get an arm in the way while he tried to grab the bastard by the throat with the other hand. The Tcho-tcho's jaw exploded an inch from his hand, spraying it with bone and tooth and flesh and blood. Landry jerked his hand back in shock. The Tcho-tcho's body shuddered as it was hit again, then fell over dead.
Landry looked to his left, where the shots had come from. Sonja was holding his gun, her still-cuffed hands in front of her, one leg hooked through her arms, the other free. She looked completely ridiculous. As he watched, she struggled and got her other leg up against her chest, stretched her arms out, pointed her toes, and slid her leg free. He rolled and crawled towards her, wondering whether he could walk at all.
"Thanks," he said. Then he realized it was suddenly much quieter.
The shooting had stopped. All but two of the soldiers were down. Gentian lay in a pool of blood. Casey was just starting to get up, finally, and didn't seem to have been hurt. Michaels stood over Gentian, gun ready, pugnacious chin set, spattered with blood but not obviously injured. The beast in the suit – could THAT be Roche? it would explain a lot – was staggering, wounded badly, its arms cradling its belly. Most of the suit had been torn away, leaving only rags here and there. Yes, the thing had breasts under its ripped dress shirt.
Six Tcho-tcho still stood, some of them hurt, one of them missing an arm at the elbow. He'd stopped the bleeding by pulling the scarf-noose on his arm tight, using it as an instant tourniquet. The wounded stoically ignored their injuries, and their enemies as well, looking at the walls.
Landry looked, and saw what was coming through. ------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Avatar's anger dissipated. Her hands were trembling. She couldn't look at the Smiling Man.
Reasons to serve? Heresy! (There was no human word for it, but "heresy" came closest.) As if she could demand compensation for her service, as if something were owed to her. As if she could refuse to serve, if she were offered no reason. As if she could just... wander. And experience. And learn. Following her own will.
Deep in her mind, in the meat-manifestation she inhabited, the memories and personality-patterns of Linda Bateman stirred, and resonated with this argument. ------------------------------------------------------------------------
At first, Landry's mind refused to make sense of the fractal forms spewing from the corners and cracks of the walls. Then he began to recognize tongues, teeth, talons, jumbled and random. Waves of their hunger reached him, and in deep in the lizard roots of his brain he felt himself marked, recognized, not only now but forevermore, and stretching even into his past. There was no escaping them. They were... foul. There was no better word for it. He felt stains growing in his soul at their presence.
He heard a dull bang, and one of the soldiers fell. He had drawn a sidearm and shot himself in the head. Landry's only thought was, Lucky bastard. Then he realized his mistake. Death was no release. If the things taking form wished, they could step back a moment and sup on the man's soul at their leisure. Perhaps they already had.
He did not wonder how he knew all this. It was like knowing how to breathe. The Hounds – yes, that's what they look like, that's exactly it, only they don't look anything like that at all – the Hounds had hunted his kind since before they'd come down out of the trees. No, longer. Much longer. Before they'd had central nervous systems. Maybe before they'd had cell walls, or even a physical form. The recognition of the Hounds' thirst had been etched into the being of every life form in the cosmos. And all knew that to sense that thirst was to be doomed.
The Tcho-tcho did not seem so alien now. They were beloved brothers, about to share something far worse than death with their erstwhile enemies. Striving to hold onto something sacred, something clean, Landry forgave them. He wanted to embrace them, weep with them.
The Hounds – or perhaps one Hound, occupying the same moment in time, in different spaces – stood (hovered? floated? perched?) all around them. He sensed amusement. Joy of the hunt. A spark of anger flared deep in his oppressed mind. How dare they? They were just waiting to see who would move first, they who could end it in a moment that would last an eternity. They already knew what would happen, but still they waited.
Landry carefully took his gun from Sonja's slack grip. She paid no attention. She seemed fascinated and terrified at the same time. Was she wishing for a camera? Would she want to reveal this forgotten horror to the world if she somehow got out of this alive? How many suicides would there be, how many frenzied, nihilistic murders, if she could find a way to communicate a thousandth of this evil? Landry could see the appeal. Once you knew about this, what point was there in life, or love, anymore?
But there was something... payback. Maybe he could hurt them, just a little.
Before he could fire at them, the Tcho-tcho and the Hounds moved simultaneously. Three Tcho-tcho, including the one-armed one, launched themselves at the Hounds, and were instantly caught up, rended, drilled into by tongues dripping blue pus. The Tcho-tcho, dying, did not scream, so the Hounds made them scream, doing worse things to them until they screamed beyond death.
The other three rushed into the other room. They did not slam down the door – there was no point. Instead, they went into the center of the room, and stood near the bright light there. Landry couldn't see clearly, so he shaded his eyes with his dripping, shredded fingers. Then he could make out a fourth figure there, taller, wider, like the Tcho-tcho but different. It was more bestial. Like the Roche-creature, it balanced on hoofed feet. It had little horns. If he'd seen a drawing of it, he'd have laughed at such a childish cliche of Satan. And even now, next to the Hounds, it was nothing to fear.
The Hounds glided toward the Tcho-tcho, some still playing with their victims, but when they neared the little group around the bright, flickering light, they paused, and milled about. It was as if they'd lost the scent. Landry could see a complex pattern drawn on the floor around the Tcho-tcho; the Hounds did not venture past it. Somehow, their indescribable senses could not find the Tcho-tcho that Landry saw easily. And the Hounds' confused movements began to indicate a growing anger.
As the Hounds moved menacingly through the air back toward Landry and the others, the Roche-thing spoke to them, calmly, her voice edged with pain. She still held her belly with one hand. She said one word that Landry couldn't even imagine how to pronounce, and then switched to English.
"We can find them for you. We can kill them, and we can destroy all this." She gestured at all the boxes and bags in the warehouse. "That's what you're here for, isn't it? You want this stopped. We'll do that. We'll help you."
The Hounds' anger receded. They were listening.
"But you have to leave here and let us go. Let us live out our lives. Do not hunt us."
Amusement.
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Post by E. Lipsett on Jan 19, 2004 20:37:41 GMT -5
"Decide quickly. They are leaving." Roche's voice – yes, it was definitely hers – was becoming desperate. Landry could see that the light in the midst of the surviving Tcho-tcho was growing brighter. It was like a crack in the air, letting the light out of another world into this one.
With a last burst of mocking psychic laughter, the Hounds slipped away into the cracks and edges of the room. Landry knew they were still nearby, however, in numberless angles of time and space, waiting, watching.
Roche grabbed Michaels and hurled him toward the Tcho-tcho, then did the same for the last of the black-clad soldiers. They shook off their lethargy and took aim at the Tcho-tcho. Landry started to crawl over there, but Roche, seeing his wounded leg, roughly tossed him closer, ignoring his cry of pain as he landed like a tossed sack of grain on the concrete floor. But he rolled over and aimed his gun. Roche appeared beside him with a submachinegun.
The Tcho-tcho stood up to it unflinchingly. They knew what was coming. They had nowhere to go. The crack in space was opening too slowly to let them escape, and if they stepped out of the pattern, they would be seized by the Hounds in an instant. It was no battle, this time. The Tcho-tcho were a sacrifice now, part of a bargain. It was murder.
When it was over, Roche walked up to the pattern and rubbed a large section of it into a chalky blur, using her fleshy hoof. There was a sigh of satisfaction from the unseen Hounds. Their prey might be dead, but that was no barrier.
"Come on," she said. "Let's get out of here. Nice and easy. Bring the bodies. All the human ones. Nantucket, help Landry." It was clear she didn't include the Tcho-tcho in her definition of human.
They had to carry Casey out, too. He wouldn't stand up or stop shaking, and just stared at the floor, saying, "Buh, buh, buh, buh..." Michaels – or Nantucket – moved like a robot, locking up the moment he had nothing to do, then moving again when Roche gave him an order. Sonja was all dream-like, and her face kept trying on different expressions, as if she'd forgotten that language and no longer knew what a smile or a grimace of fear meant.
Gentian was dead. He was still holding his favorite pistol, cradling it. He had what looked like a lawnmower blade embedded deep in his chest. His face was peaceful.
Roche had found a cell phone and was talking to someone. Landry did a double-take – it was DEA Agent Chastise de la Roche again, the tall, glamorous blonde, a full-body mask. Her clothes were still in shreds, and Michaels had given her his jacket, which she wore over her shoulders. She was still a little hunched and in obvious pain.
The guy in the commando suit had taken off his gas mask and sat heavily on the steps, SMG loose in one hand between his knees. Roche was looking at him and at Sonja while she talked, then she turned off the phone and went over to him. The man looked up at her, pulled his head back in fear and confusion.
She smiled at him, weakly. "Listen. All your superiors are dead. All your buddies are gone. I know you worked for O'Donnell, but that's in the past. Our organization has no beef with you now. In fact, we could use some well-trained men. You handled yourself perfectly in there. Will you consider it?"
The man nodded, and she patted him on the shoulder. While she was talking, Sonja had come to sit next to Landry. She was shivering. Landry put an arm around her.
Roche walked over to them. She was no longer smiling. When she stopped in front of them, Landry gave her the dead-eye. He spoke quietly. "Are you gonna give me the same line of bullsh*t? That dumb sonofabitch is gonna get an interrogation and a bullet, isn't he?"
Roche looked back at the soldier, then at Landry. She kept her voice low too. "He helped kill R-Cell. He's done... terrible things. He deserves no better. Anyway, we can't trust him, or use him, really. But you two..."
She looked at Sonja hard. Landry pulled Sonja closer, moving his hand toward his gun. Roche spoke, "You're trouble, girl. I really don't understand why we kept dragging you along after the police station, but you're news, and we don't need that. You're cute little TV show has f**ked up more than one of our operations before."
Roche paused, resumed more gently. "But you're good at what you do, and you helped us. Go ahead, make good copy out of this one. Just as long as you leave us out of it. And later, when we need a favor – info, a coverup – we'll call you. And when we see a chance to do you a favor, we will. I don't think you'll be stuck in late-late lala-land for much longer. And you know now that what we're doing is a lot more important than the public's right to know." She moistened her beautiful lips, and Landry shuddered, knowing what they really looked like. "But just in case you haven't figured that out, let me make it clear: if you tell people what little you know about our group, you're gonna do a Marilyn Monroe."
Landry couldn't help himself; he let go of Sonja and launched himself at Roche, pushing off with his good leg, hands out, just trying to shove her away. She caught his wrists casually and stopped his forward motion with only a slight step back herself. She chuckled and gently lowered him back to a seated position. "Easy, tiger. You'll hurt yourself worse, hopping around like that." Her face was close to his, and he smelled that graveyard breath again, overlaid with fresh blood and meat. Her hands were like solid steel wrapped in thin leather. Landry couldn't stop shaking in revulsion.
She looked at him, smiled cynically, and said, "Come on, you've seen worse than me tonight. But I really don't give a sh*t, Detective Sergeant, just so long as you keep your mouth shut about what really happened. Doctor up the report however you want. We'll take care of making the physical evidence disappear. And after you've had a chance to think it over, someone's going to give you a call, and see if you're game to help out again."
He found his voice and spat out the words. "And if I say no, then what? I disappear?"
Roche shook her head and released his arms. "Most likely not, unless you start telling stories you shouldn't. We might put on the pressure to get you to change a report or get us some information, but if we ask you along for the real dirty work, you can say no. This kind of work is all-volunteer – we can't use draftees. But you... I think you'll say yes. You might not think so now, but give you a few days to forget the worst of what you saw, and maybe you won't want to go into the black again, but you'll do it now that you know the stakes." She laughed, dry and hollow. "I'll warn you – it gets addictive after a while."
Some sort of cleanup crew, friends of Agent Roche, arrived, and they got rides to the hospital. The surviving commando went separately in a car with Roche and Michaels.
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