Target Rich Environment

  “Sorry to disappoint, Doc.”

  “Judging from your filthy and disheveled appearance, I’m taking it that you’ve been busy.”

  Sullivan nodded. “I found your saboteur and tossed his bomb over the side. You’ll need to send your damage control team up top to do some patching.”

  “Did you put a hole in my bag?”

  “Something like that . . . Whoever you send, make sure they’ve got a strong stomach.”

  “I’m assuming this was all your fault. Was it really necessary for you to carve a spell into my engine room to frighten my passengers?”

  “If an idea’s stupid, but it works, then it wasn’t stupid. You said your passengers were looking for adventure, well, there you go.”

  Wells sighed. “It appears your theory was correct. I haven’t had time to reconstruct the scene, but it seems the Imperium and the NKVD had quite a fight, culminating in the destruction of my runabout. From what I’ve ascertained so far, the Imperium were boarding the aircraft when they were attacked. Judging by the bits of metal stuck in the hull and in the Iron Guard’s corpses, I’d say one of the NKVD was a talented Mover. But as we both know, Iron Guard do not die easily, so they got out and went about murdering the Russians before they were brought down. The last Russian had his neck snapped right over there. In addition to my very angry clientele, I now have four corpses to deal with.”

  “Four? Where’s the professor?”

  Wells shrugged. “No sign of him.”

  The last piece of the puzzle clicked into place. “Where’s the safest place to parachute off this thing?”

  The parachutes and emergency exit hatches were kept locked up until there was an emergency. Unfortunately, Sullivan had given them more than enough emergency. In luring out one faction, he’d made the other one’s job easier.

  This area had been cleared of passengers after the captain had called off their crisis, so it was quiet as Sullivan ran down the passage. The stern was normally off limits, so it was all sheet metal and rivets. He found that the stern escape hatch was open, revealing a bright stretch of blue ocean below. Sullivan caught Skorzeny and Nishimura there, just as the German was about to cut the Cog’s head off.

  Sullivan hadn’t seen that coming.

  “Hold on now,” Sullivan ordered as he aimed his .45. “Put the knife down.”

  “Easy there, Sullivan.” Skorzeny was standing over the professor with a butcher’s blade in one hand. Nishimura was lying on the grate, unconscious but breathing. “Why would the likes of you care about one more dead Jap?”

  “Buddy, what I’m concerned about is none of your business.”

  “I must tell you, I’ve always looked at you as something of an inspiration. For how many stories there are about the ruthless Jake Sullivan and the insane objectives you’ve accomplished, the reality has left me sorely disappointed. You’ve grown soft.”

  “You’re not the first man who thought that today.” The German was already wearing a parachute and had a big leather satchel tethered around his body. Sullivan gestured with the muzzle of his pistol. “I’m guessing his head is supposed to go in the bag?”

  Skorzeny was calm as could be. “My operation has a Lazarus. We don’t need his whole body to find out what he knows. Once brought back from the dead, a severed head can talk well enough.”

  As a student of magic, Sullivan was fascinated by every type of Active, but on a deep, personal level Sullivan hated Lazarus magic. “What is it this guy knows that makes it worth blowing up five hundred people?”

  “Something about Japanese giant super robots. He recently completed a project the Imperium have been working on since they saw what the god of demons did to Washington, D.C. I don’t know the details. I’m only following orders.”

  “Can’t say I’m too fond of the idea of the Imperium getting any new toys.”

  “Then look the other way for thirty seconds and you won’t have to worry about it.”

  “Tempting . . . But that don’t mean I want your bosses to have them either. Whoever they are, they’re connected enough to know what Stalin’s secret police are up to, smart enough to let the NKVD do their thing and then steal the prize for themselves.”

  “I must admit I’m proud of my work. That last Russian never even saw me coming.”

  “Imperium gets robbed, you rob the robbers, and nobody’s the wiser. Normally I wouldn’t care, but the fact you were still gonna let the NKVD blow up the ship means you’re no friend of mine.”

  “My superiors will deal with the Grimnoir Society in time.” Skorzeny had a very cold smile. “I’ll deal with you now.”

  Sullivan shot him in the chest, and when he didn’t go down, Sullivan shot him again, and then again. He was a little surprised to see the man was still standing.

  Skorzeny looked down at the red holes in his white shirt. “That really hurt.” Then he hurled the big knife at Sullivan.

  Sullivan flared his Power, hard and sloppy, but it worked, and the knife, now with the weight of a boulder hit the floor and left a dent in the metal. He put the front sight right between Skorzeny’s eyes and pulled the trigger.

  That round hit him square in the forehead, but it bounced off.

  That should have bowled over even a Brute, but the German twisted his head back around, snarled, “You should have walked away when you had the chance,” stepped over the unconscious professor and started toward Sullivan.

  He’d fought far too much in his life to be easily excitable, and asked with more curiosity than nervousness, “What are you?”

  “The future.”

  Skorzeny hurled himself down the corridor. Power flaring, Sullivan increased his density and took the hit. The fist hit him in the chest, and even with physics on his side, the impact was so hard that it bent the grate beneath his feet. Sullivan hit him back, magic and muscle, and damn near broke his knuckles on the German’s jaw. He swung again, but missed.

  Because Sullivan was suddenly blind.

  He was too analytical to panic. His eyes were still working. It was just pitch black, like all the light had been sucked out of the world. Then something hit him in the ribs like a hammer, hard enough to lift him off the floor. The air flew out of his lungs.

  Sullivan twisted gravity to the side, dropping both of them against the wall. Then he changed its direction again, bouncing them across the ceiling. They collided in the dark, and he kicked out, heel connecting with something solid. He would have tweaked gravity so that down was pointed at the escape hatch, but he didn’t particularly want to drop the unconscious professor to his doom.

  He hit the floor, got up, and ended up with a handful of what was probably the leather satchel. He yanked back on it, slamming Skorzeny hard into the wall. He still couldn’t see a damned thing, but he could feel exactly where Skorzeny’s body was affecting gravity, and from there he could extrapolate where to slug him in the mouth.

  The artificial blackness instantly cleared. Skorzeny was right in front of him, smiling through bloody teeth.

  There was a bright flash and a loud crack. Electricity leapt between them, blasting Sullivan across the space.

  It took a second for Sullivan’s muscles to unclench enough to move. His hands were tingling and his shirt had caught fire. If it hadn’t been for his Healing spells, that shock probably would have stopped his heart.

  “You like that, Sullivan? You Grimnoir aren’t the only ones pushing the boundaries of magic.” As the German spoke, he was doing something with his fingers, almost like he was drawing a design in the air. It might have been the electrical shock, but Sullivan could have sworn that there was a lingering glow in the air. That’s impossible. You can’t draw spells on air. But, fascinating as that was, Sullivan had an ass to kick.

  Sullivan got up, but now Skorzeny was moving as fast as a Brute, hands flashing back and forth, and he hit Sullivan a dozen more times. The next thing Sullivan knew he was spinning head over heels down the hall to bounce off the ceiling and skid across the fl
oor.

  He’d landed next to the unconscious Cog. It took Sullivan a moment to collect himself. It was like being run over by a truck. The multiple Healing spells carved on his body were burning hot, gobbling up Power to fuel his life.

  “You want to know about whom I answer to?”

  The German was following him, again doing the trick with his fingers, and this time Sullivan was sure he saw the glow, and could almost trace the pattern.

  “As much as you think you know about magic, somebody knows more.”

  Skorzeny extended one hand behind him, palm open. His discarded butcher knife leapt from the floor, streaked across the distance, and Skorzeny caught it by the handle. He brought the blade around.

  “You’ve not seen anything yet.”

  “I was cocky at your age too, kid.” Sullivan grunted as he stood up.

  His opponent had just demonstrated Brute strength, Crackler lightning, the density manipulation of a Massive, the telekinesis of a Mover, and something unknown relating to light. There were only a handful of Actives in the world capable of accessing more than one area of the Power, and the only ones he knew of who’d ever used such a range so effortlessly were the Chairman and Faye back when she was the Spellbound. It was too bad he was in a fight for his life, because he really would have liked to learn more, but even Sullivan’s curiosity had its limits.

  “Before I kill you, Sullivan, I want you to know I wasn’t lying when I said you’ve been an inspiration to me. It takes a big man to do the impossible. Do you have any last words?”

  “Not for you.” Sullivan looked back down the hall as he put his hands over his ears. “Now would be a good time to help, Doc.”

  The enormous elephant gun was incredibly loud in the enclosed space. Skorzeny was hit, swept clean off his feet, and flung down the passage. The 80-caliber bullet was overkill for elephants, so it didn’t matter what kind of density altering magic Skorzeny had going on, he’d certainly felt that.

  Doctor Wells walked in, rifle as big as he was still shouldered. “That was for upsetting my passengers.”

  The thick cloud of black powder smoke cleared. Remarkably, the German hadn’t exploded on impact, but he was hurt. Skorzeny got up, shaking and grimacing. Whatever spell he had carved on his body was drawing so much energy that Sullivan could feel the Power being sucked in like a vortex. The huge lead bullet was lying on the floor, deformed and smashed flat against Skorzeny’s skin. Impressive.

  “Hold on,” Sullivan warned Wells as he grabbed hold of Nishimura’s belt.

  Skorzeny realized what was happening, but he was too injured and had burned too much Power to do anything about it. “We’ll meet again,” he gasped.

  “Bet on it.” Then Sullivan broke gravity, hard and fast, changing the pull so that down led directly out the open escape hatch. Skorzeny fell down the hall and out the side of the dirigible.

  Sullivan kept burning Power for a moment, holding on while Nishimura dangled in the air, just to make sure it wasn’t a trick. When he was sure the German had been tossed, he let go and gravity returned to normal. The Cog hit the floor hard, but considering he was Imperium, he was really lucky Sullivan had bothered to hold onto him at all.

  He limped to the escape hatch and looked outside. A white parachute had opened far below them and was drifting toward the ocean. Whatever organization this man belonged to, Sullivan had a feeling they were going to be trouble in the future.

  Wells joined him at the hatch, rubbing his shoulder. Apparently even a Massive could feel recoil. He watched the shrinking parachute but didn’t say anything.

  Then Wells reached into his coveralls, removed a five dollar bill, and handed it over.

  I have another Grimnoir trilogy planned which is set in the 1950s, a generation after Warbound. Murder on the Orient Elite sets up a few things and gives a couple of hints about events which will occur in the next trilogy, but the main reason I wrote this particular story is that I just enjoy writing Jake Sullivan and it was nice to revisit him a few years after his life has—relatively speaking—calmed down.

  FATHER’S DAY

  This story was originally published in the Shared Nightmares anthology in 2014, edited by Steve Diamond and Nathan Shumate. The theme of the anthology is the same as the title, so I got to thinking about the worst nightmares I’ve ever had. For most parents our biggest fears aren’t about harm coming to us, but rather to our family, and our inability to do anything about it. So I set out to write a gut punch for dads.

  “I WON’T LET YOU KILL my daughter.”

  The Program woman gave me a patronizing smile. She was used to dealing with parents like me by now. “Now, Mr. Brody, I can understand your concerns, but it isn’t like that at all. She will be perfectly safe. In fact, she’ll be well cared for in one of our finest medical establishments.”

  “Uh huh . . .” I pretended to study the paperwork she expected me to sign, and then I glanced around the tidy government office. There were posters on the walls about doing our civic duty to help defeat the Dreaker menace, warnings about sleeping only during the mandated times, and even cartoons for the kids about the importance of taking their mandated sleeping pills. The Program woman watched me with her cloying fake sympathy the whole time. A robotic security guard was standing directly behind my chair. That made sense. Some parents were bound to react violently when given the news that their child was being drafted to fight in the Dream War.

  She must have gotten tired of waiting for me to sign, so she tried again. “We instituted mandatory blood testing for specifically this reason. There are so few people who can do what she can. She has a wonderful but rare gift. Maximizing that gift will benefit the entire community. She’s a very lucky girl.”

  I didn’t like how this know-it-all bitch kept referring to my daughter. “She has a name.”

  “Of course!” But then the Program woman froze when she couldn’t immediately recall what it was. My child was just another asset to these people to use up and throw away. Trying to play it cool, she glanced down at her data pad. “Wendy . . . And Wendy will be very happy living in the Safe Zone.”

  “You’re going to make her into a vegetable.”

  “Somastasis is nothing like that.” She lied right to my face. No compunction, no hesitation, just the party line.

  “What is it then?”

  “When the invasion began, Dreamers were the only reason mankind survived at all. Less than one percent of the surviving human population has the genetic capability to fight off a Dreaker attack during REM sleep. On their own, a Dreamer can only protect a small area, and only for short periods of time. The Public Safety Program developed somastasis so that special individuals like your daughter could share their gift with the whole community.”

  “You didn’t answer my question. I know damn good and well what somastasis does. It’s a medically induced coma.”

  She frowned. “I don’t know about—”

  “It’s a medically induced coma, because sleeping all night isn’t enough for you. Oh no, once you figured out how the Dreamers worked, first you put them on drugs and mandated that they had to sleep ten, fifteen, even twenty hours a day. For the public good you said, but that still wasn’t enough for you parasites. You need them to fight twenty four seven, and you don’t give a shit about what it does to them.”

  From the look on her face, I was beginning to get on her nerves. “It’s a sacrifice for the good of mankind.”

  “The Dreamers already go to battle for the rest of us every single night. Every time that sweet little girl lays down her head, for her whole entire life, a thousand monsters have lined up to take a shot at her. Horrors you can’t even imagine, but she fights the Dreakers so we don’t have to. You don’t know what that’s like, doing that every single night, and you think that’s still not fucking good enough?”

  There was a vibration of an electric motor and one hard metal hand was placed on my shoulder.

  “Stand down, Ajax,” she told the robot
before it ground my bones into powder. “There’s no reason for profanity, Mr. Brody. If you become upset, I’ll have security escort you from the premises.”

  Of course I was upset. Only a soulless bureaucrat could expect a father to respect bullshit protocols more than their own child.

  “I understand your anxiety, I truly do, and I empathize with it.” She’d probably been told to say that to angry parents during some sensitivity training. “Perhaps I failed mention that the families of our volunteers are extremely well compensated. Your loved ones will be provided housing in the Safe Zone and given a generous living stipend.”

  Like a bribe could replace a kid. “Fuck your money,” I snarled. The robot squeezed my shoulder to remind me that it was illegal to be impolite to government employees. “You’re condemning Wendy to hell.”

  The Program woman tapped her fingers on her desk, probably flagging me as a subversive in their system. “This is a public safety issue, Mr. Brody. If you don’t sign those papers, we will be forced to take legal action.”

  I would have stood up and stormed out, but I was being held down by a robot.

  “It will take a week or two for the orders to be processed through Public Safety. I suggest you reconsider during that time.” The Program woman leaned forward conspiratorially, as if our entire conversation wasn’t being recorded. “Look, you seem like a loving father, Mr. Brody, so I’m going to level with you. This is a national crisis. Frankly, the Dreakers are winning. A third of the country is lost, and we’re doing better than the rest of the world. We need your daughter, and one way or the other, she’s going in the Program. The Dreamers are our only hope.”

  Wendy had just turned six.

  I had nightmares that night, but so did everyone else in the world.

  The Dreakers were masters at understanding whatever was troubling you, and then they’d dredge up every ugly bit in your subconscious and use those to chip little bits off your sanity. It was like having a loose tooth that you just kept poking at with your tongue, wiggling it until it popped out.