by J. F. Holmes
“Hey, where are you going?” I yelled after them.
The Rabbi yelled back, “We are going to save that stupid Serbian racist asshole’s bacon! So I can talk shit to him!” He gave me a thumbs up and they melted into the darkness.
Idling in front of me was a semi-truck with hazardous material containers hooked to it. O'Neill stood there talking with the driver along with my cousin from the Fire Department. “Ok, I bought us some time, but we gotta make this quick.”
“He doesn’t mess around, does he?” asked O'Neill, with a grin.
“Nope!” John grinned, “I’ve got the gear you wanted, but I gotta warn you, you screw up and you’re going to hate life. For a few minutes, anyway.”
“Sometimes, you gotta roll a hard six,” I said.
He grinned, and said, “What do you hear, cousin?”
“Nothing but the rain!” and I shook his hand. “Take care of yourself, and of the family.”
“I will. See you at the reunion!” and he faded into the darkness, barking orders. I never saw him again either.
“What was that shit ‘hard six’?” said O'Neill.
“Nerd stuff, you wouldn’t understand.” I turned to the driver and asked, “Can you fit this thing into a tight space? And no jokes.”
She smiled and said, “Tighter than a Catholic girls’ knees.”
“Ugh. Just get it as close to the bridge approaches as you can.” I liked her.
“Can do, super trooper!” and she hopped back in the truck, rumbling away to delicately maneuver the monster into position. That left me alone with O'Neill.
“So I was talking to your Staff Sergeant Hollis, she’s quite a piece. Is she, ah, single? Into the ladies? Cause maybe the three of us, after all this is over...” she asked, her voice all sweet and innocent.
“Uh, ah, I don’t ....” I stammered, unsure of what to say.
The Special Unit officer burst out laughing, a full throated peal of laughter that sounded really pleasant after the chaos of the night. “HA HA, SUCKER!” she said, then leaned forward and planted one right on my astonished mouth. “Some motivation. Look me up sometime if you make it. If you’re dead, don’t!” and then she, too, vanished into the darkness.
“Well, that was interesting!” said Hollis’ voice from behind me, and I jumped.
“Jesus Christ, don’t do that shit to me!” I barked.
In a mocking tone, she said, “You should look her up … Major, Sir.”
Women. Swear to God, I did not need this right now. “Are all the Hasidim away?”
She nodded, all back to business. “We took a few casualties, inexperienced kids mostly. Are we ready for Plan D?”
“Almost. I want to recon, and I’m hoping Clark can join us, but he might have had his hands full with the trolls. We’ll do what we can; as always, watch my back.” I glanced up at the sky; false dawn was approaching.
“Gotcha, boss.”
Out front a half a dozen soldiers were waiting for us, armed to the teeth, led by a corporal. “Listen up!” I said, “we’re going to go as far as the first barricade. There might be UXO laying around, be careful. Don’t assume that any of the bodies are really dead, these suckers are tough. What I want you guys to do is find the leadership and strip them of anything that looks important. Papers, rings, weapons, necklaces, wands, whatever, but BE CAREFUL.”
“Do we take prisoners, sir?” asked the NCO.
“I wish we could, but there’s no time. I’m expecting the next big push before dawn. Staff Sergeant Hollis will be in charge,” I said, turning to her, “I want you to get all that stuff into a Humvee and get the hell out of here.”
She started to open her mouth, then shut it and nodded. “I’ll see you at the safe house, Major.”
“God willing,” I answered, and we started out into the kill zone. The air stank of blood and gunfire and spoiling meat.
I left them to their task and there was the occasional gunshot. Myself, I ignored several moving wounded and made my way through the rapidly dispersing fog, watching for the dragons, until I found who I was looking for. The female Elf sat, drenched in blood, air rasping in and out of her lungs, up against the corpse of the giant bear. There was a piece of her breastplate ripped away, a puddle of blood on the ground around her and she had the dazed look of the dying. Tears ran down her face as she slowly petted the pelt of the dead animal. I kicked her staff away but she ignored me, intent on the bear. The Elf was done, and she knew it; none of this mattered now.
I crouched down in front of her. The face was still beautiful; even the red of the blood from a scalp wound that trickled down the side of her pale face only emphasized the sharp cheekbones, pale skin and grey eyes. I almost jumped when she spoke.
“I raised him from a cub, you know. We were bonded in the Year of the Bear, when I was twelve seasons of winter. Such times we had in the woods, chasing cirstes with our brothers. To die here, where the air is so foul from machines …” she trailed off, then tears started from her eyes, and a sob. “I …just wanted to see your …” and she coughed up some blood. I thought she was done, but then she gasped, “to see … redwoods… and dolphins … and flowers.” Then she faded. I reached over and felt for a pulse; nothing.
“What a goddamned waste,” I said to no one in particular and closed those beautiful eyes. “What a goddamned waste.”
“SIR!” called the corporal. “They’re moving in again!”
I sighed and stood up.
Chapter 25
I picked up the staff and pulled out a white rag that I found and tied it to the top. Then I rolled the staff in her blood, turning everything except the end I held crimson. The bridge roadway lay in front of me, and as I started walking forward the sun touched the flags on top of the eastern tower. A gentle breeze came up the bay and lifted them, the red, white and blue contrasting with the green and gold. It was a beautiful summer day, despite the smoke from fires burning on both sides of the water. I thought back to 9-11, fourteen years before. I was home on leave from Officer Basic Course at Fort Benning, and I honestly never thought I’d see a day like that again. This ... this was ten times worse. A hundred times, a thousand.
To my right, part of the Williamsburg Bridge was down, a hundred meter section of the roadway hanging in the middle by one set of cables, completely vertical. There was no sign of life from Bravo Company’s position, just two burning Humvees. Several buildings were also on fire, and it was going to spread. A quick survey with my binoculars showed a line of enemy foot soldiers, tiny ants in the distance, marching slowly into Queens over the Manhattan Bridge, overwatched by a dragon. There was still gunfire to the east, and from the north artillery rumbled and tank fire echoed.
To the south the bow of the sunken Navy ship still poked from the water, blobs of oil staining the waters of the harbor and smoke rising from it. Hovering over the Statue of Liberty was a huge dragon, and as I watched it erupted in fire, a long stream that caressed the torch and melted the bronze. I made a mental note as my anger settled into cool determination; I would find that rider and make him pay.
The City, as any native New Yorker referred to Manhattan proper, was a skeleton. It seemed as if every single window from Battery Park all the way up the FDR drive had been shattered. Their empty sockets gazed out into the rising sun, and then I saw them. People, dozens, no, hundreds, looking out of their empty windows, watching to see what the new day would bring. They had been cut off, unable to evacuate in time. A tough, stubborn people who didn’t know when to quit. Then my eye was drawn southward to movement.
The Staten Island Ferry terminal was packed with a swirling mass of desperate people, thousands, pressing inward to the Whitehall Terminal building. Several ferries were there, trying to depart before light hit them, and through the binos I saw … they were full, lower in the water than I had ever seen them, hundreds of people on the upper deck, many more packed below. And they were small figures. Children. Thousands of them, with some women. Even as I wa
tched, the crowd fell silent as the ramps were lowered and the first ferry cast off. It churned out of the slip and another moved in to take its place. There were eight of the big orange boats in service, and three were stacked up waiting to dock, with two still loading. I’ll give the crowd credit; they waited until the boat with the children departed, and then rushed the remaining ferries. Maybe it was the dragon burning the Statue of Liberty, I don’t know, but they charged the dock and swarmed the boat, only to be met with a hail of gunfire.
I turned away from the catastrophe and continued my walk up the pedestrian path, past the bodies of the orcs at the barricades. Like all the dead, they seemed pathetic in their armor, lying forever still, past all glory and hope. Who knows, maybe they were in Valhalla, engaged in the endless fight and feasting. If so, I wished them well. Continuing onward, I found one of the dragons, lying on the road, chest heaving, skin cracked and seeming to have exploded outwards. It wasn’t long for this world either, and I passed it by, holding up the staff with the white cloth on it. Moving under the east tower, I eventually stopped in the mid-point of the bridge and waited.
They came forward as the sun touched the wooden planks beneath my feet. Thousands of orcs, Elves, trolls, dragons, giant bears, a couple of huge snakes, a lot of other things I couldn’t name that scared the bejeesus out of me. They came to the west bridge tower and stopped, and one Elf stepped forward. He held a staff similar to the one I had in my hand, but at the tip glowed a ball of pure white. I had to assume it was his signal to parley. Either that or he was going to cast some shit at me that would disintegrate me where I stood. It was the same one who had come forward the evening before, the one whose dragon I had killed, the one who had demanded our surrender, Lord Tavan. I said nothing as he approached. Let him start the dance.
The Elf stopped about ten feet away, looking me up and down. Then he said, “Are you in charge now, Major? We destroyed the camp of your commander. You seem a capable aide, perhaps his death allowed you to step forward.”
“Not really. That’s not how it works here.” Well, it was how it worked, but I wasn’t going to tell him that. “I’m merely the local pain in the ass who has stopped you cold three times, big guy.”
He said nothing, just glared at me. Beside him Grimalt, who had followed his master, hissed something that the ring didn’t translate, but I guessed what he had said. Tavan’s eyes went to the staff on my hand, which had once been white.
“Yeah, that’s her blood. What was she, your daughter or something? Princess Tavana or something? I can see the family resemblance. She fought well, but she died lying in the street with a bullet through her chest. Before she died she talked about seeing trees and dolphins. Hardly a warrior. Probably here trying to please her father. That’s what war is, a waste of sons and daughters. Her blood is your hands. Have fun telling her mother.”
My words seemed to strike him like a physical blow. Well, I guess the Russians loved their children too. I almost felt sorry for him, for a microsecond, but it was his damn fault.
“Her name … was Ellarissa, and her mother died from a plague of your people.” Then he turned and raised his gauntleted hand. It started to glow with a humming white and black crackle of lightning and he aimed it at the ferry making its way across the harbor. “So war is a waste of sons and daughters? I was going to let them go, since we’ll need slaves, but what are thousands among millions?”
I’d like to say that I did something heroic and brave at that moment that saved those kids, I really would. The nightmare of it wakes me screaming sometimes, but I didn’t move a muscle. I was there under truce, and I needed to survive in order to execute my plan. So I stood there while he grinned at me and then opened his fist. The beam of light lanced across the open water, pencil thin, and cut its way through the hull until it hit the fuel tanks. Even diesel, if heated hot enough and subjected to enough pressure, will explode and the ship broke in half, lifting out of the water, small bodies flying. I told myself that death was, as always, better than slavery. I tell myself that a lot.
“I shot her through the head, you know,” I lied to him. “She cried and begged for her life, and I pulled the trigger. Do you know what a semi-jacketed round does when it punches through a skull? Makes the eyes explode outward, and the brain gets splashed through the huge hole in the back of the head. She ain’t pretty no more,” and I looked back at the eastern end of the bridge, “and the crows are probably feeding on her. No funeral pyre for her.”
His eyes actually glowed and he started to raise his hand again, this time towards me, but that little shitbag, Grimalt, did my work for me. “MY LORD!” he exclaimed, “you cannot violate a flag of parley. The others are watching and will throw you out of the council!”
“Yeah, Tavan, don’t want the other nobles thinking you’ll break a flag of truce, do you? Never trust you again.” It was a guess, but that shot hit home, and he lowered his fist.
Tavan stood straighter, shrugging Grimalt off, and said, “Go back to your defenses and prepare to die. Once we overrun you, we will turn our attention to your people and the slaughter will be sung about for ages.”
“Yeah yeah,” I said, “but first I’ve got a question for you. Why? Why did you invade our world?”
“Your world, human?” he laughed bitterly. “This was OUR world, long ago. We have tried before to return from exile, but this time, this time … you no longer have the powers you once did, and this ‘technology’ is no match for the practitioners of the Way.” He sneered when he said it, but ol’ Lord Shitbag had just handed me a ton of information.
I sneered back and said, “I give you one chance to head back the way you came. After that, no promises of mercy. Got it?”
“We understand each other, David of Clan Kincaid.” I guess Grimalt had told him my name. “I will feed your corpse to my dragon.”
“You mean dragon number three. Those must be expensive to raise and train, and yet, I keep killing them.” Then I took the staff his kin had carried and broke it over my knee, tossing the pieces at his feet.
“To the death, then,” he said coldly. “Were we not in a truce, I would fight you myself, face to face, sword to sword, the old way, to the death.”
“No, to the pain!” I said, but of course he didn’t get the reference. “You’re a coward, hiding behind a white rag. Let’s go, big guy,” and I drew the elvish poniard that I carried in my belt.
His hand reached for the hilt of the fighting saber that hung at his waist but his toady grabbed his arm, whining, “No. Lord, I beg you! He is goading you into breaking the truce! Let him go and then we will march over him and grind him into the dirt!”
“Your kiss-ass is smarter than you, Tavan. Maybe he should rule,” I said, sliding the knife back in my belt. I turned my back to him and walked steadily away.
Chapter 26
From the war journals of Lord Thar Tavan, Head of House Tavor, Commander of the Third Legion.
Ellarissa is dead.
The Elf Lord sat stonily on a bench on the Brooklyn Bridge walkway. No one dared to approach him; even the Yrch marching forward to the attack created a circle as they moved, they would not risk his wrath. After a while, he kneeled and bowed his head. Then he looked up, his eyes blazing with hell. It was a dangerous well he drew on, gaining strength from deals made with beings that stalked the Ways and every use cut off a piece of his soul.
“Bring me a human, a young female,” he commanded, and his guard hurried to obey. They returned with a Hispanic girl and Tavan spat. “No,” he said, “a Celt. That one,” and pointed to a pale faced red headed teenager. The elvish knights grabbed her and pushed her forward, then forced her down on her knees.
Tavan stood and drew a long cruel looking knife from his belt. “Balor,” he chanted, saying the name three times, “I offer you blood for power. Grant me the power of the ways to defeat my enemies and avenge my daughter. Come to us and make war on our behalf. I give you blood for blood.” After a moment a cloud began to
gather, a vague hint of a gigantic humanoid form. Tavan dared not look at it, he knows that the demon was exerting immense will to even appear as this shape, and he could not interfere until the bool rite was done. Calling the Old Ones was dangerous and like to kill the caller as not.
He stepped forward and grabbed the girl by the hair, forcing her neck back. She glared up at him and said, “FUCK YOU!”, then spit in his face.
*****
High atop the burning building Sasha Zivcovic watched the scene with fascination through the scope of his rifle. The primal Slav in him knew what he was about to see, a sacrifice to the old gods, the ones his grandmother had scared him with on the long winter nights. His mind toyed letting it happen, seeing the girl die and watching her soul get eaten by the demon, seeing it taking shape from the mist.
He also thought of Kincaid, a man who he respected. The American would want him to shoot the Elf Lord, but the Serb figured that it would be useless. And to be honest, he did want to see the god or demon or whatever it was. Then he saw the girl shout, reading her lips through the scope. She was beautiful, a teenager who would someday be spectacular. No, she didn’t deserve such a fate. He dialed the scope’s power up and looked at the wind.
*****
Tavan raised the knife and his aide knelt with the cup to collect her blood. He swung his arm for the stroke, hate pouring out of him as he aimed at the pale neck. The girl’s head snapped sideways, exploding in a welter of brains and blood and she crumpled to the ground like a rag doll. Behind him there was a roar and the mist vanished.
The Elf Lord turned to look across the water, stared at the smoke and fire then looked down at the girl. What were these people, that they killed their own? He shook his head, turned and started walking up the bridge. So be it, he would do this himself.
Chapter 27
First Brooklyn Volunteers