The Peacekeepers. Books 4 - 6.

by Ricky Sides

  Flavious recoiled at the man’s advance. Never before had he faced a man such as this warrior, and he had killed many men. More than he could count. Why would it matter to the warrior if he intentionally killed his enemy or if he accidentally brought about an enemy’s death? But what really disturbed Flavious was the supreme confidence that the man exuded. Though the warrior of light was aware that Flavious had the potential ability to kill him, and was a threat to his soul, his primary concern was that he not lose control, and accidentally kill his enemies. It could be that the man was a fool, or even insane, but Flavious didn’t believe that either of these conditions applied to the man.

  Clarissa complicated matters as she watched him recoil from the man’s advance. “I will fight him, Flavious,” she said fearlessly. Flavious knew that she did not sense the true power of the warrior of light.

  Turning to Clarissa, he smiled a cold smile. He’d use her to observe the warrior and learn what capabilities the man truly possessed. If he survived the battle with Clarissa, then he would kill the warrior himself.

  “Then kill the warrior of light, Clarissa,” Flavious ordered.

  ***

  Thanatos awoke ravenous. He found himself alone in the room where Clarissa had decided to turn him. Somehow, he had survived that attempt and he decided that his hunger would have to wait. Leaving the chamber, he found that Clarissa and Flavious, who were staring into the basement, blocked the way back into the house. They seemed to be concentrating on a man he could partially see from his vantage point. He turned and crept away down the tunnel toward the exit, which Clarissa had indicated would be concealed near the house.

  Soon Thanatos smelled food. Somewhere ahead were men whose hearts were rapidly pumping blood. Their blood would restore him. Of that, he felt certain. The hunger he’d felt was gnawing at him and causing his stomach to cramp. The scent of the men ahead made his mouth begin to salivate in anticipation. For a fleeting moment, he wondered if Clarissa had infected him with her insanity, but then another hunger pain caused him to double up in agony. When it passed, he straightened up his tortured body and moved ahead down the tunnel.

  Thanatos heard the prey he was stalking when they shouted and began to fire their weapons. He froze in place and looked around to see if there was a place to hide. He saw a small niche in the wall in the curve of the tunnel. Then it occurred to him that he had no light source, yet he could readily see in what must be pitch-blackness. He shrugged that off as just good night vision, brought about by years of avoiding sunlight in his role as a vampire cult leader. Thanatos backed into the niche to await his prey.

  Soon he saw a man step around the curvature of the tunnel. That man was too far away for him to grasp, and he felt too weak to summon the energy to leap after the man. He waited in the niche as the men passed by him one by one. “Do not shine your light here,” he thought intensely as he stared at the men passing, as if he could will their minds to obey him. For whatever reason, none of the men directed their light into his niche that was inset in the wall around which they were walking.

  He waited until the last man had passed him by before stepping silently from his niche. There was a twenty-foot gap between the next to the last and last man in the unit. If he timed it right, then he could take the man when the rest of the unit walked around the next curve and were out of sight of his prey. He’d take the last man and feed. Then he would have the strength he needed to flee this place before Clarissa and Flavious discovered him.

  Moving smoothly without a hint of a sound he stalked the man and his hunger grew to a yearning the likes of which he’d previously experienced only during anticipation of sex.

  Moving rapidly Thanatos soon reached the last man and grabbed him from behind. He cupped his palm over the man’s mouth, and dragged him back through the tunnel. The man was trying to bring his rifle to bear on him, so Thanatos struck him hard on the back of the head. The man’s body sagged in his arms and he lowered him to the ground. Thanatos saw the throbbing of blood pulsing in the man’s neck to the rhythm of his heartbeat.

  Always before when he had taken a victim Thanatos had needed to use a small blade to open their necks. But this time he didn’t even pause to consider such a tool. He leaned down, bit the peacekeeper’s neck, and felt the blood splash into his throat, hot and delicious. Never before had blood tasted so good.

  Further up the tunnel, the peacekeeper that was now in the rear called a halt to their progress shouting, “Lieutenant, Bobby is missing! He was behind me a moment ago but he is gone now,” the peacekeeper reported.

  The lieutenant backtracked and took the lead as they went back along the tunnel that they had just traversed. Soon their lights fell on Thanatos who was bent over the peacekeeper feeding at his neck.

  “Get away from him you freak!” shouted the lieutenant.

  Thanatos raised his head and glared into the light hissing. The peacekeepers saw the blood in his mouth and a thin trickle of the blood dribbled from his mouth onto his pale chin. Three gunshots hit the man in his chest and Thanatos fell backward away from the body of the peacekeeper.

  The medic rushed to the fallen peacekeeper’s side and started to work on the man. He checked the man’s pulse and said, “The fanatic couldn’t have taken much blood. His heartbeat is still strong, but the blood isn’t even trying to clot. It’s as if he has been exposed to an anticoagulant, like vampire bats use when they bite. I’ll put a pressure bandage on it but someone needs to walk him out of here. He’ll be weak and in no shape to fight.”

  The peacekeeper came around then and tried to get up. “I heard that, Doc, and you can forget me evacuating. I’ll not weaken the unit further by taking a good man away from the team to nursemaid me. Just help me get back on my feet.”

  “Now Bobby…,” the lieutenant began.

  “Watch out, sir!” Bobby shouted and turned his rifle toward the lieutenant. The lieutenant dropped out of the line of fire and Bobby squeezed off two rounds. Both shots hit Thanatos in the head. Incredibly, the man had gotten up and had been about to attack the lieutenant.”

  One of the Alabama’s strike force members pulled a machete and walked back to the body. “Drugged up freaks,” he said to himself and beheaded the man. “Now get up, you freak,” he said and he kicked the body.

  “You were saying, sir?” Bobby asked smiling.

  Grinning himself, the lieutenant said, “Bobby stays with us. I think he has just proven beyond reasonable doubt that he is able to defend himself, or one of us should the need arise.”

  “Thank you, sir,” Bobby said smiling triumphantly.

  “Alright, Bobby, but stand still for a minute so I can bandage the wound. The bleeding is slowing now,” the medic said.

  “Anything you say, Doc. Just get me patched up. I’m in this for the duration, just like the rest of you guys,” the peacekeeper stated emphatically. Moments later the medic had the wound bandaged and together the unit moved out.

  Chapter 23

  Pete was getting angry. The men had banged on the door for a full minute with little in the way of results. He contacted Pol and said, “Pol, I need you to sacrifice a drone for the good of the Captain.” He then explained about the door.

  A moment later, they heard a crash as Pol’s drone slammed through a double paned large bay window. Pol slowly navigated through the house toward the basement door. “Gentlemen, please move to a safe location. This could get nasty,” Pol’s voice explained. He was using the drone’s public address system to communicate with the men in the house. The drone hovered fifty feet from the door as the peacekeepers hurried to get away from the danger zone. Pol was grateful that the basement door was in line with the hallway. Otherwise, there would have been no way to use the drone as a battering ram. “Commencing the run, stay clear everyone,” the scientist warned.

  Pol opened up the throttle on the drone, which accelerated to forty miles per hour and slammed into the door. The door buckled, but did not cave to the impact. “Guys, I’ll
hold the drone in a hover. I can’t turn it around in here. I need you to get it back to the open area. Just push it please,” Pol requested and men eagerly leapt to comply. Soon they had it back into the open area.

  Pol flew the small drone to the furthest point that he could reach from the door. “Stand clear!” he shouted and threw the drone into full acceleration. This time the drone impacted the door at seventy miles per hour. Both the door and the drone disappeared inside the basement.

  Pete motioned for the lieutenant to proceed, and ropes were flung through the hole. Peacekeepers anchored the ropes with their bodies. Lieutenant Wilcox was the first man down on the floor of the basement. Pete was the second. They stood guard as the next two men came down and then Pete and the lieutenant moved out into the basement.

  Pol contacted Pete and said that the drone had lost maneuverability but was hovering in the basement. A moment later he managed to spin the drone on its axis and he said, “The captain is fighting a woman,” and then he said, “My God, I can barely follow their moves!”

  ***

  Inside the Peacekeeper Patricia began to record Pol’s feed. Tim put the ship in sleep mode so that it wouldn’t drift and then he ran over to watch the fight. “My God. Big brother’s going Wyatt Earp again!” he exclaimed and then he said, “Would you look at that! I can barely follow the action!”

  “That’s what I said!” Pol agreed. “We’ll have to watch this in slow motion once he wins.” Then Pol said, “He is fighting with sais? I didn’t know the Captain even knew how to use them.”

  “He’s had them for years, but doesn’t like to talk about them. He finds them disturbing,” Tim explained.

  “May I ask why?” Pol queried.

  “I don’t really understand it well myself, Pol, but he once told me that he was too dangerous with the sais to use them extensively,” Tim explained.

  “I can easily believe that statement,” Pol said.

  “Seeing this demonstration, so can I,” Tim said. “Almost every move he makes stabs some portion of his opponent’s body with one of the three points.” Shaking his head Tim said, “I had no idea that my brother could fight like this. It’s almost as if he senses every move that the opponent is going to make and is two moves ahead of her.”

  “Yet if you watch closely all of the captain’s moves are really a reaction to what she is doing,” Pol observed.

  “Why isn’t she bleeding?” Patricia asked.

  “She is dear,” Tim said.

  “Minutely yes, but some of those wounds should have her bleeding profusely,” Patricia stated.

  Tim watched the fight for a moment, and then he said, “You’re right.”

  ***

  Jim heard the sound of the drone ramming the door the first time as Clarissa approached him hissing. He focused his mind, concentrating on her and keeping an eye on Flavious. He stood with his arms handing loosely at his sides. His sais gripped in his favored underhand grip.

  Clarissa launched herself through the air in a flying leap she expected would tackle her opponent but Jim stepped aside and flicked his left wrist in a downward whipping motion. The left sai reversed in his grip and slammed hard into the top of Clarissa’s left forearm. It was a classic attack the attacking limb technique, which was favored by his fighting style. Her momentum carried her past him and Clarissa swirled around to face him with such speed that her skirt billowed around her legs like a parody of a parachute as she settled down to the ground.

  Jim darted toward her and attacked with a right hand thrust utilizing the blunted head of the sai. The strike was intended to hit the woman in the forehead, but Clarissa slapped his forearm hard knocking the strike aside. Jim followed the motion that she had initiated with her slap block and rotated his body with that momentum. Bringing his foot up, he slammed it into her midsection.

  Clarissa folded up but tried her best to grab his attacking leg. Jim had already snatched that leg back in and when Clarissa tried to grab it, his left sai flicked out again. This time the strike had more force behind it as the sai had traveled further, and had more time to build up speed and power. The strike landed hard on the back of her hand and should have shattered most of the bones.

  Enraged, Clarissa hissed and flung her body toward Jim with both hands outstretched. Jim darted to the side again. This time it was to the left and his right sai reversed in his grip without conscious thought as his body reacted to opportunity. He slammed that sai into the top of her right index finger near the tip so hard that he shattered the fingernail that housed the deadly razor.

  Screeching, Clarissa thrust her left fingers toward Jim’s face. Both Jim’s sais sprang up and caught her attacking limb. Jim slammed the sais in toward her arm and speared it with one of the quillions of each sai. Now Clarissa was furious. She lashed out with her foot in an attempt to kick Jim in the groin but he snapped his knee up and blocked her shin with the sole of his boot. Pushing down hard he slid the boot roughly down the woman’s shin onto the top of her foot. He pinned her foot there for a moment as he pulled his right sai free of her arm. He slammed the pointed tip into the top of her thigh. Before she could move, he also freed his left sai and leaned forward a bit. That sai flicked through the air and shattered the index fingernail of her left hand. He had deprived her of her favored weapons.

  Jim heard Flavious shift his position but the man did not yet attack. Jim was no fool. He knew that Flavious was sacrificing Clarissa in order to learn what he could about Jim’s fighting ability. He knew it was only a matter of time until the man joined in and attacked him.

  Clarissa drew her body away from Jim. There was a sickening, sucking sound as the blade drew out of Clarissa’s thigh, but she seemed to feel no pain. Jim then stepped it up a notch carrying the fight to a new level.

  He launched his first attack set at Clarissa at that point. He was seeking to drive her away from Flavious, who had as yet remained in the darkened confines of the tunnel. Clarissa retreated as he advanced toward her face with his sais spinning in a flurry of strikes that were flashing in toward her face and back out from left to right to left. Repeatedly that series of attacks came within millimeters of her face as she dashed back four steps. This placed Jim’s back to Flavious, and he couldn’t permit that. Jim darted to her right and flicked his left sai at her side in passing. The sharpened blade penetrated four inches into her lower side but was pulled out of her body by the force of his momentum.

  Behind him, Jim heard Pete shout, “Don’t shoot. You may hit Jim.” Pete and the other peacekeepers present could not see Flavious standing in the darkened tunnel around the corner from their position, so they were unaware that another antagonist was near.

  Clarissa jumped at Jim again, flailing with her sharpened nails in an attempt to claw his eyes out and blind him. Time after time, Jim batted her arms away with the sais with so much force that her arms should have been broken several times over. Many times, he speared her arms as he blocked her strikes. Yet Clarissa persisted in her attack, as though he had inflicted absolutely no damage. With a speed he didn’t know he possessed Jim struggled to match her blindingly fast series of attacks. He was blocking with the blade of the sais held in the underhand grip and tucked tightly against the underside of his forearms. Clarissa meant to kill him now. Nothing else mattered to her.

  Clarissa drew a dagger from a sheath concealed on one of her thighs. She stepped up her attack darting from side to side in a blur of motion, always seeking to get past his guard. From each new position, she would launch one or two probing attacks and then dart to another location, knowing that eventually she would wear him down to the point that he’d be just a fraction of a second late with a block. In that moment, this warrior would be hers to take.

  Jim wondered how much longer he could maintain the dazzling set of parries and counterattacks. A portion of his mind was aware that he was now fighting on a level that he had never before achieved. He didn’t pause to wonder why, or how. The biggest concern in his awareness w
as just blocking the next set of attacks. Soon even that thought receded from his awareness as he truly lost himself in the heat of battle. He was aware of Flavious’s precise position, and he was aware that Clarissa would dart to the left after her next strike. His body was already preparing to counter that move although his body didn’t bother to inform his mind that it was doing so. In short, Jim’s body was now reacting faster than the mind could interpret everything that was happening. This was the essence of his fighting style. This was what student spent a lifetime hoping to accomplish.

  When the opportunity presented itself, Jim wasn’t even intellectually aware that he was about to launch a lethal attack. He flicked out his right sai, speared her in the lower abdomen, and quickly withdrew the sai from her body. For the first time, Flavious roared a challenge. Clarissa doubled over in pain and Jim slammed both sai blades into her back. Jerking both hands to the left and right he enlarged the holes and increased the damage that the wounds caused her body. He drew the sais out of the woman’s body and she collapsed to the ground where she lay still.

  Flavious roared a horse challenge again. It was not an articulated word. A guttural sound of primal fury issued from his throat. Before anyone could shoot him, the man raced out of the tunnel at an incredible rate of speed.

  His body slammed into Jim and knocked him back away from Clarissa. They staggered through the open doorway and past the concrete divider wall that separated the two main sections of the basement. That wall served as structural support for the floor above. This somewhat isolated the combatants from the rest of the peacekeepers though they could still see the fighting through the wide doorway.

  Flavious pummeled Jim’s chest with a series of ten fist strikes in rapid succession. Jim recognized the attack as one that was supposed to disrupt his heartbeat and respiration. It was an advanced technique. It would have succeeded too, if not for the hard armor that Jim was wearing.