by Isaac Nasri
Into the Violet Gardens
Isaac Nasri
Copyright © 2021 by Isaac Nasri
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters and events mentioned are fictitious. Any semblance to a real person, living or deceased, event, or organization is coincidental and unwittingly to the author’s intention.
Published in the United States
Table of
Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Perhaps it is only human nature to inflict suffering on anything that will endure suffering, whether by reason of its genuine humility, or indifference, or sheer helplessness.
―Honoré de Balzac
Prologue
Jaguars of Apollo, December 2023. Mexico.
“Nothing’s happening as of now Ottoman,” Quincy comments to his CEO on his neural interface (NI). His nerves buzz, carrying his thoughts through like a fountain of water channeling in a tunnel.
The cyborg catches a small ball bounce in his direction. He catches it casually in time, handing the ball over to the hands of a smiling boy, who races back to his mother’s direction in a gambol. She gestures to her child in admonition.
The La Bautista motions, and the sunlight slowly descends. Stars gradually begin to illuminate outside the train’s window. The air of sweet benzene lingers inside the car, tickling Quincy Gunn’s nose. Nevertheless, silence lingers, minus his fellow Virtual operatives trudging slowly, armed, and lips tight as solid rock. The logo of a golden leaping jaguar glimmers on each of their breastplates. The same pattern flows uniformly from one of the cars behind. Just another shift and struggle for the PMCs.
“Ahora no es hora para jugar, Carlos,” the woman rebuffs.
“Arrival is expected to be in ETA, 3 hours from now to Texas,” Ottoman reports inside his neural interface. “And remember, kid, passengers. They are your company. Entertain. Farewell.”
I wish it were simpler than that.
The cyborg straightens his sunglasses, observing through his violet lens the number of asylum passengers huddling in their seats. Small golden spikes enamor on his gray prosthetic arms and legs. His moustache was ginger as an Irish terrier’s fur and his fair skin covered whatever human there was left in him.
With the state of Mexico deteriorating, the Jaguars of Apollo witnessed the number of residents fleeing in droves to escape the Mendoza Cartel’s wrath. Worse case is this country wasn’t his only one. It shocked Quincy how one Guatemalan neighbor could stir so much influence untrammeled, greeted with welcome arms by federal police and politicians. They sell their own civilians to keep the Fox drugs flowing. For that, Ottoman, in all his shrewdness, took a bold effort to confront this, and God knew how vast the enemies surrounded his PMC daily in this war. Here stood Quincy and his agents who were taking part in the most foolhardy of all missions.
Quincy faces the row of passengers in front, feeling his cheeks swell. One of the passengers looks away quickly as if unable to grasp the position he’s situated himself in. Ash stains over their cheeks. An aging woman behind him sings magnanimously in her native tongue, placating the discomfort gripping the train’s atmosphere, and a dog barks.
“Got any jokes to crack, Quinn,” he hears his fellow agent remark. The Virtual breaks into a yawn. “Can’t believe I’m feeling sleepy so suddenly.”
“Can’t guarantee,” Quincy replies.
For an agent with a wild imagination, Quincy’s fellow contractors had a boost with the anecdotes he had to share at the end of the day. But tonight didn’t seem like the case. Judging from everyone on the train, the likelihood of that suggestion will be unexpected.
Hax looms, gazing at dawn creeping over the desert from view. Its jaguar-like frame was darkish silver, tantamount to all Prowler prototypes. Its steely tail motions eerily. The dying light reflects against the Prowler’s marble eyes.
“So much…pain,” Hax says deeply. Its voice radiates like a blossom swirling to the breeze, echoing into the Virtual’s neural interface.
“I can feel it.”
Quincy looks over his shoulder, sighing.
“Government left them stranded,” the operative responds. His lips barely move. “We’re all they got left.”
Silence follows once more. Quincy opens his mouth, letting the taste of the train’s air reach inside, moistening his tongue. Soon that changes as he blinks quickly to a barking voice in his neural interface.
“Report to all JOA on the train!” the cyborg alarms in the Virtual Network.
The Virtuals around Quincy stare up as if a strange essence flew over them. Once the Virtual looks over to the car behind him, his expression darkens.
“We’re getting a grave situation,” a private military contractor (PMC) reports in front of the passengers. Her gaze locks to the window. “I repeat…a situation incoming! Stay on guard.”
I don’t understand.
It doesn’t take long for the passengers to pick up on the contractors’ grim expressions and raise their voices steadily to each other. A passenger, removing his straw hat, takes a stand and faces the agents. Meanwhile, the dog barks rapidly.
“Agents!” he cries in his Spanish dialect. “¿Qué pasa? Debe haber algo que no nos están diciendo”
The dog’s barking causes everyone to look over to the car from behind. Gunfire from outside blasts horizontally like incoming traffic, and Quincy’s eyes shake to a grim vibration.
No! NO!! They knew!!
“Get down!” Quincy cries as he and several agents dive from the shattering of the window glass.
Pieces of the hatted passenger's skull scattered on the floor, the bullets having passed through his mouth to destroy the back of his head. Drones swarm inside like locusts, and the cyborg rushes for his pistol. Passengers scream and duck frantically as agents return fire. The screams sizzle into Quincy’s ears and his prosthetic fingers tremor as he crosses them on the trigger.
He fires, and a drone skids in smoke. He dashes from one of the agents' collapse. Blood bubbles from the corpse’s retina. As more bodies fall, Quincy fires a second round, and his heartbeat accelerates.
The Cartel’s quad drones multiply from outside, inundating the train's space and a shadow creeps over him. He reaches for the cadaver’s gear belt hastily, unbuckling it and seizing one of the grenades. Holding his breath, Quincy reaches for the spoon until a wave ignites. A number of quad drones descend, unraveling on the floor.
Quincy heaves to see Hax lower its sparkling tail. The Prowler leaps over to his side. Regardless, the buzzing and commotion from out linger.
“Injured?” he asks dully.
“No.”
Removing his shades, Quincy reaches a hold of Ottoman within his neural interface.
“Yes?”
“The Cartel.” Quincy’s throat twists through multiple breaths, surrounded by the
bodies of victims and the flow of blood leaking on the ground. Passengers attempt to scurry their way out of the window. “We…we just got ambushed. It’s not going well! We may need evac. Immediately, sir.”
“Impossible. I got no—”
Suddenly an alternative thought crosses him, leaving him pausing, and it only takes three seconds for the connection to cease. The surviving drones can be seen invading the car upfront, raining bullets and two passengers hit the wall. Their backs slide downward, leaving a trail of blood that sullies the glass. Gunfire enters its way into a victim’s navel, forming a crater that leaves him clutching his stomach, and vomit releases out of his mouth like a putrid fountain. On the other hand, a woman, kneeled, cries echo inside this car’s space, dismayed by the sight of her dog’s headless corpse.
The car quakes to a violent blow, and Quincy’s head vibrates. He skids to the impact. Several explosive blows ricochet to the train’s exterior, destroying all motion in the train. Quincy’s heart leaps to the lights dimming inside, finally trapping everyone and him into darkness, let alone the smoke obscuring the car. Vehicle breaks reverberate outside the car. Quincy’s mind swirls.
RPGs. Now they’ve done it.
The moment Quincy ignites his retina, a band of glowing intruders barrage each of the entrances.
The Virtual throws the grenade only to be rammed down. The explosives from inside the belt slip from his grasp, spilling. Pain boils in his stomach. The Enforcer raises his hand, but Hax intervenes, leaping and lashing at the enemy’s face. The human throws the Prowler off his shoulder, and Quincy motions for the high energy rifle. Squeezing the trigger, the plasma engulfs the enforcer in a shroud of blue fire, rotting his vest.
However, the enforcer regains his stance, looking upon his prey sharply. Tangerine blood oozes from his bare arms, dripping to the floor. Bones crack inside his muscles. Sweat drips from Quincy’s head.
The Fox drug from within.
Clenching his teeth, Quincy fires again, but the enforcer dodges it with ruthless speed. A hand clasps the Virtual’s mouth in a heartbeat, rushing him back. Once his body hits upon impact his consciousness fades.
***
Quincy’s body hits a cold, rocky surface. He opens his eyes halfway to a burn throbbing in his throat, only for him to spit the dirt out his mouth. The agent motions his arms, but they stiffen. Quincy’s temperature drops.
Trembling flat on the dirt, cuffed at the wrists, the cyborg shakes his head to an army of enforcers roaming the desert, signaling to each other. Trucks surround the area.
His sight blurring slightly, he eyes a gruff figure, close to six feet, and in a brown war vest, stalking behind the bodies of multiple agents. Meanwhile, a surviving comrade in front of him kneels but barely raises her head. Soon that changes when he jolts to a crackling slash. Blood splashes on Quincy’s cheeks.
A man strikingly familiar all too well to him stands in the blood of the last executed Virtual. A grim shaped scar shapes over his eye, closing into the top of his upper lip. Blood drips cleanly from the edge of the captor’s tomahawk. Quincy’s expression turns sour. It doesn’t take long for Paolo to spot the agent’s tension when he raises an eyebrow.
“Ah, you’re wide awake,” he says, soon as the captive’s head rolls to Quincy’s ankle. “Just in time.”
Paolo Mendoza.
“You!” Quincy hisses.
The Bautista train, resting several feet away, remained charred in ruins and surrounded. Screams roar from within the car, and one of the enforcers catches a fleeing young boy by the neck. The child struggles in his grasp, but the effort is futile as the enforcer flings him into the train and seals the exit shut with a brand barrier. Passengers, locked by their wrist, cry out endlessly inside, but their pleas are snubbed.
No. What is this?
“Are the explosives set?” Paolo calls out in Spanish to his men.
One of the enforcers plants a device to the train’s surface, presumably the last one. He gestures a thumbs up.
“Confirmed Mendoza,” he notifies. “¡Listo para irmos!”
“¡Okay, a moverse!”
Paolo draws out the remote from his vest, and his thumb curls on the button. Quincy wiggles in a panic.
“No!”
His cries fall flat as a flare radiates, gleaming hotly before him. A chain of flames envelopes the last of what remains of the train. The blaze roars and its flakes wheeze into the star studded sky.
He puts aside the control, returning his focus to the captive.
“Mission failure, once again,” Paolo rebukes.
“No.”
Quincy’s mind spins, affecting his vision. His nerves ache deeply.
“You cyborgs amaze me with your peace nonsense,” he says. The fire fumes in the background, illuminating maliciously over Paolo. His scar glints. “Always interfering in business you can’t control. My warning for this couldn’t get cleared.”
“You won’t get away with this.”
Paolo laughs. “I already had. The economy will go on, and we will keep it so. But, no matter what you do, I’ll always be reaching the next level.” The kingpin snaps his fingers urgently. “Saca a este cabrón.”
Cartel mercenaries, each darkened by the night’s essence like shadows, lift Quincy upward. The Virtual’s heart freezes. He couldn’t believe it. This had to be a nightmare. He was completely alone, crushed in his apprehension, at the hands of wolves in the desert. At this point, Quincy discovered that any external attempt in aid would be a null effort.
They stop at the edge, where a river flows downward. Quincy’s eyes widen to Paolo strolling behind.
“If you survive long enough,” he declares, “tell Ottoman and the entire fucking American scrapdogs I’m waiting.”
The cyborg’s body glides in mid-air and hits the water’s surface. Pain roars in his eyes, and a cold hand decelerates his bloodstream. The density of his body sucks him down until the force of the river’s currents skids him like a scrap in its possession.
CHAPTER 1
Iridescent lights fluctuate in the night sky, giving color to the cold that reigned in the city of Boston. Skyscrapers gleam as if giving silent acknowledgement to the grand holiday. The transparent dome residing on the edifice’s top surface holds its stance, sheltering the gatherers from the chilling breeze outside. The pentagonal plates defining the area illuminate.
Seeing the giant bottle of water residing beside the tray of sodas on the wooden table, Troy Levi reaches over with ease. A band of musicians booms smoothly with their trumpets on the podium, as if in insouciance to the officers’ oblivion, and calmness came over Troy. However, their jazz is overshadowed by the partygoers chatter, where plenty can be seen gathering in circles chuckling among themselves. The wine in their prosthetic hands creates an aroma that traps itself inside the club, sweetening the air around them. This is their night granted, after all.
“See, you’re still not a sugar person Levi,” Taylor remarks across him. He takes a sip of his coke.
Pouring his water into the cup, Troy shakes his head.
The agent looks around him, surrounded by his fellow Virtuals and Martial sitting on the round sofa across from him. The fireworks pop, crackling into his ears.
“Cheers for a new year, everyone,” Troy comments aloud, feeling his voice trail through the noise. He raises his glass.
Taylor and Jin raise their soda cans, barely abutting each other. Meanwhile, Pitch, being the last to comply, glances strangely at the two. Instead, he raises a silver thumb, joining in awkward unison with the cyborgs.
With the exception of Pitch, Troy’s walked foot with these agents since their recruitment into the FBI’s Virtual Division. With every operation he took part in, Troy watched them evolve and harness their capacity. Their perseverance never failed to remind him of the time he first stepped his foot in, a nascent cyborg once uncertain of the future.
Troy sipped his water, and he whistles mist.
“Starting off
,” Troy remarks. He sets down his cup. “It’s a shame veteran Rebecca wasn’t able to attend tonight. But as we prep for this brand new year, I just want to offer my call of recognition.”
Jin and Taylor exchange glances, sharing nods.
Troy raises his cup and gestures to his first candidate.
“Taylor,” Troy adulates aloud, “You were at first if I can say, a goddamn stubborn one.”
Taylor rubs his cap, offering a quizzical expression. The lighting reflects against his skin, which was darker than Troy’s own. In contrary to Taylor, whose prosthetics covered his left arm and lower limb, Troy’s bionic components encased his right arm and left leg. On the other hand, Pitch stares blankly at him, as if waiting for him to implode.
“Well, reckless. Even,” Troy continues. He retains his earnest expression, but that changes as he says, “But I’ve seen you evolve from that over the years, analyzing those mistakes. One by one.”
“I needed it,” Taylor replies, as his expression transitions to an assuring smile.
Troy lays sight on Jin, who rubs his slanted eyes with his scarf.
“Now, Jin. As a starter, you were a bit anxious at first. Weren’t too sure of yourself. But I did get to see you blossom through these operations.”
Troy can recall the paleness flooding Jin’s skin as he first stepped foot alongside him in the wilderness of Panama years ago, in pursuit of a recruiter from the Mendoza Cartel. The tension risen, and so did the former tyro’s heartbeat. However, the instant Jin’s bionic hand transmuted and flared into the damp wilderness became the moment Troy saw his potential. It was his first task within the Division, and Troy couldn’t be prouder.
Jin stares downward at his hand, caressing its wrist as if in cogitation to his experiences. His hair was slightly disheveled brown, now as polished and black as a raven’s feather and lengthen top. A diminutive trace of hair betrayed above the top of his lip, giving age to his youthful face.
“And I’m proud to say,” Troy goes on, “you overcame it.”