Agent Vixen Collection

by Jay Aury

  Voices sounded ahead. Audra slowed, creeping forward. The subtle bang of distant metal and the sharp bark of German voices sparked her curiosity. What was it Alistair had said? Something about underground tunnels…

  She eased through a narrow doorway and paused, stunned. Below was a huge space laid flat with cement flooring. Steel arches curved, holding aloft a ceiling of jagged stone. Distantly she saw an elevator whirr and on the floor men moved quickly about their business, carting massive canisters stamped with warning signs. And on the wall in sharp, dark paint, looming over it all, was a black raven gripping in its talons the swastika.

  “Fucking Nazis,” Audra muttered.

  Her eyes wandered to the lower level, and she had to swallow a gasp. Towering over the floor were the unmistakeable shape of rockets on launchers, each aimed up and towards a massive steel shutter in the ceiling.

  A sudden shout drew her attention and she ducked low behind some crates. She darted a glance around it. Not far stood Victor von Hamerstein with several other men before a towering monitor and control panel. His riding clothes had been cast aside, and instead he was clad in a dark leather uniform which fit his sharp outline strikingly well, were it not for the swastika proudly displayed on his shoulder and the front of his beaked hat. Audra’s heart nearly stopped in shock when she saw just who he was speaking to.

  He stood alone, hands in the pockets of an epaulet capped jacket thrown back like a cape. Stern, his face sharply accented like someone had hacked it out of wood, his hair slicked back and his eyepatch a distinct, dark shape on his face. On his shoulder a brilliant hued parrot bobbed animatedly.

  “Yes. I would mind you using your calipers on my skull,” Sylvester Sterling said.

  “Squawk! Lube it up! Lube it up!” the parrot added.

  “But I think my research could greatly benefit from such an examination,” von Hammerstein said animatedly. “After all, despite your mongrel blood, you haf achieved so much!”

  “Nevertheless, I must decline,” Sterling repeated, his tone, as ever, utterly polite. As ever, utterly frigid. Audra shivered, recalling that voice on the Market vessel as he stepped out of the shadows, armed guards at hand. She had never felt closer to death than when that man had coldly asked her what she was doing. Only Raphael’s sudden intervention had saved her.

  She bit her lip, hunching lower, watching.

  “We have provided you with the materials and expertise to assemble your nerve gas,” Sterling said. “Payment is due.”

  Audra tensed. Nerve gas? She looked again down at the lower level of the cavern, and saw to her horror canisters littering the grounds and stamped with toxic warning labels. Canisters being loaded into the waiting missiles.

  Her attention was jerked back as Victor beckoned, and Bludghost moved forward with a heavy briefcase. He passed it off to Sterling, who took it with the sudden, jerky movements Audra recalled so vividly from the Market ship.

  “All American bills,” Victor assured them. “None of zat Euro nonsense. Soon enough, zat currency vill be vorth no more zen ze paper it is printed upon!”

  Sterling snapped open the case. His one good eye moved over the rows of green bills. The parrot on his shoulder bobbed.

  “Squawk! Fifty gets you anal! Squawk!”

  “It appears in order,” Sterling said, snapping shut the case.

  “Ze new vorld order shall thank you, Mister Sterling, for your assistance. Neither you, nor ARM shall be forgotten for your efforts in bringing zis about!”

  ARM? Audra wondered, lifting her head just a little higher.

  “No doubt,” Sterling said. “I will depart at once.”

  “Vat?” von Hammerstein said. He gestured to the screen beside them. “But you vill miss ze launch! Miss ze ultimate triumph of I! Victor von Hamerstein, and ze true Reich!”

  “Yes,” Sterling said drily. “A pity. But I have other matters to attend to.”

  “Ah vell, so be it. But I vould advise you to travel far indeed! And avoid Berlin, my friend. For soon, zose traitors to ze true Reich shall reap zeir just rewards! All those who brought about Germany’s submission shall choke on Sarin Gas, launched at every nation’s capital!” He snapped his riding crop at the map on the monitor. “London! Madrid! Paris! And especially Brussels! Ze heart of ze hated European Union!”

  “I will keep that in mind,” Sterling said. “ARM thanks you for your patronage.”

  Audra leaned a little higher, then ducked low, sucking in a breath as Sterling’s parrot flapped over to perch on the box above her. The bird cocked its head at her. She hissed, trying to shoo it away.

  “Hm?” Victor said in surprise. “You do not vish to listen to my outlining my brilliant scheme?”

  “Again. I think I’ve heard enough,” Sterling said.

  “Oh. Because I did make a very nize slideshow.”

  “Squawk!” the parrot screamed above Audra. “Missed my g-spot! Missed my g-spot! Squawk!”

  “Fuck off!” she hissed.

  “Unfortunately, I have a pressing engagement elsewhere,” Sterling said. “But, a word of advice, Mr. von Hammerstein.”

  “Ja?” Victor said.

  Sterling turned, and Audra froze as that cold eye fixed itself on her. “I suggest you seize that woman hiding behind the crates.”

  The head of every man in the room snapped towards Audra. As von Hammerstein roared an order, Audra grabbed her earring and pressed the false stone down hard.

  Breaking and Entering

  The guard smoked lazily at the edge of the cliff, watching the distant Rhine flow. The walls of the castle rose up behind him, the postern gate they were watching a shelter against a low wind blowing from the east. He took out the cigarette and flicked it into the dark, watching the glow vanish over the sudden drop. “You know vat I love about these nights?”

  “Vat?” his companion said.

  “Ze moonlight over ze vaters. It just looks so clear.”

  “It is beautiful,” the other man agreed, staring out over the darkened forest. They stood in silence, enjoying the companionable quiet only men who have worked together a long time can develop. A comfortable ease that demands nothing be said. A shared understanding. “Franz?”

  Franz turned to his companion. “Yes, Mitch?”

  “It has been a vile. And, vell, I was thinking… I just… I vant you to know that, vell, I’ve always appreciated your presence. And that, I think you’re… you’re quite handsome.”

  “O-oh.” Franz coughed softly. “Vell, Mitch. I… I must admit you have me a bit wrong footed. But… after Svetlana left me, I admit, I had… sometimes, vatched you.”

  “Franz,” Mitch said, stepping nearer.

  “Mitch…”

  They stood, staring into each other’s eyes by the light of the moon.

  And so never saw the darkness move and the sack of lead shot thud down on Franz’s head. Mitch gaped, staring at what looked like a living piece of the night as it swung a cosh straight for his head. There was a dull thunk and Mitch collapsed atop Franz.

  Alistair pulled back the black mask and looked down on the pair. He glanced at his gun still belted at his side and sighed. But really. After their confession, he really hadn’t the heart to just shoot the poor bastards cold. He crouched over Franz and began to strip him. He’d been watching the pair for the last week, measuring his options for sneaking back into Hammerstein Castle.

  But events had taken a sudden urgency.

  Clad in the dull grey uniform of the fallen guard, Alistair pulled back his sleeve and looked at the beeping red light on his watch. He frowned and looked back up along the walls. Shrugging a heavy sack filled with explosives onto his shoulder, he tugged his hat down and slipped through the postern gate.

  Audra better be alright.

  Pursuit

  Audra was not alright.

  As soon as von Hammerstein started shouting she bolted to her feet and ran. The welts on her back and the streaks on her naked rump blazed with pain as s
he raced along one of the gantries running along the upper levels of the room. The corrugated metal dug into her bare feet painfully. Shouts echoed below and a guard ahead of her turned, stunned by the sight of a naked woman running towards him. She spun, a kick cracking against the man’s jaw and sending him slamming into the railing. She went for his gun but a spray of bullets pinging off the metal from below warded her back. She turned to see another guard running at her.

  “Alive!” von Hammerstein screamed. “Take her alive!”

  The man hesitated, and Audra took advantage of his pause by kicking him between the legs. The guard’s eyes crossed and his legs buckled as he went down with a whimper. Another man was behind him and hurled himself at her. She grabbed his arm, and used his own momentum to hurl him off the gantry. He screamed as he plummeted to the floor below, but the attack proved costly. Even as she straightened a pair of massive arms closed around her, crushing her in a bear hug against a thick, massive chest and driving the air from her lungs. She snapped back her head, smashing it into a face. There was a crack of cartilage and a grunt, but the hold around her didn’t loosen an inch. She looked back and into the bloodied face of Bludghost.

  “Bring her here!”

  Bludghost grunted and turned. Audra kicked furiously, but held as she was she didn’t have a chance of making any sort of impact as the massive guard walked her back along the rail and down to the control deck. Von Hammerstein stood there, replete in his regalia of the Reich, lip curled in distaste as she was dragged before him.

  Sterling stood beside him, his parrot once more on his shoulder and bobbing with glee. “Amelia Lamen,” Sterling said.

  Von Hammerstein looked in surprise to him. “You know her?”

  “We have met before,” Sterling said. Audra shivered, those words cold as they spelled out her doom. “She caused an issue during a Market.”

  “Vat? Zen she is here to thwart me!” von Hammerstein snarled. “You little bitch!”

  “So it would seem,” Sterling said.

  “Squawk! Pull my hair and call me Shirley! Squawk!” the parrot screeched.

  Audra glared hatefully at the bird.

  “Vell! Nothing to say?” von Hammerstein demanded.

  “You’re a monster,” she informed him. Then smiled. “And your dick was like being fucked by a pencil.”

  “Silence!” von Hammerstein roared. “You vill show respect yet, mein fraulein. Once I am finished with Europe, I vill teach you it most thoroughly! Bludghost! Hold her here. She vill bear vitness to mein triumph!”

  “Hr,” Bludghost said.

  “I will take my leave, then,” Sterling said. He nodded to von Hammerstein, but his eyes lingered on Audra. “I would appreciate any information you can get out of that one.”

  “You shall haf it. I, Victor von Hammerstein, will take great joy in wringing every vord from her!”

  He snapped the riding crop against his leg. Audra glared back defiantly. Sterling turned away and departed, carrying his briefcase and escorted by a pair of his black clothed personal guards. Once they had vanished, von Hammerstein turned once more to her. “Now zen,” he grinned. “Vere vere ve… Ah yes!” he cried, swinging about to face the men at the control panels. “Gentlemen!” he cried. “Prepare ze launch!”

  Searching

  There were three men guarding the front gate to the castle. On the steps that very same morning Audra had climbed to first meet with the cruel Count von Hammerstein, they now smoked, idling with weapons hanging loosely from their belts.

  They watched the night sky, confident in their security. Their secrecy.

  Their safety.

  Claus took a cigarette from his mouth, squinting as a pale shape danced across the courtyard. “Hey,” he said. “Isn’t dat Hammerstein’s horse?”

  The first explosion threw them off their feet. The second knocked them down as soon as they had started to rise.

  A man pulled Claus up. A guard, his face shadowed in the fires billowing all over the castle, shouted, “Ve’re under attack!”

  Claus stared, gobsmacked as smoke billowed out of the garage and the gate. Fire lit the night in an inferno, licking from windows and roaring from the stables. Horses, freed from their paddocks, screamed as they trampled through the so recently repaired front gate. Claus turned as the other guard gave him another shake. “Quickly! Get up!”

  The voice of authority cut through his daze. Claus pulled himself to his feet, pushing back his hat. “Right! Yes. Under attack! Ah…”

  “Quickly!” the other man barked. “Ve haf to warn ze master! Hurry! Go! Go!”

  Claus stumbled to the main doors. He shoved them open and dashed through the entryway. The firelight streamed through the windows in swaying shapes of red and yellow, casting shadows across the tall paintings and dancing off the breastplates of suits of armour.

  “Hurry!”

  “I am hurrying!”

  “Vell hurry faster!”

  Claus swore beneath his breath as he ran through the corridor with his companion. Always just ahead of the other man. In the depths of the castle they reached at last the gloomy painting of the accusing SS commander. Claus shivered. He hated that painting. He stabbed the hidden trigger, never seeing his companion’s eyes flash as the painting swung in. Never saw the other man smile as he hefted his submachine gun, and clattered down the secret passage and into the halls beneath the castle.

  Confrontation

  Audra watched, clutched in the hands of two guards. Bludghost stood once more beside his master as the final preparations were completed. Fuel lines were disconnected from the waiting rockets. Men shouted and raced about busily, warnings whirring on the walls as a voice shouted for all personnel to clear the floor. A massive winch, relic no doubt from the Second World War whirred as it was cranked, pulling open shutters in the wall, revealing the clear stars of the night sky.

  “Behold!” von Hammerstein cackled, throwing forth his arms before the glory of the room. “Ze end of the European Union! And from ze ashes, ze Reich shall rise again!” he roared, clicking his heels and throwing forth a salute. “Sieg heil!”

  “You’re an idiot,” Audra said. “It’ll never work.”

  Von Hammerstein laughed, stalking back over to her. “Of course it shall, mein fraulein. Such an attack vill be easy to blame upon foreign powers. Fear shall motivate ze nations of Europe to race to our banner. Ze Iron Raven shall fly vonce more!”

  “God,” Audra moaned. “Do you ever shut up? Just kill me already!”

  Von Hammerstein laughed again and gripped her chin. “Kill you? Ah, mein fraulein, though you do not appreciate ze glory of ze Reich, your blood runs clear vith Aryan stock. I am certain,” he said, releasing her. “A pity you vill not join us. But your vomb may yet prove useful for ze future generations of ze race!”

  Audra shuddered in disgust. “You’re insane. And a dick, which is almost worse.”

  “Silence! You merely cannot comprehend ze… vat ze hell is that noise!” he shouted as an alarm screamed on the wall.

  Footsteps thundered down the tunnel. Two guards burst into the room. “Sir! Ve are under attack!”

  “Vat!” von Hammerstein barked, whirling on the man. “Who!”

  “Americans, sir!” the second guard gasped. “Zey’re coming over ze valls!”

  “Dem!” von Hammerstein whirled on Audra. “Bitch! I don’t know how you got your varning out but it vas for naught!” He turned to the guards. “Secure ze perimeter! The launch must not be interrupted at zis stage! Go! Go!”

  Guns were snatched up and guards from all over the room raced for the stairs. Even the technicians rose from their stations, their tasks done and snatching up weapons to join the guards in the final defence of the castle. Victor von Hammerstein swept another hand at a man. “You! Prepare my personal helicopter! You! Lock down ze launch. And you!” He snarled, grabbing Audra’s arm. “You vill be coming with me.”

  The men holding her backed off. Audra leaned away from von
Hammerstein. “Right! Let us be…” Von Hammerstein paused, peering at the second guard who had brought warning of the attack. Looking straight into the face of Alistair Smith. “Who are you?”

  “Me?”

  “Ja! You. Who are you?”

  “I am… Franz, sir.”

  Von Hammerstein’s eyes narrowed sharply. “No you are not. You are too short!” He swung his luger towards Alistair. “Who are you?”

  Several things happened in a sudden succession.

  Audra rammed her elbow into von Hammerstein’s stomach. The Nazi wheezed, doubling over, his monocle popping from his eye. She spun, wrenching his luger from his suddenly limp hand and fired, shooting him twice in the chest. Even as von Hammerstein reeled back, his remaining guards swung in shock towards Audra. The second their attention changed, Alistair opened fire, mowing down the two men with a sudden rain of bullets.

  For a brief instant things looked up.

  Then, roaring with fury, Bludghost slammed into Alistair. The spy was smashed against the control panel, the submachinegun jammed from his grasp. A bone crushing grip landed on his shoulders and forced him down. Alistair gasped, grabbing Bludghost’s bald head, desperately keeping the snapping metal teeth from his face. Alistair wound back his leg and brought up his knee, slamming it between Bludghost’s legs.

  The massive man paused. Looked down. Surprised, Alistair slammed his knee once more into the massive man’s crotch. Bludghost’s wide lips peeling back in savage amusement.

  “Oh you’re fucking kidding me!” Alistair gasped. He jerked his head aside as Bludghost’s jaws tried to close on his face with a snap like a bear trap.

  Audra cracked the stock against the back of the bald man’s head. Bludghost’s head rang like a bell. He whipped towards her, lips peeled back in an iron snarl.

  “Oh, well. Fine then,” Audra said as she cocked her luger and shoved it into his face. Just before she pulled the trigger he opened his mouth and bit down on the muzzle.

  “Holy shit!” Audra gasped, yanking back her hand as Bludghost ripped the twisted gun out of her grasp with a jerk of his massive neck. He spat out the remnants of ruined steel and turned back to her. He lifted Alistair bodily and flung the man aside, sending him crashing into the crates that had once served as her cover.