Sacrifice

by Dakota Banks

  There were several campgrounds in the area and that’s where Maliha stayed. Reading in her tent by the light of an LED lantern, she heard the conversations of neighborly campers outside and smelled the BBQ’d dinners they prepared. Someone “knocked” on her tent flap offering a glass of wine, but she said she wasn’t feeling well, and was politely left alone after that. When the sounds died down in camp, she turned off her lantern. Time for reconnaissance.

  Maliha ran through the night with her full array of weapons, her body a deadly bullet aimed at Vincent Landry. Crouching behind some bushes, she observed the guard shack. It looked like such a simple arrangement. One guard, carrying a sidearm, a phone on the wall in the booth, and controls to open the gate.

  This is what Amaro reports as heavily guarded? There must be an inner perimeter.

  She threw some rocks into the road away from her position. The guard immediately focused on the noise. She sprang from her position, ran as fast as she could toward the gate, leaped it, and kept going. The gate camera would catch her only as a momentary blur. If there was a motion detector, and she assumed there was, it would have gone off in the guard shack and in the central security area. Visual checks would show nothing except the camera blur. The verdict: An owl had swooped nearby, close enough for the motion detector, and left a shadow on the camera.

  At least it sounded good to her.

  At a full run she topped the hill in a couple of seconds, came to a stop, and crouched in the grass to look around.

  The long, curving gravel driveway ended in the middle of a field of grass. No fancy mansion. No six-car garage. Not even another guard shack. Behind the area where there would have been a home was a sheer cliff, shaped like a horseshoe, fronting the ocean.

  The approach is by water then. No wonder the security out front wasn’t too impressive. There probably wasn’t even a camera or a motion detector. The guard who whistled—just some guy standing there to keep the tourists out.

  She walked over to the cliff’s edge, flattened herself on the grass, and looked over. Because of the shape of the cliff, the water contained inside churned as waves bounced off the sides and collided. It wouldn’t be an easy approach by water. She thought she saw some openings in the side of the cliff, but it was too dark to see clearly and they weren’t exactly spotlighted. Her best approach would be to return with technical climbing gear and rappel down the cliff.

  Maliha was at the top of the hill walking back when she heard the noise of metallic gears coming from the field spread out below her. She turned around to see a section of the earth lift and slide out of the way, not large, maybe ten by fifteen feet. Rising up was a platform that held a vehicle, a van. The vehicle’s headlights were on, preventing her from getting a good look at the driver. The van pulled onto the gravel driveway and when it rounded a bend, she had a clearer view. There were no passenger windows and only the driver in the front seat.

  If this happens often, I can ride down on the top of that van. Easier than flinging myself off a cliff.

  She returned the next night with her bag of goodies, approaching cross-country this time, avoiding the dummy guard setup. She waited for several hours, hoping for a vehicle to arrive so she could ride down with it. Finally she abandoned the plan. She was going to have to reach Vincent Landry the hard way, by going over the cliff.

  At the cliff, Maliha looked over and positioned herself above a point she thought was an opening in the rock. She set three anchors, stepped into the leg loops of her climbing harness, pulled it up, and fastened it securely at her waist. After attaching the relay device with a locking carabiner, over the edge she went, ready to make a controlled fall down the face of the cliff.

  The opening she chose was a round ventilation shaft, but it was one of twenty or more that she could see honeycombing the cliff. There were so many because each of them was small, less than two feet in diameter. Not only that, the outside of each shaft was covered with a grate, and judging by the dead birds piled on the ledges below, the grates were electrified. The mesh on the grates was small—small enough to keep out bats. There was nothing to recommend her chosen shaft over any of the others. It would be luck of the draw whether it led her anywhere interesting.

  She pulled up the end of her rope, which was dangling down the cliff. Slicing off a length of a few feet, she threaded one end of it through the grate. Very carefully, she reached her finger through and tried to hook the end of the rope. If she could just get enough of her finger on it to pull it toward her, she’d have the rope looped around the wire of the grate.

  Finally she got it. She evened out the ends of the rope, yanked hard on them, and the grate moved a little. She had to plant her feet on either side of the shaft and tug with all her might, and the grate popped loose. It tumbled down into the water below.

  Her shoulders barely cleared the shaft’s diameter. With a piton in each hand, she maneuvered herself inside, head first, and detached herself from the rope. Using the pitons like clawed extensions of her hands, she pulled her way forward into the shaft. For the first thirty or forty feet, the shaft was rock, and not very smooth rock, either. It tore at her clothing as she moved along. Then she came to a shiny metal section. Still using the pitons, to punch holes in the metal, she moved forward at a cautious pace.

  I feel like a mole in a tunnel. How long is this thing, anyway?

  Just as she thought it, the shaft began to slope more steeply downward. She started to slide forward on the smooth surface, and the air around her became warm and humid. She couldn’t use the pitons any longer. They slid away from her down the shaft and disappeared.

  Uh-oh.

  Suddenly she was dangling in the air, her hands grasping the sharp metal edge of the shaft, about fifteen feet above the floor. The metal was slicing her fingers, so she let go and made the best of her landing, doing a parachutist’s bend and roll. She twisted her ankle a little but it was only a minor hindrance.

  Looking around, she found she was in a laundry room. Clouds of hot, steamy air issued from the washers when their doors opened and they tilted their contents into the yawning openings of industrial-sized dryers. The room was busy, but there wasn’t a person in sight. Everything was automatic.

  Out in the hall, moving cautiously, she found another automatic room—a bakery, going full tilt. A few fresh loaves of bread waited for the morning, and other items were in various stages of preparation.

  Getting creepy. Does Landry run on automatic, too?

  She was obviously on a utility level. Moving up a staircase, she expected to encounter armed guards. She came out into a warehouse filled with crates, presumably weapons bound for terrorist use, since Landry was a smuggler. No people, but the elevator she’d seen in operation led to this level. There were security cameras on the walls, missing from the lower automated level. Somewhere, in some security headquarters in this building, she was already on camera.

  Is anybody watching?

  She decided to try the elevator, which was a simple platform in a shaft, ideal for holding vehicles. The elevator was responsive to her press on the call button. There were four more levels in this place before the surface level.

  She got on and pressed the button for the next floor. When the door opened, a dozen guards were waiting for her, assault rifles ready to cut her apart. Someone had been watching the security camera. She raised her hands in surrender.

  She waited until they got closer to her and exploded into action. Side kicks to the temple put a couple out of commission immediately. As soon as she started moving, bullets started whining through the air. She took shelter behind a column as bullets impacted nearby. The guards didn’t seem inclined to rush her, preferring to stand back and shoot. She pulled the whip sword from its sheath at her waist, flicked it to separate the two long, flexible blades, dashed across the line of fire at superhuman speed. She snapped the whip sword repeatedly, leaving arcs of blood and a trail of severed limbs as the fast-moving blades cut through flesh. The guards were just
starting to scream when Maliha made another pass at speed behind them. This time the whip sword swept low, severing legs at the calf, leaving the stumps standing as the men toppled. In seconds, the area was the site of a bloody massacre. Maliha wasn’t even breathing hard.

  Something in her was protesting, but she shoved it down. Too bad about them. They were in my way.

  She took a dead man’s Uzi and slung it over her shoulder. She moved farther into the level, which encouraged her that she was on the right track by its luxurious appointments.

  The next group didn’t make the mistake of asking her to surrender. They just started firing as soon as they spotted her. She dove behind a large bar, but took a bullet in the calf as she went flying through the air. Behind her, liquor bottles shattered on their shelves, hit by the weapons fire. Maliha laid the guard’s Uzi on top of the bar, squeezed the trigger, and raked it back and forth until the cartridge was empty. Any guard who wasn’t under serious cover was dead. She peeked around the edge of the bar and earned a burst of gunfire. It seemed that there was only one guard left.

  “I don’t want to kill you,” she called out. “If you want to live, put down your gun.”

  “You’re out of bullets,” the guard said. “Why should I give up now? I’ve got spare clips and help on the way.”

  “Why should you give up? Because I can do this.”

  Maliha had his location pinned down from his gunfire. She swung her arm up vertically over the bar and launched a throwing star. If he hadn’t moved, he’d survive it.

  There was a scream from the guard. She looked around the bar and saw that her star had landed in his arm, right at the elbow. A disabling shot. While he was staring at his wounded arm, she put another star in his other arm. The rifle clattered to the floor.

  “I’m going to come over to you and if there’s any problem, I’ll kill you.”

  She saw him nod vigorously. He’d pulled one of the stars out, causing bleeding. He stared at the blood and then at her.

  She crossed the distance. “Where’s Landry?”

  The guard moaned.

  “Where’s Victor Landry?”

  “Uh, next floor. Locked in. Nobody gets in there but the women he calls. You know, for sex.”

  “Women?”

  “He keeps ’em locked up. Down that hall. Don’t kill me. Please. I’ve got a daughter.”

  What if your daughter was in that locked room, waiting to service Landry?

  Her knife went for his throat but at the last second, it was as though something inside jerked her strings like a puppet, diverting her hand. She knocked him out instead. He would probably be all right until help arrived later. She was tempted to visit the room of women and let them out, but it could be some kind of trap. Also, there could be women in there vulnerable enough that they’d fallen for whatever line Landry used, and were loyal to him.

  There didn’t seem to be any more guards on this level. She raided the extra clips of some of the dead guards and stored them on her belt for additional firepower. Limping back to the elevator, she favored the leg with the bullet in the calf. Maliha tore a piece of a guard’s uniform and wrapped her leg tight enough to staunch the blood. She could feel the bullet grinding painfully against her bone, but there was nothing to be done about it now. She had to walk, run, and fight on that leg.

  She thought of Lucius, moving off into the forest naked, with a fresh scale carving that must have been agony compared to her leg wound. In his pain, he’d taken time to leave a message of love and hope for her. It put her wound in perspective.

  She rode the elevator to the next floor, prepared for a reception the same or worse as on the women’s floor. The door opened to nothing but halls and rooms. Straight ahead of her, at the end of a long, dimly lighted hall, was a giant of a woman standing in a spotlight. She was at least seven feet tall, wore a loin cloth, a sword belt with two swords, and nothing else. Her skin was as tawny as a lion’s and as burnished as the belly of a Buddha statue.

  Maliha felt overdressed. She resisted the urge to cast off her clothing to match the giantess’s level of undress. If they’d been alone, she might have done so. But she was certain Landry was watching, and she wasn’t going to allow this encounter to give him any more enjoyment than what he was already getting from the nearly naked, muscular giantess. Her opponent drew swords that looked five feet long. Combined with her arm length, that gave her a reach of about nine feet.

  Fighting sphere with a diameter of eighteen feet.

  Maliha slipped the Uzi off her shoulder and sent a rain of bullets down the hallway. Just because the giantess was waving swords around didn’t mean Maliha had to respond in kind. She’d seen Raiders of the Lost Ark. To her astonishment, right before the bullets were about to hit her opponent, they struck a clear barrier and fell to the floor harmlessly. It looked as though Maliha had to engage the giantess on her own terms.

  Maliha threw down the Uzi and walked toward the barrier. When she got there, it slid into the wall.

  The woman looked her up and down. “I have heard you are a great warrior. What you lack in size, you must make up in skill.”

  “Vincent Landry exploits you, as he does the women on the floor below for his pleasure. He is watching you now. Put down your weapons, and I will spare your life.”

  “You think that little toad shares my bed? Hah!” She spit on the floor. “I’m here because my lover thinks this man is doing something important. Soon it will be over and I will gut Landry myself. I despise his appetite for girls. A true man appreciates a true woman.”

  She arched her back and thrust out her breasts, and Maliha agreed: There was no doubt this was a true woman. A woman and a half.

  Maliha was getting an idea she didn’t like and decided to test it directly. “Tell me your name and the name of the demon to which you are beholden.”

  “What is this nonsense? My name is Duma and I am beholden to no one. My lover is my only equal and he is known as the Leader.”

  Maliha feigned disinterest, even though Duma had just admitted to being on intimate terms with the man Maliha had begun to think didn’t exist.

  “If he is your leader, then how are you his equal?” She thought she had a good chance to trip Duma up through her pride.

  “He is the leader of these small-minded men whom he uses for his plans. To me he is…” Duma frowned. “Enough questions. The only thing you need to know is that I will separate your head from your body. Come, let us test each other!”

  Duma didn’t wait until she’d finished speaking. She lunged forward with one of her great swords, aiming for Maliha’s midsection, and swung the other sword at Maliha’s shoulder height. Maliha sidestepped one, ducked under the other and leaped toward her, getting inside the range of Duma’s swing. Maliha used the techniques of Wing Chun for close-in fighting, particularly effective against a larger opponent. She made vertical fists and attacked Duma with short, powerful punches. She pummeled the core of Duma’s body, the centerline where Duma drew all the strength for her massive sword thrusts. The fist strikes were meant to kill—the nose, the throat, and finally the solar plexus, but Maliha carefully controlled the force. She didn’t want Duma dead yet. With the last blow, Duma had the wind knocked out of her and staggered backward. She dropped one of her swords.

  Before Duma could recover from the spasm of her diaphragm, Maliha opened her fists and rammed both palms into Duma’s chest, cracking ribs and sending the giantess over backward. Maliha quickly took up a position behind Duma’s head and held a knife to her throat. Duma raised the sword she was still holding and tried to bring it over her head to dislodge Maliha, who easily kicked the sword away and sent it spinning across the floor.

  Duma, trying to recover from the punches, unable to gulp air because of the searing pain of the broken ribs, lay on the floor in a very unaccustomed position of defeat.

  “Who is the Leader, Duma?”

  “You can’t have the satisfaction of killing me!” Duma suddenly bit down
hard on her tongue. Blood flowed and she gagged, then spit out a piece of her tongue that showed the remnants of a capsule that had been embedded in its flesh. Moments later, Duma started convulsing.

  Maliha slit her throat, then used the knife to stab her in the heart. It was a quicker death than poison.

  She stood up and turned her head away. Maliha felt as though she’d taken advantage of the dead warrior lying at her feet. Duma fought proudly with her strength and speed, and in this instance, Maliha had used it against her.

  She felt like a female coyote, the trickster of Native-American myths. In some stories, Coyote was the bringer of death. At a time when death affected only animals, Coyote and Eagle went to the world of the dead to bring back their wives. The wives’ spirits, along with many others, were collected in a box. When they left the land of the dead, Coyote heard his wife’s voice coming from the box and was too eager to see her. He opened the box and let the idea of death escape into the world of humans.

  Trickster or bringer of death—either one seemed to fit Maliha tonight. And she wasn’t finished.

  She made her way down the rest of the hall warily. There were security cameras but no guards. She must have exhausted the private contingent of security forces.

  Somebody’s watching me but letting me advance, or can’t do anything about it.

  At the end of the hall there was another of the clear barriers.

  “Come in.” A male voice offered entry and the clear door slid back.

  She entered a darkened room with a panel of monitors showing camera views of most of the places she’d been. On one wall there were huge images of outdoor Normandy scenes, playing in a slideshow. Behind the room they were in, she could get a glimpse of other rooms, a bedroom, exercise room, and some for which she couldn’t determine a purpose.