With that, the janissary left the office, trotted down the corridor to a spot near the center of the castle, took his rifle in hand and began firing the rifle methodically into the high ceiling. Janissaries began pouring out of rooms even as smashed plaster and bits of masonry poured down from above.
Castle Honsvang, Province of Baya, 24 Muharram,
1538 AH (4 November, 2113)
It hadn't taken much to get the captive renegades to give him the combination to open the vault containing the virus. Hamilton had simply asked, "Now which of you does not want me to shoot him in the balls?" and they'd fallen over each other in their haste to volunteer.
The three renegades now sat, taped to chairs and facing away from each other. Their mouths were likewise taped. Hamilton and Hans had removed their shoes just before taping their legs to the chairs. For the nonce, Hans was occupied in the control room, watching the perimeter through the one closed-circuit television screen that was still useable, while keeping one hand poised near the switch to detonate diverse of the mines, if necessary. The slave boy liberated by Hamilton sat quietly nearby.
Not far away, in the lab, Hamilton spoke to the renegades while circling them slowly, not appreciably different from the way a shark might.
"I was taught this by Imperial Intelligence at Langley," Hamilton announced. "They called it 'musical chairs.' You'll see why in a moment.
"Here's rule number one: If any of you turn your heads to look at another, I will break one of your feet. If you understand, nod vigorously." Hamilton brandished a hammer he'd picked up in a closet off the main lab. If he hadn't found one, he'd have broken another chair to make a club for the purpose.
All three heads began bobbing like those of the children and whores the renegades had used and abused over the years.
"Very good. I'm now going to show you something. If it is part of the virus—of the virus project, rather—you will again, and without looking at each other, nod vigorously. If it is not, you will shake your heads to signify 'no.' If there is any disagreement I will smash one of each of your toes to bloody pulp. I'll then ask again. If there's any disagreement, I'll smash another. Again, in case it wasn't clear enough, if you try to consult, I'll break your foot. For starters. I can be a lot more imaginative if necessary.
"You see now why we call this musical chairs, gentlemen? It's because you sing."
Hamilton walked to a refrigerator and took a vial from it. He returned to the triangle of chairs and began to circle again, even more sharklike than before. "Is this part of the project?" he asked, with a calm all three scientists found utterly terrifying.
Hans heard Matheson's voice in his earpiece. "What's the situation?"
"We've got the castle," he reported. "We've got the scientists. The kids are still locked up except for one who was outside. We've the keys for their pen. Hamilton is interrogating your renegade scientists. So far, except for a short-lived attempt to batter down the main door, the local security, what's left of it, is just concentrating on keeping us in. It makes me wonder if they haven't got something coming to keep you from evacuating us by air."
"They did, Hans," Matheson answered. "We ducked it. They might . . . probably will . . . be back in a couple of hours."
"A couple of hours will probably give us the time we need," Hans said. "Unless . . . oh, oh."
The corbasi's truck pulled up outside the gate and stopped. Armed janissaries began to spill off of the back, each man racing for cover behind whatever could be found. The colonel himself got out quickly, then hurried forward toward the gate until stopped by the sergeant of the guard.
"Sir, no closer," the sergeant said. "Whoever is in there set off the modular mine packs. The road's covered with the little bastards."
The colonel stopped immediately in his tracks, then crouched down low to present as small a target as possible. "What the fuck is going on in there? Where the hell is ibn Minden?"
"We think he's probably dead, sir—"
"Damn!"
"Yes, sir, he was a fine young officer. Anyway, there's been no sound of fighting for a while. The last was when one of them shot three of my men as we were trying to batter down the main gate. Whoever it was who shot them is probably up there still. But he can't see much of anything from the tower I think he's in."
"How are your men who were shot?" the corbasi asked.
"Dead, all three, sir."
"Dammit."
"I've sent for aid from the platoon that was on break up at the bordello. They should be along in half an hour or so, inshallah."
Castle Noisvastei, Province of Baya, 24 Muharram,
1538 AH (4 November, 2113)
The still-cursing baseski formed the janissaries into four ranks, three of squads from the platoon and one of the company headquarters, in the reception hall above the castle's courtyard. Troops still filtered in, stumbling as they pulled up trousers and hopping as they tried to fit heavy boots to feet. None of them seemed actually drunk, the first sergeant was pleased to see.
Unfortunately, likewise were none of them armed, except for the one gate guard who had summoned them from their revels with sustained rifle fire. The baseski stifled a curse at fate.
Latif, hands clasped in worry before him, paced the hallway, likewise cursing. He'd sent two slaves, one to his own quarters and one to his guards, for whatever arms the castle might provide. He knew well enough how paltry these would be.
"Where are your stinking slaves with the weapons?" the first sergeant demanded, standing a couple of feet from the brothel keeper.
"Coming, Baseski, coming," Latif assured him.
Even as he spoke, the first of the slaves stumbled down the hall with an appreciable pile of weapons in his arms. He stopped next to the first sergeant and Latif. The sergeant took one glance at the pile and sneered.
"Shotguns? You have only shotguns in this place?"
"No, sir," the slave corrected. "There are two hunting rifles and also two automatic weapons."
"And where is the ammunition?"
The slave looked crestfallen. "You didn't say anything about ammunition," he said to Latif.
"Put down the weapons," the first sergeant ordered the slave. He then called out two names and ordered, "Go with this slave back to wherever he found these and bring all the ammunition there is to be had." The baseski shook his head with disgust. "Fuck! What does Allah have against me?"
Castle Honsvang, Province of Baya, 24 Muharram,
1538 AH (4 November, 2113)
"God has turned his face from us," Hans whispered, as he watched the janissaries pour out of the back of the truck. "And what's happened to Petra? If these got through, are the others hunting her like an animal through the woods?"
He'd called for his baby sister many times on the communicator he'd snagged days before. She didn't answer. This ate away at him, causing a rise of nausea in his stomach. He was certain she'd have answered if she were still alive. He thought back to the day the tax collector had taken her away; felt anew—as fresh as if it were just yesterday—the humiliation of being unable to defend her.
Taking a last glance at the security board to ensure all the perimeter mines were still functioning, Hans checked his submachine gun, stood and walked out of the control room and toward the lab. He walked as if going to his death as, indeed, he felt he was and perhaps even should be.
"Boy," he said to Meara's toy. "Boy, follow me."
"Are there any other samples of this virus anywhere in the Caliphate?" Hamilton asked. He'd already placed every sample identified as virus or useful to creating the virus into the containment unit he'd been given back at Langley. Immediately, the three heads began shaking "no" in unison. From Meara flew tears, so hard did he shake his head.
Cleverly, Hamilton had asked mostly innocuous questions to begin. After a dozen of those, and three pulped toes each for the renegades, he'd trained them not to lie. From there he'd gone after the rest of the lab samples. Now his questions were oriented toward the spread of the dange
r.
"Bernie? Hamilton," he sent over his communicator. "High degree of confidence that there are no other samples anywhere in the Caliphate. How far out are you?"
"Maybe twenty-five minutes, John," Hamilton heard in his earpiece. "I'll send word to higher."
"It would be a good thing not to get nuked as we escape," Hamilton agreed, sardonically.
"Escape will be highly problematic," Hans announced, as he entered the lab.
At Hamilton's quizzical eyebrow the janissary added, "Petra didn't get them all. About twenty—at least that many—have joined the guards outside. Maybe worse, I suspect that the people I sent to the other castle are on the way back. We're about to be outnumbered about forty to one, and this time there's no surprise on our side."
"How truly good," Hamilton said.
Interlude
Nuremberg, Federal Republic of Germany,
10 July, 2022
Gabi had done her best to raise Amal to be kind, sensitive, considerate of the feelings of others, tolerant, accepting . . . in all, a human monument to multicultural decency. She was also, and this had come rather harder to both mother and daughter, a good student. In her school, of course, she had friends of all stripes and persuasions; boyfriends, as well.
In fact, Amal had a lot of boyfriends. And why not? She was one of the, if not the, prettiest girls in the school. From her mother and father she'd garnered a meter, seventy-five in height . . . and she still had a couple of years to grow. Her baby-blond hair had darkened to a lustrous auburn not untypical of the province of Franconia. Her body was already that of a woman, enough so to set young boys to daydreaming in class, much to the detriment of their grades.
Between the height, the hair color, such features as she'd inherited from Mahmoud, her slightly darkened skin and light brown eyes, and her Arab given name, she could pass for an Arab or a Turk easily enough and was often taken for one. In the peculiar circumstances of Germany in the year 2021, this could be a problem.
"There's the slut now," whispered Abdul-Halim to his four friends, Taymullah, Mansur, Zahid, and Jabir. Of the five boys, two, Mansur and Jabir, were sons of German reverts to the faith. They were, if anything, more devout than the other three.
"Shameless," said Mansur. "The cunt should be veiled properly, her hair covered properly."
"It's the filthy Germans, polluting the world," added Zahid. "It will be a better place once it belongs to us, once the law of God replaces the nonsense they adhere to."
"And that is our job," said Taymullah, clutching a blanket in both hands. "As the imam said yesterday at the mosque, it is up to us to bring the word and the ways of Allah to this Godless place."
Amal was only human and thoroughly female. She enjoyed the admiration she received from people, men and women both, as she walked the street toward home.
Thus, it came as quite a shock to her, so much of a shock that she didn't even cry out, when five boys surrounded her, exclaimed, "This is our sister," dropped a blanket over her head and pulled her into a cellar.
Germans and German law had, long since, stopped defending Muslim women. Turks and Arabs, often terrified of retribution and having lost any faith that German law would protect them, simply turned away.
The "smiley," the cutting of a Muslim girl's face from one ear to the corner of her mouth in retribution for her dressing as a westerner, had been something of an urban legend in the early part of the century. Many had written and spoken of it yet no examples had ever been produced, no criminal cases had ever been launched.
Yet life can imitate art. Barraged with reports of the phenomenon, the urban legend had been adopted and turned into horrific reality. There were girls with "smileys," now, and in every corner of western Europe.
It was, after all, an excellent way to make a girl cover her face, in accordance with the hadiths and the sunna.
"You can't do this," Amal wept. "I'm not a Moslem. I've never been a Moslem."
"In the name of Allah we can do as we wish," insisted Abdul-Halim. "Besides, everyone is born a Moslem, that's what the imam says. It's just that some of them, like you, are apostate."
"You see," added Zahid, "there are only two kinds of women in the world. There are those who follow the law of God, and then there are sluts. Which are you?"
Chapter Eighteen
I will not blame Norwegian women for the rapes. But Norwegian women must understand that we live in a multi-cultural society and adapt themselves to it.
—Professor Unni Wikan, Oslo, Norway,
6 September 2001
Flight Seven Nine Three, 24 Muharram,
1538 AH (4 November, 2113)
"There's the castle," said Lee/Ling, looking through the airship's own night vision. "But . . . oh, oh . . . they've got company and there's more on the way."
Matheson, who had more than a little time under fire while praying for air support, answered, "Pity this thing doesn't have a loaded bomb rack, or a 25mm pod."
The Chinese shrugged. "Nothing we can do about that. And the winds here are going to be a pure bitch when I try to hold her steady above the castle walls."
The black nodded, then keyed the earpiece he wore. "Hamilton, Hans, this is Matheson. Report."
"We've got problems here, Bernie. More when I can talk."
Matheson heard the pffft . . . pffft . . . pffft of a silenced submachine gun in his earpiece along with the louder ringing of bullets careening off stone.
Castle Honsvang, Province of Baya, 24 Muharram,
1538 AH (4 November, 2113)
The corbasi had a simple, if inelegant, solution to the problem of the mines. He'd turned to the truck driver and asked, "Do you believe in Allah?" When the driver had, very nervously, answered in the affirmative, the colonel had said, "Go then, and drive your truck through these mines to clear a path."
Much to the surprise of both men the driver had survived the ordeal, though the truck was now considerably the worse for wear.
Through the broad, cleared path, the colonel and his remaining janissaries had poured, linking up with the dozen or so remaining to the sergeant of the guard. Not one for indecision, the colonel immediately detailed off ten men, five to each side, to watch the towers flanking the main entrance to the castle and keep anyone from shooting down at the gate. He then told the sergeant of the guard, "Get your men back on that battering ram. Make me a passage."
Hamilton felt more than heard the steady pounding coming from somewhere upstairs. "They're at it again," he told Hans. "Watch these; I'm going up to block the door."
Hans nodded, causing his face to twist and his eyes to open wide with the pain. He looked at Meara, the pederast, and said, "I think it would be simpler just to kill them now."
All three of the renegade scientists began squealing their objections through the tape over their mouths.
Hamilton shook his head. "No, not just yet anyway. But if I can't stop the people at the gate, kill these and then thoroughly destroy everything in lab. Then put all the virus containers into the crematorium and toast it."
"What about the kids?" Hans asked.
"I'll leave that to you and your conscience," Hamilton answered, glancing at Hans' weapon.
"We're going to lose, aren't we?" Hans asked.
"I don't know. I think so."
"Do you think you can use a rifle?" Matheson asked of Retief.
"Yes, of course. I did my military service."
"Good. Where's the best place to shoot from?"
"From the airship? Out either port or starboard ramp."
"Fine. We use port. Come with me. Lee? Take us over the group around the castle but put them between us and the walls, with the port side facing the castle."
"How low do you want me to go?" Lee/Ling asked.
"How big are your balls?"
"Well, at the moment, they don't exist," the pilot answered. "But you know, even if I were here in my own body . . . well, I'm only Chinese. Small penis. Not like you Americans . . . BIIIGGG penis,"
he mocked.
"Just take us in as low as you dare."
That was more serious. "Roger."
"Can you bring us in quietly?" Matheson asked.
"With all the firing down there, I hardly need to," the pilot answered.
"Yeah, come in quietly anyway. Let me know when we're broadside. And give me those goggles; you don't need them."
"Take them," the pilot said.
Asshole, Ling whispered mentally. That's my body you're taking risks with.
You knew it was dangerous when you volunteered, Lee answered.
I didn't volunteer. I was bred, chipped, and sold.
We all have these little issues, Lee answered.
Matheson and Retief crouched to either side of the ramp hatchway. Matheson still clutched his submachine gun while Retief held an assault rifle taken from one of the freed slaves. Retief wore the goggles taken from Ling's face.
"How's the armor on this thing?" Matheson asked.
"Armor?" Retief laughed. "What fucking armor?"
"Silly me. Open the hatch."
Retief's hand reached up to a button set into the wall. He pressed it, causing the hatch to slide open with a whoosh. Cold air streamed in through the opening.
"Hamilton? Matheson."
Hamilton eased the muzzle of his weapon out a window, hoping like hell that return fire wouldn't destroy his hands. He loosed a long, and almost certainly futile burst at the landing below. There was shouting and a single man cried out.
Sometimes the law of averages works in your favor, Hamilton thought.
"Hamilton? Matheson."
"I'm a little busy right now, Bernie," Hamilton answered, while dropping an empty magazine and inserting a fresh one.
"Yes, I can see. You're about to get a little, very temporary, relief. Look up."
The corbasi looked up and behind him. He wasn't sure why he did so, then or ever. He was, however, very glad that he had. At first, his mind refused to register the great, raylike shape that swung across the darkened sky without a sound. It was only when he saw the muzzle flashes that the threat registered.
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