The Darkest Night (The Second Dark Ages Book 2)

by Michael Anderle

  Yuko glanced over and looked him up and down. “First armor, then weapons.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  In the last one hundred and fifty years Akio had yet to meet anyone who could best him in hand-to-hand combat. At one level that had been satisfying, but on another level it meant he didn’t know what he could achieve.

  Now, as the container the seven of them were riding in slowly started to descend, he took a moment to look at Michael. Really look at him, and size him up.

  His stance, his graceful way of moving. A tic by his eye was the only sign that he was annoyed with himself.

  If he hadn’t known who Michael was, he wouldn’t have guessed him to be so deadly, which meant Akio had a blind spot.

  It wasn’t that Michael didn’t have a certain fluidity to his movements, but he didn’t announce his abilities with every move, every decision.

  Michael’s eyes would crinkle in humor at times. Usually it would stay there unless he touched his head. It was obvious that his lack of hair was bothering him. Even that annoyance went away quickly, however, when something else caught his attention.

  He had a certain boyish charm to his manner, to be sure. However, when he was angered or felt slighted, the person Akio had heard described in the past came out.

  The Patriarch was just under the skin, waiting to take over. Michael wore his easy-going personality like a new set of clothes. He was trying to grow into the man they represented, but his old clothes fought to stay relevant.

  Akio didn’t give the old clothes much of a thought. Bethany Anne would see that they were tossed out eventually. “Akio?” He turned to see Yuko unlatch the bottom shelf that held the sword Bethany Anne had given him. He nodded to her, and she pulled it out and lifted it to offer it to him.

  He hadn’t used it in a long time, mostly because he felt it needed to be a special occasion. Right now, his first battle by Michael’s side would be just such an occasion.

  Yuko came up to him, a sense of peace emanating from her as she held it with two hands. “Our Queen provided this sword for your use. It seems fitting that it should go into battle by Michael’s side.” Akio turned and found Michael smiling at him. It took only a half second before Michael shook his head.

  “Oh, no,” Michael told him. “Bethany Anne would have a fit if I accepted the sword from you. She gave it to a Queen’s Bitch. That Queen’s Bitch needs to be the one to use it for her.”

  Akio’s lips tried on a size-two smile, something just a bit bigger than he would normally show. The muscles in his face screamed in agony, as they weren’t used to the man stretching them to smile. His frowning muscles, however, were in top shape. Good thing the nanocytes in his body helped overcome the challenge, he thought.

  “Hai!” he agreed, and accepted the sword from Yuko.

  —

  “What the hell is that?” James asked, as he pointed to the sky some ways to their left. They were all standing on top of a tall building, waiting for the pack to reach them.

  “The hell…” Kirk mused.

  “It’s a box,” Timothy answered from behind them, a scope to his eye. “And get this shit - there is a man on it looking out an open door.” He pulled the gun out from his eye. “Want me to take him out?”

  “The Duke?” James asked.

  Kirk shook his head. “No, if the Duke is truly a vampire, he can’t be in the sun and this guy certainly is.”

  With the rifle up to his eye, Timothy spoke again, “He seems to be looking down at the Werewolves and pointing at something.”

  Timothy yanked the gun from his shoulder. “What happened?” James asked, noticing that Timothy seemed spooked.

  “Uh…” Timothy turned to look towards the dust billowing where the Yellow pack was flowing towards them from the west. “I get the impression he didn’t appreciate me aiming my rifle at him.”

  “Ok,” Kirk answered, perplexed. “I’ll bite. How would he even know you were aiming at him? He’s too far away.”

  “Apparently not.” Timothy shook his head. “Might seem weird to you, and certainly seems weird to me, but I’d put my hand on my Grandmother’s grave and swear that he just told me to aim my rifle somewhere else or he would come over here and shove it up my ass.”

  All seven men on the roof turned to look at Timothy, who held the rifle in one hand, and put the other up. “This hand will swear right here.”

  The men all had a good chuckle as they turned to the west when they felt, more than heard, a deep sound and saw a large eruption of dirt in the direction of the wolves.

  “Now what the hell?” Kirk asked.

  Timothy put the scope up to his eye and looked. “Kirk, you ain’t going to believe this shit, but it’s raining wolves out there.”

  —

  Adorjan barked twice and stopped running. He turned around to witness something he never expected to see: his pack falling from the sky along with massive amounts of dirt and rocks. He heard two yips from his left where one of his wolves was hit by falling debris.

  The humans had used a bomb on his pack.

  His pack!

  His eyes glowed a deeper yellow as he howled commands for them to catch up. The wounded would have to heal on their own. His anger was complete: now he didn’t want to taste the death of these humans because he had been commanded to; he wanted their blood all over his teeth because they dared to hurt his people.

  As the stragglers made it to the larger group, he changed and stood in his large human form. “They dared to bomb our people!” He turned and faced the city where many of them could make out tiny flickers of movement. “Leave not a one alive!” Adorjan changed back to a large sand-colored wolf and howled his anger as he bolted towards the city.

  That’s when he noticed the flying box take off into the sky. There was a new group of humans between his pack and the city. More to rip and tear before they reached the main group.

  That worked for him just fine.

  —

  The eight men watched as the wolves stopped to regroup. The floating container lowered itself to a large swath of ground between the city proper and the wolves advancing on them.

  When the container left, there were seven people on the ground.

  Kirk could hear noises from Timothy’s rifle, and turned to see him sliding the scope off. “What?” he asked. “Your sights are gonna be all sorts of fucked up now.”

  “Yeah, maybe,” Timothy agreed as he put the scope up to his eye. “But I don’t have to worry about shitting out the barrel of my gun an inch at a time either,” He answered. “We got one weird-ass group out there, boss.”

  “Here, let me see,” Kirk ordered, and Timothy passed the scope over to him. He put it up to his eye, then pulled it down and used his shirt to clean it

  —

  "What are they doing?" James asked as he watched Kirk look at the people in the distance through Timothy’s scope. "Kind of a motley crew."

  "The Motley Seven?" Kirk snorted.

  "Just answer my question. You are hogging the scope."

  "Looks like they are dressing their line." Kirk responded.

  "What line?" James asked in confusion. “There are only seven of them."

  "James?" Kirk asked. “What does your cousin look like?"

  "Gracie?" James responded. “You can't miss her, red head and skin white enough to blind you on a full moon night."

  "No," Kirk snorted, "not Gracie."

  "Sabine?" James tried a second time.

  "Yes."

  "Well, when she was alive, she had dark black hair."

  "Uh huh," Kirk replied. After a moment, he gestured. "Keep going."

  “Blue eyes, thin. She was a runner."

  "No," Kirk told him as he turned and handed him the scope. "It's not 'was'."

  "What?" James grabbed the scope from his friend and put it up to his eye. "The hell?"

  "That's my line," Kirk answered.

  "She's got guns," James blurted. "She... She’s alive?”

>   "And she's about to take on five hundred Werewolves along with six others."

  "That's not a motley crew, guys," Timothy said. He had taken the scope from James and was looking through it. "Whoever those two older men are, they are killers."

  "How can you tell?" Kirk asked.

  “Because they wear their weapons like extensions of themselves.”

  James smiled. “Fuck it! I'm going down."

  The eight men whooped in delight as Kirk called over the old radios, "All hands, do not fire. Eagle’s Nest is coming down and joining the Magnificent Seven."

  ---

  "Michael," Akio started. “You are in the middle, with Jacqueline, Mark and Eve to your right. Sabine, Yuko and myself to your left."

  Michael raised an eyebrow. “Eve?" He looked over at the tiny woman, who smiled up at him.

  "It took me three decades to come to the conclusion that killing wasn't against my protocols,” she told him.

  Michael glanced over to Akio before returning to Eve, "Protocols?"

  "She had to figure it out for herself," Yuko responded as she checked her pistols. She had a sword on her back, but wasn't planning on using it. "She had a dump of ADAM's programming, including a special section that he didn't tell anyone he had included. She had to find it out for herself, let me tell you." Yuko pulled both pistols and shot four times with each hand.

  Seven wolves dropped in the distance, and were dodged by their packmates. None of them realized that their friends were not getting back up.

  "Damn, I missed one." She chewed on her lip. “Ok, that is upsetting."

  Akio looked at Michael. “She's ready."

  "Why," Mark asked, looking over to Jacqueline, "do I feel superfluous?"

  "Probably," answered Michael, "because you two and Akio are our close support." He nodded to the wolves. "When they get up here, it's going to become a melee. Make sure you protect Sabine."

  "Hello the group!" a voice called out behind them. The seven turned around.

  "James?" Sabine spoke softly.

  "Know him?" Akio asked.

  Sabine nodded. “He's my cousin. He's the one I was coming to see."

  "Seems like it's family reunion time now." Michael smiled. "New plan, make sure your friends don't fire on those trying to help them."

  Sabine looked over at him and Michael answered her unspoken question. "Not all things that go bump in the night are afraid of the sun, Sabine."

  The woman turned to stare at Jacqueline, who looked at her and smiled as her eyes flashed yellow. “Oh. Ohhhh.”

  You are the wind, Akio’s voice rippled through her mind and she nodded her understanding to Michael.

  —

  The humans were spreading out. A bald man in a coat stood in the middle of the group. Adorjan aimed at him, as any Alpha would.

  Challenge accepted.

  There were more humans behind the first group; all of them had weapons. What this pitiful group expected to accomplish against his pack of five hundred Weres, Adorjan wasn't sure.

  It was obvious that humans had learned of the paranormal and this group had found enough silver to kill those in his pack who had tried to infiltrate the city.

  That was one of the reasons the Duke had held off attacking so far.

  Occasionally the Duke would send his son and that group of useless vampires into the city to foment more fear. It worked, to a point. What it also accomplished was providing the humans with a way to figure out how to take down vampires, with all the practice they were given.

  Garlic was useless; crosses were laughed at. Massive amounts of damage and burning solved the vampire problem just fine, though. Vampires, or Weres for that matter, were able to heal their injuries. However, if someone did enough damage it would overcome that ability and they would die.

  Five hundred against fifteen and whatever number of humans were behind them?

  His pack would be feasting on the bones before lunchtime.

  ---

  "Sabine!" hissed James from behind her.

  "Yes?" she answered, calmly looking out over the Werewolves they now could see amassing against them. The snipers behind them were firing downrange.

  The fight would begin soon.

  "You know how to use those things?" James asked, not understanding how his cousin was both alive and wearing pistols he didn’t recognize. The pistols were modified, for sure. She had some special cartridges that seemed to plug into the handles of the pistols, a total of six stored along the back of her belt.

  Timothy, next to James, whistled. “Nice cartridges,” he said, and turned to wink at James.

  “Tim, that’s my cousin!” he hissed back. “Don’t make the first person I shoot be you!”

  “No, I’m good with you shooting Tim,” Kirk jumped in. “That’s just one less for me to worry about, and you don’t count. You’re her cousin.”

  Yuko looked over to Sabine, who was rolling her eyes. “Are they fighting over you?”

  Sabine looked back at the Japanese woman. “Last night I was running away from Werewolves, now I feel like running towards them due to these jackasses behind us.”

  Yuko shrugged. “It’s kinda cute, in a barbaric sort of way.”

  “Barbaric?” Kirk responded.

  Michael snorted from the other side of Yuko. “Watch the outside, people. Gunslingers, let’s start.” He put action to words and Kirk’s eyes about bugged out when the bald man threw back the sides of his coat and grabbed two pistols, then started punching holes in wolves some distance away.

  Just what the hell were those pistols?

  “Oh, holy fuck…” James whispered as fountains of gore exploded. He couldn’t quite make out what the hell was happening, but he could see the results.

  “The hell…” Timothy said.

  “That’s my line!” Kirk argued.

  —

  Yuko winked at Sabine. “I’ve got longer range, so be patient, young one.”

  Young one? Sabine thought. How old are you? That’s when she noticed the delicate Japanese woman’s eyes flash red as she unholstered her two pistols.

  “The thing about fighting just anyone,” Yuko stated as she raised her pistols, “is that you never know who was blessed to have met Jean Dukes in their past.”

  Akio nodded in appreciation as Yuko started slamming rounds into the wolfpack. Yuko’s face showed no distaste for her kills. He wondered what was going through her mind just then.

  The wolf pack was now only a quarter mile away. Akio unholstered his pistol and started shooting randomly. He decided that he didn’t want to only be close in support.

  Yuko was humming to herself, an ancient song she sang when she wanted to lose herself.

  Michael started walking forward, both pistols continuing to fire.

  Behind them, the eight men looked at each other, eyes open in amazement. “The hell are these people?” Kirk whispered to James.

  From in front of them, Michael answered his question. “We are the Magnificent Seven.” He and the one called Akio laughed at their own joke.

  Kirk, Timothy and James swallowed.

  Had they heard them?

  Inside Paris

  “We will head out tonight,” the Duke told Gerard, “and take out any remaining humans. If the Rehbolson Pack is unsuccessful by mid-morning, send in the rest on my command. I wish to have Paris in my control before I go out at midnight, is that understood?”

  His butler merely bowed and turned to leave as his master went into his secured room to sleep.

  Tonight he would be the second most powerful man in Europe, and the most powerful human.

  The other humans just didn’t know it yet. First Paris, then old France, and then Germany would fall, and eventually there would only be one trusted human running the empire during the day.

  And only one trusted to get close enough to the Duke to help him sleep a final time, making the assassin the most powerful man in all of Europe.

  The blood the Duke had shared w
ith him already provided him with a superior body; he didn’t need hundreds of years to enjoy himself before someone else had the crown.

  But he wanted enough years to make all of his slaving for the Duke worth the effort.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Adorjan could hear cries of pain coming from behind him as he maintained his relentless pace, heading for the group of humans who were not only shooting but killing his pack.

  He would have to be deaf not to hear the sounds of his pack exploding behind him. He wasn’t sure how that had occurred, but the people in front of them must have obtained weapons from before WWDE. When they killed them, Adorjan would keep the weapons for himself and perhaps, just perhaps, he might kill the Duke with them.

  Wouldn’t that make all of these deaths around him worthwhile?

  Those human bastards were actually walking towards his people, not running in fright as they should. His growls and howls of anger were answered by those around him.

  One hundred yards left.

  —

  “So, do I get to have some fun, or do I have to stay like this?” Jacqueline asked, the desire to change already feeding into her system.

  Mark looked between his love and Michael, who was still shooting and muttering little adages. “Like shooting fish in a barrel” was one of his favorites.

  Michael turned to the humans behind them. “If any of you dare shoot us in the back, I will personally rip your arm off and shove it up your ass.”

  Sabine turned around and added, “Right before I shoot you myself. Don’t fuck with my friends.”

  Everyone noticed that the two of them still aimed and shot while talking with them.

  “The hell?” said two of the guys behind Kirk, James and Timothy as Michael and Sabine turned back around. Kirk sighed.

  Then Michael holstered his weapon.

  “Wait for it!” he commanded. “Yes, that means you, Jacqueline!” he added to the young woman.

  —

  “Did her eyes just flash yellow?” James asked no one in particular.

  Sabine’s head whipped around. “Don’t make me shoot you, James!”

  James shook his head. “You know?”