Of Cinder and Bone

by Kyoko M

  He smirked as the man’s face paled. Jack continued forward to collect the fallen weapon.

  The henchman dove for the gun.

  Jack let go of Pete and caught the man’s wrist as he raised the gun towards him. He whipped it to one side and screamed as the gun went off mere inches from his right ear. Snarling, Jack broke the man’s wrist and stomped on his shoulder socket, twisting his arm behind him at a painful angle. The henchman shrieked and released it, but by then the damage had been done.

  Behind them, Pete hissed and clawed the blindfold off her face. Jack swore and let go of the man, raising his hands and walking towards her. “Hey, hey, easy. Easy, girl. It’s okay.”

  Pete’s wings stretched to full height and flapped once, twice, as she backed away from Jack, blowing great gusts of wind that kicked up dirt clods. Jack tried getting closer, keeping his voice level, but a panicked edge had crept into it. “Look at me, Pete. It’s okay.”

  He lunged for her chain, but she leapt over his head and launched herself into the air with three powerful flaps of her wings.

  “Pete!” Jack screamed, racing after her. He leapt over the fallen man and broke into a sprint as the dragon sailed over the sparse grass and disappeared over the cliff side by the road. Jack couldn’t breathe. He just stared as she soared over the trees below and then turned a hard left, disappearing into the shadow of the mountain. Gone. She was gone. Just like that.

  He didn’t know how long he’d been standing there, the gun loose in his hand, replaying the moment his dragon flew away in his head, when he heard someone scream his name. It didn’t matter, not really. His whole life had slipped from his grasp.

  “Jack!” Kamala grabbed his shoulder, panting with exertion, her eyes wild. “Where’s Pete?”

  “Gun,” he mumbled. “Guy had a gun. Spooked her. She… she flew away.”

  “Gods,” she breathed, staring out at the countryside. “I didn’t even know she could do that.”

  A hollow laugh rattled in Jack’s lungs. “Me neither.”

  “We have to go, Jack.” At first, he didn’t budge. She gripped him harder, forcing him to face her. “Jack, we can use the tracker to find her again. Please. They’re coming.” Her words seem to jostle him out of the shock and he nodded shakily. She grabbed his arm and pulled him behind her as they hurried down the road.

  “How many rounds do you have left?” Kamala asked.

  Jack checked the pistol and then the gun he’d swiped from the henchman on the hill. “Six in the Miroku, eight in the H.K. You out?”

  “Yeah.”

  He handed her the Heckler & Koch. “Did you get the other guys?”

  “Yes, but they have reinforcements on the way. If we don’t get out of here now—”

  A black van coming up the road in the opposite direction swung towards them at breakneck speed. Jack grabbed Kamala around the waist and threw them both down near the guard rail. The van missed by a foot and screeched to a stop several yards away, blocking both lanes. Jack hauled Kamala to her feet and shoved her behind him, barking, “Go!” as he opened fire on the van’s tires. He managed to puncture two of them seconds before the door slid back and the yakuza returned fire, punching divots into the road near his feet.

  He turned tail and bolted after Kamala, flinching as he heard the bullets whizzing past him on either side. “Where the hell is Fujioka when you need her? She is so fired if we live through this.”

  “Up there!” Kamala shouted, pointing. He followed her finger and saw that to their right, about twelve feet above them and less than half a mile ahead, Fujioka, Watsuki, and Yagami were firing down on another black van blocking the road. They could just barely see an eighteen-wheeler behind it, which had to be their escape vehicle since it was the only thing large enough to transport Pete to safety. Four bodies littered the road. Three men with automatic rifles took cover behind the van to reload their weapons.

  Jack and Kamala hid in a crevasse in the cliff wall about twenty feet from the chaos. “What do we do?” Kamala asked. “We can’t get up to where they are from here. If the other men behind us catch up, it’s over.”

  “Element of surprise is the best we’ve got,” Jack said. “The guys next to the van haven’t spotted us yet.”

  She stared at him. “Those are terrible odds. We’d have to hit them all at once without missing.”

  He winced. “True, but if we miss one and he’s distracted, the others will take him out.”

  She exhaled slowly. “Then I guess we’d better not miss the first time.”

  “Yeah. Getting shot isn’t fun, let me tell you. Ready?”

  “Absolutely not.”

  “Me neither. You lead, I follow.”

  A faint smile touched her lips. “My dragon to the end. Let’s go.”

  The two moved as one around the corner, took careful aim, and pulled their triggers.

  The three yakuza collapsed to the pavement howling in pain; two of them got hit in the legs, the other in the arm.

  “Don’t move!” Jack and Kamala ordered, keeping their sights trained on the writhing men and picking up their fallen weapons as they approached.

  “Well, well,” Fujioka called down with a broad grin. “Here comes the cavalry. You’re late.”

  “Better late than never,” Jack replied. “Get your asses down here so we can get the hell out of—”

  “Look out!” Watsuki shouted, shoving Yagami behind him. The bullet hit him high in the chest, shattering his right clavicle. He collapsed to his knees and wheezed, one large hand closing over the wound as blood ran scarlet and thick down his torso.

  Fujioka didn’t react in time. The shot hit her left shoulder and she fell backward, out of Jack and Kamala’s line of sight.

  “No!” Jack and Kamala screamed simultaneously. They whirled to see the shots had come from street level, not up high.

  The seven men from the van up the road split into two groups: three giving each other a boost as they climbed on the cliff afterwhere Yagami, Fujioka, and Watsuki were, andthe others laying cover fire as they approached Jack and Kamala.

  The pair took refuge behind the eighteen-wheeler, checking the guns they’d taken from the fallen yakuza.

  “There aren’t enough rounds,” Kamala said hoarsely. “We can’t take them out.”

  The hail of bullets fell away to a blanketing silence as Jack realized they’d reached the end of the line. The world stopped spinning. The searing pain in his right ear, the burning exhaustion in his legs, the thin air in his lungs, all fell away. All he could see was the woman in front of him, the woman he’d be spending his last moments on earth with, and suddenly the words came to him.

  “I love you.”

  Kamala froze, her brown eyes wide. “W-What?”

  “I should have told you months ago,” he whispered, his own eyes wet. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Kam.” Jack raised his gun as a man came around the front of the truck and opened fire with a roar, emptying the clip into the man’s chest. The yakuza crumpled to the road in a heap. Another one stepped out from behind him and raised his AR-15, his finger closing on the trigger.

  And then the dragon dropped out of the sky right on top of him.

  Pete slammed the man to the ground with her clawed feet and took a vicious bite out of his neck, killing him instantly. A third man jumped on top of the truck’s hood and stopped dead out of pure shock, as he was now level with her. The dragon snarled and slammed her tail into his chest. It sent him cartwheeling off the edge of the road and down into the ravine beside it, screaming the whole way.

  The dragon snorted once and then hurried over to Jack and Kamala, sniffing them briefly in confirmation, and then nudging them towards her large, scaly torso.

  “I… I think she wants us to get on,” Kamala said, dumbfounded as Pete bumped her side up against them and flapped her huge wings.

  “That’s impossible,”
Jack sputtered. “The two of us together nearly weigh three hundred pounds. She can’t possibly lift—holy shitbricks!”

  Impatient, the dragon slid her neck through Jack’s parted legs and stood up, barking once at Kamala. She threw her leg over the dragon’s back. Then Pete took three mighty steps towards the edge of the road and leapt off.

  For three terrifying seconds, they dropped through the air like a cement block.

  Then, Pete’s leathery wings spread and they flew.

  Gunfire cracked behind them, but the dragon flapped her wings to carry them higher out of harm’s way. She wheeled to one side and they disappeared into the shadow of the mountain range, over the forest below.

  Jack dug his fingers into the dragon’s collar and finally opened his eyes. He stared speechless at the ground easily forty feet below them and into the cloudy horizon. Wind whistled past his ears, interrupted only by the powerful strokes of the dragon’s wings and the raspy clink of the chain still dragging below her body as they cut through the crisp air. She flew smoothly, as if she’d been doing it all her life, as if it were an effortless skill.

  Behind him, Kamala had locked her arms around his waist and buried her face between his shoulder blades when they’d first taken off. Now, she held one hand out flat, her palm parallel to the ground, feeling the wind rushing over it. Half-hysterical laughter enveloped them both as the dragon carried them higher still, until they were circling one of the mountain’s peaks.

  Enormous clouds piled high around the mountain and the air became sharply cold as they neared it. The trees stopped halfway up its craggy face and gave way to perpetual ice created from the height and upper atmosphere. As Pete circled for the fourth time, they realized she was searching for shelter.

  On the fifth pass, the dragon brought her wings in close to her body in a dive as they reached a cliff near the mouth of a cave. She fought the stiff wind and landed hard, digging her claws into the earth. Jack helped Kamala off and the dragon shook herself and stepped forward into the cave. The two of them called to her, but she paid them no mind. The freezing temperature and high winds wouldn’t make it easy to get down any time soon.

  They had no choice.

  So they followed the dragon into the darkness.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  VINDICATED

  Naturally, Kamala had no cell phone reception, but her phone still worked well enough as a flashlight as they stepped deeper into the cave. She swept it around quickly to make sure no predator—aside from the enormous dragon, of course—lurked about. The cave was only about ten feet across and barely seven feet high. The large cracks on the walls and along the ground led them to believe it had been part of a landslide that the wind and rain hollowed out over time. There were a couple of abandoned birds’ nests in one corner, but nothing to suggest anything had lived in it recently. For the moment, they were alive, and alone.

  Pete sniffed out a spot furthest from the mouth of the cave and plopped down. She curled herself into a neat circle and rested her head on her overlapped feet. She exhaled deeply and closed her eyes to rest.

  “So,” Jack said quietly. “What the fuck?”

  “What the fuck,” Kamala agreed, nodding as she stared at the slumbering giant. “Where do we even begin? How on earth did she figure out how to fly? How did her muscles and skeletal structure support almost three hundred pounds of weight during flight? Why did she come back for us when her survival instincts told her to run the first time?”

  “Yes to all of that. I’m at a loss for words here.”

  She sighed. “Well, we’re going to be stuck here for a while until that storm passes. I guess that’ll be food for thought. For now, you mentioned that we need to cure her.”

  “Yeah.” Jack reached into his coat pocket and withdrew one of the vials, and a capped syringe, both of which he’d securely wrapped for safekeeping. “She really doesn’t like needles, so let’s wait until we’re sure she’s asleep before the injection. Otherwise, we’re in as much danger as the yakuza she just snacked on.”

  She took the vial, examining it. “What are the contents?”

  He told her. “It should work, but we’ll start with a low dose and monitor her progress closely. If nothing else, the cold might help slow her metabolism.”

  A small shiver ran through her as she pocketed the vial, and a moment later, Jack’s suit jacket enclosed around her shoulders. She glanced up at him in surprise and he smiled a bit.

  “You didn’t have to—”

  “It’s fine,” he assured her. “I run hot usually.”

  He sat down in front of Pete and patted the dragon’s side before leaning into her. She slept on, her slow, deep breaths rustling the dirt where her head lay. Kamala sat next to him and rested her head against the dragon as well, staring up into the dark.

  “Do you think they’re—”

  “I don’t know,” Jack said softly. “I’m… trying not to think about it yet. You know me. I’m a worst case scenario kind of guy.”

  Kamala didn’t say anything else. The wind kept howling. The world kept spinning. In any other circumstance, the sound of nature carrying on would soothe her, but it just made everything that much worse. She didn’t try to hide the tears when they fell.

  Jack didn’t say anything either. He just wrapped his arm around her and leaned her head on his shoulder.

  After all, what was there left to say?

  ~*~

  Misaki Fujioka hadn’t suffered a gunshot in years.

  She almost forgot how much it sucked.

  First, the searing pain of impact. Second, the horrid burning stench of perforated skin, muscles, and fluids. Third, the fact that it knocked her on her ass and left her dizzy and nauseous. Fourth, the knowledge that she could either bleed to death or lose the use of a limb if she didn’t receive the right medical attention. Fifth, the overwhelming urge for revenge against the son of a bitch responsible.

  Growling curses in Japanese, Fujioka rolled over and pushed up with her working arm to survey the damages they’d suffered. Watsuki lay face up, gasping through the pain of his own wound, and she could tell he was struggling to stay conscious. A broken clavicle was one of the most painful injuries a man could endure. She sympathized, but that didn’t mean she’d gone soft.

  “Get your big ass up,” she snarled at him. “They’re coming.”

  His dark eyes darted around, his pupils wide enough to make them look black. “Y-Yagami-san? W-Where?”

  Fujioka jerked her head in the direction behind them. “He ran. Worry about yourself for now. Can you move?”

  He gritted his teeth and pushed up on one hand. “Somewhat.”

  “Can you still shoot?”

  “Too late,” he grunted, staring past her shoulder.

  Fujioka reached for the assault rifle, only to stop as she felt the barrel of a gun jab the nape of her neck.

  “Don’t move.”

  She glared upward to find herself surrounded by three men. They kicked her gun out of reach and demanded to know where Yagami had gone. Neither of them spoke. Sadly, they didn’t have to, because a moment later, someone over their ear piece told them he’d been found.

  A minute later, Yagami reappeared with his hands zip-tied behind his back, a fresh bruise puffing out over his left cheekbone. A couple of Inagawa-kai pushed him down next to Watsuki and told him not to move while they waited for their leader to arrive.

  Fujioka stayed stock still and glanced obliquely down over the ledge, hoping to catch sight of Jack and Kamala. After the gunshot, she’d heard a commotion and more gunfire, but no one was moving down there. Her gut tightened into a painful knot. Had someone gotten to them both?

  “So, what now?” Yagami growled at the men holding them. “Which one of your pathetic masters do you dogs heel to? Arisawa? Hakate? What inbred sociopath put you up to this?”

  “That would be me.”

 
The men parted.

  And Kazuma Okegawa walked into view.

  Yagami stared open-mouthed. “K-Kazu?”

  Okegawa nodded slowly. “Hai.”

  Yagami shook his head. “No. That’s impossible. You’re Yamaguchi. You’re their shateigashira. Everyone knows that.”

  “They’re supposed to know that. It’s the entire point of a sleeper agent.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?” Yagami spat.

  “We will get to that in time, aniki. For now…” His eyes fell across the trio, and a calculating look went through them. “We only need two hostages, not three.”