Conspiracy of Fire

by Tony Bulmer

  Cheena Tao gave a dry laugh. You are very sure of yourself today Ted, perhaps you find my company boring. Is that it Ted—I bore you?”

  Congo twisted the girls hair as tight as it would go, until Priscilla Geryon’s face contorted with pain, “It’s not me who’s bored lady—but the fact you even bring that up, that tells me more about your line of thinking than you know yourself. ”Congo gave Cheena Tao a contemptuous sneer, “But I can’t say I blame you. A woman like you needs stimulation and lots of it, and that husband of yours—well baby, I can’t see you getting a whole lot of satisfaction in that department, if you know what I mean.”

  Cheena Tao regarded Ted Congo carefully, with cold inscrutable eyes, “That is what I like about you Ted, your tenuous grasp of psycho-­‐ analytical principals and your abundant personal psychosis make you a quite unique case study. Perhaps I should have you stuffed and mounted under glass?”

  Ted Congo released Priscilla Geryon very suddenly and she toppled sideways into the swimming pool. Out of her depth in the deep water,

  she began splashing wildly, in an attempt to reach the side. Congo watched her thoughtfully as she floundered. “Horrible accidents happen every day. For example, drowning in swimming pools is the fifth most common cause of unintentional death in America.”

  Cheena Tao picked up the long-­‐handled pool net and examined it with interest, “What if you factor in intentional deaths?”

  “Ten people a day die of regular drowning, more if you factor in boating accidents. But in answer to your question, I would say that there is a 10% margin if you are going to factor in more deliberate causes.”

  “How interesting.” Cheena Tao raised an elegant eyebrow and reached the pool net out over the turbulent waters of the swimming pool. Very carefully she netted Priscilla Geryon’s head and gave the net an abrupt tug downwards.

  Ted Congo turned to see where the help were at, “What the hell is the matter with you guys? Stop dicking around and drag the boyfriend over here, now.”

  Congo’s goons dragged Thurston Petrelli to the side of the swimming pool. Half drowned half dazed from the savage blow to the head, he collapsed face first at the side of the pool. He lay there for a long minute unable to move until the horrible commotion in the swimming pool suddenly drew his attention. As the hapless lawyer raised his head upwards, Congo clamped a heavy foot down on the back of his neck.

  “You see that you punk? That loudmouthed little skank you’ve been shtupping is getting her comeuppance—you see that?”

  Thurston Petrelli uttered a feeble whimpering noise and clutched weakly at Congo’s ankle.

  “Get your goddamn hands of me,” yelled Congo, his spittle flecking through the air. He leaned forward now, the hard leather sole of his penny loafer eating into the soft flesh at the back of the lawyer’s neck. Thurston Petrelli made a horrible gurgling noise as the weight pressed in on his throat, closing off his airway by slow degrees.

  Unable to remove the towel from her mouth and stay afloat, Priscilla Geryon was floundering wildly in the deep water. Every time she fought her way to the surface, Cheena Tao leaned hard on the pool net forcing her victims head underneath the water once again.

  Watching every second of the unfolding nightmare Thurston Petrelli struggled desperately. He flapped and clawed and wriggled and issued horrible strangulated noises, but it was no use, slowly inexorably his struggles subsided as he succumbed to the unbearable weight pressing in from above. Then, finally, as the lawyer’s flailings subsided, overtaken by the long, slow sounds of death, Ted Congo eased back, then tilted his head, inspecting his handy work. Satisfied, he turned and threw the help a nod. They moved in, and tossed the lawyer’s lifeless corpse into the eerie, rippling waters of the swimming pool. The splash

  resounded. The prone corpse drifted downwards.

  With the pool net clamped down tight over her head, Priscilla Geryon saw everything. Her fingernails tore wildly at the fabric of the net, shredding ragged holes but it wasn’t enough to save her. The metal rim of the net remained fixed

  around her neck. Cheena Tao twisted the pole, driving it down towards the bottom of the pool. She held it there, leaning hard until the pool water filled her victim’s lungs. Then, the surface of the pool became slowly calm, as two dark shapes hung eerily beneath the water, drifting together in eternity.

  46

  With the sound of breaking glass ringing in her ears, Karyn Kane barreled through the emergency exit door of the coffee shop, straight into the guy with the blue windbreaker. She didn’t pause to think, she hit him hard and fast in the neck, with a scything forearm chop, and he went down like his legs had been cut away. The sound of running feet in the corridor behind her now—then, two quick shots fizzing past her head. She spun left, moving flush to the wall. She pulled her Sig and held it ready at head height. The first man out the door had good form, leading with his weapon, so he could double-­‐tap her on sight. He never saw her. Karyn caught him by the wrist, and took control. She hit him hard on the bridge of the nose with the edge of her pistol. His face exploded in a mess of blood. As he toppled forwards, she smashed a knee into his groin and caught him hard on the back of the skull with a powerful elbow strike. As he toppled forwards, Karyn moved fast and low. There were two men in the corridor, both of them sporting black clothes and HK MP5s. She shot the first guy twice, before he had time to even squeeze off. He went down on his ass. Guy number two overcompensated, unloading a panic burst that cut into the ceiling and carved a foot wide hole in the door. He paused and corrected, but he didn’t get a second chance. Karyn doubled two shots, one inside the other and caught him twice in the head. He impacted the wall, and slid heavily to the floor.

  There were screams coming from the front of the coffee shop now, terrified citizens reacting to

  the sight of men with guns. Outside, Karyn scoped the territory, weighing her options. Long shadows sliced into the alley. There were parked cars and dumpsters on both sides of the street; plenty of places to hide, but that wasn’t an option. She was dealing with professionals. They would set up a field of fire and comb her out in five minutes tops.

  She had to move forward. Even one second of delay would be fatal. She slammed the fire exit door and wedged it closed. The obstacle would buy her time, but the strike team would be noosing off the area, making ready for a draw in. Unless she broke the perimeter and fast, her time was short, they would pull their trap tight, then game over. There was no way these boys were looking to take her alive—they wanted to make things clean and final.

  Bullets popped through the exit door. They were shooting out the hinges; any second they would be through. The situation was desperate. She was outnumbered and out-­‐gunned, caught short in a rat-­‐pipe alleyway with only one-­‐way out.

  Karyn didn’t pause, not even for a second. She moved forwards, skirting past the dumpsters, heading
out of the darkness towards the glittering boulevard. Her enemies would be there, very many of them moving in unison, with their radio-­‐mic headsets and heavy artillery.

  Cars flashed past on the boulevard, the real world of bustling city crowds getting tantalizingly close—so close she might almost make it through the darkness, out into the fast moving and anonymous streets, where she could disappear without trace.

  The sound of an engine gunning wildly, and hot tires screeching through traffic. They were coming. Karyn raised her weapon and stood ready.

  Headlights burned into the alley on full beam. The car came fast, tortured metal rending against asphalt, as it bottomed out on the lip of the sidewalk and came roaring towards her. Karyn moved through the headlights, her Sig held high. Without pausing, she hammered off four quick shots, two for the driver two for the passenger. It was an ambitious play, based purely on instinct. But Karyn’s instincts were good, the car kept coming, but it began to veer, barreling wildly against first one side of the alley, then the other. The offside front wing peeled off dramatically and flew into the air. The car hit a dumpster and rebounded hard. A headlamp popped out, steam roared in a torrent from the radiator, but the car kept coming.

  Karyn moved forwards, her weapon high and ready. The car veered towards her with building speed. It seemed as though the damaged hulk was homing in on her heat signature, like some kind of Chinese made surface to air missile. Karyn stayed calm and kept moving, holding ready for the moment she would unleash again. The car was moving crazily now, sparks raining through the air as it accelerated towards her. She stood in the middle of the alley and let rip. She unleashed the remnants of her first magazine, and ejected it one handed. She popped a second mag’ home in a seamless, fluid motion and let go with that one too.

  Only yards away now, the car made a last violent swerve and cut into the wall. The horrible grinding impact was dramatic and final. The hood

  of the car crumpled inwards, buckling into a mess of steaming metal. Covering the cabin, Karyn moved past the wreckage. The hot smell of oil and gasoline caught on the soft night wind. She looked inside the cab. The driver was dead. Folded over the steering wheel, his face covered by the remnants of a bloody air bag. The dude in the passenger seat was still moving. He stared at Karyn, like he had just seen the grim reaper moving in to pluck his soul. She reached in quick, and gave him a fast moving right hook that caught him in the sweet spot of his bottom jaw. There hadn’t been any need to pop him, but it sure felt good anyway. This ugly little takedown was no coincidence. Deng Tao was stretching out his insidious tentacles to silence anyone he perceived to be a threat to his new world Empire.

  Karyn moved out onto the Boulevard with confidence, but the vagrant was waiting, the very same guy she had seen around the front of the café just a few short minutes before. Except he wasn’t a vagrant, he was a point man for the takedown team, ratting out her position into his headset mic. The second he saw her he fumbled inside his tatty looking vagrant coat, to pull his weapon, but he was way too slow. Karyn popped him two quick shots in the center mass at close range. She could see the rounds as they caught him hard in the tactical body armor he was wearing under the ratty vagrant coat. The impact of the bullets lifted him off his feet and he tumbled to the floor, skating across the sidewalk on his back. Karyn kicked his weapon into the gutter and scoped the street. The boulevard was plenty busy, lined with up-­‐market shops and parked cars. From across the street people had

  clearly heard the snap of gunshots and they were looking her way, unsure as to exactly what was going on. Karyn moved her weapon down to her side, and scoped the street. The black van that had been following her was parked up in a red zone, thirty yards away.

  The vagrant point man scrabbled on the floor beneath her, gasping for breath, his desperate fingers clawing for the communications headset that had gotten torn from his head. As he grasped it, Karyn trod on his hand, crushing both the microphone and his quivering fingers. He made an agonized cry. Karyn showed him her gun—let him stare into the barrel. “You want to live?” she asked.

  The point man nodded weakly. Karyn smiled. “Good choice.” Behind her the sound of running feet, pounding up the alley towards her. Karyn looked down at the guy on the floor. “How many in the van?” she asked, angling her Sig towards his head. The point man gurgled an expletive, his face twisting in agony. Karyn gave him a hard look, raised her gun another inch. The point man held up two fingers with difficulty. Karyn nodded quickly, almost imperceptibly and melted away. She had reached the perimeter. The opposition had finally made a play, shown them selves for what they were and now it was her turn to engage. Karyn strode down the sidewalk, heading towards the black van. Whoever was inside was going to feel the full force of her displeasure—and then some.

  47

  The Pacific Captain Kim and his thugs marched Kellerman above decks to the bridge. Every step she took, Kellerman felt her muscles cry out with the effort. If they had let her fall, she would have lain there on the hard floor, allowing the tides of inevitability to carry her down to the watery grave that she knew coming. As soon as these animals got what they needed they would murder her for sure. She had caused them so much trouble, it was inconceivable that there could be any other outcome.

  As she paused to draw breath before climbing the forward ladder leading to the bridge, Kellerman felt the hard jab of a gun barrel poking into her back. If she made a break now, and they shot her, she might just be able to cheat them out of whatever crazy plan they had in mind for the Nautilus. Sure, they would kill her. But it was a miracle she wasn’t dead already, what difference would a few selfish minutes of life make?

  All she needed to do was summon up the energy and the courage to make a break from her captors, force their hand so they would finish her quick at close range. But as Kellerman trudged forwards with heavy steps, the realization that she was beaten began to close in on her, like a slow tightening noose.

  Captain Kim climbed the forward ladder first, then turned and looked down on Kellerman. As she struggled up after him, hand over hand her feet skated against the cold wet rungs of the ladder.

  She slid back a rung and then another, the hard metal tearing at her knees. She let out an anguished cry, frustrated that her battered body was no longer responding to commands. She jammed her foot through the rungs, arresting her fall, but the impact twisted her ankle badly, the men below her twittered with annoyance in some alien tongue. Captain Kim scowled down at her, like she had lost her footing deliberately. “Hurry Officer Kellerman, time is short and your crew mates are depending on you.”

  But the ladder was slippery with the filth of battle and the going was treacherous. As she climbed higher, Kellerman realized that if she lost her footing now, she would fall back into the darkness below, probably break her neck in the proces
s. Her pulse amped higher, if she died now she would cheat her captors in their moment of victory. It was a crazy fleeting idea that she dismissed just as soon as it came—but she had to do something—she couldn’t just go along with these scumbags and do their bidding. She had to fight back and soon.

  As the harsh light of the open hatchway drew up to greet her, another crazy plan flashed through her mind—she could dive through the hatch and tie it down, trapping the men with guns below. It was a long shot idea, but it would narrow the odds—their leader was only a little guy and he didn’t have much weight behind him, maybe, if she timed her move just right, she could tackle him to the floor and wrassle away that peashooter pistol he was holding—see how his smart little mouth worked then.

  But as she reached the lip of the hatchway, with adrenaline pounding her heart almost through her chest, Kellerman felt nauseous with the exertion. She clawed at the edge of the hatch, with her filthy, blackened fingers. She slipped

  backwards once again, her feet skating away from the ladder, floating free for several stomach-­‐ churning seconds. She twisted her body hard against the top of the ladder and slowly and with great effort managed to drag herself away from the edge of a black and uncertain fate. She caught her breath and looked up into the eyes of Captain Kim. “You could have helped me, I nearly lost it there. Then what would you have done?” she said.

  Kim stood back, the black deadly eye of his gun staring down at her, “Perhaps you expect my sympathy Officer Kellerman? Well, you will be disappointed. You have shown yourself to be a treacherous adversary. If you obey my instructions you will be rewarded with the gift of life. If you try to break free, or attempt any kind of trickery you will be killed without mercy. Now, on your feet and raise your hands.”