Ragnarok

by Ari Bach

  VEIKKO AND Varg had Tikaried three Yakuza and shot two before Masamune and his personal guards squirmed out through a back window. Veikko shot the wall with a heavy repulsion beam and knocked it over. Varg gave chase, and Veikko, having been knocked off his feet by the force, stood up to face the one Yakuza who had stayed behind. Two were on Varg’s tail, but Wart and Walter had their Tiks ready to take them down. The man who stood before Veikko was short. Upon realizing how short, Veikko cringed. He’d seen the man before.

  Hokkaido Joe shouted happily, “Raoul? Is that you?”

  Veikko groaned and rubbed his eyes.

  “Holy shit, it is you! How you been—Hey, you killed my man! You the enemy, Raoul! The enemy. En. Em. E. You goin’ down, Raoul! You goin—”

  Veikko hit him with a microwave in the chest. This time he took no chances. He stood over the body, set his microwave to deep fat fry, and let loose a scorching bolt of energy into Hokkaido Joe’s head. The brain, such as it was, was melted in seconds. Vaporized in seconds more. Veikko kept the beam on until the very atoms of brain started to lose cohesion. Not even Niide could recover the damn bastard now. He gave the crispy head a solid kick, and it fell open with a burst of ash. His top mission priority complete, Veikko ran after Varg to save the planet.

  SHIKA LEAPED from six stairs up and brought her right sword down on Violet’s arm. It deflected off her armor, but Shika wasted no time in striking again, alternating swords and forcing Violet back down the stairs.

  Violet was surprised by the ferocity of her attack. It was as fast and skillful as something she’d expect from an elder team member. It was all she could do to block the strikes, several every second all aimed for her head or unarmored portions of her suit.

  Shika grew frustrated at Violet’s blocks and pushed forward faster, trying to knock Violet off her feet. She made certain Violet had no chance to counterattack, kept her completely on the defensive. It was difficult, more than anyone Shika could remember fighting. The girl was skilled, but she had no idea what Shika had in store for her.

  Violet finally caught a fraction of a second gap in Shika’s attack as she adjusted her grip on her left sword. She knew it might be the only mistake her opponent would make, so she took it for all she could. She dragged her Tikari blade down the sword and twisted it at the hilt. Shika was still adjusting her palm and the sword flew from her grip. Violet was about to press the advantage and strike her neck when she saw from the corner of her eye something that terrified her.

  As the sword flew from Shika’s hand, panels on its hilt were opening. She heard a click like the one her Tikari made when it engaged its launch systems. While blocking Shika’s right sword, Violet glanced at her ear and saw a second link. She realized just in time to fall back instead of striking—Shika’s sword was flight capable and link controlled.

  The sword engaged its main thruster and darted for Violet’s head. She fell out of the way just in time. Shika set the sword to orbit her and spin, creating a field of sharp metal through which Violet couldn’t strike. Violet set her Tikari to defend, matching the orbit and keeping the spinning sword from shredding her. That left Shika with one sword free and Violet with nothing.

  Shika was amused when she saw the girl’s knife start defending. They were more evenly matched than she expected. But still not evenly. Shika pressed her advantage and made several strong thrusts with her right blade.

  Violet flipped back farther, away from the stairs, but unable to stay beyond the sword’s tip. It grated into her armor and slipped onto the soft zones, cutting her deeply. Shika kept moving closer. The cuts grew deeper and deeper. Violet tried to find any nuance in the terrain or her gear to take the advantage but found nothing. She was going to die.

  And that, she remembered was her advantage. She could die, if she did it right. She crouched down, a fatal move. Shika used it as expected and stabbed down deep into Violet’s shoulder. The blade entered her torso, down through her lung and diaphragm, into her intestines. Pain shot through her like electricity, but as she expected, the sword stuck. Violet jumped back with the sword inside her, disarming Shika.

  Shika didn’t stop. She recalled her other blade and moved in to behead her quarry. She wasn’t surprised to see Violet try to pull the sword out of her body but was shocked at what came next. In her last seconds of life, Violet readied Shika’s sword, recalled her Tikari, and leaped at her with two blades.

  The advantage was finally Violet’s. Injury training suggested she had about thirty seconds left before she passed out from blood loss. The wound in her shoulder and back sprayed blood like a pump, numerous major arteries were open. She had to work fast.

  Shika defended every blow, still amazed at the girl’s resilience. She couldn’t allow her to control her sword, so she set it to fly. The flaps on its hilt opened, and the thrusters turned on maximum, burning into Violet’s hand.

  Violet gripped tighter, the flames cutting their way into her fingers. Injury training kept her on target—the muscles in her fingers had ten seconds left before they were cut. Enough time. She began to catch on fire across her arm and chest as she continued to swing the blade, which fought her with every last ounce of thrust. But she could handle it for just one more instant. Violet attacked Shika with all she had, pushing her into the stairs, stabbing and swinging for her neck, her head, and her heart.

  Shika began to flee. She’d killed the girl. All she had to do was outlast her final sprint.

  Violet wouldn’t let her. She set her Tikari to fly from her hand and impale Shika in the stomach. She was using her sword to defend against the stolen sword in Violet’s hand. The Tikari blasted in, and Shika recoiled, grabbed for her belly, and in that instant, lost. Violet took the moment for all she could and swung Shika’s sword through her temple and into the wooden post behind her, severing the top half of her head.

  Violet fell back to the ground and turned on her air field, creating a vacuum that stopped the fire that had completely consumed her. Shika’s swords fell motionless. Violet’s Tikari bolted from Shika’s stomach and flew for Violet’s chest, then hid safely inside. Blood continued to spurt from her wounds for a few more seconds, and then her heart gave out. Violet’s brain squeezed out one last thought—I should have just shot the bitch—and then she fell dead on the wooden planks. Men at the kyabakura accepted their winnings and losses.

  ALOPEX TOLD V team of her death over their links. Vibeke cursed and linked to the pogo. She’d have to get Violet into its stasis field fast. After the chicken coop, the spy was nearing the center pillar. Vibs called her Tikari in close and fell back to the side alley. The Tik saw him reach the center pillar, nearly a flat wall up close, and begin cutting into it with a razor torch. She called up architectural plans. Hollow interior, bilge pumps, and rudder controls, open air above with a one-way field on top. He could get out that way but not back in. The portal of wood fell, and he climbed inside the pillar. She didn’t send the Tik in, but it saw him climb straight up. Someone was going to meet him on the canopy, but a Yakuza pogo was inbound as well. Vibs linked her pogo to leave the water.

  By the time Veikko caught up, Varg had just microwaved the last of Masamune’s escorts. All lay atop a restaurant’s roof, which was accessible by ladder but hard to see from the street. Veikko joined him just in time to see Masamune pull out a compressed pistol. The flat card popped out of his pocket and expanded like papercraft into his hand. He leveled it at Varg. Diving out of the way, he linked to Veikko.

  “Kill?”

  “Knock out,” he replied. Veikko’s Tikari jumped at the man, but Masamune was extremely fast and managed to shoot it out of the sky. The bladed projectile hit its right wing and bent it. The Tik quickly limped away from the fight in repair mode. Varg used the instant the gun was off him to draw his microwave and fire a stunning beam. It hit Masamune full on, and he fainted, but he must have had an emergency protocol—his link broadcast his location in twenty very specific directions along with an SOS. As Veikko tended
to his Tik and Varg pulled a cerebral bore out of his pocket, Walter linked in.

  “Twenty Yaks around the city just started running. Seven close to you. First arrives in forty seconds. Want our pogo?”

  “Please.”

  There wasn’t enough time for a full hack, so Varg stuffed the bore back into a chest pocket and grabbed the feet while Veikko grabbed the head. Wart called the second pogo out of the water. By this time three pogos were heading illegally from the parking zone toward the city. Automated police drones were already in the air, and one unconventional spybot was taking notice. It began sending a report to Hashima Island about the mess.

  “Twenty seconds, two more in thirty, get out now!” linked Walter.

  Veikko and Varg exchanged a glance, moving the body was too slow. They had to risk a race against time rather than a race against Yakuza encumbered by an unconscious man. Varg raised his sword high and cut off Masamune’s head. They had a few minutes to get it to the pogo stasis field and a few hours to get it back to Valhalla for a proper hack. But by the time Varg had put the first aid plugs on, the first new Yakuza were on the scene.

  Veikko microwaved the first to pop up over the rim, but the second scaled a gutter and popped up behind Varg. Varg dropped the head to stab him with his Tikari, and Masamune’s head rolled down the slanted roof into the crowd below.

  The crowd scattered fast at the sight of a severed head. Varg jumped down immediately to recover the cranium but found himself surrounded by six men. All with swords. He had his own drawn when he landed so he engaged the first. Veikko shot the second, but as he aimed for the third, a man tackled him from behind on the roof and a struggle ensued. That was no problem for Varg of course. He had his sword. But he didn’t have many choices in how to use it. All six Yaks were skilled and left him precious few opportunities. He was constantly defending their jabs. Luckily they were close, and his armor was deflecting most of the hits they got in. Before long two of them stood in proximity, and he could strike at their necks. He hit both in one swing and sent their heads to the ground. Right next to Masamune’s. One Yak slipped on one of the heads, and Varg swung down quickly—on his neck. Varg dealt with the problem of the oncoming Yakuza but quickly found himself trying to sort Masamune’s head from the seven rolling down the street.

  Veikko microwaved his first attacker, but a second Yak quickly distracted him. Then another. He had two men on his tail, and with his Tikari awaiting repairs, his only weapon, the microwave, was occupied deflecting their shots. If they reached him they could kill him by sword. Wart’s and Walter’s Tikaris were in the sky, but Veikko needed a fast escape. W team’s pogo was heading for Varg to preserve Masamune. He could see V team’s wet pogo, not flying for Violet but toward the canopy. He could only hope it flew past him before the Yaks caught up.

  As he scaled a scaffold toward the balcony, he could see it wouldn’t. He quickly reached into his back armor for an explosive. He pulled out a fluff bomb, not much, but it would work on wooden scaffolds. He stuck it to a stud and set it for five seconds. He made the balcony five seconds later with the realization that the balcony was supported, at that time, solely by the scaffold. The bomb went off. Both Yakuza fell to the ground, and the balcony shifted forward rapidly, about to plummet into the street. He knew he couldn’t make the next building if he jumped. The balcony slipped from its last tethers and began to fall.

  It fell right onto the side of the gold pogo. Wart had remote flown it in just in the nick of time, and Veikko rolled with a few scraps of wood into its back hold. Veikko took over the controls and headed to Varg, who was accidentally kicking the closest head as he tried to chase the rest.

  VIBEKE AIMED her microwave for V’s pogo and tractored herself up. Taking the controls, she sent out a wide low-level interference pulse. It knocked all the police and parking drones off her tail and left her one Yakuza pogo to fight. She lifted up to canopy level and saw the situation: the spy was running across the canopy, and the Yakuza pogo was firing at him. Projectiles, likely tranqs. Still she had little choice. She opened fire on the Yakuza pogo before it saw her. The microwave beam popped and crackled along its hull, and it went down.

  Usagi jumped from the pogo seconds before it hit the canopy. She rolled down the fabric. The burning pogo tugged half the panel down as it hit, and the hull flames set the edges on fire. Usagi was surrounded by flames on all sides but down. Nothing else to do, she thought. She jumped and fell toward a marshmallow stand filled with soft white sugary goo. The soft mass roiled and rippled, the owner of the stand carving bits from the vat to sell to tourists. Usagi’s neck hit the vat’s hard metal corner and snapped instantly.

  Vibs spent a tenth of a second wondering what substandard flammable material the canopy was made from and went into rescue mode. She dove for the spy and braked just ahead of where he ran, opening the side door. He ran in without question, and she took off, closing the doors behind them and leaving the rest of the Valkyries behind.

  “You’re a chick!” he coughed.

  “Wow!” She couldn’t miss a beat if she was to pass as his intended rescue. “You really are a great spy. No wonder he hired you to fuck up the Ukiyo job.”

  “Fuck you, broad, just take me to Türkiye.”

  “Türkiye? I’m from a different safe house. You got the coordinates?”

  “Of course I have the coordinates, doll. Now move your ass.”

  Vibs would have to fly toward Türkiye immediately to conserve her deception. She linked on top security to Veikko to let him know she was on her way. Abandoning Violet dead on the street left a sick feeling in her stomach. But W and the boys from V were there. Violet would be fine, she told herself as she flew out of the calm air and into the storm.

  VARG JUMPED into W’s pogo and tractored the batch of heads in behind him. As the pogo took off to get Violet, he sorted through the heads, kicked the wrong ones out of the open door, and stuffed Masamune’s into the stasis chamber. A second later he landed at the bottom of the stairs, crushing Shika’s body into the wood. He jumped out and grabbed Violet’s corpse. It was pretty bad, covered in cuts and burns and severely exsanguinated. Still salvageable, though, and her head was fine. He crammed her into the same stasis chamber and took off.

  As he headed for W team, Wart linked in.

  “Leave us and get to the pit. We’ll find another way home.”

  Veikko didn’t ask any questions, he set the pogo to land by the med bay and let it take over. As soon as he left Ukiyo’s weather, the flight got rough, painful, and sickening, but they didn’t turn on the manual controls to ease the flight. They just strapped in and set the autopilot for speed, no matter how nasty the trip.

  Wunjo rendezvoused in a small Thai restaurant on the opposite side of Ukiyo from the action, where dozens of fire drones extinguished the canopy.

  “Terrible business, that fire,” said the waiter. “They say severed heads were rolling down the streets, dozens of Yakuza killed, buildings falling down.”

  W team averted their eyes. The waiter continued, “Almost the worst incident this week.”

  “I’M NOT angry,” explained Wulfgar. “I’m disappointed.”

  Somehow Red thought that was worse. Red Boots, he reminded himself. And the man before him was Little Boots, not Wulfgar. He wasn’t supposed to know that name. In fact he was certain that if W—Little Boots knew that he’d heard it, he’d be dead, and there would be a new Red Boots.

  “So you really have no idea where Yellow Boots is?”

  “N-no, sir.”

  “The reason that troubles me, Red Boots, is that he’s exactly where he’s supposed to be.”

  “Sir?”

  “Yellow Boots checked into Rüveyde Hanim exactly as he was supposed to in case he was found out.”

  Red had nothing to say. That meant everything was okay. Somehow, Yellow had escaped the Yakuza and made it to his check-in point. Made it there fast. Maybe all wasn’t lost?

  “Do you know why that troubles
me?”

  Red was seconds from dying, he knew it. Little Boots could surely see him sweating. He must have known, but he wasn’t letting on. He suspected Red of lying, or incompetence, and he couldn’t prove a thing against either. He wasn’t lying, but he had been terribly incompetent, unable to find Yellow Boots in the chaos at Ukiyo. Knocked out in the fight and awake only after the action stopped.

  He had nothing to say to the man’s piercing gaze. Little Boots stroked his fierce metal jaw and exhaled. Disappointed.

  “It troubles me because you didn’t fly him there. Which means someone did, and according to Yellow Boots, it was a woman.”

  Red stood motionless. There were no women, not a single one in the Wolf Gang. How could one even know—

  “Are you afraid of something, Red?”

  He was so afraid he couldn’t speak. He froze up.

  “Look, Red. Martin, your name is Martin, right? I’m not going to bite your head off. I’m not even going to fire you. I just need to find out how Yellow Boots got to the safe house without you. I need to find out who now knows the location of our safe house in Türkiye.

  Chapter IV: Türkiye

  VIOLET WOKE up feeling euphoric and tingly. She was lying on a table, above her the sickly green med bay lights. She ran through her last memories: fighting a Yakuza woman, dying at Ukiyo, mission inconclusive when she died.

  She looked over her body. Dozens of healing cuts and two robotic arms digging into her belly to fix the organs. She couldn’t feel anything in the area. She was under extreme analgia fields. For the better, she recognized. She had no desire to feel her duodenum getting sealed up.