Twelve Days

by Steven Barnes

  “What’s the plan?” Geek asked.

  Mark grinned. “Plan A: we stealth in, cap the bad guys, snatch the good guys, liberate expensive books, be big damn heroes, and waste away in Margaritaville. Plan B: I think there’s some hell to raise.”

  “Straight stealth sounds good to me. Raising hell might not be profitable,” Lee said.

  Pat Ronnell smiled merrily. He opened a black nylon bag and pulled out a 30-06 scoped deer rifle. “In my life, hell has always been its own reward.”

  * * *

  Terry circled Madame Gupta. She stood calm, balanced, not even bothering to turn to face him. Attack her back? Somehow he couldn’t bring himself to do it.

  But when he faced her again he slid closer and closer, her calm, unmoving form as still as the pause between two heartbeats. She closed her eyes.

  “Begin,” she said.

  So he did. Without sound, without telegraphing, Terry threw the fastest punch of his entire life at her throat, such a blur that he barely saw it himself.

  And in the next moment, Terry lay sprawled on the ground, nose broken, head ringing. He inhaled and coughed blood. Madame Gupta stood over him, peaceful as a nun at prayer.

  “This can only end one way,” she said. “You will tell the boy to do as I wish, stand together with me to help him, or you will die. I will not let your selfishness interfere with his destiny.”

  Pain was an old friend of Terry’s, but the shock was newer. Even with his enhanced skills, he had no idea what had just happened. Fear washed through him, but he did not judge or resist it, and it receded. He spit blood again. “You don’t give a shit about his destiny. You have another play in mind.”

  “And what is that?” she asked.

  “You’re killing people. Somehow. The boy is a part of it. Somehow.”

  She smiled. “Do you know how insane that sounds?”

  “Do you know that isn’t a denial?”

  “Stand up,” she said. “The lesson has just begun.”

  Grappling range. Striking didn’t work. But if he could close with her, his superior strength could …

  It was like trying to squeeze a handful of Jell-O. The pressure and speed and strength just seemed to pass through her, and she simply could not be thrown, or locked, or swept, or choked. Whatever he did he ended up slamming into the ground until it felt as if his entire body was a single enormous bruise.

  She was killing him by stages. With effortless precision she attacked joints, then muscles, and then nerves. Shocking and shaking him, driving him to his knees and then throwing him to his back, numb and then scaling the heights of agony, blind and then opening doors of perception so that he could see more clearly just how hopeless it all was.

  Taking him apart …

  Some assembly required.

  “This is tragic,” she said. “You are by far the best student I’ve ever had. You see, don’t you?”

  She leaned closer, peering into his bloody eyes.

  The snow was falling again, diffusing the light. The air around her seemed almost to glow.

  “Get up. Get up. I would have more.”

  There was a hunger beyond fleshly passion in her eyes. And he saw something that no one else had ever seen in this bitter, terrifying harpy—she was alone. Terribly alone. No one touched her. There was a sensual quality to her motion, her cant of eyes and lips, but in combative motion she was so terribly precise as to be almost insectile.

  And simultaneously yearning.

  In another world … it seemed to say. A desire, a burning need to have an equal, a mate. Even for a moment.

  He pushed himself to standing again. Summoned his strength yet again.

  She nodded approval. “Good. You have much strength. Many skills.”

  “Because of you.” He forced formality into his voice. “Because of my beliefs, my honor, I cannot yield.”

  She shook her head. “You foolish man. Did you read tales of knights and maidens as a boy? I see that in you. Protecting the weak.” Her expression softened. “If only there had been more men like you, there would be fewer women like me.”

  Terry smiled. “There are no women like you.”

  Something sparkled in the corner of her eye. What was that? A tear?

  “I see you,” she whispered. “No lies. No games. I set you free, would have made you a king. A god. And you choose to be a man. This boy’s father. This woman’s man. I see it.”

  Was she crying?

  “No one ever wanted me,” she said. “Protected me. I had to protect myself, can you understand?”

  “I understand,” he said, spitting blood again. “Neither of us can help being who we are.”

  “I’ll make you another offer.” It was a plea. “Be with me, and the family lives. Can’t you find it in your heart?”

  There it was, her eyes as hot and wide as if she were an open furnace, an unshielded reactor. In that moment, if he had spoken, all might have changed. But he waited too long, and the door slammed shut.

  “No,” she said and pulled back. “I beg no man. You have made your choice.” Her voice echoed through the lightly falling snow. “He has made his choice!” she screamed.

  “If I have to die,” he said fervently, pushing himself back up. “Let it be like this. Please. Show me the dance.”

  Hannibal stood, staring, small hands fisted at his sides, breathing like a steam engine.

  “Hani?” Nicki asked.

  He ignored her, eyes wide.

  * * *

  Tony Killinger watched, astonished, excited … and a bit jealous. The erotic connection between these two was glaringly obvious, and forced him back to memories of his own private encounters with Indra. She had shunned him, and in his heart he now understood why.

  He had not been worthy. A lioness needs a lion, and even if not at her level … this man was that.

  Tony hated him, and envied him, at the same moment.

  Gupta and the soldier seemed to have moved to another phase. And if he was not worthy, was not equal, still he was closer to her level than any man had ever been. She had absolute timing, baffling speed, and perfect technique, with a feminine flow that made ballet dancers resemble concrete blocks thumping down a hill. Killinger had seen her move many times … but never anything like this. It was so embarrassingly intimate he felt like he was watching homemade porn.

  Just die, why don’t you, you bastard. Just die.

  * * *

  Blinded by pain and blood, Terry fell again. Struggled to rise, and could not. She approached. Bent close, so that others could not hear. And when she spoke, there was in her voice something that in another woman might have seemed like desperation.

  “I say to you what I have never said to another man, and may never say again. Stop this. Be with me. The woman could be allowed to live. The family you love could survive.”

  An ache in her voice. You love them. You do not love me. But you could be with me, and in time, love might grow. It might.

  However small a chance that might be … it is worth seeking.

  He ignored her request. “What was that move? Never seen anything like that.”

  “It was not a ‘move,’” she said, exasperated. “I simply flow with the energy. You create my technique.”

  “Can you do it again?”

  “I do it every time,” she said, irritation growing. “It does not seem the same, because the moment is never the same. Because you cannot repeat what you did. How could you know what you did? You don’t even know who you are.”

  Do you know what you are, Indra Gupta? he wondered. Do you? Or has clarity become its own trap?

  “No.” And he knew in his heart that it was true. “Please,” he said. “Once more.”

  “You are magnificent,” Gupta said.

  Hannibal’s eyes gleamed. Nicki looked at him, and at Terry. And back again.

  Terry was limping now, and the expression on Gupta’s face was one of sympathy. His courage had won her heart. He stood. Breathed dee
ply. And slid his right side, his strong side, forward.

  Madame Gupta shook her head, just a little. If one hadn’t been watching closely, had not been in the tunnel of focus that connected the two, it would have been easy to miss.

  Regret, a bit of genuine human emotion.

  And he came at her, in a move that was glorious and balletic, a spinning kick.

  And she leaned back as if she had all the time in the world, so that he missed her by a millimeter. Then, as he suspected would happen, she demonstrated her own mastery of kicking arts. Her own leg flashed up. He raised a hand in weak defense—

  It was the hand holding Hannibal’s Christmas gift, the silver Uni multicolor pen. A special edition, crafted in steel. And her own force drove its point into her thigh. He wrenched it out, and stabbed her twice more, a blur faster than a sewing machine needle at full speed.

  Thank you, Father Geek. The South African killing art: Piper. Blur-fast, like running her leg under a pneumatic drill.

  Stab stab stab, three blows in a half-second.

  Pain, shock, and for the first time, fear entered her eyes. Gupta took a step back, and Terry leaped in. She raised her hands defensively, technique and delicate psychic balances confused.

  Terry saw every defensive motion, and instead of trying to pierce her defenses, he attacked them, stabbing her again and again. He was, in that moment, not the man he had been, or that he wished ultimately to be.

  He was merely … appropriate. What was needed in that moment.

  * * *

  Tony stood with his mouth hanging open, utterly shocked by what he was seeing. Maureen Skotak swung her rifle up, aiming at the two of them, but was unable to fire. The two combatants were a vortex of motion, moving far too fast to shoot one without risk to the other.

  And before Skotak could find a point of aim, her chest exploded with blood and she dropped to her knees, an almost comical expression of surprise on her face.

  Tony stared for a moment but then his paralysis broke and he dove for cover, yelling into the radio clipped to his collar.

  Madame Gupta screamed, hands clasped to her wounds, blood oozing from between clinched fingers. “Help me!”

  Roger Shilling, one of the two men who had tried to kidnap Nicki, raised his sidearm and drew a bead on Terry—

  Then his head snapped sideways, so rapidly it was as if he’d been hit in the temple with a golf club. Red mist sprayed back, marking the bullet’s exit path. The sound of the rifle shot came a moment later as two more guards flanking Olympia dropped, twin muzzle flashes sparking near the wall.

  * * *

  Two men ran from the northwest section of wall, near the woods, assault rifles shouldered and pivoting as they approached. Three more shots rang out, dropping a guard on the far side of the amphitheater. Tony crouched, confused and momentarily frozen with shock. For the first time in a very long time, he felt an unaccustomed emotion: real fear.

  * * *

  Hannibal was starting to see what Terry saw. Gupta had thought to teach him … and oh boy, was it working! When Hannibal briefly closed his eyes, the darkness swirled with light and heat. Like a bear stirring after a winter’s hibernation, something massive and primal was awakening within him.

  A cloud of different specks of light, like stars in a nebula, fractured into a thousand pieces.

  Nerves damaged, or transmitting imperfectly. Emotional turmoil, turning his light inward.

  All the darkness and dysfunction … but light flowing between them.

  Coalescing into a figure … of himself. Speaking to him.

  Wake up.

  Hannibal blinked.

  * * *

  Terry had lost his advantage. Splashed with her own blood, Madame Gupta was damaged, but had regained enough of her poise that even the blend of all Terry’s martial arts skills and the improvised Piper knife attack could not pierce her defenses …

  In one incredible moment, he attacked a dozen times in two seconds. He never saw the defensive movements and yet somehow she deflected or avoided every one.

  Then slowly, dreadfully slowly, she moved. As if, with her energies gathered, she had all the time in the world—

  Crack!

  They all heard the sound of the shattering humerus, and Terry dropped to the ground, engulfed in a world of pain. When Gupta spoke, it was not a woman’s voice. Or a man’s voice. It was something else, beyond each, channeling its way through her. Echoed from the walls and mountainsides, a primal shriek.

  “Fool!” she shrieked. “You could have had everything. Everything! Instead, I will give you a kingdom of pain.”

  * * *

  “Razor, set.”

  “Cowboy, set.”

  “Nomad, set.”

  “Geek, no change from up here. Six armed tangos. Friendlies in sight.”

  * * *

  Mark listened to the headset’s whispers, then returned attention to the tableau at hand. He had quickly realized there was no easy way into the compound. The instant he’d seen Terry getting his ass kicked he’d made the call for plan B. Targets had been assigned. Mark and Lee had been moving as a buddy team and were within fifty meters of the wall, taking advantage of the long shadows as floodlights from atop the main building reflected and diffracted from the broken glass set in the top of the wall.

  They were kneeling by trees and each had a guard in the sights of their AR-15s. Pat was farther back, lying beneath bushes. He had watch of the area, including an armed woman who looked like she was in charge of something. She was already in his scope, the 30-06 round chambered in the expensive hunting rifle.

  “Nomad, this is Razor. We go on you.”

  “Roger. Shooting in three, two…”

  Pat hit his first target, dropping the woman clean. As he racked the bolt he saw Mark’s and Lee’s targets drop, controlled pairs aimed center mass. Now they were up and moving in.

  Pat picked up his next target inside the amphitheater. The last two were outside the amphitheater, pistols up and aimed at Mark and Lee as they tried to come to save their boss. They died never realizing Pat had already planned their deaths before he fired the first shot. Pulling the trigger was just the confirmation, a smooth, intimate gesture during which Pat had his entire being focused on the person in his sight picture. And then ended him.

  His comrades were moving forward as he watched the old woman make a weird shuffle kick at Terry. Pat didn’t worry about that. Mark and Lee would take care of the situation down there. There was one last guy, a tall black man who looked like he might have been armed, who had dove down between stone seats. Pat scanned for him.

  Calm, he felt that sense of power as he controlled the life and death of all in his view. He had righteous targets and his brothers were trusting him to do whatever he decided. All was good and proper in his world.

  He died as 5.56mm rounds ripped into his body, puncturing like ice picks on the way in and blowing baby fist–sized hunks of meat on the way out.

  * * *

  Mark’s team didn’t know two things. One, Tony had outfitted his reaction squad in Level III body armor and helmets under their winter coats ever since the local area went into emergency conditions. Even if the authorities didn’t twig on them, they knew they would be a target for looters or people seeking sanctuary, and Georgia residents tended to be armed. Unlike the regular group that Tony used for protecting Madame Gupta and maintained a lower profile, these guards were intended to provide overwhelming response when needed.

  The other was they had modern military optics cantilevered from their forehead mounts on the helmets. As the setting sun cloaked the small valley, it also let the guards use infrared to sight in on Pat from several hundred meters away. The guards had come over the opposite side of the amphitheater. Pat had been focused on Tony and never saw the reinforcements.

  The other half of the react squad arrived from the direction of the admin building. Lee was the first to respond, firing center mass. The trauma plates stopped the rounds even
as they returned fire. Lee was struck multiple times even as Mark dove to the ground, seeking some sort of cover. The next fusillade hit his right arm halfway between elbow and shoulder. His rifle dropped with a clatter. He tried to reach across his waist with his left arm for his pistol as the three guards duckwalked toward him.

  “Stop!” Gupta called, blood dripping down her face. “Halt this. Capture them. We may need more meat.”

  She stood over Hannibal, heaving for breath. Turned to Olympia. “I think we are ready to begin. Don’t you? Take this garbage.”

  * * *

  “Shit,” Mark said. When the three guards facing him kept breathing, he knew Pat wasn’t. A glance told him Lee was gone. Mark rolled onto his back and stuck his hands in the air, the right one sagging at an angle as blood drenched his shirt. It was a through-and-through and had missed the bone, but it had stopped him long enough to lose the fight. He just hoped he hadn’t lost the war for himself and Terry.

  The tall security alpha was on his feet and giving orders. Mark was disarmed and driven to his knees, hands behind his head as blood continued to stain his shirt. As the other three combat-loaded guards came into the amphitheater, one of the first three pulled open a small trauma kit and tied off Mark’s bicep using an Israeli pressure bandage. His hand was numb with sharp needle sensations in his fingertips. Probably nerve damage, he guessed. Mark recalculated the odds. He carefully complied with Tony’s orders, knowing he had no options at this point.

  Mark saw Terry and nodded, hands behind his head. “I’m here to rescue you.”

  “Aren’t you a little short for a storm trooper?” Terry said.

  “Shut up, Carl.” Both men grinned. Inside joke, not for civilians. Another fine mess.

  “Fancy seeing you here,” Terry said.

  “You look like shit.”

  “You should feel it from my side.”

  Ho, ho, ho. Sometimes, macho bullshit was all that kept the screams at bay.

  They were prodded along, Terry leaning heavily against Mark.

  “Who is this bitch?”

  Tony Killinger stomped on the side of Mark’s leg. The crunch of breaking bone was horrific. Mark crumpled to the ground, clutching his knee.