The Aegirian Templar/Left Up to the Templar: Future is Prologue
From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe
Contents |
Author's Notes
This story is a direct sequel to 'Skeins', taking place shortly after the present-day events of that tale. Unlike my other Templar stories, however, this one has an origin outside my super-group's forums. Whereas 'Paladins' and 'Skeins' were derived from pieces of fiction that I posted as an interconnected whole on the Millennium Paladins website, 'Future' had its roots in a writing challenge that Servant 12's player gave to me. Its plot was something that I arrived at while still working on the plot for 'Skeins' and deciding how to wrap that tale up, and as I wrote it I decided that it provided the perfect opportunity to bring other, non-SG hero characters into the fiction for the first time. Although it does reference characters and events that were integral to 'Skeins', 'Future' exists primarily for the purposes of character development and introducing new characters into Templar's universe. While I do not necessarily regard it or its plot as 'throwaway', it is somewhat more of a 'standalone' tale than a true continuation of the overall story.
Chapter 1
Steel Canyon had always been the financial center of Paragon City. For more than a century, it had been home to the offices of the largest and most affluent businesses on the East coast of the United States. With its wide boulevards, private gardens, and glistening skyscrapers, it had long stood as a monument to American capitalism at its purest. The famous Steel Canyon skyline had first been constructed by the corporate tycoons of the ‘20’s, when the city had been flush with the money and resources gained from racketeering, bootlegging, and non-existent government regulations.
Despite its sparkling exterior, though, Steel Canyon had always been rotten at its core. The fact that Steel Canyon represented the bulk of the city’s wealth and power inevitably drew the worst elements of society to its streets. First it had been the gangsters, the bootleggers and the corrupt politicians. Then it had been Nemesis, with the Southern United plot that had culminated in the legendary Brass Monday attack in 1938. In the 1980’s, the influx of new international corporations and the flood of money that came with them had coincided with the introduction of Superadine to the city streets. Even today, the streets were overrun by Trolls, Tsoo, and Outcasts, the three of them just a few of the meta-altered gangs that thrived on the illicit trade of Paragon City’s most infamous drug. Not even the intervention of Positron, Valkyrie and hundreds of young heroes were sufficient to keep the ‘bastion of capitalism’ free and clear. The reason for that, in many people’s estimation, was obvious: the money remained.
So long as the money flowed from the towers to the streets and the streets to the towers, Steel Canyon would never be safe. The very thing that gave it its strength, beauty, and prestige was also what made it such an irresistible target.
In Paragon City, no target ever found itself faced with a shortage of predators. As the decades went by, it seemed that the number and strength of the dark forces grew larger and larger. Each new decade seemed to herald the emergence of a new gang, a new private army, a new secret society with a sinister and destructive design on the future of Paragon and its inhabitants. Beyond that, they seemed to be taking pieces of the city with them as they went. The Council had conquered Striga Isle; the Trolls had destroyed and then overrun Eastgate; the Rikti had bombarded and then occupied White Plains. Even idyllic Overbrook had been obliterated by a madman’s tectonic sabotage. Not a single neighborhood in the city was free from the influence of the gangs, and even Vanguard could not prevent the Rikti from launching hit and fade attacks on any area of the city they chose. Some marveled that anything of the city remained intact at all.
The Aegirian Templar had seen the future; the future where the fate of Paragon City had been exactly that. He had seen Paragon City in ruins; seen the heroes that protected it, the Order that he himself served, defeated. He had seen what the future was like when the Scourge had won. He had seen himself: a two-hundred and twenty-seven year old ghost, scarred physically and emotionally – a man so broken, so beaten, and so unwilling to carry on fighting that he had literally begged his younger self to take a course of action that would result in him completely ceasing to exist.
‘General Templar’ had vanished almost as soon as he and his younger self had completed that mission, and Simon took that as ‘proof’ that they had succeeded in diverting the timeline. The whole thing still disturbed Simon deeply, and his mind was still wrestling with it. Part of him was dwelling on the sheer level of sacrifice that it had required, the total willingness to end your entire mortal existence for a single cause. Was that what had gone through the minds of the Japanese kamikaze pilots during World War Two, as they flew their planes headlong into the floating hulls of the American warships?
Another part tried to push away the notion that he had deliberately obliterated a man. He knew what the cost and the payoff had been; he knew what his future self had wanted. The old man had sacrificed everything he had left to come back in time, all for the chance to save the people he loved, even though it would mean a fate worse than death for himself.
But really, was that actually the case? Another part of Simon’s brain was trying to tell him that his future self was far better off now, even though it had taken the ultimate sacrifice of one version of that man to usher in a much brighter set of possibilities. But that man was gone now, all but erased. How was it that Simon could remember anything that had happened? Wasn’t the fact that ‘General Templar’ had essentially never existed supposed to mean that all traces of his existence (including Simon’s memories of what had happened) should also be gone?
Simon didn’t know. All he knew for certain was that thinking about time travel was giving him a headache, and it was damned irritating.
Irritations were distracting, and he didn’t need any distractions right now. Right now he was trying to make sure that the future turned out the way he and General Templar wanted it to.
Forget about the past, and the future…at least for right now. Focus on Steel Canyon.
Chapter 2
Templar knelt on the edge of a parking garage in the midst of Royal Overlook, where a company called UnityArms International had a small office in the north wing of Dassault Tower. According to the available media, UAI was one of the many multi-national corporations providing ‘enhanced’ weapons systems to licensed private security companies and contractors for use in dealing with meta-human threats. Simon had read that with quite a bit more than his usual level of cynicism. They could pretty up their company line with as much puffery as they wanted; it didn’t change the fact that they essentially sold non-conventional weaponry to mercs looking to take down supers.
According to the intel he had gathered, UAI was linked somehow to the Jotunheim Scourge. In a world teeming with superheroes and supervillains alike, even the insidious Scourge would actively maintain a robust arsenal for use in dealing with individuals or groups they might consider a threat to their operations. Personally, Simon could think of at least one person that might fit into that category.
His recent encounter with his future self had revealed the existence of his Scourge ‘counterpart’ stationed in the Rogue Isles. Templar’s battle with this ‘Scourge Leader R17’ and his eerily inhuman soldiers had almost killed him, but it had finally gained the Order vital intelligence on the nature of their ancient enemy. The discovery of complex neural implants within the skulls and spines of the dead soldiers had confirmed some of the Order’s long-held suspicions about how the Scourge operated, and avenues of research that had progressed slowly and half-heartedly in the past century were now receiving greater attention.
Although the remains of the Scourge soldiers had decomposed with frightening speed after only a few minutes, precluding any chance of doing a thorough analysis, Simon was sure that even this small discovery would make the Scourge Leader focus even harder on taking him out. The Scourge had operated in near-total secrecy for the past fifteen centuries, and the utter lack of available intelligence on them had been their greatest defense against any opponent. The fact that the Aegirian Templar had managed to unearth one of their most vital secrets would undoubtedly make their leadership clamor for his immediate elimination, if only to prevent him from finding out anything else.
Thus it was time for Simon to stop tiptoeing and poking around for info; it was time to go on the offensive. If UAI really was a front for a Scourge weapons production operation, then taking out their local branch could hinder whatever offensive they were planning against Paragon City. Besides which, attacking the office would also provide an opportunity to look for more information about their operations.
Simon was absolutely certain that the Scourge knew that. The building was sure to be well-guarded, perhaps even by Scourge soldiers as opposed to ordinary security personnel. Despite the building directory stating that UAI had only the one small office, Simon had seen the building plans. Knowing that they were probably faked, he had run a detailed scan of the entire structure. Corridors and hallways that seemed to go nowhere actually led to hidden sections of the tower, and seemingly empty offices contained access points to secret rooms above and below each floor. It wouldn’t be hard for the UAI employees to maintain a substantial level of clandestine operations beyond the notice of anyone else. There could be as many as a hundred well-armed guards stationed throughout the hidden Scourge-controlled sections of the building, and there was little doubt that they had routes leading to every major access point into the tower – not to mention extensive security and monitoring systems to cover them all. Any breach into the building would be detected almost immediately, and a heavily-armed security force would undoubtedly respond within seconds afterwards.
Dassault Tower would be one hell of a tough nut to crack. Fortunately, the Aegirian Templar had a plan to get in...and he had arranged for some backup.
Chapter 3
He had chosen the time for the attack carefully. It was late Saturday night, which meant that all of the non-UAI, non-Scourge personnel were already gone. Most of the tower’s offices were vacant at the moment anyhow. The recession had left many businesses scrambling to find more affordable accommodations outside of the city, and only about a third of the building was occupied; thus, any collateral damage should be minimized.
As the Templar watched, a black unmarked van drove up to the main gate. The guard at the booth took and scanned the proffered ID without comment, handed it back, and opened the heavy security fence, after which the van trundled through. Simon waited until the van had gone about a hundred yards and was out of a direct line of sight with the guard booth, and then leapt.
His super jump took him a good two-hundred and fifty yards into the air, and he had gauged it to bring him down directly behind the booth, out of sight of the guard. A short controlled burst from his hover jets allowed him to land with hardly a sound, and a quick check of his suit’s external sensors indicated that the guard was unaware of his presence. Though the booth was positioned to give a clear line of sight in all directions, the cameras mounted on it faced out towards the street and not the courtyard; down but not up. Furthermore, there were no other cameras monitoring the booth itself; the tower was too far away and the only camera mounted on the fence was pointed at the gate. Simon knelt down and flattened against the booth, then crept over to the door. It was a solid steel security door, with no gaps or cracks between it and the frame that could be exploited. He reached into his belt for the electronic lockbreaker and attached it to the keycard reader mechanism on the door, then pulled out a static grenade. He would need to time everything perfectly.
Simon reached out and activated the lockbreaker, which quickly and silently scanned the reader for the correct code and inputted it. The lock clicked open, and with his suit’s aural sensors Simon could hear the guard spin to face the door. With a thrust of his legs, the Templar rolled through the door in an instant, his left arm extending even as the guard lunged for the alarm controls. Two wires arced out and the guard stiffened and convulsed as the metal contacts dug into the small of his back, sending 300 kilovolts of electricity coursing through his nervous system. He collapsed in a heap as the taser dart did its work, and Simon flung the static grenade towards the control panel. Arcs of bright blue electricity shot into the housings all over the booth, frying circuits, erasing data, and disabling the landlines linking the booth with the main security office in the tower. The booth and gate cameras went dark, and the alarm systems for the entryway were shut down as the interference from the static grenade cut off their electricity.
Simon spun out of the booth and made another flying leap, this one taking him over the sight lines of the tower-mounted security cameras that monitored the courtyard between the booth and the main entryway. The security officers in the main control room now knew that something was seriously wrong at the main gate, but with their access to those cameras disabled, they had no way of knowing exactly what. They would have to send someone out to investigate, and when they did, the Templar would be ready for them.
The doors to the van swung open as Simon landed on the ledge overlooking the entrance to the tower. A six-man security team piled out, their faces alert and their hands ready on their weapons. One man, clearly the leader of the unit, had one hand over his earpiece and was talking over the comm. As Simon watched, another team of eight guards emerged from the front doors and took off at a full sprint towards the gate, clearly set on covering the ground between themselves and the booth as quickly as possible. Simon knew that he would have to take down the first six men as quickly as possible, before the other team had a chance to discover the comatose booth guard and return to make their sweep of the courtyard.
The only warning the six men had of the Templar’s approach was the slithering rasp of impervium on steel, as he drew his katanas from their sheaths while plummeting down from the ledge towards them. Their leader was taken out first, as Simon landed directly in front of him and sent him slamming into the side of the van with a lightning-fast roundhouse kick. The muzzles of five submachine guns swung up to target him immediately, but by that time the Templar was no longer there. He made a second leap directly into the midst of three of the five men, who were still clustered dangerously close together. A spinning sweep of his blades disarmed them in a flash and then caught each of them on the sides of their helmets, sending them tumbling to the ground.
Bullets roared from the mouths of two P90s as the remaining pair of guards opened up on their inhumanly-fast assailant. The Templar dodged to one side, then the other as he closed the short distance between himself and them, his blades swinging to deflect several grazing rounds as he did so. Simon jumped directly into the air over one guard’s head, stomping down on the man’s shoulders as he landed. The man toppled bonelessly into the dirt, his limp fingers sending the gun clattering away as he sprawled. Simon bent his knees again, using his momentum to somersault directly behind the last guard. The P90 tracked up and around in what seemed to Simon like slow motion, bullets spraying uselessly into the air as the man tried to draw a bead on his assailant. A single backhand swipe of his right-hand katana sliced the gun in half, and Simon brought his left-hand katana around in one deft motion, neatly pummeling the man in the side of the head with the hilt of the weapon. The guard’s eyes rolled up in his head as he slowly toppled forwards, the useless half of his bisected P90 still clutched in his hand.
Simon tracked his view over each of the men in turn, his visor’s bio-sensors getting a read on them as he did so. According to his suit’s analysis, he had inflicted several concussions and quite a few broken bones, but no serious trauma to any of the guards. They were kitted out in charcoal gray combat armor and helmets, and a small unit patch on each of their left shoulders indicated that they were members of some sort of military contract corporation. Mercs, then. No doubt they were probably all scum of one variety or another, but Simon was still glad that he hadn’t crippled or killed any of them.
The fight had taken no more than twenty seconds, but the gunfire had brought the second, eight-man team running back from their sprint towards the security booth. Simon had barely enough time to duck behind a pillar on the edge of the concourse as the first burst of machine gun fire tore cement in chunks from its corner. The men spread out in pairs across a stretch of the courtyard, taking cover behind whatever objects they could find – two cement planters, a dumpster, a low rectangular pool, a pedestal. One man edged out to Simon’s right, trying to outflank him. Simon spotted him and loosed a focused burst of photons from his visor. The blast hit the merc high in the chest, and he was tossed backwards like a rag doll. But then another two bursts of assault rifle fire shattered into the pillar on either side of him, and bits of plaster and dust momentarily obscured his vision. Simon gripped his katanas as he crouched low, getting ready to make a move against the seven remaining troopers.
There was the sudden roaring of flight jets from above, and a heavily-armored and helmeted figure dropped down directly behind the skirmish line of mercs, his red power armor looking dim and dull in the darkness. A glowing red tech-sword was clutched in his right hand, its blade extended and humming with energy. As Simon turned to glance past the pillar, the red-armored hero loosed a repulsor blast from his left palm into the back of the nearest mercenary, sending him sprawling with a splash into the pool. The remaining half-dozen mercs turned towards the newcomer with surprised shouts, and the Templar took advantage of their momentary confusion to charge the left side of the skirmish line. He sacked the leftmost mercenary with a headlong bull rush, plowing him to the ground even as the man was about to trigger a burst at the red-armored figure. Volleys of bullets hammered the terrain near the hero as he ducked and dodged to one side – and then a burst ricocheted off of a bluish-green energy barrier that had suddenly coalesced around him.
There was a second man floating in the air above and behind the first, his handsome young face split into a wide grin. His rakish, shoulder-length brown hair was blowing in the breeze, and his eyes were hidden behind a pair of aviator sunglasses. He was clad from neck to foot in a bright green, armored tactical suit, as well as a long leather trenchcoat and combat boots of a matching shade. While his right hand was covered in a typical leather glove, his left hand was encased in a much larger, bulkier-looking metal gauntlet, from which the energy shield was emanating. He shouted out to Simon as he watched the tackled mercenary go down.
“Hey, Sea Scorpion! Nice hit!”
The swordsman on the ground was moving now, and the man in green re-focused his shield into a square in front of himself as one of the mercs fired a burst at him. Specks of light rippled over the face of the shield as the bullets shattered against it, and the green-clad man smirked.
“Now, that ain’t very nice,” he remarked good-naturedly, even as he blasted the offending gunman off his feet with a burst of radiant green energy. With a sudden burst of acceleration he swooped down Superman-style, his left fist extended in front of him as he plowed through a pair of mercs firing at Templar from behind a large planter. “Hey, Macintosh! On your left!”
The red-armored figure grunted and drove his left fist into the face of the merc that he had blasted into the pool, who had just been starting to rise. Then he half-turned towards another attacker directly in front of him, who had switched targets and was preparing to unload a volley at him from point-blank range. A quick sweep of his left arm deflected the muzzle of the merc’s rifle, and with a heavy overhand chop he brought the full weight of his sword down on the man’s left shoulder plate. The gunman howled as the blow smashed his collarbone; then he collapsed as the swordsman flicked his wrist and snapped the blade against the side of his head.
Two of the mercs were totally out of the fight, and two who had been hit by energy blasts were still trying to shake off the effects. Simon made a spinning leap at one, his blunted blades hammering the man’s ribs and arms repeatedly as he twirled like a windmill. The merc hit the ground like a ton of bricks, then went limp as Simon disabled him with a kick to the skull. Bullets pinged off his backplate as the man he had blasted with his laser vision staggered to his feet and drew a bead on him. Simon spared a single glance in his direction, and in that instant a flash of white light appeared out of nowhere directly behind him.
A man encased in silver-blue medieval armor and wearing a matching hood and silk mask clocked the merc smartly upside the head with a heavy wooden staff. As Simon watched, the man vanished in another flash of light, only to appear once again directly next to a second mercenary. The armored magus’ staff moved with punishing speed, and in a flurry of two-handed blows he brought the gunman down.
Energy blasts from all four heroes blanketed the courtyard as the remaining mercs tried to maintain some manner of cohesion, but they were outmaneuvered and outgunned. The magus blinked at will across the courtyard, appearing for a few seconds to deliver flurries of punishing staff blows to the arms and heads of mercenaries before disappearing again. The green-garbed flyer drew and returned fire even as he darted around, keeping the gunmen off balance as the Templar and the swordsman handled the footwork. In less than two minutes, the second patrol was down for the count, and Simon and his allies regrouped just outside of the Tower’s front entryway.
Chapter 4
With the initial battle over, the Templar glanced at the three other heroes that he had recruited to help him penetrate Dassault Tower. The man in the red armor was his friend Michael, the Crimson Firesword. The young, wisecracking flyer in green was Kyle Marsden, a former Air Force captain and Rikti War veteran who now called himself Verdant Vanguard. Simon knew little about the third man, the mysterious sorcerer in the armor, mask and hood, who called himself the Arcanknight. He spoke quietly and infrequently, and never regarding anything besides the matter at hand. What secondhand information Simon had been able to gather indicated that the man was attached, at least informally, to the Legacy Chain. However, since the Chain didn’t really keep records electronically, it tended to preclude finding any information through the usual channels. Simon knew just enough about him to know that he could be trusted, and to be confident that he would agree to help with the mission when he had been asked.
Personally, Simon felt a little guilty about involving them in the operation at all. In order to protect the anonymity of the Order, he had been forced to tell them only the bare minimum necessary to convince them to help. It was a small comfort that keeping them in the dark would hopefully keep them safe as well. It was true that the less they knew, the less likely the Scourge would consider them a threat – however, if the Scourge managed to identify them, they would probably become targets regardless.
Simon had explicitly avoided bringing in Twelve or Kura for that very reason…not to mention the fact that the Paladins lacked the time and numbers to handle an operation like this. At the same time, Simon tried not to feel as though he was cheapening his three co-combatants by using them to deflect danger away from his fellow MPs.
No distractions, dammit. They’re heroes, just like you. This is Paragon City. They know the risks. Shut up and focus.
The Paladins are good, but they’re not soldiers. This mission requires tactical coordination; that means military experience. Vanguard and Firesword know how the game is played – now I just have to trust them to carry out their part of the op. Marsden may be...eccentric now...but in spite of his recent instability, he’s still a squadron member at heart. He knows that Firesword’s been at this longer; he’ll follow Mike’s lead on the inside.
“All right, here’s the plan. Firesword and Vanguard – you’re our flyboys. The two of you go up the exterior to the twentieth-floor corner office. I want you to ransack whatever you find up there – computers, hard files, bookcases, desks. When you’re done, you’ll probably have company. I want you keep moving and keep everyone busy. Move from floor to floor if you have to – but whatever you do, do not go above twenty-five. What we’re looking for is on thirty, and anything between there and where you’ll be is bound to be nastier than you can handle on your own. You hear anything, you see anything, you feel anything coming that even seems heavier than normal security attention, you get the hell out of there pronto. I mean as fast as you can. No waiting, no peeking, no heroics. Got it?”
Standing in front of them with his arms crossed, Simon gave them the sternest glance that was possible from behind a blank visor until Firesword nodded. Vanguard simply stood there, arms also crossed, grinning at Templar’s unexpressive helmet, until Firesword elbowed him sharply in the ribs. The green-coated man recoiled and hissed in surprise and pain and threw the other man a dirty look, then glared back at Simon. “Yeah, ok, I got it. Geez.”
Simon waited for a few heartbeats, then nodded. “Arcanknight – you’re with me. We’re hoofing it from here on up. I’ll need you to take out the front end security without them knowing we’re inside. We get in fast and quiet and move as quickly as we can – straight up.”
The magus nodded promptly, once. Though he did not speak, Simon noticed the fingers of his right hand tighten on his staff. Then with a sudden motion, he hefted the weapon off the ground, taking it in both hands.
The Templar checked the chrono readout on his visor display. Twenty-one hundred fifty-nine. “All right, gentlemen. As soon as our third unit deploys, we’ll get underway. And they should be arriving right, about…now.”
There was the sudden scream of jet engines overhead, and all four men looked up to see an aircraft fly directly over the summit of the tower. Structurally, it was built like a large helicopter, with a long, streamlined fuselage and a number of airfoils. Instead of rotors, it was held aloft by a series of thrusters mounted at key points along the airframe. As they watched, it took position astride the edge of the roof, rotating to point its aft hatch towards the rooftop.
Vanguard’s face was screwed into an expression of mixed surprise, confusion, and awe. “Ok, Scorp. I’ll bite. Who exactly do you know that can throw around toys like that?”
“Nobody you’d know about.”
“Who the hell are those guys?”
"Midgardians. Let’s go.”
Marsden stood there, his hands spread out to either side, palms upturned, his expression unchanged. “That’s it? Just ‘let’s go’?”
Templar was already striding purposefully towards the entrance, the armored mage walking close alongside. “Yes. Now get moving. We’re on the clock. Firesword, take him.”
Firesword grabbed Vanguard by the elbow and fired his suit’s jumpjets, physically pulling the still-protesting hero up the side of the tower. Templar watched the cocky green daredevil being carried away with a snort of amusement, then placed his right hand on his comlink transceiver. “Blue Leader to Blue One. Status report.”
Sergeant Maddox’s voice came in clearly over the comm. “Copy, Blue Leader. Deployment completed five by five. Platoon is on-station and ready to move on the objective.”
“Excellent. Move your squads in immediately; proceed according to plan. Understood?”
“Affirmative, General. This one gets done by the book. They’ll never know what hit ‘em.”
There was the sound of a heavy metal door being kicked in, followed by the clatter of more than a dozen pairs of armor-plated boots as the two squads of troopers stormed down the rooftop access stairwell.
Templar nodded to Arcanknight. “I just got our signal. Let’s go.”
The magus closed his eyes and lowered his head – then with a flash of light, he vanished. Templar counted off to five, then charged inside.
It took him less than another five seconds to clear the main doors and enter the front lobby. Both guards were sprawled unconscious across the security desk, Arcanknight standing over them with his staff. His eyes flicked up from their comatose forms to look at Templar as he entered. “It’s done. What next?”
Simon took a quick look around at the room, then looked at his visor HUD to check the building schematics stored in his automap. His gaze focused on the door to the stairwell, and he quickly strode over and pulled it open. With a calm, deliberate movement, fast but not hurried, he reached over his shoulders and drew his twin katanas. “We climb.”
Arcanknight had stepped over to stand directly behind him, his hooded face raised to gaze up the staircase that wound upwards into the darkness. “I suppose you’ll want me out in front, scanning for threats.”
Templar shook his head. “Scanning, yes. Out in front, no. I need your magic to spot threats that my suit’s sensors might not pick up. In the tight quarters, I’ll get interference from the walls and the stairs – your magic won’t have that handicap. If somebody’s waiting to ambush us, I’m better equipped to deal with it. Besides, you can send a mental alert to me through my comlink without tipping them off. I can’t do the same so easily for you.”
“Alright, point taken. Let’s get on with it then.”
Templar nodded once more; then the two men took off up the dimly-lit stairwell.
Chapter 5
Up on the twentieth floor, Crimson Firesword and Verdant Vanguard were ransacking their assigned corner office. Marsden was toying with the room’s furniture, using streams of green energy from his power gauntlet to upturn the desks and cabinets and toss them around, spilling their contents noisily onto the floor. Firesword, in the meantime, was hunched over the office’s desktop computer looking for files, his helmeted gaze focused squarely on the screen as he jabbed at the keyboard.
“You know, I think that Templar actually wanted us to find something up here. I don’t think that throwing the furniture around is going to accomplish that.”
“He said to ransack the place. That’s what I’m doing. Ransacking. Just following orders there, Macintosh.”
“You’re making an awful lot of noise. They’ll be here at any second at this rate.”
Vanguard shrugged. “Then we take ‘em down, fast and hard. How tough can they be?”
Firesword glanced up and fixed the younger man with a glare. “You heard what he said about the floors above thirty, didn’t you? Did you happen to notice the catch in his voice? Even with that modulation from his helmet vocalizer, I could hear it. There’s somebody here – or worse, something – that’s got even Templar spooked. I’ve known the guy for almost two years, and he doesn’t spook easily, believe me. The guy is a wall – a rock. There’s something going on that he’s not telling us about.”
Vanguard rolled his eyes. “Nooo, really? Tell me something I don’t know. Look, Red, scuttlebutt says you were in the service, so you should know as well as me that whoever’s running the op never lets us grunts in on the big picture. Hell, I was an officer, and even I didn’t know what the score was half the time. That’s how it works; you earn your money and you take your chances.”
Firesword’s gaze had shifted back to the screen, but his voice was harsher now, tight. “Don’t give me any lectures, Flyboy. You’re right; I know how things work as well as you. I know that Templar planned this op, and I know that he doesn’t try anything that he can’t pull off. I also know that he’s got connections with somebody who can throw around heavies like that thing that skimmed the roof.”
He looked up one more time. “And yes, I also know that he’s keeping us in the dark. You don’t go to all the trouble of having heavies like that if you don’t need them. My guess is, he’s trying to deflect the heat off of us; keep it on him and whoever landed on the roof. We’re just the backup, the distraction.”
Vanguard scoffed. “Great. So we get to play clay pigeon down here while he goes after the real target. Exactly how much security goon gunfire are we supposed to sponge up?”
There was the sound of movement in the hallway outside the office door. Firesword sprang up from the desk, hustled over to the door, cracked it open, and peered outside. A heavily armed security squad had just exited the elevator and was setting up on either side of the hall, getting ready to breach.
Firesword pulled out his tech-sword and thumbed it on, sending the energy blade arcing up into the air in front of him. “Preferably, as little as necessary. But we also have to keep these gate crashers busy – as many as we can, as long as we can.”
Vanguard grinned finally, punching his gloved right fist into his gauntleted left hand. “Alrighty then. Finally, the fun part.”
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Sergeant Maddox and his men entered the stairwell door with practiced military precision; then charged down ten floors in under a minute. They largely ignored the stairs; each man instead leapt over each section of steps with a single jump. With their platoon leader in the front, the power-armored troopers took turns hopping from corner to corner, each man crouching and uncoiling the artificial muscles in their exoskeletal limbs. When they arrived at the door to the thirty-fifth floor access hallway, a four-man team took up position facing it. One of them glanced up at Maddox, who had stopped on the platform above the doorway with the rest of the platoon positioned around him. The sergeant gave the signal, and the breaching team detonated the pulse charge.
The shaped explosive was a breaching charge, flashbang, and small-scale EMP disruptor all in one. It was designed to kill any unarmored or lightly armored individuals standing directly around the door, incapacitate or disorient anyone slightly farther out, and scramble the electronics of the gear carried by either group. It could effectively disable visor electronics, computerized gunsights, targeting computers, combat drones, and almost anything else electrical and combat-related.
The bomb exploded straight out in a spray of smoke and fire and a brief, violent roar, sending the heavy framed steel door flying off its hinges and into the hallway beyond with a deafening clang. Maddox’s visor display flickered and waved briefly, as the short, sudden EMP burst shook his suit’s electronics in spite of the powered armor’s heavy shielding.
Troopers moved with superhuman speed and precision as they swung through the door and leveled their beam rifles, ready to fire on anything that moved. By the time the initial four-man breaching team had taken up positions on the other side of the door, the first squad was already moving up to take point.
Sigurson’s suit detected the first threat. Its VI immediately routed a priority alert through the tactical battlenet, which was picked up by the other suit VIs and displayed visually and audibly to each individual Midgardian. The entire process took less than a second, and the soldiers reacted almost as quickly thanks to their suit-enhanced reflexes. A squad of security guards, drawn by the sound of the breaching charge, half-charged into the hallway from the left side of the T-corridor. Only one was unfortunate enough to pass into the Midgardians’ line of fire before the squad realized that their opponents were already set up inside the door.
The guards’ training, however, was exemplary. The lone exposed guard, rather than faltering out in the open, instead maintained his momentum and charged for cover on the other side of the hall. As he did, he leveled his weapon at the intruders and let off a blind burst of automatic fire down the hallway. The security squad leader immediately halted the rest of his men behind the corner, and guns came into view on both sides of the hallway, spraying bullets at the Midgardians downrange. A second man followed the first to the opposite corner, moving quickly under cover of the gunfire. The Midgardians opened up on the far side of the hall, their particle beam rifles flashing as they sent kilowatt-range energy bolts slicing effortlessly through the walls. There were howls of pain and shouts of alarm as the beam blasts struck home. Maddox could hear the enemy squad leader cursing and yelling as his men were blasted down even through their cover. The man caught himself, cutting off his stream of profanity and resorting to directing his squad with hand signals.
Maddox knew this because he could see his opposite through the wall, thanks to his suit visor’s enhanced vision mode. He sighted down his rifle and squeezed off a single shot, sending a blue-white beam of polarized ions scorching through the wall and striking the squad leader in the chest. General Templar had instructed his men to use non-lethal stun beams unless absolutely necessary; low-level ion pulses intended to scramble, overload, and shut down an opponent’s nervous system. They weren’t completely harmless, however; on average, one in every twelve-hundred and sixty shots caused serious neurological damage that could result in paralysis, brain damage, or death.
Maddox hoped that he hadn’t just fired off shot number twelve-hundred sixty. But there was no time to check. As their leader dropped senseless to the floor, the remaining guards beat a hasty retreat.
The armored sergeant wasted no more time. He stood up while motioning for his men to do the same. They had five more floors to fight through to get to the main target, and these lightweights were just the first wave. Maddox hefted his rifle as he began to move. This fight was just getting started.
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Templar and his arcane companion had charged up thirty flights of stairs in fewer than five minutes. They had yet to encounter a single ambush, patrol, or trap. As far as Simon was concerned, that meant that a trap was waiting for them. As he and Arcanknight set up on either side of the thirtieth-floor access door, Simon tried to shake the feeling that he had made a very serious mistake. If the Scourge was ready for them, then he might very well have wound up getting himself, his three friends, and a platoon of Midgardians killed…and for no good apparent reason, no less. He closed his eyes, bent his head slightly and touched his left katana to his visor as he leaned against the wall with his right shoulder. Simon took several slow, deep breaths, counting to ten. Then his eyes opened, and he fixed Arcanknight with a steady stare. The hooded man met the Templar’s gaze, then nodded once.
The mage vanished in a flash of light as Simon kicked in the door and rushed through it. He had only enough time to register that he was surrounded by Scourge soldiers before he was attacked.
There were seven of them. They had clearly been standing just behind the door, waiting for someone to come waltzing through it. Six of them wore the uniform dull gray and green combat armor and visored helmet of the Scourge horde, their faces obscured by tactical visors and breath masks. They carried conventional assault rifles in their hands, though each of them had a pair of long-bladed military combat knives strapped to either leg. The seventh was a seven foot tall, hulking brute, clad in thick blood-red armor and with a trio of razor sharp claws protruding from each fist. Its neck and mouth were hidden beneath a maze of wires and cybernetic implants, leaving its scarred and disfigured bald head exposed. Discolored green veins, their patterns weirdly regular and symmetrical, streaked its pallid grey flesh. It stared at the Templar from behind lifeless, cloudy yellow eyes.
Six Scourge troopers and a berserker. Simon would be hard pressed to take out the clawed hulk on his own; trying to do so while having a half-dozen assault rifle magazines emptied into his back was tantamount to suicide. Unfortunately for the Scourge soldiers, however, they were victims of their own vigilance. They were arrayed in a semicircle around the door, with Simon in the middle. Had he been a normal human being, and not a fully trained and equipped member of the Einherjar, he would have been dead before he had a chance to react. As it was, his armor gave him the edge he needed.
The Templar rolled forwards as all seven Scourge soldiers acted at once. The six troopers opened up on the spot where Simon had been, and three of them went down immediately, their bodies shredded in the crossfire. Two salvos of bullets hammered into the berserker’s upper chestplate and it howled - an inhuman, almost mechanical sound, like the screech of a protesting car motor. It charged blindly forwards, and its deadly claws made short work of the hapless trooper directly in its path.
Simon rolled low and to the right between two troopers, dodging the bulk of the gunfire – but threat indicators still flashed as he felt the impact of bullets slamming into the armor over his back, arms, and ribs. In spite of the force of the blows, he came to his feet in an instant, his katanas scything out like cobras. His arms were a blur of motion as he rained blows upon the bodies of two Scourge troopers simultaneously. Razor sharp impervium sliced effortlessly through ceramics, muscle and bone as he dismembered them in seconds, their bodies falling to the ground in pieces around his feet. What had once been two human beings were now no more than husks, their bones, nerves and blood replaced with synthetic endoskeletons, fiber-optic wires, and clear blue conduction fluid.
Simon dropped and rolled again as the berserker howled with rage and charged at him, heedless of the fact that all six of its companions had been downed. Armored and massive though it was, however, it was still subject to the laws of physics. The mindless titan’s legs caught in the wreckage that littered the floor and it tripped, shaking the entire floor as it impacted. The berserker laboriously picked itself up and turned, only to find that its target was no longer there. Simon had dodged around it again, and with a single forceful thrust, he drove his right-hand katana through the monster’s chest and twisted it savagely. Driven by focused rage and determination, he tore the blade out through the right side of the berserker’s chest even as he swung his left-hand blade low and hacked off the creature’s left leg below the knee. Fluid spurted and circuits sparked as the berserker toppled once again – but not before Simon hauled back and decapitated it with one swipe.
He stood in the hall, surrounded by the detritus of dismembered Scourge soldiers, and said loudly, to no one in particular, “Sorry, guys. You want to take me down, you’re gonna have to do better than that.”
A female voice came from somewhere down the hall. “Very well, then, darling. If that’s what it takes, then that’s just what we’ll have to do.”
Chapter 6
Another six Scourge troopers stepped out into the far side of the hall. These had no guns; instead, each one of them was armed with a pair of curved swords - one long, one short, samurai style. They didn’t charge, however; in fact, they didn’t even move. They stood there, motionless, as though they were waiting for something.
Simon knew a thing or two about psychology. Whoever had spoken to him clearly wasn’t a drone, and he didn’t want to give them any signs of emotional stress or weakness. Despite the proximity of the threat, he decided to take a calculated risk. He rose out of his combat stance, sheathed his swords, crossed his arms, and waited for the mystery lady to appear.
She strode out into the hallway, giving Templar his first look at her: six foot two, long legs, jet-black hair. Dressed in a blood red combat suit with black highlights, her matching knee-high combat boots were flat-heeled and practical. His visor ran an analysis of the contours of her clothing as he watched her, making out the telltale signs of armor plating inserts over at least sixty percent of it. What appeared to be an authentic Japanese daisho was sheathed at her left hip - two swords; a katana and a wakizashi. As Simon glanced at the hand resting on the hilts of her blades, he noticed that her gauntlets, like his, were fitted with defensive scallops. Clearly this was a twin sword specialist, like he was. But who was she, and what was she doing here?
“You would be the Templar, then. They told me you would be coming.”
“Really. And who would ‘they’ be, exactly?”
She smirked. “Why, the people that I work for, of course. They also told me that you were good. I see that they were right.”
Templar wasn’t about to play twenty questions in response to her cryptic tone – that was her intention in deflecting his inquiries. Asking questions would actually give her more information to work with than she would by providing non-answers. He would have to play the same game if he was going to get anything out of her. “Really. That’s surprising. They’re not the sort to hand out praise even on their own side. Generally they tend to hold us human beings in contempt.”
She smiled humorlessly. “Of course they do. We have that in common, actually; it’s one of the reasons why I decided to work for them.”
Simon grunted. “You might want to consider a career change, if I were you. They have a nasty habit of replacing people’s brains with machines. I’d hate to see a lovely, intelligent gal like you reduced to a cyber-zombie.”
The smirk came out again. “Oh, fear not, Sir Knight. Despite their preference for creating corpses and then turning them into soldiers, they still have a need for and thus recognize talent. I’m too good at what I do for them to reduce me to a brain-panned circuit-head. Besides, I’ve got connections of my own, independent of their operations. Even they wouldn’t want to start something with my family – that would cost them too much.”
Her eyes sparkled as she spoke, and seemed to take on a kind of far-off look, as though she were daydreaming. Her eyes were a deep violet color, and with his visor magnification, Simon could see that they were flecked with grains of gold. They focused back on him with startling intent, and he sensed that some sort of switch had been flipped. Whatever was going on in her mind, it was fairly obvious that play time was over. The way she went from conversational, even whimsical, straight to all business and aggressive, hinted at some sort of mental abnormality – but Simon had no idea what kind it might be. All he knew was that she was proving unpredictable, and unpredictable was dangerous.
“So, my good man, what shall it be? Would you prefer to warm up on my minions first, or should I call them off? We can just as easily keep things between us – get this over and done with so I can go home. Personally, I’d rather enjoy seeing you in practice first. I could use a good show.”
Simon didn’t move, didn’t flinch; he simply held her gaze. “Is that all it is for you? A job, a game, a spectacle? Must be hard to take any joy in your work when you’ve got nothing to work for.”
The smirk came back, just for a second. “Nice try, City Boy. Like you, I’ve been trained to fight. My family made sure of that. It’s the family business, after all. Much like yours. Unlike you, however, I knew that from the start. We take pride in our work...and for us, the killing is its own reward.”
Her right hand made a slight, offhand gesture, and the six sword-armed Scourge soldiers turned and hustled out of the hallway. Then, without any warning, the woman whipped out her blades and leapt at Simon with superhuman speed.
He ducked to one side and drew his swords as she slammed down beside him, her own blades sinking into the floor where he had just been standing. Templar spun and directed a series of well-aimed strikes at her legs, arms, torso and head. Every move he made she countered with equal speed, then followed up with a counterattack. Each pair of swords flashed through the air with blurring speed and lethal purpose, and the hall was filled with the sound of clashing metal.
Templar knew he was a master of dual-bladed fighting; he had worked tirelessly for years to develop his skills. Clearly, so had she. Neither of them seemed able to make the slightest dent in the other’s defenses. He knew all of her combinations and techniques, and she obviously knew his. His armor should have given him an edge, but her reflexes were inhumanly fast, and so was her striking speed. As it was, he could just barely keep up.
She launched into a series of blows that edged him back towards the wall of the hallway. Templar dodged right to avoid one vicious swipe, then ducked under another. The blows sliced effortlessly through the thick plaster of the wall, and chunks of debris sloughed down from the gouges. He managed to unbalance her slightly with a swift kick that grazed the back of her knee, causing her subsequent swings to come in slightly off-target and slower than normal. Simon caught both blows on his blades simultaneously, then set off a short, controlled burst from his suit jumpjets. The leverage from the blade lock caused him to flip up and over her. Even before he landed, he twisted and lashed out at her with his left blade. He heard her bark in pain as the tip of the katana sliced through several layers of the combat suit’s unarmored fabric. Both of them spun to face each other and she glared at him, fury in her violet eyes.
Simon faced her, his blades held upright in front of him as blood dripped lightly from the cut in her back. It was then that he noticed two things.
First was the single drop of blood that plopped onto the floor; no more followed suit. Her bleeding had obviously been stopped abruptly by something. He discounted the theory that her suit had an automatic medical system installed. The armor plating alone seemed to be stretching the suit’s fabric; he doubted that a med system of any kind could be squeezed into its tightly streamlined confines. That meant she either had some impressive medical nanotech or regenerative capabilities.
Secondly, and far more alarming, was the condition of his blades. The katanas were crafted out of solid impervium, one of the hardest substances known to science. His suit’s advanced nanotech enabled him to manipulate the thin area of each sword’s edge, but that was the extent of it. As he looked at them, he could see long, hair-thin scratches etched onto the blades where her swords had struck them. It would have taken an incredibly sharp edge to do that.
Simon glanced over at the wall, where her blades had so effortlessly sheared through eight solid inches of dense, construction-grade plaster. Then it struck him.
He recalled the question that he had asked, and remembered what ‘General Templar’ had told him. The last thing he had said, faintly, just before vanishing completely from sight, was, “I’ve got just one piece of advice, kid. Watch out for assassins with mono-molecular blades.”
The clues clicked into place all at once, and Simon felt a fresh burst of rage wash through him. “It’s you,” he snarled. A puzzled look came momentarily over her face, to be replaced with anger and surprise as he rushed at her.
The suddenness of his attack pushed her backwards, and the speed and strength of his blows managed to knock her guard out of position by a few inches, leaving her with several shallow cuts to the shoulder, neck, and face where his blades had struck home. She hissed with rage and counterattacked savagely, but Simon’s sudden anger was little more than fuel. He sent her tumbling backwards with a kick to her midriff, and then leveled her with a blast of energy from his visor. She rolled to her feet without even flinching, and as Simon watched, the cuts on her face and neck squeezed closed and disappeared. She snarled with an inhuman sound, her violet eyes now blood red, her face so deathly pale that it was nearly white. Her ears had become pointed, and her teeth had lengthened and sharpened into a pair of fangs.
She was a vampire.
Chapter 7
On the twenty-fourth floor, Firesword and Vanguard were standing in the midst of a pile of fallen security guards, the fourth such group that they had taken down. They had gone up four separate floors, and on each one they had faced a squad of guards. So far, they had made it through with little damage, and had thoroughly combed through whatever information sources they could find. Firesword had a large sheaf of documents and a collection of OSDs stowed in his armor’s storage compartments. He doubted that there was much there that wasn’t junk, but there could be a few bits and pieces that might prove useful to Templar.
On the thirty-first floor, Sergeant Maddox and his two fire teams of Midgardians had just downed their sixth squad of security guards, and were ready to breach the stairwell to the thirtieth floor. It was there that all of the tower’s hidden accessways converged, and the general had determined that the checkpoint that oversaw them was located at that point. The troopers’ task was to secure it, investigate the secret compartments and their contents, and then blast the entire area to rubble.
Sergeant Maddox only hoped that the general had succeeded in drawing off whatever ‘heavy unit’ was supposedly guarding the central control room. While none of his men had suffered any injuries, most of them had minor damage to their battlesuits, and their pulse rifle ammo was running low. The checkpoint was certain to be the most heavily guarded point in the tower, and the Midgardians would have enough trouble taking it without having to face down an elite guard.
Another charge was detonated, and the troopers hustled through the doorway in a now-familiar maneuver. They entered the thirtieth floor without incident, and despite running thorough scans, they found no evidence of resistance. Maddox moved his men forwards cautiously, wary of an ambush or trap. As they turned the corner into the hallway that lead to the security checkpoint, he stopped, his eyes unbelieving.
The checkpoint was empty. Not simply devoid of guards; empty. A cube of four bare walls, ceiling and floor greeted the platoon of troopers. There were no gun turrets, no defense barriers, no cameras, and no hidden doorways. The accessways to the secret compartments were open and unhidden, plain for all to see. Even as Maddox began motioning troopers across the room to clear and secure the tunnels, he knew that they wouldn’t find anything. The enemy was simply gone. They had most likely been gone long before the General and his team had even begun their assault.
“Blue One to Blue Leader. Package has already been mailed; repeat, package has already been mailed.”
Templar’s eyes widened as he realized that he and his allies had been suckered. The vampiress took advantage of his split second of divided focus and charged him, her body becoming a blur as she seemed to flash horizontally through the air. Simon was thrown to the ground with jarring force, sending his swords rolling from his grip, and in an instant she was standing over him. Despite his six-hundred pound armored weight, she grabbed him by the throat and hauled him, one-handed, up into the air. A more level-headed opponent would have simply sunk their blades into him and finished him off, but Simon had clearly pissed her off by injuring her – something that she obviously was not accustomed to enduring.
His fists were both clenched on her left wrist, but despite his enhanced strength, he could not work her fingers loose. His eyes focused on the impossibly-sharp katana still clutched in her right hand. “Insolent little mortal shit,” she raged at him. “You think the Scourge inflicts horrible fates upon its victims? I will visit tortures upon your flesh that will drive you mad a hundred times over before I finally allow you to die.”
She hauled him forwards to within an inch of her lips, her blood-red eyes burning like coals. “I will make you regret the very instant you ever laid eyes upon my face.”
“Lady, I’m already there.”
Templar’s armored faceplate leapt forwards, smashing her in the face. Her head snapped back and she screamed, dropping him as her left hand came reflexively up to clutch at her broken nose. She swung her sword blindly as she stumbled backwards, and the super razor-sharp blade sliced easily through the armor plating over Simon’s thigh as he tried to roll away from her.
The point of the sword came within inches of his femoral artery, and through clenched teeth he let out a scream. His suit’s middle layer of reactive nanocells immediately closed in around the breach even as the inner layer poured medi-gel over the wound.
Teeth still gritted in agony, he crawled backwards and grabbed his swords, then rose stiffly to his feet, using the weapons for leverage as he lifted himself up. Blood was dripping steadily from her nose and mouth, and from behind her hand she spit out a mouthful of blood and broken teeth. She was crying and screeching incoherently as she stumbled and sputtered in pain and rage – thus, she was totally off guard when Arcanknight materialized with a flash behind her.
“Impetus maximus!”
The mage’s arms seemed to glow with an incandescent blue nimbus as he released the spell, and one swift blow of his staff caught her in the ribs and she doubled over. Another strike swept the sword from her hand as though it were made of wood. A hammer blow across her exposed back drove her to her knees. A savage kick to the face sent more blood flying with a sickening crunch as bone gave way. Somehow she managed to keep her balance on her knees as she glared with one swollen eye at her ambusher. Then, with grim finality, the masked wizard hauled his staff back and delivered a punishing blow to her left cheekbone with the weapon’s butt end. The beaten vampire toppled back onto the floor, her fingers twitching as she lay there, unconscious.
Arcanknight shifted his staff to his left hand, then waved his right over the vampire’s motionless form. “Gravitas immobilus.”
Her body seemed to sink into the floor as an invisible weight came to rest on top of her. Arcanknight hustled over to where the Templar was trying to walk and thrust his staff at him. “Here – put those away and take this.”
Simon sheathed his right-hand sword and grabbed the staff, putting his weight on it. “We’ve got to get out of here. The whole thing was probably a trap from the beginning.”
Arcanknight shook his head. “No. They were expecting us, but I don’t think they were expecting us to get here so soon. I saw them teleport the contents of the checkpoint out a few moments after I entered the room, and they did the same for the hidden passages immediately after that. This whole response of theirs was probably nothing more than a holding action.”
Templar shook his head. “Regardless, they managed to get what we were looking for out of here before we could get to it. They’ll be on guard from now on, too, now that we’ve found and attacked one of their front companies. Staying on the offensive now will be all but impossible without more intel.”
The mage regarded him silently, and Templar grimaced. Leave it to me to take the fun out of things, he thought sardonically. “At any rate, good work. Let’s get out of here.”
Arcanknight nodded, and Simon activated his commlink to open a channel to Firesword and Maddox. “All right, everybody. We’ve done all we can. Get the hell out of here ASAP. Sergeant, take your men back up to the transport. The rest of us will scatter.”
“Roger that, sir.”
Simon limped over to the window just in time to see Firesword’s and Vanguard’s red and green armored forms shoot out from a floor below, then streak away in different directions over the streets of Steel Canyon. Arcanknight reached out and placed his left hand on Templar’s right shoulder, then lowered his head and closed his eyes. Simon saw a bright flash of light, and suddenly he was standing on the roof of a small store. Looking around, he saw Dassault Tower standing close to a quarter-mile in the distance.
The mage glanced around, taking in his surroundings with an air of satisfaction. “Well, here we are.”
He stepped away from Templar, then turned his head to glance at him. “Oh, right – before I forget.”
Arcanknight reached into his belt pouch and pulled out a pair of OSDs. “I found these in the anteroom that I teleported into, right before I cast the shroud spell and slipped into the main checkpoint. Lucky for me that they’d already cleared it; even luckier that they’d overlooked these...things.”
He handed the discs to Simon, who grasped them and placed them in one of the storage packs on his belt. “Yeah - lucky.”
“I’d best be going...the farther away from this place, the better. You going to be alright?”
Simon nodded. “I’ll live. Thanks.”
He tossed the staff back to the hooded man, who caught it easily. Then he thumped it down on the roof three times, saluted, and vanished in a flash of white light.
Templar sheathed his other sword and grimaced as he shifted his wounded leg. It was stiff and numb from where it had been encased in medi-gel, but at least he could move it now.
There was the sound of jets above him, and a sudden wind whipped at his cloak as the Sleipnir transport came down to hover a few feet over the rooftop. Sergeant Maddox lifted open the side hatch and called out, “Need a lift, General?”
Simon grinned in spite of himself beneath his visor. “Thanks.”
He limped over to the hatch and climbed into the troop compartment, taking a seat next to the sergeant. An armored Midgardian reached out and pulled the hatch shut, and Maddox banged his fist twice on the bulkhead behind him. The jets roared out of hover mode and the transport lifted off, climbing steadily into the glittering night air.
There was a squawk of static as the compartment intercoms came on. “Crew be advised, we have two bogies flying alongside at three and nine-o’clock.”
Simon glanced out both side hatch windows. A red-armored figure was keeping formation with the transport on the port side; a green-armored figure was doing the same on the right. He grinned and signaled for Maddox to switch the intercoms on. “Not to worry, pilots. They’re our escort for tonight.”
“Copy that, sir. Shall I stand down weapons?”
“Negative, pilots. Keep ‘em hot until we get back to base. Set controls to manual with full safety auto-overrides; designate our escorts as friendly IFF.”
“Aye-aye, sir.”
Maddox gestured at several troopers, who promptly got up and made their way to the transport’s gunnery stations. Then he sat back and looked over at his general. “Sorry we didn’t manage to secure the target, sir.”
Simon didn’t reply immediately. He sat back, his gaze thoughtful. Maybe Arcanknight had been right; maybe the Scourge hadn’t been fully ready for them. If all they had been able to evacuate was their hidden facilities, there was the chance that some of the information that Vanguard and Firesword had collected might be of value – not to mention the discs that the magus had found. It was a long shot, but any clue might help him locate more enemy targets or devise a better means of fighting them.
And he knew of at least one servant of the Scourge who was still flesh and blood, someone who was clearly still susceptible to emotional manipulation. Simon doubted that this mysterious vampire assassin would ever forget her encounter with the Aegirian Templar – one way or another, he would be meeting her again. She was the one weak link in the Scourge that he knew he could potentially exploit...and if she belonged to a formal court, as she had ostensibly claimed, then chances were good that he could probably find it. If she was involved with the Scourge, then they almost certainly all were...and that involvement would give him the trail he needed. These vampires, whoever they were, were his doorway into the heart of the most insidious group of villains the world had never known. The mission, though apparently a failure, had not left him empty-handed after all.
He straightened in his seat and leaned forwards, looking out the window as Paragon City rolled by beneath. “Don’t worry about it, Sergeant. The important thing is that we all made it out alive...and mark my words - the Scourge will be giving us plenty of second chances.”
