A subtle agency omnibus, p.46
A Subtle Agency Omnibus, page 46
part #1 of The Metaframe War Series
Chloe prepared to leave when something clicked unexpectedly beneath her. She looked briefly over the parapet, and the door at the base of the tower pushed outward. She stepped back from the parapet, her mind racing. Someone had been watching.
Her lips parted with a knowing smile. She wondered if she would be surprised by who the watcher was. She flipped over the edge of the far parapet and clung on to the outside of the tower. She blended into the shadows, her Red Empire garb perfectly suited to her needs. The parapet extended out from the tower by about two feet. With fingers like forged steel, Chloe hung onto the crevices between the bricks. Her core strength allowed her to hold her position flat beneath the parapet for as long as she needed. The external metal stairs gave slightly, as someone jumped up on them. As they advanced up the stairs, she scrambled silently around the tower and remained out of sight. She could hear his heartbeat, it was slower than normal, that and the ten-foot leap to the stairs told her that it was a Ramp Master approaching.
Chloe continued to scuttle silently along. Hiding in the thick shadows beneath the parapet, placing the tower between herself and the stranger as he ascended the stairs.
* * *
Ramin Kain stepped onto the top of the tower, faltering momentarily as he took in the scene.
He braced himself for a second on the parapet, then stepped forward, careful not to leave any marks of his presence. The first praetorian knelt upright. Face down on the parapet, positioned like a wax figure in a grotesque display. The nape of the praetorian’s neck was exposed, a blade had entered straight through the brain stem, before tearing out most of the vampire’s throat. The second vampire lay spread-eagled on the floor, his heart separated from his chest and resting half a dozen feet away. He skirted the pools of blood around the praetorians and made his way to the center of the tower’s roof.
Whoever had done this, was very fast, stealthy and expertly skilled, the two vampires had been taken completely by surprise.
His scalp itched terribly. Ramin rubbed both hands through his hair beneath his broad-brimmed hat. He looked around, shocked, disbelieving what he was seeing.
“What the fuck happened?” Ramin whispered. His voice trembling, so much had hinged on this mission.
Ramin looked around again, his head jerking left and right. His night glasses gave him excellent night vision, but he could see nothing out of the ordinary, except for a brooding black van parked on the expressway and two corpses lying yards from him. He strained to hear anything, but there was only the silence of the night and the faint noises of the tower’s pumps.
A shiver went up his spine, he was horribly alone and exposed. Whoever had decimated the praetorians could still be around. He pulled his Glock 9mm and drew his sword. A dreadful sense of being watched shivered across his skin, but he could not see from where or by whom. He ramped, hard and fast. Blurring away from the top of the tower, he descending down the stairs in a flash to the ground below.
Ramin promptly disappeared north along the laneway to the streets of South Dorchester.
* * *
Chloe pushed herself away from the brick wall beneath the parapet, dropping lithely to the bottom of the water tower. For the benefit of any watching cameras, she sank into a deep crouch, before standing up. The drop was a decent jump for a vampire but a mighty leap for a Ramp master.
She stared at the fleeing form of Ramin Kain. Smiling beneath her dark veil, she whispered to herself, “The wicked flee when no man pursueth: but the righteous are bold as a lion.”
So, you were watching, and now you are running away as if pursued by the devil himself. Well may you fear a pursuer but not tonight, for tonight you are safe. You and I will meet again and then you will discover a fate beyond the limits of your imagination.
Snorting once, Chloe shook her head. This damnable heated suit is horribly uncomfortable, time for this fake Red Empire Assassin to disappear for good. After all, it is wise to never repeat a specific tactic.
She blurred along the laneway to the north, disappearing into the desolated slums of South Dorchester.
* * *
The van accelerated away from the accident and emergency entrance of the hospital and merged into the street traffic.
“All onsite cameras were offline for the drop-off,” Juliette reported calmly over the earbud comm links. “We will have continuous cover back to the safe house.”
“Good work everyone,” Francis added from the front seat. “That’s one more innocent life the vampires didn’t claim tonight.”
Relief surged through Anton, everyone had survived, not even a scratch. He’d been certain that there would be a trap, and he still had a lingering feeling of a narrow escape. He looked around the team, everyone was relaxed, comfortable, variously happy or calm, discussing the night’s events and actions the way that victors do, with a natural confidence and ease. He felt oddly out of place like he was looking at a big jigsaw puzzle and a single pivotal piece was missing. There was something, an idea or a notion, that was tantalizingly out of reach, just beyond the boundaries of his mind. He tried reaching for it, but it was like groping in pitch darkness for something that wasn’t there.
The sensation of missing something became painful, and Anton remarked, “Wasn’t that too easy?”
The team quietened down, and Francis observed, “I don’t think so Anton. Chiara, Li and yourself came in late, and Jay nearly got killed. We also didn’t save all the people, there was one casualty tonight.”
Jay tilted his head and asked, “Yes, what slowed you guys down?”
“What was your entrance like?” Chiara asked Jay.
“Our doors were shut,” Li noted. “We didn’t open them until Francis gave the call to go.”
Yvette nodded and reported, “Ours were off their hinges, we had a straight path in.”
“That’s enough to account for the gap,” Francis observed.
Anton frowned, sighed and stated uneasily, “Okay, there’s a tactical issue there, but apart from that, it felt too easy. It still feels too easy, like there’s something missing.”
Francis directed, “Anton, we will debrief in full when we get back to the safe house, see if you can clarify your thoughts by then.”
“Boojums?” Peter remarked from the driver’s seat.
Anton shrugged and frowned.
Jay caught Anton’s gaze and grinned tentatively at him.
Anton leaned forward slightly in the gloom of the van’s interior.
Jay put his right fist up in a lazy loop. Anton did the same, and they gently fist punched.
Jay leaned forward and offered contritely, “You saved my life tonight. This doesn’t change how I feel about your grandfather, but I understand that you are not him. I apologize for how I’ve treated you; it was horribly unfair.”
An intense wave of relief washed through Anton, and he replied, “No problem, forget it.”
Jay looked at Anton quizzically for a moment, whispering tightly, “I tried to kill you.”
Anton grinned crookedly. “Well, you’re not the only one.”
“You’re taking it well.”
“Jay, I’m just glad we’re on the same side.”
Jay nodded and declared, “For sure, we’re on the same side.”
Finally, some progress, Anton thought.
* * *
The Raven strove to understand the night’s events.
They had seen the break in the silhouette of the parapet along the top of the water tower. The Raven was sure it was two praetorians, armed with a sniper rifle and a light machine gun. The Raven had ramped without breaking stride. Their senses going into overdrive just as a new figure appeared from the shadows on the tower top. Cold metal had gleamed for a brief instant in the moonlight, and then the slaughter had begun.
The action on top of the tower was over a moment later. The figure shrinking back into the shadows. The Raven had breathed in the night air, letting it out slowly, allowing their Ramp to die to a cool ember. The two short swords, cowl, and long cloak were unmistakable; the figure had been a Red Empire assassin.
The rest of the team had not noticed the fight, their attention elsewhere at the critical moment. As no one else had reacted, it was obvious that only the Raven had seen the two praetorians and their mysterious killer. The Raven was shocked, what were the praetorians doing there in the first place? Did they know about the mission? Or were they simply staking out the coven, waiting for any members of the Order to arrive?
Anton, Li, and Jay had talked about the mission being a trap. Anton had proposed the idea and Jay had dismissed it, but it had turned out that Anton had been right.
An uncomfortable feeling of disquiet crept through them as they considered what had happened. Anton was quite insightful to see a trap which everyone else had dismissed. The Raven added it to the list of odd abilities that Anton had. The hard defense that broke Jay’s hand and his wild speed under desperate conditions. One day Anton may have enough awareness to see through the Raven’s disguise.
The Raven shook their head gently, beset with uncertainty. The mission had been a trap. There were two options. The first was that the coven had been created as bait by the Vampire Dominion and then staked out by the praetorians until the Order of Thoth showed up, and the second was that there was a traitor in the Order who had betrayed the Mirovar force team to the vampires.
The only people who knew of the mission were the Mirovar force team, Ramin Kain, and Samuel Luther. The Raven had grown up with the other team members. They were much-loved, albeit faithless heathens, who had not yet seen the truth of the way of the Red Empire. The Raven believed that they would all come willingly to the Red Empire in the end. It was the Raven’s sacred duty to guide them to the truth, and God willing, it would be so.
The Raven considered it impossible that the Mirovar force team had been betrayed from within, that left only Kain, or Luther, or both, in the role of traitor.
What were the possible responses? It was safer to assume that Kain and Luther were both traitors until proven otherwise. Although, they couldn’t rule out that the coven was simply a lure designed to catch and kill them all.
What about the Red Empire assassin? Who was it? Perhaps their childhood instructor Taipan, a true master of Red Empire Ninjitsu, or another who had come of age since the Raven’s insertion into the Mirovar force team. The Raven concluded that the assassin had to be the Red Ghost’s other agent in North America, the same person on the end of the messages that the Raven had sent. The only one the Raven had told of tonight’s mission and they had intervened against the vampires.
Why had the other Red Empire agent broken their cover to protect the Mirovar force team? The Raven considered the possibility that they had come to observe and fortunately discovered the praetorians before they could attack. Could they also be secretly protecting the Raven? They could ensure that the Raven would fulfill their own mission of rising to the top of the Order of Thoth. From that high position, the Raven could bend the Order to the will of Shabbah al Ahmar until the Order was absorbed by the Red Empire.
Then all the Ramp Masters would be united under one glorious banner against the Vampire Dominion.
The Raven was left with the following conclusions. Kain and Luther were not to be trusted and may have betrayed the Order of Thoth to the Vampire Dominion. Shabbah al Ahmar’s agent in North America was willing to risk all to protect the Mirovar force team. The Vampire Dominion may be willing to create covens of vampires simply to bait a trap with. Anton was brighter than people gave him credit for and his ability to reach the correct conclusion before others did may one day be a threat to the Raven’s mission.
The Raven smiled slightly, barely visible in the gloom inside the van. They would have to ensure that Anton could never suspect them of having a mission beyond the Mirovar force team. They would have to take special care to manage their relationship with him.
The van sped through the darkness, chasing the twin cones of bright illumination that lit up the trees beside the road. The trees loomed over the road like giant watchmen, silent guardians of the boundaries of the highway leading back to the safe house.
The Raven relaxed in their seat. Something teased at the edge of their awareness. They wanted to ignore it, but it wouldn’t go away, so they reached for it, and it rushed through them like an ice-cold knife.
What if Shabbah al Ahmar’s agent in North America was a double agent or worse a member of the Vampire Dominion?
A sick feeling bloomed in the middle of the Raven’s gut. The question was shocking, the level of betrayal almost beyond imagining, and yet - it felt right. It would mean Shabbah al Ahmar’s agent had been playing the Raven to achieve their own ends. But what could be their agenda? If they were also working for the vampire dominion, why would they intervene and kill the two praetorians waiting to ambush the Mirovar force team? It didn’t make any sense.
The sense of truth faded away into the surrounding darkness. The Raven groped after it, but it was like trying to grasp mist and shadow. They were left with an uneasy feeling of having missed something critically important.
The Raven worked hard to remember in detail what they had seen on top of the water tower. The masked figure had been seen briefly while the Raven was ramped, time had slowed, the assassin’s techniques were pure Red Empire Ninjitsu and had been executed with stunning speed.
The assassin wasn’t Taipan. Not even the Raven’s premier instructor was that fast. It could have been a lone wolf, someone with a rare talent for speed, and their own agenda. Someone who knew of the Vampire Dominion and the Mirovar force team’s plans.
Hell, it could have been a rogue vampire warrior dressed up as a Red Empire assassin.
The thought sent a shiver along the Raven’s skin, and they remained troubled by thoughts of betrayal for the rest of the journey to the safe house.
* * *
General Clayton Maze leaped from the hovering nightfalcon helicopter to the top of the water tower.
He landed on his feet, in a minimum crouch, his vampire physiology absorbing the impact of the twenty-yard fall without harm. His nostrils flared. The air was filled with the scent of recently congealed blood, and the whiff of decay from the apartment block opposite the tower. His eye’s widened as he took in his surroundings. He noted the precise methods that had been used to kill the two praetorians.
“Clearly an expert,” he observed without irony.
Two praetorians equipped with body bags, dropped from the helicopter, landing beside him. They moved forward to recover the remains of the Beta team.
Clayton had already seen enough to confirm the video record he’d watched in the nightfalcon. The Panopticon had harvested imagery from a US military satellite during the mission and the two praetorians being zipped into body bags had been killed at precisely 00:52:34. He was not surprised by his failure to detect any sign of the assailant. He’d spent over a century at war with their ilk. His lips curled with distaste. He hated the Red Empire with a passion bordering on fanaticism.
He went to the parapet and looked over. Better able to judge the distance to the ground from where he stood than by watching satellite images in a helicopter. It was quite a drop; not too difficult for a vampire, but a long way for a Ramp master - a very long way. Was the assailant human? Anyone could don the garb of a Red Empire assassin, but no one could fake the combat effectiveness on display.
A brief gust pulled at the dark suit jacket that he wore. The air was moist, the first hint of rain. He stood with his hands on his hips and surveyed the site. Another team of praetorians had commandeered the black van on the expressway and were driving off with it. A second nightfalcon hovered over the two-story building to the north, picking up the remains of Gamma team.
His final team was bagging the bodies of the coven vampires arrayed by the Order of Thoth in front of the apartment block.
Clayton was troubled. There was the telltale heat plume of the Ramp in the satellite view, easy to detect with an infra-red filter, it appeared that there was a very talented Red Empire assassin conducting operations in North America. He shook his bald head slowly - the facts seemed to fit a Red Empire assassin. But he’d never encountered one this effective and that left room for doubt.
Clayton reviewed the video footage in his mind, the assailant had appeared out of the abandoned houses on the north side of the main street at 00:52:06. They had blurred across the road to the base of the two-story building where they had ascended the outer wall. They had surprised and promptly dismembered the Gamma team on the roof at 00:52:13. They had then moved on, descending down to the trees and the path that wound its way around the western end of the apartment block.
Cornelius Crane had issued his abort mission command to Centurion Rawlings at 00:52:19. Rawlings never got the chance to pass the message onto his teams.
The assailant had reached the expressway over the Neponset River at 00:52:20. The van’s rear door had been torn from its hinges, and the assailant had entered the van, exiting two seconds later at 00:52:23. They had then covered the three hundred yards from the van to the tower top in ten seconds. The Beta team praetorians had died a second later.
Clayton leaned out over the parapet and saw there was enough room for someone to hide underneath it. Provided they could hold onto the edges of the bricks. A vampire or a Ramp master could do it.
The assailant had paused for a while on top of the tower, before hiding out of sight underneath the parapet while another Ramp master had ascended the tower and investigated the dead praetorians before disappearing away from the site. The assailant had dropped from beneath the parapet to the ground. They had paused briefly, and according to their infra-red heat signature had remaining ramped. They had blurred away, disappearing into the nearby abandoned houses bordering South Dorchester. For man or vampire, it would be an easy matter to break contact with the Panopticon and escape. The camera coverage in South Dorchester was as decayed as the rest of the suburb.
