The lost castle wyrd boo.., p.8
The Lost Castle (Wyrd Book 3), page 8
Spy stuff, thinks Frank. This is CIA for sure.
Or the mob.
“One last thing. One day you might be in real big trouble. You get one free Get Out of Jail card from me. Contact Department Nineteen. Ask for Mr. White.”
And then the Man with No Name is gone.
At The Chourmo, a small basement club along the Rue de la Croix, Frank finishes their first set for the evening. The musicians file out back into the alley to smoke the Gauloises they’ve gone crazy for. Frank goes to the bar and asks for a water.
“Hey paisano. You’re from America, brother.” Frank turns to see a goombah at the bar in the tiny dark club dotted with red hurricane lights on all the tables. Just like back in Chicago. The goombah is Italian-American for sure. He’s nothing like the well-dressed French, and the even better dressed Italians, who live in Marseille and are out on this Saturday evening.
“I am,” admits Frank. “Chicago.”
The guy laughs loudly like all Americans do in Europe. And Frank feels immediately uncomfortable. A moment later, the guy signals the sullen olive-skinned bartender and orders two whiskeys.
“I thought I was the only American in the city. Imagine that. You cross the whole entire world and see nothin’ but foreigners... and here you are, paisano. New York myself, but... I seen Chicago... if you know what I mean.” He winks. Broadly.
The bartender is searching for the whiskey.
The goombah looks around and Frank knows this guy is mafia. Probably over here picking up some hash off a speedboat from Marrakesh.
“You heard of a guy named Jimmy Irish?”
Frank had. Back in Chicago. Jimmy Irish was, supposedly, a hitter for the Outfit. Or at least he was before Frank left for ‘Nam.
“I don’t know him. But I’ve heard about him.”
“AhhhhhHaaaaa....” laughs the goombah again as the whiskey in two glasses lands on the bar top in front of them. “I know Jimmy Irish from way back.”
And now Frank knows exactly why he should be very uncomfortable. The mob was just a way of life for some back in Chicago. Not everyone. But everyone knew someone who was in. And when you tallied up the deaths and divorces, funerals and court appearances and long stretches, smart people steered clear as much as they could of the mob. Frank had been raised of that persuasion. His best friend had ended up there. And now he was in Joliet on a federal racketeering charge. But Frank had always stayed clear.
“I’m Nials Abruzzi. But everybody calls me the German because my ma was a kraut,” he says as he slaps Frank’s back hard and gestures with his right hand that Frank should join him for a drink.
And there’s a tiny black hand near the rim of the glass. It’s on the wrist attached to the hand holding the glass tumbler just below the goombah’s wide frog mouth and gleaming mad bug-eyes.
A tiny tattoo waiting on the inside wrist of the man who wants Frank to drink with him.
A tattoo he’s been told to watch for.
A tattoo of a black hand.
Frank has to pull his eyes away. He smiles and swipes at the glass. His hand feels like jello and he has no idea why.
Because this is the initiation. No... the audition.
In a way, Frank had forgotten about all that. He’d just been singing. That had been enough as they’d crossed Europe. Just singing.
The guy tells Frank, loudly, that he enjoys his singing. “Just like Frank,” he says, laughing a loud band saw laugh. “But you know, not as good, ‘cause no one is as good as Frank, know what I mean? Hey, your name is Frank too!”
He orders another round, and by the time Frank gets the drink down, amazed because he almost religiously never drinks when he sings, but somehow he feels he has to because...
The black hand.
It’s time to go back on for the second set.
Which he does, and somewhere before the third set, the guy comes backstage and tells Frank he’s got to go but he’ll be back tomorrow night with these two French broads. One for Frank. And then he’s gone.
The third set closes out the night, and Frank and the musicians walk back to their hotel, a small boardinghouse on a quiet street up the hill away from the seafront and the harbor.
Night mist swallows Marseille near the ocean, and Frank looks out from a street leading down to the water’s edge at the vast purple nepenthe of the Mediterranean night.
The musicians are getting ready for bed. Frank is sharing a room with the drummer, Kenji, who’s in the one bathroom down the hall. Frank slips out and back onto the streets. Two blocks of darkness and he finds a payphone. He steps in as the mist swirls against the glass. He dials the numbers and notices his finger is not shaking as he places it inside each hole in the rotary dial.
He waits for the connection and hears a distant foghorn moan forlornly out across the harbor. The line clicks, and then clicks again. There is no ring.
“Hello,” says a muted nondescript voice.
“This is Frank.”
“Yes.”
“I was told to...”
“Have you spotted the black hand?”
“I did. In the club tonight. Says he’ll be back tomorrow night.”
There’s a pause. And for a moment Frank wonders if the line has gone dead.
“We’ll be there. Be ready. Do whatever you’re told.”
And then the line goes dead.
And Frank was thinking, in the silence between the lonely calls of the deep harbor horn in the night, that the world was vast and that things went on all the time, even in the dead of night on the far side of the world. Even in Marseille.
And... every day.
Chapter Thirteen
Braddock saw the line of desert tan MRAPs parked beneath the sheltering berm of a high on ramp leading to the freeway heading west. Each vehicle faced outward to form a defensive ring.
Braddock alerted Mr. Steele with an, “Eyes on Hotel,” transmission.
But even as they approached at twenty miles an hour, circumventing the few abandoned civilian vehicles, occasional wrecks, and an overturned semi, Braddock knew something was wrong.
There should have been sentries along the elevation of the berm, or an LP/OP set up on the overpass to watch the surrounding desert. If Hotel had buttoned up the night before to wait, they should still have a secured perimeter.
“Negative contact with personnel from element Hotel. Echo, proceed with caution and secure location. Bravo will remain on over-watch, Warlord out.”
Braddock gave a series of quick orders to the different vehicle commanders and went forward with two other Humvees in a tactical wedge.
The sense that something was not right as they closed the distance increased as the Humvees approached.
Doors and a few hatches were open on the state-of-the-art mobile armored fighting fortresses known as MRAPs. Their strength and near-invulnerability made them perfect for the pandemic scenario. There was no way the Infected were getting in. The worst thing that could happen was to get stuck somewhere, surrounded by zekes, or food rioters, or even refugees. Then... after a very long time the crew would be in trouble.
But out here at this lonely overpass and interchange, there were no zekes, or anyone else, for miles.
Braddock had the convoy under orders not to engage the mangled undead trapped in wrecks they’d passed along the way so as not to draw any other large concentrations of nearby Infected hiding in the tiny deserted highway towns they’d bypassed.
Braddock ordered a dismount fifty yards out, and went in on foot across the washed-out hard-packed dirt with the crew-served weapons covering their approach. They searched the nearest desert-tan MRAP and found the bodies.
In all the other gargantuan warfighting MRAPS they found the same thing. Throats slit. Corpses pale and sightless. The dead stared back at them as though no longer caring about the mess that everything had become.
Except... there were three things wrong with the whole picture, thought Braddock as he advised Steele on what remained of Hotel via the commo net, along with the rest of the convoy.
“Coming in,” replied Steele with little emotion after finding out everyone in Hotel was now dead.
The dead were all wearing Russian Spetznaz urban warfare patterns.
Each dead guy’s eyes were wide open, some slightly queer or even lecherous smile playing around their mouths.
And the slits weren’t done by a knife. More like tears. Tight yet ragged tearing. Like something a serrated knife might make. Or a scratch from a big jungle cat.
The rest of the convoy came in, surrounding the silent hulking MRAPs while Steele got out, checking the vehicles methodically and mechanically. As though verifying something. Steele was carrying a tactical synthetic black Mossberg 590. He cleared the vehicles himself as Braddock set up a perimeter.
Whoever Hotel had been, they were armed to the teeth. They were all carrying, or had within easy reach, brand new state-of-the-art AK-47s. Not the old Soviet grunt rifle all the jihadists loved. But the new cut down Center Balanced Rifle System known as the Spike X1S Bullpup. Compact, deadlier versions of the AK that bore no resemblance to their predecessor. They looked like something out of a science fiction movie about space Marines.
If these guys weren’t Spetznaz, then why were they armed with weapons the Spetz would use inside the U.S., wondered Braddock as he examined the weapons. Each vehicle also had a rack of Lone Star Arms Tactical Shotguns with drum magazines and fat suppressors mounted on the barrels. Perfect for engaging the infected and not leaving much of a sound print. Perfect for clearing operations.
Weapons they could’ve used back in LA when he was working for Tarragon. Overrun. Surrounded. And pulling VIP extractions nonstop.
“Secure the MRAPs,” ordered Steele, his voice dull and matter of fact. “We’ll take four of them. Remove the corpses. Collect all the weapons and ammo.”
Then Braddock noticed something strange. Scrawled on one of the vehicles were bizarre rust-colored symbols. Almost Arabic but peppered with nonsense math equations woven into and between them, all of it surrounding pictoglyphs of horned stick figures gathered in a circle. Nine of them in fact. And one larger figure set apart by itself, hovering above them all.
Brees was crouched down and studying the scrawls and stick figures, his M4 resting on his knees as he traced the images with one long brown finger.
“Weird stuff, Cap. Half Arabic, half gibberish. The only parts I can make out are “ancient hunter” and “the sisters.”
Brees spit and rubbed at some of the rust-colored scribblings. It was blood. Dried blood.
“Who were these guys and what happened here?” demanded Braddock with a low voice he knew Steele would somehow hear.
Steele swiveled his head in a slow pan to land back on Braddock. Emotionless. Eyes hidden behind mirrored sunglasses.
“They’re nobody now, Captain Braddock.”
“Aircraft,” said one of the other soldiers. Everyone turned to scan the sky. What had once been so commonplace and normal was now highly unusual. It was no jetliner bound for South America or some other faraway vacation destination. Instead it was a small Cessna-type aircraft, circling off in the distance.
Steel turned toward the nearest operator. A guy named Jefferies. “Shoot it down.”
Jefferies seemed stunned into motionlessness. Then shook his head.
“Naw,” he whispered. “I ain’t doin’ that. Probably just some survivor...”
Steele raised the powerful Mossberg with one hand and pulled the trigger, plastering the side of the tan MRAP with Jefferies’ now lifeless body and blood.
The blast echoed out over the dry stillness of the late morning heat.
No one moved except Steele, who’d crossed to the nearest Humvee and removed the clamshell case they kept the Stinger in. Each vehicle had one.
Without hesitation, Steele deployed it less than a minute later.
Shoot him now, thought Braddock. Shoot him now and everybody might just join you. You might even walk away from this.
But you’ll never know.
And...
Why do you need everybody? He’s just a man.
Is he, Darling?
“Captain, tune to 131.8 and increase your volume.”
Braddock reached up and took the walkie-talkie off his chest. He dialed in the channel and increased the volume.
“... large military convoy at the fifteen, east of Victorville,” said some voice. Probably the pilot or a spotter in the tiny, distant circling Cessna. Stand by for grid...”
Everyone could hear that Steele had tone on the Stinger.
A moment later the rocket whooooooshhhhhh-ed away, lancing up toward the tiny Cessna circling off in the distance.
There was no explosion. The missile smashed through the wing and went sidewinding off into the high blue altitude. But that didn’t matter. The doomed little plane, probably some Civilian Air Patrol volunteer scouting for the government, plummeted like a one-winged butterfly, spiraling into the ground. It spun and fluttered until it disappeared behind some hard, jagged hills.
“Someone jumped,” muttered a guy named Bradley.
“Yeah,” murmured Brees. “Saw that too. But didn’t see no ‘chute.”
“Captain...” Steele threw the launcher to the ground. It was useless now. “Assign four drivers for the four MRAPs we’ll take. Time to move. The Navy will send a sortie out to search for us.”
Chapter Fourteen
The sun beat down on the dry, sage-laden hills above the old remains of the decommissioned Marine base. Holiday and Jesus followed the dry riverbeds, winding through the heavy silence and sweltering heat. After an hour, they popped out onto a wide dry grass-covered hill that had once overlooked the old base.
Once.
Now, something like a cake-frosted toaster made of chromescent steel rose up to a seemingly impossible height from the eastern end of the base. It reflected the noonday blaze with an eye-watering glare. That it was massive was not immediately evident. Not until you looked at the base of the edifice and saw the other structures surrounding it. All of them were dwarfed and seeming minuscule beneath the swirling gleaming steel edifice. It was already casting a shadow to the east as the sun passed through high noon.
Beneath the weird alien structure were small, strange-shaped buildings and clusters of fair-like tents. A tall mesh fence, screened in green canvas encircled the entire complex. There was no obvious gate or entrance from this distance. Tall future-prison hexagonal-shaped towers lay along the fence at spaced intervals.
Jesus gave a marveled whistle as he took off his straw hat to wipe sweat from his chubby cheeks and wide forehead.
Holiday looked over at his new companion.
Jesus waved his hat outward, smiled and proclaimed, “Ayiieee, grande. Mucho, mucho, grande!” He smiled as though this place was some miracle. Some happy and unexpected turn of events.
Holiday studied the situation. He could see no troops. No telltale government presence. No rescue personnel. Nothing moved, and only the enigma of the place remained tauntingly clear in the late morning heat haze.
Holiday turned back and scanned the hills behind them. In the distance were the dry brown slopes. And the townhomes Frank was turning into a castle beyond the toll road. But details were lost beyond the highway, and all he could see was the black destruction of the McMansions in the heights above that. It was still a charred swath of lifelessness that looked as though it might never heal.
How were things back at the... castle? He thought of all those dead crashing into it and hoped it was indeed a castle. That it had become an impenetrable fortress. That Frank had been right.
He thought of Ash.
He pulled the walkie-talkie off his belt.
“Frank...”
Nothing.
“Frank, this is me... Holiday.”
Still nothing.
“I’m at the base. At the thing we saw... here. I’m going in.”
Nothing.
He felt awkward talking to himself.
“All right...” and Don’t give up on me, he thought.
“C’mon,” he said to Jesus, and headed down into the shadow of the fantastic structure rising above everything on the Marine base that once was. Maybe he could find some guns... or something. Anything to help his friends. That was what he was telling himself as the feeling of unquiet power, barely restrained, seemed to pulse outward in weird waves just below his consciousness. But it was there. Coming from the strange edifice. Coming out at him.
And it grew.
Chapter Fifteen
The chorus of moaning dead is rising beyond the walls. As though their gurgle-groans and grave whispers are too heavy to climb all the way into the hot sun-parched sky. Instead, their continual murder-muttering falls back down into the courtyard, and for a moment Frank thinks they’ve broken through some new gap in the walls.
His walls. That they might be inside and swarming.
He never thinks about cutting and running.
Like Ritter does as he climbs up to the roof and sees the frightened look on Candace’s face. Like Dante does as he holds the ladder that’s shaking as Frank works his way up onto the balcony they must soon enter the overrun townhome unit through.
Frank can feel how unsteady the ladder is. He knows Dante will have trouble coming up it.
He sees Cory still staring at some new flower by the pool. Following a bee with his motionless body and watchful eyes.
“Hey,” Frank yells, his voice a booming blast that catches everyone’s attention. But he can’t remember Cory’s name. Because he’s seen him until now as nothing but a liability. Nothing but a...
“... Hey, Batman!”
Cory turns, his mouth open. Watching Frank. “I need you to hold this ladder, Batman.”
Frank watches as Ash waves to Cory. A moment later Cory is loping awkwardly, his body movements neither swift nor graceful, across the street from the pool and into the hot square of the parking courtyard and the surrounding garages that form the outer wall.
Dante shows the large man-boy how to hold the ladder, then fixes Frank with a glare which leaves little doubt that he hates everything about this situation. A second later he starts climbing up after Frank.
