With six legs and two arms, a mind of hunger and a voice of fear, the way is opened to the land of the titans and the steel cities, who will covet the death of night. In its aftermath will come the great devourer, Taraxippus, passing through the opened way.
Taraxippus! Taraxippus! Never dead and never alive, never hungry and never full, always strong and always weak, will come the demon, chasing its poisoned blood, leading its cruel army, and leaving empty lands.
Its arrival cannot be halted, its rage cannot be abated, and its mercy cannot be found.
But the renegade sun may stop it.
- Prophecy 46 “Taraxippus Vision”, The Book of Future Things
Taraxippus
Steel Cities - One: Echo-Hotel
New York, a city of cities. One of the twinkling diamonds of Earth that captured the core of humanity in all its light and darkness. Glowing cityscapes, the great monuments and architecture, the energy and life, the entertainment, the company, the light pollution, musty sewers, stock brokers, club goers, poets, artists, home makers, homeless, junkies, and criminals. The great seething collection of the world, micronized.
Day or night, something was always happening, people were too busy living to sleep. The city that never sleeps, merely alternating.
One building sat at the boundary of light and darkness. Sitting outside the lights of the city center, too far away for the well to dos to approach, sitting away from the darkness of the periphery, too legitimate for riff raff to claim for their own before urban development and law enforcement forced them out. It was a building that was once abandoned, possibly an apartment, a hotel, a department store, or anything once upon a time, but now was owned and occupied by one sole individual, who cared for it as one’s own castle.
In the one room of the one building, sat one man in the furnishings with all the niceties of 21st century modern living. He leaned back in the leather easy chair, with small coffee table at his knees, hewn unevenly from fresh marble. Pressed against one side of the wall was a surround sound system hooked up to a classic vinyl disc player for that perfect sound quality from Selling England By The Pound by Genesis.
The room was cast in shadows, all the lights inside down, so that distant lights of the city could shine in, something close enough to the moon and the stars. On the marble table, lay a glass of brandy, set close to the edge.
In the center, lying on felt cloth, were two guns. They were disengaged, asleep, slides open, safeties locked, shells about them. But ready.
One was a silver beast, with a thick and impressive bore, and a revolving cylinder made for a party of five. Smith and Wesson 500. Heavy Duty. Just In Case. Fortissimo Piano. The tune ends with this note.
The other was a black warrior, slim and perfect. Old but balanced, wielded by one who understood it best. 1911 by Strayer Voigt Infinity. Fine tuned. Custom. Match grade. Subtle, simple, serious.
He sat back, covered in the darkness, eyes closed, and unmoving. In New York, with no desire to be awake, and no tradition of being asleep, he decided to be as dead as possible, and felt the parts of himself shut down.
Cells frozen, pulse low, pressure falling, temperature dropping, nerves losing charge…
A shrill noise cut through his songs by Genesis.
BEEP BEEP BEEP. BEEP BEEP BEEP. BEEP BEEP-
His eyes weakly fluttered in slight discomfort, and his mind tried to make sense of the noise. Dream images, memories, reckonings trying order themselves, reorient the man in reality.
Where was he again? Europe? South America? Africa? The Middle East? A mountain? A desert? A jungle? A slum?
-BEEP BEEP-
Beeping. Electronic. Leather under his fingers. Passive or active audience? Kidnapped? Interrogator? Explosive? Beeping belongs to films. Cinema? Collateral Damage? The Hurt Locker?
-BEEP BEEP BEEP-
Was it the tube, full of needles, again? Or was it the void? That sense of helplessness as you float, and watch… ah, but not that second time, in the void… that time, I was the abyss, and I made you blink…
-BEEP BEEP BEEP-
“Nnrrggh!”
Neurons fire. Brain active. Headache rising. Nausea returning.
In the darkness of the room, accompanied by Aisle of Plenty, he returned, and found himself in New York. His eyes opened, and they were two dark, brown pits, unreflecting, dead. Septic windows.
He looked towards the window sill, and reached for the cell phone (the work phone) that was vibrating on the wood setting. Veins in his neck were protesting at the need to work. He felt light headed. His brain was floating in its case, bouncing against the sides, and he tried to ignore it as long as possible
He stared at the miniscule LCD screen, indicating where the number was coming from.
(Geneva BRADLEY calling…)
What the hell time was it? This was way past happy hour, and he was not happy. No emergency was worth this. His mind cleared and his eyes narrowed in extreme displeasure, and allowed the call through as he brought the phone to his ear.
“Gen, I swear to god, this better be worth it, or I will drown Lime in his own goddamn gold Jacuzzi.”
His throat hadn’t cleared the disuse yet. The threat came through sticky and gravelly, but the youth of his voice was still convincing, after swallowing and clearing.
“Good morning Mr. Colt. An Echo-Hotel has just escalated,” The woman on the other side responded, barely paying attention. She knew what he said was just for show. Or maybe he knew that she never buckled. She had that sort of personality.
“Really…” The man tried to wipe his bleariness from his face with one hand as he rose from the chair, willing tightened muscles to do their job, “Echo-Hotel… what’s the psi on the thing?”
“I’ve been told about 16,000.”
“Shit…”
“Just about, Mr. Colt. Mr. Lime is on site discussing options with the police, but he decided your presence is necessary. I’ll be around in the car in thirty minutes. Please be ready by then.”
“Fine, fine. It’s serious enough, I guess. I’ll see you downstairs.”
“Until then. Oh, and Mr. Lime doesn’t have a gold Jacuzzi. It’s beneath him.”
“I’ll buy one for him to drown him in.”
“I’m sure he’ll be pleased to hear that.”
The line went dead after that. He took a moment to grumble the last of his confusion away, while the head pain continued to inch further through his veins. He dropped the phone behind him onto the chair and reached for the one other object occupying the sill, since there was no room on the table. A small metal cylinder with a sharp metal nib barely protruding on one side, surrounded by a spring loaded ring to protect it. A motion long practiced sent the autoinjector into artery in the side of his neck, and he grunted for an instant at the sting. There was a pneumatic hiss as a medicinal cocktail poured into him, almost immediately into his brain, and he could feel the light headed nausea dull and settle in the back of his head, gone for a time.
He dropped the syringe onto the ground, abandoned for the while, and reached for the 1911, and thumbed the slide release, snapping the empty gun closed.
Thirty minutes. Enough time to find some spare magazines, and get his hat. Then to work.
Somewhere at the edge of New York was a warehouse under siege. On all sides of the building, it was cordoned off by yellow and black tape, red and blue flashing lights, and black and white vehicles. Police had blockaded the facility, spotlights from the ground and helicopters illuminating all sides with bright white circles. Temporary headquarters were set up, vans with surveillance equipment parked, Ambulances were at the ready, news reporters, thrill seekers, and all other civilians were being pushed back outside the tape, and all in all, this little patch of the city verging on warfare.
It was taking one man to keep it from happening.
“Mobile HQ” as it were, was a tent set up behind a SWAT van for protection from fire arms. Headquarters was really nothing more than a table with some chairs, but sometimes, that was all it needed. The table was a veritable spread of photographic imagery, blue prints, marching orders, note pads, and felt tip routes traces across paper.
Cheap plastic folding chairs had been arranged for the people in charge, and they ground noisily against the pavement, driving everyone’s tension up. Present were the chief of police, police negotiator, SWAT commander, a few aides and note takers, and the one man who was holding their plans up. Three hours had passed since the beginning of the siege.
Naturally, no one was happy.
“This is ridiculous!” The chief snarled. He was a well built man, who probably believed in “large and in charge”, hence when his palms slammed onto the table and he rose up to point an indignant finger at the man at the opposite end, it was invariably quite intimidating, and loud.
“Only a bureaucrat would talk about ‘efficiency’! Police officers are getting butchered out there, and you’re talking about sitting back so your people can tromp in on our jurisdiction!”
The finger had been pointed at a young man, small enough to look like he was still worming his way through his twenties, a whole decade behind everyone else present, and almost out of place, mussed blond hair, a tweed vest thrown over his casual clothing making him seem unprepared for the reality he was in. That was of course, completely ignoring the steely green look he was returning to the chief of police from behind a pair of glasses, without nary a blink.
“Sir, I have no intent or interest in subverting the actions of the police up to now,” he said, accent marking an excellent British heritage, “But regardless, if you insist on a raid now, I have no doubts you will be sending more of your men to the hospital. Also, as much as it pains me to say it, with the confirmation of an Echo-Hotel on site, the current United Nations ratification states that my organization must be present to assist. So in essence, it’s not entirely just your jurisdiction.”
The chief of police’s lips made many interesting shapes but manages to settle into a thoroughly unamused straight line. The SWAT commander was next to object, a man with a buzz cut and a mustache.
“Look, Mr. Lime, I understand you have to intervene, but you’re underestimating the officers here. The men who were attack were caught off guard and unprepared. Now that we have them boxed in, they can’t catch us by surprise, my team is already running simulations. We have the entry points and routes ready, and my team is better armed and armored. No matter what we have-“
“I’m afraid you’ll have to hold back this time. Your men are trained for incidents against other men, but you have no experience against the Echo-Hotel. My responsibilities include reducing the damage.”
He was starting to rub his shot cut head in frustration, “Look, they’re five men-“
“And one Echo-Hotel, Commander,” Lime interrupted once again, “I am here to advise on the situation, not to take control of this investigation, and advice is to assess your options here. The Echo-Hotel was responsible for the injuries sustained on the police officers tonight, showing a willingness to ignore our civil rules and be the aggressor. We’ve had readings that the Echo-Hotel is capable of emitting some 16,000 psis of force. That’s the equivalent of the ocean depth of the Marianas trench being fired at a human being. Do your men have training or countermeasures against such an attack?”
“Well…”
“Do you have protective equipment that can sustain such force? Do you have an armored vehicle that can resist it?”
The SWAT commander didn’t say a thing.
“That’s why I have been advising this raid to be delayed until the necessary expertise can arrive to neutralize this threat with a minimum of difficulty. Once the Echo-Hotel has been removed from the equation, your raid against five armed men will go uninhibited. All I ask is that you trust my organization to do the job it’s been tasked to do for the past five years.”
While not mollified, Lime had managed to stop the men from complaining any further about the British man’s single handed ability to affect a police operation. That was when a man pulled in through the tarp behind Lime, giving a rather animal grin.
“Hey! I heard some babies needed their diapers changed!”
And now they had something new to complain about. The chief was never happy without someone to be angry about.
“Who the hell are you? This is a restricted area, you’re not allowed past the cordons!”
“I got through with Jedi mind tricks.” The new man said with a slight shrug.
“What!?”
“...You clearly grew up watching The Phantom Menace first.”
Lime gracefully turned in his chair, and looked up the interloper with long stare, before speaking.
“Colt. This is a meeting. Shut up.”
Colt made an annoyed exhaling noise at the reprimand, “Ooufff, sucking happiness and joy from the face of the planet…”
Lime ignored that comment, and turned back to the confused coordinators of the police siege.
“Gentlemen, this is Jeremy Colt, my personally employed investigator and associate. His expertise is necessary for this crisis.”
The three men looked at him with general disbelief, given his appearance. It was short of professional and long on delusional in their heads, a wiry man who had thrown on a black hat akin to a fedora with too much brim, and a black coat, over a white polo and jeans.
The SWAT commander was less than thrilled to realize this cowboy was what everyone was waiting for, “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“His personality is one of his many defects, I admit, but I ensure you that Colt here has many skill sets that he alone possesses. If you allow him inside the warehouse, I promise that he will have the Echo-Hotel situation resolved before the hour is out.”
The chief of police, SWAT commander, and the police negotiator sized him up.
His easy posture, his nonchalance, his cheap action-movie dress, it set everyone off. Lime was bad enough, but at least he was polite and to the point… but this man? It seemed more likely he would be killed and make the situation worse than provide the help promised.
The police negotiator though, who had so far decided to remain neutral and observant on the matter, looked at his face, and discovered something wrong with his eyes. He did grin, and his brows cock with all manner of confidence and swagger, but it all seemed to be a setting to ward off attention to that dead gaze, that never showed anything for it. Eyes that saw a different world, and always belonged to a most dangerous breed of man, who he had a career of often talking to.
His worries changed compared to the chief and commander. They were going to send this man!? Was Mr. Lime insane?
The British man rose from his seat, “If you will excuse me gentlemen, I have to bring my investigator up to speed on the situation at hand.”
Colt followed his employer outside, and out across the maze of police men and police vehicles surrounding the warehouse until the litany of noise blanketed them, allowing the two to have their conversation. As they came to a halt, the black coated man had produced another autoinjector from a pocket to jab into his neck.
Lime blinked, seeing the taller man medicate himself, “So soon?”
“It was a long ride. The headaches build whether I do anything or not.”
“Ah. Has Ms. Bradley informed you on the way over?” Lime asked, his business stare boring into Colt.
“She told me mostly about the Echo-Hotel. I wanted to hear the sitrep from ground level, but Storm Signal sounds like a tough little bitch.”
“The raid the police have been planning with our evidence seems to have been botched. The Echo-Hotel and five men have sealed themselves up inside the warehouse. There has been one firefight in the past three hours. Five officers have been incapacitated, two requiring immediate hospitalization. Fractured ribs, and battered organs from large blunt force trauma. There are also reports of the men carrying firearms. Nine millimeter hand guns.”
Colt snorted, and turned to look at the warehouse, “Why isn’t the power down on the place? I still see lights from the inside.”
“It’s the usual Es-En-Ey-Ef-Yu. The warehouses are all rigged together so they can’t be shut off individually, the police want to manually cut the wiring, but the owner doesn’t want any damage, and they’ve still been arguing.”
“…You do know the acronym can be pronounced ‘Snafu’.”
“Well, I’m a civilized human being, from a country called England.”
“I’m amazed you haven’t classified as a civilized plank of English Oak yet,” Colt said, rolling his eyes, “A warehouse isn’t exactly a fortress. So they’ve been sitting inside here for three hours and haven’t made any demands for a vehicle or attempts to escape yet?”
“No. Then again, they do believe they have a miraculous force multiplier with them. I think they believe they can fight it out.”
Colt’s eyes narrowed from under his hat, as he put a hand under his chin, fingerless leather caressing his ruminations, “That’s not right… they think… or they have to… they don’t want to give up this warehouse… could it be…?”
“You have an idea?”
“Nothing that will change anything. I’ll check it out when I’m inside,” the action hero said before changing the subject, “Blunt force trauma, huh. So our little friend’s has lost enough of her cute side to be willing to open fire, huh. And we didn’t have this Echo-Hotel on file?”
“She’s not a repeat offender on either side. It seems this is her first time.”
“Tch, well, I’ll put the fear of God into her myself and make sure this is her only visit. Little pissant thinking it’s open house because she found a backdoor…”
While grumbling, Colt reached behind his back, under the heavy coat fabric and withdrew the black Strayer Voigt Infinity from the holster flush against the small of his back, pulling back the slide lightly for a brass check.
Lime glanced down at the gun.
“Minimal force, Colt.”
The gunman looked at his employer, disdainful, “You’ve got to be shitting me. We do have the legal right to string these people up by their guts, you know. Anything I do would count as self defense, and they have an Echo-Hotel. One of them.”
Lime’s poker face never broke, even as Colt glared, “You do realize that our organization is investigative and advisory. I have been advising the police to delay their strike to provide a minimum of bloodshed. You walking in there and murdering everyone inside because we have a legal right is not minimal bloodshed. Not to mention the example you’ll be setting, since I told everyone to hold back so my associate can act like some gauche PMC villain from a Hollywood film…”
“I’m detecting some horrible Obi-Wanesque ‘and’ here, Lime.”
“And you joined because you want to use your talents for accomplish a real goal for once. The goal.”
The Goal. Their little secret for the most part. And every time Lime brought it up, Colt remembered. It wasn’t like five years back, where he found work worldwide, when the only answer needed to be claret and crimson. No more deserts. No more favelas. No more burlap sacks over people’s heads. No more hiding in the brush behind a scope. There was a job to do, above all jobs that have occurred in the history of the world, and only they could do it.
They stood for a moment, alone in the crowd. Then Lime spoke.
“…Padawan.”
“Ugh! You son of a bitch!”
Colt twisted away groaning, almost physically disgusted. Lime’s passive features didn’t move. Maybe he was, since he could feel the headache was starting to boil again.
“And if you do something horrible inside the warehouse, I’ll find inventive, Hayden Christensen related things to do to your salary.”
“Alright Lime, I understand. I’ll play softball and let them shoot first.”
“Standard procedure, that’s all I want.”
The two returned to the headquarters tent, in time to see the three policemen stand up, wringing their hands and seeming slightly sheepish.
“Well… the Commander and I have agreed to let your… specialist assist in the operation,” The Chief said, trying to look serious.
“Thank you. Hopefully we will resolve this situation quickly. I like to remind you that my organization’s interest is bringing the Echo-Hotel into our custody. You will be responsible for charging and arresting the other men.”
“Yes, of course.”
Colt rolled his eyes again as he watched Lime play nice and pretend to be stupid.
Those guys are so pissed, it’s obvious. I don’t even need to try to see what they’re thinking. They’re hoping I do something stupid so they can laugh at us. Then again, I would be too… well, that negotiator guy seems to be a little freaked, rather… psychology degree, I guess.
The Commander spoke up, “Well, Mr. Colt, if you’re ready, you can join the insertion team-“
“That won’t be necessary,” Lime interrupted.
“What?”
Colt continued for his boss, “I’ll do this myself. I just need a vest with full plates and to let the guys watching the building know I’m going in.”
“Mr. Colt, there are five armed men in there, and that thing with the…”
“Sixteen thousand pounds per square inch at the fingertips.”
“I don’t care who you think you are, but if you think you’re some ‘badass’…”
I am so totally a badass. Women melt at the sight of my desiccated corpse.
Colt raised a hand, trying a bit of this “diplomacy” thing Lime loved so much, “Commander, I need you to trust me. There’ll be a lot less chaos if it’s just me. I can handle this. You want minimal damage-“ Lime, seriously!? Ugh. “-One man can do a lot more precise work than a whole team barging in and inviting another fight.”
“I think we’ll trust his advice this time,” The Chief of Police said. In Colt’s mind he was starting to look less large and more just fat, “He’s a tough man, and their expert, I’m sure he knows what he’s saying. We’ve been told to trust them all this time. A little more won’t hurt.”
Translation, ‘Ha-ha-ha’, go die stupid man! Watch as our police save the day and laugh at how you tried to be so tough! Ha-ha-ha!’
The SWAT Commander groaned, and acquiesced, “Alright. You can get a fully equipped vest from the SWAT van outside. We’ll call everyone and let you know that you’re to be allowed into the warehouse.”
“Thanks.”
Colt turned to leave the tarp, before looking back.
“Oh, one more thing. I’ll be going through the front entrance, so make sure nobody shoots me in the back, alright?”
As the black coat swept out the tarp enclosure, the Chief of Police manage to strangle back his outrage at Lime.
“W-What is with that man!? Is he insane? His body will be all over the headlines by nine in the morning!”
Lime shrugged, “I’m not sure myself. I always believed his body chemistry is a bit suspect.”
Colt gave the black nylon cover over his torso a few appreciative thumps as he ducked under a half opened shutter that lined the front of the warehouse, his silhouette foreshadowing his arrival thanks to the bright spotlights trained on him while he had approached.
Trauma plating was one of life’s little creature comforts. That and the Velcro on load bearing vests.
Before him, the guts of the warehouse revealed themselves. Layer after layer of red steel shelving, all to be packed tightly with cardboard boxes that were sealed in layers of plastic wrapping, with everything brightly illuminated above with tubes of sickly white fluorescent lighting.
As it were, though, it looked like a small tornado had passed through-
Heh heh, “Storm Signal”.
-leaving cargo pallets all over the floors, and whole rows of boxes thrown down from their shelves, sometimes smashed so terrible their cargo guts were splayed across the linoleum. The collapses were so bad that some paths were completely blocked off. Some other paths he could see had fork lifts parked sideways.
Attempts to barricade. No doubt half this stuff was being thrown at the cops earlier. But of course, it’s a warehouse… Could be a new phrase, “Like an Echo-Hotel in a Warehouse”. I’ve seen worse attempts.
Enough dicking around.
Colt took in as deep a breath as his lungs would allow him, feeling his ribs complain at having to stretch out for something like breathing.
Headache rising. Neurons firing. Game face on. Three syringes. Strayer Voigt Infinity 1911. Seven round capacity, three magazines. Six tangos, lightly armed, nine millimeter, training unknown. Echo-Hotel hostile, training unknown. Potentially FNG.
He marched forward. A few steps more and he approached a small booth that probably served as a security station and took one look at it. High on one corner of the booth was a small tubular security camera, little light on the end glowing red. It turned at looked at him. Colt didn’t even blink.
Another security station further in the back, then. They know I’m coming.
He walked forward, feeling his brain surge. He let his ears sharpen and become curious.
They were whispering at the far end of the warehouse.
“Someone’s coming!”
“There’s only one of him!”
“Is he a negotiator?”
“He doesn’t look like a cop.”
“Fuck, whatever, I don’t know what they’re thinking, but if they’re giving us a hostage-“
“A hostage! But we can’t-“
“Shut up! Hector! James! Go get him!”
He paid attention to the vibrations that were touching his skin. Air pressure carrying stray feelings. Two presences moving towards the front of the warehouse (towards him).
-anxiety fear swallow it got guns stupid guy in a coat why am I doing it we’re fine two on one-
They were stalking forwards against the sides of the warehouse. They wanted him to walk towards the middle and flank him from behind to jam their guns in his back, like in the movies. Hm.
Colt, walking forward to the shelves, took one look at a convenient box in front of a forklift in front of a shelf, all in a row. Ignoring his muscles that wanted to just stay where they were, he quickly stepped on the series of objects, one after another, until he half jumped off the back of the forklift to clamber onto the side of the shelving unit. He could feel a slight tingle of a totally non-existent field, that will never be detected nor measured by science, surrounding his hands and his feet, softening the impact of his hard grasping so nary a sound was made while he made his way up, until he was crouched and quietly crawling above everyone else’s field of vision. They never looked up.
He followed the vibrations, and the noise of their breathing, and found himself perched above one of the gunmen.
-anger frustration confidence where is he son of a bitch quiet one not getting away-
The braver one of the two.
Colt waited for him to pass before he dropped down behind him, again with nary a sound. He landed on all fours and pushed forward into a roll to keep the landing from vibrating through his limbs, and rose up behind a dusky skinned man in casual clothing and a Glock in one hand.
He clucked his tongue twice.
The dusky man turned around, gun arm swinging out behind him.
Oh, wrong, wrong, wrong!
The gunman never really had time to quite understand what happened, because the black coated man he was hunting was upon him. The heel of one hand had slammed into his throat turning his cry of alert into a quiet, wheezing gargle, and another hand had wrapped its fingers around the frame of the gun and was twisting out of his hands, and leg was kicking into the back of his knee, causing him to stumble off balance as he was choking, and then a palm had wrapped around his face and was thrusting him backwards-
That was the last he thought as Colt slammed the back of the man’s head into the warehouse flooring with a meaty thud. The body flopped slightly and stopped moving.
The investigator heard someone gasp a few aisles down.
“Hector! What was that? Hector? Shit…!”
There was sounds of someone struggling and kicking his way through cardboard as he rushed over. Air pressure was moving around fast. Feelings were flying like sweat.
-fear shock confusion surprise unease curiosity caution-
Not much time, then.
It wasn’t entirely elegant or professional, but Colt had to shove the Glock (carefully!) into his coat pocket for a second so he could get both his hands around the ankles of Hector’s unconscious body so he could drag him backwards a few feet. The panicked kicking-running was getting louder along with hissed curses under breaths, and Colt sidled up against a shelf, listening to shoes clacking towards his position. The closer the enemy approached, the stronger the details kept growing until emotions started turning into vague surface thoughts.
-What was that what’s happening did Hector die shit shit shit fuck oh god-
The second target was a stocky man who was trying to make up for it with a terrible beard and a blonde ponytail, but despite his figure, had nearly raced past the investigator without noticing him, had Colt not grabbed his out stretched hand pointing his own gun (Beretta 92FS), his fingers wrapping around James’ own and pulling the arm back over the poor man’s shoulder. James gave a quick gasp as he was pulled backwards, wrist twisting in a painful direction that caused his fingers to loosen around his gun, leaving the Beretta to fall away. James was wrenched back into Colt, where a forearm wrapped around his neck, and the Colt guided the two of them to spin onto the ground, leaving James disoriented and landing painfully on his chest and stomach as he took the weight of two men. Colt’s legs wrapped around James’ and applied pressure around the neck. The man underneath gagged and struggled as he found it impossible to breath, and could feel his face heating up and turn purple. James scrabbled and struggled, trying to worm his torso this way and that out from underneath the man who was applying the lock. But the man’s body was solid like steel, not budging, even as he kicked, choked, and generally panicked as a man out of his depth would.
Eventually there was not enough blood or air to do anything, and James slowed and eventually stopped.
Instantly Colt eased the pressure and pulled himself off the still body. Throwing James onto his back, he checked for a pulse and groused that Lime would be pleased to know that he was being a good, law abiding, non mass murdering crazy person thus far.
Strike two tangos.
Time was short. There was no clue how edgy the others would be when they heard a commotion and he needed new intel fast.
Colt took a look at James’ ruddy face and clasped his palm on his face, willing the touch to drink everything in. With an unconscious man who had no surface thoughts, Colt started feeling his aberrant dreams made from the visual centers of the brain doing their own thing, and the recent memories laid bare. He focused on the latter.
…Ah. So there was Hector and James here, and Michael with another Glock, Frank, with a Hi-Power, and Henry with a third Glock. So they were all armed.
And Storm Signal. Looking very unsure but determined to see things through to the end.
So that was what they were so eager to protect… Storm Signal always taking skirting looks towards a maintenance hatch on the ground… She and Henry talk a lot. Good friends… heh, actually…
Listen James, you’re either in this or not, and don’t give me that shit about how bosom buddies we are with the pencil-head. Things are fine now, but when shit hits the fan…
Colt felt his cheeks rise in savage glee as he dropped his hand off the unconscious James, before he fought it back down. Game face, buddy.
The black coat unfurled as he got back to his feet. Taking a quick glance around, the investigator found the abandoned Beretta and scoped it up. He had no intent of letting any of the OpFor keep their stupid gun-illiterate hands on things that could kill him. A few quick motions had the breakdown lever thrown, the magazine falling away and the slide and receiver separating, before Colt reached into his pocket to kill the Glock he had stolen.
Moments later, bits of gun - spring, polymer, metal, and lead - clattered about the floor. Alone, he took a moment to diagnose himself, and gauged the worsening throbbing in his head. Certainly very lightheaded, like he was going to start floating. It certainly didn’t appreciate all that sudden movement required in the take downs.
It was a bit soon, but why carry three if you were going to be afraid to use them?
Colt grunted as he jammed the needle into his neck and felt the lightheadedness dissipate. He stalked onwards, towards the back of the warehouse, where the feelings were pressing against his skin harder and harder.
-unease fear expectation wait for it wait for it-
He could feel their guns were drawn in his direction.
-now exhilaration effort attack-
A blue sparkling hue covered one of the barricading crates up ahead, one that he was idly considering just jumping over, before it rose into the air.
Echo-Hotel. Right.
Colt made the connection right as the heavy package slammed into his chest. The pain was quite brilliant.
The projectile continued forward, carrying him several meters backwards, until the soles of his shoes skidded across the floor and pulled him under the flying crate. Even as it flew above him, he felt his body slap to the ground and roll about messily until he stopped on his side. Colt grunted, pressing his jaws together to keep from groaning too loudly as he clutched his chest. It seemed his ribs still held, but doubtless the bruises would be a sight. Ow, ow, ow, ow.
“Glrgghk,” Colt swore, trying to focus his head on things besides the spinning. Stupid semicircular canals.
“Did we get him?”
“It hit something!” The second voice had a feminine lilt to it.
It was perhaps unwise, but Colt responded like any animal being struck, as he staggered to his feet. Even with his jaws closed, he couldn’t help the gargling in his throat turn into a feral growl.
“I hear him! I think he’s getting back up!”
“That’s impossible! What I threw was huge!”
“Storm, hit him again!”
“How could he-“
“Hit him!”
Several things were now being covered with the glow and raised into the air, high above the investigator. He glared, vowing not to be caught off guard again, and pushed his mind and his senses to the limits, ordering himself to pay attention and keep up.
Neurons firing, nerves overacting. Hearing, smelling, tasting, touching, seeing more. As the levitated things turned into a downward barrage, Colt moved in sync, running and twisting around boxes that fired at him, but he always just jinked away just enough so the most they did was rub uncomfortably across his arms and back. Damn muscles groups weren’t elastic enough.
It wasn’t quite like seeing the world slow down. It was more like feeling the world expand around him, as there was more information that was being given away that people didn’t realize. People normally didn’t realize. The human nervous system was a limited thing.
But Colt had unique skill sets. There were so many gaps in between the projectile cargo that was obvious if he was busy paying attention.
Storm Signal was getting desperate. A forklift was picked up and sent screeching towards him, trying to be too big to jump over or dodge around. Colt noticed she made the mistake of having it lifted a few feet off the ground. It wasn’t even a matter of faith, this was a simple maneuver.
He kept running as the hijacked machine loomed in, right until he kicked out his legs in front of him, letting momentum slide him under the narrow gap, as the second big thing of the night flew over top of him. The only real casualty was front brim of his hat scrapping the underside. That was going to reduce shelf life by a bit.
Colt curled up his legs as slide out, letting momentum again help him swing him up back into a run, as he cleared the last boxes laid around the floor and the last of the arranged shelving and broke into the rear loading entrance.
They still had their guns trained in his direction.
Henry screaming “Shoot him!”, their firing without any real need of his instruction, and Colt’s feet squealing to a halt just in time so he could roll away behind some packaging happened in quick succession, nearly enough to that he was afraid his reflexes wouldn’t save him from having to pick metal out of his feet later. All the same, it didn’t distract him from the situation at hand, which required him to cover his head with his arms as bullets slammed into the layers of Styrofoam packed knick knacks behind him. Every loud staccato was followed by the boxes celebrating by gradually exploding more and more, throwing bits of paper and plastic in the air, and it was definite that the bullets were probably going to just punch all the way through in a few more seconds.
Luckily, it seemed the gunfire petered out before it got that bad.
-confusion curiosity why is it quiet is he still there-
Looks like they had a good sense to realize that just firing at concealed target didn’t really contribute. It was just as well to Colt, considering he was curled up on his side, trying to hide himself as much as possible. The position was vaguely embarrassing.
“Jesus Christ- Don’t shoot! I’m unarmed!” Colt shouted over what remained of the cover. It was technically true, consider there wasn’t anything in his hand, currently.
“Bullshit! You took two of my guys out!” Henry’s voice shouted back.
“His guys”. Yep, definitely the self-styled leader.
“And you didn’t hear any gunfire! Look, I’m not here to escalate the situation with a gunfight! I just want to talk!”
Talk until I deescalate the situation. With a shooting. Which is not a gunfight.
“Stand up, hands way above your head! Remember we got a unicorn here that can use you the paint the floor!”
“That’s what I want to talk about.”
Colt slowly, gingerly rose into view over his bullet soaked concealment, hands raised like they instructed. His eyes traced the room. They were arrayed in front of him, standing behind bits of cover of their own.
Michael to the left with a buzz cut, Frank to the right who seemed to be dabbling in facial piercings, Henry in the middle, who was rocking a pretty good sneer right now on his skinny face.
And beside Henry was Storm Signal the Echo-Hotel, or “unicorn” as people preferred to call them. A four footed intelligent creature that was rose up to around Henry’s chest, gray pelt, and a long mane that looked like a smoky white, akin to an overcast sky. He couldn’t see the identifier on her thigh from this angle, but the horn certainly was noticeable. She was trembling a little, but certainly brave enough to try her hand at glaring with those doll eyes of hers.
“Who are you? You aren’t the cops,” Henry preempted, after taking one glance at the certainly non-police officer attire of the man in front of him.
“My name is Matthew Baker,” Colt said, “I’m with an affiliate organization that’s concerned about the well being of your friend there.”
Henry snorted, “You’re telling me you walked through a police blockage to tell me you’re an MFS guy who’s worried about the horses?”
Colt tried his best to avoid rolling his eyes.
Oh God. Of all the things I have to be associated with, it has to be the MFS.
With some extreme effort, “Matthew Baker” managed to answer, “That’s right. Even though we’re an NGO, I was called in because the situation is unique. We’re only one of the two organizations really dedicated to the care of our new friends. Besides, we’re the lesser of two evils. You think the police would ask help from those goose-steppers?”
Henry’s hard stare seemed to lighten, as he started to believe him. The stupid unarmed guy from the hippies.
“Also, uh, I know it’s colloquial, but please refer to Miss Storm Signal as a “pony”, not a horse. It’s proper.”
“Shut up! We’re the ones with the guns. Tell Storm what you want. After that, you start listening to what we want.”
“That’s fair.”
Colt turned and fixed his gaze on the unicorn.
“You’re Storm Signal, right?”
“Y-yes-“ The horse swallowed and answered firmly, looking tough, “Yes.”
“You realize you just hospitalized two of police officers out there. That’s like attacking members of the Royal Guard on your side, right? This is serious, you know.”
Flinching. FNG.
“It… it was self defense!”
“Was it? What’s so important about this place, Storm? Hiding in here and attacking the police…”
The pony twitched, trying to imagine excuses, “That’s none of your business! This place is important to my friends and I!”
Colt raised his brows, unconvinced, as he started putting some “intel” to use.
“This is about the witchweed, isn’t it?”
Ah, the look of shock on their faces.
“Witchweed, right? You keep a small batch underneath the warehouse. Growing something like that on this side would make tons of money, that was what you were thinking. People would kill to have a hit of that stuff.”
“How could you have-“
“Known? Come on, Storm, my organization wouldn’t be able to work if we didn’t have some good informants working for us. And with something as rare as witchweed. Hell, maybe it was one of you acting like concerned citizens.”
It was a flimsy method to turn them against each other, and everyone knew it. But what other way they have found out it was here? The men were skirting glances at each other, wondering. Storm Signal kept denying.
“That’s a lie! None of us would do that! We’re in this together!”
All their attentions turned back to Colt, emboldened by the pony’s declaration. They were in it together, against him. The outsider. What could he possibly know?
The man at gunpoint’s eyes didn’t seem to change much, but Storm Signal swore she saw a glimmer of something akin to amusement.
“Is that so? So you’re all friends?”
“T-That’s right,” The gray unicorn answered, swallowing.
“Matthew Baker” stared at her, before his dead stare shifted to her side, suddenly announcing, “Henry! If you’re good friends, why don’t you tell her your great escape route?”
The man almost shriveled under the sudden scrutiny, confused why he should at all, when he was the one with the gun…
“The hell is that supposed to mean?”
“Come on! Don’t give me that shit about how bosom buddies we are with the pencil-head. Things are fine now, but when shit hits the fan…”
Henry looked almost like he was physically struck by the perfect quotation. Michael and Frank also turned wild glances to their leader, while Storm Signal choked.
“P-Pencil head…?”
Colt continued, “You told the others, but you didn’t tell Storm, did you? If something like this happened, you were more than willing throw your pony friend to the wolves and let her distract everyone while your pals make off with the witchweed!”
Storm turned back and forth between the two men, almost dazed, “Henry wouldn’t… He wouldn’t!”
“Don’t listen to him, Storm!” Henry snarled, keeping his aim up, “He’s lying! I’m your-“
“You already told him all the tricks to cultivating the witchweed, Storm, he doesn’t need you any more! As long as he runs this operation, what makes you think he’ll take the risk of keeping a liability like you along? He knows how to care for the plants, you’re more trouble than you’re worth if he gets caught with you-!”
“Shut up! Shut up!”
Henry and Storm Signal were both shouting for different reasons.
“You honestly thought he was your friend!? You don’t have any friends on this side, Storm Signal! We’ve been using horses for transportation for thousands of years, what makes you think we’d suddenly care about one that talks? You’ve been fooled into being a meal ticket, Storm!”
“Henry! He’s lying, right? You’re not going to do that!”
“Of course! Of-of course! We’re friends!”
Colt was close. Their attentions were dipping. Henry was fighting to pay attention to two different people at once, arguing and assuaging at the same time.
…Ah hell, let’s just be thorough.
Under the hat, a wide sneer opened up, “You’re a real pal, Henry. Text book blood sucker. No wonder Frank came to warn us to protect you, Storm Signal.”
Henry’s eyes turned, and his face warped with sheer rage.
“Frank, you mother fucker!”
The man was already babbling denials, “Henry, I swear to God, he’s lying-“
“He knows about the witchweed, how much did you tell him!?”
Colt watched and saw it was time. Storm Signal was turned to Henry, Henry was turned to Frank, Frank vice versa, and even Michael’s eyes began darting towards the erupting argument.
Colt’s hands dropped. With a swinging under hand, his palm slapped the side of the half eaten cargo he had been hiding behind, and he felt the field push from his hand and start seeping into paper and plastic. It took only a moment, and suddenly the plastic wrapped crate was connected to his hand and was lifted from the ground by an idle touch. A vicious wave, and the crate was flung off his palm, sailing through the air towards Storm Signal and Henry.
Shock certainly went through the pony’s mind as she saw what was normally her trick being hurled her way, and without a second thought, Henry and her safety immediately took over all other issues. Gathering all her strength, she sent bolt of gray color from her horn in the pitched mass coming her way.
What followed was a glorious, muffled explosion that sent bits of paper, dangling bits of wrapping, and pulverized Styrofoam every which way.
Everybody was flinching, backing away from the chaos. Except Colt, who saw everything, and whose hand was sweeping under his jacket to the holster at the small of his back.
Fingers wrapped around the grip. Field was pushing onto the metal, trapping it flush against bone and flesh. Senses were pushing, informing him of the alignment of his body, every angle of his arm as he brought it up through the blast.
Colt stared at Michael, and the Strayer Voigt Infinity followed suit and he pulled the trigger.
A forty five caliber bullet flew through the minute gaps of the debris that only Colt could pick out in time, and smashed into the first man’s shoulder, pulverizing bone and transferring force that rippled and tore through muscles. Michael gasped and started falling. His attacker barely registered the recoil as the gun shuddered against the field surrounding it, no force jumping into his wrist and impending his perfect aim.
Frank was next, being still in his line of sight. Colt’s arm swung towards him. A blank stare was already triangulating the angle of the muzzle until it happened to be at the perfect spot. Trigger pull.
The second bullet left the gun. It sailed just to the side of Frank’s head, tumbling lead carving a hard gash, grazing his skull with enough force to send him tumbling into unconsciousness as he thought he died.
“Son… of… a…”
Henry was starting to pick up what was happening, and Colt felt lethal intent. He was aiming the gun at center mass, most likely. The investigator’s body had already began moving, falling down into a crouch, and his head jerking as far to the side as possible as Henry fired. Colt could hear the distinctive “Voom” and the rippling of his hat when a projectile passed besides his head. Even with his off center aim, and the plume of packaging in the way, Colt knew what direction his arm was pointed, what position Henry was, and what was going to happen. Trigger pull.
The third bullet was away, diving straight into the center of the explosion. Energy was shaved off as it cut through layers of packaging, slowing just the slightest until it exited out the other side, flying under Henry’s arms that were raised, trying to shoot again. Lead slammed into a rib, shattering it while it flattened to a halt, sending the last attacker backwards with a cry of anguish.
As the debris fluttered away, Signal Storm opened her eyes and saw her three friends (?) lying haphazard on the floor around her, producing more blood from wounds than she had ever seen in her entire life.
She stared, frozen at the wanton carnage. Her legs were rooted and frozen save for a little trembling, and her heart pounded in her chest.
How did things spiral out of control like this? The idea had been so harmless…
And now she was alone, terrified, staring at her friends, and turning her gaze to the black monster ahead of her, whose gun was still raise in the air, muzzle smoking slightly.
“Only you, Storm. I was always curious if the insides of horses was made of cotton candy…”
The gun aimed downwards at her. Signal Storm gave a shriek and poured all the magic she could in front of her, pulling up a wall glowing wall that sparked as a hollow point round crumpled up against it.
Colt counted in his mind, letting Storm Signal protect herself behind the shield. He walked forward.
Three shots.
He fired again, another bullet loudly pinging off the affront to all logical science, making the Echo-Hotel flinch and shrink further behind the defense.
Two.
He calmly kept moving forward. He timed the intervals between his shots. Every time the pony began to rise up and recollect herself, he fired again, eliciting another yelp.
One.
He was only a few steps away. She couldn’t back away or attack without dropping the shield. Colt fired again, with the slide locking back on the empty gun. The sound of the ricochet rang in both their ears. He could see her tall ears flattening as he towered over her, though he wasn’t sure whether it was from the sound or from fear. Both was acceptable. The shield was flaring with all the strength she could muster, and he was right in front of it.
Perfect.
The gun fell from his hand in the same movement the coated man stabbed his fingers into the magic and stayed there.
Storm Signal’s jaw dropped.
With a rising growl, Colt began to pull his arms outward, prying the shield open. Where the clawed hands pulled away from each other, gaps started giving way, like seams on an old quilt.
“Ah… ah…!” The unicorn could hear noises coming from her, though she had no idea what she was trying to vocalize as she watched the translucent gray wall continue to tear open, letting the two meet face to face. Storm Signal hissed, pushing all the magic she could in the last few seconds into her shield, trying to delay the widening gap.
But it was too late. With one last snarl of effort, Colt pulled the shield apart, arms splayed apart. The magic twisted away into wisps and streams, unable to protect the unicorn any more.
As his arm was thrown out, almost off balance from the sheer force of his actions, Colt forced his legs apart, widening his stance, balled his right hand into a fist, and deftly swung a wild haymaker into his target.
There was a terrible sound of bone creaking under the impact of four knuckled, and Storm Signal’s world reverberated, blinding pain erupting in her jaw right before the blow sent her crashing sideways into the ground.
The world swam and wobbled, and the disoriented unicorn tried to swim away from danger in turn, limbs awkwardly scrabbling against linoleum in every which way. She made five inches before a shoe stepped on her tail.
“Not so fast, missy,” That contemptible voice drawled.
Storm Signal stiffened, as she felt a presence hover beside her. A black gun drew to the side of her vision, and she clearly saw a bullet (that’s what they’re called right?) jump up into the chamber as the slide was released, gun swallowing a new magazine and ready to spit lead again.
She flattened herself almost to the ground, ears limp.
“Please… don’t hurt me…” She whimpered. Colt snorted, while noting off hand that the horse’s identifying mark was a black cloud of some sort. At the same time he jabbed the second of the syringes into his neck, medicine hissing into him. He wiped some stray drops of cold sweat from his brow, making sure she couldn’t see him as he pushed on.
“Then comply, Echo-Hotel. Where. Is. The witchweed.”
“I’ll show you! I will!”
“Do it.”
Colt’s foot let off her tail, and the unicorn scrabbled away, but slowly enough that the man could follow, always mindful that no magic worked at all on him, and he had a gun trained on her the whole time, no matter how easily he was ambling after her.
He followed her to the maintenance hatch he saw her always looking at in James’ visual memories, tucked away in the corner of the building, almost forgettable given how it was planted in the floor.
“It’s under here...” Storm Signal whimpered again. Colt motioned to it.
“Well, I’m not waiting for an invitation. Open it and go in first. I’m not turning my back to a horse like you for an instant.”
The unicorn grimaced, but followed his orders. The gray glow attached itself to the hatch and swung it open. The gray pony slipped inside, followed by Colt dropping in after. He landed in a crouch, and found himself in what he had always suspected to be a niche for maintenance of local cabling, bare light bulbs bouncing orange light off cold concrete walls. It was certainly larger than he expected, though, basically being a tunnel that barely scrapped the top of his head. He didn’t even need to duck while he kept following after his quarry, who took him to a piece of tarp that had been strung up as a covering at the far end of the corridor.
“Making an extension during renovations, I see,” Colt muttered to himself, as he pushed past the tarp after Storm Signal.
The room after was obviously not part of the original planning. It was basically a burrow carved out the soil, a room made of packed dirt and supported by wooden beams jammed into the ceiling at four points, with more light bulbs drawn in and hanging by cables.
All over the floor were plants, potted with whatever would contain soil. Ceramic bowls, plastic boxes, grocery bags. All nurturing a rare, almost neon green fern that didn’t exist on earth. Witchweed. A pretty bundle worth a huge steal.
The investigator whistled, looking all around, while Storm Signal sulked in the center of the fern field, nursing her battered cheek. As he pushed through the plants, Colt’s gaze strayed to the far end of the room-
Colt’s breath got caught in his throat, and he stared.
There was more than just the plants in here.
Suspended against the dirt wall, mid air grew cracked and crumpled, jagged like glass. At the center of the broken physics, air whistling to and fro, rushing from a gap, a window that emitted bleeding red light. An open wound on time and space, only a few feet long and a few inches wide, but a brilliant red tear all the same.
“A rift… you’ve been hiding a rift…”
Colt walked forward, his arm twisting to keep his gun towards the unicorn as he passed her, with a limp and most distracted manner as he stared.
“It… was how I met Henry and the others. The other side is near my home.” Storm Signal mumbled.
“You’ve been using it to smuggle the witchweed,” Colt said, but in such an offhand manner, it seemed like it was a stray detail compared to the rift itself.
Then a sudden terrible and angry noise crawled up his throat as his eyes narrowed at the red pseudo-portal. He holstered the gun.
In all her time here, Storm Signal had never been able to affect the “rift” as they called it. She had always considered herself possessing an above average capacity for magic, but for all that she could wield, nothing was ever enough to widen or close, or manipulate the phenomenon.
There would be no expression appropriate now or ever as she watched the man who punched her walk up to the rift with empty hands, and proceed to grab the either jagged side, simply just grab a spatial anomaly with his own hands and struggle with it. As he forced his hands together, the glass joined, and the red dimmed, until his fingers clasped over nothing. The cracking sealed up, flattened, disappeared.
The fabric of reality was whole again.
“By the sun…” She choked, “My… my rift… you destroyed my rift…”
A horrid loneliness and growing despair fell on Storm Signal, as she realized what she had experienced. In one night, the steadfast loyalty she had in her friends had been battered, themselves assaulted and injured, and now the rift, her rift, her secret, her passage to and from home was gone, and now she was trapped, in a dirt packed room, alone.
Alone with a black coated beast, who kept walking forward no matter what was thrown at him, who tore magic asunder and shut rifts with his own strength.
He turned around, glassy glare aimed at her.
She started backing away, through the leaves.
“’Your rift’? Your rift? So you horses can just own rifts now as you please?” He spat, ambling over. His hands were twitching, and Storm Signal feared where they would go next, “You think can just traipse through unstable dimensional tears because they’re fun? Not worrying about what it could do to my world?”
“N-no! No!”
“Just pouring in, without a care? You think you can just do whatever you want? Manipulate us because we can’t use magic? Smuggling witchweed or your potions, or your gems, because you think you can get away with? All you goddamn horses...”
The gray unicorn kept walking back, until she felt herself touching crumbling soil behind her. There was no where left to go. In front of her, he towered over her, ugly yellow light silhouetting him. Under the shadow of the hat, she could barely see that furious stare.
“I swear, it never meant to be like this…!” Storm Signal was close to babbling, feeling her heart hammer in her chest, her breath shallow and ragged.
“No. You thought you could get away with this,” Colt coldly retorted. Hands were clawed at his side.
It would be so easy.
A thousand and one methods, a thousand and one excuses, and a thousand and one methods to slip away.
It would be so easy…
Colt’s pocket started vibrating.
BEEP BEEP BEEP. BEEP BEEP BEEP.
The artificial noise cut through the tension, Storm Signal flicking her sight from his face to his hand, nervously wondering where it would decide to go. To the pocket? To behind his back?
For Colt, as his phone rang, he realized how hard he was breathing, how agitated his circulation was, how much his temples were throbbing. His ribs were hurting. A haze started clearing, and he saw that he had lost his temper. God dammit. He was better than this.
Yes, it would be easy. But that’s not why I’m here.
His breathing evened out. His hand fished the phone out, and looked at who was calling.
(Aloysius LIME calling…)
Colt fought back something that might have been a chortle. Where Lime was involved, it was never coincidence. He answered the call.
“Yeah?”
“Colt. I heard gunfire, but I restrained myself from calling immediately to let you finish your business. Has everything been taken care of?”
“Yeah, yeah it has,” Colt exhaled and craned his head back, trying to massage tension out, “I’ve tried to be less lethal, but they were certainly coming at me with intent to kill.”
“And the Echo-Hotel?”
“Yeah, I got them all, nice and wrapped up for you,” He answered, before taking a look around at the room, “It gets better. They weren’t just harboring a fugitive, you know. They were smuggling exotic plants in too.”
“I’ll have to inform the police that I’ll be sending sterilization equipment as well, then. The SWAT team are moving to enter as I speak. On of our vans have also arrived. Take the Echo-Hotel there, and your work will be finished.”
“On it. I’ll see you later, then.”
Colt turned to look down at Storm Signal, who whom cut tension was like cutting the last strings of her fortitude, given how she was slumped on her stomach, sighing.
“Hey, don’t think you’re clear yet. I’m marching your stupid ass out, little horsie. Once we’re deport you back to magical pony land, you’re going to have a record so fucking huge, on either side, you’ll be lucky if you can even get away with littering unnoticed. Maybe you should have thought of that before hand.”
Storm Signal winced, “You… who are you…?”
He grinned, while reaching for his last syringe, “Matthew Baker isn’t my name, obviously. My name is Jeremy Colt. Chief investigator for Taraxippus Detection and Containment, and you’re already under arrest for violating bans from both the United Nations and Equestria on travelling through a rift, not to mention hiding one, keeping one, and using one for smuggling illegal material.”
The unicorn swallowed loudly. Only one word registered for her, “T-Taraxippus? You mean…”
Colt leaned forward, until he was just a little above face to face, still sneering, “That’s right. One of the goose-steppers.”
As if to punctuate, the syringe went into his neck. The hissing sent a chill up Storm Signal’s back.
“A little celebratory alcohol, Colt?”
“Not up for it. There’s a glass of brandy with my name on it at home, and besides that, I am fucking bushed. I got hit by a crate, you know.”
The situation had been resolved. Storm Signal was carted away in one of their personal armored vehicles, and men, and the police arrested the human conspirators. Before the civilians and news reporters who had arrived could see the involved parties, Colt had already pushed himself into Lime’s limousine, and driven off.
Limousine was an exaggeration. Lime never care for excess. As it was, it was just a car that had been stretched far enough to allow a second row of seats to be fitted in so two parties could face each other. The barest definition of “Limousine”.
Colt sat limp to one side of the back seat, knees splayed outward in sheer exhaustion, one arm flopped against the seat, and another supporting his cheek, as he leaned against the window, staring outside at the flickering highway, looking at the contrast of orange street lights and a sky that was turning dark blue.
Lime sat in front of him, shrugging, and pouring himself the brandy from the snifter that he had offered to his companion.
At the driver’s seat, a young woman was directing the car, more delicate looking than an employee in this business should have, but had an utterly business like appearance by contrast, with a hard gray business outfit, a passive, serious expression, topped by a dark red bob cut, and dangling office regulation earrings that seemed to increase her generic appearance more than anything.
“On this case alone, I would call this a great success. An Einhorn definitely located and deported, the men involved captured, and a smuggling circle smashed. And you did it with something that could almost be defined as subtlety, Colt.”
The blond man turned behind him, to the woman driver, “Wouldn’t you call it a success, Bradley?”
“Yes, Mr. Lime,” Geneva Bradley responded mildly, eyes never leaving the road, “Mr. Colt certainly cleaned out the Augean stables. His being subtle must have been a herculean effort on his part.”
Colt rolled his eyes from where he had his head pressed to the glass, “Ha, ha, Gen. Sometimes I wonder how the hell you found your secretary, Lime.”
“Sometimes, you have to look low while you aim high,” He said, between sips of the rough amber liquid, “As for you, old friend, a sour disposition doesn’t suit you.”
Colt didn’t answer immediately, and kept looking out for several seconds before speaking.
“Down in the spot where the horse was growing the witchweed, there was a splinter rift there. I closed it already before you called.”
Lime looked at the black coated man, before answering ambiguously, “I see.”
“Just seeing one… every time I see one… new ones keep splintering off. How long will this take, Lime? I close as many as I can…”
“And you’ll close them all. Our investigators will find them all, our security will contain them, and you’ll close them. As long as we are alive, Taraxippus will exist. It doesn’t matter if it takes ten more years or ten thousand years, you’ll see the end of your work, buffeting humanity against threats from within and without that it doesn’t realize.”
“Hm…”
“Now you’re just sulking, Colt.”
“I hate rifts, and I hate what comes through them.”
“Well, our fun never ends. Especially with the fundraiser in the coming days.”
“Oh God.”
“Until then…” Lime turned to Geneva, “Bradley, drive us to an excellent fast food restaurant. We’ll buy our old friend an excellent meal, then drive him home.”
“Understood.”
Colt sat, nearly lulled by the loud drone of the engine, and kept staring outside at the sky. Across the blue expanse, a great band of broken glass floated, the red wound within glowing as brightly as ever, as The Rift twisted across the sky and through the world for the entire world to see. The Rift from which splinters wormed their way into the fabric of reality.
Five years since the day. No matter how long it took…
Have to close it…
The resolve fixed itself once again in Colt’s mind.
He sighed. He shouldn’t have put his head against the window. The vibrations were starting to make his head hurt.