Chapter 32 - Rise
By Cille
Roy Mustang stood frozen with his arm extended and his fingers pressed together. That child’s face… and the face of the woman looking defiantly back at him, as she protectively cradled the stunned girl in her arms…
How many times had he seen those faces before? Children looking at him with eyes pleading for mercy… mothers desperate to save their children, looking at him with intense hatred or begging him to take their lives instead… and how many times had he ignored their pleas and snapped his fingers anyway?
His hand began trembling. He had always told himself he was just following orders, just doing what he had been told to do. The lives he had taken were a necessary sacrifice. He was a soldier, dammit.
But, in truth…
Was he any better than this “monster” who knelt before him? She, who had killed so many people, who was responsible for Riza’s death… she had been following orders too. And now, in the heat of battle, she was willing to put her own life on the line for this innocent girl.
“NO!” he shouted, shaking his head violently to make those thoughts go away. “Don’t you dare go playing the saint here! I know what you’ve done! Don’t think you can make up for all that by saving one little girl!”
And what will you do to atone for everything you’ve done? the voice in his head demanded.
“It’s… it’s not the same,” he insisted, his resolve weakening. Emiri just watched him, uncertain about what the conflict she saw on his face would mean for her.
Finally Mustang flung his arm down in disgust.
“Just tell me one thing,” he said, his voice shaking through his clenched teeth. “One thing… Do you regret what you’ve done? Do you truly regret taking those lives? Or have you lost the ability to feel remorse?”
She looked at him with what almost looked like a hurt expression. “You mean how I can still remember the looks on their faces when I killed him? How I can’t get them the hell out of my head anymore? How it’s been driving me crazy that there’s nothing I can do that will ever change what I did?” He saw that she was serious, and he began to understand what she had been going through, that it was hurting her too. “No,” she continued with a derisive laugh, “I don’t feel anything.”
She looked away from him, that pained and angry look still on her face. As upset as he still was, and as much as he knew he could never totally forgive her, he realized that simply killing her right here would do no good. Just like she could never change what she had done, he could never do anything to bring his loved one back. And maybe it was up to him to be the bigger man and accept her remorse rather than exact his revenge.
“Mommy!”
The little girl wriggled out of Emiri’s grasp and ran to where her parents had emerged from behind a tree. Emiri watched her go, and then stood up and faced Mustang.
“So what now, big guy?” she asked.
Mustang regarded her for a moment. “You said you wanted to join the Syndicate, right?”
“That was the idea, yeah. You got a problem with that?”
Mustang narrowed his eyes, but restrained himself from snapping back. “If you’re really serious, I think it’s a fine idea. That crew isn’t exactly competent when it comes to fighting. They could probably use a trained killer like you.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“Come to think of it, they could probably use someone like me too. A disciplined military man could do them some good. And who knows, they might need someone to keep you in line.”
Emiri raised an eyebrow, but thought better of mocking him. He had almost toasted her, after all.
“So shall we head back there?” she said instead. “If we’re going to be allies now, then I should probably stop Kira from slicing up your sidekick.”
“If he’s not all shot full of holes by now,” Mustang replied snarkily.
They returned to the cafe to find that Havoc had barricaded himself behind a chunk of the cafe wall, and was taking pot shots at his Soul Reaper opponent. Kira easily dodged them, seeming content to bait Havoc rather than going after him with the intent to kill. The others were huddled just inside the building, yelling at the two of them to knock off their fighting before any more damage was done. Hikki in particular seemed kind of agitated about what had happened to his cafe.
“Kira!” “Havoc!” Emiri and Mustang yelled at the same time. They glared at each other, and then turned back to their partners.
“Stand down, Havoc,” Mustang commanded.
“Yeah, you don’t have to kick this guy’s ass just yet,” Emiri added, looking at Havoc out of the corner of her eye.
“Sir?” Havoc said, warily rising from behind his impromptu fortress.
“We’ve come to terms,” Mustang said. “That’s all you need to know. And we’ve both decided to join up with the Syndicate.” With that he turned to the group inside the cafe, particularly addressing Hikki. “We haven’t got much left to do now that our little mystery has been solved, and you seem like you could use some extra firepower. So if you’ll take us, we’ll be on your side.” He noticed their harried expressions, and glanced around at the still-smoldering wreckage around them. “Oh… and sorry about your cafe.”
“Mon dieu…” Hikki managed. “Eef eet ees not somsing eet ees anozzer…”
Clarice and Samson exchanged glances, and then Clarice stepped forward, realizing that her boss wasn’t in much of a state to discuss terms of membership. “Perhaps we should all come inside to talk…”
They all regrouped in a back room of the cafe.
“So…” Clarice said, “you all want to join the Syndicate?”
“I already told you that’s what I’m here for,” Emiri said. “Kira and I have been trying to get here for ages, so I think it’s about time we get to actually do something to help you out.”
“But… you were just trying to kill us,” Samson pointed out, unconsciously reaching for the arm she had almost severed. “And now you want to help us?”
“Look, I know I’ve done some rotten things to you. And if there were a way to prove to you how sorry I am, I’d do it. But you’re just gonna have to take my word for it.” She looked defiantly over at Mustang. “People can change, you know.”
“And what about you?” Clarice asked Mustang. “You’re willing to join up with us too? Even if it means working with her?”
Mustang gritted his teeth. “I made up my mind to fight with you. If she’s here, she can just stay out of my way. It’s not like she’s going to scare me off.”
The look on Emiri’s face said “oooh, aren’t you the big man,” but once again she knew enough to hold her tongue.
Samson turned to Havoc and Kira, who were still keeping their distance from each other. “And you guys are in on this too?”
They each looked to their respective partner, and then both nodded.
Samson and Clarice looked at each other, and then at Hikki. The Frenchman still looked a little dazed, but seemed to have mostly been following along with what was going on.
“So… what do you think, fearless leader?” Clarice asked.
Hikki pouted for a moment, then stood up straight and looked right at Mustang. Pulling something out of his pocket, he marched over to the alchemist, and then slapped him across the face with a white glove.
“ZAT EES FOR MY CAFE!” he bellowed.
Before anyone could react, he stalked over to Emiri and did the same to her.
“AND ZAT EES FOR MON CHER SAMMIE!”
The two of them just looked at him, rubbing their cheeks and feeling kind of stunned, as he strode back to his place next to Samson and stuffed the glove back into his pocket. Taking a huge breath and exhaling slowly to dissipate some tension, he turned back around to address them civilly.
“Now…” he began, “Eef you are really serious about joining us, you must set aside your deeferences and be able to wairk weez each ozzer, and weez us, as a team. Eef you can do zat, zen you may conseeder yourselves welcome.”
Emiri and Mustang looked at each other, both perhaps feeling a little more humble than they had before.
“All right,” Mustang said. “If you think you can trust her, you won’t have any trouble from me. I’ll be keeping an eye on her to make sure she plays nice, though.”
The old Emiri might have made a crack about how he just wanted to check out her hawt bod, but she realized that that might be bad form when the guy was still mourning his former fiancée.
“Oh, I can behave,” she said sweetly instead. “Just don’t think it’s because of you. I’ve got a lot to make up to these people.”
“Vairy good zen,” Hikki said, before either of them could go any further with the taunts. “Your fairst job as new membairs of ze Syndicate… ees to go back out zair and start cleaning up ze mess you made.”
The new recruits let out a collective sigh of chagrin, and then headed out of the room to start their work.
“Hikki.” Clarice stopped him before he could follow. “Do you think we need to clear this with Landon?”
“Landon hasn’t shown his face around here for weeks,” Samson pointed out. “If anything’s going to be done around here, it’ll have to be up to us.”
Clarice and Hikki looked at each other, and then Hikki nodded. “Eef Landon weeshes to revoke zair membersheep latair, zat ees up to heem. For now, I seenk I can act on our behalf. Objections?”
“None,” Clarice replied. Samson looked down, having nothing more to say.
“Tres bien,” Hikki said. “Now pairhaps we shall go to asseest our new comrades?”
Clarice nodded, and left the room. Samson remained silent for a moment, and Hikki wondered if he was just going to stay behind.
“I have to get back to my work,” Samson said, as if in answer to Hikki’s questioning look, and then left to go back to his room.
Hikki sighed, and then began rubbing his temples as he walked out toward the front room.
“Eef eet ees not somsing, eet ees anozzer…”
**********
A few hours later, an Alter user and a zombie robot pirate found themselves staring at the scorched remains of the park.
“Aha… so there was some reckless fiyah going on around here,” Kazuma said.
“Yarrrrrr,” Yemman concurred. “But it do be lookin’ like it’s all gone out now, matey.” There wasn’t even any sign of the crowd that had witnessed the spectacle earlier.
“Oh man, this is just great,” Kazuma said grumpily, kicking at a charred tree stump. “First that jerk with the glasses tells us off just as we’re about to charge into Comdot Estate. Then you decided you needed a drink so you could think it all over, and the next thing we know we’re waking up in an alley somewhere and discover that the chick who tried to pick us up in the bar made off with everything in our pockets. THEN we spend weeks chasing her down just so you can get your stupid pirate hat back. Then, when we’ve finally gotten back on track, and we make up our minds to come back here and fight, and it finally looks like we’ve found some action, Captain Lunkhead here gets us lost and we miss out on all the crap exploding.”
“Garrrr… me compass has never steered me wrong b’fore…” the pirate muttered, tapping the device impatiently.
“Yeah, and it never will AGAAAAAIIIIIN!!!” Kazuma yelled, grabbing the compass and tossing it up in the air so he could punch it into smithereens.
Yemman looked at him with a slightly hurt expression. “Well ye didn’t have t’go doin’ that now…”
“So what are we supposed to do now? There’s obviously nobody here to fight. Are we just going to sit around waiting for another riot to break out? Or should we go back to busting into Comdot?”
“Well…” Yemman considered their options. “Ya know, maybe that lily-livered scalawag with th’ specs was on t’ somethin’. A pirate ain’t a pirate without a crew. Maybe we ought t’go scout out me old mates and join our swords… uh…” (looking at Kazuma) “fists…” (glancing down at his own body) “robot… whatever I am… with theirs! We’ll make that scurvy Ozzal walk the plank yet!”
“But… weren’t you the one who started those riots that ended up getting a bunch of them arrested and killed? And didn’t you actually off one of them?”
“Aye, matey…” Yemman said sadly. “It were a dark time indeed. Meetin’ you has changed me whole outlook, though. It be time fer me t’put me back t’ th’ wind and me hands t’ th’ rope. ‘Drastic me soul,’ as you always be sayin’.”
“Well as long as it involves punching things, you can count me in. Lead the way, captain!”
“Y’know, it’d be a lot easier t’ find me way if I had me compass…” Yemman mumbled as they started off.
**********
Landon Blaken had always wanted to accomplish great things.
As the top student in his small-town school, he had always been told that he could do anything he set his mind to. He was used to succeeding, but he always felt that he was wasting his time and talents and that there was something much bigger in store for him.
The military provided a way out, and promised opportunities far beyond anything that small town could offer. Landon was accepted into the military academy and was soon recognized as one of the more outstanding new recruits.
After its humiliating defeat in Babblstan, the Actonian army needed time to regroup and rethink its strategy. It would be several more years before the then-disgraced General Ozzal would be in a position to push her country into war yet again. So even as the military worked to replenish its ranks and rebuild itself into the powerful force it had been, there was really very little for those ranks to do.
And so Landon found himself once more in a state of dissatisfaction and boredom, feeling like his considerable abilities were going to waste. He lost interest in his classes, and began spending more time pursuing his own personal studies. His instructors might have wondered what happened to their star prospect, but they weren’t about to go coddling students who didn’t feel like doing the work. And so Landon finished at the academy as just another grunt soldier, graduating without honors. He didn’t really care, since he knew he was capable of far more than they gave him credit for.
Being an active member of the military at least gave him the chance to feel like he was doing some good and helping people, as his unit traveled around the country to build up towns that had been adversely affected by the war. Perhaps it was his upbringing in a similar small town that gave him a certain kinship with these people, or the fact that he finally felt that he was accomplishing something, but for once he was involved in something that he found at least a little bit satisfying.
One day while he was out alone on a scouting run in a remote area not far from the Babblstan border, he came upon a man who had been seriously wounded. Realizing that he would die without immediate medical attention, he carried the barely conscious man to the nearby town and left him in the care of the town’s doctor. The next morning, before his unit left for their next assignment, Landon stopped in to see how the man was doing. He found him lying in a bed, bandaged and weak but conscious. Landon introduced himself, and the man looked closely at his face.
“Obrigado,” was all he said.
Landon would consider this a good deed to add to his karmic resume, but in time he forgot the details of the encounter. Then, a couple of years later, his unit was assigned escort duty for a group of refugees from the Sailors Tribe of Toonamia. Suddenly they were ambushed by a sniper, who systematically picked off not only the Toonamians, but also every single Actonian soldier – except for Landon.
Crouching in a ditch by the side of the road, with the bodies of his fallen comrades all around him, Landon truly believed that this would be the end of his dreams of grandeur. And then he heard a rough voice with a thick accent calling to him.
“Hey… you can come out now.”
Landon cautiously raised himself up, to see a man in a dark cloak and a mask coming toward him with a very impressive-looking gun.
“Do you remember me?” he asked, pulling the mask away from his face.
Landon looked at him intently, trying to remember where he had seen this swarthy face before. “Who are you?”
“I am a man who lives in the shadows,” the sniper replied roguishly. “A man whose life you once saved. And now I have returned the favor.”
It came back to Landon in a flash: the man whom he had carried to the doctor in that small town… was an assassin who would come back to kill his entire unit and a group of innocent refugees.
The man seemed amused at the somewhat stricken expression on Landon’s face. “You don’t need to worry about what has happened here. Nobody will miss these worthless Sailor dogs, and these foot soldiers were always just holding you back. Isn’t that right?”
So somehow this man knew about Landon’s aspirations. He had obviously been doing his homework.
“But perhaps…” he continued, “I have done you a favor today. You are a free man now. So… how would you like to become my partner? It would be a lot more exciting than being a lapdog of the pathetic Actonian government.”
Somewhat impulsively, Landon agreed. With his unit wiped out, nobody would really know or care that he was missing too, so he figured he might as well take advantage of this new opportunity. He and his new partner, who went by the name of Da Sombras, spent the next year or two traveling around the country and making their own fortunes. They took to calling themselves the Cool Mexicanos, just because it sounded badass. Although Da Sombras was always quick to point out that he was Brazilian, not Mexican.
Even as he found himself enjoying the freedom to live by his own rules, Landon often had to rein in his partner’s less moral inclinations to keep them both from running afoul of the law. Fortunately this didn’t seem to bother Da Sombras too much, and in fact he seemed to like having someone there to keep him from going too far. They did run into trouble from time to time, though, since Da Sombras had built up quite the nefarious reputation and couldn’t entirely control his penchant for making mischief.
After a time, Landon decided to return to his old life and continue trying to make a name for himself on the right side of the law. General Ozzal had gained back much of her power and was beginning to exert her influence on the government and the Actonian people, and Landon was beginning to feel disgusted with the political situation in the country. And so he and Da Sombras parted on amicable terms, and each went back to his old vocation. Landon was welcomed back to Orly as the only survivor of his unit’s ambush, and was given another assignment within the army. Even as he worked to reestablish himself as an honorable soldier, he felt increasingly frustrated with the way the country was headed and sympathetic to those who opposed the emerging leadership. Eventually he became more actively involved with the small resistance movement that was already beginning to form in the city, even assembling his own small group of activists after being inspired by the words of a pirate he met in a bar one night.
And then there was… that woman. Landon met Lucille Compton by chance one night in a cafe in Orly. He had never concerned himself much with women, since his ambition always came first, but he was not above dabbling with a pretty girl every once in a while. And so when the restaurant’s proprietress struck up conversation with him, and then introduced him to a young woman who was apparently in need of some companionship, he figured that he could have some fun putting his charm to work. It quickly became clear, though, that this wasn’t the type of girl you could sweet-talk into a one-night stand. But for some reason, he found her a little bit fascinating. She was intelligent and well-spoken, with a wit and sense of humor that very nearly matched his own. And perhaps more than that, he found it refreshing to talk to someone who seemed to be a genuinely nice person. When they finally said goodnight, it occurred to him that he hadn’t enjoyed himself that much in quite a long time. And even though he hadn’t expected anything to come of their evening together, he found himself wondering if he would ever see her again. After a week away from the city, he decided to at least try. He went back to that cafe and found her again, and a romance was born. A short time later, he impetuously proposed to her.
It was an odd thing for him to do, in retrospect, to tie himself down to a family – particularly since Cille had an adoptive son who was nearly grown himself. Perhaps he rationalized it as just part of his rise to the top; Cille came from a good family, and it couldn’t hurt too much to have a supportive wife and son. Or perhaps he was still just enjoying himself, figuring that he could take off again if he got tired of playing house. But there was something nice about having a little bit of stability in his life, and he put on a good face for the woman and boy who clearly adored him.
At first, the organization that came to be called the Blacken Syndicate was little more than a small group of would-be freedom fighters using covert means to quietly undermine Ozzal and give aid to those who had been hurt by her policies. They might help build support for a political campaign for a candidate who was sympathetic to the people, or raid transports of supplies en route to Orly and take them to poorer towns, or simply put out dissenting opinions in underground publications like ray=out.
Even after Ozzal officially wrested the title of Head Governor from the previous occupant of Comdot Estate, and the rebel group grew in size and boldness, it was still sufficiently loosely organized that Landon could maintain his life with his new family and still plan and participate in its activities. Fortunately Cille always believed him when he told her he was being called out for military duty or was off to visit family or friends. Even as he almost pitied her naivete and all the trust she put in him, something made him want to live up to that trust, and he found himself looking forward to returning from his missions to be with them again.
And then Landon’s entire family, whom he had left behind in his small town when he went to make a name for himself, was murdered in one day. Not by some petty criminal, but by representatives of Head Governor Ozzal herself.
In the aftermath of that terrible news, he realized that simple resistance was not enough. Not against a government that thought nothing of striking down its citizens when they had done nothing but congregate to speak out against its policies. If they were going to fight with guns and grenades, then so would he. The entire principle of the Syndicate would have to change.
And unfortunately, his life would have to change with it. His time of playing house was over. The day after the uprising in his town, he packed a bag and left a note and silently said goodbye to his fiancee and her son. He hoped they would understand someday – why he had to leave them, and why he was unable to explain everything to them himself. It hurt him to leave them, as he realized afterward just how much he really had come to care about Cille and Raef. But he told himself that it was for their own good that he was keeping them as uninvolved in his revolution as possible. He asked his friends Eric Ominae and Straight Cougar to make sure that Cille was getting along all right in his absence, and to give her whatever aid she might someday need.
His newfound determination revitalized the Syndicate. They formed a much stronger core group, and began striking out at Ozzal’s forces, hoping to create enough disorder that her nascent administration wouldn’t be able to maintain its hold on the country. But for every riot they incited, and every one of her officials they beat up, she only seemed to grasp her power more tightly.
And then from out of the blue came a call from someone he hadn’t seen in what seemed like ages, but whose thickly accented voice he would recognize anywhere. It was Da Sombras, offering his “services” as an assassin if the Syndicate should want to have any of Ozzal’s minions – or Ozzal herself – taken out. And in return, all he wanted was to partner up again, to pursue what Da Sombras eagerly described as “the secret to eternal life.” At first Landon was understandably skeptical, but Da Sombras had apparently become enamored of the idea after reading some ancient texts from his homeland. Perhaps as a response to his own closeness to mortality, Da Sombras seemed determined to discover and harness the secret if it really did exist. But even the brash Brazilian realized that he could use someone more grounded and book-savvy to assist in his quest, and Landon’s leadership of the Syndicate had caught his attention again.
Eventually, despite his reservations, Landon accepted the offer. The Cool Mexicanos were reborn, and various of Ozzal’s underlings began turning up dead with no trace of their killer. As easy as it would have been to eliminate Ozzal herself, Landon restrained his assassin partner, believing that the country would simply be thrown into chaos without a sufficiently strong faction in place ready to take over. Secretly, though, he was also determined to bring about Ozzal’s downfall himself, and he wasn’t about to let the sniper deprive him of his glory with a single shot.
For his part, Landon began spending more time doing research into possible avenues for attaining eternal life, and the duo began expanding as more people joined the group. Many of them were associates of Da Sombras whose previous shady dealings Landon didn’t care much to know. Among them were a homunculus, Greed, and an android, Tres; a thief and cutthroat who called himself Slik the Bandit; Liam Green, a young man who also possessed a great analytical mind; and a terrorist named Gauron. Landon was free to command all of them, and they likewise reported back to Da Sombras, who was having fun tooting around in his new zeppelin. Eventually a couple of scientists were added to the team, and they established their own research facility some distance from Orly.
As time went on, and the group began discovering strategies that seemed like they might actually be feasible, Landon found himself becoming more intrigued with the idea. He knew that Da Sombras was only interested in the secret to eternal life for his own selfish purposes, but Landon began thinking about how it might be used to benefit the world at large. If people had nothing to fear from death, he reasoned, then they would have no reason to fear standing up to a corrupt government. What happened to his family would never happen to anyone else again. And what if eternal life could be granted to the great men and women whose passing always seems to leave the world a little poorer? Surely the world would be better off if its great thinkers and artists and scientists could remain alive indefinitely. It was a lofty goal, to be sure – Landon still had no idea if they would ever find a way to achieve eternal life, or if the secret could ever be applied on a wide scale. But still he became more and more obsessed with the idea, and ultimately one thought took hold over all the others: if he, Landon Blaken, could gain immortality, then he would surely be able to fulfill his potential for greatness and lead the people in creating a society free from injustice and pain. In truth it was probably only slightly less selfish and arrogant than Da Sombras’ desire to cheat death, but in Landon’s mind it was only logical that he should take his place as a hero of the oppressed masses.
Meanwhile, the effectiveness of the Syndicate was slipping. The increase in the rebels’ activities had been accompanied by an increase in military and police retaliation, as Ozzal struggled to maintain her position of power and continued her efforts to crush anyone who opposed her. Even with Da Sombras’ contributions to the cause, the Syndicate seemed to be getting further and further from victory. And it didn’t help that its leader was becoming more and more distant as he devoted more time and energy to the Cool Mexicanos.
Landon’s situation became even rockier when Raef Compton appeared, angrily demanding that he answer for abandoning him and his mother. Landon didn’t blame him for being upset, of course, and he managed to assuage him by explaining about the dangers of the revolution and his concern for their safety. The boy then insisted on joining in the revolution, and Landon had no choice but to admit him as a member of the Syndicate. Their relationship remained strained, though, and Landon always had to wonder if the boy was able to see through his selfless hero persona.
A short time later, Landon decided to leave the Syndicate. It was becoming too troublesome to hide his involvement with the Cool Mexicanos, especially with Raef watching his every move. And without having the rebels to deal with, he could concentrate on achieving his ultimate goal of immortality. He left them with a few instructions, but without his strong leadership the group fell into disarray. Eventually a new batch of recruits came to the group, and a new leader was named, but they were never the force they had once been. About the only thing keeping them from being totally wiped out was the fact that they were too inept for Comdot to continue bothering with them. Landon watched them from afar, and occasionally sent messages or orders to help keep them in line, but he was mostly content to bide his time until he could make his triumphant return.
A few months after his departure, a headline in the Orly Review caught his attention and made him consider making that return. “Conspirator sentenced to death,” it read. Amusingly enough, the article seemed designed to lead readers to believe that Landon himself was the one who had been captured, presumably to force the Syndicate into the open to mount a rescue. And if they took the bait, which undoubtedly they would, then they would be putting themselves into a very precarious position, if they even managed to survive at all. He could no longer sit back and entrust the Syndicate to these fools, after he had put so much of his time and effort and genius into creating it and building it up.
And so Landon handed over the major operations of the Cool Mexicanos research projects to Liam Green, who had become something of a protege, and headed back to Orly. He took up residence in an old law office, and set about monitoring Syndicate activities and planning his comeback. Fortunately their raid on Comdot went surprisingly successfully, allowing him a little more breathing room before he made his presence known.
Unfortunately, though, the hubbub surrounding his supposed capture (and the subsequent kidnapping of Raef Compton) had attracted the attention of Cille, who had in turn attracted the attention of Da Sombras and his cohorts in the Cool Mexicanos. Like the naive fool she was, she had started poking her nose into the Syndicate’s affairs, looking for both Raef and Landon. Da Sombras’ agents made sure she didn’t find out too much, but even after Ozzal’s minions went after her, she still persisted in trying to involve herself in the rebellion. And Da Sombras was not pleased. “You should have known better than to take up with a woman,” he grumbled. And he had a point – if Cille found out too much, and stumbled upon the Cool Mexicanos while she was searching for Landon, she could completely blow their cover. Most of their operatives were wanted by the federal government for various major crimes, so a raid on their facility could be devastating. And more importantly to Landon, being exposed as a double agent could mean losing not only his dream of immortality, but his credibility with the revolutionaries.
Da Sombras wanted to simply pop the meddlesome woman off right away, but Landon resisted allowing any action to be taken against her. He wouldn’t have admitted it to his scornful partner, but he still harbored some affection for his former fiancee. Besides, she was still an innocent civilian, and it seemed cruel to kill her simply because she might get in their way.
Until, that is, Cille actually found him. Or at least, a woman who looked suspiciously like Cille. He might have suspected her of being her older sister if he hadn’t known that she had been an only child. But she claimed, in a story that at first he found too fantastic to believe, that she was a future incarnation of Cille who had come back in time to help save the world from Ozzal’s tyranny. He probably would have dismissed her completely if she hadn’t known particular details of both Cille’s past and their own relationship. But given what she knew, he had no choice but to believe that she was who she said she was.
What she told him next was quite possibly even harder to accept. It seemed that one of the primary reasons for the fall of the Syndicate was that she herself had been responsible for the deaths of several of its members. She didn’t elaborate very much, but her primary goal in returning to her past seemed to be to prevent her alter ego from making the same mistakes. Even, she said gravely, if that meant she had to die.
At first Landon found the idea distasteful. But she insisted that she was prepared to make that sacrifice, and that it would be the surest way of making sure she couldn’t repeat her mistakes. And finally, Landon had to admit to himself that it might be worth having his ex-fiancee out of the Cool Mexicanos’ way for good. And so he agreed to work with this future Cille, and to allow the Lucille Compton of the present to be killed if it came to that.
Da Sombras was particularly delighted to hear that Cille was now fair game. Unfortunately for him and his itchy trigger finger, though, Landon and his new partner agreed that if Cille was to die, it should clearly be at the hands of the Syndicate’s enemies. That way they would at least appear blameless, and perhaps her death would spur an outcry against the government and make way for the triumphant return that Landon had envisioned for himself.
When they received word that Echelon agents were being sent out to round up Syndicate members, it seemed that Comdot was playing right into their hands. Cille was one of those arrested, and this time it seemed that Ozzal intended to try to lure Landon out by making a media event of his fiancee’s death. According to Dino, a Syndicate informant in Comdot’s security forces with whom Landon had remained in contact, Ozzal’s right hand man Goda was planning to have Cille murdered as part of his experiments with a new Stimulant drug.
It almost seemed too perfect. Cille would be eliminated, and all Landon and his associates had to do was sit back and watch.
And then, of course, it all backfired. Cille managed to escape, most likely with the aid of that gallingly steadfast idiot Cougar, and it seemed that they were right back where they started. Landon would not be deterred from retaking the Syndicate, though. The revolution was his to lead, and he had been growing impatient waiting in his secret lair. And so he declared that they would proceed with their plans, have Cille’s death staged, and continue on to take control of the Syndicate. Thanks to some clever scheming by his new partner, they didn’t even have to stage or publicize the murder themselves – their contacts in Comdot quietly worked the suggestion through the pipeline until it was accepted by the higher-ups as their own idea to put out fake bait for the missing leader of the Blacken Syndicate.
Of course, Da Sombras and the others weren’t entirely satisfied. Not only was the original Cille still a potential problem, but now Landon was shacking up with yet another troublesome woman. Gauron was sent down to talk some sense into Landon, and eventually he agreed that they should continue looking to rid themselves of both Cilles. In truth, though, he was in no hurry to see either of them killed; part of him couldn’t help feeling a little bit relieved that Cille had escaped, and her future counterpart was still potentially a valuable resource for the Syndicate. But she was also a threat to the Mexicanos, staying so close to Landon, so he resolved to gain as much of her knowledge of the future as he could, and then allow her to be offed. He convinced himself that it was a necessary sacrifice for the good of his goals, which he still saw as noble even as corrupted as they had become.
He would be the immortal hero of the people. As incompetent as they were on their own, he was the only one capable of leading them to a new and better society. And he would do it, even if he had to sacrifice a few of them along the way.
**********
“I want you to teach me what I need to know.”
Cougar looked up from his book, mildly startled to see that Cille had snuck up on him while he had been engrossed in his story. He had seen this coming, though, since Cille had become increasingly restless during their stay at the HOLY cabin. It had only been a few days, but he could tell that she wanted to be doing more than helping Scheris with the housework and going for walks in the woods. He couldn’t really blame her, either; while he had been enjoying the chance to relax and do some reading, there were times when he felt that things were going entirely too slow.
“What is it that you want to learn?” he asked, putting the book down.
“When we get back to the Syndicate I need to be able to help them… to actually do things – to be able to protect people, instead of being the one who always needs to be protected. I don’t want to be a n00b anymore.”
Cougar smiled at the hint of Actonian dialect. “You want to learn to fight, then.”
“Yes. And anything else you think I should know.”
“Mmm…” he thought for a moment, and then looked back up at her. “We’ll start tomorrow, then. There’s something I need to pick up for you. I hope you don’t mind waiting.”
She sighed. “I suppose I can hold out for another day. Urizane wanted some help out in the garden, anyway…”
The next morning Cougar was setting up watermelons along a stone wall when Cille came out of the cabin. Her hair was pulled back in a low ponytail, and she had traded the colorful outfits she had been borrowing from Scheris for a simple black tank top and pants. He couldn’t quite help raising an eyebrow and staring a little as she walked toward him.
“What?” she asked ingenuously.
“Hrm… eheheheh… well, I must say, Ms. Cillie, that outfit suits you quite well…” he said sheepishly.
“Oh,” she said, blushing a little. “It’s just something Scheris found for me. It is a lot better than those ridiculous clothes of hers with the random flaps all over the place…” she laughed.
As she came closer he noticed the marks of the wounds that were still healing on her bare arms. It had been a wise decision to put off the more physical parts of her training.
“I have something for you,” he said, going to the wall and picking up a handgun. “I know you lost the other gun I gave you when Ryuho arrested you, so I thought you should have this…”
He handed it to her, and a look of surprise came over her face.
“I’ve seen this gun before,” she said, inspecting it more closely. “It looks like…”
“It’s your father’s Mateba revolver,” he finished for her, just as she recognized the inscription on the handle. “I picked it up for you last night.”
“Where did you find it?” she asked.
“Your father sold it to his friend Eric Ominae years ago. It’s been in his personal collection ever since, on display in his shop.”
“You saw Eric?”
“No, actually… he wasn’t there at his shop. And I wasn’t able to get ahold of him, so I just kind of let myself in.” He grinned. “I’m sure he wouldn’t mind, knowing what it’s for.”
She looked down at the gun again, recognizing that this was to become her new weapon. She grasped it and raised it to look through the sight. It certainly fit into her hand much better than it had the last time she had held it.
After a brief lesson on stance and firing, Cille set up and took aim at one of the watermelons. Her first shot went wide, and the recoil would have sent her reeling backwards if Cougar hadn’t been there to steady her. The next shot shattered one of the stones in the wall, but the third blew the melon right off.
“Not bad, Ms. Cillie,” Cougar said, impressed that she’d gotten the hang of it so quickly.
“I used to be pretty good at this when I was a kid,” she said with a grin. “When my father taught Raef how to shoot, I made him teach me too. It’s been a while, though. So I really need the practice.”
A few hours later, when her muscles had gotten sore enough to quit shooting for the day, Cougar began instructing her on cleaning and maintaining the weapon. She watched closely as he demonstrated dismantling the gun, trying to keep up as he rattled off the name and purpose of each component. Fortunately he was much more patient when it was her turn to try taking it apart. She concentrated on it intently, and the silence was only broken when he had to correct her or explain something.
“So…” she said after a while, “you never did get around to telling me what happened to Landon. I don’t suppose you still feel like you can’t trust me…”
He smiled, remembering their earlier exchange about his old friend. “Heh… well, the truth is… we don’t know exactly where he is either. It’s been months since anybody has seen him, and we lost contact with him not long after he left. So I really couldn’t tell you, as much as I might want to.”
“I see,” she said, somewhat disappointed. “I suppose I should have expected as much.”
She went back to polishing gunmetal, looking thoughtful. “How did you know him?” she asked.
“We were classmates at the military academy, actually. That was… quite a while ago.” He laughed. “Landon was very charismatic, easy to get along with. As I’m sure you know very well.” She smiled a little in spite of herself. “When he started putting together the Syndicate, he looked me up again to see if I was interested in joining. That was while HOLY was still together… at the time I preferred to remain on my own side, but I admired his goals and told him I might be able to help him out from time to time. That’s pretty much how it’s been… although it looks like my involvement with the Syndicate may have become more permanent.”
“You’re leaving the military?”
“I may not have any choice. If Ozzal has any idea that I was the one who broke you out of Comdot, I’d probably be apprehended as soon as I walked back into the place. They may already have the Echelon out looking for us. And even if they don’t suspect me… I think I’ve got a more important mission out here.”
She looked up at him, and for a moment their eyes met. Then, not wanting to seem like she was reading too much into what he was saying, she went back to her polishing.
“I’m a little bit surprised the military didn’t reassign you after HOLY was broken up,” she said after a few moments. “I assume that’s why Scheris and the others left the military too?”
“Yes, essentially. Most of us went directly to HOLY after we finished at the academy, so we didn’t have any other units to go back to. You know, HOLY didn’t even exist before Ryuho and I founded it.”
“You founded HOLY?”
“Heh… well, it was Ryuho’s idea. He was one of my classmates too, and he thought that there should be a special unit for people with our powers. So between the two of us we were able to build up enough support to make it happen. Ryuho took over as commander, of course… the rest of us were happy enough just to have a place to call our own. Alter users aren’t always accepted by ‘normal’ society, you know.”
She frowned sympathetically. “And then Ozzal disbanded you.”
“Mm-hmm. When she came to power, she started restructuring the army and doing whatever she thought would solidify her rule. She saw the Alter users as a threat, especially since we operated as such a tight-knit and relatively independent group. So she forced us to break up. Some people, like Urizane and the others, simply left the military for good and came out here. Ryuho, as angry as he was, refused to be cast out or demoted, so he joined the Echelon. It’s no small irony that he’s now acting as a lapdog for the tyrant who snubbed him.”
“And that’s why he hates you… he sees you as a traitor for helping the Syndicate…”
“Yeah. At least that’s what I have to believe. I haven’t really spoken to him since he joined the Echelon. But he always was stubborn… and sometimes he lets his sense of authority get in the way of seeing what actual justice is.”
“Mmm.” Cille was slipping the last piece of the gun into place, and held it up for inspection.
“Not too shabby,” Cougar said, taking it to get a closer look. “Except… this is on here a little too tight… and somehow you’ve got this on backwards…”
Cille Kif sighed. “I guess I’d better try it again…”
The training montage continued for several days, with more target practice interspersed with hand-to-hand combat once Cougar felt that Cille was physically ready for it. Their friends occasionally watched the two of them from the sidelines, offering advice and encouragement (or in Urizane’s case, weeping over his splodeyed watermelons). Scheris in particular seemed to enjoy watching them, often with a playful and knowing smile dancing in her eyes, and at times drifting back to memories of someone she had once looked at the same way she saw Cille looking at Cougar.
At the moment, though, she was finding it hard not to bust up laughing at Cougar’s latest display, as he explained the next lesson to Cille at his usual frenetic pace:
“The secret to hand-to-hand fighting is always staying at least one step ahead of your opponent. Anticipating his next move, reacting before he even has a chance to act. You have to read his body language, watch his eyes, sense the way he shifts his weight on his feet. It’s rather like dancing, you know. Except you don’t wait for him to follow his lead. You create your own steps, in order to most effectively counteract the moves that he’s planning to make. Of course, if he doesn’t do what you expect him to do, you have to adapt quickly, and stay fluid enough to change your movements to match his. A wise man once said that you have to be like water. To catch a fish, you have to think like a fish. I forget who it was who said that. Maybe it was two different guys. But anyway, what’s important is to always stay on your toes. Grace, elegance, agility, strength, focus, that’s what it’s all about. You understand, don’t you, Ms. Cillie?”
The shellshocked look on the poor girl’s face was all the answer they needed. Scheris completely lost it, and fell over guffawing.
Cougar shot her an annoyed look, but seemed largely unfazed.
“Well, we’ll work on it… that’s what training is for, after all.”
**********
Two hundred seventy-two…
Two hundred seventy-three…
Two hundred seventy-five…
Two hundred seventy-fff…
Wait…
Aww, who the f**k cared… not like it mattered how many specks there were on the wall…
Elizabeth Saurie St. Gaurdsmen sat slumped against the wall in a cell in the Comdot prison, looking dazedly through half-closed eyes at the other side of the room.
She was so… f**king… bored…
She had counted the panels in the ceiling. She had played imaginary connect-the-dots with the chips in the walls. She had pretended to shoot anything in the joint that could serve as a target. She had done situps and one-handed pushups and stretching exercises and whatever else she could think of to try to stay in shape. She had tried vainly to catch sight of something – anything – through the tiny barred window near the top of the wall. She had gone through every bawdy drinking song she knew.
And still, here she was, with abso-f**king-lutely nothing to do.
She closed her eyes and let her thoughts drift again. How long had it been since she had been tossed in here? F**k all if she knew. And there sure wasn’t anybody else there who was telling her. She’d barely even spoken to anyone since a few days after her arrest, when she’d been hauled out of the cell to go talk to that ugly dude… what was his name… Goda, maybe?
Not having anything better to do, Elizabeth let herself go into flashback mode…
“I want you to tell me what you know… about Glass.”
“Glass? I don’t know anything about any damn glass. What in hell are you talking about?”
The scarred man smirked at her. “You were in the Gunsmoke branch of the Syndicate, were you not? And one of your associates, I believe, went by the name of John Sadar. Is that right?”
She glared at him. “What the hell does that matter?”
“Your association with this Sadar leads me to believe you know something about Glass. And I want to know what that something is. So you are going to tell me. Now.”
“I still don’t know what you’re talking about.”
The scarred man nodded, and the two Dars behind her tightened their grip on her arms. A tall, thin man in a pinstriped suit stepped forward, leering at Elizabeth, and smashed her across the face. It felt like his hand was made out of steel.
Goda held something out toward her. “Have you ever seen anyone wearing one of these?”
Elizabeth peered toward his outstretched hand, and as her vision cleared she made out a cross-shaped piece of glass. She shook her head. “No, I haven’t.”
Goda nodded again, and this time the metal hand went for the other side of Elizabeth’s face.
“Are you sure?” he asked, turning his back on her and pacing a few steps away.
It took Elizabeth a few moments to catch her breath again. “I told you I don’t know what the f**k you’re talking about. I’ve never seen one of those things, and I don’t know anybody named Glass. And if you’ve got some problem with the things you drink your liquor out of, then I don’t really give a flying f**k.”
He was silent for a few moments, and then he looked down with a small chuckle.
“All right then,” he said, “I suppose that’ll be all for now. If I need anything more I’ll call on you again.”
And so back into the cell she went. Back to counting spots on the wall, back to wishing her shoulder would stop throbbing, back to wondering if anyone would remember to come after her, or even realized she was there.
The one bright spot in her incarceration had been occasional visits from a teenage girl, who came with something to eat or drink or just to see how Elizabeth was doing. She was soft-spoken, but had a kind smile and bright eyes. Elizabeth had to wonder what someone like her was doing in a dingy craphole like this.
On one of her visits the girl had brought a basin of water and a bag of first-aid supplies. She patiently cleaned and dressed Elizabeth’s wounds, much to the imprisoned woman’s relief.
“So hey… how’d a nice girl like you get stuck taking care of trash like me?” she said with a wryly amused smile.
“It’s just… something I like to do,” the girl answered simply. “It keeps me busy… and I like helping people whenever I can.”
“That’s awful gracious of you,” Elizabeth said, looking down appreciatively at the clean bandages the girl was wrapping around her arm.
She was silent again, and Elizabeth watched her placid face for a few moments. “Say… you know who I am, don’t you? And why I’m here?” Elizabeth continued.
“Yes, I know who you are. I remember you from the last time you were here. You came to rescue someone… someone I care about,” the girl said.
“Rescue someone… you mean Raef? You know him?”
The girl nodded. “I came to know him while he was imprisoned here. And we…” She caught herself and began blushing. “I was glad to see him get out of this place, even if it meant that I couldn’t see him as much. So I’m grateful to you and your friends, who came after him. Otherwise I don’t know what my – what might have happened to him.”
“Do you know where he is now?” Elizabeth asked. “We haven’t seen him since we got him out.”
The girl nodded again. “I still see him… he’s staying nearby the estate. I can’t tell you too much, though… he says he’s through with fighting, if he can help it.”
Elizabeth nodded, a little sadly. Raef had been a worthy comrade, despite his age and relative inexperience. She remembered when he had first come to the Syndicate, demanding to see Landon. She never knew just what transpired between them, but she and the others guessed that he was angry at Landon for leaving him and his adoptive mother. The two of them seemed to come to terms, though, although the boy never seemed to really trust their leader. In a way she wasn’t surprised that he had chosen to break away from the group, but she was sorry that his determination and potential had given way to disillusionment.
The girl put the finishing touches on Elizabeth’s bandages, and began gathering the first-aid supplies into her bag.
“Hey… what’s your name?” Elizabeth asked.
“Starry,” she said, standing up to go.
“Nice to meet you. Give Raef my regards,” Elizabeth said with a grin.
“I will.”
“And thank you… I really appreciate this.”
The girl simply smiled, and left the cell.
That was the last time Elizabeth saw her. The next day some sort of explosion hit the estate, and since then the girl hadn’t come back. Elizabeth could only wonder what had become of her new friend, and hope that she and Raef were doing all right…
“F**kety f**king f**k…” she mumbled. All of this flashback crap wasn’t making her feel any less bored. She took a deep breath and tried to stretch out, slumping even further down on the wall, when she noticed something sitting on the floor in front of her. She didn’t remember anything having been there before. It looked like… a black cat. She just looked at it sluggishly, wondering idly how long it had been there and how she had managed not to notice it wandering in.
“Well good afternoon.”
Annnnnd… now the cat was talking to her. Great.
She just sort of stared for a few more moments, trying to decide if she had finally gone off the deep end, or if there was a man in the cell talking to her, or if that voice really had come from that cat.
“You can come to your senses any time, you know.”
No, that was… that was definitely the cat.
“What the hell do you want?”
The cat almost seemed to smile at her bluntness. “Kisuke sent me to spring you out of here.”
“Kisuke?” Elizabeth didn’t recognize the name.
“Oh, that’s right… you’re not actually with his group. Ah well, just consider me a friend of a friend of a friend.”
The cat peered out of the cell into the dingy hallway beyond, where a lone guard sat dozing off. He had been posted there since that explosion or whatever it was that had rocked the prison quarters a few weeks before. He was obviously just as bored with the whole setup as Elizabeth was, and since she hadn’t offered him any trouble he barely paid attention to her.
The cat slipped through the cell bars into the hallway and sauntered up to the snoozing guard. He rubbed up against the man’s legs, purring and meowing invitingly. The man gradually came out of his stupor, blinking and snorting, and looked down to see the stray animal staring up at him with what seemed like a friendly smile.
“Hey, kitty… how’d you get in here?” he drawled, reaching down to pet the cat. “Kitty” purred appreciatively and arched his back, and then ambled a few steps away and turned to look back at the guard.
And then all of a sudden he disappeared, and there in his place stood a naked woman.
Elizabeth raised her eyebrows and let out a low whistle. She’d certainly never seen a trick like that before. Not only that, but she had to admit that this chick was pretty damn hawt.
Elizabeth wasn’t the only one who was impressed. The guard immediately developed a gushing nosebleed and fell over backwards, knocked out cold. The woman stood looking at him with a hand on one hip.
“Men… such predictable creatures, aren’t they?” she said, winking at Elizabeth.
She knelt next to the guard and felt around in his pockets, finally coming up with a jangling set of keys.
“So… you got a name, sister? Or should I just call you Kitty?” Elizabeth asked, standing up.
The woman smiled as she came to unlock the cell door. “Yoruichi’s the name.”
“Pleased to meet you.”
Yoruichi finished with the lock and slid the door open. “Let’s go.”
They took off through the hallways, looking for the nearest exit. Every once in a while they would come across another guard or two, but without fail the men were incapacitated at the sight of the naked babe coming toward them. The two women ran on, laughing their heads off at the men dropping around them. It seemed that they were finally nearing a way out, when they suddenly met a girl coming around a corner toward them and came to a halt. It was Starry.
The girl’s eyes widened at the sight of the naked woman standing next to Elizabeth, but she kept her composure remarkably well. She looked back and forth between the two women, clearly understanding what was going on.
“Hey,” Elizabeth said, sounding assured despite the uncertainty of what the girl would do.
Starry’s expression softened, and she pointed down the corridor behind her. “That way and up the stairs to your right… there’s a door to the courtyard. From there you can climb the vines to get over the wall.”
Yoruichi looked at Elizabeth, who nodded her approval, and then started down the hallway.
Elizabeth turned back to Starry with an appreciative look. “Thanks. And good luck with that boy of yours,” she said, and then took off running after Yoruichi.
The two of them found themselves in a large open space in what must have been the rear of the estate. The outer wall loomed in front of them, covered with vines.
“What now?” Elizabeth asked. “You’re not exactly dressed for wall-climbing…”
“Well, probably the easiest way to do it…” Yoruichi looked at Elizabeth. “How would you feel about a piggy-back ride?”
Elizabeth raised an eyebrow. “I’m up for anything,” she said with a saucy grin.
“My kind of woman.” Yoruichi returned the grin, and then she hoisted Elizabeth onto her back.
“Hold on tight,” she called, and they were off in a flash. Elizabeth could hardly tell what was happening. They seemed to disappear and reappear, and then they were soaring above the city, landing on rooftops only to flit away again. Far below they could see the occasional shocked onlooker, no doubt wondering if they were really seeing a naked chick flying over their heads.
“So, where to?” Yoruichi called.
“Well… I don’t know if there’s still anyone left at Gunsmoke, but I might as well stop by and see what the place looks like. I need to find out what’s been going on while I’ve been out of it…”
“You got it,” Yoruichi answered, and away they went.
**********
Larry Zorin sat in a pizzeria, munching on a slice of plain cheese pizza and thinking about how his life kind of sucked.
It had gotten better, certainly, since he had finally gotten away from that hellish lab and its psychotic inhabitants. He didn’t have to worry about being fondled by tentacles or shot with lazor cannons or gnawed on by whatever the hell Amy was. And since he had been staying with his friend Raef, it almost seemed like he was back to living a normal life.
It was kind of… boring.
He’d been gone for weeks now, and nobody had come after him. He had even been wearing his Comdot ID badge on his jacket for everyone to see. But nobody seemed to care who he was or what he knew. Didn’t they realize that he had been privy to all of the secrets of Ozzal’s covert scientific experiments? That he could expose all of the corruption in Actonia’s government if he wanted to? But no… he was just a nothing to them, a pathetic loser who wasn’t worth bothering with.
He looked down at his toppingless pizza and sighed. Once upon a time he would have gladly ordered it with pepperoni or sausage, but for some reason he could never bring himself to go near those things since he started working for Professor Matrix. The only thing that seemed safe anymore was regular old cheese pizza. It seemed so plain, just like his life.
“Maybe Raef is right…” he mumbled to himself. “Maybe I should just give up pretending to be badass and admit that I’m a total failure…”
All he had ever wanted was to be a scientist. He had always loved playing with new gadgets and designing his own experiments and learning as much as he could about the world around him. In college, when other guys were out drinking and trying to pick up chicks, he was studying and building models of robots. Where they had posters of star athletes and bikini-clad babes draped across hot rods, he had Bill Nye the Science Guy and a map of Middle Earth. He was a nerd through and through, and it made him happy. At least it used to, before he had been abducted into that nightmarish world where science was a perversion and experiments were done for the benefit of power-hungry villains.
He put down the unfinished slice of pizza and began absentmindedly poking it with his finger, thinking again of what Raef had said to him when they had first met up again. “If you really want to help the Syndicate…” At the time he had dismissed the idea, which he considered just a random speculation to begin with. What would make him think that someone like him belonged in the Syndicate? But the more he imagined it, and the more it became clear that he was never going to amount to anything just sitting around hoping someone from Comdot would notice that he was gone, the more he thought that maybe, just maybe, this might be a way he could make something of his life. If he could help the Syndicate in their fight for justice and freedom, maybe he could prove to them all that he was a somebody.
Maybe he could be badass after all.
**********
The leaders of the two most powerful branches of the Order of Glass were on the phone.
“What is the status of your preparations for instigating the Actonia-Comedia war?” Schwarzwald asked.
“Nearly all of our safeguards have been put in place,” Dr. Girlfriend replied. “We should be ready to move shortly. When we get your go-ahead, of course.”
“I think… we should stand down the operation,” Schwarzwald said bluntly.
“What? Why?”
“The Syndicate has not begun moving as we had anticipated. In fact, there’s barely been any response to Lucille Compton’s death at all.”
“Didn’t Blaken come out of hiding as expected?”
“Yes. And apparently he’s taken control of the Syndicate again. But there has been no order to move against Ozzal. We can’t tell what his plans or motives are. It’s very peculiar.”
“And so you think it would be too soon to provoke war.”
“Without decisive action on the part of the Syndicate, war between Actonia and Comedia would be meaningless. It would be on our heads to come forward and take full responsibility for the conflict. And this isn’t the time for that.”
“You’re still resolved to see Ozzal overthrown?”
“Yes. But if it can come about through the will of the people, we should allow them to take action themselves. We simply need more time to see what will become of the Syndicate and what Blaken has in mind for it. What we took to be disorder may simply be their efforts to regroup.”
“All right. I’ll put my people back on standby. But we’ll continue monitoring the situation from here.”
“There’s something else. Iron has struck again.”
“What was it this time?”
“A mole inside our organization. He tried to take out a new recruit, but fortunately we got to him first.”
The voice on the other end of the phone sighed. “You have to be careful, Schwarzwald. The integrity of our organization depends on the integrity of our members.”
“I know that. And we’ll be doing everything we can to prevent something like this happening again. But unfortunately we can’t help a certain amount of vulnerability in opening our organization to new members, which is a necessity right now.”
“Just be careful. And keep me updated if anything more happens.”
“Of course. That is all for now.”
“Goodbye then.”
Schwarzwald hung up the phone, and leaned back in his chair and rubbed his eyes. He and his comrades had a lot to deal with right now, but at least he had been able to stop this war before it started. Actonia – and the Order of Glass – had enough trouble brewing without causing any more conflict.
**********
It had been quite a while since Dewey Novak had seen his boss so agitated. At least over something that didn’t involve taquitos or reality television.
“What in hell is going on around here?” she was bellowing, as he followed her through the halls of Comdot Estate. “I turn around for five seconds, and this entire country goes to hell! Goda and the Echelon were supposed to take care of the Syndicate once and for all, and you and Taredan were supposed to whip up support for me among the people. And what have we got now? The Syndicate is still on the loose, the people are blaming me for their own riots, Taredan is telling us off, and now I’ve got these fools trying to tell me that they’re pulling my strings and I’m just some sort of pawn. I mean gawd! Who the hell do they think I am?” She stopped for a moment, vaguely feeling like she had heard that phrase somewhere before, and then continued her tirade. “I’m Head Governor Ozzal, bitches! I own this country! I didn’t spend all those years clawing my way to the top just to be yanked around by some shady-ass hoodlums who think they’re smarter than me! I call the shots around here! Goda be damned! It’s my way or the highway! Rawwwr!”
Dewey sighed. “I can understand your frustration, Madam Governor. But perhaps your energy would be better put to use finding a way to rectify the situation rather than venting about it.”
“Oh, I’ll rectify the situation. I’ll rectify it so hard, Goda’s fugly head’ll explode.”
“You might also be more discreet about expressing such sentiments,” Dewey said wearily. “It should be clear by now that you can’t trust everyone who might be listening in here.”
“Hrmph. At least I know I can trust you. At least I’ve got SOMEone here who isn’t waiting to stab me in the back.” This, fortunately for Ozzal, was true enough. Dewey had risen with her through the ranks of the military, and she had no reason to question his loyalty. She also knew that she had the support of the military at large, should she need to lay down some smack. Which, given the fact that she could no longer rely on Goda’s Echelon, was a distinct possibility.
The two of them reached Ozzal’s office. “Shut the door,” she commanded. Dewey obliged, and Ozzal turned to him with a newly determined glare.
“Okay. Here’s what we’re going to do. Get me on a conference call to the Comedian senate. I want Georgie, Killface, Phantom Limb, Johnny Law and I. A. Coaster on the line. Call them out of their senate session if you have to. It’s time we stop talking about taking over the world and actually freaking do it.”
Less than an hour later, the five Comedian senators had been assembled. Not all of them were especially happy to be there, judging by the smileyindifferents they were giving Ozzal over the monitor.
“This had better be bloody important, Ozzal,” Killface snapped.
“You can go back to fixating on your billionaire playboy later,” Ozzal shot back. Killface narrowed his eyes and glowered. “Right now we’ve got some actual nefarious deeds to discuss.”
“I’m sure you recall our earlier conversations about the potential for a… transaction involving our two countries,” she continued. “At the time you were all quite interested, and I want to know if that’s still the case. If so, I believe it’s time to move our deliberations forward.”
The Comedians exchanged glances.
“You’re really serious about this, Ozzal?” Law asked. “It’s been a while since we’ve heard from you. We assumed you’d dropped the idea when you started having so much trouble with the Blacken Syndicate.”
“I’m not having any trouble with the Syndicate. Things are quite under control here,” Ozzal retorted, a slight edge in her voice belying her self-assured manner. “I simply don’t see any reason to keep dragging our feet on this. If – and I mean IF – there’s going to be any trouble with rebel factions here, it will be to our mutual benefit to have our plan well in motion before they can cause any real commotion.”
“So let me get this straight,” Georgie said. “You want us to take over your country, and add it to our territory. From an acquisitional standpoint, this seems advantageous for our economic situation and political standing… but what’s in it for you?”
“For Actonia, it means access to your resources. You’re wealthier than we are, and you know it.” It might have occurred to the others that the primary reason Actonia was in worse shape was that Ozzal had been running it into the ground for a year, but none of them were going to say so to her face. “For me personally?” She grinned. “I expect a suitably high position can be found for me in the new national government.”
The senators looked at each other again. They might not be especially fond of Ozzal, but they could see where she was coming from.
“Then how do you propose we proceed?” Phantom Limb asked. “I don’t suppose you’ve thought through an actual strategy for your little pipe dream…”
“As a matter of fact, I have.” Ozzal crossed her arms and tried to keep her eyebrow from twitching. Yet another idiot who underestimated her… “You can push a motion through the senate to invade Actonia. Like you’re taking advantage of the political turmoil over here to expand your territory. Then there will be nothing left for me and my embattled army to do but surrender to avoid more warfare. For the good of my people.” She smirked at the irony of the thought. “That’ll work, right?” she said, turning to Dewey.
“The people of Actonia won’t be happy about it,” Dewey replied. “But they won’t be happy about this no matter how you go about it. We’ll just have to convince them that this is in their own best interests. That you’re planning to take advantage of Comedia’s resources to restore Actonia’s infrastructure. At any rate, with reinforcements from Comedia’s army, there won’t be much the people can do about it.”
“There, then.” Ozzal turned back to the monitor. “If you gentlemen can come up with anything better, I’ll be happy to hear it. I want nothing more than for this to be beneficial for both of us.”
“It will of course take some time for us to deliberate on your offer,” Phantom Limb said. “But I think I can safely say that it is something worth considering.”
Georgie nodded. “It would be a great asset to Comedia to expand our hold on the region.”
“Not to mention a boost to our national pride to have our people believe we conquered Actonia,” added Coaster.
“All right, we’ll discuss it,” Killface said somewhat irritably. “We’ll get back to you when we have our answer.”
“Very well. I look forward to working with you,” Ozzal said with a smile.
The transmission was terminated, and Ozzal and Dewey were left alone again. Ozzal’s face was smug and defiant.
“I don’t know who you bastards are…” she said quietly and intently, “but you’re about to learn that Michelle Ozzal is nobody’s pawn.”
**********
Samson rolled over in his bed and looked to his nightstand.
2:30am.
He had been awake for two hours, and still couldn’t fall asleep. He rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling. Sighing, he raised his hand above him and clenched it into a fist. “Why can’t I get that traitor off my mind?”
Moonlight shone through his window on newspapers, pictures, and reports that were strewn about his room all over the floor, and on his computer in the corner of the room. The titles and headlines read like something out of a political thriller: “Mysterious organization linked with coup.” “Glass cross found at scene of assassination attempt.” “Agents vanish overnight.”
Samson turned his head and looked out the window. He could see the skyline of the tall buildings downtown. “Somewhere…” he whispered, “he’s out there somewhere.”
He couldn’t let this run his life anymore. The uncertainty, the questions, the doubts gnawing away at his conscience… it all had to end. And there was only one man who could answer those questions, and only one person he could rely on to find that man – himself. Hikki and Clarice didn’t understand, and for all he knew Jake had already turned against them too. This was his quest, and it was his responsibility to see it through. Tonight, if Samson had anything to say about it, the man who called himself Sadar would answer for his betrayal.
Samson got up out of bed and walked to his closet. He silently went through the motions of getting dressed, barely conscious of what he was putting on. When all that was left of his suit was the jacket, he straightened his dark purple tie and sat on his bed. Reaching underneath him, he pulled out a rather heavy shoebox. Inside were the tools he believed he would need for this task: a holster to go underneath his coat, and a pistol.
He loaded the weapon and inspected it. He almost never carried a gun, and he didn’t really like the idea of having to use it. But in his mind he would need whatever defense he could get against the untrustworthy priest. If he was unarmed and Sadar attacked him, it would be all over for him in an instant.
He holstered the gun under his arm and put his coat on. As he walked past the mirror on the wall, he looked away. He hadn’t cared at all about his appearance these past several days, and he didn’t want to know what he looked like as he set out on this grim mission.
He slowly walked down the hallway, trying to be as silent as possible so he wouldn’t wake anyone in the rooms around him. From Hikki’s room he could hear a sleepily muttered stream of meaningless French. As he walked past Clarice’s room, he felt a pang of guilt, and quickened his pace a little. But when he came to Anne’s room, he stopped and stared at the closed door. Finally he stood up straight and slowly opened the door, to get what in his mind might be the last look he would get of his beloved sister. He watched her for a while as she silently slept. He thought of the things he might have to do out there, that she had absolutely no idea about. The two of them had been through a lot. Whenever he was desperate somehow this little girl managed to pull him out of it. But now he was on his own.
He quietly closed the door, continued down the stairs to the front room, and picked his way through the rubble that had once been the front entrance to the cafe. He didn’t know exactly where he was going, but he knew his search had to begin now.
Samson walked down the dark streets of the city, turning his head to look in every alley he passed. He had been searching for what felt like hours, and it seemed that as time went on it was getting colder outside. As determined as he was to find Sadar, he had quickly realized that he had no idea where the man might actually be. The only lead he had was Warehouse 13, but when he arrived there he didn’t find a soul.
The sun was just coming up as Samson found himself walking through the park. The cold autumn air seemed to bite him as he walked down a stone path leading through a small group of trees whose leaves had begun to turn orange. This section of the park had fortunately escaped being torched, but Samson could still smell the burnt wood wafting through the air. It was almost like the smell of a fireplace on a cold day. He smiled as it reminded him of happier times with his sister, but he couldn’t allow himself to be distracted when he had to stay focused on his goal. He had to find Sadar, but after searching nearly the entire area he was beginning to think that it was impossible.
His mind started running through possible scenarios. Finding such a secretive organization was going to take more planning and work. The Syndicate had a few safe houses, so surely the Order of Glass must have a few of its own. Perhaps he could find an Order safe house by following someone with a cross around his neck… “No, no,” he thought. “Now I’m just thinking like an idiot… I’m so damn tired…” He ran a hand through his hair. “I just want to finish this once and for all. I’m so tired of this.”
“You’re out quite early. You must be looking for something important.”
Samson quickly turned around to see Sadar standing on the path behind him, with a smile on his face and his hands clasped behind his back. Samson froze, startled that he hadn’t noticed the man coming up behind him.
“Yeah… you might say that,” he said finally, eyeing the priest warily.
“Is it anything I can help you with?” Sadar asked genially.
“Actually…” Samson was beginning to regain his composure. “I’ve been out looking for you.”
“That’s funny, because I was just thinking about you,” Sadar laughed. “How fortuitous that we would come upon each other like this.”
“You wanted to see me? Why?” Samson’s face was coldly serious.
“Well, you’re awfully different from the last time I saw you…”
“Things change.”
“That they do, that they do.” Sadar nodded, looking a little introspective.
“Are you going to tell me what you want with me?”
“Well, I could ask you the same thing.” Sadar smiled. “But I don’t mind going first. I heard about what happened to you and your friends a little while ago. I wanted to make sure you were all right, and perhaps see if you would like to join our Order. You never answered that invitation I gave you.”
Samson shoved his hands in his pockets, and his fingers brushed against the glass cross Sadar had given him. “And just why would I want to join your ‘Order’?”
“Well, I know you’re very aware of how dangerous your situation has gotten lately, especially after what happened to you during that crackdown. And now that your sister Anne is with you, you have even more to worry about. She would be much safer if you were with the Order. The Order is neutral, so we don’t attract too much attention to ourselves… which helps keep our members, and our families, safe.”
“So you just sit back and pull strings from the shadows…”
Sadar smiled. “In a way, yes.”
Samson clenched his teeth. “So I guess it’s to be expected that you would run at the first sign of a real fight.”
Sadar furrowed his brow. “What?”
“You gave me that cross before you left. And after you left everything fell apart. You knew what was going to happen, didn’t you?”
The priest took a deep breath. So this was what had been bothering Samson.
“We anticipated that the military would make a move against the Syndicate. We had no way of knowing just how extensive it would be, but… yes, we saw it coming.”
“And instead of staying to help us, you ran away. You abandoned the people who trusted you and needed your support! For all we know, you wanted them to kill us all!”
“That’s not true, Samson. We don’t want to see anyone get killed.” Sadar sighed. “In the Order of Glass we live by the saying ‘No connections, no regrets.’ And so as much as I liked and respected you and your cause, when the orders came down, I had no choice but to retreat.”
“Is that what you do? Just listen to orders and back out on your friends? Were we even friends?!”
Sadar raised his hands defensively. “I would have been happy to consider you a friend, Samson. And sometimes I wish it could have turned out a different way. But the work that we do dictates that we stay as neutral as possible, and avoid getting too close to anyone we work with. My associates and I were already pushing it enough by staying involved with the Gunsmoke Syndicate branch for as long as we did. So any ties that we were imprudent enough to make had to be broken.”
“And that’s what you want me to do too, isn’t it.” Samson narrowed his eyes. “You expect me to leave everyone I care about, betray the Syndicate, just to join you?”
“Don’t think of it as a betrayal. Think of it as another way in which you can help your friends.”
“You mean help them the way you helped us when we were all getting arrested? When people were getting killed? Do you realize how many people we lost because you and your little pals were just sitting around watching instead of helping us fight?”
Sadar was silent for a moment. This tirade sounded very familiar… “That’s not something I’m happy about, or something I’m proud of. But in conflicts such as this, there are necessary sacrifices and people who are going to be lost. If you can’t come to terms with that, you might as well give up right now.”
“Yeah, well I’m not going to sacrifice my friends. And I’ll be damned if I’m going to give up and run away when they need me. You can act all high and mighty if you want to, and pretend like none of this affects you, but I have people I care about, and I’m staying right there with them, even if it gets me killed.”
He fished around in his pocket and pulled out the glass cross. “Here,” he said sharply, holding the cross out. “You can have this back. I don’t want it.”
Sadar took the cross from him somberly. “I had hoped that having you come to the Order would keep you safe, would help you avoid what you went through with the Echelon. But if that is how you feel, if you’re that sure that staying with the Syndicate is worth it, then you must follow what you believe in. I’m only sorry that we couldn’t leave this on better terms. You were a good man to work with.”
“And I’m sorry you turned out not to be the kind of man I thought you were. Have fun staying safe in your little glass tower. Maybe I’ll see you in hell.”
And with that, he turned and angrily strode away. Sadar watched him go, wishing that he could find something more to say, but knowing that nothing he could say would make any difference.
Samson walked back toward the cafe, feeling no more settled than when he had left, and even more mentally and physically exhausted. “That bastard,” he fumed. “I can’t believe he would ask me something like that after what he’s done. I knew I couldn’t trust him. He’s probably lying about everything. I’m going to have to work even harder to prove it.”
He walked in through the front door of the cafe to find Clarice sitting at a table near the corner, talking to someone on her cell phone. Samson went to the counter to get himself some coffee, overhearing her conversation.
“Yeah, I guess he just turned out to be really good at getting scoops. But he can’t publish everything he finds out, since Ozzal has to approve everything that goes into the Review. So he passes on the rest of it to that detective.” She paused and listened. “I know, it doesn’t seem like much. But that’s what she found out.” Pause. “I don’t know, maybe she just wanted to seduce the guy.” Pause. “Yeah, okay. Thanks, Cowboy.”
She hung up as Samson finished pouring his coffee. When he turned around, he saw her looking at her watch.
“It’s seven in the morning, Samson. Where have you been out to so early?”
“What do you care?” Samson snapped. “I haven’t been gone long.”
Clarice looked taken aback. “Sam, you’ve been gone since at least three am,” she said quietly. “I got up to go to the bathroom and your door was open and you weren’t inside.”
Samson looked away sullenly. “It’s nothing you have to worry about,” he said, not feeling like fighting about it. “Just leave me alone. I have work to do.”
She watched him go as he skulked up the stairs toward his room. She knew it was pointless to argue with him, but she wished there were some way she could help him find whatever it was he was looking for.
**********
Future Cille lay facing the wall on her makeshift bed in the hideout she shared with Landon. She had barely gotten any sleep after returning the previous night. She had almost considered just running away, but after wrestling with her thoughts for a couple of hours she decided that she couldn’t risk breaking away from him just yet. And so she put on her best poker face, and came back to report to him that the errand she had been on had taken her a little longer than she had anticipated. Fortunately he had seemed too preoccupied with the papers he was looking at to be concerned with the details of her mission, and she had retired to a sleepless night alone with her thoughts.
She took a deep breath and stretched out, rolling onto her back and looking up at the ceiling.
“Ah, you’re awake,” a voice said.
She looked sleepily over to see Landon putting on a coat.
“You’re going out?” she asked.
“I’ve got some things to take care of. I probably won’t be back until tonight.”
“All right. Is there anything you’d like me to do today?”
“Not especially. If you want to you can keep tabs on the news. I heard something about explosions near the park yesterday; you could look into that. Just make sure you don’t attract any attention if you go out.”
“Of course.” She had kept an extremely low profile since the report of her alter ego’s death had been published.
Landon headed out the door, leaving her alone again. She felt a certain sense of relief. As skilled as she had become at acting, she couldn’t help feeling a certain amount of apprehension over deceiving someone she had been so close to.
“Well…” she murmured to herself, “they didn’t call me DangerCille for nothing.”
A short time later she left the building, wearing a long black coat and black sunglasses. She walked past the park, taking stock of the burn damage and the wreckage of the surrounding buildings. There seemed to be a trail of destruction leading away from (or perhaps originally to) the park. She tracked it until she came upon what appeared to be its source – the storefront of what had been Luna’s cafe.
“Well then…” she said under her breath.
She stopped to pick up a newspaper from a vending machine on the corner of the block where the cafe was located. She scanned over the headlines on the front page, and then found the story about the explosions on the third page. Interestingly enough, the article didn’t mention who was responsible for the damage, and instead focused on the response from Comdot promising immediate attention and rehabilitation for the area.
Holding the opened newspaper in front of her, she sauntered down the sidewalk in the direction of the cafe. She sat down on a bench a short distance away, where she would have a clear view of the cafe across the street. Pretending to be very interested in some article on the top of the page, she inspected the building and the surrounding rubble. Judging from the way the debris was scattered, the initial explosion had come from inside the building, and then the source of the explosions must have continued on down the street toward the park.
She could see several people inside the cafe, presumably taking stock of the damage and discussing what to do about it. There was a cop car parked nearby, so obviously the event hadn’t escaped the attention of the authorities, despite the cavalier tone of the newspaper report.
A few minutes later two men came out of the cafe and headed toward her. Must be they were the cops who belonged to the car. DangerCille raised the newspaper back up in front of her face. As the voices came closer, she started to be able to make out what they were saying.
“Like hell they don’t know what happened. Gimme another croissant.”
“They did say they weren’t interested in pressing charges. So as far as the law is concerned, our work here is done. Not that you were doing any actual work…”
“Hey, I just wanted to see if that nice insurance girl could tell us anything. It’s just a coincidence that I happened to also get her number.”
“You’re lucky you didn’t get your head chewed off by her partner. She was shooting daggers at you the whole time.”
“Like I’ve ever let that stop me before.” There was a pause. “You know, I can’t help but feel like I’ve seen that kind of damage before.”
“You mean in that weapons shop that got blown a couple of weeks ago? You think this could be the same perp?”
“No… I mean in my office.”
A couple of car doors slammed, and a few moments later the car drove away.
DangerCille peered over the top of her newspaper. It looked like the coast was clear. She stood up, folded the paper under her arm, and started walking away from the cafe.
If Landon really considered her an adversary, then it was entirely possible that he was having her tailed. And she couldn’t afford for him to know about the meeting she was about to have. Fortunately, she knew every back alley and secret passageway in this city. Now she just had to hope that the one she needed actually existed in this time.
It took her several minutes to reach her destination, especially after adding a few detours as an extra precaution. Finally she came upon it: an old storage shed that seemed to have been forgotten by the previous owner, who had left it mostly filled with junk. She carefully worked her way through the piles of clutter until she came upon a clear space with a throw rug covering the worn floorboards.
If she was right, then Luna’s tunnel should still be here, leading into the basement of the cafe…
Beneath the rug she found what she was looking for, and the trap door yielded much more easily than the last time she had used it. She climbed down the ladder and made her way through the dark and narrow corridor, finally coming to what appeared to be a dead end. She felt along the edge of the wall until her fingers lit on a small indentation, and then a chunk of the wall sprang open in front of her.
“Hot damn.”
She eased herself through the hole into what indeed appeared to be the cafe basement. She smiled to herself, as it occurred to her that it would be a little while yet before anybody in this time would learn of her old friend’s smuggling operation.
There didn’t seem to be anyone around, which wasn’t surprising given the commotion upstairs. Cautiously and quietly she crept up the stairs and into the kitchen, which was also empty and thankfully unscathed aside from a layer of dust. She didn’t have to wait very long before Hikki came bustling into the room, wiping his hands on his apron. He froze when he saw her, and she gave him an amused smile.
“Hey. Can I get a blueberry muffin and some tea?”
“You… is it…” he stammered, not quite sure if he believed who was standing in front of him.
She took off her sunglasses and smiled at him slyly.
“Oh…” he murmured.
Just then Samson and Clarice walked through the door behind him, and were similarly taken aback at the sight of their visitor. She seemed pleased to see them.
“You guys got a minute? It’s important,” she said.
A few minutes later the four of them had congregated around a table in a back room.
“Is Eric here?” DangerCille asked. “He should hear this too…”
The others looked at each other, slightly dumbfounded. None of them had paid much attention to their guest since Jake had brought him to the cafe.
“Um… come to think of it… I did see him leave a few days ago,” Clarice finally remembered. “He said something about going out on a mission. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but I don’t think he’s been back since.”
“I see,” their visitor said. “Then I guess it’ll have to be just you three.”
“So you’re… you’re really who Landon said you were? You’re really Cille… FROM THE FUTURE!?” Samson asked.
Hikki and Clarice looked at him, wondering if he’d finally lost it. Their visitor laughed.
“I know it must be hard for you to think of me as your friend Cille,” she said. “I’d almost forgotten how much I’ve changed since you knew me.” For a moment she let her mind wander to memories of her past self. “If it makes it easier for you, you can call me DangerCille. I’m more used to that, anyway – that’s what everyone started calling me during the war after I turned badass.”
“So what exactly happened during this war?” Samson asked. “Landon hasn’t really told us anything about it.”
“That… would be kind of a long story,” DangerCille said with a wry smile. “Ultimately, though, Ozzal succeeded in taking over much of the world, and making most of its people miserable.”
“Yeah, that’s the part we know,” Samson said. “But how exactly did it happen? For someone who was supposedly going to be the key to our victory over Ozzal, you really haven’t told us anything about the future.”
“You’re right, we haven’t told you very much,” DangerCille replied. “For some reason after that first meeting we had, Landon decided that it would be better if I stayed out of sight, and he would pass my knowledge on to the rest of the group. I… presume he really hasn’t done that?”
“Not at all,” Clarice said. “All he’s done is pass down a few orders. We haven’t even seen him in person since that meeting.”
Samson frowned. Maybe he had been right to be skeptical of Landon.
“Hmm.” DangerCille looked thoughtful. “Well… I guess I have quite a bit of ground to cover,” she said. “But the first thing I have to tell you is… I’m sorry.”
“Sorry? For what could you be sorry?” Hikki asked. “You came here to help us, no?”
“There’s a lot that you don’t know… about the future, about me… and about Landon,” she said evenly. “I came back to help you, yes… but it’s because I made a terrible mistake that cost us everything. It’s… my fault that the Syndicate failed.”
“What do you mean?” Hikki asked.
She took a deep breath and sighed. “In my past, at a time a little bit before where we are now, Landon came back to lead the rebellion. I had only recently come to the Syndicate, after hearing that Landon had been captured and Raef had been kidnapped. You know how that happened, and how it turned out – Landon’s capture was a ruse, and Raef was successfully rescued.”
The others nodded.
“But in my time, Landon made himself known shortly after your rescue mission in Comdot. And he and I… well, as you know, we were engaged at one time… and we became involved again. I became what you might call his second-in-command, despite the fact that I was pretty much a total n00b.” She shook her head and smiled wryly at her own folly. “I was so determined to make a difference and live up to what I thought he expected of me, that I started taking on way more than I could handle. I wanted to know everything about the Syndicate, and I made sure I had a hand in every decision that we made. Landon was so brilliant, and we all looked up to him as our hero. And I wanted so badly to be his match. But what I saw as the desire to help my comrades was really just hubris… and that was what brought us all down.”
“What happened?” Clarice asked gently.
“Under Landon’s leadership, we started working against Ozzal more boldly, which of course got her attention again. She started looking for ways to eliminate the Syndicate, but Landon was too smart for her. And then, the night before we were going to mount a huge offensive, I was captured by Ozzal’s men and imprisoned in Comdot.” She paused and looked down. “They tortured me… and I totally cracked. I told them everything they wanted to know. And so the next evening when the Syndicate was assembled to prepare for their mission, the Echelon and Ozzal’s military police knew exactly where to find them.”
She paused, and the others exchanged worried looks.
“Many of my comrades died that night… including Landon,” DangerCille finally confessed. “Some of them got out alive, but too many of them didn’t. And without a strong leader… without Landon, the Syndicate was hopeless. The rest of us tried to regroup, but we just didn’t know what to do. I even tried to take the lead again, to get the group back on track, but I just couldn’t handle it. And after the others found out that I was the one who had given up that information to Ozzal, it was a long time before they could even think about forgiving me. I think some of them never did, even though I did eventually grow into a capable fighter and leader.”
“Wait, so you were able to escape from Comdot?” Clarice asked.
“They let me go, actually,” DangerCille answered. “I don’t know why they let me live… maybe it was a twisted kind of ‘thank you’ for helping them out, or maybe they knew how little of a threat I really was to them. Or maybe they figured that living with the knowledge of what I had done was punishment enough. Which… was probably true.”
There was a silence as the others looked at her sympathetically.
“But,” she continued, taking a deep breath to pull herself together, “we did manage to carry on with what small forces we had, and the rebellion in its essence continued. Unfortunately, we became so disorganized and fractured that Ozzal had very little trouble running right over us on her way to conquering the world. And so finally, when we realized that there was no hope left for us, our last desperate option was to try to alter the path that had brought us to that end. And so I was sent back in time to stop myself from making that fatal mistake, and to do whatever I could to protect Landon’s life. I came back to a point just before he was set to return to the Syndicate, and I was able to convince him to… take certain steps in preparation for retaking control of the organization. And I hoped that that would be enough to change the course of events that originally led to our defeat.”
She gave them a few moments to absorb the story, which must have been as hard for them to hear as it was for her to tell.
Finally Hikki cleared his throat nervously. “So… you mean… zat some of us die een zees future of yours?”
“Yes, that’s what happened,” she replied sadly.
“Do we die? Me, and Clarice, and Sammie?”
DangerCille looked at each of them in turn, as they all looked back at her expectantly. Then, feeling conflicted, she looked down and seemed to be making a hard choice. The truth was, all three of them had died in that ambush, along with Cougar and many of their other friends. But she couldn’t bring herself to let them know that.
“I’m sorry…” she said at last. “I shouldn’t… I shouldn’t tell you that. It would be too difficult for you… and if I’ve been at all successful, it won’t even come to pass the way it did for me. I haven’t even told Landon about his own death… I think I was just too afraid that he would never forgive me if he knew. All he knows is that I somehow caused the Syndicate to fail.”
“There’s something I don’t understand,” Samson said. “You said that the big tragedy that caused the downfall of the Syndicate was when the Echelon ambushed us, and that was what you came back in time to stop. But the Echelon did come after us. You saw that, didn’t you? They arrested a whole bunch of us, and some people were even killed.”
DangerCille shook her head. “That was different. They weren’t trying to wipe you out; they just wanted to make a statement to the people – a show of force to prove that the Syndicate was no threat. And more importantly, Landon wasn’t in a position where he could be killed, because he hadn’t come forward yet. And preserving Landon’s life was the most important part of what I came here to do, because it was his death that threw us into chaos. Without him to lead us –“ An idea seemed to flash before her eyes, as she made a connection to what she had learned the previous night. “Unless… it wasn’t him at all…”
The others looked at her with concern, not sure what she was thinking.
“D – DangerCille?” Hikki said uncertainly.
She looked back up at them as if with a new understanding of their situation. “I told you before that there was a lot you didn’t know about Landon,” she said. “And I didn’t know it until just recently, either. But… it’s possible that we were wrong about what losing him meant to the Syndicate’s future. Because the truth is, and what I actually came here to tell you, was that Landon isn’t who he appears to be.”
“What do you mean?” Clarice asked.
“I’m not entirely sure what’s going on with him myself. But he’s got this other group, that’s apparently involved in some kind of shady research. I don’t know too much about them, except that there’s someone named ‘Da Sombras’ who sounded like Landon’s boss or partner. But it seems that the Syndicate is only a diversion for him, and his true loyalties lie with this other group. And… he’s not above sacrificing any of us if he thinks we’re in his way. Including me.”
Samson narrowed his eyes. “Then we can’t trust Landon either?”
“It seems that way,” DangerCille answered. “At the very least, you should be very careful with him. Without knowing just what he’s after with this other group, I have to question just how genuinely he is on our side. But I wanted to let you know what I had found out, so that you’re aware of his duplicity. We may need to be prepared to take the revolution back into our own hands.”
“Does he know you’re here? I mean, does Landon know that you’re in on his secret?” Samson asked.
“No. At least I don’t believe so. I’m doing my best to cover my tracks, so hopefully he should have no reason to suspect me. I can handle myself, but you should be very careful yourselves. And it goes without saying that I was never here.”
“Of course,” Hikki said. “I seenk we all undairstand how serious zees ees. And we shall carefully conseeder what may be ze best course of action for us to take.”
His counterparts nodded.
“All right then… I think my business here is done,” DangerCille said. “I… hope it wasn’t too heavy for you all.”
“We’ll… probably manage,” Clarice said, still looking a little unnerved.
DangerCille smiled a little, and stood up to go.
“May I offair you some asseestance to make your way outside?” Hikki asked, rising from his seat. “Ze way ees slightly obstructed…”
“I can show myself out. Thanks.”
She headed toward the door.
“Oh hey…” she said, turning back to them. “What happened to the cafe?”
The others exchanged weary looks. “Um… just a… minor eenceedent yesterday,” Hikki answered. “Nossing to worry about… too much…”
“Okay then,” DangerCille said, still slightly puzzled, but not enough to press the matter. “Take it easy.”
And then she was gone, leaving the three revolutionaries alone to discuss the startling information she had given them. If their leader really was planning to betray them or was otherwise untrustworthy, and if it were true that the Syndicate might be doomed without him, then it might be up to them to become the heroes who would carry the revolution forward.
Chapter 32 author’s notes:
Recurring characters:
Emiri - _Boxers_
*Heero Yuy – HeeroYuy135 (the “him” Emiri killed)
Hikki Follet – Kohikki
Clarice Rowe – QueenoftheDorks
Samson Monroe – MasterSamson
Captain Yemman – myname
Landon Blaken – Blah_canbespanish
Michelle Ozzal – Mike Lazzo
Da Sombras – Shadowstaarr
Cille Compton – Cille
*Raef Compton – Maenos
*Eric Ominae – OMNI-Enforcer
DangerCille – Cille
Dino – SwimOdin
Elizabeth Saurie St. Gaurdsmen – EdSpikeSesshyGirl
Father John Sadar – FurionTassadar
Starry Ozzal – starryjelly
Larry Zorin – LAZY17
*Amy – Amalgam
*Professor M. Matrix – matrixman124
*Major Tom Taredan – Metatronda
*Jake Thompson – SportsMaster
*Anne Monroe – herself
*Yupat – yupat
*Angel Sarcasta – mgangel1124
Keith Douglas – k_dawg_3484
*Cowboy – CowboyCadenza
Allen Black – AlastourBlaque
*Goose Maverick – Top_Gun (the “perp” who wrecked the weapon shop and is currently on the lam)
*Luna Monegossde – MoonGoddess17
Roy Mustang – Fullmetal Alchemist
*Riza “Hawkeye” Yuy – Fullmetal Alchemist
Izuru Kira – Bleach
Jean Havoc – Fullmetal Alchemist
Kazuma – s-CRY-ed
*Ishida – Bleach (the “jerk with the glasses”)
Straight Cougar – s-CRY-ed
*Greed – Fullmetal Alchemist
*Tres – Trinity Blood
*Gauron – Full Metal Panic!
*Ritsuko Akagi – Neon Genesis Evangelion
*Shou Tucker – Fullmetal Alchemist (the two scientists working with the Cool Mexicanos)
Goda – Ghost in the Shell: 2nd Gig
Scheris Adjani – s-CRY-ed
Urizane – s-CRY-ed
*Ryuho – s-CRY-ed
Dars – s-CRY-ed
Alan Gabriel – Big O
*Kisuke Urahara – Bleach
Schwarzwald – Big O
Dr. Girlfriend – Venture Brothers
Dewey Novak – Eureka udok
New characters:
*Slik the Bandit – theSLiKbandit
*Liam Green – lithium_green
Johnny Law – Johnny_Law
I. A. Coaster – itsacoaster
*Budou Kiba – Samurai Champloo (the chick who rolled Kazuma and Yemman)
Yoruichi Shihouin – Bleach
Georgie – Crayon Shin-chan
Killface – Frisky Dingo
Phantom Limb – Venture Brothers
*Xander Crews – Frisky Dingo (Killface’s “billionaire playboy”)
*Milly Thompson – Trigun (Keith’s “nice insurance girl”)
*Meryl Stryfe – Trigun (her partner)
*Characters marked with an asterisk are mentioned in this chapter but do not have an active role in the story.
References:
Mateba revolver – the type of firearm used by Togusa in Ghost in the Shell
“You have to be like water” – Spike’s fighting philosophy in Cowboy Bebop
“To catch a fish, you have to think like a fish” – advice given to Jin by a wacky fisherman dude in Samurai Champloo
Thanks to Blah for coming up with the ideas that inspired much of Landon’s backstory.
Roy Mustang stood frozen with his arm extended and his fingers pressed together. That child’s face… and the face of the woman looking defiantly back at him, as she protectively cradled the stunned girl in her arms…
How many times had he seen those faces before? Children looking at him with eyes pleading for mercy… mothers desperate to save their children, looking at him with intense hatred or begging him to take their lives instead… and how many times had he ignored their pleas and snapped his fingers anyway?
His hand began trembling. He had always told himself he was just following orders, just doing what he had been told to do. The lives he had taken were a necessary sacrifice. He was a soldier, dammit.
But, in truth…
Was he any better than this “monster” who knelt before him? She, who had killed so many people, who was responsible for Riza’s death… she had been following orders too. And now, in the heat of battle, she was willing to put her own life on the line for this innocent girl.
“NO!” he shouted, shaking his head violently to make those thoughts go away. “Don’t you dare go playing the saint here! I know what you’ve done! Don’t think you can make up for all that by saving one little girl!”
And what will you do to atone for everything you’ve done? the voice in his head demanded.
“It’s… it’s not the same,” he insisted, his resolve weakening. Emiri just watched him, uncertain about what the conflict she saw on his face would mean for her.
Finally Mustang flung his arm down in disgust.
“Just tell me one thing,” he said, his voice shaking through his clenched teeth. “One thing… Do you regret what you’ve done? Do you truly regret taking those lives? Or have you lost the ability to feel remorse?”
She looked at him with what almost looked like a hurt expression. “You mean how I can still remember the looks on their faces when I killed him? How I can’t get them the hell out of my head anymore? How it’s been driving me crazy that there’s nothing I can do that will ever change what I did?” He saw that she was serious, and he began to understand what she had been going through, that it was hurting her too. “No,” she continued with a derisive laugh, “I don’t feel anything.”
She looked away from him, that pained and angry look still on her face. As upset as he still was, and as much as he knew he could never totally forgive her, he realized that simply killing her right here would do no good. Just like she could never change what she had done, he could never do anything to bring his loved one back. And maybe it was up to him to be the bigger man and accept her remorse rather than exact his revenge.
“Mommy!”
The little girl wriggled out of Emiri’s grasp and ran to where her parents had emerged from behind a tree. Emiri watched her go, and then stood up and faced Mustang.
“So what now, big guy?” she asked.
Mustang regarded her for a moment. “You said you wanted to join the Syndicate, right?”
“That was the idea, yeah. You got a problem with that?”
Mustang narrowed his eyes, but restrained himself from snapping back. “If you’re really serious, I think it’s a fine idea. That crew isn’t exactly competent when it comes to fighting. They could probably use a trained killer like you.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“Come to think of it, they could probably use someone like me too. A disciplined military man could do them some good. And who knows, they might need someone to keep you in line.”
Emiri raised an eyebrow, but thought better of mocking him. He had almost toasted her, after all.
“So shall we head back there?” she said instead. “If we’re going to be allies now, then I should probably stop Kira from slicing up your sidekick.”
“If he’s not all shot full of holes by now,” Mustang replied snarkily.
They returned to the cafe to find that Havoc had barricaded himself behind a chunk of the cafe wall, and was taking pot shots at his Soul Reaper opponent. Kira easily dodged them, seeming content to bait Havoc rather than going after him with the intent to kill. The others were huddled just inside the building, yelling at the two of them to knock off their fighting before any more damage was done. Hikki in particular seemed kind of agitated about what had happened to his cafe.
“Kira!” “Havoc!” Emiri and Mustang yelled at the same time. They glared at each other, and then turned back to their partners.
“Stand down, Havoc,” Mustang commanded.
“Yeah, you don’t have to kick this guy’s ass just yet,” Emiri added, looking at Havoc out of the corner of her eye.
“Sir?” Havoc said, warily rising from behind his impromptu fortress.
“We’ve come to terms,” Mustang said. “That’s all you need to know. And we’ve both decided to join up with the Syndicate.” With that he turned to the group inside the cafe, particularly addressing Hikki. “We haven’t got much left to do now that our little mystery has been solved, and you seem like you could use some extra firepower. So if you’ll take us, we’ll be on your side.” He noticed their harried expressions, and glanced around at the still-smoldering wreckage around them. “Oh… and sorry about your cafe.”
“Mon dieu…” Hikki managed. “Eef eet ees not somsing eet ees anozzer…”
Clarice and Samson exchanged glances, and then Clarice stepped forward, realizing that her boss wasn’t in much of a state to discuss terms of membership. “Perhaps we should all come inside to talk…”
They all regrouped in a back room of the cafe.
“So…” Clarice said, “you all want to join the Syndicate?”
“I already told you that’s what I’m here for,” Emiri said. “Kira and I have been trying to get here for ages, so I think it’s about time we get to actually do something to help you out.”
“But… you were just trying to kill us,” Samson pointed out, unconsciously reaching for the arm she had almost severed. “And now you want to help us?”
“Look, I know I’ve done some rotten things to you. And if there were a way to prove to you how sorry I am, I’d do it. But you’re just gonna have to take my word for it.” She looked defiantly over at Mustang. “People can change, you know.”
“And what about you?” Clarice asked Mustang. “You’re willing to join up with us too? Even if it means working with her?”
Mustang gritted his teeth. “I made up my mind to fight with you. If she’s here, she can just stay out of my way. It’s not like she’s going to scare me off.”
The look on Emiri’s face said “oooh, aren’t you the big man,” but once again she knew enough to hold her tongue.
Samson turned to Havoc and Kira, who were still keeping their distance from each other. “And you guys are in on this too?”
They each looked to their respective partner, and then both nodded.
Samson and Clarice looked at each other, and then at Hikki. The Frenchman still looked a little dazed, but seemed to have mostly been following along with what was going on.
“So… what do you think, fearless leader?” Clarice asked.
Hikki pouted for a moment, then stood up straight and looked right at Mustang. Pulling something out of his pocket, he marched over to the alchemist, and then slapped him across the face with a white glove.
“ZAT EES FOR MY CAFE!” he bellowed.
Before anyone could react, he stalked over to Emiri and did the same to her.
“AND ZAT EES FOR MON CHER SAMMIE!”
The two of them just looked at him, rubbing their cheeks and feeling kind of stunned, as he strode back to his place next to Samson and stuffed the glove back into his pocket. Taking a huge breath and exhaling slowly to dissipate some tension, he turned back around to address them civilly.
“Now…” he began, “Eef you are really serious about joining us, you must set aside your deeferences and be able to wairk weez each ozzer, and weez us, as a team. Eef you can do zat, zen you may conseeder yourselves welcome.”
Emiri and Mustang looked at each other, both perhaps feeling a little more humble than they had before.
“All right,” Mustang said. “If you think you can trust her, you won’t have any trouble from me. I’ll be keeping an eye on her to make sure she plays nice, though.”
The old Emiri might have made a crack about how he just wanted to check out her hawt bod, but she realized that that might be bad form when the guy was still mourning his former fiancée.
“Oh, I can behave,” she said sweetly instead. “Just don’t think it’s because of you. I’ve got a lot to make up to these people.”
“Vairy good zen,” Hikki said, before either of them could go any further with the taunts. “Your fairst job as new membairs of ze Syndicate… ees to go back out zair and start cleaning up ze mess you made.”
The new recruits let out a collective sigh of chagrin, and then headed out of the room to start their work.
“Hikki.” Clarice stopped him before he could follow. “Do you think we need to clear this with Landon?”
“Landon hasn’t shown his face around here for weeks,” Samson pointed out. “If anything’s going to be done around here, it’ll have to be up to us.”
Clarice and Hikki looked at each other, and then Hikki nodded. “Eef Landon weeshes to revoke zair membersheep latair, zat ees up to heem. For now, I seenk I can act on our behalf. Objections?”
“None,” Clarice replied. Samson looked down, having nothing more to say.
“Tres bien,” Hikki said. “Now pairhaps we shall go to asseest our new comrades?”
Clarice nodded, and left the room. Samson remained silent for a moment, and Hikki wondered if he was just going to stay behind.
“I have to get back to my work,” Samson said, as if in answer to Hikki’s questioning look, and then left to go back to his room.
Hikki sighed, and then began rubbing his temples as he walked out toward the front room.
“Eef eet ees not somsing, eet ees anozzer…”
**********
A few hours later, an Alter user and a zombie robot pirate found themselves staring at the scorched remains of the park.
“Aha… so there was some reckless fiyah going on around here,” Kazuma said.
“Yarrrrrr,” Yemman concurred. “But it do be lookin’ like it’s all gone out now, matey.” There wasn’t even any sign of the crowd that had witnessed the spectacle earlier.
“Oh man, this is just great,” Kazuma said grumpily, kicking at a charred tree stump. “First that jerk with the glasses tells us off just as we’re about to charge into Comdot Estate. Then you decided you needed a drink so you could think it all over, and the next thing we know we’re waking up in an alley somewhere and discover that the chick who tried to pick us up in the bar made off with everything in our pockets. THEN we spend weeks chasing her down just so you can get your stupid pirate hat back. Then, when we’ve finally gotten back on track, and we make up our minds to come back here and fight, and it finally looks like we’ve found some action, Captain Lunkhead here gets us lost and we miss out on all the crap exploding.”
“Garrrr… me compass has never steered me wrong b’fore…” the pirate muttered, tapping the device impatiently.
“Yeah, and it never will AGAAAAAIIIIIN!!!” Kazuma yelled, grabbing the compass and tossing it up in the air so he could punch it into smithereens.
Yemman looked at him with a slightly hurt expression. “Well ye didn’t have t’go doin’ that now…”
“So what are we supposed to do now? There’s obviously nobody here to fight. Are we just going to sit around waiting for another riot to break out? Or should we go back to busting into Comdot?”
“Well…” Yemman considered their options. “Ya know, maybe that lily-livered scalawag with th’ specs was on t’ somethin’. A pirate ain’t a pirate without a crew. Maybe we ought t’go scout out me old mates and join our swords… uh…” (looking at Kazuma) “fists…” (glancing down at his own body) “robot… whatever I am… with theirs! We’ll make that scurvy Ozzal walk the plank yet!”
“But… weren’t you the one who started those riots that ended up getting a bunch of them arrested and killed? And didn’t you actually off one of them?”
“Aye, matey…” Yemman said sadly. “It were a dark time indeed. Meetin’ you has changed me whole outlook, though. It be time fer me t’put me back t’ th’ wind and me hands t’ th’ rope. ‘Drastic me soul,’ as you always be sayin’.”
“Well as long as it involves punching things, you can count me in. Lead the way, captain!”
“Y’know, it’d be a lot easier t’ find me way if I had me compass…” Yemman mumbled as they started off.
**********
Landon Blaken had always wanted to accomplish great things.
As the top student in his small-town school, he had always been told that he could do anything he set his mind to. He was used to succeeding, but he always felt that he was wasting his time and talents and that there was something much bigger in store for him.
The military provided a way out, and promised opportunities far beyond anything that small town could offer. Landon was accepted into the military academy and was soon recognized as one of the more outstanding new recruits.
After its humiliating defeat in Babblstan, the Actonian army needed time to regroup and rethink its strategy. It would be several more years before the then-disgraced General Ozzal would be in a position to push her country into war yet again. So even as the military worked to replenish its ranks and rebuild itself into the powerful force it had been, there was really very little for those ranks to do.
And so Landon found himself once more in a state of dissatisfaction and boredom, feeling like his considerable abilities were going to waste. He lost interest in his classes, and began spending more time pursuing his own personal studies. His instructors might have wondered what happened to their star prospect, but they weren’t about to go coddling students who didn’t feel like doing the work. And so Landon finished at the academy as just another grunt soldier, graduating without honors. He didn’t really care, since he knew he was capable of far more than they gave him credit for.
Being an active member of the military at least gave him the chance to feel like he was doing some good and helping people, as his unit traveled around the country to build up towns that had been adversely affected by the war. Perhaps it was his upbringing in a similar small town that gave him a certain kinship with these people, or the fact that he finally felt that he was accomplishing something, but for once he was involved in something that he found at least a little bit satisfying.
One day while he was out alone on a scouting run in a remote area not far from the Babblstan border, he came upon a man who had been seriously wounded. Realizing that he would die without immediate medical attention, he carried the barely conscious man to the nearby town and left him in the care of the town’s doctor. The next morning, before his unit left for their next assignment, Landon stopped in to see how the man was doing. He found him lying in a bed, bandaged and weak but conscious. Landon introduced himself, and the man looked closely at his face.
“Obrigado,” was all he said.
Landon would consider this a good deed to add to his karmic resume, but in time he forgot the details of the encounter. Then, a couple of years later, his unit was assigned escort duty for a group of refugees from the Sailors Tribe of Toonamia. Suddenly they were ambushed by a sniper, who systematically picked off not only the Toonamians, but also every single Actonian soldier – except for Landon.
Crouching in a ditch by the side of the road, with the bodies of his fallen comrades all around him, Landon truly believed that this would be the end of his dreams of grandeur. And then he heard a rough voice with a thick accent calling to him.
“Hey… you can come out now.”
Landon cautiously raised himself up, to see a man in a dark cloak and a mask coming toward him with a very impressive-looking gun.
“Do you remember me?” he asked, pulling the mask away from his face.
Landon looked at him intently, trying to remember where he had seen this swarthy face before. “Who are you?”
“I am a man who lives in the shadows,” the sniper replied roguishly. “A man whose life you once saved. And now I have returned the favor.”
It came back to Landon in a flash: the man whom he had carried to the doctor in that small town… was an assassin who would come back to kill his entire unit and a group of innocent refugees.
The man seemed amused at the somewhat stricken expression on Landon’s face. “You don’t need to worry about what has happened here. Nobody will miss these worthless Sailor dogs, and these foot soldiers were always just holding you back. Isn’t that right?”
So somehow this man knew about Landon’s aspirations. He had obviously been doing his homework.
“But perhaps…” he continued, “I have done you a favor today. You are a free man now. So… how would you like to become my partner? It would be a lot more exciting than being a lapdog of the pathetic Actonian government.”
Somewhat impulsively, Landon agreed. With his unit wiped out, nobody would really know or care that he was missing too, so he figured he might as well take advantage of this new opportunity. He and his new partner, who went by the name of Da Sombras, spent the next year or two traveling around the country and making their own fortunes. They took to calling themselves the Cool Mexicanos, just because it sounded badass. Although Da Sombras was always quick to point out that he was Brazilian, not Mexican.
Even as he found himself enjoying the freedom to live by his own rules, Landon often had to rein in his partner’s less moral inclinations to keep them both from running afoul of the law. Fortunately this didn’t seem to bother Da Sombras too much, and in fact he seemed to like having someone there to keep him from going too far. They did run into trouble from time to time, though, since Da Sombras had built up quite the nefarious reputation and couldn’t entirely control his penchant for making mischief.
After a time, Landon decided to return to his old life and continue trying to make a name for himself on the right side of the law. General Ozzal had gained back much of her power and was beginning to exert her influence on the government and the Actonian people, and Landon was beginning to feel disgusted with the political situation in the country. And so he and Da Sombras parted on amicable terms, and each went back to his old vocation. Landon was welcomed back to Orly as the only survivor of his unit’s ambush, and was given another assignment within the army. Even as he worked to reestablish himself as an honorable soldier, he felt increasingly frustrated with the way the country was headed and sympathetic to those who opposed the emerging leadership. Eventually he became more actively involved with the small resistance movement that was already beginning to form in the city, even assembling his own small group of activists after being inspired by the words of a pirate he met in a bar one night.
And then there was… that woman. Landon met Lucille Compton by chance one night in a cafe in Orly. He had never concerned himself much with women, since his ambition always came first, but he was not above dabbling with a pretty girl every once in a while. And so when the restaurant’s proprietress struck up conversation with him, and then introduced him to a young woman who was apparently in need of some companionship, he figured that he could have some fun putting his charm to work. It quickly became clear, though, that this wasn’t the type of girl you could sweet-talk into a one-night stand. But for some reason, he found her a little bit fascinating. She was intelligent and well-spoken, with a wit and sense of humor that very nearly matched his own. And perhaps more than that, he found it refreshing to talk to someone who seemed to be a genuinely nice person. When they finally said goodnight, it occurred to him that he hadn’t enjoyed himself that much in quite a long time. And even though he hadn’t expected anything to come of their evening together, he found himself wondering if he would ever see her again. After a week away from the city, he decided to at least try. He went back to that cafe and found her again, and a romance was born. A short time later, he impetuously proposed to her.
It was an odd thing for him to do, in retrospect, to tie himself down to a family – particularly since Cille had an adoptive son who was nearly grown himself. Perhaps he rationalized it as just part of his rise to the top; Cille came from a good family, and it couldn’t hurt too much to have a supportive wife and son. Or perhaps he was still just enjoying himself, figuring that he could take off again if he got tired of playing house. But there was something nice about having a little bit of stability in his life, and he put on a good face for the woman and boy who clearly adored him.
At first, the organization that came to be called the Blacken Syndicate was little more than a small group of would-be freedom fighters using covert means to quietly undermine Ozzal and give aid to those who had been hurt by her policies. They might help build support for a political campaign for a candidate who was sympathetic to the people, or raid transports of supplies en route to Orly and take them to poorer towns, or simply put out dissenting opinions in underground publications like ray=out.
Even after Ozzal officially wrested the title of Head Governor from the previous occupant of Comdot Estate, and the rebel group grew in size and boldness, it was still sufficiently loosely organized that Landon could maintain his life with his new family and still plan and participate in its activities. Fortunately Cille always believed him when he told her he was being called out for military duty or was off to visit family or friends. Even as he almost pitied her naivete and all the trust she put in him, something made him want to live up to that trust, and he found himself looking forward to returning from his missions to be with them again.
And then Landon’s entire family, whom he had left behind in his small town when he went to make a name for himself, was murdered in one day. Not by some petty criminal, but by representatives of Head Governor Ozzal herself.
In the aftermath of that terrible news, he realized that simple resistance was not enough. Not against a government that thought nothing of striking down its citizens when they had done nothing but congregate to speak out against its policies. If they were going to fight with guns and grenades, then so would he. The entire principle of the Syndicate would have to change.
And unfortunately, his life would have to change with it. His time of playing house was over. The day after the uprising in his town, he packed a bag and left a note and silently said goodbye to his fiancee and her son. He hoped they would understand someday – why he had to leave them, and why he was unable to explain everything to them himself. It hurt him to leave them, as he realized afterward just how much he really had come to care about Cille and Raef. But he told himself that it was for their own good that he was keeping them as uninvolved in his revolution as possible. He asked his friends Eric Ominae and Straight Cougar to make sure that Cille was getting along all right in his absence, and to give her whatever aid she might someday need.
His newfound determination revitalized the Syndicate. They formed a much stronger core group, and began striking out at Ozzal’s forces, hoping to create enough disorder that her nascent administration wouldn’t be able to maintain its hold on the country. But for every riot they incited, and every one of her officials they beat up, she only seemed to grasp her power more tightly.
And then from out of the blue came a call from someone he hadn’t seen in what seemed like ages, but whose thickly accented voice he would recognize anywhere. It was Da Sombras, offering his “services” as an assassin if the Syndicate should want to have any of Ozzal’s minions – or Ozzal herself – taken out. And in return, all he wanted was to partner up again, to pursue what Da Sombras eagerly described as “the secret to eternal life.” At first Landon was understandably skeptical, but Da Sombras had apparently become enamored of the idea after reading some ancient texts from his homeland. Perhaps as a response to his own closeness to mortality, Da Sombras seemed determined to discover and harness the secret if it really did exist. But even the brash Brazilian realized that he could use someone more grounded and book-savvy to assist in his quest, and Landon’s leadership of the Syndicate had caught his attention again.
Eventually, despite his reservations, Landon accepted the offer. The Cool Mexicanos were reborn, and various of Ozzal’s underlings began turning up dead with no trace of their killer. As easy as it would have been to eliminate Ozzal herself, Landon restrained his assassin partner, believing that the country would simply be thrown into chaos without a sufficiently strong faction in place ready to take over. Secretly, though, he was also determined to bring about Ozzal’s downfall himself, and he wasn’t about to let the sniper deprive him of his glory with a single shot.
For his part, Landon began spending more time doing research into possible avenues for attaining eternal life, and the duo began expanding as more people joined the group. Many of them were associates of Da Sombras whose previous shady dealings Landon didn’t care much to know. Among them were a homunculus, Greed, and an android, Tres; a thief and cutthroat who called himself Slik the Bandit; Liam Green, a young man who also possessed a great analytical mind; and a terrorist named Gauron. Landon was free to command all of them, and they likewise reported back to Da Sombras, who was having fun tooting around in his new zeppelin. Eventually a couple of scientists were added to the team, and they established their own research facility some distance from Orly.
As time went on, and the group began discovering strategies that seemed like they might actually be feasible, Landon found himself becoming more intrigued with the idea. He knew that Da Sombras was only interested in the secret to eternal life for his own selfish purposes, but Landon began thinking about how it might be used to benefit the world at large. If people had nothing to fear from death, he reasoned, then they would have no reason to fear standing up to a corrupt government. What happened to his family would never happen to anyone else again. And what if eternal life could be granted to the great men and women whose passing always seems to leave the world a little poorer? Surely the world would be better off if its great thinkers and artists and scientists could remain alive indefinitely. It was a lofty goal, to be sure – Landon still had no idea if they would ever find a way to achieve eternal life, or if the secret could ever be applied on a wide scale. But still he became more and more obsessed with the idea, and ultimately one thought took hold over all the others: if he, Landon Blaken, could gain immortality, then he would surely be able to fulfill his potential for greatness and lead the people in creating a society free from injustice and pain. In truth it was probably only slightly less selfish and arrogant than Da Sombras’ desire to cheat death, but in Landon’s mind it was only logical that he should take his place as a hero of the oppressed masses.
Meanwhile, the effectiveness of the Syndicate was slipping. The increase in the rebels’ activities had been accompanied by an increase in military and police retaliation, as Ozzal struggled to maintain her position of power and continued her efforts to crush anyone who opposed her. Even with Da Sombras’ contributions to the cause, the Syndicate seemed to be getting further and further from victory. And it didn’t help that its leader was becoming more and more distant as he devoted more time and energy to the Cool Mexicanos.
Landon’s situation became even rockier when Raef Compton appeared, angrily demanding that he answer for abandoning him and his mother. Landon didn’t blame him for being upset, of course, and he managed to assuage him by explaining about the dangers of the revolution and his concern for their safety. The boy then insisted on joining in the revolution, and Landon had no choice but to admit him as a member of the Syndicate. Their relationship remained strained, though, and Landon always had to wonder if the boy was able to see through his selfless hero persona.
A short time later, Landon decided to leave the Syndicate. It was becoming too troublesome to hide his involvement with the Cool Mexicanos, especially with Raef watching his every move. And without having the rebels to deal with, he could concentrate on achieving his ultimate goal of immortality. He left them with a few instructions, but without his strong leadership the group fell into disarray. Eventually a new batch of recruits came to the group, and a new leader was named, but they were never the force they had once been. About the only thing keeping them from being totally wiped out was the fact that they were too inept for Comdot to continue bothering with them. Landon watched them from afar, and occasionally sent messages or orders to help keep them in line, but he was mostly content to bide his time until he could make his triumphant return.
A few months after his departure, a headline in the Orly Review caught his attention and made him consider making that return. “Conspirator sentenced to death,” it read. Amusingly enough, the article seemed designed to lead readers to believe that Landon himself was the one who had been captured, presumably to force the Syndicate into the open to mount a rescue. And if they took the bait, which undoubtedly they would, then they would be putting themselves into a very precarious position, if they even managed to survive at all. He could no longer sit back and entrust the Syndicate to these fools, after he had put so much of his time and effort and genius into creating it and building it up.
And so Landon handed over the major operations of the Cool Mexicanos research projects to Liam Green, who had become something of a protege, and headed back to Orly. He took up residence in an old law office, and set about monitoring Syndicate activities and planning his comeback. Fortunately their raid on Comdot went surprisingly successfully, allowing him a little more breathing room before he made his presence known.
Unfortunately, though, the hubbub surrounding his supposed capture (and the subsequent kidnapping of Raef Compton) had attracted the attention of Cille, who had in turn attracted the attention of Da Sombras and his cohorts in the Cool Mexicanos. Like the naive fool she was, she had started poking her nose into the Syndicate’s affairs, looking for both Raef and Landon. Da Sombras’ agents made sure she didn’t find out too much, but even after Ozzal’s minions went after her, she still persisted in trying to involve herself in the rebellion. And Da Sombras was not pleased. “You should have known better than to take up with a woman,” he grumbled. And he had a point – if Cille found out too much, and stumbled upon the Cool Mexicanos while she was searching for Landon, she could completely blow their cover. Most of their operatives were wanted by the federal government for various major crimes, so a raid on their facility could be devastating. And more importantly to Landon, being exposed as a double agent could mean losing not only his dream of immortality, but his credibility with the revolutionaries.
Da Sombras wanted to simply pop the meddlesome woman off right away, but Landon resisted allowing any action to be taken against her. He wouldn’t have admitted it to his scornful partner, but he still harbored some affection for his former fiancee. Besides, she was still an innocent civilian, and it seemed cruel to kill her simply because she might get in their way.
Until, that is, Cille actually found him. Or at least, a woman who looked suspiciously like Cille. He might have suspected her of being her older sister if he hadn’t known that she had been an only child. But she claimed, in a story that at first he found too fantastic to believe, that she was a future incarnation of Cille who had come back in time to help save the world from Ozzal’s tyranny. He probably would have dismissed her completely if she hadn’t known particular details of both Cille’s past and their own relationship. But given what she knew, he had no choice but to believe that she was who she said she was.
What she told him next was quite possibly even harder to accept. It seemed that one of the primary reasons for the fall of the Syndicate was that she herself had been responsible for the deaths of several of its members. She didn’t elaborate very much, but her primary goal in returning to her past seemed to be to prevent her alter ego from making the same mistakes. Even, she said gravely, if that meant she had to die.
At first Landon found the idea distasteful. But she insisted that she was prepared to make that sacrifice, and that it would be the surest way of making sure she couldn’t repeat her mistakes. And finally, Landon had to admit to himself that it might be worth having his ex-fiancee out of the Cool Mexicanos’ way for good. And so he agreed to work with this future Cille, and to allow the Lucille Compton of the present to be killed if it came to that.
Da Sombras was particularly delighted to hear that Cille was now fair game. Unfortunately for him and his itchy trigger finger, though, Landon and his new partner agreed that if Cille was to die, it should clearly be at the hands of the Syndicate’s enemies. That way they would at least appear blameless, and perhaps her death would spur an outcry against the government and make way for the triumphant return that Landon had envisioned for himself.
When they received word that Echelon agents were being sent out to round up Syndicate members, it seemed that Comdot was playing right into their hands. Cille was one of those arrested, and this time it seemed that Ozzal intended to try to lure Landon out by making a media event of his fiancee’s death. According to Dino, a Syndicate informant in Comdot’s security forces with whom Landon had remained in contact, Ozzal’s right hand man Goda was planning to have Cille murdered as part of his experiments with a new Stimulant drug.
It almost seemed too perfect. Cille would be eliminated, and all Landon and his associates had to do was sit back and watch.
And then, of course, it all backfired. Cille managed to escape, most likely with the aid of that gallingly steadfast idiot Cougar, and it seemed that they were right back where they started. Landon would not be deterred from retaking the Syndicate, though. The revolution was his to lead, and he had been growing impatient waiting in his secret lair. And so he declared that they would proceed with their plans, have Cille’s death staged, and continue on to take control of the Syndicate. Thanks to some clever scheming by his new partner, they didn’t even have to stage or publicize the murder themselves – their contacts in Comdot quietly worked the suggestion through the pipeline until it was accepted by the higher-ups as their own idea to put out fake bait for the missing leader of the Blacken Syndicate.
Of course, Da Sombras and the others weren’t entirely satisfied. Not only was the original Cille still a potential problem, but now Landon was shacking up with yet another troublesome woman. Gauron was sent down to talk some sense into Landon, and eventually he agreed that they should continue looking to rid themselves of both Cilles. In truth, though, he was in no hurry to see either of them killed; part of him couldn’t help feeling a little bit relieved that Cille had escaped, and her future counterpart was still potentially a valuable resource for the Syndicate. But she was also a threat to the Mexicanos, staying so close to Landon, so he resolved to gain as much of her knowledge of the future as he could, and then allow her to be offed. He convinced himself that it was a necessary sacrifice for the good of his goals, which he still saw as noble even as corrupted as they had become.
He would be the immortal hero of the people. As incompetent as they were on their own, he was the only one capable of leading them to a new and better society. And he would do it, even if he had to sacrifice a few of them along the way.
**********
“I want you to teach me what I need to know.”
Cougar looked up from his book, mildly startled to see that Cille had snuck up on him while he had been engrossed in his story. He had seen this coming, though, since Cille had become increasingly restless during their stay at the HOLY cabin. It had only been a few days, but he could tell that she wanted to be doing more than helping Scheris with the housework and going for walks in the woods. He couldn’t really blame her, either; while he had been enjoying the chance to relax and do some reading, there were times when he felt that things were going entirely too slow.
“What is it that you want to learn?” he asked, putting the book down.
“When we get back to the Syndicate I need to be able to help them… to actually do things – to be able to protect people, instead of being the one who always needs to be protected. I don’t want to be a n00b anymore.”
Cougar smiled at the hint of Actonian dialect. “You want to learn to fight, then.”
“Yes. And anything else you think I should know.”
“Mmm…” he thought for a moment, and then looked back up at her. “We’ll start tomorrow, then. There’s something I need to pick up for you. I hope you don’t mind waiting.”
She sighed. “I suppose I can hold out for another day. Urizane wanted some help out in the garden, anyway…”
The next morning Cougar was setting up watermelons along a stone wall when Cille came out of the cabin. Her hair was pulled back in a low ponytail, and she had traded the colorful outfits she had been borrowing from Scheris for a simple black tank top and pants. He couldn’t quite help raising an eyebrow and staring a little as she walked toward him.
“What?” she asked ingenuously.
“Hrm… eheheheh… well, I must say, Ms. Cillie, that outfit suits you quite well…” he said sheepishly.
“Oh,” she said, blushing a little. “It’s just something Scheris found for me. It is a lot better than those ridiculous clothes of hers with the random flaps all over the place…” she laughed.
As she came closer he noticed the marks of the wounds that were still healing on her bare arms. It had been a wise decision to put off the more physical parts of her training.
“I have something for you,” he said, going to the wall and picking up a handgun. “I know you lost the other gun I gave you when Ryuho arrested you, so I thought you should have this…”
He handed it to her, and a look of surprise came over her face.
“I’ve seen this gun before,” she said, inspecting it more closely. “It looks like…”
“It’s your father’s Mateba revolver,” he finished for her, just as she recognized the inscription on the handle. “I picked it up for you last night.”
“Where did you find it?” she asked.
“Your father sold it to his friend Eric Ominae years ago. It’s been in his personal collection ever since, on display in his shop.”
“You saw Eric?”
“No, actually… he wasn’t there at his shop. And I wasn’t able to get ahold of him, so I just kind of let myself in.” He grinned. “I’m sure he wouldn’t mind, knowing what it’s for.”
She looked down at the gun again, recognizing that this was to become her new weapon. She grasped it and raised it to look through the sight. It certainly fit into her hand much better than it had the last time she had held it.
After a brief lesson on stance and firing, Cille set up and took aim at one of the watermelons. Her first shot went wide, and the recoil would have sent her reeling backwards if Cougar hadn’t been there to steady her. The next shot shattered one of the stones in the wall, but the third blew the melon right off.
“Not bad, Ms. Cillie,” Cougar said, impressed that she’d gotten the hang of it so quickly.
“I used to be pretty good at this when I was a kid,” she said with a grin. “When my father taught Raef how to shoot, I made him teach me too. It’s been a while, though. So I really need the practice.”
A few hours later, when her muscles had gotten sore enough to quit shooting for the day, Cougar began instructing her on cleaning and maintaining the weapon. She watched closely as he demonstrated dismantling the gun, trying to keep up as he rattled off the name and purpose of each component. Fortunately he was much more patient when it was her turn to try taking it apart. She concentrated on it intently, and the silence was only broken when he had to correct her or explain something.
“So…” she said after a while, “you never did get around to telling me what happened to Landon. I don’t suppose you still feel like you can’t trust me…”
He smiled, remembering their earlier exchange about his old friend. “Heh… well, the truth is… we don’t know exactly where he is either. It’s been months since anybody has seen him, and we lost contact with him not long after he left. So I really couldn’t tell you, as much as I might want to.”
“I see,” she said, somewhat disappointed. “I suppose I should have expected as much.”
She went back to polishing gunmetal, looking thoughtful. “How did you know him?” she asked.
“We were classmates at the military academy, actually. That was… quite a while ago.” He laughed. “Landon was very charismatic, easy to get along with. As I’m sure you know very well.” She smiled a little in spite of herself. “When he started putting together the Syndicate, he looked me up again to see if I was interested in joining. That was while HOLY was still together… at the time I preferred to remain on my own side, but I admired his goals and told him I might be able to help him out from time to time. That’s pretty much how it’s been… although it looks like my involvement with the Syndicate may have become more permanent.”
“You’re leaving the military?”
“I may not have any choice. If Ozzal has any idea that I was the one who broke you out of Comdot, I’d probably be apprehended as soon as I walked back into the place. They may already have the Echelon out looking for us. And even if they don’t suspect me… I think I’ve got a more important mission out here.”
She looked up at him, and for a moment their eyes met. Then, not wanting to seem like she was reading too much into what he was saying, she went back to her polishing.
“I’m a little bit surprised the military didn’t reassign you after HOLY was broken up,” she said after a few moments. “I assume that’s why Scheris and the others left the military too?”
“Yes, essentially. Most of us went directly to HOLY after we finished at the academy, so we didn’t have any other units to go back to. You know, HOLY didn’t even exist before Ryuho and I founded it.”
“You founded HOLY?”
“Heh… well, it was Ryuho’s idea. He was one of my classmates too, and he thought that there should be a special unit for people with our powers. So between the two of us we were able to build up enough support to make it happen. Ryuho took over as commander, of course… the rest of us were happy enough just to have a place to call our own. Alter users aren’t always accepted by ‘normal’ society, you know.”
She frowned sympathetically. “And then Ozzal disbanded you.”
“Mm-hmm. When she came to power, she started restructuring the army and doing whatever she thought would solidify her rule. She saw the Alter users as a threat, especially since we operated as such a tight-knit and relatively independent group. So she forced us to break up. Some people, like Urizane and the others, simply left the military for good and came out here. Ryuho, as angry as he was, refused to be cast out or demoted, so he joined the Echelon. It’s no small irony that he’s now acting as a lapdog for the tyrant who snubbed him.”
“And that’s why he hates you… he sees you as a traitor for helping the Syndicate…”
“Yeah. At least that’s what I have to believe. I haven’t really spoken to him since he joined the Echelon. But he always was stubborn… and sometimes he lets his sense of authority get in the way of seeing what actual justice is.”
“Mmm.” Cille was slipping the last piece of the gun into place, and held it up for inspection.
“Not too shabby,” Cougar said, taking it to get a closer look. “Except… this is on here a little too tight… and somehow you’ve got this on backwards…”
Cille Kif sighed. “I guess I’d better try it again…”
The training montage continued for several days, with more target practice interspersed with hand-to-hand combat once Cougar felt that Cille was physically ready for it. Their friends occasionally watched the two of them from the sidelines, offering advice and encouragement (or in Urizane’s case, weeping over his splodeyed watermelons). Scheris in particular seemed to enjoy watching them, often with a playful and knowing smile dancing in her eyes, and at times drifting back to memories of someone she had once looked at the same way she saw Cille looking at Cougar.
At the moment, though, she was finding it hard not to bust up laughing at Cougar’s latest display, as he explained the next lesson to Cille at his usual frenetic pace:
“The secret to hand-to-hand fighting is always staying at least one step ahead of your opponent. Anticipating his next move, reacting before he even has a chance to act. You have to read his body language, watch his eyes, sense the way he shifts his weight on his feet. It’s rather like dancing, you know. Except you don’t wait for him to follow his lead. You create your own steps, in order to most effectively counteract the moves that he’s planning to make. Of course, if he doesn’t do what you expect him to do, you have to adapt quickly, and stay fluid enough to change your movements to match his. A wise man once said that you have to be like water. To catch a fish, you have to think like a fish. I forget who it was who said that. Maybe it was two different guys. But anyway, what’s important is to always stay on your toes. Grace, elegance, agility, strength, focus, that’s what it’s all about. You understand, don’t you, Ms. Cillie?”
The shellshocked look on the poor girl’s face was all the answer they needed. Scheris completely lost it, and fell over guffawing.
Cougar shot her an annoyed look, but seemed largely unfazed.
“Well, we’ll work on it… that’s what training is for, after all.”
**********
Two hundred seventy-two…
Two hundred seventy-three…
Two hundred seventy-five…
Two hundred seventy-fff…
Wait…
Aww, who the f**k cared… not like it mattered how many specks there were on the wall…
Elizabeth Saurie St. Gaurdsmen sat slumped against the wall in a cell in the Comdot prison, looking dazedly through half-closed eyes at the other side of the room.
She was so… f**king… bored…
She had counted the panels in the ceiling. She had played imaginary connect-the-dots with the chips in the walls. She had pretended to shoot anything in the joint that could serve as a target. She had done situps and one-handed pushups and stretching exercises and whatever else she could think of to try to stay in shape. She had tried vainly to catch sight of something – anything – through the tiny barred window near the top of the wall. She had gone through every bawdy drinking song she knew.
And still, here she was, with abso-f**king-lutely nothing to do.
She closed her eyes and let her thoughts drift again. How long had it been since she had been tossed in here? F**k all if she knew. And there sure wasn’t anybody else there who was telling her. She’d barely even spoken to anyone since a few days after her arrest, when she’d been hauled out of the cell to go talk to that ugly dude… what was his name… Goda, maybe?
Not having anything better to do, Elizabeth let herself go into flashback mode…
“I want you to tell me what you know… about Glass.”
“Glass? I don’t know anything about any damn glass. What in hell are you talking about?”
The scarred man smirked at her. “You were in the Gunsmoke branch of the Syndicate, were you not? And one of your associates, I believe, went by the name of John Sadar. Is that right?”
She glared at him. “What the hell does that matter?”
“Your association with this Sadar leads me to believe you know something about Glass. And I want to know what that something is. So you are going to tell me. Now.”
“I still don’t know what you’re talking about.”
The scarred man nodded, and the two Dars behind her tightened their grip on her arms. A tall, thin man in a pinstriped suit stepped forward, leering at Elizabeth, and smashed her across the face. It felt like his hand was made out of steel.
Goda held something out toward her. “Have you ever seen anyone wearing one of these?”
Elizabeth peered toward his outstretched hand, and as her vision cleared she made out a cross-shaped piece of glass. She shook her head. “No, I haven’t.”
Goda nodded again, and this time the metal hand went for the other side of Elizabeth’s face.
“Are you sure?” he asked, turning his back on her and pacing a few steps away.
It took Elizabeth a few moments to catch her breath again. “I told you I don’t know what the f**k you’re talking about. I’ve never seen one of those things, and I don’t know anybody named Glass. And if you’ve got some problem with the things you drink your liquor out of, then I don’t really give a flying f**k.”
He was silent for a few moments, and then he looked down with a small chuckle.
“All right then,” he said, “I suppose that’ll be all for now. If I need anything more I’ll call on you again.”
And so back into the cell she went. Back to counting spots on the wall, back to wishing her shoulder would stop throbbing, back to wondering if anyone would remember to come after her, or even realized she was there.
The one bright spot in her incarceration had been occasional visits from a teenage girl, who came with something to eat or drink or just to see how Elizabeth was doing. She was soft-spoken, but had a kind smile and bright eyes. Elizabeth had to wonder what someone like her was doing in a dingy craphole like this.
On one of her visits the girl had brought a basin of water and a bag of first-aid supplies. She patiently cleaned and dressed Elizabeth’s wounds, much to the imprisoned woman’s relief.
“So hey… how’d a nice girl like you get stuck taking care of trash like me?” she said with a wryly amused smile.
“It’s just… something I like to do,” the girl answered simply. “It keeps me busy… and I like helping people whenever I can.”
“That’s awful gracious of you,” Elizabeth said, looking down appreciatively at the clean bandages the girl was wrapping around her arm.
She was silent again, and Elizabeth watched her placid face for a few moments. “Say… you know who I am, don’t you? And why I’m here?” Elizabeth continued.
“Yes, I know who you are. I remember you from the last time you were here. You came to rescue someone… someone I care about,” the girl said.
“Rescue someone… you mean Raef? You know him?”
The girl nodded. “I came to know him while he was imprisoned here. And we…” She caught herself and began blushing. “I was glad to see him get out of this place, even if it meant that I couldn’t see him as much. So I’m grateful to you and your friends, who came after him. Otherwise I don’t know what my – what might have happened to him.”
“Do you know where he is now?” Elizabeth asked. “We haven’t seen him since we got him out.”
The girl nodded again. “I still see him… he’s staying nearby the estate. I can’t tell you too much, though… he says he’s through with fighting, if he can help it.”
Elizabeth nodded, a little sadly. Raef had been a worthy comrade, despite his age and relative inexperience. She remembered when he had first come to the Syndicate, demanding to see Landon. She never knew just what transpired between them, but she and the others guessed that he was angry at Landon for leaving him and his adoptive mother. The two of them seemed to come to terms, though, although the boy never seemed to really trust their leader. In a way she wasn’t surprised that he had chosen to break away from the group, but she was sorry that his determination and potential had given way to disillusionment.
The girl put the finishing touches on Elizabeth’s bandages, and began gathering the first-aid supplies into her bag.
“Hey… what’s your name?” Elizabeth asked.
“Starry,” she said, standing up to go.
“Nice to meet you. Give Raef my regards,” Elizabeth said with a grin.
“I will.”
“And thank you… I really appreciate this.”
The girl simply smiled, and left the cell.
That was the last time Elizabeth saw her. The next day some sort of explosion hit the estate, and since then the girl hadn’t come back. Elizabeth could only wonder what had become of her new friend, and hope that she and Raef were doing all right…
“F**kety f**king f**k…” she mumbled. All of this flashback crap wasn’t making her feel any less bored. She took a deep breath and tried to stretch out, slumping even further down on the wall, when she noticed something sitting on the floor in front of her. She didn’t remember anything having been there before. It looked like… a black cat. She just looked at it sluggishly, wondering idly how long it had been there and how she had managed not to notice it wandering in.
“Well good afternoon.”
Annnnnd… now the cat was talking to her. Great.
She just sort of stared for a few more moments, trying to decide if she had finally gone off the deep end, or if there was a man in the cell talking to her, or if that voice really had come from that cat.
“You can come to your senses any time, you know.”
No, that was… that was definitely the cat.
“What the hell do you want?”
The cat almost seemed to smile at her bluntness. “Kisuke sent me to spring you out of here.”
“Kisuke?” Elizabeth didn’t recognize the name.
“Oh, that’s right… you’re not actually with his group. Ah well, just consider me a friend of a friend of a friend.”
The cat peered out of the cell into the dingy hallway beyond, where a lone guard sat dozing off. He had been posted there since that explosion or whatever it was that had rocked the prison quarters a few weeks before. He was obviously just as bored with the whole setup as Elizabeth was, and since she hadn’t offered him any trouble he barely paid attention to her.
The cat slipped through the cell bars into the hallway and sauntered up to the snoozing guard. He rubbed up against the man’s legs, purring and meowing invitingly. The man gradually came out of his stupor, blinking and snorting, and looked down to see the stray animal staring up at him with what seemed like a friendly smile.
“Hey, kitty… how’d you get in here?” he drawled, reaching down to pet the cat. “Kitty” purred appreciatively and arched his back, and then ambled a few steps away and turned to look back at the guard.
And then all of a sudden he disappeared, and there in his place stood a naked woman.
Elizabeth raised her eyebrows and let out a low whistle. She’d certainly never seen a trick like that before. Not only that, but she had to admit that this chick was pretty damn hawt.
Elizabeth wasn’t the only one who was impressed. The guard immediately developed a gushing nosebleed and fell over backwards, knocked out cold. The woman stood looking at him with a hand on one hip.
“Men… such predictable creatures, aren’t they?” she said, winking at Elizabeth.
She knelt next to the guard and felt around in his pockets, finally coming up with a jangling set of keys.
“So… you got a name, sister? Or should I just call you Kitty?” Elizabeth asked, standing up.
The woman smiled as she came to unlock the cell door. “Yoruichi’s the name.”
“Pleased to meet you.”
Yoruichi finished with the lock and slid the door open. “Let’s go.”
They took off through the hallways, looking for the nearest exit. Every once in a while they would come across another guard or two, but without fail the men were incapacitated at the sight of the naked babe coming toward them. The two women ran on, laughing their heads off at the men dropping around them. It seemed that they were finally nearing a way out, when they suddenly met a girl coming around a corner toward them and came to a halt. It was Starry.
The girl’s eyes widened at the sight of the naked woman standing next to Elizabeth, but she kept her composure remarkably well. She looked back and forth between the two women, clearly understanding what was going on.
“Hey,” Elizabeth said, sounding assured despite the uncertainty of what the girl would do.
Starry’s expression softened, and she pointed down the corridor behind her. “That way and up the stairs to your right… there’s a door to the courtyard. From there you can climb the vines to get over the wall.”
Yoruichi looked at Elizabeth, who nodded her approval, and then started down the hallway.
Elizabeth turned back to Starry with an appreciative look. “Thanks. And good luck with that boy of yours,” she said, and then took off running after Yoruichi.
The two of them found themselves in a large open space in what must have been the rear of the estate. The outer wall loomed in front of them, covered with vines.
“What now?” Elizabeth asked. “You’re not exactly dressed for wall-climbing…”
“Well, probably the easiest way to do it…” Yoruichi looked at Elizabeth. “How would you feel about a piggy-back ride?”
Elizabeth raised an eyebrow. “I’m up for anything,” she said with a saucy grin.
“My kind of woman.” Yoruichi returned the grin, and then she hoisted Elizabeth onto her back.
“Hold on tight,” she called, and they were off in a flash. Elizabeth could hardly tell what was happening. They seemed to disappear and reappear, and then they were soaring above the city, landing on rooftops only to flit away again. Far below they could see the occasional shocked onlooker, no doubt wondering if they were really seeing a naked chick flying over their heads.
“So, where to?” Yoruichi called.
“Well… I don’t know if there’s still anyone left at Gunsmoke, but I might as well stop by and see what the place looks like. I need to find out what’s been going on while I’ve been out of it…”
“You got it,” Yoruichi answered, and away they went.
**********
Larry Zorin sat in a pizzeria, munching on a slice of plain cheese pizza and thinking about how his life kind of sucked.
It had gotten better, certainly, since he had finally gotten away from that hellish lab and its psychotic inhabitants. He didn’t have to worry about being fondled by tentacles or shot with lazor cannons or gnawed on by whatever the hell Amy was. And since he had been staying with his friend Raef, it almost seemed like he was back to living a normal life.
It was kind of… boring.
He’d been gone for weeks now, and nobody had come after him. He had even been wearing his Comdot ID badge on his jacket for everyone to see. But nobody seemed to care who he was or what he knew. Didn’t they realize that he had been privy to all of the secrets of Ozzal’s covert scientific experiments? That he could expose all of the corruption in Actonia’s government if he wanted to? But no… he was just a nothing to them, a pathetic loser who wasn’t worth bothering with.
He looked down at his toppingless pizza and sighed. Once upon a time he would have gladly ordered it with pepperoni or sausage, but for some reason he could never bring himself to go near those things since he started working for Professor Matrix. The only thing that seemed safe anymore was regular old cheese pizza. It seemed so plain, just like his life.
“Maybe Raef is right…” he mumbled to himself. “Maybe I should just give up pretending to be badass and admit that I’m a total failure…”
All he had ever wanted was to be a scientist. He had always loved playing with new gadgets and designing his own experiments and learning as much as he could about the world around him. In college, when other guys were out drinking and trying to pick up chicks, he was studying and building models of robots. Where they had posters of star athletes and bikini-clad babes draped across hot rods, he had Bill Nye the Science Guy and a map of Middle Earth. He was a nerd through and through, and it made him happy. At least it used to, before he had been abducted into that nightmarish world where science was a perversion and experiments were done for the benefit of power-hungry villains.
He put down the unfinished slice of pizza and began absentmindedly poking it with his finger, thinking again of what Raef had said to him when they had first met up again. “If you really want to help the Syndicate…” At the time he had dismissed the idea, which he considered just a random speculation to begin with. What would make him think that someone like him belonged in the Syndicate? But the more he imagined it, and the more it became clear that he was never going to amount to anything just sitting around hoping someone from Comdot would notice that he was gone, the more he thought that maybe, just maybe, this might be a way he could make something of his life. If he could help the Syndicate in their fight for justice and freedom, maybe he could prove to them all that he was a somebody.
Maybe he could be badass after all.
**********
The leaders of the two most powerful branches of the Order of Glass were on the phone.
“What is the status of your preparations for instigating the Actonia-Comedia war?” Schwarzwald asked.
“Nearly all of our safeguards have been put in place,” Dr. Girlfriend replied. “We should be ready to move shortly. When we get your go-ahead, of course.”
“I think… we should stand down the operation,” Schwarzwald said bluntly.
“What? Why?”
“The Syndicate has not begun moving as we had anticipated. In fact, there’s barely been any response to Lucille Compton’s death at all.”
“Didn’t Blaken come out of hiding as expected?”
“Yes. And apparently he’s taken control of the Syndicate again. But there has been no order to move against Ozzal. We can’t tell what his plans or motives are. It’s very peculiar.”
“And so you think it would be too soon to provoke war.”
“Without decisive action on the part of the Syndicate, war between Actonia and Comedia would be meaningless. It would be on our heads to come forward and take full responsibility for the conflict. And this isn’t the time for that.”
“You’re still resolved to see Ozzal overthrown?”
“Yes. But if it can come about through the will of the people, we should allow them to take action themselves. We simply need more time to see what will become of the Syndicate and what Blaken has in mind for it. What we took to be disorder may simply be their efforts to regroup.”
“All right. I’ll put my people back on standby. But we’ll continue monitoring the situation from here.”
“There’s something else. Iron has struck again.”
“What was it this time?”
“A mole inside our organization. He tried to take out a new recruit, but fortunately we got to him first.”
The voice on the other end of the phone sighed. “You have to be careful, Schwarzwald. The integrity of our organization depends on the integrity of our members.”
“I know that. And we’ll be doing everything we can to prevent something like this happening again. But unfortunately we can’t help a certain amount of vulnerability in opening our organization to new members, which is a necessity right now.”
“Just be careful. And keep me updated if anything more happens.”
“Of course. That is all for now.”
“Goodbye then.”
Schwarzwald hung up the phone, and leaned back in his chair and rubbed his eyes. He and his comrades had a lot to deal with right now, but at least he had been able to stop this war before it started. Actonia – and the Order of Glass – had enough trouble brewing without causing any more conflict.
**********
It had been quite a while since Dewey Novak had seen his boss so agitated. At least over something that didn’t involve taquitos or reality television.
“What in hell is going on around here?” she was bellowing, as he followed her through the halls of Comdot Estate. “I turn around for five seconds, and this entire country goes to hell! Goda and the Echelon were supposed to take care of the Syndicate once and for all, and you and Taredan were supposed to whip up support for me among the people. And what have we got now? The Syndicate is still on the loose, the people are blaming me for their own riots, Taredan is telling us off, and now I’ve got these fools trying to tell me that they’re pulling my strings and I’m just some sort of pawn. I mean gawd! Who the hell do they think I am?” She stopped for a moment, vaguely feeling like she had heard that phrase somewhere before, and then continued her tirade. “I’m Head Governor Ozzal, bitches! I own this country! I didn’t spend all those years clawing my way to the top just to be yanked around by some shady-ass hoodlums who think they’re smarter than me! I call the shots around here! Goda be damned! It’s my way or the highway! Rawwwr!”
Dewey sighed. “I can understand your frustration, Madam Governor. But perhaps your energy would be better put to use finding a way to rectify the situation rather than venting about it.”
“Oh, I’ll rectify the situation. I’ll rectify it so hard, Goda’s fugly head’ll explode.”
“You might also be more discreet about expressing such sentiments,” Dewey said wearily. “It should be clear by now that you can’t trust everyone who might be listening in here.”
“Hrmph. At least I know I can trust you. At least I’ve got SOMEone here who isn’t waiting to stab me in the back.” This, fortunately for Ozzal, was true enough. Dewey had risen with her through the ranks of the military, and she had no reason to question his loyalty. She also knew that she had the support of the military at large, should she need to lay down some smack. Which, given the fact that she could no longer rely on Goda’s Echelon, was a distinct possibility.
The two of them reached Ozzal’s office. “Shut the door,” she commanded. Dewey obliged, and Ozzal turned to him with a newly determined glare.
“Okay. Here’s what we’re going to do. Get me on a conference call to the Comedian senate. I want Georgie, Killface, Phantom Limb, Johnny Law and I. A. Coaster on the line. Call them out of their senate session if you have to. It’s time we stop talking about taking over the world and actually freaking do it.”
Less than an hour later, the five Comedian senators had been assembled. Not all of them were especially happy to be there, judging by the smileyindifferents they were giving Ozzal over the monitor.
“This had better be bloody important, Ozzal,” Killface snapped.
“You can go back to fixating on your billionaire playboy later,” Ozzal shot back. Killface narrowed his eyes and glowered. “Right now we’ve got some actual nefarious deeds to discuss.”
“I’m sure you recall our earlier conversations about the potential for a… transaction involving our two countries,” she continued. “At the time you were all quite interested, and I want to know if that’s still the case. If so, I believe it’s time to move our deliberations forward.”
The Comedians exchanged glances.
“You’re really serious about this, Ozzal?” Law asked. “It’s been a while since we’ve heard from you. We assumed you’d dropped the idea when you started having so much trouble with the Blacken Syndicate.”
“I’m not having any trouble with the Syndicate. Things are quite under control here,” Ozzal retorted, a slight edge in her voice belying her self-assured manner. “I simply don’t see any reason to keep dragging our feet on this. If – and I mean IF – there’s going to be any trouble with rebel factions here, it will be to our mutual benefit to have our plan well in motion before they can cause any real commotion.”
“So let me get this straight,” Georgie said. “You want us to take over your country, and add it to our territory. From an acquisitional standpoint, this seems advantageous for our economic situation and political standing… but what’s in it for you?”
“For Actonia, it means access to your resources. You’re wealthier than we are, and you know it.” It might have occurred to the others that the primary reason Actonia was in worse shape was that Ozzal had been running it into the ground for a year, but none of them were going to say so to her face. “For me personally?” She grinned. “I expect a suitably high position can be found for me in the new national government.”
The senators looked at each other again. They might not be especially fond of Ozzal, but they could see where she was coming from.
“Then how do you propose we proceed?” Phantom Limb asked. “I don’t suppose you’ve thought through an actual strategy for your little pipe dream…”
“As a matter of fact, I have.” Ozzal crossed her arms and tried to keep her eyebrow from twitching. Yet another idiot who underestimated her… “You can push a motion through the senate to invade Actonia. Like you’re taking advantage of the political turmoil over here to expand your territory. Then there will be nothing left for me and my embattled army to do but surrender to avoid more warfare. For the good of my people.” She smirked at the irony of the thought. “That’ll work, right?” she said, turning to Dewey.
“The people of Actonia won’t be happy about it,” Dewey replied. “But they won’t be happy about this no matter how you go about it. We’ll just have to convince them that this is in their own best interests. That you’re planning to take advantage of Comedia’s resources to restore Actonia’s infrastructure. At any rate, with reinforcements from Comedia’s army, there won’t be much the people can do about it.”
“There, then.” Ozzal turned back to the monitor. “If you gentlemen can come up with anything better, I’ll be happy to hear it. I want nothing more than for this to be beneficial for both of us.”
“It will of course take some time for us to deliberate on your offer,” Phantom Limb said. “But I think I can safely say that it is something worth considering.”
Georgie nodded. “It would be a great asset to Comedia to expand our hold on the region.”
“Not to mention a boost to our national pride to have our people believe we conquered Actonia,” added Coaster.
“All right, we’ll discuss it,” Killface said somewhat irritably. “We’ll get back to you when we have our answer.”
“Very well. I look forward to working with you,” Ozzal said with a smile.
The transmission was terminated, and Ozzal and Dewey were left alone again. Ozzal’s face was smug and defiant.
“I don’t know who you bastards are…” she said quietly and intently, “but you’re about to learn that Michelle Ozzal is nobody’s pawn.”
**********
Samson rolled over in his bed and looked to his nightstand.
2:30am.
He had been awake for two hours, and still couldn’t fall asleep. He rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling. Sighing, he raised his hand above him and clenched it into a fist. “Why can’t I get that traitor off my mind?”
Moonlight shone through his window on newspapers, pictures, and reports that were strewn about his room all over the floor, and on his computer in the corner of the room. The titles and headlines read like something out of a political thriller: “Mysterious organization linked with coup.” “Glass cross found at scene of assassination attempt.” “Agents vanish overnight.”
Samson turned his head and looked out the window. He could see the skyline of the tall buildings downtown. “Somewhere…” he whispered, “he’s out there somewhere.”
He couldn’t let this run his life anymore. The uncertainty, the questions, the doubts gnawing away at his conscience… it all had to end. And there was only one man who could answer those questions, and only one person he could rely on to find that man – himself. Hikki and Clarice didn’t understand, and for all he knew Jake had already turned against them too. This was his quest, and it was his responsibility to see it through. Tonight, if Samson had anything to say about it, the man who called himself Sadar would answer for his betrayal.
Samson got up out of bed and walked to his closet. He silently went through the motions of getting dressed, barely conscious of what he was putting on. When all that was left of his suit was the jacket, he straightened his dark purple tie and sat on his bed. Reaching underneath him, he pulled out a rather heavy shoebox. Inside were the tools he believed he would need for this task: a holster to go underneath his coat, and a pistol.
He loaded the weapon and inspected it. He almost never carried a gun, and he didn’t really like the idea of having to use it. But in his mind he would need whatever defense he could get against the untrustworthy priest. If he was unarmed and Sadar attacked him, it would be all over for him in an instant.
He holstered the gun under his arm and put his coat on. As he walked past the mirror on the wall, he looked away. He hadn’t cared at all about his appearance these past several days, and he didn’t want to know what he looked like as he set out on this grim mission.
He slowly walked down the hallway, trying to be as silent as possible so he wouldn’t wake anyone in the rooms around him. From Hikki’s room he could hear a sleepily muttered stream of meaningless French. As he walked past Clarice’s room, he felt a pang of guilt, and quickened his pace a little. But when he came to Anne’s room, he stopped and stared at the closed door. Finally he stood up straight and slowly opened the door, to get what in his mind might be the last look he would get of his beloved sister. He watched her for a while as she silently slept. He thought of the things he might have to do out there, that she had absolutely no idea about. The two of them had been through a lot. Whenever he was desperate somehow this little girl managed to pull him out of it. But now he was on his own.
He quietly closed the door, continued down the stairs to the front room, and picked his way through the rubble that had once been the front entrance to the cafe. He didn’t know exactly where he was going, but he knew his search had to begin now.
Samson walked down the dark streets of the city, turning his head to look in every alley he passed. He had been searching for what felt like hours, and it seemed that as time went on it was getting colder outside. As determined as he was to find Sadar, he had quickly realized that he had no idea where the man might actually be. The only lead he had was Warehouse 13, but when he arrived there he didn’t find a soul.
The sun was just coming up as Samson found himself walking through the park. The cold autumn air seemed to bite him as he walked down a stone path leading through a small group of trees whose leaves had begun to turn orange. This section of the park had fortunately escaped being torched, but Samson could still smell the burnt wood wafting through the air. It was almost like the smell of a fireplace on a cold day. He smiled as it reminded him of happier times with his sister, but he couldn’t allow himself to be distracted when he had to stay focused on his goal. He had to find Sadar, but after searching nearly the entire area he was beginning to think that it was impossible.
His mind started running through possible scenarios. Finding such a secretive organization was going to take more planning and work. The Syndicate had a few safe houses, so surely the Order of Glass must have a few of its own. Perhaps he could find an Order safe house by following someone with a cross around his neck… “No, no,” he thought. “Now I’m just thinking like an idiot… I’m so damn tired…” He ran a hand through his hair. “I just want to finish this once and for all. I’m so tired of this.”
“You’re out quite early. You must be looking for something important.”
Samson quickly turned around to see Sadar standing on the path behind him, with a smile on his face and his hands clasped behind his back. Samson froze, startled that he hadn’t noticed the man coming up behind him.
“Yeah… you might say that,” he said finally, eyeing the priest warily.
“Is it anything I can help you with?” Sadar asked genially.
“Actually…” Samson was beginning to regain his composure. “I’ve been out looking for you.”
“That’s funny, because I was just thinking about you,” Sadar laughed. “How fortuitous that we would come upon each other like this.”
“You wanted to see me? Why?” Samson’s face was coldly serious.
“Well, you’re awfully different from the last time I saw you…”
“Things change.”
“That they do, that they do.” Sadar nodded, looking a little introspective.
“Are you going to tell me what you want with me?”
“Well, I could ask you the same thing.” Sadar smiled. “But I don’t mind going first. I heard about what happened to you and your friends a little while ago. I wanted to make sure you were all right, and perhaps see if you would like to join our Order. You never answered that invitation I gave you.”
Samson shoved his hands in his pockets, and his fingers brushed against the glass cross Sadar had given him. “And just why would I want to join your ‘Order’?”
“Well, I know you’re very aware of how dangerous your situation has gotten lately, especially after what happened to you during that crackdown. And now that your sister Anne is with you, you have even more to worry about. She would be much safer if you were with the Order. The Order is neutral, so we don’t attract too much attention to ourselves… which helps keep our members, and our families, safe.”
“So you just sit back and pull strings from the shadows…”
Sadar smiled. “In a way, yes.”
Samson clenched his teeth. “So I guess it’s to be expected that you would run at the first sign of a real fight.”
Sadar furrowed his brow. “What?”
“You gave me that cross before you left. And after you left everything fell apart. You knew what was going to happen, didn’t you?”
The priest took a deep breath. So this was what had been bothering Samson.
“We anticipated that the military would make a move against the Syndicate. We had no way of knowing just how extensive it would be, but… yes, we saw it coming.”
“And instead of staying to help us, you ran away. You abandoned the people who trusted you and needed your support! For all we know, you wanted them to kill us all!”
“That’s not true, Samson. We don’t want to see anyone get killed.” Sadar sighed. “In the Order of Glass we live by the saying ‘No connections, no regrets.’ And so as much as I liked and respected you and your cause, when the orders came down, I had no choice but to retreat.”
“Is that what you do? Just listen to orders and back out on your friends? Were we even friends?!”
Sadar raised his hands defensively. “I would have been happy to consider you a friend, Samson. And sometimes I wish it could have turned out a different way. But the work that we do dictates that we stay as neutral as possible, and avoid getting too close to anyone we work with. My associates and I were already pushing it enough by staying involved with the Gunsmoke Syndicate branch for as long as we did. So any ties that we were imprudent enough to make had to be broken.”
“And that’s what you want me to do too, isn’t it.” Samson narrowed his eyes. “You expect me to leave everyone I care about, betray the Syndicate, just to join you?”
“Don’t think of it as a betrayal. Think of it as another way in which you can help your friends.”
“You mean help them the way you helped us when we were all getting arrested? When people were getting killed? Do you realize how many people we lost because you and your little pals were just sitting around watching instead of helping us fight?”
Sadar was silent for a moment. This tirade sounded very familiar… “That’s not something I’m happy about, or something I’m proud of. But in conflicts such as this, there are necessary sacrifices and people who are going to be lost. If you can’t come to terms with that, you might as well give up right now.”
“Yeah, well I’m not going to sacrifice my friends. And I’ll be damned if I’m going to give up and run away when they need me. You can act all high and mighty if you want to, and pretend like none of this affects you, but I have people I care about, and I’m staying right there with them, even if it gets me killed.”
He fished around in his pocket and pulled out the glass cross. “Here,” he said sharply, holding the cross out. “You can have this back. I don’t want it.”
Sadar took the cross from him somberly. “I had hoped that having you come to the Order would keep you safe, would help you avoid what you went through with the Echelon. But if that is how you feel, if you’re that sure that staying with the Syndicate is worth it, then you must follow what you believe in. I’m only sorry that we couldn’t leave this on better terms. You were a good man to work with.”
“And I’m sorry you turned out not to be the kind of man I thought you were. Have fun staying safe in your little glass tower. Maybe I’ll see you in hell.”
And with that, he turned and angrily strode away. Sadar watched him go, wishing that he could find something more to say, but knowing that nothing he could say would make any difference.
Samson walked back toward the cafe, feeling no more settled than when he had left, and even more mentally and physically exhausted. “That bastard,” he fumed. “I can’t believe he would ask me something like that after what he’s done. I knew I couldn’t trust him. He’s probably lying about everything. I’m going to have to work even harder to prove it.”
He walked in through the front door of the cafe to find Clarice sitting at a table near the corner, talking to someone on her cell phone. Samson went to the counter to get himself some coffee, overhearing her conversation.
“Yeah, I guess he just turned out to be really good at getting scoops. But he can’t publish everything he finds out, since Ozzal has to approve everything that goes into the Review. So he passes on the rest of it to that detective.” She paused and listened. “I know, it doesn’t seem like much. But that’s what she found out.” Pause. “I don’t know, maybe she just wanted to seduce the guy.” Pause. “Yeah, okay. Thanks, Cowboy.”
She hung up as Samson finished pouring his coffee. When he turned around, he saw her looking at her watch.
“It’s seven in the morning, Samson. Where have you been out to so early?”
“What do you care?” Samson snapped. “I haven’t been gone long.”
Clarice looked taken aback. “Sam, you’ve been gone since at least three am,” she said quietly. “I got up to go to the bathroom and your door was open and you weren’t inside.”
Samson looked away sullenly. “It’s nothing you have to worry about,” he said, not feeling like fighting about it. “Just leave me alone. I have work to do.”
She watched him go as he skulked up the stairs toward his room. She knew it was pointless to argue with him, but she wished there were some way she could help him find whatever it was he was looking for.
**********
Future Cille lay facing the wall on her makeshift bed in the hideout she shared with Landon. She had barely gotten any sleep after returning the previous night. She had almost considered just running away, but after wrestling with her thoughts for a couple of hours she decided that she couldn’t risk breaking away from him just yet. And so she put on her best poker face, and came back to report to him that the errand she had been on had taken her a little longer than she had anticipated. Fortunately he had seemed too preoccupied with the papers he was looking at to be concerned with the details of her mission, and she had retired to a sleepless night alone with her thoughts.
She took a deep breath and stretched out, rolling onto her back and looking up at the ceiling.
“Ah, you’re awake,” a voice said.
She looked sleepily over to see Landon putting on a coat.
“You’re going out?” she asked.
“I’ve got some things to take care of. I probably won’t be back until tonight.”
“All right. Is there anything you’d like me to do today?”
“Not especially. If you want to you can keep tabs on the news. I heard something about explosions near the park yesterday; you could look into that. Just make sure you don’t attract any attention if you go out.”
“Of course.” She had kept an extremely low profile since the report of her alter ego’s death had been published.
Landon headed out the door, leaving her alone again. She felt a certain sense of relief. As skilled as she had become at acting, she couldn’t help feeling a certain amount of apprehension over deceiving someone she had been so close to.
“Well…” she murmured to herself, “they didn’t call me DangerCille for nothing.”
A short time later she left the building, wearing a long black coat and black sunglasses. She walked past the park, taking stock of the burn damage and the wreckage of the surrounding buildings. There seemed to be a trail of destruction leading away from (or perhaps originally to) the park. She tracked it until she came upon what appeared to be its source – the storefront of what had been Luna’s cafe.
“Well then…” she said under her breath.
She stopped to pick up a newspaper from a vending machine on the corner of the block where the cafe was located. She scanned over the headlines on the front page, and then found the story about the explosions on the third page. Interestingly enough, the article didn’t mention who was responsible for the damage, and instead focused on the response from Comdot promising immediate attention and rehabilitation for the area.
Holding the opened newspaper in front of her, she sauntered down the sidewalk in the direction of the cafe. She sat down on a bench a short distance away, where she would have a clear view of the cafe across the street. Pretending to be very interested in some article on the top of the page, she inspected the building and the surrounding rubble. Judging from the way the debris was scattered, the initial explosion had come from inside the building, and then the source of the explosions must have continued on down the street toward the park.
She could see several people inside the cafe, presumably taking stock of the damage and discussing what to do about it. There was a cop car parked nearby, so obviously the event hadn’t escaped the attention of the authorities, despite the cavalier tone of the newspaper report.
A few minutes later two men came out of the cafe and headed toward her. Must be they were the cops who belonged to the car. DangerCille raised the newspaper back up in front of her face. As the voices came closer, she started to be able to make out what they were saying.
“Like hell they don’t know what happened. Gimme another croissant.”
“They did say they weren’t interested in pressing charges. So as far as the law is concerned, our work here is done. Not that you were doing any actual work…”
“Hey, I just wanted to see if that nice insurance girl could tell us anything. It’s just a coincidence that I happened to also get her number.”
“You’re lucky you didn’t get your head chewed off by her partner. She was shooting daggers at you the whole time.”
“Like I’ve ever let that stop me before.” There was a pause. “You know, I can’t help but feel like I’ve seen that kind of damage before.”
“You mean in that weapons shop that got blown a couple of weeks ago? You think this could be the same perp?”
“No… I mean in my office.”
A couple of car doors slammed, and a few moments later the car drove away.
DangerCille peered over the top of her newspaper. It looked like the coast was clear. She stood up, folded the paper under her arm, and started walking away from the cafe.
If Landon really considered her an adversary, then it was entirely possible that he was having her tailed. And she couldn’t afford for him to know about the meeting she was about to have. Fortunately, she knew every back alley and secret passageway in this city. Now she just had to hope that the one she needed actually existed in this time.
It took her several minutes to reach her destination, especially after adding a few detours as an extra precaution. Finally she came upon it: an old storage shed that seemed to have been forgotten by the previous owner, who had left it mostly filled with junk. She carefully worked her way through the piles of clutter until she came upon a clear space with a throw rug covering the worn floorboards.
If she was right, then Luna’s tunnel should still be here, leading into the basement of the cafe…
Beneath the rug she found what she was looking for, and the trap door yielded much more easily than the last time she had used it. She climbed down the ladder and made her way through the dark and narrow corridor, finally coming to what appeared to be a dead end. She felt along the edge of the wall until her fingers lit on a small indentation, and then a chunk of the wall sprang open in front of her.
“Hot damn.”
She eased herself through the hole into what indeed appeared to be the cafe basement. She smiled to herself, as it occurred to her that it would be a little while yet before anybody in this time would learn of her old friend’s smuggling operation.
There didn’t seem to be anyone around, which wasn’t surprising given the commotion upstairs. Cautiously and quietly she crept up the stairs and into the kitchen, which was also empty and thankfully unscathed aside from a layer of dust. She didn’t have to wait very long before Hikki came bustling into the room, wiping his hands on his apron. He froze when he saw her, and she gave him an amused smile.
“Hey. Can I get a blueberry muffin and some tea?”
“You… is it…” he stammered, not quite sure if he believed who was standing in front of him.
She took off her sunglasses and smiled at him slyly.
“Oh…” he murmured.
Just then Samson and Clarice walked through the door behind him, and were similarly taken aback at the sight of their visitor. She seemed pleased to see them.
“You guys got a minute? It’s important,” she said.
A few minutes later the four of them had congregated around a table in a back room.
“Is Eric here?” DangerCille asked. “He should hear this too…”
The others looked at each other, slightly dumbfounded. None of them had paid much attention to their guest since Jake had brought him to the cafe.
“Um… come to think of it… I did see him leave a few days ago,” Clarice finally remembered. “He said something about going out on a mission. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but I don’t think he’s been back since.”
“I see,” their visitor said. “Then I guess it’ll have to be just you three.”
“So you’re… you’re really who Landon said you were? You’re really Cille… FROM THE FUTURE!?” Samson asked.
Hikki and Clarice looked at him, wondering if he’d finally lost it. Their visitor laughed.
“I know it must be hard for you to think of me as your friend Cille,” she said. “I’d almost forgotten how much I’ve changed since you knew me.” For a moment she let her mind wander to memories of her past self. “If it makes it easier for you, you can call me DangerCille. I’m more used to that, anyway – that’s what everyone started calling me during the war after I turned badass.”
“So what exactly happened during this war?” Samson asked. “Landon hasn’t really told us anything about it.”
“That… would be kind of a long story,” DangerCille said with a wry smile. “Ultimately, though, Ozzal succeeded in taking over much of the world, and making most of its people miserable.”
“Yeah, that’s the part we know,” Samson said. “But how exactly did it happen? For someone who was supposedly going to be the key to our victory over Ozzal, you really haven’t told us anything about the future.”
“You’re right, we haven’t told you very much,” DangerCille replied. “For some reason after that first meeting we had, Landon decided that it would be better if I stayed out of sight, and he would pass my knowledge on to the rest of the group. I… presume he really hasn’t done that?”
“Not at all,” Clarice said. “All he’s done is pass down a few orders. We haven’t even seen him in person since that meeting.”
Samson frowned. Maybe he had been right to be skeptical of Landon.
“Hmm.” DangerCille looked thoughtful. “Well… I guess I have quite a bit of ground to cover,” she said. “But the first thing I have to tell you is… I’m sorry.”
“Sorry? For what could you be sorry?” Hikki asked. “You came here to help us, no?”
“There’s a lot that you don’t know… about the future, about me… and about Landon,” she said evenly. “I came back to help you, yes… but it’s because I made a terrible mistake that cost us everything. It’s… my fault that the Syndicate failed.”
“What do you mean?” Hikki asked.
She took a deep breath and sighed. “In my past, at a time a little bit before where we are now, Landon came back to lead the rebellion. I had only recently come to the Syndicate, after hearing that Landon had been captured and Raef had been kidnapped. You know how that happened, and how it turned out – Landon’s capture was a ruse, and Raef was successfully rescued.”
The others nodded.
“But in my time, Landon made himself known shortly after your rescue mission in Comdot. And he and I… well, as you know, we were engaged at one time… and we became involved again. I became what you might call his second-in-command, despite the fact that I was pretty much a total n00b.” She shook her head and smiled wryly at her own folly. “I was so determined to make a difference and live up to what I thought he expected of me, that I started taking on way more than I could handle. I wanted to know everything about the Syndicate, and I made sure I had a hand in every decision that we made. Landon was so brilliant, and we all looked up to him as our hero. And I wanted so badly to be his match. But what I saw as the desire to help my comrades was really just hubris… and that was what brought us all down.”
“What happened?” Clarice asked gently.
“Under Landon’s leadership, we started working against Ozzal more boldly, which of course got her attention again. She started looking for ways to eliminate the Syndicate, but Landon was too smart for her. And then, the night before we were going to mount a huge offensive, I was captured by Ozzal’s men and imprisoned in Comdot.” She paused and looked down. “They tortured me… and I totally cracked. I told them everything they wanted to know. And so the next evening when the Syndicate was assembled to prepare for their mission, the Echelon and Ozzal’s military police knew exactly where to find them.”
She paused, and the others exchanged worried looks.
“Many of my comrades died that night… including Landon,” DangerCille finally confessed. “Some of them got out alive, but too many of them didn’t. And without a strong leader… without Landon, the Syndicate was hopeless. The rest of us tried to regroup, but we just didn’t know what to do. I even tried to take the lead again, to get the group back on track, but I just couldn’t handle it. And after the others found out that I was the one who had given up that information to Ozzal, it was a long time before they could even think about forgiving me. I think some of them never did, even though I did eventually grow into a capable fighter and leader.”
“Wait, so you were able to escape from Comdot?” Clarice asked.
“They let me go, actually,” DangerCille answered. “I don’t know why they let me live… maybe it was a twisted kind of ‘thank you’ for helping them out, or maybe they knew how little of a threat I really was to them. Or maybe they figured that living with the knowledge of what I had done was punishment enough. Which… was probably true.”
There was a silence as the others looked at her sympathetically.
“But,” she continued, taking a deep breath to pull herself together, “we did manage to carry on with what small forces we had, and the rebellion in its essence continued. Unfortunately, we became so disorganized and fractured that Ozzal had very little trouble running right over us on her way to conquering the world. And so finally, when we realized that there was no hope left for us, our last desperate option was to try to alter the path that had brought us to that end. And so I was sent back in time to stop myself from making that fatal mistake, and to do whatever I could to protect Landon’s life. I came back to a point just before he was set to return to the Syndicate, and I was able to convince him to… take certain steps in preparation for retaking control of the organization. And I hoped that that would be enough to change the course of events that originally led to our defeat.”
She gave them a few moments to absorb the story, which must have been as hard for them to hear as it was for her to tell.
Finally Hikki cleared his throat nervously. “So… you mean… zat some of us die een zees future of yours?”
“Yes, that’s what happened,” she replied sadly.
“Do we die? Me, and Clarice, and Sammie?”
DangerCille looked at each of them in turn, as they all looked back at her expectantly. Then, feeling conflicted, she looked down and seemed to be making a hard choice. The truth was, all three of them had died in that ambush, along with Cougar and many of their other friends. But she couldn’t bring herself to let them know that.
“I’m sorry…” she said at last. “I shouldn’t… I shouldn’t tell you that. It would be too difficult for you… and if I’ve been at all successful, it won’t even come to pass the way it did for me. I haven’t even told Landon about his own death… I think I was just too afraid that he would never forgive me if he knew. All he knows is that I somehow caused the Syndicate to fail.”
“There’s something I don’t understand,” Samson said. “You said that the big tragedy that caused the downfall of the Syndicate was when the Echelon ambushed us, and that was what you came back in time to stop. But the Echelon did come after us. You saw that, didn’t you? They arrested a whole bunch of us, and some people were even killed.”
DangerCille shook her head. “That was different. They weren’t trying to wipe you out; they just wanted to make a statement to the people – a show of force to prove that the Syndicate was no threat. And more importantly, Landon wasn’t in a position where he could be killed, because he hadn’t come forward yet. And preserving Landon’s life was the most important part of what I came here to do, because it was his death that threw us into chaos. Without him to lead us –“ An idea seemed to flash before her eyes, as she made a connection to what she had learned the previous night. “Unless… it wasn’t him at all…”
The others looked at her with concern, not sure what she was thinking.
“D – DangerCille?” Hikki said uncertainly.
She looked back up at them as if with a new understanding of their situation. “I told you before that there was a lot you didn’t know about Landon,” she said. “And I didn’t know it until just recently, either. But… it’s possible that we were wrong about what losing him meant to the Syndicate’s future. Because the truth is, and what I actually came here to tell you, was that Landon isn’t who he appears to be.”
“What do you mean?” Clarice asked.
“I’m not entirely sure what’s going on with him myself. But he’s got this other group, that’s apparently involved in some kind of shady research. I don’t know too much about them, except that there’s someone named ‘Da Sombras’ who sounded like Landon’s boss or partner. But it seems that the Syndicate is only a diversion for him, and his true loyalties lie with this other group. And… he’s not above sacrificing any of us if he thinks we’re in his way. Including me.”
Samson narrowed his eyes. “Then we can’t trust Landon either?”
“It seems that way,” DangerCille answered. “At the very least, you should be very careful with him. Without knowing just what he’s after with this other group, I have to question just how genuinely he is on our side. But I wanted to let you know what I had found out, so that you’re aware of his duplicity. We may need to be prepared to take the revolution back into our own hands.”
“Does he know you’re here? I mean, does Landon know that you’re in on his secret?” Samson asked.
“No. At least I don’t believe so. I’m doing my best to cover my tracks, so hopefully he should have no reason to suspect me. I can handle myself, but you should be very careful yourselves. And it goes without saying that I was never here.”
“Of course,” Hikki said. “I seenk we all undairstand how serious zees ees. And we shall carefully conseeder what may be ze best course of action for us to take.”
His counterparts nodded.
“All right then… I think my business here is done,” DangerCille said. “I… hope it wasn’t too heavy for you all.”
“We’ll… probably manage,” Clarice said, still looking a little unnerved.
DangerCille smiled a little, and stood up to go.
“May I offair you some asseestance to make your way outside?” Hikki asked, rising from his seat. “Ze way ees slightly obstructed…”
“I can show myself out. Thanks.”
She headed toward the door.
“Oh hey…” she said, turning back to them. “What happened to the cafe?”
The others exchanged weary looks. “Um… just a… minor eenceedent yesterday,” Hikki answered. “Nossing to worry about… too much…”
“Okay then,” DangerCille said, still slightly puzzled, but not enough to press the matter. “Take it easy.”
And then she was gone, leaving the three revolutionaries alone to discuss the startling information she had given them. If their leader really was planning to betray them or was otherwise untrustworthy, and if it were true that the Syndicate might be doomed without him, then it might be up to them to become the heroes who would carry the revolution forward.
Chapter 32 author’s notes:
Recurring characters:
Emiri - _Boxers_
*Heero Yuy – HeeroYuy135 (the “him” Emiri killed)
Hikki Follet – Kohikki
Clarice Rowe – QueenoftheDorks
Samson Monroe – MasterSamson
Captain Yemman – myname
Landon Blaken – Blah_canbespanish
Michelle Ozzal – Mike Lazzo
Da Sombras – Shadowstaarr
Cille Compton – Cille
*Raef Compton – Maenos
*Eric Ominae – OMNI-Enforcer
DangerCille – Cille
Dino – SwimOdin
Elizabeth Saurie St. Gaurdsmen – EdSpikeSesshyGirl
Father John Sadar – FurionTassadar
Starry Ozzal – starryjelly
Larry Zorin – LAZY17
*Amy – Amalgam
*Professor M. Matrix – matrixman124
*Major Tom Taredan – Metatronda
*Jake Thompson – SportsMaster
*Anne Monroe – herself
*Yupat – yupat
*Angel Sarcasta – mgangel1124
Keith Douglas – k_dawg_3484
*Cowboy – CowboyCadenza
Allen Black – AlastourBlaque
*Goose Maverick – Top_Gun (the “perp” who wrecked the weapon shop and is currently on the lam)
*Luna Monegossde – MoonGoddess17
Roy Mustang – Fullmetal Alchemist
*Riza “Hawkeye” Yuy – Fullmetal Alchemist
Izuru Kira – Bleach
Jean Havoc – Fullmetal Alchemist
Kazuma – s-CRY-ed
*Ishida – Bleach (the “jerk with the glasses”)
Straight Cougar – s-CRY-ed
*Greed – Fullmetal Alchemist
*Tres – Trinity Blood
*Gauron – Full Metal Panic!
*Ritsuko Akagi – Neon Genesis Evangelion
*Shou Tucker – Fullmetal Alchemist (the two scientists working with the Cool Mexicanos)
Goda – Ghost in the Shell: 2nd Gig
Scheris Adjani – s-CRY-ed
Urizane – s-CRY-ed
*Ryuho – s-CRY-ed
Dars – s-CRY-ed
Alan Gabriel – Big O
*Kisuke Urahara – Bleach
Schwarzwald – Big O
Dr. Girlfriend – Venture Brothers
Dewey Novak – Eureka udok
New characters:
*Slik the Bandit – theSLiKbandit
*Liam Green – lithium_green
Johnny Law – Johnny_Law
I. A. Coaster – itsacoaster
*Budou Kiba – Samurai Champloo (the chick who rolled Kazuma and Yemman)
Yoruichi Shihouin – Bleach
Georgie – Crayon Shin-chan
Killface – Frisky Dingo
Phantom Limb – Venture Brothers
*Xander Crews – Frisky Dingo (Killface’s “billionaire playboy”)
*Milly Thompson – Trigun (Keith’s “nice insurance girl”)
*Meryl Stryfe – Trigun (her partner)
*Characters marked with an asterisk are mentioned in this chapter but do not have an active role in the story.
References:
Mateba revolver – the type of firearm used by Togusa in Ghost in the Shell
“You have to be like water” – Spike’s fighting philosophy in Cowboy Bebop
“To catch a fish, you have to think like a fish” – advice given to Jin by a wacky fisherman dude in Samurai Champloo
Thanks to Blah for coming up with the ideas that inspired much of Landon’s backstory.