Abominations Read online

  “I could say that no one could expect to do any better, but Miss Farris here managed well enough, no one got past her...” The armored people took up positions around the building while they spoke, the smallest of them walked over finally and took the helmet of the armor off, a dull gray metal that reminded Gwen of the sphere that she had to focus on to power the stove in color.

  A woman's head appeared from the armor, the whole thing looking suddenly out of proportion, now that something as normal as a human head stuck out of it. Sweat beaded her forehead, but she didn't wipe at it, probably because the only thing she had to work with would be the back of her metal glove at the moment.

  Darrick recounted the story for the woman, without waiting to be prompted. Then Beth and Kelvin chimed in with what happened from their perspective. When they finished everyone turned to her expectantly, so she tried to fill in everything as precisely as possible, since everyone else had too.

  She left in everything, including how she didn't know how to use the weapons at first, thinking that these obviously hardened combat troops might get a laugh out of it, even if they waited until later to do it. At the moment, if anyone even smiled at her story, they did it with their helmets still on, because she didn't see anything.

  “Wait...” The armored woman in front of her held up a gloved hand. “You noticed that the Saracen's focus sword, something you'd never even heard of before, cut the beam, so you immediately shot him in the legs?”

  Gwen shook her head. “Not immediately, no, it took two or three shots to realize what was happening.” Then she continued through to the part where the others had come into the room and she'd been hoping they were the backup. “Because that armor looks tough. I don't think I could take any of you... Especially unarmed.”

  The whole room had turned to look at her, then at the bodies on the floor. No one said anything, they just collected information it seemed. It turned out that everyone but her in the room and one other man, in a greenish silver armor was a Westmorland. Most of the people that could power the armor well enough for combat either didn't want to serve with them or didn't want to enlist at all. There was more money in being a high powered mage it seemed. That their six person team had even one non-Westmorland made them special, an exception, Beth and Darrick both let her know.

  It seemed to Gwen that someone had wanted the doctor pretty badly, to put together a team of mercenaries to try and liberate her from them. They may not have known who all would be there, but they'd come loaded for bear, she told the room.

  They knew what bears were, but had no clue what had been loaded. She let it go instead of trying to explain, restating it.

  “They came prepared to fight more than what we actually had ready to face them with, I mean, all to get the doctor away. Why? How much would a team like that cost to hire and who could afford it? Were they already in the country, waiting to go or were they brought in? I guess I don't even have to say such things out loud here, you know what to ask better than I do. I must be tired. Sorry...”

  The armored woman, obviously someone special, the team leader possibly, waived her apology away and told her to go on. Kelvin had gone into a blank looking state, similar to the one Beth had worn the first few times she'd seen her. Gwen listed off every question she could think of for the man. When she ran out of sensible questions she went silent and waited.

  “Given all current information, there is a seventy-three percent chance that the Duke of Aubry directly ordered this action. A twelve percent chance that someone in his immediate organization did it for him, believing it would protect him from harm or harassment. A nine percent chance that Doctor Debussey contracted them herself as a contingency plan, if so, she most likely traded services for the insurance toward a future date, the monetary cost being too high for her known income, though unknown income is a possibility. The remaining six percent is taken up by a series of less and less likely scenarios. Including happenstance and incorrect targeting on the part of the mercenaries.”

  Seeing that Kelvin had run through the calculation, Darrick asked him to return to A-state. Which apparently got him back to normal.

  They talked for a while about what to do next. They couldn't pursue a Duke directly, the King simply wouldn't allow it. Even the huge likelihood of this having been him wouldn't be enough to go after the man. They clearly felt like this obstacle would be insurmountable.

  “Well, then, why go after him at all? We had Debussey and know that someone was afraid enough of what she'd say that they did all this. Is she protected, even if she's with a Duke? And if a Duke's hiding her, doesn't that point enough of a finger at him for a real investigation? Even if we can't take him down, if enough eyes turn on him, it may keep him from trying to reorganize this... cult or whatever it was that keeps trying to sacrifice people, right?”

  Even though they all nodded at her, no one really looked like they had a lot of confidence in that plan. Short of killing the guy, and they didn't know he'd even really done anything, just been a part of the group at some point maybe, if that wasn't a trick, what else could they do?

  Darrick smiled at her grimly and mentioned that it would be best not to even hint at assassination around this group, being that they made up a portion of the royal protection unit, though he did appreciate that she'd been speaking against the idea, at least for now. The armored woman's head bobbed in agreement with the older man's advice.

  It turned out to be Beth that explained the situation to her clearly enough for her to understand. “You see, Gwen, here, as long as a duke doesn't directly threaten the life or power of the King, they can do about anything they want. Oh, best to not cause too much of a stir, keep things out of the public eye, but ultimately? The duke could very well have ordered this and not even have to pay a fine for it. Aubry is a large power in the kingdom too, so we won't just get a sanction from the king, like we did with Baron Richter Mathews.”

  Gwen blinked.

  “I thought his first name was just Baron.” Well, that could be complicated then, she wondered what the special service would do about it, tensing slightly.

  Darrick, wiping at the blood with a handkerchief smiled grimly.

  “Landless Baron. Still, we had to put in the paperwork and the king signed off on it personally. Otherwise he'd have been protected too. At least after the fact. The idea of someone sacrificing people to raise some kind of ancient “god library” isn't something that thrills the king, thankfully.”

  Beth shook herself and kept speaking, this time looking at Darrick and the woman in armor.

  “Something I picked up from Debussey though... She doesn't intend to simply raise enough power to call these old gods up and ask them a few questions for academic purposes, she intends to bring them back and be well rewarded for her efforts. If the duke can be shown to know about that, then the king might find this worth an investigation. After all, the destruction of the world with a madwoman put in power of the ruins is probably enough of a threat to the king to count, yes?”

  The armored woman closed her eyes briefly.

  “Yes, that would do it alright.”

  Chapter twenty-seven

  It took the whole night and part of the morning to get everything that could be done in motion as far as the search for Debussey went. A Westmorland, Darren, had been contacted over the telestator and given all the information they had on the woman. His job right now consisted mainly of finding people's locations, but he could do other things too, they told Gwen after the connection had been cut. For some reason they kept what exactly these other things were very vague. They spoke of him with amusement... and a bit of awe.

  Beth grinned and told her, “Gwen, Darren is... special. He does things that no one really thinks should be possible at all and does them constantly. If anyone can find her, he can.”

  At about ten in the morning, Darrick, who seemed to be in charge of the investigation now that an important duke had become involved, let them go home to get some sleep, request
ing that they both remain available in case something requiring their individual skills came up.

  In the back of the white lorrie that James brought for them, Gwen turned to Beth and raised an eyebrow. “Since when do I have skills that may be needed? I doubt anyone here needs my great crystal charging abilities, right? And while I guess I did OK in that fight back there, most of that had to do with those Saracens hesitating instead of hitting or killing a woman, I think. If it wasn't for that, I'd be dead right now. Though if you guys need a web-site, I'm all over it.”

  Bethany laughed and leaned into her companionably. She rested her head on Gwen's shoulder and murmured sleepily that Darrick had just given her the same speech that any Westmorland in charge of an operation gave all the others involved each time they parted.

  “It just means that he forgot you weren't one of us, is all. Don't take offense. It was a long night for everyone...”

  Take offense? She thought, keeping the words to herself. That someone she'd just met had thought her competent enough to count as one of an elite group of what amounted to super-soldiers? She supposed that some people here would be offended. The stigma of the group being so great that being included would be off-putting. Maybe stupid people would think that or hate-blinded bigots.

  In truth it felt a little off-putting to her too, she realized, but only because she'd never had that happen to her before. Being included in a group like that. Any group. The closest she'd come to that before was the way that the Vernors treated her, or maybe the crew of the Peregrine. She'd been a medical subject, with a group around her, true. Even the head of web-design projects, but those were all done at a remove, online, so no one ever saw her face.

  This felt different. Darrick, even though tired and mistaken, had included her. That kind of thing would take time for her to get used to. For right now she had to hang on to consciousness until after they got home, exhaustion pushing at her, trying to drag her into sleep.

  In the apartment itself, a horrible thought occurred to Gwen. If this were a movie or even a videogame, then Debussey would be coming after them as they slept, when their guard went down. Probably in the bathroom. Yeah, they always waited for you to take a shower for some reason. When Bethany went to take a nap, Gwen blearily sat on the sofa in the living room, clutching a kitchen knife, just in case something happened.

  Nothing did of course, until around six in the evening, when Wilbur came to check on them. Bethany opened the door cautiously, after staring at it for a few seconds. “It's Constabulary Detective Wilbur.” Gwen realized that the woman had checked who stood there telepathically and the words had more to do with letting Gwen have time to hide the knife in her hand than not wanting to open the door.

  “Good to see you too, Miss Westmorland!” He did sound enthused and after the door closed behind him gave the woman an immodest hug. Bethany looked at the man kindly for a second then stood back, remembering that Gwen still sat on the sofa.

  “Hey... um... I've been up for a while now, you two up to standing guard while I try to sleep?” Gwen stood, knife in hand, making Wilbur's eyes go wide. Bethany smiled and gave her a playful wink, then told her that they could indeed stand watch for her.

  She slept for a while, dreaming of death and how many people she'd killed the day before. Body after body hit the floor as she pointed a broom handle at them saying “bang, you're dead,” to each one in turn. Finally a man came with a big knife, a scimitar, like the sword she'd seen earlier, this time made out of gray plastic. Her broom pointing powers weren't enough for him, because every time she said, “bang, you're dead,” he stopped her by calling out that he had an invisible force field.

  When she woke, it was with a start, wracked with a horrible sense of guilt over the men she'd killed. Tears flowed down her face, she kept the sobbing in so that she wouldn't concern Beth or Wilbur in the other room. After a couple hours of this, a soft knock came at the door.

  “Miss Farris,” came Wilbur's voice, sounding slightly amused. “There's someone for you at the door...”

  Gwen got up, realizing that she hadn't even changed out of her clothes from the day, no, two days before. She hoped it wasn't anyone she needed to impress, because that didn't really feel possible right now. Her eyes would still be puffy, from all the crying, even if her face was dry.

  She went out cautiously, still clutching the knife she noticed, which she must have picked up from her table while she slept. It amazed her that she hadn't cut herself somehow. When she got to the door, two masked men dressed in the all black uniforms that the Saracen mercenaries had worn the night before rushed her, swords drawn.

  She fought on instinct then, slashing with the ten inch kitchen knife as they moved toward her. As before, the men paused slightly before engaging, giving her a chance to jump to the side and cut first the one closest to her on the arm and then, using his body as a battering ram and shield all in one, as he responded to the pain, she slammed the other into the wall using the injured man.

  Slam, it turned out, was too generous a term. Nudged him into the wall seemed closer to the truth, as it didn't even stun the man. It did tie up his arms long enough for her to reach over the shoulder of the man she'd pushed into him and slash him across the eyes with the knife as hard as she could. He screamed.

  Reversing directions suddenly she drew the knife over the neck of the closer man for good measure, since he'd started to resist now, his momentary shock having worn off. The blade cut deep across the right side of his neck, finally rasping on bone, large splashes of blood going everywhere. She cut him across the face on her backslash, going for his eyes but missing. He fell to the floor and stopped making noise. She turned and kicked the now blinded man into the wall, which did a lot more than the little nudge she'd managed earlier, and cut downward across his neck as well, at an angle, slicing deep with the knife.

  Wilbur stood in the middle of the room, naked from the waist down, wearing no shoes, just a pair of brown socks. On the same sofa where Gwen had waited trying to stand guard earlier, Bethany lay naked, face down, tied up with rope in some kind of complicated fashion, her arms and legs under her, pushing her rear up into the air.

  After a moment, Gwen saw movement from behind and to the left of Wilbur. At first she thought it was Debussey, come to stop them from looking into the duke, but finally she made out who it actually was.

  Emma Forster.

  The undergrad that they'd already cleared and suggested to Debussey she take under her wing. Well, Gwen reflected a bit bitterly, that worked out.

  She didn't bother to think about what to do next, she threw her knife at Emma to distract her, knowing that it wouldn't do much – if any – damage. Knife throwing was more art than fighting skill she knew, since she'd practiced it for a while. It looked cool in movies, but the odds of a knife hitting and sticking in a real target were about twenty percent. These odds didn't go up much when you got better against targets either, the trick involved control of the throwing distance and the spin of the blade in the air. Besides, this knife had a rounded tip. Gwen just wanted Emma to focus on ducking out of the way – in case the woman turned out to be armed – while she rushed Wilbur, hitting him in the jaw as hard as she could with the palm of her right hand, pulling on his shirt front with the other. Because of her forward momentum, the whole move proved to be more than a little awkward, but the large man went down and stayed on the floor without moving.

  Emma had a small silver rectangle in her hand, like the one Darrick had used the night before. She brought it up as if to fire on Gwen, or whatever the thing did. It didn't make any noise or flash or anything, if she remembered correctly, people just fell down and died when Darrick had used his. Nothing happened, so Gwen flew at the slightly smaller woman, a novelty in her life, fighting someone that didn't outweigh her significantly, and began to beat her, mainly blows to the head, using palms, elbows and knees. After a minute of this, the woman stopped fighting even weakly, allowing Gwen a clean kick to the back of her h
ead as she lay on the ground.

  She picked up the silver weapon and slipped it into her pocket, then retrieved the knife from the floor and cut the ropes that bound Bethany. Gwen helped her remove the gag that prevented her from speaking.

  “Wilbur was already under when he got here. I should have known something was up when he wanted to tie me up before sex. I resisted a little, but, well, I figured he was just being playful or something, so I didn't want to get too loud and disturb you. Then Miss Forster there came in. We need to bind them both, gags too. I don't think Wilbur knows any mesmerism, but who knows what they've been putting in his head. Then we need to call in Darrick and the others.” Bethany's head hung for a moment.

  “I'm so sorry, Gwen! I thought you were just being paranoid, insisting on a guard like that. I didn't think that Wallace could be compromised. He seemed fine at the door! Totally normal, only thinking about having come to see me and maybe... well. Yes.”