Redemption (The Alliance Series Book 1) Page 2

  I leaned back in my chair, intent on getting a little rest. I can throw a lot of lightning around with small problems, but snatching up a few tons of pavement and making a centaur ramp, on the fly, takes a lot out of a guy.

  "You know I would go with you anywhere. We've been through too much together. I just have to know what you think the likelihood is of us getting to D.C., getting in touch with the Col., of him actually being able to help and getting out alive again is?"

  "On a scale of one to ten? One being dead meat, ten being home scott free?" I asked.

  "Yeah, whadya think?" Nathan looked at me sideways while still keeping his concentration on the road. We switched a few miles back in anticipation of me needing some rest.

  "Oh, I'd say honestly, point oh five." I grumbled.

  "So, you're saying we at least have a chance." He said.

  "You know you don't have to go with me. If you wanna bail I'd understand. I mean this is a whole lot bigger than sneaking out of our barracks during training and hitting the bars." I looked at him with a small smile and said.

  "You could always go back to being the second in line for shaman gig."

  Nathan smiled back, “I just don't see myself dancing all day for rain, you know?"

  "Besides, who would keep your skinny ass from getting skewered by six feet of centaur sword?"

  "So, you really think we can trust the Col.?" Nathan asked changing subjects.

  "I know you don't trust him like I do, but the guy took me in and raised me like a son." I answered.

  "He taught me everything I know about magic. I trust him."

  "He also taught you how to kill people without a second thought." Nathan pressed.

  I looked at him with irritation, drawing lower in my seat. I tried to ignore the wind that assaulted me as it came in from the broken windows.

  Nathan shrugged his shoulders non-apologetically, "I'm just saying."

  Once I closed my eyes the past events that led me to be in this beat up Neon, with no windows, kept playing out in my head like a broken record.

  I kept seeing faces of men, twisted faces of pain and anguish. Faces of the targets I was supposed to eliminate, a mother and daughter of Asian descent. Dark raven black hair, so black it looked blue. Scared, with desperation in their eyes looking at me with fear and hope...

  Chapter 4

  The hatch slammed shut. Everything is louder in a ship.

  I guess that wouldn't be accurate, it wasn't a ship so much as an aircraft carrier. Describing it as a ship just doesn't do it justice. The U.S.S. Enterprise, the pride of the Navy, a massive aircraft carrier with the latest in air defense on board. She carried the F-22 Raptor, capable of vertical takeoff and stealth attacks, the AH-64 Apache Longbow, capable of low level sneak attacks and enough firepower to level a small city, not to mention a few top secret aircraft. The ones that no one sees or hears but claims to have spotted them hovering over a city street, you know, the black helicopters.

  Yes, they exist and they are pretty cool.

  Turning the lock to ensure the hatch was secured, Chief Anderson, a short man with hairy arms and a bushy mustache, nodded to Nathan.

  Nathan got up, went to the door and made a few quick motions with his fingers and said something under his breath that I couldn’t quite hear. Nathan’s magic is more complicated than mine. He uses words and hand motions to help formulate his spells. The ones that were more delicate or complicated used more focus. He has, working with me, had to learn to create shields quickly and often and has gotten those down without the use of added focusing techniques. Creating a sound dampening field is more complex.

  My ears popped, like they do when you go up in altitude.

  I knew his sound proofing had worked. No one could hear us outside of this room and no sound could pass from inside the room to outside by means of a bug or listening device. Magic doesn’t ruin electronics unless it’s directed for that purpose but it can, when engineered properly; disrupt the effectiveness of a listening device if it's meant to.

  Nathan meant to.

  "All set." Nathan said, sitting down in front of me in the briefing room.

  Chief Anderson nodded and said. "All right gentlemen, you know the drill."

  "Standard operation objective, we have Intel reports that a South Asian green dragon and her hatchling have infiltrated the highest levels of the North Korean hierarchy and are goading Kim Jong into attacking South Korea."

  "We have confirmed reports of nuclear testing underground with positive detonation of a low level warhead."

  "Kim is attempting to build a long range missile capable of reaching Honolulu and maybe San Francisco."

  "We have tracked the movements of the dragons and have followed them to a house in San Francisco’s China town. We believe they are here in order to get finalized weapons guidance systems. We don't know who their suppliers are and hope this operation may shed some light on that."

  "We are under orders to infiltrate the dragon’s home, gather Intel and then dispose of the targets or vice versa, with extreme prejudice."

  "Remember, the greens love acid. It can eat through three inches of steel in under eight seconds, nasty stuff. Make it quick and clean, come home in one piece. Any further questions about tactical arrangements or personnel please direct to Sgt. Brookes here. Thank you and God speed."

  Nathan turned around to me and said, "Green dragon? You up for a lizard hunt?"

  Dragons are a nasty bunch. Sure, there may be an exception to the rule, a dragon that is nice and just wants to live in peace. I haven't met one. To be fair I have only come into contact with one other dragon, a European red. He was in human form and had established a large trading firm that was involved in the shady banking deals that caused a huge problem for economies worldwide. He walked away making billions. I'm still hoping I can settle that particular score.

  "I could use a new pair of boots." I said. Nathan smiled and relaxed back into his seat.

  He always did relax best when under pressure. I admired him for that.

  "Sgt. Brookes?" I asked.

  Sgt. Brookes looked up from her notes, apparently reading more Intel material.

  She was an attractive woman. Hard to see with her uniform on, but you could tell none the same.

  Evidenced by her glasses and no nonsense expression she was only interested in getting the job done. I could understand that.

  "Yes, captain?" she responded.

  "Dragons have hides thicker and tougher than the chief’s skull. Have we acquired the needed ammunitions to pierce the dragon’s scales? Without that we might as well throw rocks at her." I said.

  "Yes captain, we have issued nine rounds of .44 caliber armor piercing Arthur bullets, to both the Lt. and yourself." She said very crisply.

  Arthur rounds were badass. They were designed after the instructions found in King Arthur’s diary. Do kings keep a diary? Let’s call them his notes. King Arthur, with the help of Merlin, of course, perfected the technique for making weapons that could get through dragons scales. They were expensive and hard to manufacture. Of course the U.S. military had to adapt them to fit bullets which made them more expensive and even harder to get. With the defense budget we had, no one would notice 55,000 dollars, per shell.

  "Is there anything else captain?" Sgt. Brookes asked.

  "Yeah, what are you doing after you get off this rust bucket?" I asked.

  Sgt. Brookes looked at me with not the slightest hint of amusement. She gathered up her notes and walked out of the briefing room effectively disrupting the containment field Nathan had established.

  "Damn she's cold." Said Nathan, "Or maybe your just a sorry sack?" He added.

  "I have a way with people." I replied.

  Chapter 5

  Five hours later, in a rundown Asian market, Nathan and I had set up our reconnaissance site.

  We were above an all-night food court that sold everything from yesterday’s fresh catch to unrecognizable meat that I swore used to
wear a name tag that said Fido.

  All in all the smell wasn't that bad, but the traffic it presented kept us effectively hidden in plain sight.

  We had high powered scopes set up and were watching a house that was actually rather nice for this part of town. You could occasionally hear the telltale bells of the trolleys that ran up and down San Francisco’s streets.

  "I have a positive I.D. on green lady" I said.

  Looking through my scope and into the house’s kitchen I could see a middle aged women chopping up vegetables in preparation for a meal. She matched the description of our green lady as she was in human form.

  Dragons are really big lizards so it's hard for them to fit into society when they send everyone screaming and running down the road. That's why they use glamour and appear in human form. They basically shrink and compact their mass into a smaller vessel, giving them massive amounts of strength and strong, dense bones.

  As if they weren't hard enough to kill in dragon form. They can also revert back in an instant and commence to whooping ass if they feel threatened, or if they just choose to. This is where the Arthur rounds come in handy. They can pierce the scales and the dense skin.

  "Roger that, I have a positive I.D. on green girl." Said Nathan through our headsets; we had the real cool kind that you could hardly see. Small little earpieces that allowed us constant radio contact while giving us the use of both hands.

  "Can you get us an audio link? I'd like to hear what they are saying." I asked.

  Nathan looked at me with as if I had said something rude.

  He walked away from the scope to another window on the left of his and sat down, well, Indian style.

  I could feel him beginning to gather his energy and felt it when he released his spell. When he was done I could hear the conversation going on across the street as if I was in the room. I held up my hand and gave Nathan a thumbs up. He went over to a bag and started eating an apple he had in it.

  "Why are you making dinner? We have to get out of here they know we know something. They are going to come after us." I heard the young girl say.

  "We can't do anything that would make them suspicious. It would just set them off. Of course we are going to leave; I have already made contact with someone who can get us out of here. We have to wait until tomorrow when they’ll be able to help. Just one more night, that's it, and then we can leave." The green lady said.

  I could hear what sounded like someone rummaging around moving clothes or fabric. Packing, maybe?

  "What are you doing with all that? We need to be able to get out in a hurry. I have some cash that will get us out and then we can worry about the rest once were safe. We can always replace our jewelry and trinkets." Green lady said.

  What?

  She didn't just say that. I mean we were talking about a dragon weren't we? They hoard gold, armor, gems, money basically. They are all but immortals. Finding unending sleep only when someone removes their hearts or heads. Anything less they can walk away from. They spend thousands of years gathering wealth, prestige and power. The older ones usually stay in their lairs. Surrounded by their vast treasures they are content to protect it. Others, younger ones, are active. They are busy gathering their own wealth and power. They value their possessions more than anything else, save their own hides.

  This one just said to leave it all? It’s not as if this super strong and resilient creature couldn't just carry a cars worth of gold with her if she wanted to.

  What was going on?

  Either things were far worse than we were briefed about or something wasn't as it should be.

  "Look, let’s just go out to the market for a few hours. Get out of the house. Make it seem like everything’s normal. When we come back I’ll help you pack and there will only be a few hours until dawn. Then we can meet up with our contact." said green lady.

  "Okay mamma, I hope dawn gets here quick." Green girl said.

  Something wasn't right.

  Before I pulled the trigger on these two I felt I had to make sure they were who they were supposed to be. I was done killing before I had all the answers, if I could help it.

  "Green lady and green girl are going to leave for a few hours. I’m going to go inside and see if I can’t get some information before we finalize our mission." I said to Nathan.

  "What’s wrong?" he asked. Nathan knew me pretty good; he could tell something was bothering me.

  "Nothing for now, I’m just going to check something out, you keep your eyes and ears on, tell me if anyone tries to sneak up on me. I’ll be back in a jiffy." I said, trying to exude calm.

  "Be careful." warned Nathan.

  "Thanks mom." I said sarcastically. Nathan just shook his head.

  I gave the girl and her mom a ten-minute head start then made my way over to their house.

  I wasn't too worried about the dragons having set magical booby traps. They are rather arrogant, with their magic resistant, bullet resistant, sword, knife, flaming boulder from a catapult resistant scales and ability to breathe some sort of deadly on contact substance from their mouths. Dragons weren't too worried about being assaulted, magically or otherwise.

  That didn't mean I ignored my training.

  I went up to the six-foot wall that surrounded the house and scanned for modern traps, claymores, I.E.D.s, you name it.

  I found the area to be clean so I jumped the wall and crept towards the back door. There was an electronic security system. The ones that required a password to disable it once the doors opened. I didn't know what the password was but I did know how to bypass the alarm. These types of alarm systems used a sensor that was on the door and on the wall. When the door was shut the wall’s sensor was in contact with the door’s sensor and a continuous flow of small amounts of electricity was sent back to the main computer. When someone opened the door they interrupted that flow, causing the main computer to sense an anomaly and sound the alarm if the password wasn’t entered within the time limit. I couldn't trick the computer into thinking I knew the code, but I could trick it into thinking no one opened the door.

  I used a lock pick, I know not very wizardly of me, to open the door, then administered a small but steady stream of voltage from my index finger as it came in contact with the door frames sensor. Effectively keeping the circuit closed. Allowing the flow of electricity to continue made the computer think the door was still closed.

  Pretty neat, huh?

  I closed the door behind me, scanning and searching for anything that would make me dead.

  As I entered the house the smell of something delicious assaulted my nose, I looked to the kitchen and saw a pot boiling on a low simmer. My mouth started watering. I ignored it.

  Entering the living room I could tell that someone was in the process of packing, there was an open suitcase on the couch. It was half-packed with items. White socks, jeans and underwear were haphazardly thrown in it.

  I noticed a few frames and saw a nice looking oriental woman standing next to a sweet young girl of about ten.

  You could instantly tell they were mother and daughter. They were in front of a large body of water, holding up big foam fingers that had the Giants logo on them. They wearing 49er’s shirts, obvious tourists.

  Since when do dragons act as common tourists? They were a proud race, and solitary. They didn't like crowds.

  Quickly scanning the room, I spotted what I was looking for. A laptop, I went over to it and felt with my senses for any traps there also. Dragons hoard money, for them it represents power; another form of power is information.

  What could have more information on it than a laptop?

  So it seemed likely that a greedy dragon would protect its information, but I found nothing wrong with the laptop.

  I opened it up and powered it on.

  I inserted a flash drive that had on it a decrypting program designed by the computer geeks at Langley, guaranteed to bypass any firewall or security program just short of the Pentagon’s. It didn't let
me down.

  Instantly I began seeing files being accessed. Some read “Pics”, or “vacation to S.F”

  One in particular caught my eye. It was named “Frankenstein”.

  I opened it and saw top-secret information about a program designed to genetically engineer men and women, enhancing them with super human abilities.

  I guess the vanilla mortals were tired of being outgunned.

  The file showed footage of lab experiments, where men were subjected to horrendous acts of mutilation. There were scientists working alongside wizards who were stabilizing patients that would have instantly died from some of the things being done to them. There were videos showing a patient before surgery and other clips showing patients after surgery, having had their arms replaced with varying assortments of weaponry or surveillance equipment.

  Other videos showed dull eyed men, who clearly just got out of a hospital bed, in a training facility with mannequin targets and dummies set up. I watched as one man in a reverse hospital gown raised up his arm and where his palm was supposed to be there was a hole. The man made a grunt and out of that hole streamed liquid fire, turning a human into a one-man napalm party.

  I was sickened.

  I saw another file named “Joint Venture” and opened it. It showed me grainy video footage of a U.S. Army base where the same tortured souls were performing super human feats as well.

  I could overhear a scientist and a guy I remember from Scientific Research and Development at combat school talking.

  "The process works." The scientist said with a strong eastern European accent, Russian maybe?

  "I can see it works." Said the other guy, "But is it necessary to remove their frontal cortex? I mean is there no way to have them operate independently?"

  "No, you see how erratic the ones with the ability to think are? They must be controlled, turned into living machines if you will, that is the only way." The scientist said.