SHIAM Conspiracy- Book 1 (18 page)

“Try breathing through your mouth,” Zak said.
“It’ll help a little.”

The nearness of death was now like some great
weight pressing down upon him. He fought to shrug it off, as he
aimed the flashlight past the shelving and swept it in a large
arch. The narrow beam cut into the darkness, revealing a row of
workbenches stretching from the near wall on the right and on into
the darkness to their left. As he worked the light along the
benches, he could see that they were empty, evenly spaced with gaps
between them to allow passage from one side of the tables to the
other. Beyond the workbenches several wooden pallets were scattered
about the floor.

“The sound is coming from over there.” Megan
motioned to a point beyond the pallets.

Zak pointed the light in the direction she
indicated and it fell upon a small prefab aluminum structure about
thirty meters away. The metallic walls were an age-yellowed white
that appeared much brighter in the glare of the flashlight. A large
glass window and a door were set into the wall nearest them.

“Looks like some sort of office.”

“That is not what it is being used for now!”
Megan said. “Look...the window.”

The large window had revealed only darkness
except where the beam of Zak’s flashlight reflected back from the
glass. But when he took a closer look he detected a subtle change
inside the office. The pure darkness of before was slowly being
replaced with a reddish luminescence. As he watched the tainted
reddish glow gradually grew brighter, throbbing and pulsing to a
soft sizzling sound.

The sizzling morphed into the same crackling
sound of energy they had been hearing since they entered the
building, the crimson glow steadily growing brighter within the
small room. The air above the office became distorted, the same
rippling affect they’d seen above the building outside now rising
up from the small prefab office towards the roof of the
building.

The light blinked out with a distinctive
popping sound, the air becoming once again calm and dark within the
office. In the sudden silence, the persistent rattling of rain upon
the metal roof seemed even more ominous than before and death again
reminded them of its nearby presence.

Zak’s senses told him that the bodies were
close. As curious as he was about what was going on inside the
small structure, it would just have to wait. He flashed his light
over the concrete floor, inspecting his immediate surroundings for
any sign of what he expected to find. The oval brightness
immediately fell upon numerous tracks that had been stomped into
the thick dust of the floor. He followed the trail with his light.
It led from the door of the small office off to his left, toward
the line of workbenches they’d seen. He approached the prints
carefully, bent down and began to examine them.

“Looks like a number of people were here
recently,” he said as he studied the floor. “Hard to tell if they
were Orks or Elves, both walk similarly. I’m pretty sure these were
made by one or the other. Certainly not by Humans.”

“There are both Ork and Elf prints,” Megan
said peering over his shoulder. “Perhaps some Human, as well. It is
difficult to tell when most of the prints are so mucked up.”

“Mucked up?” In spite of the oppressive
weight of their situation, or maybe because of it, Zak had to smile
at her use of the outdated Human expression.

He followed the footprints towards one of the
gaps between the tables. It was then that he found the first body.
It lay sprawled on its back next to one of the workbenches several
meters away. The body was Orkensha.

Zak let out an unpleasant sigh, his Elvish
senses threatening his equilibrium. It was like being caught up in
an avalanche, his emotions rolling down on top of him with
unrelenting force. The nearness of death was nearly overwhelming,
the actual smell of it even worse.

“Guess this confirms the fragging Orks are
involved.” His voice was nearly a snarl of hatred. His sense of
loss eased as his hatred for the Orkensha served as an antidote for
his Elvish sensitivities.

He took a step toward the body, then stopped.
He scanned the area with the flashlight, looking for the best way
to reach the dead Ork without disturbing the footprints on the
floor. He determined that his best approach was along the rows of
shelving units, where no previous tracks had been made.

“Yes, but who killed him?” Megan asked as she
followed him.

“Good question. Careful,” he said glancing
over his shoulder at her. He wasn’t sure if she could see his
smile. “Walk in my footsteps so you don’t
muck up
the place
any more than it already is.”

“Very funny.”

Breathing through his mouth didn’t help much
this close to the corpse. He felt a burning in his eyes and the air
that he drew into his mouth felt unclean and foul. Several
blowflies fled from his approach, but quickly returned to claim
their share of the body as Zak knelt next to it. The Ork was in
jeans and a t-shirt, lying on his back, his head turned so that Zak
could clearly see his face, his lifeless eyes staring up at
him.

There were two wounds, both about the size of
Zak’s index finger. The shooter had been sloppy, one shot grazing
the Ork’s ribcage just below his right armpit. He examined the
wound more carefully. Judging from the angle, the Ork had been
turned partially away from the shooter, which told Zak he wasn’t
expecting the shot. Most likely, that was the first hit. The second
was a direct hit in the chest. The Ork must have spun toward the
shooter after the first hit.

“You might want to wait over by the shelves,”
He said to Megan as he heard her coming closer.

“No, I am okay,” she said weakly.

“Suit yourself.” Zak continued his
observations. He was no forensic expert, but he had learned to read
crime scenes well enough while he was with ASID. He gingerly lifted
the Ork’s t-shirt and examined his stomach. “Looks like he’s been
dead about four days.”

“How can you tell?”

“See how the stomach is slightly bloated and
the skin has a greenish color to it?” Zak pointed to the dead Orks
stomach. “The bloating is from the gases that build up inside the
stomach as decomposition starts. The greenish look is from
bacteria. It begins with the stomach about four days after death
and spreads out from there. This stuff is just now starting to
spread. Also, notice how the veins beneath the skin are slightly
visible? That also begins after about four days, as the veins come
closer to the surface of the skin.

“You can also tell by the fly larvae.” He
continued as he pointed toward the chest wound where clusters of
small white larvae were wriggling about. “See how small they are?
They’re still young, weren’t here long enough to mature yet. And
there’s only one beetle that I can see. Another sign that the
body...”

“Yeah okay, I get it. He has been here about
four days.”

“That would put the time of death on the same
night as the Grimrok theft.”

Zak spotted the weapon as he searched the
immediate area with the flashlight. It was an Uk’glok CKP Energy
Pulse handgun. It was the same type of weapon the Orkensha punk had
outside of Underworld, the same type of weapon used by the Dhoraz.
He used his handkerchief to pick it up and checked the energy pack.
“This weapon has been fired. The energy pack is partially
drained.”

He went back to the body and rolled the Ork
just enough to inspect the exit wounds on his back. The wounds were
neat little holes about the same size as the entry wounds on the
front of the body.

“The Uk’glok wasn’t the weapon that killed
this Ork,” he told Megan. “Uk’glok’s leave a much larger exit
wound. The energy pulse expands when it hits its target. The exit
wounds on the Ork were made by a small LPM laser weapon of some
kind.”

He studied the relative position of the
Uk’glok from the dead Ork’s outstretched hand. It looked about the
right distance from the body for the Ork to have dropped it when he
went down. The question was, who killed the Ork and why?

Several rapid successions of lightning lit
the warehouse with a flood of light that seemed reluctant to leave
and Megan suddenly cried out.

“Oh, no!”

Zak looked up to see her standing with her
hands cupped to her mouth. She looked as though she was fighting
the urge to scream, her gaze fixated on something on the other side
of the workbenches. Darkness had returned to the building and Zak
had to follow her line of sight with the flashlight. There was a
gap between two of the benches. The beam cut through the darkness
and came to rest upon another body. This one was Elf.

“Gavril?” he guessed.

She could only nod her confirmation. The
tears welling in her eyes could have easily been from the foul air,
but she allowed them to streak down her face in grief.

He was lying on the far side of the benches
about ten meters beyond where they stood. Gavril looked to be about
average height for an Elf, thin build and delicate features. He was
lying on his back, a shocked expression on his cold dead face.

Zak continued to sweep the area beyond the
workbenches with his light. The bright beam came to rest on another
body, then another and another, until he counted five bodies in
all. At least two besides Gavril he could identify as Elves. The
remaining two were face down so Zak couldn’t be sure, but he
guessed that they were Elves as well. They were lying in a straight
line from one another, spaced about two meters apart, which
suggested to Zak that these weren’t random killings. The five had
been executed.

As he approached, Zak’s flashlight revealed a
splattering of gore on the concrete floor beyond the bodies that
told him everything he needed to know about how they died.

“That is Gavril,” Megan whispered, her voice
cracking with emotion, as Zak reached the first body.

He knelt to examine the wounds on the Elf’s
body. There were two holes in his chest, but these were slightly
larger than those in the Ork. The wounds were grouped tightly
together; two quick shots with deadly accuracy, the sign of a pro.
He rolled the body only enough to confirm what he suspected; Gavril
had been killed with the Uk’glok, his back one large crater between
his shoulder blades. He eased the body back to the floor, not
wanting Megan to see the gruesome wounds on her friend.

He carefully moved to the next body. The
second Elf had similar wounds in his chest. He didn’t want to
disturb the crime scene any more than he had to in the dark, so he
didn’t bother to check the Elf’s back; he already knew what he’d
find. When he moved to the third body, he could tell it was another
Elf even though the body was face down on the floor. The Elf’s back
was in the same condition as Gavril’s. One large gaping mess that
looked as though something had exploded from the body. The exit
wounds from the two shots overlapped, the energy pulses expanding
as they left the body. Pieces of the Elf’s lungs and muscle tissue
were left clinging to the gaping wounds, as well as scattered upon
the floor around him. Zak made his way to the remaining two bodies,
confirming that they were also Elves and that their wounds matched
those of the others.

“They were all shot with an Uk’glok,” he said
finally, shaking his head. “I assume the weapon over there by the
Ork. It looks like these Elves were executed. Orkensha style. The
Ghanstap have been training both the Dhoraz Sect and the Orkensha
mafia for years, so it would be difficult to determine which group
is responsible unless one of them claims credit.”

“So, the Orkensha are behind this!”

Zak paused at the bitterness now in Megan’s
voice. No, not only bitterness. A deep anguish as well. He felt an
overwhelming urge to comfort her, but he felt helpless to do so.
His hatred for the Orks swelled within him, “The fragging scum are
going to end up starting a war!”

“I do not understand,” Megan said, her voice
now weak with distress. “Elves would never willingly work with the
Orkensha. Gavril would never...”

“I have a feeling the EAST Group isn’t all
that it appears to be on the surface,” Zak said. “Gavril may not
have known what was really going on. Hell, I still don’t know
what’s really going on!”

“It is pretty obvious that the Orks
double-crossed the Elves,” Megan said in a bitter voice. “They
probably lured them here under false pretense and then murdered
them in cold blood. We have to make them pay!”

“We don’t know anything for certain,” Zak
told her. He surprised himself by saying it. Everything they found
so far seemed to verify Megan’s interpretation of what happened.
And, considering how he felt toward the Orks, he was more than
willing to jump to the same conclusions. But something about it
didn’t feel right. “All we have here is one dead Ork. It is not
enough to prove that it was an organized Orkensha operation. And
leaving one of their own behind isn’t typical of the Orks.
Something’s not right. There’s something we’re missing here...”

“Vennhim told you his contact confirmed the
Dhoraz were involved!” Megan was practically screaming. “The proof
is lying right here on the floor. What more do you need! You hate
them, yourself. Why are you protecting them?”

“I am not protecting them!” Zak’s anger
flared before he could stop it. “You’re fragging right. I do hate
the Orks. But I am not prepared to sacrifice innocent lives
needlessly in order to satisfy my own vendetta. If this thing gets
out of hand, it could end up turning into a world-wide conflict. Do
you understand what that would mean?”

If Megan’s emotions were not running so
strong, Zak would have called the expression now on her face a
pout. When she answered him, her pain cracked the hard stone of her
voice. “Then I guess we had better find out what exactly is going
on.”