The 6th of Six (The Legend of Kimraig Llu) (19 page)

“Alright, alright,” Bradley said, pulling up off his knees and adjusting his trousers to cover himself, a few more minutes and he might have been successful. Standing, he aimed a kick at Breen and walked to a nearby table. He added a much harder kick to Mistress Ann as he passed.

“That is for making fun of me,” Bradley said, hardly sparing her a glance. He had eyes only for a clear glass beaker that sat in the center of the table two steps away. A cloudy liquid swirled inside. The scrawny old man raised it to his lips and drank deeply.

“Good vintage, this bug juice. Made it yesterday,” Bradley belched and moved to the door. “BJ, we call it.”

“It seems I am needed to direct my Army. I will get back to you ladies. No, in fact all of my men will get back to you, several times, before we trade you for what is rightfully ours.” He laughed and wedged the slab door closed behind him.

All he needed was a little rest to get it up, and he would come back and complete his rape of both of them.
Should’a went first, stead of giving the guys the okay. Damn this toe hurts.
Those two women would pay for this, as soon as he got back,

Mistress Ann waited, her eyes inspecting dust particles on the floor where her forehead rested.
Make sure he does not send those awful big beasts to stand guard and lick with their smelly little froth.

Finally, she moved her shoulders enough to ease the pain of wrists tied behind her back.

“Breen, Breen,” she called. The young woman had been unconscious so long. There had to be damage there, so she would be of no help getting out of this room, much less the building.

Nothing to push against, have to untie myself the hard way.

Mistress Ann stretched her legs as far out as they would go. Then, clenching hard, she rolled over onto her back; arms pinned painfully to the floor. In one fluid motion, she drew her legs to her breast, clenched her stomach muscles and forced a sit up. Took three tries, but she finally wobbled onto her butt cheeks.

With careful rocking motions, accompanied by painful lightning strikes behind her eyes, she swayed side-to-side. She stretched her arms down, working her wrists under her, and then finally past her butt. She almost blacked out from the pain of forcing her heels onto the crudely tied bindings and working the cord towards her toes. Her wrists were finally in front of her, agony blocking the memory of how they got there. She got busy, using every screaming muscle to return feeling to her joints.

Not bad for an old broad, good thing I work out every day with them young split tails.
She always got a kick out of that expression.
Daddy, you did have some descriptive phrases.

Time passed without feeling. She did not taste the blood in her mouth or on her teeth as she chewed the cord from her wrists. When her wrists came free, and circulation throbbed through her fingertips, she finally saw blood and tasted freedom

Then, standing on old wobbly legs, she finally found some use for what they had done. Without their lust, rope would have tied her ankles together.
That is hard up gents; I could be your mother’s grandmother. You will be calling for your mother before I am done with you.

There it is, my first tool, conveniently stored in that large beaker.

“Do not think. Do not taste, just drink. With it, you kill without remorse. Without the drink, you think instead of act.”

That had been one-armed Grant up on that desk at the Crandall Towers, yelling at groups of twelve young women armed with pieces of sharpened pipe and chair-seat shields about to attack men with guns.

They had mowed through the drunks like a giant machine harvesting wheat. Two of the old males had followed behind, collecting the few guns from the dead and dying. They also drank from the bottles of amber liquid, while they killed the wounded—no need for prisoners.

Forget being Mistress, she needed Ann. Ann drank deeply. Ann chocked with revulsion at the memory of her repeated violation in this room. Bury that deep with another long pull as she emptied the clear glass beaker.

Now it is time for her second tool. One sharp rap on the edge of the table and she had a usable shard of glass six inches long.

I should have guessed that Bradley had his own agenda when he had proposed this parley. He does nothing for anyone without the bulk of the benefit going to him.

Muffled clatter in the hallway and fumbling at the door. Fleeting flashes of hiding behind the opening slab, the comforting lightness of the clear glass shard braced against her rag wrapped palm: door latch locking; grouts of warmth splashing wetly up her arm; dead weight almost taking her to the floor. Old wrinkled male leaking foul, more holes than the glass had slashed.
More wrinkles than I do!
Psycho giggle—not Bradley.

Ann needed the contents of her stomach and fought hard against the retching. Action—she had to act. First, check to make sure Breen was still breathing. Okay, she is barely alive. Ann was too old to carry her out of the room, so she would have to get help.

I will be lucky to help myself.

Closet off to the left. Maybe there were clothes there.
I can certainly pass for one of these old coots.

* * *

On the street below and around the corner from the Annex, a makeshift Battle Group sprinted from the rubble to the shattered entrance of One Nine. “Go. Go. Go,” echoed in battle helmets. When they drew no fire; Kimraig followed, accompanied by his now permanent bodyguard, LaJay. Dr. Painter-Richards had demanded he take her, claiming she was a better Hunter then most Builder Hunters. With the help of the two self-adjusting canes she loaned him, he made good time yet lagged badly behind.

He had discussed this route with all the others. They would attack up the stairs to the fifth floor. He would use the elevator shaft since he was unable to hold a shield. His destination was the interior spaces surrounding the elevators, the only place Kimraig had failed to gain access. He would meet them there on the fifth floor, if he had the strength to make the climb.

There were access ladders inside these elevator shafts, hard traveling with his damaged ribs. A long ago genius had decided to protect the ladders in this one particular building with a lightweight aluminum cage. The cage protected maintenance men from falling backwards to their death—one of the few buildings he had seen with anything like it. With the cage and LaJay there to help him, he should be fine. Two others would add protection: one up the ladder and the last at LaJay’s back.

The inside of the shaft glowed 10 times darker than pitch. At the passing of each floor, closed double doors bled needles of light—each quickly blunted against the black. At the fourth floor, Kimraig could no longer climb. He had stumbled on a bent rung and lost his grip. The aluminum safety rig saved him but he could not lean forward enough to regain a handhold. His knees trembled, threatening to collapse.

Hitch it up Hunter. Breen is on the next floor. Move it, now.

From below, hands at his shoulders forced him back upright. LaJay had climbed beside him on the outside of the cage, hung by one knee hooked in a cage strut, and pushed. She steadied him, making sure he had regained his grip. They started up again. A whisper filtered down to him from above.

“At the top, everyone form on me.”

What seemed like days later, that whisper was beside him in a hallway, a hallway he could not remember entering. “Where is the room,” it questioned, and Kimraig pointed the way.

“Twenty paces down to your right is a small indentation. I was never able to open it but that is the only place where our people could be.”

After pointing with his left arm extended, vertigo swept through him. He leaned back against the marble wall until it passed.

Better not raise that arm again.
He watched the two Troopers advance at a fast pace.

At the far end of the hallway, five Outsiders held the door open to the stairwell. Three charged as soon as they caught sight of his small group.

He was sure there had been five, a faint impression lingered of two more disappearing down the stairwell. One looked familiar.

“Blood, lots of it, door is open,” the lead Trooper shouted back to them as he prepared to engage the threat pounding down the hallway.

Somehow, Kimraig was at their back forcing his weight against the marble slab that should be a door. It yanked away, letting him spill forward, losing his balance. Heading toward the floor again, instincts spun him sideways—he did not make the turn, landing on the damaged shoulder.

The slab door closed quickly leaving him alone inside.

He had a brief glimpse of an old Outsider in badly wrinkled clothing charging at him with a shard of bloody glass. Then there was nothing but fire in his chest and a blanket over his sight.

* * *

“I should have cut your throat, but I am getting old,” said a familiar voice. Then again, taunting him. “Looks like that beating missed a spot.”

One finger poking at a rib. Agonizing pain cleared his vision.

“Oh, guess not, so sorry.”

He would recognize that psycho giggle anywhere.

Mistress Ann, just my luck.

“Mistress Breen?” he questioned.

“Medic took her to the morgue in the hallway.”

Kimraig struggled, rolling to his side on the hard floor, attempting to stand. No explaining how he felt, just a weight pressing as heavy as One Nine, his anger at Mistress Breen forgotten in the face of Mistress Ann’s explanation.

As he lay on his side, he felt a heavy pressure against his neck, near the artery. Her old foot pinned him against the floor. Conscious thought began slipping away; her voice echoed one last time.

“Medic is on the way, got you a special mat in the morgue, right next to your Mistress Breen. No, I did not change my mind about cutting your throat. But, I am not too old to use my foot.”

When he came around, he found that morgue mats are uncomfortable at best; a corpse would no longer care. Kimraig swiveled his head first to the right and then to the left. Two dead covered with tarps, each much too small to be Breen. A dark shadow hovered over him. He involuntarily flinched away; suddenly aware he could no longer protect himself.

The dark shadow that suddenly covered him was all too real; Brody-1 had come to finish him off. Her restraining hand on his shoulder broke his attempt to rise.

“Stay where you are or you will start that bleeding thing again.”

“Where is Breen?” Kimraig whispered through cracked lips.

“That is Mistress Breen to you, old man,”

Kimraig could detect no malice in Brody-1’s voice, only her usual impatience.

“Well, where is she?”

“Off with Mistress Ann and the other delegations. Or what is left of them.”

“You were detailed to return for help. Why are you still here?”

“Simple, it was my first command decision. I sent Mistress Breen’s Hunter, Yates. The remaining Superiors know him, not me.”

Brody-1 had no problem holding Kimraig down as he attempted to rise.

“Listen for once you idiot.”

Brody-1 went on to explain that a delegate, Leader Sala from the Wicca, had returned with a message. Mistress Ann, Leader Breen, and he, must appear before the Council. They were all under arrest until they explained this failure. All personnel would accompany them.

Ha, just like the Wicca, foolish. Abandon tasks half-done and then come back at another time and start all over again. Against orders, he would leave a small force to hold what they had shed blood to take.

I must stand before them and defend myself. Can I stand? Not sure, have to wait and see.

A stretcher would be here for him soon, LaJay had helped him finish the climb up the elevator shaft so she could steady him as he attempted to walk. Now he would really need the canes from Prime Minister Painter-Richards.

“Need LaJay,” he said, almost passing out from that small effort.

“She has not left your side since the elevator shaft. I have no idea what all these women see in you.”

The trip to the elevator shaft itself was an ordeal. Traveling by stretcher was a series of side-to-side, nauseating swings and up and down bumps guaranteed to roil the strongest stomach. He had a mouthful of the foul, fat little leaves LaJay had given him. To ease the pain, she had explained. A product from her mother’s country she had managed to cultivate in window boxes. A few swallows of the bitter sap and he could feel the nerve endings relaxing, the pain ebbing to a bearable ache.

“Swallow the pulp as soon as you can,” LaJay warned. “Or an intense sense of euphoria takes over.”

“Explain, please.” He tried not to growl but he knew he had. He had absolutely no idea why anyone would use a word like “euphoria.”

She gave him an amused glance; her nose twitching up in an unusual way. That one glance saying she was about to play a game he had better learn fast. “You laugh, and laugh when they hang you.”

Lowering him down the elevator shaft strapped in the stretcher was the worst. A short five floors to the basement, they said. It seemed to take forever. He could remember little else, except trying now to swallow the leaves, when an excruciating jar sent him into a gasping fit. He went with the euphoria. Took his breath right away and he slept.