Tandem of Terror (16 page)

Another soldier cried out for help and she
turned her head, drawn by his desperate call. She hurried to him
and as he begged her for help, she slashed the dagger across his
throat.

Ben felt bile rise in his throat. Horrified,
he watched her send the wounded to the next life before their time.
His arms and legs trembled; the sweat poured down his face. His
throat was dry. He struggled to rise but the pain kept him in
place. He was much too weak.

He turned away from the young woman, hoping
she was merely a product of the trauma, his delirious mind
conjuring up fantasies that didn't exist. In the distance, on the
far side of the beach, he could see another dark figure working its
way through the bodies.

Who the hell were they?

He looked back and she was closer, unleashing
her blade upon more wounded and snatching their dog tags from them.
The wind howled as she stood, the blood from her latest victim
dripping from her blade. Ben gave a choked cry.

The dark maiden turned in his direction,
glittering eyes fixed on new quarry. Nimble as a cat, she started
toward him. Ben swore he could see right through her.

As she drew closer he saw how radiant she
really was, a contrast of dark and pale beauty, perpetually young,
and mysterious. Her black robe flowed around milk-white, curvaceous
flesh.

What is she? Is this death, here to wrench
us over to the other side? An angel or a
devil?
Slowly
Ben realized that he no longer cared. He wanted to go to her.
Something in her eyes called to him, summoned him. He sensed peace
in her eyes, tranquility in her cold beauty.

She stood before him looking down, the dagger
held aloft. Their eyes met and he saw that hers were, sensuous,
alluring...blazing. He smiled and reached out to her, suddenly,
inexplicably hungry for her sweet embrace, the eternal escape she
promised from the pain and horror.

She's so beautiful, so flawless,
thought
. Maybe this is meant to be... Maybe I'm meant to go to
her... I am supposed to die here; I feel it. Let her end the pain,
the nightmare, end it all. Take me, please take me!

He began to succumb to her, felt his soul
slipping away as she advanced.

Finally, she bent and stared into his
face.

Ben looked into the eyes once more and basked
in her unnatural energy, her malevolence... and suddenly he knew
what she was.

She had existed for centuries, drawn by
conflict and carnage, a malicious entity feeding on the wounded, a
vulture of battlefields, pushing those trapped between life and
death into the void, and taking their souls.

She had robbed ancient warriors and soldiers
of insignia, family banners, family crests, heirlooms, signet
rings, leaving behind anonymous, faceless things and tortured
families.

He remembered watching Jimmy die, watching
him give up and succumb to death.
No goodbyes, Jim.
He had
wanted Jimmy to fight. So how could he do any less? This wasn't
right; it wasn't time. He returned to himself in time to see the
white face looming over him once again.

NO! He couldn't let her take him. He would
not die here on this beach; not at her hands. He was a soldier of
honor, strength and faith. He could accept dying at the hands of
his mortal enemy but not an inhuman, immortal one.

He would fight to live, to survive. It was
not his time. This specter of war and discord, this malevolent
weaver of shadow would have to seek another victim for he promised
himself now that he was going to live to tell his children what
he'd seen.

"
Stay the hell away from
me!" He screamed. "Stay away!" With all of the strength he had
left, he dragged himself away from her. She stood, with what might
have been a shocked expression on her face. A feral look twisted
her beauty and she stalked him, determined not to lose her
prey.

"
No!" Ben screamed again,
pulling himself over Jimmy's lifeless body, pain searing his back
and legs.

She continued to follow, bloodstained dagger
poised. Ben scrambled frantically, his hand alighting upon the
fallen weapon of his friend. He picked up the gun with both hands
and fired directly at the woman.

The bullets whistled through her as if she
wasn't there and it did not slow her advance. Ben fired again,
wildly, full of rage and defiance, bullets rattling, skimming the
air and hitting nothing. Her face remained expressionless. Ben
shivered all over, icy cold slithering through his body.

"
You're not taking me! I
don't want to die. I don't want to
die
!"

She stood before him, dagger raised high.

"No, don't..."

The dagger fell.

Someone grabbed his arm.

"
Hey he's alive!" the medic
called out before turning back to Ben. "We got another survivor
over here! Hold on buddy, you're gonna be ok." He glanced down and
read Ben's dog tags. "Ben, don't you worry. We're gonna patch you
up in no time."

Ben sighed and looked around the beach. The
woman in black was nowhere to be seen. He turned back to watch the
medic shuffling for pain meds and bandages as others came running
to help.

"
I'm alive...alive," he
mumbled over and over to himself.

The sounds of war had stopped and as Ben
looked around he saw the lifeless bodies of his friends and
comrades scattered everywhere.

But
she
was gone. The stealer of life,
the thief of hope and faith, was just a voice on the wind again, a
shadow in his mind.

Rain and sand sprayed his face as they
hoisted him from the ground and carried him to the boat. He forced
a feeble smile. He was glad to be alive.

Ben ran a hand through his coarse silver
hair, and stared at the Purple Heart he kept on the fireplace
mantel. His wife was still asleep upstairs. He was still haunted by
the memory of that day so long ago. He read somewhere, in a book by
some historian that the Nazis had experimented a lot with the
occult during World War II. Experimentation with strange sciences,
alchemy and other such nonsense. He wasn't sure about any of it. He
wasn't even sure what had
really
happened that day. But he
was sure he would never forget. Ever.

War did strange things to people, made them
see things no man should see, hear things one would never want to
hear again. But what he saw that day Ben could never put into
words, never fully or sanely explain to anyone. He had never even
told his wife and sons of it and probably never would. They would
think him insane. And maybe they'd be right.

He watched the fire crackle in the hearth. He
was tired. So very tired. He'd had a good long life but since his
retirement, he hadn't felt like himself. He couldn't remember the
last time he slept through the night
.

I think it's time.

He puffed on his pipe once more and caught
sight of something out of the corner of his eye. He turned and was
not terribly surprised, even through the fear, to see the woman in
black approaching him, her dagger gleaming in the firelight.

Unexpected Fun

Eric S. Brown

Hagan awoke to the sound blaring alarms. His
quarters were filled with the pale red glow of emergency lights.
Something bad was happening. The change in the lighting could only
mean that something had taken the Ravenhawk's engines off-line. He
rolled out of bed, the flesh of his bare feet slipping onto the
cold metal floor.

After five years of serving in the Alliance
infantry, Hagan had thought himself beyond fear but now he felt it
once more. Cursing his weakness at being caught unprepared, he
hurried to don his uniform, knocking a pair of energy shackles off
the table by his bed. He ignored them and snatched the suitcase
propped against the wall, opening it. Inside were two T-27 pistols.
He checked their energy cells to make sure they had power and
shoved them into his belt.

He wished he'd paid more attention to the
tour guide of the ship who had led him around this transport ship
when he'd boarded it. He turned on the computer on the room's desk
to try to find out what was going on and check the ship's layout as
the Ravenhawk shook violently.

The computer, despite his best attempts, gave
him no useful information. It told him that a late dinner was now
being served in the dining hall for all passengers and suggested
several upcoming social events, which it assured him would keep him
entertained all the way to Earth. Hagan calmly smashed the cheerful
computer's screen in with a balled up fist. He stood staring at the
worthless machine with blood dripping from his hand where the
monitor glass had cut him. Hagan was faced with an unpleasant
choice. He could remain here in his quarters until a member of the
crew came to let him know what was going on or he could head out
into the ship in search of answers. Being who he was, Hagan could
not sit idly by while his life might be at stake. He approached the
door of room. When it did not open as it should have, Hagan wedged
his fingers into it and forced it open with his bare hands. As he
stepped out into the Ravenhawk's corridor, a woman came running
into view. She had a frantic expression on the sharp features of
her face, her hazel eyes wide.

"
The Skrillians!" she warned
him. "They've attacked us!"

Hagan grabbed her by the arms, pinning them
to her sides. "How many ships?" he demanded. "Have we been
boarded?"

Tears ran down the woman's cheeks as she
tried to answer. "I... I don't know. They've fired on us. I'm sure
of that."

Hagan released her, his attention turned to
the bends of the corridor as if he expected a Skrillian soldier to
come into view at any second. The woman noticed his uniform and
when she spoke again her voice held a grain of hope. "You're a
marine. Are you here to save us?"

Hagan repressed the urge to smack her for
being so stupid. "No. I'm just a passenger like you are. I was on
my way to Earth. Do you know how to get to the bridge? I'm sure the
captain could use a bit of help at the moment."

The woman shook her head in the negative,
staring at him blankly. "Come on," Hagan ordered taking her by the
hand and led her down the corridor after him. "We can't stay out in
the open like this. If there are Skrillian boarders, they're sure
to find us."

The bridge of the Ravenhawk was filled with
frenzied activity. Captain Jones appeared to be pushed beyond the
limits of what she could handle. This was a civilian transport ship
not a damn battle cruiser. "Bryant!" she barked, "You
will
find a way to get a message drone by them!"

Bryant, as calmly as he could manage, turned
to her to remind her of the facts of their current situation.
"Captain, three fourths of the crew and passengers are already
dead. Most died when the Skrillians pods attached to us and cut
through the hull to dump their troops inside. Main power is
off-line all over the ship. Even if we could launch a drone it
would never reach Earth in time to bring us help."

Jones ignored him. "Shield status!" she
screamed. Bryant looked at her as if she'd lost her mind. "That
last volley of fire before they boarded us crippled the shields
ma'am. They're gone. May I suggest we offer the Skrillians an
unconditional surrender?"

"
Why?" Jones laughed.
"They'll just kill us anyway."

Hagan and the woman, who had finally
introduced herself as Kim Whitney, made their way to the
Ravenhawks' main dinning hall since it was closer than the bridge
to the level that Hagan's quarters were on. As they entered it,
they felt a sudden change in gravity. The system which maintained
Earth normal levels on the ship was out in this section. Floating
in the air before them were plates of split food and a sea made up
of droplets of human blood. The bodies of nearly a dozen crewmen
and passengers hung limply in the zero G as they drifted about the
room. Hagan launched himself towards them, snaring the nearest one
and rolled it over in his arms. He inspected the corpse's wounds.
"Skrillian projectile weapons," he muttered. "They
are
onboard."

Kim pushed herself up to his side. "I don't
understand. Why would the Skrillians do this? I thought the war was
over."

Hagan shrugged. "So did I."

A movement underneath one of the dining
tables caught Hagan's eye. He drew one of his T-27 pistols and took
aim. "Don't shoot!" a high pitched voice wailed. "I'm human!" A
young man, who appeared to be barely out of his teens, crawled out
from under the table.

"
Kid you don't know how
close you just came to meeting your maker." Hagan said glancing
over the young man. The kid was a mess, his hair matted to his head
with blood that wasn't his own and a long gash stretched across his
left cheek. On the side of his right arm were three black
interwoven bars tattooed into his skin. Hagan saw them and
snickered. "You're a pleasure clone," then he spat in disgust, "Oh,
come on!," wishing the kid had been someone more useful.

Hagan, Kim, and the boy left the dinning area
and with the boy's help they finally located the bridge of the
ship. As they reached it, the door to the bridge exploded out into
the corridor in front of them. The force of the explosion sent them
tumbling. Hagan was on his feet first. "No fracking way!" he raged,
knowing that going inside was useless and at the moment impossible
due to the flames spilling out the entrance way. Kim and the
pleasure clone looked to Hagan for their next move. When he
remained silent, Kim piped up. "The Captain's dead. It's useless
Hagan. This ship's lost. Maybe... Maybe we could reach the
lifeboats?" She half asked.