Howzis for obscure fandom?
I was bored enough at work that I dusted off an old Battlelords fanfic that I'd started there and finished it. The last half hasn't gone through much editing, but I'm just happy to have finally gotten something done. It's quite heartening. Normally, I find it very difficult to write these days.
The drip-drip of blood running off the knife has slowed somewhat and taken on a soothing, almost hypnotic quality. For a moment, it is the only sound in the room that is otherwise filled with a total, almost sacred silence. Even colonel Ishkan, muscles tautly extended, is holding his breath as the combat high slowly fades form his eyes.
Then the Phentari impaled on the Colonel's curve-bladed kajot shudders and slumps backward with a guttural hiss of escaping methane. The thump of its squid-like body hitting the floor and joining the six other corpses in the room seems to break some spell over two of the three beings still standing. The Colonel grunts in vexation and begins to wipe the acrid, purplish blood off his blade. Specialist Gregorov begins to check the vital signs of the bodies on the ground, making sure that each one is indeed a corpse. Ensign Natalie M'badi, however, can only stand agape while her fully charged laser pistol dangles weakly in limp fingers.
Desperately, she tries to digest what has just happened, to recall and comprehend the murderous half-minute that has just passed her by in a torrent of motion, screams, shouts, blood, and gunshots. Colonel Ishkan, the compact Kizanti swordsman, had lead the way into the gangster's office. Nikolai Gregorov had flanked the Colonel on the right, watching and cataloging every person, thing, and event into his perfect memory while looking for all the world like a deactivated I-Bot. Natalie herself had been to the Colonel's left, wondering why she, trained for both crisis and diplomatic negotiation as well as close-quarters combat, wasn't in the lead. Their fourth companion, Sprinn-
She suddenly comes back to the here-and-now as she realizes that the Zen Riglen medic is somewhere among the dead littering the floor. She steps over a human and a seven-fingered Orion Rogue, heedless of their blank expressions, and kneels by the skeletal being that is slumped over on the hardwood floor. Turning him over, she can only stare wonderingly at the lack of any wounds on his body. It isn't until she sees the gaping hole in Sprinn's throat that she comprehends that he is already dead, and for a moment she can only ponder absurdly at how little his corpselike Zen features have changed as rigor mortis begins to set in.
"S-sir," she says weakly, requiring two tries to speak clearly, "We have a teammate down!"
There is no response, only the sound of Specialist Gregorov's boots treading around the room, his expression looking for all the world like some macabre general delivering a surprise inspection to mediocre troops.
Belatedly, she realizes that she only managed to whisper. "Sir, Sprinn's down!" She manages with more force.
"Heard you the first time," he growls, his voice speaking of the bloodlust still racing through him, "Is he alive?"
His matter-of-fact tone shocks her, and for a moment, she cannot respond. One of their teammates just died, and all he wants to know is-
"I said: Is. He. Alive?"
Colonel Ishkan turns. His left contact lens, designed to allow him to pass for human, has fallen out, revealing the blood-red gem of a normal Kizanti eye. The blood on his face and chest, the glistening rage still evident in his expression, and the grinding scrape of metal-on-metal as he sheathes his kajot, all combine to turn him into the avatar of some ancient god of war from Terra's legends. For a moment, Natalie is rooted to the spot in pure terror.
"N- h-he's dead," she manages at last.
The Colonel growls irately before pressing his fingers to either side of his throat, activating the subcutaneous communicator implanted there.
"Kruush, status." Though he is only whispering in the room, his voice comes through Natalie's communicator as though he were holding her by the collar and hissing into her ear.
There is no immediate response. The Colonel's eyes narrow in irritation and he moves his jaw as if about to speak again when the channel suddenly explodes with the sound of gunfire. It is covered by the crackling scream of a pulse weapon being discharged. Now the channel only reports a dying hum, and the hint of crackling and popping that reminds Natalie of the roast turkey freshly emerging from the oven the last time she saw her brother and his family. Finally, the booming voice of the Ram Python floods the channel with a torrent of noise, causing Natalie to flinch and even prompting a contortion that almost resembles a wince from the blank-faced Gregorov.
"Buncha guys with guns rush Kruush. One of 'em hadda pulse gun."
"Are you badly injured?" The Colonel's inquiry is terse and without a hint of concern for his subordinate's well being.
"Nah. S'mine now. Kruush think they all- whoops, hang on." The banshee keening of plasma covers any other sound for a moment. "Now they all dead. Prolly more coming, though. Need our stuff now?"
"Return to the extraction point."
Natalie realizes that she is still kneeling down by the body of Sprinn. Had their roles been reversed, Sprinn could have used a psionic healing matrix to assist her. Now, however, there is nothing to be done. She is almost shocked at the cold logic of the thought. Is she responding to the presence of a hardened team, as if it were a communicable condition? Or has the recent brush with death merely awakened in her a primal, human need to survive; an Escape-Now-Mourn-Later response?
She straightens his body and lays his hands at his side as best she can, determined to at least show some respect for his remains, as she somehow knows that their escape will not involve carrying a two hundred kilogram corpse. The Colonel has not moved, his eyes seeming far away. Absently, she pulls a clean handkerchief off of the gangster's desk and sets about wiping the ichor from Sprinn's throat off of the coffee-colored skin of her hands.
Abruptly, Gregorov's eerie monotone intrudes on the quiet. "This one is alive."
As he picks up a barely-conscious Orion Rogue by a bloody collar, Natalie is about to mention that some intelligence would be helpful. Before she can elucidate her thoughts, there is a whimper that is cut off by a gurgle. Again the blessed silence as Natalie's head whips up from her hands in horror. Her mind makes an absurd, macabre still-life painting of the picture of Gregorov holding a dead Orion, ceramic dagger buried to the hilt in his throat, by the collar while blood from a severed carotid artery washes over his hand.
"Nikolai, I didn't order his death yet."
"Extrapolation. This was a mere gunsel. Froze up when you pulled your kajot. Inexperienced. Unlikely to have any pertinent information that was not backed up in the computer."
The Colonel growls in irritation. "Don't undermine my authority, Specialist."
"Apologies, sir."
The body lurches as Gregorov releases the collar and yanks his slim weapon out simultaneously. Heedless of the crimson film covering his right hand past the wrist, he turns to face Colonel Ishkan. In so doing, his eyes slide momentarily into line with Natalie's. She sees no rage, satisfaction, pity, remorse, or even a reaction of any sort.
Colonel Ishkan is Kizanti, a species that had been driven to the brink of extinction and forced to revert almost to barbarism to survive. Ferocity is an inborn part of his nature, and his bladework harkens back to a brutal, atavistic survival instinct. Natalie understands that much, can almost condone it. But the Gen-Human's clinical, almost bored methods allow for only one conclusion: Nikolai Gregorov is insane.
"Ensign," the Colonel begins after another moment, "Is the brute-force unit still operational?"
For a moment, she cannot peel her eyes away from Gregorov's. If he notices her scrutiny out of his periphery vision, he gives no indication. The sight of the Colonel moving his jaw as if to speak prompts wild images of him gutting her with his blade for making him repeat himself yet again. In a rush, she gushes an affirmative, as if by forcing her response out quickly, she can retroactively place her words into the seconds it took her to respond.
Where have your wits gone, asks a voice in Natalie's head that sounds like an amalgamation of herself and her grandmother. You're tougher, smarter than this. Be quick and do what needs doing!
Natalie mentally throws her shoulders back and seizes the initiative. She advances on the desk and shoves the dead gangster out of his chair, a touch more forcefully than she needs to. He flops limply to the floor, and she shoves down a bout of panic as his seven-fingered hand slumps onto the cuff of her pants. The dead do not move.
Working quickly, she produces a multitool from her belt and unbolts the panel on one side of the desk. The computer terminal sits in the newly revealed compartment, the wires leading to the flatscreen display on the desk's surface making it look like a belabored, mechanical heart. She pulls a boxy, fist-sized, and unassuming-looking peripheral from a pocket inside her ballistic jacket and plugs the cable to a port on the computer's interior, hoping that the onboard software will be able to work out whatever incompatibility or malfunction that technologists seem to enjoy building into their wares.
With a slightly shaking finger, she taps the button. The peripheral dutifully begins winking at her with a red light on its exterior, indicating its readiness to work. Eager to both prove her calm in a crisis and get away from this office-turned-morgue as soon as possible, she taps a second key to initiate the transfer.
Nothing happens.
Natalie looks up, her mind containing a growing seed of fear drowning in a flood of embarrassment.
Gregorov raises an eyebrow one centimeter.
She wonders doubtfully if the unit had been damaged in the scuffle that she had only been involved with in a tertiary sense. Frantically she begins to reach for the cord, hoping that it is merely a faulty connection.
As if sensing the perfect moment to generate an anticlimax, the light changes its hue from red to green, and its pulsing subsides to a steady glow as it begins to rip the contents of the desk computer's hardwired disk storage away, bit by agonizing bit, heedless of file delimitations, data encryption, or empty space.
"Problems, Ensign?"
"No Colonel," she responds, surprised at the clarity and strength she is able to put into her voice. He nods and turns his attention elsewhere.
The digital readout on the unit's face lights up with a numeric display, informing her of its estimated time to completion. Seventeen seconds.
"Boss, Kruush thinks we got some company." The boom of the Ram Python's voice prompts Natalie to pull the comm receiver out of her ear. Fourteen seconds.
"What sort of company?" The Colonel's voice betrays no worry, only irritation. Twelve seconds.
"Hadda shoot another guy. He said somethin' about mercs." With the receiver out of her ear, she hears Kruush's voice at a tolerable volume. Nine seconds.
"That's great. How many?" Natalie cannot shake the notion that Colonel Ishkan sounds like he has just learned that he has just won an indeterminate number of tickets to a sporting event. Eight Seconds.
"Sorry. He was dea-oops." The comm channel is flooded with the sounds that can only come from a three-meter reptilian diving for cover. Six seconds.
"Kruush, what's going on?" Almost disbelievingly, Natalie notes concern warring with anger in the Colonel's voice. Five seconds.
There is no response. Four seconds.
Three.
Two.
One.
For one horrible instant, everything has returned to a deathly still state of tranquility as if the universe has stopped to acknowledge another of her teammates. Natalie crouches by the desk, frozen. Aghast.
The entire room seems to lurch back into the proper flow of time as the unit innocently beeps its completion.
Gregorov's eyes slide shut. Colonel Ishkan reaches for his kajot. Natalie feels almost foolish reaching to disconnect the brute-force copy unit from the computer.
The door explodes inward without fanfare. Wooden splinters of varying size form tiny shrapnel that perforates the room, causing both Gregorov and Natalie to shield their faces to escape its wrath. A massive object lands with a wet thud. As dust settles, she sees even more blood covering the ground.
"Kruush." The Colonel's tone reminds Natalie of a stern father confronted with a favored son's mischief.
"Sorry boss," the Ram says as he stands, "Busted comm."
Abruptly, Natalie realizes that the blood covering the front of Kruush's armored street clothing is not his own. Several corpses on the floor had formed a hideous cushion for the massive Ram to land on. The bodies had ruptured like ripened tomatoes, spilling viscous red juice on everything in their immediate vicinity.
"How many?"
"Not sure. Only saw armored squid at front door."
The Colonel's kajot seems to scream with anticipation as he draws it from its scabbard, thirsty for more Phentari blood. He stalks past Kruush, looking for all the world like an eager executioner. Kruush looks at Gregorov as the tiny-looking man files into the hall dutifully. He then grins and beckons Natalie forward.
"C'mon teammate. Gotta split."
Natalie cannot explain the rush of mixed feelings of revulsion and elation that flood her when she realizes the import of the Ram's words: she has been accepted into this circle of soldiers and killers. Instead, she simply stows the unit back underneath her jacket and rushes through the door.
"Okay team," Colonel Ishkan says, "Let's move."