"TIGER NATION II"
TIGER NATION II
2/12/2022
I.
"I'm scared, I don't have a problem admitting it," Timothy Limbo said. Still watching the row of monitor screens and status lights, he pushed the collective/cyclic stick forward and brought the CORBY up to four hundred miles per hour. "Maybe I shouldn't have watched those videos of tigers leaping up fifteen feet in the air with no trouble. Or that one where a tiger catches up to a car going forty."
Next to him in the co-pilot seat, Jocelyn sounded more tired than anything else. "You've seen my Red Spectre, Tim. She is living lightning. She is faster than anything of flesh and blood and she can blast through granite."
"Yeah. That's true, and I'm glad you're paired up with me, to be honest. My caspers are great for searching and spying and stuff, but not much use against Tigermen." In the subdued light of the CORBY cabin, Timothy's face looked as exhausted as his teammate's voice sounded. His bright yellow hair had finally been trimmed by a professional barber, it no longer hung down over his forehead almost in his eyes. "Having you and your Spectre with me is a big comfort."
"I've got your back, my friend." In the years she had lived in New York, Jocelyn Garimara's accent had eroded so much that someone meeting her would not immediately know she was Australian from her voice. But the rich dark brown skin, straight black hair and distinctive facial bone structure made it clear she was Aboriginal, from the Northwest.
Timothy was not a big man, a few inches under six feet and lanky but she was small as well. Both were wearing the KDF field suits with the layer of silk-thin armor and tiny weapons and gadgets in numerous pockets. She went on, "I never trusted anyone until I met our team."
"This is awful. My heart has broken in half. I'm still having trouble processing what happened but instead of having time to think, here we are chasing monsters again. How are you doing?"
"Okay, I guess," she replied. "It happened. We lost Megan. Maybe it's better to be busy now. We certainly should concentrate on what we're doing for our own sakes."
"Yeah. Looks like another three or four minutes before we need to find a touchdown. I'm sure no one will be ready for us. Sensors aren't picking up any radar within miles, we're in a black stealth copter with no external nights flying through a moonless light. And the CORBYs don't make any more noise than a stiff breeze passing by."
Jocelyn took a moment before venturing, "Do you ever get tired of this, Tim? It feels like we've been fighting the Midnight War all our lives. We were barely adults when we started. I'm not sure I want to do this forever."
"No, I haven't felt like that. Not yet. But I'll tell you the truth, I'd rather be doing more research and rescues than fighting." He turned his head for a second and saw she was watching him thoughtfully. "Anyway, right now we don't have a choice. Those monsters are out there. They'll keep killing innocent people until we stop them. So they don't have a choice, either."
"I know. They're like animals, not good or bad, they act the way they're made to act. I've been given my Red Spectre, you've been given your caspers. I think we've been made special for a reason. We can save a lot of lives tonight, how can we turn away?"
"Yeah, I'm not arguing with that. We do have an obligation. Okay, I'm slowing down and descending. Night vision screens are working great but all I see are miles of trees. We need a clearing in the next few miles. See anything?"
"Not yet. Shogren's cabin is almost within sight, maybe we should circle a little... Hey! On your nine o'clock, there's a spot."
"Great, I'm bringing us down now." The CORBY touched down so gently that no impact at all could be felt, and as the rotors slowed, the Trom-built impulse engines reduced even their whisper to silence. Tim checked the status lights one last time, then the cabin went black as he shut the stealth copter down. Through the windscreen, not even starlight could be seen on this overcast night.
Jocelyn unbuckled the restraint straps from around her waist and across her chest. "We're suited up. All we need to put on is our helmets and gloves."
"We'll be glad to have these suits tonight. It's twelve degrees out there."
"You and your Fahrenheit," she said, lowering her helmet down and tightening the seal where it attached to her suit's high collar. Her voice came clearly through a speaker in the jawbar, "America's a civilized country except for its dumb measuring."
They got out, sliding their hatches shut, and the CORBY automatically locked itself and armed its alarm systems. Timothy held up an individually crafted handgun with a barrel thicker than normal, clicked its mechanism and holstered it again at his right thigh. "No dart guns this time. I'm not counting on anesthetic darts against people with tiger DNA, hell no. They'd be done eating me before the drug put them to sleep."
Jocelyn placed a hand on her friend's shoulder and squeezed. "We're heading north northwest, this way. Come on, Tim. We're doing what Megan would have wanted us to continue doing." She sat out with a brisk stride and he followed without hesitation.
That trek was little more than a mile and nothing unusual happened, but it was nightmarish for both of them. Grief and lack of sleep left them not at their best. Bane's description of the Tigerman he had faced had been terrifying in itself, but the reports of another savage killing in this area by one of these monsters made it worse. An experienced hunter with a Marlin in his hands had been ripped open. If an alert man holding a rifle didn't deter these Tigermen, then normal unsuspecting Humans would be completeless prey.
Making as little noise as possible, relying on the light enhancers in their helmets' visors, Jocelyn and Timothy covered ground quickly. Their nerves were raw. Even the slightest sound from the forest around them made both swing around with hands dropping to clutch their weapons. A brisk wind had picked up, howling through tree branches with no leaves to soften its whine. Even though they were both warm and comfortable in their field suits, they frequently shivered anyway.
Walking up an elevation that made jogging difficult, they slowed to a walk and finally peered out between a clump of birch. Ahead, on a hill from which the trees and brush had been cleared, sat a simple one-story cabin of redwood planks. The single window showed yellow light. They could make out a generator beside the humble structure, black smoke drifting in the wind away from a stovepipe chimney. Next to the cabin sat three all terrain vehicles.
As they studied the scene, from around them came the snapping sounds of things deliberately making noise. Timothy and Jocelyn pressed their backs together, turning in a circle, hardly breathing.
A low, mocking voice said, "Looks like a feast tonight."
II.
Years of Kumundu training failed Jocelyn and Timothy that night. The deepest, most primitive fears overwhelmed them. It was instincts older and stronger than martial arts or civilization itself, instincts from dim ages when their tiny primate ancestors ran shrieking from gigantic predators. Every nerve pulled at them to run as fast as they possibly could.
But the two Tel Shai knights stood where they were and showed none of this.
Moving out between the widely spaced trees, four men in dark clothing stalked in at them, encircling them. With their light enhancers, Timothy and Jocelyn could see that these Tigermen remained mostly Human normal except for the fangs and claws where their teeth and fingenails had been. The way they moved so lightly on their toes, slightly crouched, shoulders up, was inevitably suggestive of cats moving in on prey.
The fifth men was different, walking in a Human manner, holding a 12 gauge pump action shotgun with both barrels aimed squarely at the two prisoners. "Keep quiet," he warned. "Not another house for ten miles around, no one to hear you scream."
Surprising everyone, Jocelyn placed both hands on her narrow hips and calmly asked, "Is Baron Shogren up there?"
"Har! What do you care? You're gonna be dinner in a minute."
One of the Tigermen rumbled deep in his chest. "I smell fear but not enough. What's going on?"
"We have an offer for the Baron. Serious money from a group that wants to back him. You've heard of STIGMA, right?" Jocelyn said.
"He's not here, no matter what offer you got," scoffed the shotgun man. "He's in Florida and by the time we could reach him, these boys will be cracking your bones for the marrow."
"They can try," was her answer. From inside her torso, a shimmering crimson outline of a woman's form lifted up into the night. Crackling, surrounded by an aura that made its details indistinct, the Red Spectre hovered at head height. Faced with something they could not understand, the Tigermen cringed back as they would from a raging fire.
The normal one yelled, "I was told all about you!" and let loose both barrels of the shotgun right at Jocelyn's chest. At pointblank range, that storm of pellets would have shredded an unprotected person. Her Trom armor under the field suit dissipated most of the impact but nothing is completely effective. The air was driven out of her lungs with a gush and she fell backwards without trying to catch herself.
The Red Spectre seemed to resist being drawn back to her. Despite its flailing, the weird apparition flashed backwards to merge into Jocelyn's limp form.
Pumping the action on his shotgun, the Human menace started to say something but there was the sharp crack of a pistol immediately followed by a deeper boom as the man's body flew apart in gouts of blood and flesh. Timothy whirled, firing three more times as quickly as he could. Three more explosions thundered in the woods. The Tigermen were blown into bits before they could realize what was happening. Timothy had brought one of the KDF concussion guns, intended for actual all-out combat, and each resonance cap was more devastating than a grenade.
He managed to get three of the monsters before the fourth Tigerman sprang fifteen feet through the air and pounced down upon him with all its weight. Timothy had happened to have his gun hand raised when he was slammed down to the ground. The creature's jaws gaped wide and clamped down on Timothy's forearm with force that would bite cleanly through a bare arm. Even with the protection of the Trom armor layer under his sleeve, Timothy screamed as the bone broke.
The gun had fallen from his hand. There was no hope of reaching it, and he was pinned down in a way that prevented him from reaching his survival knife or other weapons. Timothy couldn't draw his legs up under him or wriggle loose. Panic ran cold through his chest. Even if this monster couldn't bite through the armor, those fangs and claws could do enough internal damage to kill him in a few seconds.
Red lightning blinded him. A fierce sizzling rang in his ears as Timothy suddenly felt the crushing weight lift off him. He took deep, shuddering breaths. The Tigerman slumped to one side with a trench seared through the torso that made the corpse fall into unequal halves. Gulping for air, his right arm dangling in horrible pain, Timothy scrambled to his feet and looked for his partner.
"Jocelyn! Jocelyn, are you okay?" he yelled but could hardly hear his own voice. Even with his helmet dampening loud noises, those explosions a few seconds earlier had left his ears ringing.
"I'm all right. I'm all right. Just.. got the wind knocked out of me. Damn, Tim, you sure blew them away. Not enough left to dress up for the wake, as we say."
Despite everything, he laughed at that. "Ow, ow. I'm pretty sure my right arm is broken. Our healing factors should get rid of the pain in a few minutes."
"I'll make sling. Here's someone's shirt sleeve with not much blood on it. Hold still." She fashioned a workable sleeve and tied it up behind him neck. "Will you hold STILL! Stop wriggling."
"I guess my arm will heal in a few hours. That's the norm for us, but if the bones are misaligned, they'll seal up that way."
"Can't be helped right now, mate. If that happens, you'll need a little surgery and get a day or two off. Right now, we have to search that cabin and the vehicles."
Tim grunted and let his arm relax, feeling the sling hold it securely. "Good work with this thing. Yeah, you're right. We need as much information as we can find up there. How many of these creatures are there? Where are they? We might be taking that place apart all night."
"First, let me tell the others what happened. The man with the gun mentioned Florida, that might be exactly what our team needs to know." She twisted the left earpod on her helmet two clicks counter-clockwise. "Hello. Sable? We're both fine but we have a lot to report..."
III.
When the segmented roof panel slid open, freezing night air poured down into the tenth floor hangar. Sable's black hair whipped around and she shivered, but it would only be for a moment. Behind her, Ashley and Sheng stood unaffected because their field suits had an internal power source that kept them heated and comfortable.
Weirdly silent even at such close range, the dark stealthcopter CORBY II descended to touch down with gentle precision in the marked off circle on the floor. The top rotors slowed to a halt and the right front hatch slid open.
Stepping down from the pilot seat, Josef Jubilec crouch-walked over to where his teammates waited. "She's ready for action, captain," the Blind Archer said.
"Good work, Josef," replied Sable. "Thanks for going to Hawk Island and bringing it here. I can't remember when we last had both CORBYs in use."
"There's still the third one at the HCE Project. I contacted Stephen earlier to see if he was working on her and he guaranteed that copter can be wheels up in ten minutes. He also said he's standing by to bring her in and he'll be ready himself for anything we want him to do."
Sable nodded, untensing as the roof closed up again and the hangar returned to normal room temperature. "I don't know if that will be necessary. Jocelyn and Tim should be back with the other CORBY in an hour. If we have it here, Unicorn and Sheng will have to return this one to the island and then drive back down from Maine. There's barely enough room for one CORBY at a time here."
"We'll see what happens," Josef said. "I'm ready to go with them right now."
"No. I want you here in case we find another pack of these Tigermen. I'm still searching for where Baron Shogren has his hideouts. It's taking me forever. I can't simply hack into DMV and power company records as easy as Megan could. I'm not as smart as she was."
From behind her, Sheng Mo-Yuan said, "None of us are. We're doing the best we can with what we have."
Ashley Whitaker, the second Unicorn, chipped in, "You're dealt your cards and you play the game. That's what my mom used to say."
Sable jerked a thumb toward the door behind her. "You're off duty for four hours, Josef. I'd like you to nab some sleep. None of us have been getting as much as we should the past few days."
The Blind Archer's normally terse voice had softened as he went toward the door. "I'll be ready when you need me."
When he had gone from the hangar, Unicorn said quietly, "I've never seen him so gentle. He's trying to be supportive, captain."
"I know, I know. Josef has feelings, he was brought up not to show them but he's as hurt by Megan's death as the rest of us. Back to business. We have our hands full and we need to concentrate on our mission."
The Unicorn's perfect little face revealed more exhaustion than it ever had before. Dark circles under the crystal blue eyes showed she had not applied even her minimal make-up that day. Yet her voice remained firm and clear. "You don't have to remind us, Sable. I believe in what we do! Being Tel Shai knights is an honor and a duty."
Next to her, Sheng had lowered his helmet over his head, leaving the visor up. To most people, the Chujiran seemed to be Northern Chinese but that beaked eagle nose suggested his true origins. "We've got the co-ordinates of Shogren's facility," he said. "I'm going Mach-plus as soon as we're high enough, we should be there by dawn."
"All right. I'll be here, tracking down more leads. Jeremy is going through his own sources. He promised to contact us if he found anything instead of going after it on his own. But you know how he is."
Heading for the pilot side of the stealthcopter, Ashley scoffed. "Dire Wolf! If you ask me, he should really be called Lone Wolf." She hopped up lightly into the seat and raised one gloved hand toward Sable in a sort of salute, two fingers up by her temple. Beside her, Sheng got in from the other side.
"Good luck," Sable called as the rotors began to turn again. "Be careful." Overhead, the steel roof panels rolled open and a gust of subzero wind rushed in. The black helicopter shot straight up more quickly and silently than anything made by Human technology could match. Sable watched it go, finally allowing her face to lose some of its stoical strength now that no one was there to see her doubts and worry. "Please be careful."
IV.
As they shot up to twenty thousand feet, Ashley helped Sheng by watching all the monitor screens and gauges. The interior of the cabin was illuminated by dozens of blue and green lit dials. Any one of them going red would have stood out dramatically. "Radar reaklignment working fine," she said. "Although, to be honest, what would really happen if anyone picked us up? A tiny blip for a few seconds before vanishing? Any air traffic controller would shrug it off."
"Good to be careful anyways," Sheng replied. "Okay, we're accelerating to just under Mach-One. Still can't feel any shuddering but in a minute we'll be able to crack the barrier and really travel."
"These are amazing aircraft, all right. Mom gave me some lessons in a Bell she leased and they're incredibly hard to fly. You have to worry about fuel, which you don't with a CORBY, you have to watch oil pressure and engine temp and a dozen other things while you're also balancing lift and thrust to keep the bird from crashing. It's nerve-wracking and I have iron nerves of course."
"Yeah." Sheng hesitated before adding, "I wonder if the Trom will send one of them to do maintenance on these?"
"I dunno. I hate to think about it. Megan used to spend two days a week servicing the CORBYs and our Links and all our other equipment. I guess Jeremy or Sable will be working out a new arrangement with those guys. Bunch of cold-hearted emotionless geniuses!"
"We're speeding up now. Rotors are locked and Trom impulse engines cranked up. Hitting the resistance. There! We're through."
"I hardly felt anything," the little blonde said. "These things are basically spaceships disguised as helicopters. Hey, Sheng, I wanted to ask you. Remember when you fought that Turner guy who turned into a tiger?"
"As if I'd forget. Cirkoth watch over me! He wasn't like these monsters, he physically went full tiger. Nine feet long. he tossed me around like a stuffed toy. My Argent powers weren't much help. I can tell you, I'm not exactly excited to be faced an unknown number of Tigermen." Sheng made a disgusted noise.
"Huh. And I don't think my Horn will be any help either. Sure, it removes gralic abilities from anything from werewolves to Dragons to sorcerers. But these critters don't have any gralic force in them. I came packing serious weaponry this time."
Sheng checked a monitor screen. "ETA is one hour, eleven minutes to Florida itself but then we have to go into the Everglades, so who knows how long the whole trip will take. I figure we'll finding Baron Shogren's headquarters around two this morning."
"You know what's weird? I had a favorite Mad Scientist bad guy. I thought Cogitus was hilarious. He had a head like a watermelon long side up, and he wore mechanized exoskeleton armor because he was so damn old he wouldn't be able to hold his head up without it."
"I remember him. His real name was Sinclair."
"Well, I always laughed at the way he insulted everybody. He didn't even know he was doing it. Everytime he opened his mouth, he said how smart he was and how we were barely better than trained monkeys. After awhile, I almost looked forward to listening to him."
Sheng glanced over at his friend. "You're ODD, Ashley, but in a good way. He was trying to kill us, when he wasn't unleashing a horde of Insectoids or trying to keep brains alive in fish tanks."
"Oh, sure. He was still funny, though. Maybe being raised to be an action girl by my mom left me with a strange sense of humor. Listen, don't you think we should have had a service for Megan?"
"I'd have liked that," Sheng responded more somberly. "Back in Chujir, we had two days of fasting when a family member died, everyone got to say something about them, then we all got drunk on rice wine and hugged each other."
"We need something. We need closure." Unicorn pulled her helmet up and hung it on a hook on the back of her seat. Pulled up in a bun, the silver-blonde hair shone in the subdued cabin light. "I know her will said she didn't want any ceremony. She didn't believe in rituals or holidays or even birthdays. I know she's already been cremated and her urn will be buried by Archie's parents when the ground softens up. Where's that again?"
"St Anne's Church, up by Albany."
"Yeah, that's it. I think we need to all go up there and say goodbye. Otherwise, I dunno, we'll never feel like we were respectful enough. And another thing, don't you think Archie's taking it well?"
"He IS," Sheng agreed. "I mean, you can see he's crushed but he has been coming over to our headquarters building and working on Tim's motorcycle or our cars every day. I guess he wants to be doing something useful."
Ashley leaned over toward her teammate. "Don't tell anyone, but I'm glad he's acting like that. I expected him to blame us! I seriously thought he would hate all of us for getting her into danger."
"Guess not. He knew she loved this life. Listen, Ash, you sound like you're ready to drop."
"Yeah. I guess I'll stretch out in the back compartment and take a nap." She punched him lightly on the bicep. "I couldn't be any safer than being in this bird and having you nearby."
After she had unbuckled the restraint straps and wriggled through the clear divider panel into the rear compartment, Sheng Mo-Yuan exhaled sadly and patched into their satellite channels. He found some soft music he liked, something called post-rock, and settled down for the flight.
He didn't miss Chujir any more. Actually, he had lived in Manhattan longer than he had lived back in his home realm. His family there were only some uncles and aunts he barely knew, he had not had many friends in his village but he did like to visit Sifu Tang once in a while. Tang Ming, once a Tel Shai knight and KDF member herself. If not for her, he would never have known about the real world, let alone dared to live in it. He should go home soon and visit her, bring some gifts from so-called civilization.
There was Uncle Pao to think about, too. The old man had been very fond of Megan Salenger, one of the few white people he ever warmed up to. Sheng had often wondered why, but then who could explain why some people got along better than others? Uncle stayed at Sheng's office on Canal Street so much he was practically living there. Before he visited Sifu Tang, Sheng thought he should take Uncle Pao on a little vacation. Going to Arizona in the middle of winter should please the old Chinese. They had thought of each other as uncle and nephew for so long that either would have been startled at being reminded that they were no blood relation at all.
Sheng blinked as he realized they were on the edge of the Everglades. He had sunk deeper in thought than he had realized. The chronometer told him they had been in the air for an hour and a half. The Chujiran throttled down, eased the CORBY down below the speed of sound so he could engage the rotors again.
"Ashley! Hey blondie, we're almost there," he called over his shoulder.
The Unicorn mumbled something that sounded like, "Come on Cory, five more minutes, okay?"
She could be heard yawning, getting up and climbing back into the cabin. "Drat, I was out like nobody's business. Some strange dream about climbing trees in the rain, I remember that much. Let me get strapped in."
"That's Highway 88 below us," Sheng said. "I haven't seen a car for the past twenty miles. This is really isolated territory. There! That house there up its little side road, that's on the co-ordinates Sable turned up."
Peering down through the windscreen, Unicorn wrinkled her nose. "Imagine living there. Almost an hour to the nearest store. Who the heck built that house in the first place?"
Instead of answering, Sheng said, "I'm going to swing around again. Do me a favor and use thermal imaging and neural scans. See if anything living is down there."
"I'm on it. Nah. Nothing. Maybe a few mice that are too small to detect."
"Really? That's disappointing. Oh well, we better search anyway. There could be useful information about these Tigermen. That area behind the house looks big enough for the CORBY and the trees say it's solid enough to land on."
"Go for it, Sheng. We must be crazy, you know? We're feeling let down that there aren't a pack of extremely dangerous bloodthirsty half Human half tiger monsters for us to fight."
"Landing gear down. Descending," Sheng said. "Here we go. Yeah, when you put it that way, it's funny. But we'll be looking for these creatures until we find them. Touch down, we're good." He began slowing the rotors, and switching off various functions.
Ashley opened the hatch to her left but, before exiting the copter, she held up a handcrafted pistol with an unusually thick barrel. "Our strongest resonance caps. You can blow up an engine block with these shells. Believe me, I'm keeping it ready until we're back in the air again."
V.
When they met by the CORBY's nose, Sheng had fastened his own helmet on but had not drawn his dart gun. Seeing Unicorn's questioning expression, he said, "I'm shifting to durability. As dense as I can get. Right now, my skin is bulletproof, muscles and bones are like leather and granite. I feel a little safer."
"No one can hear us talking, right?"
"As long as we using the coms in our helmets, no." He began moving toward the house slowly, looking around the area. The light enhancers in their visors illuminated everything brilliantly. In this moonless cloudy winter night, they saw at a level comparable to noon in summer sunlight. The only drawback was range, the visible area only extended thirty feet in any direction.
"Say, Sheng, did you ever find a way to use two gralic effects at the same time? You know, be fast AND strong or strong AND invulnerable?"
"Nah. Not that I haven't tried," he laughed. "Teacher Jathis says I do actually have some secondary effects each time, though. When I get strong, my body also toughens up otherwise I would hurt myself. Same for when I get fast, so I don't rip tendons. And when I go dense, like now, my normal strength goes up a degree, too, otherwise it'd be hard to move."
"Jest wondering. Not that I'm envious of you having actual gralic abilities or anything, although I am! Check out how chewed up this front yard is. Lots of cars parked here and almost getting stuck in the mud."
"You're right." They stood in front of the house for a moment, studying the scene. Sheng said, "Looks to me like there was quite a crowd here and they left recently. The tire tracks are still sharp-edged, they haven't softened with erosion. There was a cold rain two days ago, judging by the mud, so these Tigermen were here after that."
"The detective speaks! What else?"
"Expensive vehicles, too. I'm not as good at identifying treads as I should be, but going by the size alone, these were mostly ATVs. Not a good sign. We're not dealing with one mastermind and only a few thugs."
"A Tiger Nation," Ashley suggested. "Not great news. Let's circle the house."
Behind the building, two aluminum garbage cans were full and there was a black plastic bag next to them, tied up tight. Sheng poked it with his boot. "Yeah, we're going to have to rummage through that before we leave. It's amazing how even otherwise sharp crooks leave receipts and envelopes in their garbage instead of destroying them." He turned back to the house itself.
"Ranch style," he continued. "Brick walls. I'd say built in the early 50s. The usual low-pitched roof, large windows, sliding glass doors. Not really popular in Florida, but then Shogren wasn't from this country."
"If you say so." Ashley had not relaxed her vigilance in the slightest. While her partner looked at the house, she kept turning in all directions, searching the trees behind them and watching the corners of the building, expecting Tigermen to come charging at them at any second.
"Door's unlocked." Sheng entered into a long kitchen that had been left with all its hanging pots and pans, coffeemaker, microwave on the counter and even some untouched fruit in a bowl on the round table. Coming in behind him, closing the door silently, Unicorn opened the refrigerator door a crack. There were still some items in there, but it was not stocked.
For the next full hour, they moved through the house. The living room had five blankets stretched out on the rug, with pillows or rolled up towels at the end of each one. The bedroom had two more blankets on the floor, as well as unmade sheets and blankets on the bed itself.
"I like this less and less!" Unicorn grumbled. "At least ten of these varmints were staying here. Add another one on the couch. I didn't mean 'Tiger Nation' as a literal phrase, I was hoping there was only a few of them."
She watched how Sheng searched quickly but systematically, tilting or moving furniture to look underneath, checking for any items that had been dropped and forgotten. From his lack of comment, apparently nothing he found was of any significance. Ashley herself checked the underside of drawers and in other classic hiding places, but with no better luck.
It was the biggest room by the front door that gave them the most to think about. All the furnishings had been removed. Deep parallel scrapes in the polished wood floor led from several directions toward the door. One coil of heavy-duty orange extension cord had been left behind, as well as a few scraps of cardboard and loose wrapping paper.
"Whoa, seems to me like this is where that Zhune equipment was used. They dragged it out without trying to protect the floors," Ashley said. "I bet it was because of Jeremy killing that Tigerman back in New York. They knew some Humans had learned about them and they ran for cover."
Sheng made a non-commital sound, as he was kneeling to examine scorch marks around an electrical outlet near the floor. "It has to be Zhune artifacts doing this. They need so much electricity that there's a danger of starting fires in the wall."
"I vote we stop for a minute," Ashley said. "First, I need a bathroom break. And a few protein bars, I haven't eaten since breakfast. Also, I think we should report to Sable."
"Okay. Yeah, you're right," he said, straightening up. "I brought some sandwiches. We can eat them while we take a break. Sable always worries about us on a mission, but I'm sure she's even more concerned right now."
Unicorn couldn't keep a saddened tinge from her tones, "Because of what happened to Megan. I get it. Let's go sit in the CORBY and take five."
Going back through the house and out the rear door again, they both found themselves moving slowly, facing in opposite directions so they were almost back to back. "Drat it all, Sheng," Unicorn said in a low voice, "I don't remember us ever being so timid. We've tackled the most bloodthirsty nightmares the Midnight War could throw at us."
"Why are you whispering?" asked Sheng. He approached the CORBY's tail, which did not have rotor blades but instead two vertical vanes using high-pressure air streams to help control flight. With all his training and experience, as keyed up as he was, he was still taken off guard. A huge bulky form scrambled up from under the stealthcopter's tail and crashed into him with bone-breaking impact, immediately swerving to leap up beyond head height and pounce down on Ashley. She cried out more in surprise than pain, feeling her gunhand pinned down to the ground by more than two hundred pounds of weight, the other foot pressing down on her chest and keeping her from drawing in a breath.
"Hey!" shouted Sheng from where he had jumped back on his feet. "Eat the bigger one first."
In a split-second, faster than an untrained eye could have followed, the Tiger vaulted across the intervening distance, ready to rip and slash. He dove right into a steel-hard fist at the end of a stiffened arm as rigid as a bar of steel. Sheng had braced himself and didn't budge as the brute cracked its face against that fist.
Not expecting that at all, the monster fell back a step, shaking its head. Sheng closed in and swung a wide looping overhand punch that started down by his knees. That blow hit like a hammer swung by a determined blacksmith. Blood splashed out from a broken nose. The creature loped back out of reach and swung around to escape.
But Sheng Mo-Yuan ran and actually tackled the brute, catching him off balance and throwing him down on his back. Straddling on his knees over the Tigerman, Sheng blasted furious alternating left-right hooks to a face that was beginning to lose shape under those impacts. "You started this!" Sheng yelled as loud as he could, "But I'm going to finish it!"
Before he could be killed, the creature thrashed about, got Sheng off him and was up on his feet again. In the last second of his life, he saw a small dark figure aiming a strange looking handgun at him. Then the sharp crack of the explosion sounded as his head flew apart into fragments too small to be recovered.
The echoes of that blast echoed from the forest behind them. Ashley lowered her gun and shouted, "Hell yeah! We're the top of the food chain for a reason."
Sheng loomed up over the corpse, with its mangled neck a mere stump and the head obliterated. "Ash? Can you hear me?"
"Barely. I hope I'm not permanently deaf. That shot nearly broke my little wrist, these resonance firers have some recoil."
"Use the infrared in your visor," he snapped. "Right now. We need to see if there are any more in the woods sneaking up on us."
After a few tense moments, they both relaxed very slightly. Sheng said, "Nothing."
"Me neither. That ambush was my fault, buddy. When we were in the air, I searched the house for heat sources. But I didn't check the woods around the house. My bad."
"Next time, we'll know better. Cirkoth guard me, that was actually scary. I lost it because I was mad at myself for being afraid."
Bending down over the headless body, Unicorn scoffed. "I'm not going to bother looking for a pulse. Man. Sheng, we have a lot to tell Sable about now. Let's sit in the CORBY and I'll call her. She's gonna be glad to hear we're both okay. Such a mom."
Before turning away from the dead thing, Sheng noticed how the splashes of blood were steaming in the frigid night air. "Why did this one remain behind? Why was he waiting out of sight?"
"Because this Tiger Nation knows who is after them," offered Ashley. "Next time we catch up with them, they'll be ready for us. I have that sinking feeling we're headed for a full scale, no-fooling battle."
4/6/2022
2/12/2022
I.
"I'm scared, I don't have a problem admitting it," Timothy Limbo said. Still watching the row of monitor screens and status lights, he pushed the collective/cyclic stick forward and brought the CORBY up to four hundred miles per hour. "Maybe I shouldn't have watched those videos of tigers leaping up fifteen feet in the air with no trouble. Or that one where a tiger catches up to a car going forty."
Next to him in the co-pilot seat, Jocelyn sounded more tired than anything else. "You've seen my Red Spectre, Tim. She is living lightning. She is faster than anything of flesh and blood and she can blast through granite."
"Yeah. That's true, and I'm glad you're paired up with me, to be honest. My caspers are great for searching and spying and stuff, but not much use against Tigermen." In the subdued light of the CORBY cabin, Timothy's face looked as exhausted as his teammate's voice sounded. His bright yellow hair had finally been trimmed by a professional barber, it no longer hung down over his forehead almost in his eyes. "Having you and your Spectre with me is a big comfort."
"I've got your back, my friend." In the years she had lived in New York, Jocelyn Garimara's accent had eroded so much that someone meeting her would not immediately know she was Australian from her voice. But the rich dark brown skin, straight black hair and distinctive facial bone structure made it clear she was Aboriginal, from the Northwest.
Timothy was not a big man, a few inches under six feet and lanky but she was small as well. Both were wearing the KDF field suits with the layer of silk-thin armor and tiny weapons and gadgets in numerous pockets. She went on, "I never trusted anyone until I met our team."
"This is awful. My heart has broken in half. I'm still having trouble processing what happened but instead of having time to think, here we are chasing monsters again. How are you doing?"
"Okay, I guess," she replied. "It happened. We lost Megan. Maybe it's better to be busy now. We certainly should concentrate on what we're doing for our own sakes."
"Yeah. Looks like another three or four minutes before we need to find a touchdown. I'm sure no one will be ready for us. Sensors aren't picking up any radar within miles, we're in a black stealth copter with no external nights flying through a moonless light. And the CORBYs don't make any more noise than a stiff breeze passing by."
Jocelyn took a moment before venturing, "Do you ever get tired of this, Tim? It feels like we've been fighting the Midnight War all our lives. We were barely adults when we started. I'm not sure I want to do this forever."
"No, I haven't felt like that. Not yet. But I'll tell you the truth, I'd rather be doing more research and rescues than fighting." He turned his head for a second and saw she was watching him thoughtfully. "Anyway, right now we don't have a choice. Those monsters are out there. They'll keep killing innocent people until we stop them. So they don't have a choice, either."
"I know. They're like animals, not good or bad, they act the way they're made to act. I've been given my Red Spectre, you've been given your caspers. I think we've been made special for a reason. We can save a lot of lives tonight, how can we turn away?"
"Yeah, I'm not arguing with that. We do have an obligation. Okay, I'm slowing down and descending. Night vision screens are working great but all I see are miles of trees. We need a clearing in the next few miles. See anything?"
"Not yet. Shogren's cabin is almost within sight, maybe we should circle a little... Hey! On your nine o'clock, there's a spot."
"Great, I'm bringing us down now." The CORBY touched down so gently that no impact at all could be felt, and as the rotors slowed, the Trom-built impulse engines reduced even their whisper to silence. Tim checked the status lights one last time, then the cabin went black as he shut the stealth copter down. Through the windscreen, not even starlight could be seen on this overcast night.
Jocelyn unbuckled the restraint straps from around her waist and across her chest. "We're suited up. All we need to put on is our helmets and gloves."
"We'll be glad to have these suits tonight. It's twelve degrees out there."
"You and your Fahrenheit," she said, lowering her helmet down and tightening the seal where it attached to her suit's high collar. Her voice came clearly through a speaker in the jawbar, "America's a civilized country except for its dumb measuring."
They got out, sliding their hatches shut, and the CORBY automatically locked itself and armed its alarm systems. Timothy held up an individually crafted handgun with a barrel thicker than normal, clicked its mechanism and holstered it again at his right thigh. "No dart guns this time. I'm not counting on anesthetic darts against people with tiger DNA, hell no. They'd be done eating me before the drug put them to sleep."
Jocelyn placed a hand on her friend's shoulder and squeezed. "We're heading north northwest, this way. Come on, Tim. We're doing what Megan would have wanted us to continue doing." She sat out with a brisk stride and he followed without hesitation.
That trek was little more than a mile and nothing unusual happened, but it was nightmarish for both of them. Grief and lack of sleep left them not at their best. Bane's description of the Tigerman he had faced had been terrifying in itself, but the reports of another savage killing in this area by one of these monsters made it worse. An experienced hunter with a Marlin in his hands had been ripped open. If an alert man holding a rifle didn't deter these Tigermen, then normal unsuspecting Humans would be completeless prey.
Making as little noise as possible, relying on the light enhancers in their helmets' visors, Jocelyn and Timothy covered ground quickly. Their nerves were raw. Even the slightest sound from the forest around them made both swing around with hands dropping to clutch their weapons. A brisk wind had picked up, howling through tree branches with no leaves to soften its whine. Even though they were both warm and comfortable in their field suits, they frequently shivered anyway.
Walking up an elevation that made jogging difficult, they slowed to a walk and finally peered out between a clump of birch. Ahead, on a hill from which the trees and brush had been cleared, sat a simple one-story cabin of redwood planks. The single window showed yellow light. They could make out a generator beside the humble structure, black smoke drifting in the wind away from a stovepipe chimney. Next to the cabin sat three all terrain vehicles.
As they studied the scene, from around them came the snapping sounds of things deliberately making noise. Timothy and Jocelyn pressed their backs together, turning in a circle, hardly breathing.
A low, mocking voice said, "Looks like a feast tonight."
II.
Years of Kumundu training failed Jocelyn and Timothy that night. The deepest, most primitive fears overwhelmed them. It was instincts older and stronger than martial arts or civilization itself, instincts from dim ages when their tiny primate ancestors ran shrieking from gigantic predators. Every nerve pulled at them to run as fast as they possibly could.
But the two Tel Shai knights stood where they were and showed none of this.
Moving out between the widely spaced trees, four men in dark clothing stalked in at them, encircling them. With their light enhancers, Timothy and Jocelyn could see that these Tigermen remained mostly Human normal except for the fangs and claws where their teeth and fingenails had been. The way they moved so lightly on their toes, slightly crouched, shoulders up, was inevitably suggestive of cats moving in on prey.
The fifth men was different, walking in a Human manner, holding a 12 gauge pump action shotgun with both barrels aimed squarely at the two prisoners. "Keep quiet," he warned. "Not another house for ten miles around, no one to hear you scream."
Surprising everyone, Jocelyn placed both hands on her narrow hips and calmly asked, "Is Baron Shogren up there?"
"Har! What do you care? You're gonna be dinner in a minute."
One of the Tigermen rumbled deep in his chest. "I smell fear but not enough. What's going on?"
"We have an offer for the Baron. Serious money from a group that wants to back him. You've heard of STIGMA, right?" Jocelyn said.
"He's not here, no matter what offer you got," scoffed the shotgun man. "He's in Florida and by the time we could reach him, these boys will be cracking your bones for the marrow."
"They can try," was her answer. From inside her torso, a shimmering crimson outline of a woman's form lifted up into the night. Crackling, surrounded by an aura that made its details indistinct, the Red Spectre hovered at head height. Faced with something they could not understand, the Tigermen cringed back as they would from a raging fire.
The normal one yelled, "I was told all about you!" and let loose both barrels of the shotgun right at Jocelyn's chest. At pointblank range, that storm of pellets would have shredded an unprotected person. Her Trom armor under the field suit dissipated most of the impact but nothing is completely effective. The air was driven out of her lungs with a gush and she fell backwards without trying to catch herself.
The Red Spectre seemed to resist being drawn back to her. Despite its flailing, the weird apparition flashed backwards to merge into Jocelyn's limp form.
Pumping the action on his shotgun, the Human menace started to say something but there was the sharp crack of a pistol immediately followed by a deeper boom as the man's body flew apart in gouts of blood and flesh. Timothy whirled, firing three more times as quickly as he could. Three more explosions thundered in the woods. The Tigermen were blown into bits before they could realize what was happening. Timothy had brought one of the KDF concussion guns, intended for actual all-out combat, and each resonance cap was more devastating than a grenade.
He managed to get three of the monsters before the fourth Tigerman sprang fifteen feet through the air and pounced down upon him with all its weight. Timothy had happened to have his gun hand raised when he was slammed down to the ground. The creature's jaws gaped wide and clamped down on Timothy's forearm with force that would bite cleanly through a bare arm. Even with the protection of the Trom armor layer under his sleeve, Timothy screamed as the bone broke.
The gun had fallen from his hand. There was no hope of reaching it, and he was pinned down in a way that prevented him from reaching his survival knife or other weapons. Timothy couldn't draw his legs up under him or wriggle loose. Panic ran cold through his chest. Even if this monster couldn't bite through the armor, those fangs and claws could do enough internal damage to kill him in a few seconds.
Red lightning blinded him. A fierce sizzling rang in his ears as Timothy suddenly felt the crushing weight lift off him. He took deep, shuddering breaths. The Tigerman slumped to one side with a trench seared through the torso that made the corpse fall into unequal halves. Gulping for air, his right arm dangling in horrible pain, Timothy scrambled to his feet and looked for his partner.
"Jocelyn! Jocelyn, are you okay?" he yelled but could hardly hear his own voice. Even with his helmet dampening loud noises, those explosions a few seconds earlier had left his ears ringing.
"I'm all right. I'm all right. Just.. got the wind knocked out of me. Damn, Tim, you sure blew them away. Not enough left to dress up for the wake, as we say."
Despite everything, he laughed at that. "Ow, ow. I'm pretty sure my right arm is broken. Our healing factors should get rid of the pain in a few minutes."
"I'll make sling. Here's someone's shirt sleeve with not much blood on it. Hold still." She fashioned a workable sleeve and tied it up behind him neck. "Will you hold STILL! Stop wriggling."
"I guess my arm will heal in a few hours. That's the norm for us, but if the bones are misaligned, they'll seal up that way."
"Can't be helped right now, mate. If that happens, you'll need a little surgery and get a day or two off. Right now, we have to search that cabin and the vehicles."
Tim grunted and let his arm relax, feeling the sling hold it securely. "Good work with this thing. Yeah, you're right. We need as much information as we can find up there. How many of these creatures are there? Where are they? We might be taking that place apart all night."
"First, let me tell the others what happened. The man with the gun mentioned Florida, that might be exactly what our team needs to know." She twisted the left earpod on her helmet two clicks counter-clockwise. "Hello. Sable? We're both fine but we have a lot to report..."
III.
When the segmented roof panel slid open, freezing night air poured down into the tenth floor hangar. Sable's black hair whipped around and she shivered, but it would only be for a moment. Behind her, Ashley and Sheng stood unaffected because their field suits had an internal power source that kept them heated and comfortable.
Weirdly silent even at such close range, the dark stealthcopter CORBY II descended to touch down with gentle precision in the marked off circle on the floor. The top rotors slowed to a halt and the right front hatch slid open.
Stepping down from the pilot seat, Josef Jubilec crouch-walked over to where his teammates waited. "She's ready for action, captain," the Blind Archer said.
"Good work, Josef," replied Sable. "Thanks for going to Hawk Island and bringing it here. I can't remember when we last had both CORBYs in use."
"There's still the third one at the HCE Project. I contacted Stephen earlier to see if he was working on her and he guaranteed that copter can be wheels up in ten minutes. He also said he's standing by to bring her in and he'll be ready himself for anything we want him to do."
Sable nodded, untensing as the roof closed up again and the hangar returned to normal room temperature. "I don't know if that will be necessary. Jocelyn and Tim should be back with the other CORBY in an hour. If we have it here, Unicorn and Sheng will have to return this one to the island and then drive back down from Maine. There's barely enough room for one CORBY at a time here."
"We'll see what happens," Josef said. "I'm ready to go with them right now."
"No. I want you here in case we find another pack of these Tigermen. I'm still searching for where Baron Shogren has his hideouts. It's taking me forever. I can't simply hack into DMV and power company records as easy as Megan could. I'm not as smart as she was."
From behind her, Sheng Mo-Yuan said, "None of us are. We're doing the best we can with what we have."
Ashley Whitaker, the second Unicorn, chipped in, "You're dealt your cards and you play the game. That's what my mom used to say."
Sable jerked a thumb toward the door behind her. "You're off duty for four hours, Josef. I'd like you to nab some sleep. None of us have been getting as much as we should the past few days."
The Blind Archer's normally terse voice had softened as he went toward the door. "I'll be ready when you need me."
When he had gone from the hangar, Unicorn said quietly, "I've never seen him so gentle. He's trying to be supportive, captain."
"I know, I know. Josef has feelings, he was brought up not to show them but he's as hurt by Megan's death as the rest of us. Back to business. We have our hands full and we need to concentrate on our mission."
The Unicorn's perfect little face revealed more exhaustion than it ever had before. Dark circles under the crystal blue eyes showed she had not applied even her minimal make-up that day. Yet her voice remained firm and clear. "You don't have to remind us, Sable. I believe in what we do! Being Tel Shai knights is an honor and a duty."
Next to her, Sheng had lowered his helmet over his head, leaving the visor up. To most people, the Chujiran seemed to be Northern Chinese but that beaked eagle nose suggested his true origins. "We've got the co-ordinates of Shogren's facility," he said. "I'm going Mach-plus as soon as we're high enough, we should be there by dawn."
"All right. I'll be here, tracking down more leads. Jeremy is going through his own sources. He promised to contact us if he found anything instead of going after it on his own. But you know how he is."
Heading for the pilot side of the stealthcopter, Ashley scoffed. "Dire Wolf! If you ask me, he should really be called Lone Wolf." She hopped up lightly into the seat and raised one gloved hand toward Sable in a sort of salute, two fingers up by her temple. Beside her, Sheng got in from the other side.
"Good luck," Sable called as the rotors began to turn again. "Be careful." Overhead, the steel roof panels rolled open and a gust of subzero wind rushed in. The black helicopter shot straight up more quickly and silently than anything made by Human technology could match. Sable watched it go, finally allowing her face to lose some of its stoical strength now that no one was there to see her doubts and worry. "Please be careful."
IV.
As they shot up to twenty thousand feet, Ashley helped Sheng by watching all the monitor screens and gauges. The interior of the cabin was illuminated by dozens of blue and green lit dials. Any one of them going red would have stood out dramatically. "Radar reaklignment working fine," she said. "Although, to be honest, what would really happen if anyone picked us up? A tiny blip for a few seconds before vanishing? Any air traffic controller would shrug it off."
"Good to be careful anyways," Sheng replied. "Okay, we're accelerating to just under Mach-One. Still can't feel any shuddering but in a minute we'll be able to crack the barrier and really travel."
"These are amazing aircraft, all right. Mom gave me some lessons in a Bell she leased and they're incredibly hard to fly. You have to worry about fuel, which you don't with a CORBY, you have to watch oil pressure and engine temp and a dozen other things while you're also balancing lift and thrust to keep the bird from crashing. It's nerve-wracking and I have iron nerves of course."
"Yeah." Sheng hesitated before adding, "I wonder if the Trom will send one of them to do maintenance on these?"
"I dunno. I hate to think about it. Megan used to spend two days a week servicing the CORBYs and our Links and all our other equipment. I guess Jeremy or Sable will be working out a new arrangement with those guys. Bunch of cold-hearted emotionless geniuses!"
"We're speeding up now. Rotors are locked and Trom impulse engines cranked up. Hitting the resistance. There! We're through."
"I hardly felt anything," the little blonde said. "These things are basically spaceships disguised as helicopters. Hey, Sheng, I wanted to ask you. Remember when you fought that Turner guy who turned into a tiger?"
"As if I'd forget. Cirkoth watch over me! He wasn't like these monsters, he physically went full tiger. Nine feet long. he tossed me around like a stuffed toy. My Argent powers weren't much help. I can tell you, I'm not exactly excited to be faced an unknown number of Tigermen." Sheng made a disgusted noise.
"Huh. And I don't think my Horn will be any help either. Sure, it removes gralic abilities from anything from werewolves to Dragons to sorcerers. But these critters don't have any gralic force in them. I came packing serious weaponry this time."
Sheng checked a monitor screen. "ETA is one hour, eleven minutes to Florida itself but then we have to go into the Everglades, so who knows how long the whole trip will take. I figure we'll finding Baron Shogren's headquarters around two this morning."
"You know what's weird? I had a favorite Mad Scientist bad guy. I thought Cogitus was hilarious. He had a head like a watermelon long side up, and he wore mechanized exoskeleton armor because he was so damn old he wouldn't be able to hold his head up without it."
"I remember him. His real name was Sinclair."
"Well, I always laughed at the way he insulted everybody. He didn't even know he was doing it. Everytime he opened his mouth, he said how smart he was and how we were barely better than trained monkeys. After awhile, I almost looked forward to listening to him."
Sheng glanced over at his friend. "You're ODD, Ashley, but in a good way. He was trying to kill us, when he wasn't unleashing a horde of Insectoids or trying to keep brains alive in fish tanks."
"Oh, sure. He was still funny, though. Maybe being raised to be an action girl by my mom left me with a strange sense of humor. Listen, don't you think we should have had a service for Megan?"
"I'd have liked that," Sheng responded more somberly. "Back in Chujir, we had two days of fasting when a family member died, everyone got to say something about them, then we all got drunk on rice wine and hugged each other."
"We need something. We need closure." Unicorn pulled her helmet up and hung it on a hook on the back of her seat. Pulled up in a bun, the silver-blonde hair shone in the subdued cabin light. "I know her will said she didn't want any ceremony. She didn't believe in rituals or holidays or even birthdays. I know she's already been cremated and her urn will be buried by Archie's parents when the ground softens up. Where's that again?"
"St Anne's Church, up by Albany."
"Yeah, that's it. I think we need to all go up there and say goodbye. Otherwise, I dunno, we'll never feel like we were respectful enough. And another thing, don't you think Archie's taking it well?"
"He IS," Sheng agreed. "I mean, you can see he's crushed but he has been coming over to our headquarters building and working on Tim's motorcycle or our cars every day. I guess he wants to be doing something useful."
Ashley leaned over toward her teammate. "Don't tell anyone, but I'm glad he's acting like that. I expected him to blame us! I seriously thought he would hate all of us for getting her into danger."
"Guess not. He knew she loved this life. Listen, Ash, you sound like you're ready to drop."
"Yeah. I guess I'll stretch out in the back compartment and take a nap." She punched him lightly on the bicep. "I couldn't be any safer than being in this bird and having you nearby."
After she had unbuckled the restraint straps and wriggled through the clear divider panel into the rear compartment, Sheng Mo-Yuan exhaled sadly and patched into their satellite channels. He found some soft music he liked, something called post-rock, and settled down for the flight.
He didn't miss Chujir any more. Actually, he had lived in Manhattan longer than he had lived back in his home realm. His family there were only some uncles and aunts he barely knew, he had not had many friends in his village but he did like to visit Sifu Tang once in a while. Tang Ming, once a Tel Shai knight and KDF member herself. If not for her, he would never have known about the real world, let alone dared to live in it. He should go home soon and visit her, bring some gifts from so-called civilization.
There was Uncle Pao to think about, too. The old man had been very fond of Megan Salenger, one of the few white people he ever warmed up to. Sheng had often wondered why, but then who could explain why some people got along better than others? Uncle stayed at Sheng's office on Canal Street so much he was practically living there. Before he visited Sifu Tang, Sheng thought he should take Uncle Pao on a little vacation. Going to Arizona in the middle of winter should please the old Chinese. They had thought of each other as uncle and nephew for so long that either would have been startled at being reminded that they were no blood relation at all.
Sheng blinked as he realized they were on the edge of the Everglades. He had sunk deeper in thought than he had realized. The chronometer told him they had been in the air for an hour and a half. The Chujiran throttled down, eased the CORBY down below the speed of sound so he could engage the rotors again.
"Ashley! Hey blondie, we're almost there," he called over his shoulder.
The Unicorn mumbled something that sounded like, "Come on Cory, five more minutes, okay?"
She could be heard yawning, getting up and climbing back into the cabin. "Drat, I was out like nobody's business. Some strange dream about climbing trees in the rain, I remember that much. Let me get strapped in."
"That's Highway 88 below us," Sheng said. "I haven't seen a car for the past twenty miles. This is really isolated territory. There! That house there up its little side road, that's on the co-ordinates Sable turned up."
Peering down through the windscreen, Unicorn wrinkled her nose. "Imagine living there. Almost an hour to the nearest store. Who the heck built that house in the first place?"
Instead of answering, Sheng said, "I'm going to swing around again. Do me a favor and use thermal imaging and neural scans. See if anything living is down there."
"I'm on it. Nah. Nothing. Maybe a few mice that are too small to detect."
"Really? That's disappointing. Oh well, we better search anyway. There could be useful information about these Tigermen. That area behind the house looks big enough for the CORBY and the trees say it's solid enough to land on."
"Go for it, Sheng. We must be crazy, you know? We're feeling let down that there aren't a pack of extremely dangerous bloodthirsty half Human half tiger monsters for us to fight."
"Landing gear down. Descending," Sheng said. "Here we go. Yeah, when you put it that way, it's funny. But we'll be looking for these creatures until we find them. Touch down, we're good." He began slowing the rotors, and switching off various functions.
Ashley opened the hatch to her left but, before exiting the copter, she held up a handcrafted pistol with an unusually thick barrel. "Our strongest resonance caps. You can blow up an engine block with these shells. Believe me, I'm keeping it ready until we're back in the air again."
V.
When they met by the CORBY's nose, Sheng had fastened his own helmet on but had not drawn his dart gun. Seeing Unicorn's questioning expression, he said, "I'm shifting to durability. As dense as I can get. Right now, my skin is bulletproof, muscles and bones are like leather and granite. I feel a little safer."
"No one can hear us talking, right?"
"As long as we using the coms in our helmets, no." He began moving toward the house slowly, looking around the area. The light enhancers in their visors illuminated everything brilliantly. In this moonless cloudy winter night, they saw at a level comparable to noon in summer sunlight. The only drawback was range, the visible area only extended thirty feet in any direction.
"Say, Sheng, did you ever find a way to use two gralic effects at the same time? You know, be fast AND strong or strong AND invulnerable?"
"Nah. Not that I haven't tried," he laughed. "Teacher Jathis says I do actually have some secondary effects each time, though. When I get strong, my body also toughens up otherwise I would hurt myself. Same for when I get fast, so I don't rip tendons. And when I go dense, like now, my normal strength goes up a degree, too, otherwise it'd be hard to move."
"Jest wondering. Not that I'm envious of you having actual gralic abilities or anything, although I am! Check out how chewed up this front yard is. Lots of cars parked here and almost getting stuck in the mud."
"You're right." They stood in front of the house for a moment, studying the scene. Sheng said, "Looks to me like there was quite a crowd here and they left recently. The tire tracks are still sharp-edged, they haven't softened with erosion. There was a cold rain two days ago, judging by the mud, so these Tigermen were here after that."
"The detective speaks! What else?"
"Expensive vehicles, too. I'm not as good at identifying treads as I should be, but going by the size alone, these were mostly ATVs. Not a good sign. We're not dealing with one mastermind and only a few thugs."
"A Tiger Nation," Ashley suggested. "Not great news. Let's circle the house."
Behind the building, two aluminum garbage cans were full and there was a black plastic bag next to them, tied up tight. Sheng poked it with his boot. "Yeah, we're going to have to rummage through that before we leave. It's amazing how even otherwise sharp crooks leave receipts and envelopes in their garbage instead of destroying them." He turned back to the house itself.
"Ranch style," he continued. "Brick walls. I'd say built in the early 50s. The usual low-pitched roof, large windows, sliding glass doors. Not really popular in Florida, but then Shogren wasn't from this country."
"If you say so." Ashley had not relaxed her vigilance in the slightest. While her partner looked at the house, she kept turning in all directions, searching the trees behind them and watching the corners of the building, expecting Tigermen to come charging at them at any second.
"Door's unlocked." Sheng entered into a long kitchen that had been left with all its hanging pots and pans, coffeemaker, microwave on the counter and even some untouched fruit in a bowl on the round table. Coming in behind him, closing the door silently, Unicorn opened the refrigerator door a crack. There were still some items in there, but it was not stocked.
For the next full hour, they moved through the house. The living room had five blankets stretched out on the rug, with pillows or rolled up towels at the end of each one. The bedroom had two more blankets on the floor, as well as unmade sheets and blankets on the bed itself.
"I like this less and less!" Unicorn grumbled. "At least ten of these varmints were staying here. Add another one on the couch. I didn't mean 'Tiger Nation' as a literal phrase, I was hoping there was only a few of them."
She watched how Sheng searched quickly but systematically, tilting or moving furniture to look underneath, checking for any items that had been dropped and forgotten. From his lack of comment, apparently nothing he found was of any significance. Ashley herself checked the underside of drawers and in other classic hiding places, but with no better luck.
It was the biggest room by the front door that gave them the most to think about. All the furnishings had been removed. Deep parallel scrapes in the polished wood floor led from several directions toward the door. One coil of heavy-duty orange extension cord had been left behind, as well as a few scraps of cardboard and loose wrapping paper.
"Whoa, seems to me like this is where that Zhune equipment was used. They dragged it out without trying to protect the floors," Ashley said. "I bet it was because of Jeremy killing that Tigerman back in New York. They knew some Humans had learned about them and they ran for cover."
Sheng made a non-commital sound, as he was kneeling to examine scorch marks around an electrical outlet near the floor. "It has to be Zhune artifacts doing this. They need so much electricity that there's a danger of starting fires in the wall."
"I vote we stop for a minute," Ashley said. "First, I need a bathroom break. And a few protein bars, I haven't eaten since breakfast. Also, I think we should report to Sable."
"Okay. Yeah, you're right," he said, straightening up. "I brought some sandwiches. We can eat them while we take a break. Sable always worries about us on a mission, but I'm sure she's even more concerned right now."
Unicorn couldn't keep a saddened tinge from her tones, "Because of what happened to Megan. I get it. Let's go sit in the CORBY and take five."
Going back through the house and out the rear door again, they both found themselves moving slowly, facing in opposite directions so they were almost back to back. "Drat it all, Sheng," Unicorn said in a low voice, "I don't remember us ever being so timid. We've tackled the most bloodthirsty nightmares the Midnight War could throw at us."
"Why are you whispering?" asked Sheng. He approached the CORBY's tail, which did not have rotor blades but instead two vertical vanes using high-pressure air streams to help control flight. With all his training and experience, as keyed up as he was, he was still taken off guard. A huge bulky form scrambled up from under the stealthcopter's tail and crashed into him with bone-breaking impact, immediately swerving to leap up beyond head height and pounce down on Ashley. She cried out more in surprise than pain, feeling her gunhand pinned down to the ground by more than two hundred pounds of weight, the other foot pressing down on her chest and keeping her from drawing in a breath.
"Hey!" shouted Sheng from where he had jumped back on his feet. "Eat the bigger one first."
In a split-second, faster than an untrained eye could have followed, the Tiger vaulted across the intervening distance, ready to rip and slash. He dove right into a steel-hard fist at the end of a stiffened arm as rigid as a bar of steel. Sheng had braced himself and didn't budge as the brute cracked its face against that fist.
Not expecting that at all, the monster fell back a step, shaking its head. Sheng closed in and swung a wide looping overhand punch that started down by his knees. That blow hit like a hammer swung by a determined blacksmith. Blood splashed out from a broken nose. The creature loped back out of reach and swung around to escape.
But Sheng Mo-Yuan ran and actually tackled the brute, catching him off balance and throwing him down on his back. Straddling on his knees over the Tigerman, Sheng blasted furious alternating left-right hooks to a face that was beginning to lose shape under those impacts. "You started this!" Sheng yelled as loud as he could, "But I'm going to finish it!"
Before he could be killed, the creature thrashed about, got Sheng off him and was up on his feet again. In the last second of his life, he saw a small dark figure aiming a strange looking handgun at him. Then the sharp crack of the explosion sounded as his head flew apart into fragments too small to be recovered.
The echoes of that blast echoed from the forest behind them. Ashley lowered her gun and shouted, "Hell yeah! We're the top of the food chain for a reason."
Sheng loomed up over the corpse, with its mangled neck a mere stump and the head obliterated. "Ash? Can you hear me?"
"Barely. I hope I'm not permanently deaf. That shot nearly broke my little wrist, these resonance firers have some recoil."
"Use the infrared in your visor," he snapped. "Right now. We need to see if there are any more in the woods sneaking up on us."
After a few tense moments, they both relaxed very slightly. Sheng said, "Nothing."
"Me neither. That ambush was my fault, buddy. When we were in the air, I searched the house for heat sources. But I didn't check the woods around the house. My bad."
"Next time, we'll know better. Cirkoth guard me, that was actually scary. I lost it because I was mad at myself for being afraid."
Bending down over the headless body, Unicorn scoffed. "I'm not going to bother looking for a pulse. Man. Sheng, we have a lot to tell Sable about now. Let's sit in the CORBY and I'll call her. She's gonna be glad to hear we're both okay. Such a mom."
Before turning away from the dead thing, Sheng noticed how the splashes of blood were steaming in the frigid night air. "Why did this one remain behind? Why was he waiting out of sight?"
"Because this Tiger Nation knows who is after them," offered Ashley. "Next time we catch up with them, they'll be ready for us. I have that sinking feeling we're headed for a full scale, no-fooling battle."
4/6/2022