Cities grow and become forgotten. What once was a monument to greatness and valour will eventually get dwarves by the giant fast food restaurant built next door. Soon even that was made small in its turn until eventually all was buried under a growing tide of population. There are many hidden places in a city like that, places that might once was been important but now serve only the memory of ghosts.
Snuggled in the womb of the forgotten city Eynbeth was feeling completely safe.
And why shouldn’t she? Yes, she was smuggling some highly illegal goods and if she was caught a life sentence in prison would be a mercy. But her boss was nice enough to send along for of his guards, all of them with biceps thicker than her waist. They were hidden in the shell of an old multi-storey car park, a remembrance to the times when cars only crawled along the ground. It might once have been beautiful, in a solid concrete kind of way. The road curves and wove through the supporting columns, leaving patches of what might have been light, when light last shown down here. Not they showed only darkness, thick and as complete as you’d expect on at this level.
The scramblers on the truck were top of the range. The police would have a hard time tracking it, even if they knew to look for it. Which they shouldn’t, its tax was up to date and it hadn’t been involved in any serious crime before.
And they were dealing with monks! How safe could you get?
Probably quite a bit safer, she thought to herself quietly, if they didn’t consider you an abomination. She was surprised that Drongo had even considered to trade with them in the first place. But money was money and if they wanted these goods so badly then maybe they weren’t as prejudiced as they made out to be. Maybe Drongo was right, maybe it was just attention seeking.
Of course if it was up to her she’d take their money then call in the police. Even the Pure couldn’t explain away carrying the earth they were. But Drongo said not to and she followed his instructions. She was sure he liked her enough not to instantly fire her but she never wanted to push it.
She was standing by the cab, watching the last of the crates being loaded up onto the monk’s trailer. As it hit the truck bed the monk turned and walked over to her, dusting off his hands. He was a strange one, even for a monk. She didn’t know what he looked like, his face completely hidden by the hood of his habit. Even that was odd, the traditional scarlet colour but with the insignia of a crossed sword and cog. He hadn’t said a word the entire operation, hadn’t even inspected the goods, just began loading them up. Maybe he thought it was beneath his dignity to talk to the likes of her.
Something about his stance made her unease but she shook this unease off. After all he was just one monk. What could he do?
Obviously she wasn’t the only one to notice it, however. Engra, one of her protectors squared his shoulders and stepped forward to intercept him. Drongo believed in a show of strength and Engra and his brother couldn’t be beaten. All of them were Alanchi, originally bred as soldiers before the Skyguard got more creative. A whole squad of them could take on just about anything and walk away grinning.
Engra barely opened his mouth to talk to the stranger before a sword burst from his back, spraying Eynbeth with his blood. She instinctively jumped back, rolling into a ball and dropping beneath her truck. Quick as she was the Alanchi were quicker, pulling the guns slung around their necks and unleashing a hell storm of lead towards Engra’s still twitching body. As they did so they spread out, making themselves as hard a target as possible. Eynbeth began to relax. She felt bad about the loss of Engra, who had always been good to her, but she couldn’t help thinking that now she would get the money and the cargo. Drongo wouldn’t be happy about losing a guard but he might be appeased by that.
Then the second guard died.
She didn’t even see it happen, just saw his body hit the floor. Then she notivced that instead of poinding into flesh the concussive shells were hitting concrete. She frowned.
The Alanchi were missing.
That was all she needed to know it was time to get the hell out of there. That monk had just taken down half the squad and it didn’t seem to be slowing. She concentrated and turned invisible.
There was a reason that she’d been trusted to make this cargo drop,m even though she was younger than most of her collegues. The fact was that she had the tallents to make sure it went all right.
She cursed her luck. Talents? What she was good at was spying and keeping secrets. If she had real talents then she would have worked out that a religious order that called her kind scum wouldn’t be likely to just hand over 50 million credits.
Though she doubted that anyone would have expected this.
She had to get out of there. Drongo would understand. This city was all about survivial and information. And the information that the monks had this kind of power would be worth a lot.
But not her life.
The third Alanchi was dying as she got to the entrance of the area. She turned, flatteneing herself against the wall, hugging the shadows. She couldn’t move too fast, she’d be spotted. This meant that she got to see the final moments of the last squad member.
She wore that the monk was barely even trying to avoid the bullets. He just seemed to flicker as he walked, the bullets spraying past his habbit. He just approached, holding his blood-stained swwrd in a confident manner. The Alanchi gave up on the gun, pulling out an axe, holding it high and charging forward. Though she could see his face Eynbeth swore that the monk smiled at the approaching 400 pound axe-man. Then there was another brief flicker of movement and the last of the Alanchi subsided, now no more than 400 pounds of kibble.
Eynbeth tried not to notice. She was almost by the exit now, almost ot freedom. Once she was out of this cave the she’d be able to escape. She’d be able to live. The monk wuld wasdte time looking for her. She’d survive.
Then the moink looked right at her and lifted back its hood.
She saw an old face there, mid-forties if she had to guess. It looked unscarred and unworried, as if fights like that happened every day.
And he was wearing a pair of infra-red goggles.
She swore and ran, knowing that he could see her and that she didn’t stand a chance. But she had to try.
She heard her death whistling towards her and she turned, wanting to look it in the face, to see it coming. The knife struck her in the shoulder, throwing her backward.
Eynbeth got a lost look at the monk as she hurtled backwards. He was already turning away, not seeming to care that he had just killed five people.
Then the back of her legs hit the barrier and she fell over and backwards, down into the darkness.
