"Secret Wisdom of the Dead"
May. 16th, 2022 09:53 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dochermes"Secret Wisdom of the Dead"
11/15/2001
I.
A rather pretty young woman walked briskly up Third Avenue. Despite the chill of a November afternoon, she wore only a thin tan topcoat over some sort of black outfit with a high collar. Beneath a shag of tousled black hair was an inquisitive, gamin face with huge dark eyes. At 44th Street, she swung right and walked up to a four-story building of yellow brick. Its sign listed EMERGENCY ONE, a clinic for minor medical emergencies, as well as three doctors' offices, a photography studio and a posh spa. She strode through the lobby without pausing, past the elevators and wide stairs, to a short hallway that ended with a steel EMERGENCY EXIT ONLY door. On the lefthand wall was a plain wooden door with a brass plate that read DIRE WOLF AGENCY. She rang the doorbell three times in short bursts.
Seconds later, the door swung open and a tall gaunt man in his mid 40s, dressed all in black, burst through. The girl jumped to embrace him with fierce enthusiasm. "Captain! My captain!" She buried her face on his shoulder. "I have not seen you for too long."
Jeremy Bane received the hug with some uneasiness, patting the girl's back and eventually disengaging. "Hi, Megan. Good to see you." He held her at arm's length and studied her upturned face. "How's our Trom Girl?"
"I am well in every regard," she answered. "This is your detective agency. Will you show it to me, Jeremy?"
"Of course, come in," Bane said, closing the door behind him. "This is the waiting room. Not much but a few chairs and some magazines on a table. It's useful for cooling off a client while I talk to someone else" He showed her through to the office itself. To the right was a large oak desk with a cordless phone in its charger, in and out trays, and a laptop computer. Two plain wooden chairs stood in front of the desk. Facing them as they entered was a long leather couch under a curtained window, with endtables holding reading lamps. The wall to the left was bare. Behind them as they stood in the doorway were two matching doors, one concealing a minimal bathroom and the other a closet. On a shelf over the closet door was a police scanner.
"Efficient use of space," Trom Girl said, "but that south wall is being wasted. Perhaps a filing cabinet or bookcase? I assume that you have prepared a secure hiding place?"
The faintest of smiles touched Bane's mouth. "Not yet, Megan. I'm thinking of digging a shallow pit right there, with a sliding bookcase to conceal it. That's where I will keep my weapons and field suit."
Megan turned to grin at her captain. "Well done. Oh, you are missed at KDF headquarters."
Walking over to sit behind the desk, Bane gestured for Megan to take one of the chairs, and she pulled it close to his right side. "We discussed this. If Cindy and I had stayed at headquarters, your team would never come into its own. We would always be butting in. Lauren has real leadership qualities, and I have complete faith in her."
"But... surely you miss the KDF? You miss US?"
"Of course," he said gently. "But you know, it's not like I moved to an adjacent realm. You and the others can drop by and I will probably be stopping over for research." He leaned forward, elbows on the desk. "You know, for someone raised by the Trom, you still have genuine emotions."
Megan opened her topcoat and shrugged it off. Underneath, she was wearing tight pants and a snug jacket of dark leathery material, with a high military collar and several flap pouches. "I am Human, after all. The Trom raised me from infancy but they acknowledged that I would never approach pure reason as closely as they do. They make allowances." Megan Salenger flashed an appealing conspiratorial smile. "Which brings me to my covert agenda."
"Which is?"
"Fast food for lunch. I am on a strict dietary regimen planned for me by Trom specialists. I agree to its logic and wish to remain in peak health but... I am allowed to deviate on specific occasions as part of my mission to blend into Human society."
Bane gave one of his rare laughs, caught off guard and expecting some momentous crisis. "You crave junk food? Oh, you ARE human, Megan. Do you have anything particular in mind?"
"I thought it would be productive to leave it to your experience," she said. Megan Salenger was just twenty-two, but in her enthusiasm, she looked even younger.
"Sounds good." The Dire Wolf stood up and got his black sport jacket from where it had been draped over the back of his chair. As always, he wore black slacks and long-sleeved turtleneck. 'I think I know just the place, not four blocks away." As he led her from the office, locking the door behind them, he said, "Fill me on your teammates. What's up with them?
Megan Salengber shrugged into her tan topcoat in the lobby. "Well. Sable has been planning our missions thoroughly, she's very diligent. Almost a Trom, in fact. Argent is always in trouble. He gets carried away and acts on impulse. Josef doesn't change much. Oh and Unicorn is having a romance with Johnny."
"Wait, what...? Johnny Packard? The Brimstone Kid?" Bane scowled. "Well, she's not a minor anymore but I think he's a bad influence."
Megan chuckled. "You sounds like a father when his daughter brings home a date. As I understand Human psychology..."
"At any rate, here we are." Bane led her into a Five Guys. The next fifteen minutes were spent devouring two freshly-cooked hamburgers with assorted toppings and way too many French fries cooked in peanut oil. Megan had a large Pepsi and even a refill. As they left, she repressed a belch.
"Feel better, honey?" Bane asked. They were back out on the street.
"I have a pleasant sensation of satisfaction. Captain, this is my free day. I have no duties. Perhaps I may assist you in your cases?"
"Hmm. Maybe." He led her back to 44th Street, enjoying the eagerness in her voice. Had he ever been that young? He didn't think so. "There is something I have been asked to handle by the mayor of Post Oak, Texas. Something about six headless corpses found in the past year."
II.
Back in his office, the Dire Wolf led Megan to her chair, then opened a manila folder and spread an assortment of newspaper clippings out on his desk. "These deaths caught my eye last summer and I was thinking of going out to look over the scene. Then the mayor called me. He knew me because of the time I caught Pantera. He was a young serial killer from near El Paso and I had to testify at his trial. Apparently I made a good impression. So. Six bodies have been found without their heads within a hundred mile radius of Post Oak." It was getting dark, so he turned on a few lamps.
Megan shuffled through the clippings, her eyes flickering over them so briskly that it seemed she could not have been paying any attention to them. Yet Bane knew she had in fact memorized every word. Her upbringing by the Trom had developed aspects of her mind to near complete potential. She turned those dark eyes at Bane. "All the victims are male, middle-aged or older, all associated with local colleges or research facilities. Each was a respected authority in a demanding field. Criminal law, chemistry, civil engineering, archaeology, electronics and surgery. I see no other connection yet. Is there some information you possess not in these articles, Jeremy?"
"Yes. In fact, the most significant detail. The decapitations were cauterized somehow. No blood was found, even though the bodies were still at the scene of their deaths."
Megan considered this for a mere second. "Human techniques to do this would involve large conspicuous equipment, yet the clippings indicate nothing unusual was observed at the scenes."
"Exactly," said Bane. He began to stuff the clippings back in the folder. "So I have a theory that I doubt would ever occur to the police or FBI. It involves black magick of the worst kind, necromancy."
The Trom Girl was watching him intently. "This means divination by communicating with the spirits of the dead."
"uh-huh," Bane answered. He flipped open his laptop, logged on with his password and slid it over to face where Megan sat. "Here is where your skills come in. Let's face it, you are a million times better with the computer than I ever could be."
"True," she said, oblivious to the fact no question was involved.
"I want you to look for advances or developments in the specialties of each man, but only after their deaths. Let's see, for example. Gilbert Biedermann. He was working for the DEA on ways to identify new strains of marijuana. Anything noteworthy in that area after his death. Same with the other victims."
"I understand, captain." Trom Girl adjusted the screen and began typing so rapidly it looked as if she were just pretending to be writing. Yet Bane knew she was entering questions about each specialty of the murdered men. Nor did she have to refer back to the clippings; he knew that, years from now, she would be able to quote the articles word for word from that brief glimpse she had given them. Leaving to her work, Bane went into the bathroom. It was a tiny cubicle without a shower. He washed his face and hands, and brushed his teeth. She had done this in the ladies' room at Five Guys, but he had wanted to get back here. The Dire Wolf stole a glance at the screen. She had four windows open and was going back and forth between them.
"Jeremy?"
"Yes?"
"Your computer is crawling with viruses and you have one malware I recognize. Let me take this after we are done and I will clean it and tune it up."
"Okay, Megan. What have you got?"
"Your computer is running at 68% potential speed. Hold on. I have to go in through the side of another company's firewall. This is interesting. Five special interest fields of the victims have had new breakthroughs since their deaths, all involving licensing and patents for new applications. Former employers are suspicious but nothing has been proven."
"Just what I was looking for. See if the people who benefit from these developments have a common element.'
"On it," she said. Her fingers played on the keyboard so rapidly it looked as if she were just drumming away at random. Another ten minutes passed. "Yes. Three possible names who made large profits from these innovations. One is far ahead of the others in terms of millions made. The dummy corporations they set up to hide behind are not convincing if you look for matches between payrolls and profits. Got it." She turned her pale face up at the Dire Wolf. "A man named Morgan W Heyer. Do you recognize that?"
"No," said Bane. "Where's he based?"
"That clinches it. His family estate is twenty miles outside of Oak Post, Texas. It was built in 1897. The family became wealthy through unethical deals in an oil boom in the early 20th Century. Should I save all this?"
"Huh? Oh yes. Put it in a folder marked 'Headless Murders, Texas November 2000.' Thank you. How long would it take Human computer experts to do what you just did?"
With a barely noticeable hint of pride in her voice, Megan Salenger answered, "Months to years. If they could accomplish it at all. I used parallel leaps in undertone logic which the Trom have developed."
The Dire Wolf went to the closet and rummaged around, coming out with a cardboard shoe box marked SNEAKERS with a felt-tipped pen. "I think we have something to go on, Megan. If it doesn't pan out, I will start again from a different angle but I think you do have to report back to KDF headquarters at some point."
"Are we going to Texas? Let's head to the headquarters, we can use a Corby, I'll fly you there-"
"No. Sorry, I appreciate the offer, but those copters are for your team now. In a major crisis I could justify asking to use one, but this is not that pressing a problem. I do have an Eldar travel crystal here. It's my personal property, the Eldar gave it to me after the Invasion of Maroch, That was a few years before you were born, I think."
"Captain, I have found something else," she said quietly. "This morning, Texas Rangers reporting the finding of a seventh headless corpse near Cross Plains. That is about a two hour drive from Oak Post. The victim has been identified as Steven Corcroran, age 51, video game designer. The media have not been informed."
"What? Then how do you know this?"
"I hacked into Texas State Police channels," she answered in the same tone of voice one would use to describe finding a quarter on the sidewalk.
"Maybe I'd better you get away from that thing," Bane said dryly. He removed his jacket and strapped a small blue jewel between his shoulder blades. It was held in a simple silver setting, with elastic straps going over one shoulder and under the opposite one. He shrugged his jacket back on and threaded a holster to his belt behind his left hip. "I don't like taking the crystal with me as a rule. If it gets damaged, it would be hard to replace, maybe impossible at this point."
Closing the laptop, Megan got up and stretched. "You are wearing the torso armor, Jeremy?"
"Yes. I have one of the anesthetic dart guns and my silver daggers, of course. I have cut way back on the arsenal of the old days." He reached out and took her hand. "Ready?"
"Ready, captain," she answered. Pale blue light swirled around the office in a soundless flare, and when it faded, they both were gone.
III.
They appeared in a dusty field. The air was dry and chilly, and a mild breeze did not help. They got their bearings. A highway stretched off to a dim hazy horizon, and a similar barren field was on its other side. Half a mile down the road, a long side road led up a slight elevation to where an old fashioned Southern mansion stood, complete with a nearby servant's house. As they watched, a long black limousine rolled down the highway and turned up that driveway. Its headlights were on, dusk was falling fast.
"That is the Heyer family estate," Megan said quietly.
The Dire Wolf was silent for a few seconds. "Trom Girl, here's the plan. I want you to fly overhead and get in the house from behind. Search around for anything that smells like magick, particularly in a basement. I am going straight in the front and be confrontational. Stand by after you locate anything, and if you can get by unseen, follow our voices."
"Understood." In the gloom, she shrugged off the tan topcoat and stood revealed in a dark jumpsuit loaded with Trom devices. Megan Salenger was slim, almost boyish in build, and looked younger than her age. She thumbed controls built into the cuffs of her suit and abruptly plunged straight up into the sky, accelerating so quickly she was lost from sight in a blink. Bane was not at all surprised. Even before she had joined the KDF, an earlier Trom calling himself Leonard Slade had worked with him for years. The gravity shield technology was way beyond Human knowledge and he regretted the Trom were not inclined to share it with their Human cousins.
He shrugged and started walking briskly toward the highway. Off on the horizon, heat lightning flickered but he could hear no thunder. In a few minutes, he was striding up to the front of the old mansion, It had a long mosquito-net enclosed porch extending its width, with the large high doors a bit off center. Lights were coming on. The limo still stood in front of the house, and a man in a black chaffeur suit was talking on a cell phone by its open driver's door.
As Bane appeared out of the gathering darkness, the driver jumped and almost dropped the phone. "Excuse me!" he called out. "Just one moment, sir--"
"Don't bother," Bane said. "I'll let myself in." With a draw any gunfighter of the Old West would have respected, he had the air pistol out and it gave a soft cough. The chaffeur twitched violently, grabbed at the side of his neck and fell to the gravel. The anesthetic darts were not painless by any means. The stings were long and sharp to penetrate clothing, and the potent drug they injected burned as it spend into the bloodstream. In the second it took for the driver to recognize what the sudden sting was, he was already going under. Bane picked the man up and placed him behind the wheel, then closed the door. He went up to the front door of the mansion and let himself in. Not bad. A lot of money had gone into this place, judging by the marble and the paintings and carved wood paneling. The Dire Wolf stood motionless, listening and thinking. He had no psychic senses at all, just long experience that warned him that there was real danger here.
A butler came out of a side door, an older man with greying hair and a prominent nose. As he saw Bane, he said smoothly, "May I help you, sir?" but his hand was reaching the side of an endtable. The anesthetic dart caught him in the back of the hand. Bane saw the man give a start, wince and start to raise him hand in puzzlement before he passed out. Bane lunged in, caught the butler silently and hauled him into the open door where he had first appeared. A linen closet, good enough. As he concealed the sleeping man, Bane patted him down and found a small flat automatic in the waistband. There was no doubt he was on the right trail now.
Quietly as long training and natural stealth allowed, Bane made his way through the house. He saw no one else. As he passed down a long hallways lined with portraits and busts on pillars, he heard a woman's voice through a half open door but as she mentioned being worried about burning the roast, he dismissed her for the moment. Soon, he spotted a big pair of double doors at the end of the hall. Sitting in a chair with a magazine was a beefy-looking man in a suit that did not fit him well. Bane took careful aim and let him have a dart in the neck. The thuggish guard convulsed for a second, grunted, and sagged back in his chair with the magazine in his lap. Perfect. The Dire Wolf stepped past him, opened the doors the barest crack and peeked through just as he was seized from behind.
III.
Coming in from overheard, Megan swung around in a circle to study the mansion. In flight, she had the grace of a skater, and it was a strangely poignant sight. She came down lightly near a section of the back wall which showed no lights. She was almost giddy with delight at working with Bane again. Despite the Trom's teachings, despite a childhood of discipline, she had normal feelings and she did not want to lose them. The Trom were intelligent, moral, humane. But they were humorless, distant and deadly dull. Working with the KDF had made her feel really alive for the time. It was like seeing in color after a childhood of black and white.
In her dark field suit, only the pale oval of her face showed in the murk. She probed with her enhanced senses, detected no one nearby and used a sensor built into her suit to look for electric circuits. No alarms in the door she could find. Megan unclipped a metal device from her belt and clicked a neural shock cartridge into place. Her primary weapon and tool was this, the projector, and this cartridge was calculated to stun a 200 pound man into senselessness instantly, hopefully without doing permanent harm to the nervous system. Holding the projector up at chest level with her thumb on the contact stud, she opened the door and stepped through.
This was a storage area, with lawn furniture and athletic equipment stacked all over. She passed through the inner door, went past smells of cooking and headed down a hallway. Lights were at the other end. Megan spotted a narrow side door, checked it out and saw concrete steps leading steeply down. This looked promising. Both Bane's advice and her own experience in the Midnight War told her that evil sorcery tended to done deep underground, while more spiritual magick was usually performed in towers. She descended into a wine cellar lit by a single naked light bulb overhead, and decided to explore further. There were voices behind a heavy steel-reinforced door. Megan paused for a second and pulled it open, despite the resistance of stiff hinges.
Dull red light showed an awful scene. In a bare stone chamber, one wall held a shelf on which sat a row of human heads. These were propped upright on velvet-covered stands. They were all men, obviously the victims of the beheadings. Megan stayed unseen in the shadows, barely breathing. In front of the row of heads tottered a dwarflike, frail old man in a heavy robe. His bald round head and beaked nose irresistably remind her of a vulture, The elder leaned on a thick walking stick with a jewel set in the handle and he was laughing mirthlessly. near behind him stood three unbreathing, unmoving forms.
Megan had fought zombies before. She knew them when she saw them, and these were figures which moved but did not draw breath. There was something so unnatural about zombies, lifeless corpses force to walk about, that living humans felt an instinctive revulsion deeper than fear. They were wrong. They should not be. Without realizing it, she quietly removed the useless neural shock cartridge from her projector and replaced it with the photon ram, setting it on high.
If Megan thought things were as horrifying as they could get, she found out otherwise. As the withered old man spoke teasingly, the heads on their velvet stands began to answer. Their eyes rolled wildly, the jaws twitched and clenched, and hollow sepulchral voices echoed in that cellar. "Megistus!""Release us!" "In God's name, Megistus, let us find peace! Let us rest!" And the old man cackled as they spoke.
The Trom Girl adjusted the projector and debated her next move. Should she back out of here and try to find find her captain? Before she could decide, the heavy door on the other side of the cellar opened and two zombies shoved Jeremy Bane through. Her heart almost stopped beating at the jolt, but she caught herself. She saw that he was not hurt, he was not being dragged in. Bane walked under his own power, hands down at his side, and she understood he had let himself be brought in here. The zombies marched him closer, one of them had its head lolling to the side. As he heard them enter the cellar, the old man stiffly turned around.
"It can not be...! Fate is good, to deliver you into my hands at last."
Bane smiled. "Megistus. You've looked better. Even the best alchemy can't keep you alive much longer, eh? You ARE the original Morgan W Heyer from the 1800s, huh?"
"Dire Wolf, you have always been a fool," hissed Megistus.
"Stop, you'll hurt my feelings." Bane stepped away from the zombies as if they did not concern him and looked up at the row of suffering heads. "Necromancy is a new low, even for you. There's a reason it's a forbidden art."
"Go on, tell me what you know."
The Dire Wolf folded his arms and gave the wrinkled sorceror an unfriendly stare. "Your game seems to be just another money making scheme. You get information from these poor souls that they were working on in life, then you cash in on it. Sick. But I expect something bigger from you, Megistus. This isn't really what you want from the talking heads, is it?"
"No, indeed. You surprise me, young man. Perhaps you are not as shallow as you seem. The dead learn much which is banned from living minds. Glimpses of the future. Warnings. And, perhaps, magick spells undreamt of by any who still breathe."
"The secret wisdom of the dead," Bane said coldly. "Nothing new. Sorcerors have damned themselves for ages trying to learn what is better left unheard. You're not going to get any further. Better minds than yours have failed."
Now Megistus could hardly keep his laughter down. "What secrets your mind holds, unworthy though it may be. Tel Shai training. Knowledge gained from the Trom, from the Eldarin, from perhaps Jordyn Himself? We shall find out."
Now it was Bane's turn to smile grimly. "What, you think you're putting my head up on that shelf?" As the final word was out of his mouth, the Dire Wolf's folded arms snapped apart and he gripped the silver-bladed daggers which were kept sheathed on his forearms. He knew where the zombies stood close behind him. Quicker than a real wolf, he struck back behind him and those blades chopped dead into undead chests. Against the pure silver ensorcelled by the immortal Eldarin, few creatures of the night could stand. These zombies fell apart into foul ruin as the daggers broke the spell which kept them animate. As he tugged the daggers free, Bane plunged at Megistus. The ancient warlock had raised his staff and the red gem on its tip flickered with a lurid unholy light... and then shattered into tiny bits. Megistus screamed and dropped the stave from broken fingers.
Bane understood. He glimpsed Megan Salenger crouched in the shadows by the other door and he figured she had used her photon ram to break the sorcerous gem before it could strike. Even as Megistus dropped his weapon, his centuries-long reign of fear and greed ended. Bane struck him once, an elbow to the side of the head as he passed, that cracked the ancient brittle skull and flung the dying wizard to the floor. The Dire Wolf gave him no second glance. He had rushed for three remaining zombies and his silver daggers flashed left and then right. Two were freed from undeath and dropped to the stone floor. The one remaining seem to have a glimpse of awareness. It lowered its arms and stepped forward, offering its exposed chest. Bane lunged like a fencer, drove the dagger in and then out, and the zombie fell. "Rest in peace," He said.
The Dire Wolf heard something to his side, he spun and saw the row of talking heads had been smashed into red and pink ruin, like Halloween pumpkins crushed by pranksters. Nothing recognizable remained. He sheathed his knives, which had not been bloodied, and turned to his teammate. "Megan?"
The Trom Girl holstered her projector and came forward. Her voice was unsteady, ready to break. "I couldn't stand seeing them suffer like that. They were begging to be released. Captain," she asked in a whisper, "was it the right thing to do?"
"Absolutely. The spell would have kept them in that state indefinitely. There is nothing more miserable than to be like that. You freed them, Megan, don't feel bad about it."
She nodded. "What now, captain?"
The Dire Wolf thought for a second. "Well, I think we will find a phone and make an anonymous 911 call. The FBI is already in the area, and the Rangers. Let them clean this up. I'll talk to the mayor later, maybe tell him I'm not making any progress and ask him if he's getting anywhere with the Headless Murders. I was in New York two hours ago, I'll leave a message tonight, and no one would be able to link me with... Megan? You okay?"
Despite her best efforts, Megan Salenger was starting to cry. "I can't help it. I'm so sorry. The way those men suffered..." Tears poured down her face. "I only hope they're better off now. And I wanted to go on an 'adventure' with you. Some adventure!"
Bane put an arm around her shoulder and squeezed. "It's all for the best. Don't be ashamed to cry, Megan. Nothing wrong with being human."
3/12/2013
11/15/2001
I.
A rather pretty young woman walked briskly up Third Avenue. Despite the chill of a November afternoon, she wore only a thin tan topcoat over some sort of black outfit with a high collar. Beneath a shag of tousled black hair was an inquisitive, gamin face with huge dark eyes. At 44th Street, she swung right and walked up to a four-story building of yellow brick. Its sign listed EMERGENCY ONE, a clinic for minor medical emergencies, as well as three doctors' offices, a photography studio and a posh spa. She strode through the lobby without pausing, past the elevators and wide stairs, to a short hallway that ended with a steel EMERGENCY EXIT ONLY door. On the lefthand wall was a plain wooden door with a brass plate that read DIRE WOLF AGENCY. She rang the doorbell three times in short bursts.
Seconds later, the door swung open and a tall gaunt man in his mid 40s, dressed all in black, burst through. The girl jumped to embrace him with fierce enthusiasm. "Captain! My captain!" She buried her face on his shoulder. "I have not seen you for too long."
Jeremy Bane received the hug with some uneasiness, patting the girl's back and eventually disengaging. "Hi, Megan. Good to see you." He held her at arm's length and studied her upturned face. "How's our Trom Girl?"
"I am well in every regard," she answered. "This is your detective agency. Will you show it to me, Jeremy?"
"Of course, come in," Bane said, closing the door behind him. "This is the waiting room. Not much but a few chairs and some magazines on a table. It's useful for cooling off a client while I talk to someone else" He showed her through to the office itself. To the right was a large oak desk with a cordless phone in its charger, in and out trays, and a laptop computer. Two plain wooden chairs stood in front of the desk. Facing them as they entered was a long leather couch under a curtained window, with endtables holding reading lamps. The wall to the left was bare. Behind them as they stood in the doorway were two matching doors, one concealing a minimal bathroom and the other a closet. On a shelf over the closet door was a police scanner.
"Efficient use of space," Trom Girl said, "but that south wall is being wasted. Perhaps a filing cabinet or bookcase? I assume that you have prepared a secure hiding place?"
The faintest of smiles touched Bane's mouth. "Not yet, Megan. I'm thinking of digging a shallow pit right there, with a sliding bookcase to conceal it. That's where I will keep my weapons and field suit."
Megan turned to grin at her captain. "Well done. Oh, you are missed at KDF headquarters."
Walking over to sit behind the desk, Bane gestured for Megan to take one of the chairs, and she pulled it close to his right side. "We discussed this. If Cindy and I had stayed at headquarters, your team would never come into its own. We would always be butting in. Lauren has real leadership qualities, and I have complete faith in her."
"But... surely you miss the KDF? You miss US?"
"Of course," he said gently. "But you know, it's not like I moved to an adjacent realm. You and the others can drop by and I will probably be stopping over for research." He leaned forward, elbows on the desk. "You know, for someone raised by the Trom, you still have genuine emotions."
Megan opened her topcoat and shrugged it off. Underneath, she was wearing tight pants and a snug jacket of dark leathery material, with a high military collar and several flap pouches. "I am Human, after all. The Trom raised me from infancy but they acknowledged that I would never approach pure reason as closely as they do. They make allowances." Megan Salenger flashed an appealing conspiratorial smile. "Which brings me to my covert agenda."
"Which is?"
"Fast food for lunch. I am on a strict dietary regimen planned for me by Trom specialists. I agree to its logic and wish to remain in peak health but... I am allowed to deviate on specific occasions as part of my mission to blend into Human society."
Bane gave one of his rare laughs, caught off guard and expecting some momentous crisis. "You crave junk food? Oh, you ARE human, Megan. Do you have anything particular in mind?"
"I thought it would be productive to leave it to your experience," she said. Megan Salenger was just twenty-two, but in her enthusiasm, she looked even younger.
"Sounds good." The Dire Wolf stood up and got his black sport jacket from where it had been draped over the back of his chair. As always, he wore black slacks and long-sleeved turtleneck. 'I think I know just the place, not four blocks away." As he led her from the office, locking the door behind them, he said, "Fill me on your teammates. What's up with them?
Megan Salengber shrugged into her tan topcoat in the lobby. "Well. Sable has been planning our missions thoroughly, she's very diligent. Almost a Trom, in fact. Argent is always in trouble. He gets carried away and acts on impulse. Josef doesn't change much. Oh and Unicorn is having a romance with Johnny."
"Wait, what...? Johnny Packard? The Brimstone Kid?" Bane scowled. "Well, she's not a minor anymore but I think he's a bad influence."
Megan chuckled. "You sounds like a father when his daughter brings home a date. As I understand Human psychology..."
"At any rate, here we are." Bane led her into a Five Guys. The next fifteen minutes were spent devouring two freshly-cooked hamburgers with assorted toppings and way too many French fries cooked in peanut oil. Megan had a large Pepsi and even a refill. As they left, she repressed a belch.
"Feel better, honey?" Bane asked. They were back out on the street.
"I have a pleasant sensation of satisfaction. Captain, this is my free day. I have no duties. Perhaps I may assist you in your cases?"
"Hmm. Maybe." He led her back to 44th Street, enjoying the eagerness in her voice. Had he ever been that young? He didn't think so. "There is something I have been asked to handle by the mayor of Post Oak, Texas. Something about six headless corpses found in the past year."
II.
Back in his office, the Dire Wolf led Megan to her chair, then opened a manila folder and spread an assortment of newspaper clippings out on his desk. "These deaths caught my eye last summer and I was thinking of going out to look over the scene. Then the mayor called me. He knew me because of the time I caught Pantera. He was a young serial killer from near El Paso and I had to testify at his trial. Apparently I made a good impression. So. Six bodies have been found without their heads within a hundred mile radius of Post Oak." It was getting dark, so he turned on a few lamps.
Megan shuffled through the clippings, her eyes flickering over them so briskly that it seemed she could not have been paying any attention to them. Yet Bane knew she had in fact memorized every word. Her upbringing by the Trom had developed aspects of her mind to near complete potential. She turned those dark eyes at Bane. "All the victims are male, middle-aged or older, all associated with local colleges or research facilities. Each was a respected authority in a demanding field. Criminal law, chemistry, civil engineering, archaeology, electronics and surgery. I see no other connection yet. Is there some information you possess not in these articles, Jeremy?"
"Yes. In fact, the most significant detail. The decapitations were cauterized somehow. No blood was found, even though the bodies were still at the scene of their deaths."
Megan considered this for a mere second. "Human techniques to do this would involve large conspicuous equipment, yet the clippings indicate nothing unusual was observed at the scenes."
"Exactly," said Bane. He began to stuff the clippings back in the folder. "So I have a theory that I doubt would ever occur to the police or FBI. It involves black magick of the worst kind, necromancy."
The Trom Girl was watching him intently. "This means divination by communicating with the spirits of the dead."
"uh-huh," Bane answered. He flipped open his laptop, logged on with his password and slid it over to face where Megan sat. "Here is where your skills come in. Let's face it, you are a million times better with the computer than I ever could be."
"True," she said, oblivious to the fact no question was involved.
"I want you to look for advances or developments in the specialties of each man, but only after their deaths. Let's see, for example. Gilbert Biedermann. He was working for the DEA on ways to identify new strains of marijuana. Anything noteworthy in that area after his death. Same with the other victims."
"I understand, captain." Trom Girl adjusted the screen and began typing so rapidly it looked as if she were just pretending to be writing. Yet Bane knew she was entering questions about each specialty of the murdered men. Nor did she have to refer back to the clippings; he knew that, years from now, she would be able to quote the articles word for word from that brief glimpse she had given them. Leaving to her work, Bane went into the bathroom. It was a tiny cubicle without a shower. He washed his face and hands, and brushed his teeth. She had done this in the ladies' room at Five Guys, but he had wanted to get back here. The Dire Wolf stole a glance at the screen. She had four windows open and was going back and forth between them.
"Jeremy?"
"Yes?"
"Your computer is crawling with viruses and you have one malware I recognize. Let me take this after we are done and I will clean it and tune it up."
"Okay, Megan. What have you got?"
"Your computer is running at 68% potential speed. Hold on. I have to go in through the side of another company's firewall. This is interesting. Five special interest fields of the victims have had new breakthroughs since their deaths, all involving licensing and patents for new applications. Former employers are suspicious but nothing has been proven."
"Just what I was looking for. See if the people who benefit from these developments have a common element.'
"On it," she said. Her fingers played on the keyboard so rapidly it looked as if she were just drumming away at random. Another ten minutes passed. "Yes. Three possible names who made large profits from these innovations. One is far ahead of the others in terms of millions made. The dummy corporations they set up to hide behind are not convincing if you look for matches between payrolls and profits. Got it." She turned her pale face up at the Dire Wolf. "A man named Morgan W Heyer. Do you recognize that?"
"No," said Bane. "Where's he based?"
"That clinches it. His family estate is twenty miles outside of Oak Post, Texas. It was built in 1897. The family became wealthy through unethical deals in an oil boom in the early 20th Century. Should I save all this?"
"Huh? Oh yes. Put it in a folder marked 'Headless Murders, Texas November 2000.' Thank you. How long would it take Human computer experts to do what you just did?"
With a barely noticeable hint of pride in her voice, Megan Salenger answered, "Months to years. If they could accomplish it at all. I used parallel leaps in undertone logic which the Trom have developed."
The Dire Wolf went to the closet and rummaged around, coming out with a cardboard shoe box marked SNEAKERS with a felt-tipped pen. "I think we have something to go on, Megan. If it doesn't pan out, I will start again from a different angle but I think you do have to report back to KDF headquarters at some point."
"Are we going to Texas? Let's head to the headquarters, we can use a Corby, I'll fly you there-"
"No. Sorry, I appreciate the offer, but those copters are for your team now. In a major crisis I could justify asking to use one, but this is not that pressing a problem. I do have an Eldar travel crystal here. It's my personal property, the Eldar gave it to me after the Invasion of Maroch, That was a few years before you were born, I think."
"Captain, I have found something else," she said quietly. "This morning, Texas Rangers reporting the finding of a seventh headless corpse near Cross Plains. That is about a two hour drive from Oak Post. The victim has been identified as Steven Corcroran, age 51, video game designer. The media have not been informed."
"What? Then how do you know this?"
"I hacked into Texas State Police channels," she answered in the same tone of voice one would use to describe finding a quarter on the sidewalk.
"Maybe I'd better you get away from that thing," Bane said dryly. He removed his jacket and strapped a small blue jewel between his shoulder blades. It was held in a simple silver setting, with elastic straps going over one shoulder and under the opposite one. He shrugged his jacket back on and threaded a holster to his belt behind his left hip. "I don't like taking the crystal with me as a rule. If it gets damaged, it would be hard to replace, maybe impossible at this point."
Closing the laptop, Megan got up and stretched. "You are wearing the torso armor, Jeremy?"
"Yes. I have one of the anesthetic dart guns and my silver daggers, of course. I have cut way back on the arsenal of the old days." He reached out and took her hand. "Ready?"
"Ready, captain," she answered. Pale blue light swirled around the office in a soundless flare, and when it faded, they both were gone.
III.
They appeared in a dusty field. The air was dry and chilly, and a mild breeze did not help. They got their bearings. A highway stretched off to a dim hazy horizon, and a similar barren field was on its other side. Half a mile down the road, a long side road led up a slight elevation to where an old fashioned Southern mansion stood, complete with a nearby servant's house. As they watched, a long black limousine rolled down the highway and turned up that driveway. Its headlights were on, dusk was falling fast.
"That is the Heyer family estate," Megan said quietly.
The Dire Wolf was silent for a few seconds. "Trom Girl, here's the plan. I want you to fly overhead and get in the house from behind. Search around for anything that smells like magick, particularly in a basement. I am going straight in the front and be confrontational. Stand by after you locate anything, and if you can get by unseen, follow our voices."
"Understood." In the gloom, she shrugged off the tan topcoat and stood revealed in a dark jumpsuit loaded with Trom devices. Megan Salenger was slim, almost boyish in build, and looked younger than her age. She thumbed controls built into the cuffs of her suit and abruptly plunged straight up into the sky, accelerating so quickly she was lost from sight in a blink. Bane was not at all surprised. Even before she had joined the KDF, an earlier Trom calling himself Leonard Slade had worked with him for years. The gravity shield technology was way beyond Human knowledge and he regretted the Trom were not inclined to share it with their Human cousins.
He shrugged and started walking briskly toward the highway. Off on the horizon, heat lightning flickered but he could hear no thunder. In a few minutes, he was striding up to the front of the old mansion, It had a long mosquito-net enclosed porch extending its width, with the large high doors a bit off center. Lights were coming on. The limo still stood in front of the house, and a man in a black chaffeur suit was talking on a cell phone by its open driver's door.
As Bane appeared out of the gathering darkness, the driver jumped and almost dropped the phone. "Excuse me!" he called out. "Just one moment, sir--"
"Don't bother," Bane said. "I'll let myself in." With a draw any gunfighter of the Old West would have respected, he had the air pistol out and it gave a soft cough. The chaffeur twitched violently, grabbed at the side of his neck and fell to the gravel. The anesthetic darts were not painless by any means. The stings were long and sharp to penetrate clothing, and the potent drug they injected burned as it spend into the bloodstream. In the second it took for the driver to recognize what the sudden sting was, he was already going under. Bane picked the man up and placed him behind the wheel, then closed the door. He went up to the front door of the mansion and let himself in. Not bad. A lot of money had gone into this place, judging by the marble and the paintings and carved wood paneling. The Dire Wolf stood motionless, listening and thinking. He had no psychic senses at all, just long experience that warned him that there was real danger here.
A butler came out of a side door, an older man with greying hair and a prominent nose. As he saw Bane, he said smoothly, "May I help you, sir?" but his hand was reaching the side of an endtable. The anesthetic dart caught him in the back of the hand. Bane saw the man give a start, wince and start to raise him hand in puzzlement before he passed out. Bane lunged in, caught the butler silently and hauled him into the open door where he had first appeared. A linen closet, good enough. As he concealed the sleeping man, Bane patted him down and found a small flat automatic in the waistband. There was no doubt he was on the right trail now.
Quietly as long training and natural stealth allowed, Bane made his way through the house. He saw no one else. As he passed down a long hallways lined with portraits and busts on pillars, he heard a woman's voice through a half open door but as she mentioned being worried about burning the roast, he dismissed her for the moment. Soon, he spotted a big pair of double doors at the end of the hall. Sitting in a chair with a magazine was a beefy-looking man in a suit that did not fit him well. Bane took careful aim and let him have a dart in the neck. The thuggish guard convulsed for a second, grunted, and sagged back in his chair with the magazine in his lap. Perfect. The Dire Wolf stepped past him, opened the doors the barest crack and peeked through just as he was seized from behind.
III.
Coming in from overheard, Megan swung around in a circle to study the mansion. In flight, she had the grace of a skater, and it was a strangely poignant sight. She came down lightly near a section of the back wall which showed no lights. She was almost giddy with delight at working with Bane again. Despite the Trom's teachings, despite a childhood of discipline, she had normal feelings and she did not want to lose them. The Trom were intelligent, moral, humane. But they were humorless, distant and deadly dull. Working with the KDF had made her feel really alive for the time. It was like seeing in color after a childhood of black and white.
In her dark field suit, only the pale oval of her face showed in the murk. She probed with her enhanced senses, detected no one nearby and used a sensor built into her suit to look for electric circuits. No alarms in the door she could find. Megan unclipped a metal device from her belt and clicked a neural shock cartridge into place. Her primary weapon and tool was this, the projector, and this cartridge was calculated to stun a 200 pound man into senselessness instantly, hopefully without doing permanent harm to the nervous system. Holding the projector up at chest level with her thumb on the contact stud, she opened the door and stepped through.
This was a storage area, with lawn furniture and athletic equipment stacked all over. She passed through the inner door, went past smells of cooking and headed down a hallway. Lights were at the other end. Megan spotted a narrow side door, checked it out and saw concrete steps leading steeply down. This looked promising. Both Bane's advice and her own experience in the Midnight War told her that evil sorcery tended to done deep underground, while more spiritual magick was usually performed in towers. She descended into a wine cellar lit by a single naked light bulb overhead, and decided to explore further. There were voices behind a heavy steel-reinforced door. Megan paused for a second and pulled it open, despite the resistance of stiff hinges.
Dull red light showed an awful scene. In a bare stone chamber, one wall held a shelf on which sat a row of human heads. These were propped upright on velvet-covered stands. They were all men, obviously the victims of the beheadings. Megan stayed unseen in the shadows, barely breathing. In front of the row of heads tottered a dwarflike, frail old man in a heavy robe. His bald round head and beaked nose irresistably remind her of a vulture, The elder leaned on a thick walking stick with a jewel set in the handle and he was laughing mirthlessly. near behind him stood three unbreathing, unmoving forms.
Megan had fought zombies before. She knew them when she saw them, and these were figures which moved but did not draw breath. There was something so unnatural about zombies, lifeless corpses force to walk about, that living humans felt an instinctive revulsion deeper than fear. They were wrong. They should not be. Without realizing it, she quietly removed the useless neural shock cartridge from her projector and replaced it with the photon ram, setting it on high.
If Megan thought things were as horrifying as they could get, she found out otherwise. As the withered old man spoke teasingly, the heads on their velvet stands began to answer. Their eyes rolled wildly, the jaws twitched and clenched, and hollow sepulchral voices echoed in that cellar. "Megistus!""Release us!" "In God's name, Megistus, let us find peace! Let us rest!" And the old man cackled as they spoke.
The Trom Girl adjusted the projector and debated her next move. Should she back out of here and try to find find her captain? Before she could decide, the heavy door on the other side of the cellar opened and two zombies shoved Jeremy Bane through. Her heart almost stopped beating at the jolt, but she caught herself. She saw that he was not hurt, he was not being dragged in. Bane walked under his own power, hands down at his side, and she understood he had let himself be brought in here. The zombies marched him closer, one of them had its head lolling to the side. As he heard them enter the cellar, the old man stiffly turned around.
"It can not be...! Fate is good, to deliver you into my hands at last."
Bane smiled. "Megistus. You've looked better. Even the best alchemy can't keep you alive much longer, eh? You ARE the original Morgan W Heyer from the 1800s, huh?"
"Dire Wolf, you have always been a fool," hissed Megistus.
"Stop, you'll hurt my feelings." Bane stepped away from the zombies as if they did not concern him and looked up at the row of suffering heads. "Necromancy is a new low, even for you. There's a reason it's a forbidden art."
"Go on, tell me what you know."
The Dire Wolf folded his arms and gave the wrinkled sorceror an unfriendly stare. "Your game seems to be just another money making scheme. You get information from these poor souls that they were working on in life, then you cash in on it. Sick. But I expect something bigger from you, Megistus. This isn't really what you want from the talking heads, is it?"
"No, indeed. You surprise me, young man. Perhaps you are not as shallow as you seem. The dead learn much which is banned from living minds. Glimpses of the future. Warnings. And, perhaps, magick spells undreamt of by any who still breathe."
"The secret wisdom of the dead," Bane said coldly. "Nothing new. Sorcerors have damned themselves for ages trying to learn what is better left unheard. You're not going to get any further. Better minds than yours have failed."
Now Megistus could hardly keep his laughter down. "What secrets your mind holds, unworthy though it may be. Tel Shai training. Knowledge gained from the Trom, from the Eldarin, from perhaps Jordyn Himself? We shall find out."
Now it was Bane's turn to smile grimly. "What, you think you're putting my head up on that shelf?" As the final word was out of his mouth, the Dire Wolf's folded arms snapped apart and he gripped the silver-bladed daggers which were kept sheathed on his forearms. He knew where the zombies stood close behind him. Quicker than a real wolf, he struck back behind him and those blades chopped dead into undead chests. Against the pure silver ensorcelled by the immortal Eldarin, few creatures of the night could stand. These zombies fell apart into foul ruin as the daggers broke the spell which kept them animate. As he tugged the daggers free, Bane plunged at Megistus. The ancient warlock had raised his staff and the red gem on its tip flickered with a lurid unholy light... and then shattered into tiny bits. Megistus screamed and dropped the stave from broken fingers.
Bane understood. He glimpsed Megan Salenger crouched in the shadows by the other door and he figured she had used her photon ram to break the sorcerous gem before it could strike. Even as Megistus dropped his weapon, his centuries-long reign of fear and greed ended. Bane struck him once, an elbow to the side of the head as he passed, that cracked the ancient brittle skull and flung the dying wizard to the floor. The Dire Wolf gave him no second glance. He had rushed for three remaining zombies and his silver daggers flashed left and then right. Two were freed from undeath and dropped to the stone floor. The one remaining seem to have a glimpse of awareness. It lowered its arms and stepped forward, offering its exposed chest. Bane lunged like a fencer, drove the dagger in and then out, and the zombie fell. "Rest in peace," He said.
The Dire Wolf heard something to his side, he spun and saw the row of talking heads had been smashed into red and pink ruin, like Halloween pumpkins crushed by pranksters. Nothing recognizable remained. He sheathed his knives, which had not been bloodied, and turned to his teammate. "Megan?"
The Trom Girl holstered her projector and came forward. Her voice was unsteady, ready to break. "I couldn't stand seeing them suffer like that. They were begging to be released. Captain," she asked in a whisper, "was it the right thing to do?"
"Absolutely. The spell would have kept them in that state indefinitely. There is nothing more miserable than to be like that. You freed them, Megan, don't feel bad about it."
She nodded. "What now, captain?"
The Dire Wolf thought for a second. "Well, I think we will find a phone and make an anonymous 911 call. The FBI is already in the area, and the Rangers. Let them clean this up. I'll talk to the mayor later, maybe tell him I'm not making any progress and ask him if he's getting anywhere with the Headless Murders. I was in New York two hours ago, I'll leave a message tonight, and no one would be able to link me with... Megan? You okay?"
Despite her best efforts, Megan Salenger was starting to cry. "I can't help it. I'm so sorry. The way those men suffered..." Tears poured down her face. "I only hope they're better off now. And I wanted to go on an 'adventure' with you. Some adventure!"
Bane put an arm around her shoulder and squeezed. "It's all for the best. Don't be ashamed to cry, Megan. Nothing wrong with being human."
3/12/2013
