dochermes

"Golden Ring and Cobalt Lamp"

11/11/1997

I.

When the old man stepped through the front door of the KDF headquarters, his feet stuck firmly to the polished hardwood floor as if they had been nailed there. He scowled and struggled but not could lift either foot even a fraction of an inch.

Watching his visitor, Jeremy Bane felt his suspicions confirmed. This man had given his name as Radi ben Mohallet and had asked for an appointment to discuss a serious Midnight War crisis in the making. He seemed be about seventy, below average height although some of that might come from his back being curved with age. Mohallet wore unremarkable Western clothes, a light brown business suit with a tan shirt and black tie; his white hair was cropped short and contasted with the deeply tanned wrinkled face. A prominent beaklike nose and deepset glowering eyes did not make him any more personable.

Standing off to one side, well out of reach, Bane was not alarmed but intensely curious. At forty, he remained gaunt and wiry in his invariable outfit of black slacks, sport jacket and turtleneck. The infamous grey eyes were colder than usual. Leaving the inner door open, he moved around to where he was facing Mohallet while staying a prudent distance. "You can't move because you're a threat to me," he said evenly.

"This is intolerable!" Mohallet snapped with a distinct but unobtrusive accent. "I have come here in good faith. Whatever Black Magick you are using on me, I demand to be freed."

"It's the farthest thing from Black Magick," replied Bane. He did not explain that a potent Eldar talisman was secured beneath the floor directly inside his headquarters. Nor did he explain that the Shield of Elvedal guarded those who lived here and would not allow enemies to pass. This was a secret he intended to keep. "Listen. Either your intention is to attack me or you are carrying a malevolent gralic talisman on you. What's the deal?"

Mohallet took a deep breath and got hold of himself. "Oh. I see. Very well, Dire Wolf. I suppose a man with many enemies must take precautions. What do you make of this ring?" With that he held up his left hand, showing a gleaming band on the second finger.

The Dire Wolf moved closer, staying wary getting a better look. "Hmm. Not pure gold, I'd say 12 karat. Obviously old. The oval on the face has an outline incised of an old-fashioned railroad lantern complete with handle. There is an inscription on the outer surface but I would need a magnifying lens to make it out. I don't see anything supernatural about it."

"This is a mighty talisman from the Days of Ignorance," said Mohallet. "My family has passed it down for many generations. Right now, it is cold and empty. Its flame has gone out. Yet I suspect that enough gralic traces remain that whatever you use to guard yourself has reacted."

"Well, certainly I'm interested." Bane held out an open palm. "Tell you what. Let me put that ring on the bookshelf beside the front door, right behind you there. You should be able to move around normally after that."

"Surrender the ring....?" The horror in Mohallet's voice sounded as if Bane had asked him to cut off the finger as well.

"It's up to you. Otherwise, you can slide a few steps backwards, that's available to you. I'd have to talk to you outside."

Mohallet chewed this over, then finally decided to tug the ring off one gnarled finger. He held it out and Bane took it to the top of a bookcase, between a framed photograph of William Murdock and a curious five-pointed fossil.

"It's as safe there as anywhere," Bane told the unhappy old man. "When the front door closed, all the locks and alarms armed themselves. You should be able to move now."

Stepping around in an experimental circle, the aged mystic grumbled, "A good host makes his guest comfortable."

"Yeah, right. And a good guest doesn't show up wearing a hostile talisman. Let's go in my office, that door over there." The Dire Wolf ushered Mohallet to a chair in front of a wide oak desk, then crossed over to seat himself facing the man.

The sorcerer was regarding the beautiful handpainted map of the world as it had been in 1937 that hung over Bane's desk. "So much has changed," he muttered as he peered up at the details. "Empires have fallen, new nations have risen, the lands shift. The world goes downhill."

"That's the way it goes," Bane dismissed the thought. "So. Mr Mohallet, you called me for an appointment a few days ago. The Dire Wolf Agency mostly handles serial killers, assassins, maniacs and so forth these days. But you are obviously deep into the Midnight War."

After the old man got himself comfortable, he unbuttoned his suit jacket and leaned back. "Yes. I know your reputation, Mr Bane. You have been a Tel Shai knight for twenty years. Your list of conquered enemies is most impressive. As you can see, my days of swift action and physical confrontations are behind me. In this hour of dark uncertainty, I could think of no man better suited to intervene and protect the race of humans."

"It's nice to be appreciated," said Bane. "What is it you think I can do for you?"

"Ah. You see, that ring is one of a pair of talismans from the elder days. According to the lore passed down, it was crafted by the great Suleiman himself, wisest of men, at the same time he fashioned an oil lamp. The two sigils are linked."

"Excuse me for bringing up what must be obvious," interrupted the Dire Wolf, "But the lamp outline cut into the ring is not from ages ago. It looks to me like a 19th Century railroad lantern. The kind workers carried when they walked the tracks at night."

"This is so. Over thousands of years, the ring and the lamp have changed. Some think that it was done by wizards to make them less antique in appearance. Some.. and here I tend to agree.. feel that the talismans adapted themselves gradually to changing times."

Bane did not smile in the slightest. "The idea is that these objects reshaped themselves? Well, I've seen stranger things happen. Where is this lamp anyway?"

"Ah. That is the great peril." Mohallet leaned forward, bony hands clasped and stared a bit too intensely for comfort. "If the ring and the lamp are brought together, enormous gralic power will be released.For good or for ill. And here in this country of yours, a vile thief and notorious rogue is even now hot on the trail of the lamp. I know he intends to snatch the two artifacts and gain such magic power that no one will be able to stand before him. I do not think there is much time, Mr Bane. If Aden succeeds, this land will groan under the heel of a new tyrant who cannot be stopped."

( the rest of the story )

"Funny Little Kid Named Bennie"

4/19/1997

I.

At full speed, Jeremy Bane raced headlong at the seven-foot-high stone fence, leaped straight up and caught the top with both hands, swung his legs up to one side and cleared the fence entirely. He landed lightly on toes and fingertips on the other side without a hint of noise. Bane froze, slowing his breathing until his enhanced hearing kicked in. Nothing. He rose smoothly to his feet and stood in the gloom of a sultry April night, still staying alert and probing the night with his senses.

The Dire Wolf was almost invisible in the darkness with his usual all-black outfit of slacks, turtleneck and sport jacket. He stared up the gentle hill to the three-story run-down mansion where lights burned in only three windows on the ground floor. Bane hated acting without enough information, without even a little research on the enemy or time to set strategy. But the tip had come from his most trusted observer, Bleak, and if the Goons were going out tonight, it meant more deaths. If he could prevent a Goon rampage, he had to try.

Stalking up the hill toward the mansion, Bane figured where he would place a guard to watch the grounds. That cluster of silver birch trees on a little rise. Keeping low and moving quickly, the Dire Wolf circled around to approach any sentry from behind and he was not disappointed. Sitting on the ground between the trees was a man in a down-filled coat, holding a pair of binoculars and with a Marlin 30-30 propped up within reach. Perfect. Bane became a blur of perfect motion, lunging in to crack the edge of his stiff open hand to the joining of the guard's neck and shoulder. The man grunted and fell over sideways and Bane caught the rifle before it would make a noise.

In the distance, feet padded softly on the grass, coming closer. They sounded heavier and clumsier than what normal Humans would make. Bane stepped away from the clump of trees and waited. In a few seconds, he could make out the hulking silhouettes of a half dozen Goons lumbering toward him. Even in the murk, he could how much longer their arms were than normal, how much wider their shoulders and shorter their legs. Running, they were bent far forward with their hands touching the ground almost as apes would run.

The Goons were much quicker than he had expected. Fast as tigers. They were rushing on top of him within a few seconds. Bane swerved to one side, giving an elbow to the back of the head of a Goon as it dove past him, then meet the next one with a straight short punch to the face that stopped the monster dead in its tracks and flipped it over backwards.

Four of the creatures tackled him from all directions. Bane crouched and spun, throwing one off but the Goons were too strong for normal tactics. Even as they brought him down to the cold grass, the Dire Wolf got his left hand on the hilt of the silver dagger sheathed under the sleeve on his left arm. In another second, he could slice his way free....

There were three sharp thumping noises and the Goons fell away from him. For once, even Bane was taken by surprise. As he leaped back up onto his feet, he found himself standing next to a strange little boy.

Maybe eleven years old at the most, well under five feet tall, the boy was immensely fat. His body looked like a beach ball in khaki slacks and a white long-sleeved dress shirt with a black necktie. Bane was confounded for a second. The boy stared at him blankly through thick-lensed eyeglasses over a snub nose in a round moonface. The black hair looked as if it had been cut by placing a bowl over his head and shearing away everything outside the bowl.

Slowly, the strange kid reached up and stuck the end of a candy cane in his mouth. "Might thank me," he mumbled.

"You... YOU knocked these Goons out?" Bane demanded, glancing around but seeing no one else in sight.

"Wasn't Sugar Ray Robinson," answered the kid. "Watch yourself. Could get hurt." With that, he turned and started waddling away. Over one shoulder, he muttered, "Name's Bennie."

"I could get hurt? Wait. Come back here, I can't let a minor wander around this place." Bane took a step forward and paused. The boy was gone, just like that.

For a long moment, the Dire Wolf stood motionless, unable to digest what he had just seen. How could it be possible? Was he hallucinating? Maybe that was the answer, maybe someone like Indigo the Illusionist had made him think he saw a fat little boy rescue him from four Goons. Bane bent and examined the snoring monsters. They were stunned, all right. One was bleeding from a scalp cut on the bald cone-shaped skull. If not that kid, then someone had definitely bludgeoned these brutes hard.

Not having had a good look at Goons before, the Dire Wolf examined them. They all seemed identical. A little under six feet tall, maybe two hundred and forty pounds, with those long arms and short legs that gave them simian proportions. They were wearing simple flannel trousers and white T-shirts, and were barefoot. Bane saw with interest that their big toes stuck out at an angle that suggested they were prehensile.

Stepping back, he admitted he still wasn't sure what these Goons were. They had been reported three times in the metropolitan area and each time seemingly random people had been roughed up but not killed. Nothing was stolen. There was no connection between the victims that the NYPD could see, and in desperation Lt Montez had come to the Dire Wolf Agency and unofficially asked for help.

Bane had gone through his network of observers and gotten a tip from Bleak to check out this house on the east coast of Staten Island. With a jolt, he took off into the direction the strange little boy had been heading. He spotted the kid standing almost at the rear of the mansion, where a shiny black Mercedes was parking on a paved turnaround. As Bane neared, he saw the boy - Bennie?- was next to a black and white housecat.

The strange little boy said in his laconic way, "Boots. Long time no see."

And Bane froze in disbelief as the cat answered him in a teenage girl's voice, "Hiya, Bennie. I suppose you want to face down Belaric?"

"Don't wanna. Have to."

Bane stared, watching as the cat's mouth moved when she spoke. The girl voice went on, "Well, if anyone can stop his nonsense, it's you. He has Shy Anne the Hag with him, as well as a bunch of those stupid Goons she makes from his stooges. Listen. Go in the front door. Shy Anne let me out and I didn't hear her lock it. I have to go now." And the cat stretched, tilted her head quizzically at the dumbfounded Bane and sauntered off.

The boy turned his head as if it were an imposition, saw Bane and showed no reaction at all.

"You... you were talking to a cat? And the cat talked back?" the Dire Wolf managed to get out in a voice that sounded very unsteady to himself.

"Sure. Known Boots for years." He started trudging toward the front of the house. "Tag along if you like."

( the rest of the story )

"Come Slyly, Death"

(10/1/1997)

He decided to take the bullet high on his chest. In the split-second that he would have been dodging, he drew and fired back. Bane was using a long-barreled .38 revolver, not the most powerful available but one he found accurate and reliable. As the assassin's slug punched hard just above his sternum, he knew he had hit the man right in the face by the way the body flung its arms up. He himself was knocked back off his feet and fell hard to the concrete. Every time Bane got hit by a bullet, it felt as if the Trom armor had failed but each time he recovered in a second and found the foil had dispersed all but a small fraction of the impact. He rolled over on his knees and got back up as if he had merely lost his footing. The pain in his chest was just a dull ache.

In the moonlight, the Dire Wolf could see his opponent clearly enough. The Repairman, what a name for an assassin. He supposed it helped when discussing him, you could say, "Time to call the repairman," without worrying about being overheard. Bane walked over and glared down at the body. The famous goggles, the longish blonde hair, the tan jacket with its pouches. Even the rifle with its infra-red scope was accurate. But he knew better.

Without turning around, Bane said, "Who was he, really?"

The familiar drawling voice came from closer than he would have thought. "The Repairman? You want his real name?"

"No," said the Dire Wolf. "Whoever this poor soul was before the surgery." He swung around, the gun still in his left hand. Not far away, the roar of a plane engine passed overhead and he saw the lights go by as the general was on his way to the States. No one else should be near this abandoned airfield for miles but coming out of the shadows of a maintenance building was a stocky little man with curly hair and a soft voice.

"Mr Bane, really." Carmody kept his hands in his coat pockets. "You have got to get your imagination under control."

"Oh, I'm imagining a lot of things right now. I saw the Repairman once, I saw how he moved. His sense of balance. This wasn't him."

Carmody giggled. "I think you are giving yourself credit for more perception than you can have-"

"No. You don't know Tel Shai. My training is not anything you are familiar with." Bane holstered his gun and came closer to the man. "I suppose you think your Mandate has the ultimate expertise but there is secret knowledge in the world that goes back thirty thousand years. Plastic surgery isn't enough to fool a Kumundu master, practice and rehearsal isn't enough. I can tell the inner balance of a man in a way I can't explain to you."

The wind had died down and the night was muggy again. Carmody grinned under the full moon like a Halloween pumpkin. "I suppose you deserve a little information. The Mandate is not concerned with whether or not General Dominguez made it to the plane. He's not important. We really wanted to know if the Repairman was still sticking to his agreements."

"He worked for whoever paid him. Money was all he cared about."

"Of course. But the question is, would he change sides if offered more? We needed to know because we were planning on putting him in a situation where he would be tempted by a higher offer. So we had to tempt him first."

Bane interrupted. "Why have me confront an imposter? Why ask me to come down here to protect the general if he was not the real thing?"

"Because we are worried about you as well. You are a random element, an extra joker in the deck. No one really knows what you want. What is behind your ghostbusting? And your serial killer chasing? Your so-called Midnight War?"

For the first time, a trace of amusement showed in the Dire Wolf's voice. "See, this is where you are too jaded to see the truth. There IS nothing behind my work. I am just what I seem to be. You can't recognize a knight because you don't believe they exist."

Now Carmody moved his hands inside his coat pockets. Bane had detected the man held a small caliber pistol in each hand, and the coat was of such a thin material to avoid interfering with the trajectory that the motions were more obvious. Almost with a sigh, Bane said, "You just saw me take down a man who was already aiming a rifle at me. Don't think you can survive any more than he did."

"Oh, but it is not I who will do -" began Carmody just as a large hole popped open in his forehead. Blood splatted out, black in the moonlight, and he fell to his knees and then onto his face. His hands were still in his coat pockets. The thump of the gunshot was muted but still recognizable.

Bane had not moved. From the angle of the wound, he saw where the bullet had come from and his superior night vision spotted the man even before he moved out of the doorway. Eric Spiegel lowered the Parabellum and untwisted the hot silencer. He looked as Bane had remembered him from years ago, a tall handsome man with thick black hair and a flashy smile. He wore a lightweight tropical suit in white. " 'Come slyly, Death," he quoted, "come like a thief in the night.'"

"Spiegel. Oh brother, another layer of deception," the Dire Wolf said. "Okay, let's have your version."

The Mandate's top field agent raised the barrel and sniffed it delicately. "I don't really like the smell, but I have a theory it's a little different each time. Jeremy Bane, the Dire Wolf. We haven't had to cross paths for a few years now."

Bane nodded toward the dead body lying in front of him. "I'm guessing not much of what he told me was true, eh?"

"Not much. Although he thought it was. Or we think he did. See, the Repairman died suddenly, on the job as it were, and I was the only one present. Oh, why be modest? I removed him from the living. My chief already had someone on the staff who resembled the Repairman closely, chap named McDowell, and some surgery and acting lessons made the impersonation undetectable." Spiegel's voice sharpened. "Or so we thought. How did you spot him, by the way?"

"Just as I said. I have had training not available in the world. When you stepped forward, just now, I saw you didn't get enough sleep and you ate too much last night and you have an old injury in your lower back that is bothering you. Also, you are getting myopic."

Despite himself, Spiegel flinched. "Ah well, parlor tricks. I think you still deserve a little information, son. McDowell as the Repairman was only a lure to get you down here. We thought you would be interested in facing an assassin of his stature. Carmody had orders not to try to kill you but we knew that a third party was going to try to hire him to do just that. Carmody was the real problem. He played three sides against the middle."

"FACADE!" snorted Bane. "Those losers again."

"I did NOT say that name. I don't think the existence of FACADE has ever been established. There are no freelance espionage groups, they don't exist, everyone works for one country or cause."

"If you say so. This man McDowell behind me. The one I killed a few minutes ago, the one you disguised to look like the Repairman. Did he know he was going to his death?"

The Mandate agent shrugged, an expressive gesture for him. "He knew the risks. He was a professional and he was expendable. We know that. You, me, him... we are all expendable."

"That's where we disagree," Bane said quietly. "I am not expendable."

Spiegel came groggily back to his senses. The side of his neck hurt atrociously, and he was lying on the cold hard concrete runway. Confused, he tried to get up and couldn't. His hands were tied behind him, and his ankles were tied together. Despite the pain when he moved his head, he twisted around to see the grey eyes of Jeremy Bane watching him with cool interest.

"What the...? How did you DO that?"

"I hit you with the outer edge of my hand," Bane replied. "Not hard enough to be fatal, it takes some precision."

"But I was looking right at you."

Bane said, "You still don't understand. I am not part of your world of lies and schemes and betrayals. I am something you will never figure out. Ah, but I think I do understand YOU. You have not been working exclusively for your masters in the Mandate, have you?" The Dire Wolf bent and picked up the big man with one hand, as if it was no effort at all. "Come with me. Tell me all about FACADE."

5/77/2013

"Execute Him Again"

6/11-6/12/1997

I.

He was met at the airport by men from the governor's office. Bane had just retrieved his knapsack from the carousel and was heading for the sliding glass doors through which blinding sunshine flooded across the floor. He saw two men in tan suits, one rather tall and skinny, the other a typical dumpy office drone. They had been waiting for him, and moved toward him immediately.

The Dire Wolf had not tried to take his Smith & Wesson through security, figuring he would pick up a gun as soon as possible, but he did have the matched silver daggers strapped to his forearms beneath his sleeves. They were concealed in high density silicone pads crafted to feel exactly like human muscle to the touch, and so far no one had ever spotted them during a search. Those daggers had been a gift to Bane from Kenneth Dred and he would have given up everything else in life before parting with them. So, although he did not have a gun on him, he was far from unarmed. Not that it mattered at the moment, these two had harmless body language and balance.

The taller of the two men held out his hand and the Dire Wolf shook it grudgingly. "Mr Bane? I'm Tom Hayes and this is Jackson Willets. We've been sent to fill you in on the situation. This way, please, our car is waiting."

"A little ID, maybe?"

"Huh? Oh, certainly. Here. Jackson, show him your card? Satisfied? Good. I recognize you of course from your file. Governor Harkins has told us about the last time you were in Florida." Hayes began steering them toward the doors again. His mirrored sunglasses flashed in the sunlight as they stepped out into high humidity and ninety degree temps. Waiting in the lot was a long black Lincoln Continental with official plates. Bane was ushered into the back seat, where he stowed his knapsack on the floor as he buckled himself in.

"Let's get right to the briefing," the Dire Wolf said as Hayes took the wheel and started the big car rolling. "All I know is that a dangerous fugitive is at large. Give me something to work with."

Now Willets took over. He had a soft, almost apologetic voice. "Philo Adamantios. Career criminal, suspected of over a dozen murders but he finally got convicted on kidnapping charges. Sat in the chair Tuesday morning. It may be the last time anyone is executed that way incidentally, the legislature is working on a bill to introduce death by lethal injection. Everything went as scheduled, he was pronounced dead by the doctor and wheeled down to the morgue for the required autopsy. But then something strange happened. The Medical Examiner was found strangled, his smock and clothing were gone and no sign of Adamantios. The ME's car left the grounds, and the guard who let it pass has been disciplined. Apparently Adamantios and the ME had a superficial resemblance and with sunglasses and a hat, the guard was fooled."

Bane grunted ambiguously and waited for the man to continue.

"So the guard is likely to lose his job and Adamantios is on the run. Here's a strange thing. The chair was examined and it's working perfectly. The doctor who examined Adamantios certifies that the man was dead, and those who witnessed the execution verify that Adamantios received a lethal jolt. The smell of burning flesh and hair is unmistakable, and they verify that the man was dead when they loaded him on a gurney to take him to the morgue." Willets turned around to make eye contact with Bane in the back seat. "So you see, there's something fishy."

"Could be a third party," Bane said. "Someone from Adamantios' gang killed the ME and stole their boss' corpse. That could be who was driving while Adamantios was in the trunk? No, forget it. A visitor or someone on staff would be missing and I'm sure that would have turned up. It's asking too much that someone broke into State Prison successfully the same day someone escaped."

"Oh, the grounds have been searched like never before," said Willets. "Everyone accounted for."

"There have been cases where someone was bribed to sabotage the chair," Bane went on. "The charge was less than fatal and the prisoner was smuggled out later. But you say that doesn't check out, either. The doctor who examined Adamantios has been investigated?"

"Not a trace of anything shady about him," Hayes put in from the driver's seat. "Let me be direct. No natural explanation has been found. The State Police are admitting they hit a wall. The governor suggested that perhaps you might be called in..."

"Unofficially and off the record," the Dire Wolf finished for him. "I know, I know. I will be acting on my own, with no backing." He sighed and shook his head, then added, "You'd think I'd know better by now. I should request SOME sort of authorization in case I face a hundred charges."

For the first time, Willets relaxed and his voice had humor in it. "From everything I've heard of you, Mr Bane, you would never be happy working that way. The Midnight War is what you live for."

The Lincoln pulled into the parking lot of a rather posh-looking seven-story hotel called TARLETON. "We took the liberty of booking rooms for you for the next week. Taxpayers are picking up the tab. Sorry we can't be of any more help."

Bane picked up his knapsack and paused as he started to open his door. "How are the police investigating this?"

"Officially, Adamantios is dead. Death certificate signed by a doctor. As far as we can admit, his corpse was stolen for unknown reasons, but we can't put out an APB for him or even openly conduct a hunt. But you can."

The Dire Wolf got out of the car and leaned toward Willet's open window. "I have a few ideas. I'll keep you informed. This isn't the first time I've chased a dead man."

( the rest of the story )