෴Reginald Martine෴

෴෴Candace 'Candy' Remington෴෴

෴McAvoy෴

෴Sasha Strakowski෴

෴Paolo Garcia෴

෴Emily Strakowski෴

෴෴෴෴෴෴

Extreme Sanction

෴෴෴෴෴෴

Martine’s phone chimed. He reached for the handset and paused.

“Kyrie Eleison” he muttered and then picked it up.

“Hey Reggy, it’s me of course, Candy, I’ve got McAvoy on the line for you. Just a heads up, he wants your final approval on the airstrike.” her enthusiastic tone at odds with the content of the message.

“Thank you Candy, put him on please.”

The line beeped softly. Reginald didn't wait for McAvoy to speak. “Martine here. What can I do for you?”

“Martine, my pilot is nearing the target dropzone. I need your final go ahead.” McAvoy said.

Martine hunched over in his chair. He set his desk phone to speaker mode and then rested his head in his hands.

“So soon? I only sent you the final target data a few hours ago! How on earth did you get things in place so quickly?” Martine’s hoarse tone betrayed an inner turmoil.

“Well, thanks? I guess? I thought you wanted this to happen fast.” McAvoy sounded put off by this line of discussion.

Martine cleared his throat. “No, of course, I wanted it done with all possible speed. I just. I just thought it would take longer to happen. You’ve surprised me.”

McAvoy’s shrug was clear even through the phone. “Your payment hit days ago. You told us it was within fifty miles of El Prat, so I’ve had things ready to go since then. It’s not really a big thing. Call it me being eager for the remainder of my fee.”

Martine nodded to himself and clenched his fists. “Very well then. So tell me, how are you going to do it?” his voice anguished.

“How much detail do you want?”

Martine sighed, “All of it, I can’t shy away from the details of what I’m paying you to do.”

“Well, the aircraft is high above a passenger jet, staying in the shadow. If you give the ok, we’ll be dropping the packages in roughly, ah, ten minutes from now.”

“Ten minutes? Why so long?

McAvoy sighed. “I thought you were glad we could move fast on this. Sorry about asking you to wait for up to ten minutes. In answer to your question, I’m calling you ten, well nine minutes out now, for a bunch of reasons, none of them in our control except for my knowing we’d be having this conversation instead of just getting a go or no go from you. Do you want the details or not?”

Martine leaned forward in his chair and pinched the bridge of his nose. He took a deep breath and let it out. “Yes, please go on.”

“We have an untraceable cargo plane loaded with all the GBU 28’s it can carry. Well, all we could get on short notice. It’s an older bunker-buster bomb, considered to be just about obsolete, but for one target, seven of them will leave nothing but a deep crater. I’d have gone for something better like some of your products, but your requirements were quite specific in this regard. That was a good call though, your stuff might be cutting edge but finding it for sale is hard. These might be older tech, but it’s still thirty-five thousand pounds of high penetration ordinance. More than enough to get the job done.”

Martine interrupted him. “So you’ve ensured there is no connection between us for this job?”

“Yeah, everything is totally sanitized. Chances are some random group will claim responsibility. I can assure you that no one at the target site will be in a position to come after anyone for this. I’ve got a painter on the ground. He’ll mark the target as soon as the bombs are away. After that it's nothing but waiting for the rain. I can pretty much guarantee that unless they have a hundred thousand tons of high strength reactive alloy armor hidden under that concrete, nothing will survive that. What else do you want to know?”

“What is the expected collateral damage?”

“Very low. I won't say none because the fact is, there are too many ways a drop can go wrong. However, the man on the ground has a handheld and stationary painter, and the bombs are considered low collateral damage weapons with shaped charges and a high degree of accuracy on target. Oh, that reminds me. There’s something else.”

Martine rubbed his chin. “What would that be?”

“I have another operative on the ground with a live camera feed going to your incoming server, if you follow the link Candace should have sent you, you can pull up a high-quality live feed of the strike. I figured with as much as you’re paying for this, you must really want this site gone. We’re going to make that happen, and as a bonus for you, I figured you deserve a nice 4k livesteam of the event.”

Martine’s shoulders shook with silent sobs. He silently mouthed a series of curses. He carefully controlled his breathing to keep his reaction out of his voice. His look at the phone was one of pure hatred. He opened his mouth like he was about to say one thing and then closed it as though having changed his mind about what he would say. “That is, unexpected. You really shouldn’t have.” He clenched his jaw and fists and took a long slow breath. “I truly cannot thank you enough. I’ll pull it up.”

McAvoy made a clicking sound with his pen on the phone. “Tick-tock, we don’t have much more time. If we miss this window my people will have to start all over, get a new plane, new bombs, the works. You’re down to just under five minutes. Do we have a go?”

Martine looked at the video feed showing the unassuming concrete building nestled in a commercial and light industrial district. The video had two blank timers on it, and a superimposed circle showing the predicted affected impact zone. He swallowed hard. “You’re a go.”

“Got it. I’ll call you if I have anything new for you.” McAvoy ended the call.

Martine knelt down on the floor and bowed his head. He wiped his eyes and began to pray. Moments later, he took a deep breath and got back into his chair to watch the live streaming video.

The video included an estimated countdown until drop and a countdown for the final impact. The countdown timer till drop had started running. Reginald let out several choice curses at whoever had included those details. He made himself keep watching.

He watched a young couple walk out of the building a few seconds after the feed indicated the bombs had been dropped. The two were clearly a couple. She played with her long dark hair and looked up at him with an obvious expression of happiness and love. They walked slowly, holding hands and talking.

Martine slammed his fists down on the desk hard enough to bloody his knuckles. “This has to be worth it!” he muttered urgently.

෴෴෴ ෴෴෴ ෴෴෴

Half a world away, Paolo and Sasha were making lunch plans on a mid morning break.

Paolo took her hand as they walked out toward the street. “What about that little stand that has the Greek food?”

Sasha smiled, “We’ve had that twice already this week. I’m hungry for something a little different today. I wish there was good sushi, or a Chinese place around here,” she pulled him in for a quick kiss.

The kiss lingered for a few seconds and they stopped at a bench next to the street. Paolo sat down first, Sasha snuggled in close to him. Arm in arm they looked at the unassuming building they both worked in.

“You know, I could go get us some Chinese food. There is that great place across the bay,” she said.

“If you really want to do that, I don’t mind. On the other hand, we could borrow a boat and go across the bay after work, we could invite Emily and Tony, make a night of it.”

“You mean we can all be on one small boat, with each couple taking turns sneaking below, and then pretend we didn't just use the bed? Wait, are you trying to avoid me bringing us lunch? I’ve gotten a lot better since that last time,” she said.

Paolo burst into laughter. “That was hilarious. I wonder if they ever figured out where that chunk of table went? Oh, and I like that you’re hoping the boat will be big enough for that kind of fun.”

Sasha’s pale face and neck went pink. “Hey! I didn’t say I was hoping that. I just assumed you would try to get one like that. And I’ve gotten a lot better since then. I haven’t had any trouble carrying the test loads all week since my last dip. That reminds me. Too bad we can't borrow the company yacht, now that would be a night in style.”

Paolo pulled her in for a kiss. “Of course. I know you’ve gotten so much better. I am still so glad you took the path of safety. I was so worried you would land on something. I was holding my breath every time you disappeared until you came back ok. That isn’t a bad idea. The company boat is very nice. I know Tony can pilot it. Not sure we can get it.”

She smiled, “You do love me!”

He sighed and leaned back to look up at the sky. “I would worry even if I didn’t, but you know I love you so—” He trailed off, staring into the clear blue sky. His eyes flashed, “Que mierda!” He stood up and cupped his hands around his eyes to block out some sun. “Sasha, we have to go!”

He took her hand and pulled her to her feet. She looked at the sky. “What do you see?”

“There is something falling straight at us.” He tugged her away from the building. “Less than ten seconds! We have to run!”

Sasha dropped his hand. “No! Not without Emily!” she vanished with a soft pop.

Paolo looked up at the falling shapes and back at the spot his girlfriend had just vacated. He took several steps back from the spot. He looked up at the falling shapes. His eyes shifted, becoming dark pools of infinite depth. He took in the trajectory of the falling objects. Then a tiny dot on the slanted metal roof, well outside the human visual range. His gaze snapped to a source of the dot—a human silhouette on a rooftop several blocks away. His intent gaze at the distant figure there was broken by a popping sound followed by a splashing sound and the sensation of warm water hitting his face.

He looked at the sound to see Sasha with her arms wrapped tightly around her sister Emily. He realized she was only holding most of her sister. Emily’s left leg now ended at mid-calf. He saw one pulse of bright red blood splash into the pool of blood on the ground when a spurt from her missing forearm caught him in the chin. Paolo moved toward them to help.

Sasha smiled at Emily. “See, I got you out ok. We need to go!”

Emily nodded, her expression confused. “I, I don’t feel good.”

He yanked his belt off. “Sasha! Lay her down now, we need to put on a tourn—”

The first bomb hit. Several hundred yards from the blast, the roaring shockwave instantly stunned all three of them. As though every bone in their bodies had been replaced with tuning forks, and rung forcefully. The wave knocked them to the ground. The deafening first explosion made the following six detonations felt but not heard.

Paolo recovered first, looking through the heavy choking cloud of dust with his enhanced vision. He crawled to Sasha, where she was shielding her sister. He carefully lifted and rolled Sasha off of Emily. The wide sightless eyes and large pool of blood around her still body confirmed his fear. His expression of stunned horror twisted into one of fury. The image of the man and the device shining its light at the building burned in his mind as he picked up Sasha and cradled her in his arms. His glowing eyes guided him through the dust and smoke while he limped away under the concealing aftereffects of the blasts.

He looked back once, before turning onto a small side alley. His anguished expression and dust-covered face tracked with his tears at the thought of all the friends gone in seconds. He looked down at Sasha and kept limping toward his nearby flat. If he could have heard anything, he might have wondered why he couldn’t hear any sirens.

෴Raz෴

෴෴෴෴෴෴

Bad Morning

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Raz woke up from a bad dream. All he could remember was wandering through Braithwaite’s maze-like facility looking for his mom. Somehow in the dream he’d known she was there and needed his help, but he woke before finding her. He knew it was bad by the pounding of his heart and the shaking of his fingers. The other details of the dream itself had already faded from his mind.

His hands felt a little tired and achy. The view out the window looked like it was going to be a beautiful day. He got up and looked in the mirror on the wall. His face looked tired and strangely pale and colorless. He studied his reflection Raz scratched his chin and wondered if he was getting sick.

Outside the window it looked like a storm was brewing. He looked out the fifth floor window, first at the street below, then up at the dark clouds. A summer storm on the way for sure.

Raz decided to go find Sia. Something was wrong. He called out to her but heard no reply. His gaze flickered over at the window again. A large black figure with bright red eyes blazing like twin fires stood outside the window.

Before he could even turn to run the black figure blasted through the exterior wall into the room in a blur of motion. A cold metal hand took him by the neck and lifted him into the air.

Raz didn’t wait for whatever was coming next. He lifted his legs and tried to twist out of Doktor Midnight’s grip as he kicked out against the unyielding metal torso. The kicks hurt his feet but he didn’t stop till he got loose enough to turn his neck. With a concerted twist and push he burst free from Doktor Midnight’s grip and fell backwards away from the armored attacker.

Doktor Midnight laughed at his effort and snatched one of his ankles as he fell. Raz twisted furiously and kicked with his other foot until the iron grip began to tighten down on his ankle.

Before his ankle bones gave way he stopped fighting and went limp.

Doktor Midnight lifted him high, putting them eye to upside down eye. “I can’t believe that fool Braithwaite let you escape. In my lab, you won't be needing arms or legs for my research.”

His grip tightened down on Raz’s ankle again.

Just as it felt the bone would shatter Sia came through the door with her old pump-action shotgun. “Let him go!” She pointed the shotgun at Doktor Midnight.

Doktor Midnight laughed so hard small jets of steam escaped from around his blazing eyes.

She didn’t hesitate, snapping her rifle to her shoulder and firing a burst at the armored form.

Doktor Midnight let Raz go. He didn’t fall, just hung there suspended in the air.

The armored form turned its attention to Sia as she hit it with another burst of rifle fire.

She called to Raz, “Stop floating there and come on!”

Raz fell to the floor just in time to see Doktor Midnight turn his fiery gaze on her. An unseen force gripped her and flung her out the hole in the wall.

She screamed as she fell out of sight.

Raz rolled to get to his feet and leap to her aid but found his left foot caught on something.