The QUEEN SONG

(15) Scenes 35-37

07/19/2019
Mike W McCoy

Version 1.0

<>35<> If you survive.

The slipping sounds of the twin rotor blades of the Ninja Team Six helicopter drowned out most of what Mr. Hiedo had said.  “-should last two hours, but the depth of your injuries-”

“Enough!” Agent Yoshi barked pushing back the corpsman’s syringe.

“As you wish,” he replied hoping to hide the surprise and suspicion surrounding his eyes.

Inwardly the Japanese man was glad a sterile surgical mask concealed his grin of support.  The wounded woman who held dominion over him, as well as the whole operation, was back to being the classic ball busting bitch. 

“Is there more?”

The question drew a raised eyebrow response as she fumbled out a cigarette.

“More?” pausing the lighter’s flame.  “Oh, yes,” inhaling the words.  “There is.”

The veteran Ninja could tell the flame’s low golden glow had gouged open the question.  So much more, her expression seemed to say.  An emotional struggle quivered her scarred facial flesh, and hints of sorrowful words silently twitched her lips.

“Mr. Hiedo,” exhaling deeply.  “Did I ever thank you?”

“Ma’am?”

“You know,” dragging on the smoke again.  “For saving my life?”

He pulled down his mask, looked into her eyes, and answered slowly.  “I was honor bound to do no less.  I, no, we all owe you our lives.”

The woman’s smile was crooked, like a cocked gun.  “Yeah, you kind of do.”

Before more to the answer came, Yoshi repositioned herself so that both legs dangled over the edge of the open bay door.  The helicopter’s metal floor was still sticky from her blood, and at only a few strides away, the smart-cactus all around them no longer appeared asleep.  Briefly she wondered if they could smell it.

“Mr. Hiedo, I consider your honor flawless.  If you survive, tell my family that I Miako Chocolate Yoshi release you off your debt.”

His eyes twitched with understanding, as she inhaled deeply. 

“As you said, I am honor bound to do no less,” exhaling smoke like a dragon or a witch.  He wasn’t sure which.

Fighting the urge to groan, she re-adjusted.  “Mr. Shinya, status please.” 

The young man’s voice proceeded his appearance from the night’s gloom.  He was costumed as the rest of the team, but her blood stained the form fitting charcoal black fabric, and tight leather straps holding his secured pistols and blades. 

“Yes, Agent Yoshi.  The LZ is secure,” he began after a glace to the other 3 men standing nearby.  “The target vehicle we followed is two kilometers South, over that dune.  It appears to be unguarded, but-”

“But nothing, Mr. Shinya,” she cut in, inhaling more to fight off a gag reflex.  “Pilot?”

From the cockpit the man’s gruff response came quickly.  “Yes Ma’am?”

“Do you still have a heading on special agent Boris’s vidfone?”

“Yes and no.  Satellite A.I, had a lock until a few moments ago.  Re-acquiring has been a negative.  Speculation has it damaged or destroyed.”

“Of course it,” her course humor grunted before going quiet.

Mr. Hiedo, Mr. Shinya, and the pilot all watched her think, the cigarette forgotten in her bandaged hand.  The other 3 men, standing guard position around the machine, were also staring back at her.  The Org-crime Agent’s mind raced with many competing concepts, but loyalty to a debt won out. 

“Gentlemen, what I said to Mr. Hiedo applies to each of you,” dropping the cigarette on the last word.  “Your honor is satisfied.”

The words hung between them for a moment, until Mr. Shinya knelt like a servant before her.  With a frustrated glare she waved him to talk. 

“Ma’am, if it is all the same, I want to finish the mission.  Free your brother, and retaliate for the sacrifice of Captain Kakihara.” 

The name of their fallen Team Leader, the man who died to save her life, brought nods and grunts of acknowledgement from the rest of the team.  The thought of Boris and his avenging gun shot, raised the vibe so that the long scar running across her face seemed to flair with anger and power. 

“Gentlemen, I like this idea,” Yoshi finally began after staggering into a standing position.  “Mr. Shinya, take Mr. Tsuge and Mr. Matsumoto to secure a tracking device on that target helicopter.”

“Yes Agent Yoshi!” the 2 ninjas said excitedly, and stood alongside the youngest, who also bowed, while displaying a soda can sized device.

“Mr. Hiedo and Mr. Takaoka will come with me.  Mr. Kitano will await our call for extraction, and coordinate thru the Sat. A.I.,” the woman commanded.

She took a moment to look each man in their eyes clearly, then began by glancing down at herself.  “I know I am not one hundred percent secure for this.  But…”

Wide white bandages, slightly seeping crimson, still covered her naked torso above tight fitting expensive black slacks.  The IV shunt was still taped in place, bruises and bandages marred her bare tattooed muscular arms, and her wild black hair was held back by another blood stained cloth.

She gave a deep and painful bow towards the Ninja Team.  “But I will try to be worthy of your loyalty.”

Agent Yoshi’s voice then boomed bitterly beyond bravado and into prophecy.

“Together we will mortally wound the Yellow Hand tonight.  And most importantly gentlemen,” pausing to draw her scalpel sharp steel.  “I will kill the thing that calls itself Jax.”

Murmurs of agreement flowed from the team as they bowed back respectfully.  None dared voice what they all thought.  This was a suicide mission, but each had come to terms with that thought after the disaster at Club Uzi. 

She could sense their resolve, and drew strength from their union.  “Stay focused, stay tight, and some of us may yet survive this night.”

And with those words she shuffled forward towards the desert sand, and the Grand California Resort.

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<>36<>  They did not bite or sting, but stabbed. 

The night’s colors stretched to all compass points like the beginning of the cosmos.  The desert sand and air were welded together without a joint.The oppressive overall weight seemed to move slightly vertical with each passing moment.  The sparse moonlight, and a sea of immeasurable far-off stars, tinted the emptiness into that of a dull knife which was only briefly lit by the redness of the flailing burnt embers marking the path of the approaching noise.

A bass heavy rhythm of hundreds of trudging bare feet undercut the off-key undulating groans and screams escaping the dry parched throats of the human wreckage that flowed forward, almost blindly, in the wake of their cult leader. 

“These are the songs of Hell,” the Firstborn of Mother let slip out when he paused on the cresting sand dune.  His tone didn’t sound disappointed.

From behind and below a snake of shambling human wretchedness and degradation made the broken noise that made Jax smile.  When the dying flames of the burning smart-cactus fronds approached and passed, the man’s cruel cryptic appearance altered within the glow.  Shifting shadows danced across his foxlike face, some light and gay, others dark and ominous, it was as if dual personalities occupied the same deeply tanned flesh. 

His tall narrow shouldered physique was now clad in the relics of clothing.  A wild multi-colored Guayabera short sleeve shirt, taken from a Mexican Dog’s corpse at Club Uzi, was draped openly enough to expose his flat abs and hairless chest.  A pair of Denim dungarees hung loosely above his ash-soiled feet which sported toenails much longer and tougher than humanly normal. 

Unexpectedly, a short sliver of passing moonlight drowned all with a subbed burst of glare.  The marching mass passed Jax within only inches.  Each cultist did so without a glance at him, and showed only a total encompassing deathlike indifference of unhappy slaves. 

The multitude of meager breasts panted together, while wide dilated nostrils quivered as their eyes stared blankly straight.  Uniformly, the flesh showed every rib, or the joints of their limbs as being like knots in a rope.  Each cultist appeared to have a psychic collar connected by an invisible chain whose links swung between them, rhythmically clinking inside each fractured mind. 

The dull light also showed attitudes of ‘Pain’, ‘Abandonment’, and ‘Despair’.  It was like an amusement park line to a place where the helpless withdrew to die.  The cultists were no longer normal people, nothing earthly now, nothing but dark shades of disease and starvation, shuffling sluggishly in the eerie gloom of a fleeting ember tinted night.

Occasionally, a few would pause and slowly their eyelids would open wide.  The sunken orbs looked up, enormous and vacant, showing a blankness with only a white flicker around a dark center, which then quickly died out.

Big flies buzzed furiously, they did not bite or sting, but stabbed.

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<>37<>  A concert of lunacy. 

Far down below the dunes, a vast semi-dormant forest of smart-cactus encroached alongside the rubble edges that separated the true-believing cultists from the walking wounded of weak limbed worshipers.  A knee high stacked stone wall held back the burnt umber and turquoise terror.  The waist high plants, toothy fronds folded, seemed to sway slightly in an unfelt breeze. 

The glare of moonlight chose that moment to re-expose itself, and show the terrible tragedy about to unfold.

Jax had begun to advance towards the line’s vanguard.  He moved down along the line of disciples, the swaying and burning torches of which, dripped red hot embers for the Firstborn to fire-walk upon.  His feet moved slowly, as if walking thru thick mud or deep snow.  But instead of soapy water of falling ice, burnt ash cinders waved and twirled in odd psionically synched gyrations. 

The child of Experiment Number Eight could feel, more than glimpse, the fleeting movements of the near naked cult dancers who leapt across his field of view.  Their arms held the long wands of fire that dropped and swayed to the unsettling audio Soundtrack pounding his chest. 

Farther up the trail, obscured man-shaped shadows became clearer.  They appeared to hold chess piece positions, with glowing robotic eyes that cast a brightness that was painful to look at. 

A slight wind whistled across the ruins from the Grand California Resort, and it seemed to carry a low grade guttural noise.  Several dozen cult followers in line, tried to repeat the din.  Darkly sunburned, and deeply scratched arms flayed, as the cultist’s filthy dirty faces lifted high to release a jumbled wave of erratic ecstasy.  But only ‘Laughter’ slid sideways across the Soundtrack making these outside sounds scattered and surreal, a concert of lunacy. 

Up ahead, the game board of Chinese animals adjusted their position, but not their attitudes.  Only the red dressed Vulture, Mei Liun, stepped forward towards the advancing mass of madness.  Even at a half dozen car lengths distant, the Firstborn could see no fear on her face, but his Alien acuity did ‘feel’ her anger.  It made him smile.

The Yellow Hand triad Snakes stood a few paces back-stage.  Their hands were ready to react to any of the wild animal antics of the cultists whose presence didn’t appear to physically phase the Firstborn.  He looked entertained and enthralled by the spectacle.

The same could not be said for the squad of 8 yellow headband wearing Chinese thugs positioned near the washing machine sized dull metal box.  Not having the advantage of computerized T-glass shades, they appeared anxious.  Even the few remaining triad Birds managed to look more poised and accepting than them.

“So boss,” Mahn, the henchman captain in the tattered gold pinstriped suit began.  “Are you ready for this?”

Xais, the triad underboss adjusted his own swampy green suit, and started to say something sarcastic.  But instead, he smiled at his man.  “Mahn could you at least look more relaxed?”

The stout man smiled slightly, but it was forced.

“Ao, good start.  How about I read you the message from Uncle Ueo?”

Mahn nodded abruptly.  Xais held out the elaborately engraved wood placard that had come along with the duel padlocked metal box. 

The underboss started flatly, “This wedding gift is for my favorite nephew.  May it serve you well.  Signed the Little Big Man, your uncle Ueo.  Then is says you must keep balance, Give a child for a child.”

“What is that?”

Xais half chuckled to hide the questions racing in his mind.  “I don’t know, Mahn.  But I’m getting a wife.”

The henchman listened to close approach of the cultist throng.  He knew this was indeed madness, the macabre of nightmare.

“That’s not all boss,” he finished by to Jax kissing the hand of Mei Liun. 

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