Worldwide corruption
“You’re kidding me, right? There’s no way the UN would even dream of working with Yugorovski. Normally, they’d consider people like him as beyond contempt!”
“Normally, you’d be right. Point is we have a corrupt leader. He’s the high command of the UN ‘peacekeeping’ forces. He’s been corrupted by the power that Yugorovski has promised him, and he believes that he can control Yugorovski, while it’s actually Yugorovski controlling him,” Lieutenant Nakejama surmised.
“Our high command is beyond useless, and beyond contempt. He sucks the morale out of our forces, and feeds it to Yugorovski. He’s Yugorovski’s lapdog, always doing what Yugorovski wants. He thinks that he controls Yugorovski and his mercenary forces. The reverse is true, and with that we have to follow the orders now, or something bad will happen to our families.” Captain Blacks eyes start to mist over. “They’ve already had my wife killed for insubordination,” he sobbed.
“Who is the current High Command?”
“A rich fool called Roberto Tomicielli.”
“Yep, that bastard rules the roost. Or Yugorovski lets him think that. The entire UN has fallen under his sway. It’s now just another part of the seedy corporation with a different name. He now has control of the worldwide defence force. As if that wasn’t bad enough, we’re letting him keep control.”
“Well, what do you expect with threats like that?” screamed Nakejama, “Either we follow the orders, or a family member dies. We’re left in an impossible situation. Either way we’re made to hate ourselves, firstly, for not being able to do anything about it, secondly, for being too cowardly to try.”
Dafs shook his head, he felt sympathy for these guys, he knew what Yugorovski was capable of; certain threats had stopped him from leaving Yugorovski’s side as soon as he’d planned. He may have been a spy, but Yugorovski’s rules still applied. “This time we’re in disagreement, if it involves family then bravado doesn’t even attempt to enter into it. It’s a double edged sword, you see. If you let it take over your judgement, then you put your family at direct risk.
“What troubles me though, is that you didn’t leave sooner, if you knew then what you know now, then why didn’t you quit?”
“Exactly the same reasons we were forced to wait for salvation. Exactly the same reason you worked there for so long. In this case you guys were the salvation.”
How do they know about my working with Yugorovski? How do they know? Dafs wondered, quite shocked.
As if they had noticed his shocked look, Nakejama and Black looked at Dafs, “So, you wonder how we know about your spying? We kept tabs on anyone who we thought was close to Yugorovski. We had an Englishman working as a surveillance man. His name was Johnny Cooper.
“We did it since the UN was working as Yugorovski’s worldwide lapdog. We had to keep tabs on anyone we thought were actively working for, and helping Yugorovski. That meant you too.”
“Great, a Welshman being spied on by an Englishman. Why is it never the other way round?” sighed Dafs. “I just hope that you ended up thinking I was one of the good guys,” Dafs trailed off, yawning. “I’ve been awake for 36 hours.”
*************************************************************
Carys came in, awoken by her need to see Gustav. Dafs gave her a grin, “Hey. Gustav’s alive and well, the would-be assassins are here, under interrogation,” and with that, he collapsed into a deep sleep.
For a while she looked concerned, looking at the person lying on the floor. “He’s sleeping, there’ no need to worry, he’s just tired out. After all he has been looking after Gustav for a long enough time,” said Nakejama, quite bluntly.
Carys looked at the two new people with interest mixed with anger, “So, why did you guys try to kill me? And who are you?”
Roger Black looked at her, almost as if he was trying to work out a difficult puzzle. “The UN has become little more then a private army for a businessman called Yugorovski. And as you hadn’t completed the job you were sent for, and were seen by spies to be cavorting with the offenders we were called by him to kill. Our target was you.
“We’d been working for the UN for quite some time. Unfortunately, our leader is a bloody pillock who has fallen under the sway of Yugorovski, meaning that Yugorovski is basically in full control of the UN.
Nakejama looked less cheerful then usual, and his normally melodious voice turned sombre, “Everything which our organisation once stood for, honour, justice and peace, are what we are now being used to destroy. Our leader has found the position of ultimate power very contagious, and is now absolutely corrupt.
“As you didn’t do the job of infiltrating Vostok, and killing off all of those within, along with the fact our leader is under the influence, to put it subtly, of a tyrannical, power mad psychopath, then we’ve been sent to clear up the mess you left, with reparations if we didn’t. We’d forfeit our lives and the lives of our family.
“I’ve been noticing something since you came up here, and I could look at you, you look pretty similar to my associate. Something tells me you’re related.”
A hint of recognition flashed in Captain Black’s eyes. The final piece of the puzzle in Black’s mind fitted snugly into place, “Carys? Could it be? I never thought I’d ever see you again. I thought you died along with my wife and my mother. I thought you got killed!”
Sarcasm filled her voice, bitter, almost twisted, “Such a great welcome, almost being shot, almost killing a friend of mine, and causing one of my best friends to crash and burn from exhaustion.
“Yeah, great welcome.”
Slowly her eyes recognised the person in front of her, “Roger?” she gasped ecstatically. “Aren’t you supposed to be working for the UN?”
“Technically, I still am. However, like Nakejama said, the UN is under ‘corporate control,’” Black screamed, spitting out the words. “The entire thing is a farce, the UN is supposed to keep peace, the irony is obvious. Trying to kill the enemies of a ruthless, vindictive slob, a corporate dictator, a person who’ll kill for money.”
Nakejama and Black looked at each other. “Yugorovski,” they sighed. “You know, the fact that our boss thinks he can control that tyrant is shocking, the stupidity is immense. Off the scale, so to speak.”
“Yugorovski already has him around his little finger, he just doesn’t know it yet.”
“Obviously, otherwise our leader would be more careful where he stuck his face into Yugorovski’s plans. But he doesn’t seem to care. About us, about the organisation, about anyone. He just doesn’t care,” sighed Black, a huge, exasperated sigh, “It’s the first major disaster our organisation has been through for a long time. But, our leader is a disaster area, morally crushing. He’s an autocratic monster only in charge of the organisation because it gives him the most promise of wealth, at the least risk to his backside.
“I realised that when he authorized the plan to kill my wife. The pillock listened to Yugorovski’s twisted reasoning, that she had fought for what was right, and had her shot.”
“Some leader! You must really hate him for being such an arrogant, smug git. Much like how I remembered you, brother.” She smiled at him.
He smiled back, teasing, “Oh, how you remembered me so well. You mercenary,” he stroked her hair tenderly, “Still available to the highest bidder?”
She stuck her tongue out, “Jerk.”
Nakejama brought them out of reminiscence, back into reality. “You can reminisce when this mess is sorted, and the deed is done; when both bastards have been killed, killed by the same greed that drives them to disregard human life. I will be watching when that greed disregards their life, and shows them the mercy they show us. I will savour that moment, when I finally know my wife and kids are safe from their treachery, when I finally see the proof that they can’t harm us anymore.”
“And how are we meant to end the treachery? He probably has units searching for us right now. Searching for us all, to end our lives. Either that, or he’s moving in to kill our family, and I don’t just mean our nearest and dearest. He’s going to go to kill our extended families, and then he’ll kill everyone close to them in a world-wide annexation, until he’s the only one left in the world.”
“Look, I’m not going to dispose of my honour in the nearest UN funded bog-hole, thank you very much. If doing that brings my family in the firing line, then so be it, I’d rather they went to heaven instead of hell due to my actions.”
From inside the cargo bay they heard one of the guys shuffling about. What the? Surely they can’t have resuscitated by now. The blows would have surely made them incapacitated. In fact, it’s fair to say, the interrogation of the others was deadly. They were far less willing.
Slowly Carys, Captain Black and Lieutenant Nakejama reassured themselves that it was either Terrik or Commander La Salle, or, in the case of Black and Nakejama, their over-stressed imaginations. Or it could be Gustav up and around again, even though he wasn’t projected to be able to walk for a couple of days.
Then they heard a muffled gasp of pain, and a slight thud as someone hit the floor, obviously incapacitated by the impact.
Then the cargo bay crashed open as Eugene La Salle, and Curtis Kayne grappled with each other. Eugene, though winded, managed to gasp, “He’s taken out Terrik.” That lapse of concentration, though small, was enough for Kayne to smash him into the floor. Eugene coughed in agony, then went limp.
Carys screamed in wide-eyed terror. He was going to take her to Yugorovski, or worse.
Captain Black managed to untie himself and went to kick Kayne solidly in the upper-back. “Face it Kayne, you were outclassed by me the first time you went against me in unarmed combat.” He smiled as Kayne went down with the first hit.
As Black went to deal Kayne the final kick, Kayne kicked the leg Black was standing on and Black crashed down to the floor. He held up three fingers, the signal to Nakejama to transmit everything he heard to Johnny Cooper.
Kayne got up, and lunged at Black’s throat. Black aimed a solid kick at Kayne’s ‘family jewels’ and Kayne went down, coughing and spluttering as his face went white from pain.
As Black came closer Kayne took out a syringe full of a non-lethal venom, and stuck it into Black’s thigh. Slowly, ever so slowly Black began to lose consciousness. First, he started swaying, his eyes seemed to go in and out of focus, then he fell, quite gracefully it seemed, on to the helicopter floor.
Carys was shocked, felt her entire self being knocked out of her. “What have you done to him, you scumbag. You killed him.” When the weight of those words reached her mind, she cried a guttural scream of rage, and leapt at him, catching his throat with her foot.
He choked, his face went pale, and his hand moved reflexively to his throat to protect it. “He’s not dead. Sure, it’s powerful enough to put him out for a few days, but its not lethal. He’ll be back on his feet within a week, I’m not even going to report him to High Command.”
Her rage subsided a little, just enough to give Kayne an upper hand in this fight. He wasn’t going to lose to her, no matter how close his defeat may look.
Kayne blocked Carys’ kick to the guts and did a high kick to her stomach. Her eyes widened substantially, and she choked, her hands grasping at her stomach as she went down. “Coward!! Bastard!!” she choked as a wave of pain washed over her guts.
Kayne managed to find a pressure point in the neck, and just applied enough force to knock her unconscious. He whispered in her ear, “You’re worth more to me alive then dead, sister, and soon, your friends will be too.”
*************************************************************
Kayne let her drop to the side of the wall temporarily, kissing her slightly on her cheek, a sign of betrayal. He walked at normal pace towards the person who had imprisoned him. Right where he knew Dafs was. Kayne shook Dafs slightly, to make sure he was just awake enough to feel the pain, but not awake to do anything about it.
When Dafs opened his eyes Kayne maliciously sneered, “So my good man,” he jovially laughed as he kicked Dafs right in the balls, causing him to grunt, “how’s my captor today?” He spat the word ‘captor’ out, as it was an abomination to Kayne, a painful memory of something that should never have happened.
Dafs grinned slightly, through the pain, “Coward, you’re no better then Yugorovski.” He grunted again as Kayne aimed a harder kick at Dafs balls. The pain managed to clear Dafs’ vision, and he grabbed Kayne’s leg with his organic arm, and swung a punch at him with the hydraulic one.
Kayne’s eyes boggled slightly, and his vision went slightly out of focus. Dafs sneered, spitting blood as he said “You’ve made your final mistake Kayne. You know how grouchy I become after being woken up from a snooze.”
Kayne blinked, his eyes widened in fear as he saw the hydraulic arm swinging at him. One chance at this, I only have one chance. In an instant he grabbed a syringe full of tranquiliser from his belt, and stuck it right into the arm of Dafs, his captor. I can only watch, this will either work, or it won’t.
A lot less graceful then Black, but a lot longer to take effect, Dafs crumpled to the floor, and assumed a foetal position, and snored softly, just softly enough to let people know he’s alive.
“I never get beaten by the same person twice,” Kayne nodded arrogantly, “You may have beaten me once, but that’ll be the only time.”
Dafs wriggled gently, and started to mutter, “We’ll meet again, and you’d better watch your six when we do, Captain.” He started to laugh, and cryptically said, in a dream-like trance, “We’ll be watching it, and you’d better believe we’re capable enough to compromise it. You stab our back, and we’ll stab yours”
He watched Dafs fall back to sleep, and motioned him carefully by the cargo hold, and shut the door on top of his hydraulic arm, wedging it firmly into place, “You better watch more then your back,” Kayne muttered, “As unless you get out of this, they’ll be nothing more then a body to hide.”
Kayne sneered predatorily, “I’ll be back to deliver you and the rest of your crew to the UN High Command. He’s always wanted new toys to play with. But first I’ll deliver the intended target to him. Once I’ve dealt the final solution to the ultimate problem.
He went to Gustav’s compartment. As expected, Gustav was fitfully dosing, the pain he was in etched in lines on his face. Kayne took no pity, and loaded up his sniper rifle with a tranquiliser dart. At such close range that could kill Gustav. Both Yugorovski and Tomcieli had shown interest in keeping him alive, however, so he shot at the back of Gustav’s leg. Watching as Gustav’s eyes shot open, clouded over and then closed again.
He moved out of the helicopter with Carys slung over his shoulder, and started a long walk to the nearest town, 50miles away. “After all,” Kayne deliberated with some thought, “I can’t be expected to walk all the way to Spain, can I?”
*************************************************************
Nakejama switched off the recording device with his teeth. “I hope you got all of the important details Johnny. Something tells me that’s all the information you’ll have to work with. Tell me when you’ve worked out where High Command is now, and where Kayne is going.
“He’s compromised the entire unit. Black, the most proficient at hand to hand has been injected with poison, probably lethal enough to incapacitate him for the next few days or weeks.
“Does he know you’re transmitting Nakejama?”
“I doubt it somehow. If he did he’d have made sure that this transmission wouldn’t have happened. I don’t think he noticed it. I managed to record that entire message without detection. If he was going to notice anything he’d have done so after he’d taken out Black. He would’ve had a brief look at what was holding Black before he escaped. There would’ve been enough time before Carys became enraged.”
“Did he?”
“What do you think? He may be combat trained and an able sniper, but his intelligence is somewhat lacking. He has the observation skills, when it occurs to him to actually use them. Otherwise he lacks any type of intelligence.”
“For someone with a lack of intelligence he seemed to be fairly competent in out-manoeuvring you guys.”
“What do you expect from a mercenary who desperately wants his share of the profits as soon as possible? Desire for money seems to override any discernible intelligence two to one. Also, the fact that one of the guys who captured us was so exhausted he fell asleep didn’t help matters.
“Kayne is a competent combatant who came as or more prepared then us, and not barred by any moral judgement. He managed to take out two military men on one on one combats, obviously relying on surprising the opposition before he could react.”
“Basically you guys are just trying to excuse yourselves for mistakes in which you had no excuse.”
“Kayne was incapacitated by the punch that the Welshman gave him with the hydraulic arm. Theoretically he shouldn’t even have woken up for a few days, let alone of had the strength to fight through what he did. We weren’t ready for the impossible, and that seemed impossible.”
“Yeah. Ok, fair enough.” Thoughtfully, Johnny mused, “I do believe that High Command is currently in Spain.”
“Spain? Why Spain?”
“Who would think that he’d be hiding in a place he was so well known in?”
*************************************************************
Kayne got himself to a car park, and spotted a run-down Ford Escort of which few would notice, or care, about its prolonged disappearance. Except the owners.
After a few minutes of tense work Kayne hot-wired the Escort and its engine roared into life. He dragged Carys into the back seat, belted her up, and gagged her. He engaged first gear and quickly drove off out of the town, his destination was Spain.
“Objective achieved, sir. I have her alive and ready for questioning,” Kayne said, his gruff voice distorted over the com.
“Alive? Well, I thought the mission you designed robbed us of any chance of that.”
“The shot designed to kill her got somebody else instead. Not my fault; something or someone sacrificed themselves for her. What does that mean for payment?”
“She’s still alive? Hmm, you get double the pre-mission payment.” High Command stated.
“And more? Because if what I’m planning works, you’ll have more potential things to play with.”
“Excellent, this could improve my mood considerably. You have done well.”
“Well enough to secure a safe passage out?”
“We will see, we will see.”
*************************************************************
Carys woke up, bound and gagged. Ripping the gag from her mouth she screamed. Her head was pounding. “Eh?! What am I doing here?” She lifted her head and saw her captor, “You!! I’ll kill you! Kayne, you murdering son of a bitch, you killed my brother!”
“Temper, temper,” he sneered. “The more agitated you get the less I get paid. The less I get paid, the more agitated with you I will be and the less favourably your stay here will be.”
Carys started to free herself from the bonds. As soon as she was free she went to strangle Kayne. He gasped as her hands wrapped themselves around his neck.
Quickly he broke to a stop with both the footbrake and the handbrake. His head lurched forward enough to break Carys’ hold. Admiringly he looked at her for a moment. Then he slapped her. “You are worth more to me alive, but if you try to kill me I will kill you. No payment is worth the loss of my life, simply because with the loss of my life there’d be no way for me to utilise the payment.
“Resistance is not advised.”
“I’ll resist, and I’ll get High Command.”
“To get High Command, you’ll also have to get me, and I’m not an easy target. Like I said, resistance is futile.”
And with that Kayne knocked her out, and snarled, “Objective achieved, I’d better get paid.”
*************************************************************
Again, she woke up, again she had a headache. Carys managed to get her thoughts in focus. She was trapped in a glass case. And was in a room of interrogation. It would also be safe to assume that they’d knock her unconscious pretty soon. How? Well, they could always fill the chamber with a non-toxic gas that would effectively anaesthetize her.
Carys was again resigned to the fact that she might not get out of this alive. After all, worse things had happened.
From a door on the far left came five people, one was, she assumed, UN High Command, looking like the posh braggart her mind had imagined him to be. He looked Italian, but mainly he looked overweight, and would be quite a target for dieticians to try their ‘patented works’ on.
Another person beside him, trying to negotiate for more payment was Kayne. The arrogant mercenary was obviously competent in mathematics, even though all other forms of intelligence, and morality had eluded him.
Two bodyguards had their assault rifles out in an alert stance, scanning the room for enemies who could have infiltrated the base. They looked well-trained, but nothing would give her a clue to how they’d act against a real person, obviously they had never been against real people before. They looked too tense, too nervous.
Beside them was a medic. She carried a small pistol and a datapad. She was obviously talking to Roberto Tomicieli, High Command of the UN, as he’d turned around by now to talk to her. She motioned him towards Carys’ glass chamber and opened it.
“… and this, sir, is what bait we have. We assume the targets have emotional ties with her.”
“Good, good.”
Suddenly, her vision went hazy as she slowly dipped in and out of focus. Everything went black, but before it did High Command walked over to her. “Ah, Carys Perry, you are now bait. Elaborate bait for an elaborate trap. Your friends will come to rescue you, and when they do, we’ll kill them.”
Assassin's Curse Chap9
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Dragon_Rider
- Posts: 239
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Urashima Keitaro
- Posts: 1247
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Well, I managed to get some written. I also managed to read some books over the holidays. First time in months. Really improved my imagination, and my ability to get creativity down on paper.
Well, you probably won't have to wait as long for ten. I've already got some ideas in the works. Thanks, in part, to ies9662. Thanks Ben.
Well, you probably won't have to wait as long for ten. I've already got some ideas in the works. Thanks, in part, to ies9662. Thanks Ben.
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Urashima Keitaro
- Posts: 1247
- Joined: Thu, 21. Oct 04, 11:25
Unfortunately you may have to, still more coursework to plug through. I'll do what I can but chap10 probably won't be completed for several months. It's a shame, but its what coursework does. Delays everything that you wanted to do, until it's too late to do what you wanted to do.
Still, I'll do what I can when I can. Just don't expect it anytime soon.
Still, I'll do what I can when I can. Just don't expect it anytime soon.
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Urashima Keitaro
- Posts: 1247
- Joined: Thu, 21. Oct 04, 11:25
