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Ian Fleming’s James Bond 007
in
Nightmare Land

By John Lam



Dreamland, USA

The cool corridor amplified the sound of the men’s footsteps, marking each with a noise that approximated a small-caliber gunshot. The thin strips of neon light overhead bathed the whole space and its occupants in a sickly pale, white light. As the men proceeded along the narrow hallway, they were mostly silent. Only the leader, apparently acting as a guide, spoke from time to time, giving the others bits of information that he deemed interesting and relevant about the top-secret military base that they were in.

Bond felt thirsty, and in desperate need of a cigarette. However, their guide, who had introduced himself as Lieutenant Colonel Frank Harris, had made it very clear that no smoking was allowed on the premises. This actually worked out well, Bond reflected, as his inability to smoke made him feel irritated. As a result, instead of being relaxed and lulled into a state of bored complacency by the monotonous voice of the Lieutenant Colonel, Bond found himself unusually on edge, alert to everything around them except the lecture about the base that was being given for his and the other visitors’ benefit.

“Although I’m not at liberty to either confirm or deny any of the rumors regarding the existence of any spaceship, or any other piece of technology of an extraterrestrial origin here in Area 51”, Harris was saying in a tone that made it impossible to tell whether he was joking or not, “I can tell you that this base has served as the test site for some of the most top-secret aircrafts the U.S. Air Force has ever built.”

“Including the Reaper, of course,” the young, tough-looking Brit walking next to Bond chimed in. Adam Jackson, like all former SAS men, moved with the relaxed confidence of someone who could take care of himself in a fight.

“Yes, you’re right,” Harris turned around and addressed Jackson amiably, apparently not minding the interruption. “We have logged over two thousand hours of flight testing of the Reaper at this facility alone. Trust me, gentlemen, when I tell you that all the bugs have been ironed out of this baby. Of course, this machine has also been battle-tested while being flown in hundreds of combat missions over Afghanistan and Iraq. Armed with Hellfire II laser-guided air-to-surface missiles as well as Stinger air-to-air missiles, the Reaper’s offensive and defensive capabilities are unparalleled among all unmanned aerial vehicles. When you buy a Reaper, you’re buying a proven, deadly machine, one of the best that we have in our arsenal.”

“I certainly hope so,” the man standing next to the Lieutenant Colonel replied. “Otherwise, the Queen would be very disappointed.” He smiled at Harris to let him know that he was joking, and the worried look that started to creep across the man’s face disappeared.

Bond looked at the man who’d just spoken. He was another Brit, in his mid-fifties, small in stature, but possessing a distinguished, almost aristocratic look that commanded immediate respect from everyone around him. Trevor Crowe, Assistant Chief of the Air Staff, was the reason that Bond was there at Area 51. Bond’s mission, as spelled out by M in her London office yesterday, was simple: keep Mr. Crowe alive for the next 48 hours.

**************************

Twenty-four hours ago, Bond found himself facing M across her large mahogany desk. He had been summoned rather abruptly to her office by a phone call at 5 A.M., which could only mean one thing: Bond’s current period of inactivity was about to come to an end. That thought alone was enough to put him in good spirit even as he had to get himself tidied up and rush to MI6 Headquarters at that ungodly hour. Bond hated these down times, these weeks, sometimes even months, spent perusing endless, and endlessly boring, piles of intelligence reports from various branch offices around the globe. He had certainly not anticipated, upon joining the Double-O Section, that the majority of his time would be spent “shuffling paper”, Bond’s term for the office work that occupied him in between his stints in the field.

“Take a look at this,” M said while pushing a sheet of paper toward him. Bond picked it up and as his eyes scanned across the couple lines of text typewritten on the paper, he frowned in puzzlement.

“January 5th … Dreamland … Predator B demonstration.
Operation Phoenix … British … Staff … terminate.”

“Where did this come from?” Bond asked.

M fixed her steely gaze on him. When she spoke, he thought he could detect a trace of anxiety in her voice, which was quite unusual.

“One of our men in New York sent this message to us. He has been working with the NSA for some time in trying to infiltrate an international organization dealing in the trafficking of black-market weapons. A couple of days ago, after months of under-cover work, the NSA pulled the trigger and raided the headquarters of this group. Apparently, they went in while a transaction was going down. There was a shootout, resulting in casualties on both sides. One of the bad guys killed was not a local. In fact, the NSA believes that he was a customer who came to pick up his guns. When the shooting started, the guy ran to his car and tried to get away. He was shot at, and his car exploded with him inside. All the NSA could recover afterward from the wreck was a charred body and a badly burnt laptop. Still, our American friends were able to retrieve bits and pieces of data from the damaged hard drive, including this message. They said it was all that they could recover from an email the man had previously sent from his computer.”

“It looks like an order green-lighting some kind of operation,” Bond said. “I guess the Americans sent it to us because the message has the word “British” in it. Was anybody on our side able to make head or tail out of it?”

“As a matter of fact, yes. The reference to the Predator B was the key to this cryptic message. A chap in our Cryptography department used to work in the Royal Air Force. He recognized the name of the Americans’ latest UAV, Unmanned Aerial Vehicle. This machine, code named Predator B and also known as the Reaper, was developed just prior to the start of the war in Afghanistan, and has been used extensively by the USAF in that arena.”

“I see,” Bond’s eyes brightened. Everything just clicked into place like pieces of a puzzle inside his head. “The RAF wants to purchase some Reapers from the Americans, and some big shot in the Air Force is going to attend a demonstration of the UAV.”

“You’re catching on, 007,” M nodded. She pressed a key on the virtual keyboard projected on her desktop, and the photo of a middle-aged man in an RAF uniform came up on the monitor behind her. “The big shot, as you put it, is actually Trevor Crowe, the Assistant Chief of the Air Staff, i.e. the second most powerful man in the RAF. He is going to attend the demonstration given by the U.S. Air Force on January 5th at…”

“Area 51!” Bond exclaimed. “I should have figured that one out before. Dreamland is a lesser known name the Americans use to refer to their famous air base in Nevada, ever since the Area 51 name became too widely used and abused by sci-fi writers and aficionados all over the world.”

M smiled. “Yes, I suppose many people still believe the Americans are hiding some kind of alien spaceship there. It just goes to show how difficult it is to kill a legend once it has been started. Anyway, you have probably figured out by now that the message we intercepted is the proof that some terrorist organization is planning to assassinate Crowe when he gets to Dreamland.”

“Why would they want to take a shot at him there?” Bond was puzzled. “Surely security will be very tight. Crowe will have his bodyguards with him, but before anyone can get close to him, they will have to get into one of the most difficult to infiltrate places in the world.”

“That’s my thought exactly,” M concurred. “Perhaps the people planning this want to make a statement. Just think of the instant credibility they would have among the terrorist circles if they were to succeed. This may be a fledgling organization out to make a name for themselves. On the other hand, the words Operation Phoenix make me think the answer may be something else altogether.”

“Yes … a phoenix … rising out of the ashes. The imagery points to this coup being the work of some organization on the decline or already thought to be extinct trying to announce to the world that they’re back. Somehow, I have a feeling that we’ve already crossed paths with the group behind all this,” Bond observed.

“That’s a distinct possibility. We can’t rule out the chance that this signals the reawakening of SPECTRE, the Union, or perhaps a more likely candidate: Quantum.” M’s face took on a troubled look as she uttered the last name.

“Quantum,” Bond’s voice turned somber as he repeated the name of an enemy he thought he had already vanquished. “I would have thought that they are finished after the debacle in Buenos Aires, where we killed or captured most of their leaders.”

“That was two years ago. Plenty of time for them to regroup. Besides, we never did get the Number 1 man, or woman, the one they call The Elder,” M replied, her tone a little accusatory. She had been quite disappointed when the joint task force made up of the best agents from MI6, including most of the Double O’s, and the CIA, failed to capture the elusive head of Quantum, someone that even high-ranking Quantum members had never met face-to-face.

“Quantum was almost completely destroyed. Whoever he/she is, The Elder must have been harboring a huge grudge against us and the CIA the past couple of years. If the organization has recovered enough to become operational again, it would make sense that one of their first acts would be to strike back at and humiliate those who had almost defeated them.” Even as Bond said this, his anger started to build. He was mad at himself for not having been able to finish the job in Buenos Aires, and at Quantum for their refusal to fade away. He was itching to have another go at this tenacious and deadly adversary, and he knew that M was about to give it to him.

“Crowe will have his usual, hand-picked bodyguard – the one from the SAS - with him on this trip,” the MI6 boss was speaking again. “However, knowing what we do now, I feel that this may not be enough to guarantee his safety. We can’t afford to let Quantum, if indeed it is they who are planning this hit, succeed. First of all, Crowe is a senior leader of the RAF and a friend of the Prime Minister, so we must see to it that no harm will come to him. Secondly, a successful assassination will embolden not only Quantum, but also all the anti-American and anti-British terrorist groups, to attempt even more ambitious strikes against the two nations. Therefore, I want you to go with Crowe to Nevada, and I want you to make damn sure that the man can do his job and get back here in one piece. Now, did I make myself clear?”

“Perfectly,” Bond said as he rose. Walking toward the door of M’s office, he started to feel the familiar tingling of excitement build up inside him once again. It was a feeling he always experienced before a mission, and he welcomed it like an old friend.

As Bond exited M’s office and was passing through the adjacent anteroom, Moneypenny was speaking to M via the intercom: “Yes, M. Nevada. I’ll make the arrangements.”

Seeing Bond walking by, she called out to him from behind her desk:

“Oh James! I heard you’re going to Nevada? There are some lovely shops in Las Vegas. Don’t forget to pick me up something while you’re there, darling!”

Bond walked over and flashed his most charming smile: “But of course, my dear. You know, I think you would look lovely in a sexy swimsuit. I know just the thing for you. The last time I was in Vegas, I had a chance to swing by the Saks store, and they carry a great line of swimwear by Eres. There’s this little white one-piece number that would look perfect on you. I’ll make sure to get it for you so that you may show off MI6’s best-kept secret: your smashing figure.”

“James, you naughty boy!” a blushing Moneypenny said. “That sounds heavenly! While you’re there, could you also get me a navy blue-and-white striped sarong – the semi-transparent kind – to go with the swimsuit. Then, when you get back, I’ll make you take me down to Brighton so that I can properly show it off.”

“Moneypenny, do you think that would be a good idea? You know I won’t be able to keep my hands off of you if I see you in something like that,” Bond teased.

“That’s the whole point, James!” Moneypenny replied mischievously. “I want to see if you’re all talk, or if you can back it up.”

At that point, the intercom crackled to life with the voice of M: “Before you go any further into this shameless fantasy of yours, Miss Moneypenny, I thought I ought to let you know that you’d forgotten to switch off the intercom. Also please tell 007 that if he thinks he can put any such gift on his expense account, he must be dreaming.”

Mortified, Miss Moneypenny mumbled “Sorry, Ma’am” and hastily pressed the intercom’s Off button, while her face turned to an unnatural shade of red that was not without its charm.

As Bond walked out the door, he would have laughed out loud, had he not felt just a bit sorry for M’s poor secretary.

[dsomerset]

Close Encounter of the Deadly Kind

As he walked about ten yards behind Lieutenant Colonel Harris and the British visitors, Andy Pemberton’s mind started to wander. He thought about Kimberly, a blackjack dealer working at the gaming tables of the Luxor Hotel in Las Vegas. After work tonight, the Master Sergeant of the 99th Air Base Wing was supposed to meet up with his girlfriend at the hotel. He was going to take her to dinner, and then to “KÀ”, the Cirque Du Soleil show currently playing at the MGM Grand Hotel, to celebrate the one-year anniversary of the day they’d first met. Afterward, if he was lucky, Pemberton would be spending the rest of the night at Kimberly’s apartment, engaged in celebratory activities of a more intimate nature, which his mind already began to picture in great details.

Suddenly, his reverie was interrupted by the crackling sound of the tiny earpiece in his right ear coming to life. Then, the voice of Jack Markham, Chief of Security for Area 51, came through, tinged with urgency: “Andy, are you there? Can you hear me?”

“Yes, sir,” Pemberton spoke into the microphone he was wearing on the lapel of his uniform. “I hear you. What can I do for you?”

“Andy, be careful! Only answer with a Yes or No, understand? Is Trent there with you?”

Pemberton glanced over at the man walking besides him and then replied in a half-whisper: “Yes.”

“Andy, listen to me! That’s not really Trent Norton. He’s an impostor! You are to disarm him and take him into custody immediately. Use any means necessary. Get back-up if you need to.”

“But, sir…” Pemberton was so shocked that the words came out before he could stop himself.

“Don’t argue with me!” Markham raged. “There’s no time! Trent Norton’s body was found thirty minutes ago by his roommate. He has been stabbed to death. The man posing as Trent must have been the killer. Whatever he’s planning to do, he must not be allowed to carry it out. Do you understand?”

Pemberton finally recovered enough to realize the extreme danger that he was in. He started to turn toward the man next to him, while his right hand dropped to his holstered SIG P250, but he was too late. The fake Trent Norton had already taken a couple of quick steps that brought him to within a few inches of Pemberton’s right side. His hand flashed upward, and Pemberton felt a blinding pain as a long, thin blade was rammed into his body, just below the rib cage. Through a haze of agony, his eyes registered their last vision: another pair of eyes staring back at them. Those eyes were so cold, and yet there was something burning in the back of them, something akin to lust, as they greedily drank in the sight of his life draining out of him. Another thought flashed through his dying brain: Kimberly would be so disappointed at having to miss the Cirque Du Soleil show; she had been looking forward to seeing it for so long.

As Andy Pemberton’s body crumbled to the ground, his killer was already spinning away to deliver a perfectly timed kick to the right arm of the remaining security guard, a Senior Airman. The sound of cracking bone was accompanied by a scream of pain as the Airman had to drop his handgun. The killer gracefully pirouetted again in a perfect ushiro mawashi geri, and the heel of his combat boot made violent contact with the Airman’s temple, sending him flying face first into the wall. The man was knocked out cold on his feet and never felt the impact of the concrete crushing the bones in his face.

The sound of the fight alerted Trevor Crowe’s bodyguard. Adam Jackson turned around just as the assassin was disposing of the second guard. The former SAS man drew out his Walther P99 and took the double-handed stance while the assassin also whipped out his SIG. There came a double roar as both guns discharged at the same time, the sound reverberating from the walls of the tunnel. Jackson missed high and was killed an instant later as the assassin’s bullet pierced his throat. The arterial spray splattered blood all over Trevor Crowe’s handsome face and his salt-and-pepper hair as the Assistant Chief of the Air Staff watched in disbelief.

Bond’s eyes did a lightning-quick scan of the surroundings as his hand un-holstered his own P99. On the wall to his right, at about shoulder height, was a large red button with the word “Emergency” above it. Bond lunged for it, and as his palm slammed down on the button, sirens began to wail and a pair of thick, bulletproof glass doors popped out of the walls and started to glide toward each other, forming a barrier shielding Bond and Crowe from the assassin.

Realizing that he was losing his opportunity to carry out the kill, the killer sprinted forward while firing through the gap between the closing doors. Bond crouched down and shouted to Trevor Crowe: “Get behind me, sir! Quickly!” However, the sound of footsteps behind Bond told him that the ACAS, in his panic, had already started to run away from him down the hall.

The glass doors were closing, but not fast enough. Bond saw that the killer still had time for at least another clean shot at Trevor Crowe’s back, and his instincts and training took over. Firing a quick shot from the Walther, Bond launched himself across the tunnel, placing his body in front of the narrowing gap between the doors. Thus, 007 took the bullet that was destined for Crowe’s spine. Bond expected the tremendous impact that threw him down on his back, but not the bolt of white-hot flame that went through him afterward. He looked down in bewilderment at the hole in his shirt and the bulletproof vest underneath, and saw blood starting to seep through in thin, crimson streams. ”The damn vest failed!” Bond thought groggily. He looked upward and saw the next two bullets crash into the now fully-closed bulletproof glass wall, spawning spider-webs of cracks but not piercing through. Then he saw the assassin throw himself at the unyielding wall, pounding on it with his fists. The man’s face, or at least the face that he had borrowed from the deceased Airman Trent Norton, was contorted in an uncontrollable rage, and as he looked down at Bond, pure hatred shone out of his half-crazed eyes. That twisted, snarling face was the last thing that 007 saw as a warm, bottomless pit of darkness seemed to open up in the floor beneath him and swallowed him whole.


*************************************


“Commander Bond! Can you hear us?”

The voice seemed to come from the water surface down through dozens of meters of murky water to where Bond’s body was drifting along a warm, thick current that enveloped him like a cocoon.

Another voice chimed in, and Bond struggled to catch bits and pieces of what it was saying.

“… bullet missed … vital organs… damn lucky …”

Slowly, Bond’s mind began to recall images of the recent past: the gunfight in a long, narrow corridor, the brutal kick of the bullet as it burned its way through vest and flesh, the assassin towering above him as he was losing consciousness. As more and more memories came back to him, the viscous, salty ocean that had wrapped itself around him now seemed to lose interest in its prey. It released its grip upon him, and Bond found himself languidly, but inexorably, floating up to the surface. His head broke through the plane between water and air and…

Light! Blinding light flooded in as his eyelids fluttered open. He had never seen so much light before. It was like staring into the sun itself.

Thankfully, a gloved hand came into his field of vision and pulled the lamp that was shining down on his face away.

“Glad you’re back with us, Commander,” the owner of the hand said. “How do you feel?”

Bond slowly turned his head toward the source of the voice, and found himself looking up at the face of a man dressed in a white, doctor’s coat with the U.S. Air Force insignia on it.

“Like I’ve been run over by a truck!” Bond replied. His speech was still slurred, as if his brain had not regained full control of his tongue and vocal chords.

“You are very lucky to be alive, Commander Bond!” the doctor said. “The vest malfunctioned, but still deflected the bullet enough that it missed any vital organ. You simply suffered a flesh wound, although you’ve lost a lot of blood.”

“What about the shooter?” Bond asked. “Did they get him?”

“Unfortunately, no. Somehow, he managed to escape. I don’t know how he could have gotten out. Usually, when the emergency alarm sounds, Security will have this place locked down so tight a rattlesnake wouldn’t be able to crawl in from the desert without getting shot to pieces.”

“I need to talk to the man in charge of Security right now,” Bond said as he started to get up from the examination table.

The doctor started to protest: “But Commander, you should rest! You are still weak from the blood loss, and…”

Bond put up his hand to stop him.

“The man who tried to murder Mr. Crowe tonight is a professional, and a very dangerous one,” Bond told the doctor. “It is imperative that we locate him quickly, and either terminate or capture him. Otherwise, I’m certain that he’ll try again, and more people will die. Now, can you tell someone to get the Chief of Security over here?”

The doctor shook his head in disapproval of Bond’s recklessness, but he also turned away with a look of resignation on his face and left the room.

Bond stood up and took a look around the small examination chamber. The only other occupant was an USAF nurse, who had been tending to his wound. Now, she avoided eye contact with him, an intense and rather pushy foreigner, and busied herself with the task of cleaning up at the sink in the corner of the room. To Bond, it seemed a little surreal to watch her matter-of-factly scrubbing off blood from her instruments and gloves, knowing that the blood was his. He felt strange, and uncharacteristically sad, to see the blood swirling down the drain. An unwelcome, maudlin thought crept into his head: after a lifetime of risking life and limb for Queen and Country, what is his legacy? For every Blofeld that he killed, there are several others waiting in the wings for their turn to wreak havoc on the world. If he were to die tomorrow, will future generations have any way of knowing he has ever existed? Or will he simply disappear, his memory swept away by the flow of time like his blood being inexorably flushed down the pipe by a stream of tap water?

As he was thinking all this, the nurse was putting away the surgical instruments and blotting up the excess water around the sink with a paper towel. When she was done, she left the room without saying anything to him.

Left alone, Bond walked up to the mirror above the sink and took inventory of his body. He looked quite pale, probably due to the blood loss and the shock of getting shot. He had been stripped bare to the waist. A large bandage was wrapped around his waist, and there was a crimson oval on his left side where the blood had seeped through to the outer layer of the bandage and dried up. Other than that, he thought he looked rather well for someone who had just taken a bullet less than an hour ago.

The door swung open, and in came the doctor, followed by Jack Markham, a bear of a man in full USAF uniform.

The Chief of Security walked toward Bond with his hand extended.

“I’m Jack Markham, and I’m in charge of security for this base. I really want to thank you for what you’ve done. It takes a lot of guts for a man to do that. Without you, Mr. Crowe would’ve been dead, and we would have a full-scale international problem on our hands right now.”

“Just doing my job,” Bond replied. “Things also got a bit dicier than I’d expected.”

“Ah yes, the vest,” Markham nodded. “Unfortunately, things like that happen a lot out here. These new bulletproof vests, although lighter and less restrictive, tend to have a high failure rate after long periods of heat exposure. I’m really sorry about that.”

“It’s not your fault. Now, tell me what happened after I passed out.”

“We immediately took the ACAS into a secure area, where he remains under the protection of half a dozen security personnel. We also locked down the base. Still, the killer managed to escape. Fifteen minutes ago, we found two dead guards at the North exit. Apparently, the assassin shot the first guard, commandeered a Jeep, ran down the second guard and rammed the gate with it. We have set up road blocks on all surrounding roads and freeways within a twenty-mile radius of the base. I also have several teams with dogs combing the area inside the circle even as we speak.”

Bond was impressed by the speedy and efficient way Jack Markham had handled the situation, but he didn’t say it. Instead, he asked:

“So have you heard anything from any of the checkpoints?”

“Nothing so far. But don’t worry. This area is pretty hard to navigate without using the roads, which we’ve blocked off. I think we’ll get him by tomorrow’s morning.”

“I have a feeling it won’t be as easy as that. This man’s a pro.” Bond reached for his shirt and put it on. “I need to borrow a car.”

“You’re not seriously thinking about going out there?” the doctor asked incredulously.

“I can’t sit here and hope that he will make a mistake, because that’s the only way he’ll get caught. I need to go after him myself.”

“Well, I can’t let you do that. In my opinion…” the doctor started, but Markham waved him off.

“It’s no use, Doctor. I know people like Commander Bond. You won’t be able to stop him. Heck, if I were him, I would do the same thing. Here, Commander,” he handed Bond a key, “you can take my car. It’s the grey ROUSH Mustang Sport parked in front of this building.”

“Thank you,” Bond said. He gave Jack Markham a small nod, a sign of respect from one man of action to another. Then he rushed out of the room, down a ramp, and out into the chilly desert night.

[dsomerset]

La Gamine

Isabelle Devereux cursed out loud as the bottle of Bruce hardwood floor cleaner tumbled out of the top shelf of the cupboard and fell to the floor. The cap had not been tightly screwed on, and now the yellowish liquid spilled out onto the wooden planks, forming a messy puddle right in the middle of the small kitchen. Isabelle’s first thought was to put on a pair of latex gloves before reaching for the towel below the sink. Then, she took a look at her once-beautiful hands and told herself ”Who am I kidding?”. The shape of her hands still remained attractive, small, with long, slender fingers. However, the skin was unhealthily dry and rough, reddish in spots, reflecting all the abuse that she put her hands through everyday trying to single-handedly keep her modest bed & breakfast clean. Constant exposure to hot water and detergents of all kinds was not exactly the recipe for keeping the skin on one’s hands soft and supple. Isabelle sighed and pulled the towel off the rack with her bare hands, then got down on her knees and started to soak up the floor cleaner with the dirty rag.

Life had never been easy for Isabelle. Born of a French father and an American mother, she grew up in one of the poorest neighborhoods of the predominantly blue-collar city of Liggett. The city was a tiny speck on the California map, about 30 miles east of San Simeon, the town on the central coast made famous by Hearst Castle, the former residence of the late newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst. Her father worked in the local Del Monte fruit cannery (Isabelle could still remember those quaint TV ads during her childhood days with the slogan ”The man from Del Monte says Yes…”), and her mother ran a small house-cleaning business.

When she was very young, Isabelle was a thin, awkward girl with saucer-like eyes that always seemed too big for her face, and a painfully shy personality. Her father was a fan of classic movies, and an even bigger fan of the famous actress Audrey Hepburn. One day, while he and Isabelle were watching the Gregory Peck/Audrey Hepburn movie Roman Holiday together, he told her there was something about her that reminded him of his favorite actress, and it was then that he gave her the nickname la gamine, a term some people used to refer to the elfin Hepburn herself.

Even in the slum where they lived, the Devereuxs couldn’t afford a house. They lived in a one-bedroom apartment, on the ground floor of a building where at night, decent people locked themselves up in their apartments, afraid to venture out into the hallways and stairwells, which became the domain of marauding young thugs, prostitutes and drug dealers.

The Devereuxs’ modest home consisted of the single bedroom where the parents slept, a tiny kitchen, and a space that served as both living and dining rooms. That space was also Isabelle’s bedroom, as she spent her nights sleeping on an old sofa-bed her Dad had bought from the local thrift store. The mattress of that tacky, orange-colored monster was so worn, its springs so old and rusty that the thing always gave forth a symphony of squeaks and groans every time Isabelle tossed and turned. She became so used to the noise that later on in life, when she had the chance to sleep on proper beds, with springs that didn’t protest so vociferously as they went about their work, Isabelle frequently had trouble sleeping. When she was about ten years old, one night Isabelle jokingly told her Mom: “Listen maman, the couch is singing to me!” Her mother did seem to get the joke, as she replied with a smile: “Yes cherie, it’s singing a lullaby.” Still, Isabelle could have sworn that she saw a tear appear at the corner of her Mom’s eye. Her mother hastily wiped it away with the back of her hand, though, before Isabelle could ask her why she was crying.

As la gamine became a little bigger, her mother would sometimes ask her to help out with the house-cleaning jobs when the regular assistant, Rosa, was sick or out of town. On these occasions, her mother would only let Isabelle do the sweeping and dusting, while she herself did all the heavy-duty cleaning. She always told Isabelle: “Your hands are so pretty, cherie, I don’t want you handling all these chemicals and detergents!”

One day, mother and daughter were called upon to clean a house in one of the most affluent parts of the city. It was Isabelle’s first glimpse of how the other half lived. She wandered through the hallways paved with gleaming, Brazilian cherry wood, gazed at the beautiful furniture and artwork on the walls, and ran her hand in awe over the vast expanses of granite countertops in the cavernous kitchen. Then she went upstairs, and walked into the bedroom at the top of the stairs, which was apparently the room of the daughter in the household. The bedroom itself was almost as big as the Devereuxs’ apartment, and decorated to be every little girl’s dream. The walls were painted a soft pink color, and one whole wall was taken up by a huge, hand-painted trompe l’oeil that depicted the scene of a stone archway opening onto a lush flower garden filled with blossoming roses, tulips and marigolds. The bed beckoned her to come and yield herself to the embrace of its soft linen sheets and luxurious goose-down comforter, but she resisted, feeling herself unclean, and unworthy of it. On top of the dresser were half a dozen Barbie dolls – the real ones, not the cheap imitations that her Mom used to buy for her from the Dollar Store for ninety-nine cents apiece. In a corner sat a huge, brown teddy bear that was bigger than Isabelle herself. She couldn’t even imagine how much such a beautiful thing would cost! It was then that Isabelle promised herself that one day, she would buy a house like this for her and her parents to live in, no matter how hard she would have to work to be able to afford it.

As Isabelle became older, she blossomed into a beautiful young woman. By the time she became a sophomore in high school, her body, previously thin and flat like a young boy’s, started to develop curves that she’d thought she would never have. Her tomboyish face softened into a more feminine and alluring visage, while her huge, startling green eyes remained her most attractive and distinguishing feature. Boys who had never given her a second glance started to pay attention. However, most of them were kept at bay by her protective father, a large and intimidating figure. The few “cool” boys that she brought home were summarily rejected by her Dad. He would always scare them away by peppering them with questions about their grades in school, where they were taking her on their dates, and if they were thinking about trying any “funny business” with his only daughter. Afterward, he would sit her down, look her in the eyes and say: “I did that for your own good, Isabelle. I know how those boys think. Once upon a time, I was one of them. I was the bad apple that messed up your mother’s life. She was a good kid and a good student. She could’ve gone to college, had she not gone out with me. Then she got pregnant with you and had to drop out of high school. Look, we never regretted having you. We thank the Lord every day of our lives for giving you to us. Still, I sometimes feel that if I had not come into your Mom’s life, she could have gone on to bigger and better things, and her life would not be as hard as it is now. Your Mom and I don’t want you to make the same mistake that we made.”

The only boy that her Dad gave his blessings to was a member of Isabelle’s study group, a shy, serious boy who was, she believed, even more nervous than she was during the few times that they went out together. His name was Henry Ackerman, and now looking back on those awkward teenage days, Isabelle believed the reason her Dad had no problem with Henry taking her out was because he was sure the poor guy would not try anything on their dates. In fact, she still clearly remembered the time they went to the local cinema to catch one of those teenage slasher flicks that were all the rage during the early 90’s. The theater was filled with other couples, and all through the movie, the girls would pretend to be scared so that their dates would have to put their arms protectively around them. Then one thing would lead to another, and soon enough, most of the audience would be too busy making out to pay attention to the psychopath slaughtering their movie counterparts on the big screen. Meanwhile, Henry treated the armrest between him and Isabelle like some kind of Demilitarized Zone between two hostile countries, a no-man’s-land never meant to be crossed. He sat staring straight ahead, probably scared out of his mind that at some point, Isabelle would ask him to do some of the things that the other boys were doing with their girlfriends. After a few such disastrous outings, she broke up with him, much to the chagrin of her father.

One silver lining of not having a serious romantic liaison during high school was that Isabelle did not get distracted too much from her studies. As a result, she was one of the star students of East Valley High, and her grades and SAT scores were good enough that when the time came for Isabelle to apply to the universities, she got a grant to attend the University of California at Santa Barbara. Her parents were of course very proud, but also worried because for the first time in her life, she would have to live far away from home. Isabelle did her best to reassure them that she would be all right staying in an apartment that she shared with another girl from the same high school, and promised that she would come back to visit them every weekend and during the holidays.

She did start her freshman year at UC Santa Barbara with the best intentions, fully focused on maintaining her excellent academic record. However, as was the case with many sheltered young women who finally got a taste of freedom from parental supervision, Isabelle soon succumbed to the usual temptations of collegiate life. It all started when her roommate talked her into attending one of the parties being thrown by some of the more popular girls in her class. At first, Isabelle felt a little out of place since she did not know many of the people of the “in” crowd, so she kept to herself, standing in a corner of the room instead of mingling with the others. Ironically, that was how she caught the eye of Frank Haugen.

Frank was a ladies’ man. He looked tough in a James Dean-sort of way, played the guitar, knew how to dance (proper ballroom dances too, not just the rock’n’roll stuff), and did not do very well in school (in fact, he hardly bothered to do the mundane stuff like attending lectures and doing homework). He knew a little bit about romantic poetry, having dated a girl who was an English Lit major, and could recite a few lines off the top of his head at the right moment when he wanted to impress. He drove a 1982 Pontiac Trans Am with modified exhaust pipes whose rumble was so loud they could scare the living daylights out of the neighborhood pets from a few blocks away. In short, to a naïve young woman like Isabelle, Frank Haugen was the epitome of cool.

For his part, Frank’s interest was immediately piqued by the shy, young beauty standing by herself in the corner of the room filled with rowdy, drunken partygoers. She was so different from the other girls in the room, and from all the girls Frank has ever known. She wore almost no make-up, and seemed totally unaware of how beautiful she looked, with her dark, almost black, hair perfectly complementing her white, porcelain skin, and her large green eyes giving him an innocent look that he found so seductive. He walked over to her and made some lame joke about the party. Much to his surprise, she laughed, and that broke the ice. He felt bold enough now to switch on the patented Haugen charm, which she seemed to be susceptible to. By the end of the night, he was able to achieve that first, all-important milestone: getting her phone number.

He called her a couple of nights later, and while playing it really cool, asked for a date. He had half expected her to turn him down, and was quite pleasantly surprised and excited when she said yes. They went to see Casablanca in a local theater that just happened to be running a Humphrey Bogart festival, playing seven Bogie movies in a week. The festival was purely a coincidence, but it worked out well for Frank. It gave him a chance to score big points with Isabelle, who had inherited a love for classic movies from her father.

The young couple quickly became inseparable. Isabelle fell in love, and what her father feared the most happened. She started to neglect her studies, and spent all her time with Frank. Her grades took a nose-dive, and she was so afraid of disappointing her parents that she started to lie to them, always telling them she was doing as well now in her classes as she had ever done in high school.

About six months into their courtship, Frank popped the big question. He asked Isabelle to marry him, to give up her studies and move with him to Nevada, where he came from. He told her that his father owned a beautiful bed & breakfast in the Nevada desert near Las Vegas, which would now become his as his father was retiring. “Forget school, babe,” Frank said forcefully. “You won’t need a degree, ‘cause you won’t need a job. That B&B is a gold mine. People on their way to Vegas stop by there. And of course, there are the nut jobs who come from all over the country to Nevada to catch a glimpse of the famous Area 51, hoping to see UFOs, aliens and sh!t like that. They need a place to stay too, you see. So you just help me run this B&B, and we’ll soon be making more money than we know what to do with.”

Isabelle thought about Frank’s idea, and she had to admit that the notion of being an innkeeper out in the middle of the desert was kind of romantic. Nobody would expect her to do something like that, and that was precisely why she wanted to do it. She wanted to feel like a maverick, a pioneer. Besides, she was madly in love with Frank at that point. She suspected that if he’d asked her to move with him to Vegas and work as a stripper in one of Sin City’s seedier clubs, she would’ve still said yes. So she gave Frank the answer he’d wanted to hear, and a month later, without first consulting with her parents, Isabelle dropped out of school and moved with Frank to Nevada.

The B&B was called the Sandy Hollow Inn, and it wasn't nearly as grand as Frank had made it out to be. It was an old house, built around the 1930’s, and had been renovated only once in the 70’s. The house had five bedrooms, four of which were made into guest rooms. The bedroom downstairs was where the innkeeper and his wife would live. Frank’s parents had lived there for almost ten years, and now that his father had decided it was time for him and Frank’s mother to move to a condo in Florida for their retirement, the Sandy Hollow was his to either sell or take over himself. The real estate market in Nevada had softened considerably in the past year, so Frank decided to move into the old building and try his hand at running a B&B, until the market had turned around and he could sell it for a decent profit.

The rooms in the house were quite small and poorly furnished, but in the ad that Frank ran in the local newspaper, they were described as “cozy and rustic”. The house itself was located in a desolate part of the desert, with no neighbor within a mile. It could be reached only via a two-lane road that branched off Dry Creek Road, a barely noticeable exit of the Extraterrestrial Highway (otherwise known as the Nevada State Route 375). All the rooms featured virtually identical views of vast, monotonous expanses of flat, parched desert land (“romantic vistas of awe-inspiring Southwestern landscape”, according to the ad).

As Frank and Isabelle soon found out, business was not very good at their inn. The poor location was mainly to blame. The inn was never completely filled; in fact, most of the times, two or more of the guest rooms would stay vacant. It became quite clear that they needed a second source of income in order to make a decent living. That was when Frank hooked up with a colorful character named Jonas Hucksley. Mr. Hucksley had lived in Vegas all his life, and had been, at one point or another, a card shark, a pimp, and a drug dealer. In his latest incarnation, Mr. Hucksley had gone semi-legit: he now called himself the “Vegas King”, and operated a small business that was in essence a glorified concierge. He catered to the high rollers who came to Vegas with plenty of disposable income to burn and needed someone to show them how best to burn it. Vegas King or his associates would provide these clients with whatever their hearts desired, whether it was front-row seats at a boxing world title fight at the Mandalay Bay or MGM Grand hotels, or a reserved table at the exclusive Playboy Club in the Palms Resort. They could even hook their clients up with the best, and most expensive, call girls Vegas had to offer. ”We will make your Sin City dream come true” was the slogan of their business.

Frank fit into the new organization perfectly. He was young, looked presentable, and could talk well. He already knew Vegas like the back of his hand, and had a lot of connections. Therefore, he quickly became Vegas King’s right-hand man, the one who was entrusted with the most important, high-profile clients. Soon after he started working for Vegas King, Frank began to spend more and more time away from the inn, taking clients around the city and entertaining them. In his new job, he could meet and hang around with the rich and famous. His clients included rock bands, movie stars, and professional athletes. Just by being seen with them, he felt that he was able to share in their aura of fame and wealth, and he loved it.

At first, Isabelle didn’t mind that her husband was spending much of his time away from home. He was leaving the task of running the inn up to her and her helper, a pleasant young Mexican woman named Esperanza, and only helped out by doing the weekly grocery shopping or fixing things that broke down around the house. Isabelle learned to handle the solitude and extra workload, while taking comfort in the fact that money was no longer a pressing concern like it had been before. They could now afford to live a good life (although not a life of luxury by any stretch of the imagination), pay Esperanza a decent wage on a regular basis, and still save a little money every month. Hopefully, if things kept going this way for a few years, Isabelle believed she would finally be able to buy the big, beautiful house she had dreamed of since her childhood. Then she would invite her parents to leave their dingy apartment and come live with her and Frank in her new house. At least, that was her plan, until Fate interfered and wrecked everything.

One night, over dinner, Frank gave her the shock of her life. He told her he was leaving her for another woman, a waitress named Kathlyn who worked at the Playboy Club. Apparently, he had met her while bringing a movie star client to the club. One look at the voluptuous blonde waitress dressed in the black, skin-tight, $2000 Cavalli bunny suit with the fluffy white tail, and the black fishnet stockings and black stiletto high-heels, was enough to make Frank Haugen fall head-over-heels in lust. He started having an affair with her soon afterward, and they had been secretly seeing each other for the past five months.

“So what can she possibly offer you that I can’t?” Isabelle wanted to know, as she started to break down and cry.

“Well, babe, she’s not as beautiful as you are, that’s for sure,” Frank said while keeping his eyes on his plate, too ashamed to look at her. “But Kathlyn, she has this … look about her, you know, this wild look that drives a man crazy. I just can’t help myself. Whenever I see her, I just feel like I must have her. And …”, he stopped himself.

“And what? You might as well tell me everything now. Don’t hold back,” Isabelle said. Her heart was already broken. What else could he possibly tell her that would make things any worse?

Frank stood up and walked away from the table. He went to the window and stared outside so he wouldn’t have to face her as he gave her the news.

“Kathlyn’s pregnant,” he finally announced after taking a few deep breaths to steady himself. “She just told me last week. And babe, you know how I’ve always wanted to have a kid. We even talked about it recently, you and I. We’ve been trying, but it didn’t work out for us. And now that Kathlyn is going to bear my baby, I can’t leave her.”

Frank might have said some other things after that, but Isabelle no longer heard him. She’d thought nothing could hurt her more than being told by her husband that he desired another woman more than her. However, the pain of her wounded pride was nothing compared to the pain of hearing him say he was leaving her because the other woman could give him the one thing she couldn’t: a baby. She felt hurt, betrayed, victimized, and yet guilty, ashamed and inadequate, all at the same time. She thought it was a miracle she didn’t pass out from the storm of conflicting emotions ravaging her.

“Babe, are you all right?” Frank was kneeling besides her and awkwardly touching her shoulder. She hadn’t been aware that he had come back to the table. Something on her face must have worried him enough to make him come to her aid. Isabelle pushed his hand away rather roughly. She couldn’t stand to be touched by him at that point. Grabbing the back of the chair for support, she weakly stood up. Then, she turned away from him, dragged herself to the bedroom, and locked herself up in the room. As soon as she had locked the door, Isabelle dropped to the floor and cried until she thought no more tears could possibly come, and then she cried some more.

Edited by dsomerset, 23 December 2008 - 06:31 AM.

[dsomerset]

Frank filed for divorce soon after that. He moved out of the Sandy Hollow, and into Kathlyn’s apartment in downtown Vegas. Feeling some pity for Isabelle, who had no family or friend nearby to turn to, and really no other way to support herself, he let her stay in the inn. By the law of community property, half of the Sandy Hollow was his, but he was willing to let Isabelle have sole possession of the house for a year before she would have to sell it and split the profits, if any, with him. Of course, she would have to pay for the mortgage, the utilities and any other cost for maintaining the inn herself during that year. Still, that arrangement gave Isabelle some time to get back on her feet and find another place to live, and she was grateful to her ex-husband for that small bit of kindness.

Isabelle soon found out, though, that she couldn’t quite make ends meet with only the meager income generated by running the Sandy Hollow. She had to start looking for any way possible to cut costs, so it was with much regret that she had to let Esperanza go. The young maid was the only one that supported her through the ordeal of the divorce, and she was a hard worker, but Isabelle could no longer afford to pay her. Esperanza volunteered to stay on and work for only room and board, but Isabelle knew that there were several housekeeping jobs with good pay open to the young woman, and refused to take advantage of Esperanza’s good heart by accepting her offer. So a couple of months after seeing Frank go, Isabelle said good-bye to the only companion she had left as she watched Esperanza walk out the door.

Without any help, operating the inn proved to be quite challenging to Isabelle. Every single day, she had to put on many different hats to keep her business running. She had to be the cook, cleaner, hostess, accountant, and even handyman (handyperson, she corrected herself). With no money to pay for professional plumbers (who charged seventy-five dollars just for coming out to the secluded inn and before doing any actual work), when the pipes leaked, Isabelle had to learn to crawl under the musty sink and fix the problem herself.

She also learned to be more organized. Having a fine-tuned routine was the only way that she could get by. Most guests came during the period of Friday night to Sunday night, so on the weekends, Isabelle was busy cooking, cleaning the rooms, and entertaining. All the maintenance work for the inn had to be taken care of during the weekdays. So Mondays became days to work on the budget, and Tuesdays were the house-cleaning days. Most reservations came in on Wednesdays and Thursdays, so by the end of Thursday, she usually had a pretty good idea about how much supplies she would need to prepare meals for the guests. Thursday nights were when she compiled her shopping lists, and Friday mornings were the times that she would drive her battered Subaru station wagon thirty miles down to Las Vegas to buy all that she would need for the inn for the coming week.

Life became like a solitary, never-ending drive down a monotonous highway, marked by the familiar (her weekly chats with Pam, the plump, good-natured cashier at the Save-Mart where Isabelle shopped for groceries), and the not-so-familiar (her meetings and conversations with the guests who stayed at the inn, some of whom were quite interesting characters). It was a lonely road, but after traveling on it for a while, Isabelle came to find that it had a comforting rhythm all its own. However, just as it had done to her before, Fate threw another chicane into Isabelle’s life just when she thought the path ahead was a straight and smooth highway.

A Little Piece of God

The wind howling across the barren Nevada desert tonight reminded the assassin of the gusts that he had once witnessed sweeping through the plains of Africa during the sandstorm season. Of course, the intensity of this wind was much less, but it still acted as a reminder of the awesome power of nature, a hostess constantly abused and underestimated by her tenants – mankind – until the moments that she decided to show them who was the true mistress of the house.

Hassan was sitting on the narrow bed and polishing a wicked-looking thin blade that was significantly longer than a typical knife. With a fluid motion, his hand moved the damp cloth across the entire length of the blade, then reversed direction and repeated the action again. He did this over and over, until the metal surface gleamed like a mirror, and he could actually see the reflection of his face on the blade, illuminated by the pale moonlight shining in through the window next to the bed.

The window gave him a commanding view of the parking lot, which was mostly empty except for an old Subaru Outback and a big, late-model Fleetwood RV. The garish Sandy Hollow sign standing in one corner cast a red pall over the cracked concrete, making the rectangular lot appear like a swimming pool filled with blood.

As Hassan polished his weapon, his mind kept replaying the scene that took place in Dreamland. The memories stirred up the embers of a dormant fire of anger inside him, and threatened to fan them up into a flame. He had to force himself to stop thinking about that failure and take a few calming deep breaths. It would not do to allow one of his almost uncontrollable fits of rage to come on, especially when he could not use its power to his advantage, as he had done so many times in the past.

He had not suffered the humbling taste of failure for so long that he almost forgot what it was like. All the hits that he attempted in the last fifteen years or so had been successful. In fact, he had only failed twice, and both times had come during the first year of his becoming a killer for hire.

Before that, he had been a professional kickboxer. His name was also not Hassan then. However, he had come to like this name that his Master, the one known as The Elder, had given him so much that he no longer thought of himself by his true name. It was as if the person that he was prior to becoming Quantum’s killer had died a long time ago.

In Hassan’s former life, he paid his dues fighting for chump change in local K1 circuits, and other mixed martial arts promotions. Technically, he was always very solid, and his strength and endurance were almost superhuman. However, he had an Achilles’ heel that prevented him from ever achieving greatness as a fighter, and that was a sadistic desire to hurt his opponents. That desire always led him to become overly aggressive in fights, and those who knew how to use that to their advantage were the ones who invariably gave him the most trouble. Still, he had never been beaten because whenever he felt his adversary gaining the upper hand, his competitive fire turned into rage, and he started to resort to dirty tactics that enabled him to turn the tide and very often inflict career-threatening damage on his opponents. Those questionable tactics did get him disqualified on multiple occasions, and even worse, he started getting a reputation as one of the dirtiest fighters around. Soon enough, all the reputable promotions wanted nothing to do with him, and up-and-coming fighters who wanted to protect their careers avoided him like the plague.

Hassan came to realize that he had become an outcast within the kickboxing community, and it was time for him to look for another career. The problem was besides fighting, he had virtually no other skill to speak of. So he had to turn to something that he had previously considered beneath him: fighting in underground, no-holds-barred, tough-guy contests. Ironically, he quickly found out that this form of combat, with no rules and regulations, fit him like a glove. Now, instead of being punished for his sadistic impulses during fights, he was applauded and even rewarded for them. Like an unchained beast, he became invincible, and left his mark on numerous battered and broken adversaries.

It was during one of these underground bouts that he was first noticed by Gunther Mueller, the German CEO of a highly successful advertising firm, who also happened to be Number 6 in Quantum’s chain of command. Mueller always had a taste for blood sports. Finding the mainstream boxing or martial arts matches too tame, he sought out the most brutal underground fight clubs to satisfy his voyeuristic needs to watch human beings beat each other to a pulp.

It just so happened that on the night Mueller first saw Hassan fight, the German was also looking for a replacement for his top enforcer, who had been killed recently while carrying out a hit that he had ordered. As usual, Hassan disposed of his opponent by a crowd-pleasing, bloody knock-out. In the process, his athleticism and perhaps more importantly, his mean streak, really impressed Mueller. He learned from the club owner where Hassan lived, and a couple of days after the fight, sent his bodyguard out in a shiny black Mercedes S550 to pick the fighter up.

Hassan found neither the luxury automobile nor the messenger, a thug clad in Armani, particularly impressive. However, he did find the thick wad of cash, his to keep just for agreeing to come and talk to Mueller, enticing enough that he got into the Mercedes to go hear the German’s offer.

The deal that Mueller offered him was indeed attractive: a base salary equal to the highest amount he had made in any one year from fighting, plus a generous bonus for every hit that he would perform. If he were to believe what the German told him, in a typical year, he would be making three to four times what he had made in his most successful year as a fighter. Besides, Hassan figured that by working as Mueller’s enforcer/hit man, he would learn a whole new set of skills that would make him very marketable if he ever decided to become a free-lance assassin later on. Without any hesitation, he accepted the new job offer.

“Excellent!” Gunther Mueller beamed. “Now, I know that you are a formidable fighter. However, to be my top enforcer, you would need to be much more than that. Come, let me take you to see a very special man. He used to be one of the best hit men in the world. Since his retirement, he has been working for me, training my enforcers and bodyguards. He’ll whip you into shape in no time.”

Hassan felt a bit insulted at this last comment. No one had ever accused him of being “out of shape”. He wondered what this man that he was about to meet could possibly teach him.

Mueller and his bodyguard took Hassan to a small, anonymous building in a tough neighborhood inside Harlem. Although there was no sign above the entrance advertising it as such, the inside of the building looked like a gym, with the usual training paraphernalia (weights, punching bags, pictures of famous boxers and kickboxers on the walls, etc.) and a square ring for sparring in the middle of the warehouse-like space.

A man was shadow-boxing in the center of the ring. Although Hassan had faced many tough customers in his time, he was still impressed by this man’s appearance. Hassan himself was solidly built, standing 6’1’’ tall and weighing 190 pounds, but the other man towered above him by at least 5 inches, and probably outweighed him by more than 30 pounds. All that extra weight also looked to be muscle, not fat. The man’s face was that of someone who had been through many wars inside the ring and out, with a nose that had obviously been broken before, and a lot of scar tissue around the eyes. His head was clean-shaven, and the only facial hair that he sported was a blond goatee. The man was shirtless, and Hassan could see that a large, very detailed tattoo of the Grim Reaper took up most of his back, while barbed wire tattoos encircled his huge biceps. Perhaps I could learn a thing or two from this monster, Hassan thought.

The only other person in the room was a small, wiry Oriental man who was busy putting some weights back on the racks in the corner of the gym. Hassan looked at him once when the group entered the building, and never paid the man, probably a janitor, any further attention.

“Hey Sakura!” Mueller yelled. “I have a new rookie for you to train. Come and say hello to him.”

Much to Hassan’s surprise, instead of the shadow-boxing Goliath, it was the “janitor” who walked over. He stopped a few steps away from the visitors, and began to look Hassan over without much interest, or any other emotion, on his face.

Sakura looked to be in his mid-fifties, but since most Orientals tend to look younger than their age, he was probably much older than that. He did not seem to pose any physical threat at all, being quite skinny (like a dried-up old twig that he could break in half with his own hands, Hassan reckoned). Unlike Goliath, Sakura’s face was unmarked, bearing no tell-tale sign that he had ever been in any fight.

“So, you are the guy that the boss has been talking about”, Sakura finally spoke in surprisingly good English, without any detectable accent. “It seems you are quite a fighter. Come, let me see you go up against Rock.”

“Rock?” Hassan asked, although he already knew the answer.

“Yes. Rock”, Sakura repeated, while pointing toward Goliath.

Somehow I knew this was going to happen, Hassan thought. With a sigh of resignation, he went and put on the gloves, then climbed inside the ring.

Rock eyed him with the look of a cat appraising the mouse that was going to be its dinner. Then, the two men assumed the standard boxer’s stance, and started circling the ring, with Hassan on the outside, and Rock on the inside looking to cut the ring off.

Without any forewarning, Hassan stepped in and delivered a lightning-fast one-two combination. His left jab was blocked, but the following right hand got through Rock’s defense and landed solidly on the big man’s jaw. Hassan finished off the combination with one of his favorite weapons – a low leg kick – by driving his right shin into the outside of his opponent’s left thigh. He felt like he’d just kicked a tree trunk, and his shin seemed to get the worse of it. To his surprise, getting hit by two solid blows didn’t seem to faze Rock one bit. He grinned tauntingly, as if saying that he didn’t feel any power at all in Hassan’s shots. Then, the giant retaliated, throwing a big overhand right with murderous intent. Hassan had kept his hands up, and blocked most of the strike with his glove. Still, he got hit a glancing blow on the back of his head, and that was enough to send him staggering to one side, while multi-colored stars seemed to dance along the back of his eyes. Rock’s grin widened, and he raised his huge fist and looked toward Sakura as if to celebrate. Upon seeing this, Hassan lost all control of his temper. He no longer cared about his safety or anything else except to hurt the man who had humiliated him. He fought his way in close to Rock with a couple of jabs, then when he got inside the other man’s defense, launched a vicious uppercut. However, instead of aiming for Rock’s chin, he aimed for his trachea, a forbidden zone. Rock’s eyes bulged as Hassan’s fist slammed into his windpipe, and it was his turn to stagger backward. Hassan then jumped up and drove his right knee into the giant’s jaw, and took great satisfaction in hearing it break. Rock spun once, then toppled face-first to the canvas, where he lay immobile. Hassan stood above his fallen foe, his eyes still ablaze, as if daring Rock to get up so he could administer some more punishment.

After a moment of silence, Mueller started clapping in admiration of his new enforcer’s brutal efficiency. Sakura, though, remained unimpressed.

“You won by an illegal strike”, he observed. “There is no honor in that.”

“I won, didn’t I?” Hassan countered. “Honor is in the winning. Besides, we were not fighting in a tournament. There were no rules.”

“When you are a man of honor, there are always rules. Now, let’s talk about your fighting. There is too much anger in it. You fight to impose your will on your opponent and to hurt him. Those are not good reasons for fighting. You should know the ultimate goal of any martial art is to conquer the enemy inside oneself, and not the enemies outside.”

What kind of gook mumbo-jumbo is that? What is the “enemy inside oneself”? Hassan was furious. He had just defied the odds and defeated someone who was much bigger and stronger than himself, and instead of being praised for it, he was getting a lecture on honor and the meaning of martial arts from an old man that he could probably kill with one punch.

“Enough of this Jap bullsh!t!” he spat out. “If you have something to teach me, then teach me. Don’t throw these fortune-cookie sayings in my face!”

Sakura looked at him in silence, then looked toward Mueller as if to say why did you put this burden on me. Then he turned toward Hassan again and shrugged: “Well, I guess there are lessons that you are ready for, and those that you are not. There is no point in trying to teach you the latter at this time. Very well, follow me. Let’s begin with the more practical things, shall we?”

He led Hassan toward the back of the gym, through a narrow, unmarked door, and down a flight of wooden stairs to what had been the basement of the house. However, as Sakura flipped a light switch on, Hassan saw that the space had been transformed into a sparsely but expensively furnished living area. The décor was an interesting and surprisingly harmonious mix of modern Western ideas and traditional Japanese themes. In the middle of the room, a leather sofa by Poltrona Frau and a couple of futuristic-looking chairs by Emanuela Bosio surrounded a granite cocktail table by Brueton. On the walls hung several framed works by the Japanese photographer Satoshi. One entire wall was taken up by a huge bookcase displaying an impressive-looking collection of antique books. At the opposite end of the room, a beautiful 18th-century Japanese Shoji screen separated the sleeping quarters from the main living room.

“You live here? It’s nice,” Hassan observed.

“Yes, this is my humble home,” Sakura acknowledged. “I’m at an age where I find it quite convenient to live where I work. I do enjoy the commute this way.”

He walked over to the bookcase and pushed in one volume in a row of seemingly identical books. There was a sharp click, followed by the whirring sound of machinery turning, and the whole bookcase slid to one side, revealing a hidden closet where the most eclectic collection of weapons Hassan had ever seen was held. The assassin approached the collection in awe, his eyes slowly moving from one beautiful weapon to the next. On the left were the more conventional weapons: pistols, revolvers, rifles, and machine guns. Moving toward the right, he saw that the weapons became more esoteric. There were some nasty-looking swords and knives, and then some things that he did not recognize at all: a small tube made of bamboo, a set of simple metal disks, and a curious device that looked like a round metal gourd with a short spout at one end and a couple of curved levers at the other.

Sakura noticed that Hassan’s eyes were fixed on this strange contraption. He gave a short laugh:

“You seem to like this gun. It’s a Minneapolis palm pistol. Its nickname is the “Protector”. It’s designed for close-range work. You see, it can be very easily concealed. The user can hold it in his closed fist, with the short barrel barely protruding between the first and second fingers. The round body of the weapon is actually a circular magazine housing ten .32 cartridges. One would load and fire the gun by clenching one’s fist and pressing down on the levers.”

“Very ingenious,” Hassan said in admiration. As he turned away from the closet, his eyes were drawn to one of the machine guns on display. It was a slender gun, about 45 inches in length, with a wooden butt-and-pistol grip combination, and a telescopic sight. However, what was remarkable about this gun was something attached to the front of it: a wicked, 10-inch-long blade with a curved handle.

Again, Sakura stepped in with an explanation: “This is a Type 96 Japanese light machine gun, used extensively in the Second World War. The gun was relatively reliable, and didn’t overheat too much. It’s also fitted with a standard infantry bayonet. When the weapon runs out of bullets, the gunner is expected to pick it up and charge the enemies with it, hence the bayonet. That would be a purely suicidal attack, of course, since the weapon is too heavy and unwieldy to be used as a thrusting weapon. However, such a death would be, shall we say, an honorable one.”

Hassan ran his hand lightly over the evil-looking blade. He didn’t care much for the philosophy behind coupling a bayonet with a machine gun, but the blade itself appealed to him greatly. Like him, it was simple, sleek, and deadly. For Hassan, that moment was the only time in his life he experienced something close to love at first sight.

“So, which weapon do you want to master?” Sakura addressed him from behind.

Hassan turned toward the Japanese and replied: “All of them.”


***************************************************************************



Under Sakura’s tutelage, Hassan became the best hit man Mueller had ever employed. Over the next twelve years, he served the German exceptionally well. A ruthless and ambitious man like Mueller was always looking to expand his domain of power, and he didn’t mind creating many bitter enemies in the process. Still, that meant there was always plenty of work for someone like Hassan. Sometimes, the German would order him to carry out a hit as an intimidation tactic, to scare someone into giving up his “territory” within the ubiquitous umbrella that was Quantum. At other times, he would order Hassan to kill people as a pre-emptive strike, before they could mobilize their forces against him. With every successful assassination, Hassan’s fortune, and his legend within Quantum, grew. Soon, his exploits became known to all the Quantum leaders, including The Elder.

Then came that fateful day two years ago. Hassan did not accompany his master to Buenos Aires, so he was able to avoid the massacre. He received the news a day after the event itself, as he learned that Gunther Mueller had been among the Quantum bigwigs gunned down by the CIA-MI6 joint task force. Many other Quantum leaders were captured. The few who were left went underground. Within a very short period of time, the empire that was Quantum crumbled to the ground, and Hassan suddenly found himself becoming a ronin, a samurai without a master.

The next few months were difficult for him. The inactivity, lack of purpose, and most of all, lack of opportunity to kill, really drove him crazy. He didn’t realize he had become so addicted to murder. For him, killing another human being had become the ultimate power trip. By taking another life, he felt that for a moment, he possessed a little piece of God, the one who could give life or take it away. That feeling of power was, to him, more pleasurable and intoxicating than anything that he had experienced via sex, drugs, or anything else for that matter. Now he could no longer indulge his greatest appetite, and the pain of withdrawal was almost unbearable.

Thanks to Sakura’s training, Hassan knew many ways to kill, but his preferred method was to use the bayonet he had first seen attached to the machine gun in his Japanese mentor’s collection. Sakura had given it to him upon his “graduation” from his personal training course. Now, Hassan feared that the blade would never taste human blood again. Then, just as his craving started to turn into some sort of psychosis, he was rescued by a phone call from a most unexpected source: The Elder.

Edited by dsomerset, 02 January 2009 - 06:28 PM.

[dsomerset]

“Do you recognize my voice?”

“Yes,” Hassan answered. How could he not? Whoever programmed that voice changer that the Quantum leader always used had done a masterful job in creating an unmistakable, and strangely unnerving, voice. It was a barely audible whisper that somehow still carried a great deal of authority, commanding the utmost attention from every listener. The voice was a deep male bass, but since it was synthesized, it could have belonged to a man or a woman. However, the most memorable aspect of this voice – whether a natural characteristic or the product of some technological wizardry – was that it sounded so ancient, like the sound of the wind blowing through the ruins of some antediluvian temple. It was as if the owner of that voice had seen everything, done everything, and that vast well of experience had imbued him or her with superhuman knowledge and power.

“Good. I have a business proposition for you. Get ready. Someone will come by in half an hour to pick you up.”

Hassan was quite excited. Within the ranks of Quantum, only the twelve members of the Inner Council had ever been granted private meetings with The Elder. He knew that he had been given this opportunity only because of the recent misfortunes that had fallen upon this once-mighty organization, but still, he felt that he had been granted a great honor.

Neither the driver of the Porsche Cayenne Turbo that picked him up, nor the intense-looking man (who reminded him of a coiled spring) keeping him company in the backseat during the drive, said anything to him. They brought him to a car manufacturing plant that was one of the many legitimate business fronts for Quantum. He was led to a chamber marked “Delivery Area”. This was where new owners would be brought in to take delivery of their shiny purchases. The floor was covered with black marble tiles polished to a mirror-like shine. On the ceiling, there were track lights that concentrated their beams on the area at the center of the chamber. This was where an automobile, just rolling off the assembly line, would normally be parked, waiting for its new master. Now there was a table and a chair positioned where the beams met, and as they entered the room, the mercenary who’d come to fetch him nodded toward the chair and told him: “Sit down!” Hassan looked at him long and hard, then slowly walked over to the chair and sat down, while making it clear with his body language that he did it because it pleased him to do so, and not because he was following any order. The merc smiled, then left the room.

A couple of minutes passed. Hassan felt as though he was being observed, although he could see no camera or one-way mirror anywhere. Then, that unmistakable voice came, streaming out of hidden speakers in the walls and ceiling. It seemed to come at him from all directions at once.

“Contrary to what you may have heard, Quantum is not extinct. Think of it as a wounded soldier left for dead on the battlefield. He will, in time, rise up once more to take revenge on those who had inflicted these pains upon him. However, there’s a little problem. You see, even though the soldier is still alive, some pesky vultures have descended upon him. They’ve started pecking away at his flesh, and given his weakened state, they’ll pick his bones clean if someone doesn’t interfere and chase them away.”

The voice stopped for a brief moment, then started up again.

“I see, from the puzzled look on your face, that you don’t quite follow what I’m telling you. Let me explain: during Quantum’s expansion, some of my lieutenants have taken over businesses (some legal and others not), resources, and distribution networks belonging to other organizations. Now, many of these lieutenants have been killed, and their rivals have started coming out of the woodwork and trying to take back their lost empires. This is unacceptable. As far as I’m concerned, everything that we’ve worked hard to amass still belongs to us, to Quantum, and those who don’t realize that need to be taught a lesson. I want you to be my blunt instrument as I wage war against these vultures.”

“Well, you see, technically my obligations to Quantum are terminated the day Mueller died,” Hassan replied slyly. He might be a hired killer, but he was also an astute businessman who could recognize an opportunity to make some serious money when one presented itself. “If you want my services, then we will have to work out a new contract.”

A moment of silence ensued, since apparently the leader of Quantum was not accustomed to being talked to in this manner by someone he considered a lowly underling. Then, he laughed.

“Spoken like a true mercenary. I could have you killed for your lack of respect, but you do possess a set of skills that’s valuable to me. Very well, name your price, mercenary.”

Hassan thought for a moment, then decided that if he had taken the risk of bargaining with The Elder, he might as well ask for an amount that was worthwhile. He went for the highest number that he dared to put forth, half expecting his proposal to be immediately rejected. Thus, he was shocked to hear The Elder’s reply.

“Is that all?” the Quantum leader said, with contempt in his voice. “Let’s make it interesting. I’ll double that amount. How does that sound?”

Sounds fantastic, Hassan thought with glee. Outwardly, he tried to hide his joy, and replied in a calm, I’m-not-getting-excited-over-this voice: “You have a deal.”

“Done. Make no mistake, though. With this money, I’ve not only bought your services. I’ve bought your soul, merc. You belong to me now. Whatever I want you to do, you’ll do it, no question asked. Is that understood?”

“Yes,” Hassan replied. He had always been confident in his abilities, and could not imagine a case where he could not carry out a task that The Elder would give him.

“Good. Now, you can begin serving me by eliminating some of these vultures that I’d talked about. I want to make examples out of them, so you can’t simply kill them. You’ll have to do it in the most spectacular and brutal manner possible. Can you do that?”

“Consider it done,” Hassan said. What The Elder had asked for was the way Hassan usually went about his business anyway, so he saw no problem with that.

Over the next 12 months, Interpol was kept very busy by a series of assassinations of high-profile men in business and political circles around the world. One CEO of a steel company was shot in the face at point-blank range in the middle of his big, elaborate birthday party, and somehow the killer managed to escape without any partygoer being able to provide a good visual ID of him. In another incident, a Saudi oil tycoon who was also an international playboy apparently lost control of his Lamborghini Murcielago while traveling at high speeds on the mountainside roads near Modena with his girlfriend, a French model. The car broke through the guard rails, plunged several hundred feet to the valley floor below, instantly killing both occupants. Later investigations revealed that the Lamborghini’s hydraulic dual-circuit braking system and its electronic traction control unit had been tampered with.

Several other equally spectacular murders had the international tabloids in a frenzy, as they speculated some kind of connection between these seemingly disparate incidents. However, Interpol could not establish any such connection, and after months of intensive investigation, was no closer to collaring the perpetrators of these crimes.

Meanwhile, within the ranks of Quantum, the legend of Hassan grew with each successful killing. He soon gained the complete confidence of The Elder who, as a sign of approval, gave him the name that he now went by. He would later find out its significance: Hassan was the name of the founder of the feared secret society of the Hashashin, the Order of assassins that terrorized Syria and Persia in the Middle Ages. Having learned the origin of the name, he wore it with pride.

One night, about three months ago, Hassan was once again summoned by The Elder. He was staying in San Francisco at the time. This was only the second time that he had been called to a personal meeting with the leader, and he sensed that something very important was about to be revealed to him. The same bodyguard who had picked him up last time came to fetch him, and drove him to a mountaintop overlooking the entire Bay Area. They waited for about ten minutes on a promontory that gave an awesome view of the glittering SF skyline at dusk. Then, Hassan heard the sound of a car approaching. He turned around and saw a big, black Maybach making its way up the tortuous road that he and the bodyguard had taken just a few minutes ago. The winding path seemed almost too narrow for the imposing automobile, but the German luxury car was apparently driven by an expert, who guided it smoothly and quickly up the side of the mountain. As the car glided to a stop in front of him, Hassan started to walk toward it. The bodyguard immediately grabbed his right arm and held him back, while telling him that he was not to come any closer to the Maybach. Hassan jerked his arm free and glared at the man, but he also stopped moving forward.

As the headlights of the car turned off, Hassan saw that the back window was slightly lowered, but a curtain had been drawn across it. From behind that curtain came the now-familiar voice that never rose above a whisper:

“You must be wondering why I bothered to have this face-to-face meeting. It’s because I want to impress upon you the importance of the mission that I’m about to give you, and to make you understand how vital it is to the future of our organization. This mission must succeed in order for Quantum to complete its return to greatness. You should feel very proud that I’ve chosen you to play the central role in this operation, which I’ve decided, for obvious reasons, to call Operation Phoenix.”

As if on cue, the bodyguard next to Hassan handed him a tiny Flash drive.

“That drive contains everything that you need to know,” The Elder explained. “I want you to begin the preparations immediately. Remember, Quantum is depending on you. I’m depending on you. Don’t let me down.”

Those words now came back to haunt Hassan as he sat in his dingy room overlooking the parking lot of the Sandy Hollow. Like clockwork, every phase of Operation Phoenix had gone according to plan up until that moment in Dreamland, when he was about to gun down the British Assistant Chief of the Air Staff. Then, that meddlesome bodyguard had interfered, sacrificing himself and taking the slug meant for Trevor Crowe. In doing so, he had given Hassan a taste of failure, something that the killer had almost forgotten. However, this would only be a temporary setback, Hassan swore to himself. As long as he lived, he would not allow Trevor Crowe to get out of Nevada alive.

The sound of tires crunching on gravel and a rumbling exhaust note jerked Hassan’s mind back to reality. He looked out the window, and saw a grey Mustang pull into the parking lot. As the engine died down, the driver got out of the car. The moonlight caught his face, and a profanity escaped Hassan’s lips as he recognized who it was. Speak of the devil, the killer thought. Apparently, this British agent, whoever he was, was more ambitious than Hassan had imagined. Not happy with simply thwarting the assassination attempt, he had decided to hunt down Trevor Crowe’s would-be killer by himself. Well, how arrogant is this man, believing that he can take me on alone, Hassan thought. He needs to be taught a lesson, a very painful one, something that he can take with him to his grave. A cruel, humorless smile spread across the killer’s lips, and he quietly pulled back from the window and turned out the light.