So because I’ll be not preaching the next two weeks, given my little out-of-town-hood. I wanted to give everyone a little teaser on a new project I’ve been working on, with the help of everyone’s favorite nymph-stalker, Satyr. And so without further adieu, here’s a little fun from the soon-to-be-fleshed-out Pegasus’ Bridle universe.
Please be advised — this is written from the perspective of the character. The character happens to have what one would call a potty mouth. If you follow the podcast, you know that I am trying to lessen my use of such language. So … umm … yea. Enjoy!
The shit really hit the fan this time.
Okay, that’s not really all that accurate. The shit lodged itself so deeply in the fan that its mass overwhelmed its angular momentum and it stopped in a rank mess of human excrement. And that doesn’t even begin to describe the clusterfuck that was this mission.
Let me back up. Two months ago one of our assets came to us with information on a smuggler within the Unalloyed. He had developed the nasty habit of selling heavy weapons to certain factions within the Lesser, which wouldn’t have ordinarily been an issue for us. Sure they’re misguided, but we just can’t afford to piss them off. But this guy, this little ball of useless humanity, was getting a little too big-time for the Ruling Council to turn a blind eye too. The kind of hardware he was shifting could have tipped the balance a little too far, and we just can’t let that happen. It’s what we do.
So that’s how I found myself in my standing in my Emir’s office that day. I really need to get better at this whole understatement thing – I was standing rail straight in a stark metal room with no option to sit down in the unlikely event Emir-3 Tracy would allow me to sit down. Of course, she was seated in a padded desk chair she “re-purposed” after one of her missions in Ascended territory. To this day I have no idea how she managed to smuggle it out, along with her whole squad, after bringing her target to a swift remembrance.
I never spoke, only nodding once. She spoke twice. “Here’s your mark.” “Don’t screw this up.” There really isn’t anything else to say. She had already transferred the information to my nanos. It gave the name of my target, my contact on Wolff, and my deadline. I had 3 months to eliminate Fyr Certaine. Caid-2 Vladimir was a friend – I had worked with him on other rememberances – and he was a good contact to have. This mission was the only time he had ever let me down, and it wasn’t even his fault.
Getting to Wolff was easy. Getting settled in was easy; Vlad was so efficient he had our covers ready for us before we arrived, making insertion a whole lot easier. I don’t know how he did it, but I was assigned to Certaine’s bodyguard. How he managed to fake the background check is something I’ll likely never know. It didn’t hurt that Certaine was one paranoid black marketeer; it’s a lot easier to infiltrate a force way too big for its own good.
The rest of my squad had various jobs around the complex. Tim was a dockworker. He was big enough that he even looked like he had been schlepping cargo his whole life. Kim, Jose, and Diane had covers as the cleaning crew. It’s the oldest trick in the book, but it always works. It’s kind of pathetic really. So if any of you fine people end up on our bad side, make sure your cleaning crew is in-house. It may not be great for morale, but it might just keep you from getting killed. In this case it only got them killed. But that’s still few weeks away.
The last member of our squad, Juliet, hooked up with an escort service. Now before you think I’m some perverted commander who was just itching to make this woman an object – it was her idea. Vlad had told us this happened to be our mark’s favorite service to use, and she wanted to make herself his favorite escort. Juliet was twisted, but I’m damn glad she’s on our side.
And so for a month we did the prep work. It’s not that exciting. We did everything we could to look like normal people doing normal things, the only difference is we were looking for ways to take out our boss. Tim figured out the dock schedule so we knew when things were quiet. Kim and his crew had the layout for the building down so we had our escape route planned. Juliet and I kept track of Certaine’s movements. We took things slow – we wanted to be absolutely sure as little as possible would be out of our control.
Finally we thought we had enough intel to move. The remembrance would be the night after Juliet’s next visit with Certaine. Up to this point the whole operation was going perfectly, she left our calling card – a simple, folded piece of paper with two words: “We Remember” – on his pillow as he slept before she left his quarters. And after tomorrow night, he would be little more than a memory.
And so, Fyr Certaine, being the paranoid pile of shite that he is called in every single one of his guards to watch him for the next twenty-four hours. We always struck within 24 hours of leaving the note – and everyone knew it. It made it more fun for us, having to sneak in while the mark was expecting it. There was one thing we never expected, and his name was German Douglas.
Douglas was Certaine’s right-hand man. They had been working together for twelve years. Certaine build his operation through Douglas. Noone was more loyal than him. At least until that night. An hour after we started to move in, and two hours before we planned to strike, Douglas decided to take advantage of Certaine’s paranoia and stab him in the neck with a pen. A damn pen!! How special is that! The amateur couldn’t even silence his scream when it happened, so the door guards ran in expecting to see us so Douglas offed them with Certaine’s sidearm. That bought him just enough time to radio to the whole compound that The Remembrance killed Certaine and are running out of the building.
Now don’t get me wrong – I love sneaking out of buildings after we remember our mark. But we’re not near as clumsy as that fucktard Certaine. When we remember someone, they just look like they’re taking a nice relaxing nap and noone notices our work until the morning. We don’t leave a bloody mess behind and we damn well don’t have collateral damage. That’s just how we work; for every body we leave behind that the Council didn’t mark for death we lose a rank.
So once the mission went all to hell, the only thing to do was get out, or wait it out. I thought option two would be the better choice. I was wrong. In their zeal to hunt down the ones who killed their worthless leader, they stumbled on us camped out in the air vent. I’m still trying to figure out how in Hassan’s name they thought to check the air vent. But we sure as Douglas is a useless fucktard didn’t expect it.
It’s at this moment when the shit-covered fan reared its stinking head. We were so caught off guard Kim and Juliet actually got killed. We never get killed. It just doesn’t happen. Maybe these shitheads came up with some tech the Lesser hadn’t stolen for us yet. To this day I can’t recall how we got out. Well, how I got out. The rest of the squad didn’t make it.
I’m glad Vladimir didn’t ask many questions when I got back to his hideout. A Fedayeen never comes back alone. But he arranged travel for me back to Hassan, where there was sure to be some kind of inquiry. There was, and I found myself in front of the Caliph himself.
“Caid Rikard, It seems you were able to survive our little test” Test? What test. Wait … they couldn’t? “Rikard you have dishonored us by your actions. We are not like the Lesser we brought you out of. This exercise was meant to claim only your life, but your constant reckless disregard for our ways cost us the lives for five faithful servants to The Order. This test could have saved you; we could have overlooked your past actions. Instead, you compounded your dishonor by cowering like a frightened child!” I felt a small pressure on my neck. “Because of this dishonor, it is you who will be remembered this day.” This was the slow-acting toxin. It had to be. I wasn’t dead yet. “From this moment you are no long Fedayeen.” The toxin started to take effect; everything was getting dimmer and slower. “May this act restore some of the Order you have taken away in Pegasus.”
It was the last thing I heard. The toxin had shut down all my senses. It was black. It was quiet. I felt nothing. I smelled nothing. All I had were my thoughts. The Fedayeen required ultimate loyalty. I had not given it to them, and so I was a liability. A threat to The Order. And so I was remem….
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