The Coalition
Chapter 1 : GETTING THERE IS HALF THE FUN
Introduction
Wednesday morning on the Coalition's island was foul. The grey drizzle that covered everything along with the martini binge from last night's celebration (another secret disclosed!) had made Keiko as pinched up and bitter as her delicate features would allow.
The room you had been instructed to meet in was large by Coalition standards -- immense by most others. A handful of people sat scattered about, nobody wanting to get too close (telepaths everywhere you know). These meetings are always hideously boring (you already know about the downlink on Friday and the inspections this weekend). The swirling warm brown pattern of the chairs pulled you in, sucking your attention away from Keiko's voice until you hear the roll call.
"Kyle Stafford, Charles Garcia, Winter Morgan, and Chester Dougan will report immediately to the Gallileo conference room. The rest of you are dismissed until further notice."
With that Keiko grabbed her still dripping coat and sped out of the room. You quickly hurry towards your destination, wondering what you were just informed about.
Greetings were mumbled, nodded, and passed with a glance as the team assembled in the conference room. You recognize a few faces, but not everyone. Introductions would have to wait as Keiko immediately begins speaking.
"Listen up boys and girls -- we have a situation in Minneapolis. George Ziang was found murdered in downtwon. More accurately Mr. Ziang's head was found in Britt's Pub. This would be of no particular consequence if Mr. Ziang wasn't one of our top occultists in the midwest. Here are your tickets, grab your stuff and hit the plane -- it leaves in less than 2 hours. Introductions can wait until you're on the plane. There will be computer access in-flight if you need it. Lets move it, kiddies."
Keiko never did bother with small talk.
Turn 1
"The plane leaves in a little under two hours", Dugan thinks, so If I skip a shower I should be able to get...hmm, forty more minutes of sleep." He goes to his quarters, pulls the shades, finds the alarm clock (which has somehow gotten buried beneath a pile of dirty laundry), sets it, and falls asleep.
An hour and ten minutes later, after hitting the snooze button a couple of times, Dugan stuffs some clothing and toiletries in a duffel bag, grabs his laptop and what he thinks of as his "spy briefcase", and hurries towards the plane.
On board, Dugan sits as still as possible, trying to ignore the viscious pounding in his head. How many martini's had he had last night? He remembers finishing his fifth, then challenging that girl from the admin department to a bout of Grecko-Roman wrestling. He lost, and insisted his opponent drink the traditional "Five Martinis of Victory", spinning some tale about the first olympics, and how Ceasar rewarded the gold medalists with giant goblets of martinis. By the time she realized Dugan was lying, she was too drunk to care, and soon after she and Dugan were exploring various wrestling techniques in the privacy of his quarters.
* * *
Winter yawned as she stood. She hadn't slept very well the previous night. Something had told her it would be like this. She ran her tongue over the inside of her teeth; her gums felt funny the morning after flossing. Her dentist told her if she didn't start flossing, she'd be in for dental surgery her next check up. That had gotten through to her and she flossed that night and every night for the last two weeks. At first she had bled like a stuck pig, but gradually she noticed she had spit out less blood.
She looked over at Chester. What kind of guy was he? What was his story? She liked to make guesses about people and see how observant she was. She was convinced you couldn't truly tell anything about a person by their appearance. But it was still interesting to concoct a story about someone and find out if you had hit any of the nails on the head.
Dugan was pulled from his musings of the night before by a voice to his left.
Winter walked over and stuck out her hand. "Hi, I'm Winter. Guess we'll be working together." I swear, she thought, if he's some kind of prick and won't shake my hand--some bullshit macho trip, I swear I'll knock him out.
She wore a twill skirt and a man's white oxford shirt, nude pantyhose and dark flats. Her auburn hair was french-braided and her eyes were the color of swamp water. She knew she could be deadly if she turned on the charm, but her gums felt funny and she wasn't in the mood.
Dugan looked at the attractive young lady, and shook her hand. "Hi, I'm Dugan. Please pardon the red rings around my eyes. I think I ate too many olives last night." He digs in his pocket, and pulls out a black eyemask, the kind used to block out sunlight. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I really need to focus my inner chi". He puts the eyemask on, and settles in for a nap.
* * *
It was always a good idea to get to know your captain. If something went wrong you had an in for the last lifevest or parachute or what have you. Kyle had picked up this habbit back in grade school, making friends with the janitors and luch ladies. An extra helping of applesauce could make or break you durring the longer days.
Kyle discovered, unfortunately, that Captian Haull was not only a terrible conversationalist, but his particular genetic enhancements made him a bit frightening to look at. Kyle was more than pleased to hear other voices on the plane.
Exiting into the passenger section Kyle saw Dugan and Winter. A few minutes of research on the database was always good for knowing who to become nicely aquinted with. Pulling his black turtleneck into place, he introduced himself.
"Uh . . .Dugan? Winter?. . .hi. I'm Kyle."
Winter looked up and smiled, laughing warmly at the man's discomfort.
"Hi yourself. You have the advantage, I'm sure. Nosing around in the databases again...hmmm?" A twinkle in her eye and she went back to reading her book. This week it was A Princess of Mars, by Burroughs for, oh, about the twentieth time
Elloquent as usual, Kyle thought. Oh well. Kyle was sure he'd made 'the face'. At least he didn't feel like vomiting when he saw Winter. It was completely professional this time. Beautiful or not, it was just work.
Dugan made some sort of waving motion from under his black mask. Oh well. Kyle sat down and opened an online connection. A little research never hurts.
* * *
Charles dased down the runway, hoping like hell that all these damn bags beating his sides wouldn't result in too many marks and joint pains. Can't do your work if your hurtin'. The small plane was just maneuvering into position for it's long run to takeoff. The sounds of the vile string of curses that poured from Charles's mouth was overpowered as the small jet's engines flared into life.
I hate having to do this, Charles thought, but they didn't give us enough time. The reports of people witnessing a man running down the runway surrounded by a sparkling blue haze would be dismissed. Who the hell believes people in an airport? Concentrating as best he could while running full tilt, Charles focused his point inside the plane. The welling of energies from the In Ovo warped his flesh outward then deposited Charles inside the moving aircraft.
Charles looked around. The bathroom. Not too bad. Damn. Where are my bags.
This time the mishmass of general obscenities, oaths, and curses was well heard by everyone in the plane. Pulling himself together Charles smothed down his shirt, brushed back his too-long hair, and exited the bathroom.
Winter arched an eyebrow as she looked around the plane's cabin in bewhilderment. Now, just hold the heck on a minute, she thought. Her scan of the plane had been clean except for those she had already
accounted for. Where had this guy come from? She checked him out with just a minor looksee and swam through all the cluttered thoughts about men and women and what men and women can do so well sometimes. She was sed to it and it was all so cold and distant with her. She liked to think of herself as a surgeon, or more like a pathologist, capable of erforming her autopsy and eating a sandwich.
Charles looked around the interior of the plane, noting the three people watching him emerge he began to speak.
"Greetings. Charles Stafford. Adeptus of Kano-Kani, Calabani Master, and generally swell guy. I expect this is the flight to Minneapolis. It's a pleasu--"
As Charles made eye contact with Winter he stuttered, then floundered, then more or less said hello and sat down in his seat. Telepath Women. Those things just set the world on fire.
The Airport
After an hour or so of flight time Charles, utterly bored with
watching the patchwork landscape stumble by decided to see what kind of mortals he was stuck working with. More than anything, though, he wanted to see if anyone was his size. Of course, buying an entire new wardrobe in Minneapolis wasn't wholly unapealing.
Moving next to Dugan, he noticed the furious manner of Dugan's
hunt-n-peck style typing. Sixty Five words per minute, easily. "What
are you up to over here, Dugan? Anything I might be able to help
with?" Damn. His waist was too large and his feet too small. At
least I might be able to get a good chat in before we land.
"Maybe," Dugan says, "Take a look at this." He shows Charles the
newsgroup post regarding Ziang and In Ovo. "Does this mean anything to
you, Chuck?"
How interesting, thought Charles.
The flight continued much the same, Charles explaining as best he could the nature of the In Ovo to Dugan, Winter quietly reading and glancing up from time to time, and Kyle sitting by himself typing and mumbling.
When the jet was finally moving in for a landing, a situation easily stermined not only by the feeling of dropping (which made Kyle look slightly panic-stricken) but by Captian Haull?s too-smooth voice informing the crew :
"Once we land, please exit in an orderly fashion. The Greek Council has posted gaurds among the mundanes of this airport. Psychic activity is being monitored in a low-scan. You will be meeting a contact from the Eastern Divison -- Jade Capstone. Her domestic flight will arrive in 2 hours. Meet her at Gate 13. Please fasten your belts."
The jet landed smoothly and, only moments after all four pasengers had moved off the runway, took off again without refueling. Winter felt the warm buzz in the far back of her mind. ESPers were planted thinly but effectively. Dugan's trained eye picked out a few of the GC, Charles looked wholly uninterested, and Kyle glanced about nervously. Strange things are afoot at the cirlce-K, thought Kyle. The four were escorted into the building and past security.
"Where are your bags, Mr. Garcia?" asked a curious GC member. Charles sneared at the poor woman as the others chuckled silently to themselves.
The inside of the airport was just as one would expect. Too many people with too many problems. A wretched mish-mash of colors and professions, social class and hygeine. Suddenly that warm buzz in Winter?s mind cut out. Kyle began to convulse. Screams were heard from every direction, each proceeded by a thick popping noise. Dugan instinctively reached for his gun (secreted in his pocket).
"Sorcery!" Charles projected into each of the other's minds, a faint blue tint encompasing him. A man dressed in a casual suit came running towrds the four, flashing the hand signs noting him as a low-ranking member of the Coalition. Before anyone could react his head erupted, showering everyone nearby with a thick layer of gore. A cloud of fine red mist floating in the air about his mangled skull, he dropped dead to the ground.
Turn 2
Doing what any sensible person would do, Dugan dove under a bench and tried to make himself as small as possible. He keeps an eye on the crowd, hoping to somehow identify the person or persons responsible for this sudden outbreak of exploding head syndrom. Maybe when Charles lets loose with the hocus-pocus, it'll be obvious who the evil mage was. He sure hoped so.
"Christ!" Winter blurted out, hitting the deck. She craned her neck to look around her for the signs of the shooter, but she wasn't sure she could pick anyone out in the crowd.
There was just no point in checking to see if the man was still alive; the man's brains sticking to her hair told her everything she needed to know about that. It also told her what she had suspected: there were
sniffers here and they dealt with espers permanently.
Winter closed her eyes and cleared her mind of the image of the man's mangled head. She concentrated. And let it come to her, absorbing, breathing in the minds. Passive. Receptive. Who was out there? Everyone had a signature. What was his?
The overwhelming terror that had suddenly grasped people was making it slightly more than difficult for Winter to do anything. Every last person with the most minute ammount of psychic potential was screaming, their minds filling the expansive space of the airpost with a clutter of ranting mania. It was much like listening for a bit of Shakespeare at a Pantera concert : one could here it out there in someone's mind.
Then she felt it, no more than 100 yards away, a thin greasy feeling -- cold like autumn metal. His mind was smooth and stinging upon initial contact but, the moment she pushed in a barage of Hell struck her. Every possible nightmare ever concieved on the fevered sickbed madmen roamed within this man's head, but each thought was more - each thought was alive -- and each thought wanted her to join them.
Winter's physical form shook violently as she mentally tried to widthdraw from this hermetic's head for fear of gaining even the smallest portion of his madness. When she opened her eyes she felt the residue of the man's madness clingin to her. Her susceptability to the emotions of those she links with was always a danger in this business. She faught down the bile that was rising in he throat, only a second had passed, but the sickness that was within her seemed as though it would remain forever.
Charles stood and let loose with his arcane talents. The wave of passive energies that Charles projected worked to calm the crowd. People stopped screaming and running, began going about their business, and ignored the bodies littering the ground. Charles was glowing a bright blue, engulfed in the flames of reality-warping power. Charles also knew that he would mark himself as a target for the enemy who could, if they were of any potential whatsoever, be able to see through the SEP field charles had created.
Kyle stood still, the magic coursing through his body and bringing to life the genetic code he cursed so often. The worst part was the he could still think. His body was completely unresponsive as long as magics coursed through the air about him. It did give him, however, an extra bit of time to observe. As soon as the sorcery stopped, he had his target and, as fate would have it, he brought both of his handguns with him.
Enter the Madman
The SEP (Somebody Elses Problem) field that Charles had willed into being caused the mundanes to simply not notice the dead bodies, himself, Kyle, Winter, and Dugan, and four men dressed in black suits that were walking directly towards them. Luckily, the oviate that had crawled through was also being ignored by the populace. Unfortunately, it was an oviate.
The long bunchy form of the oviate worm latched onto the already drained Charles. It began to draw blood from him, the red swirling visibly with the black muck of its innards through the thin flesh that held it together. Charles collapsed.
Three of the four suits pulled out pistols and grinned.
Kyle felt the sinews of his body melting back to normal, pulled out both pistols and grinned.
The last suit, his face covered with tatoos and scars, held up metal-bound wooden rod and grinned.
Turn 3
Winter still reeled from the disgusting images, putrid smells, creepy feelings, sickening sounds and gut wrenching tastes that she had been left with after leaving that motherfucker's mind. NO ONE that twisted should be allowed to live.
She wondered how many times she had blacked out. Time compressed. She saw the suits walking toward her, and she swore they had these shit eating grins on their faces, but there was another part of her that knew these creeps never smiled.
Dugan, in his hiding place under the bench, braced his .38 special and took aim at his nearest assailant. Looks like we've got ourselves a security breach, he thought as he shuffled a bit to get a clear shot. Damn. It didn't happen often, but when the Coalition's plans got leaked to the bad guys, things invariably got real ugly, real fast. Oh well, he thought, time to do what I do best: take a couple of potshots
at gun wielding maniacs while hiding under a bench.
Winter rolled over and winced as the H&K P7 9mm automatic pinched the skin of her bicep. No time for finesse. This was not like so many times where she had to make someone go to sleep or cause someone to forget she'd been seen. This was a time to save her ass.
Kyle’s grin went from thought to face in the split second that mana wasn’t polluting the air. He raised his weapons, pointing one at a suited mook and the other at the thing attempting to burrow into the fallen Charles. He had no desire to save Charles (fucking sorcerers) but the oviate would come wriggling after him when it finished with Mr. Garcia here.
Dugan steadied himself, drew in a deep breath, and squeezed the trigger as he released it. The bullet tore at one of the suits clothing, causing him to jump back giving Winter that spit second she needed. The flat, squeeze cocker came out of her shoulder rig in a smooth action and she had the gun up, her fingers pulling in and the striker popping out. The first shot exploded and took the closest of the black suited
bastards just above the knee, blood fountaining out in a syrupy geyser. He dropped and all his composure vanished as his nerves went up in napalm fire. As he fell, the second shot smacked him center dead in the skull and he fell over, one less black-suited prick in the world.
Surprise was on her side and it gave her the time to clear her mind, temporaily--it was always temporary--and focus just long enough to lock on to the remaining black suits. She worked the energy, shaping it,
coaxing it together in to a nice coherent package, amping it, holding it and then letting it go--right into the core of their mind. It detonated in their conscious mind, blowing a hole into their subconscious and they keeled over, holding their heads in agony.
Kyle’s weapons blazed in automatic glory, shards of metal ripping apart flash and floor alike. The oviate now proudly wore a series of hole along it’s greasy hide, each one oozing a thick black fluid highlighted with red. Leftmost mook dropped to the ground a heartbeat before he pulled the trigger. As he fell stray shots went of into the crowd, people falling. As people fell, they began noticing what was happening again. the SEP field was crumbling. Slowly, but crumbling.
The backlash was a bitch. Winter’s own head started to pound; the effort bringing on one of her migraines that would last forever. She'd think about turning the gun on herself it would get that bad, but she never could. No matter how bad the pain was, she knew what she'd done was worth it. For a second, as if in acknowledgment, the pain subsided. She felt almost good. But it was just a second. The bile began to rise in her throat.
Dugan took the oportunity that Winter had given him and quickly dispatched the last mook with a clunning to the head. Blood was such an intollerable pain to get out of the carpet after all. Plus it might not be bad, he thought, if we have someone to talk to. People were looking at him.
The crowd knew something was wrong, but couldn’t quite put their fingers on it. They milled about, each with a look of distress and fear on their faces. Noone talked. It suddenly became disturbingly clear that theh only sound in the airport was the shuffling of stunned masses.
Winter, struggling to keep her body’s violent reactions under control, and Dugan, visibly shaken from the sudden and violent encounter, raced over to help Charles. Kyle glanced around for the suit with the stick. He was gone. The masses milled about in near silent desperation. The smell of ozone was in the air.
Strange Airs
The stillness of it all was so compelling. Scents of fresh bread and peach blossoms swirling about in the moist air. Sedate. Sleep. Kyle looked about in disgust.
“What the hell is happening here?"
Each word that came from his mouth was slowed by the thick air, each letter was larger than life and soft, fuzzy and complete in it’s warmth. Kyle dashed them out of the blue grey sky and shook the darkening clouds from about his face.
Dugan was growing a set of feline ears from the top of his head. "I suspect this is something our friend is up to." Dugan looked down at Charles, now nothing more than a flesh-sack holding rocks and tidbits of knowledge.
Winter glanced about at the people were beginning to take root. She pulled her feet free from the tangle of flowing carpet. Something in the back of her mind was tingling and separate from all of this.
Reality this was definitely not, but real it surely was. How could the Coalition have overlooked one so powerful. If these were all mind games they were exacting and meticulously constructed. If reality had, in fact, been subverted here in the Minneapolis International Airport, would it remain so after the creator was gone? Each heartbeat could be felt in the minds of the world. It was all getting a bit confusing.
Suddenly Dugan looked up. "There!" he shouted, pointing at a railing on the second floor. "There he is!"
Turn 4
"Aw Jesus. I hate this crap," Dugan said. He knealt beside Charles
and pulled the injured man behind a tower of sweetbuns. "C'mon,
Charlie," he said, slapping the unconscious sorcerer lightly on the
face, or at least, where his face should have been, "Wakey wakey. We
could really use a little hocus pokus right about now." As Dugan’s hand passed through the mist-that-was-Charles, he felt the shiver of the man’s discorporating figure.
Christ, Winter thought, I just do not need this shit. She was a
rational woman who had seen some unrational crap go down. Bullshit
plotting, counter-plotting, men firing bridal gowns. What?
Kyle raised both collumns of flesh that his arms had doricly emulated. Las pistolas had to be in there somewho he emoted to everything about him. Dugan opened his mouth and the only thing in the air was the deafening sound of the wedding march.
Winter sighed and closed her eyes and tried to concentrate. Sheep. She
was counting sheep and she was 6 and she couldn't sleep. Mom? But it
wasn't her mom but someone surreal and menacing.
Dugan checked his .38 to make sure it was still a gun, and hadn't been
transformed into something else, like a potato or an adverb. "Hey
gang! I've got a swell idea! Let's ventilate the goofball with the
magic stick!" he yelled, ducking from behind his pastry cover.
Winter looked at the P7 in her hand. She knew it was a gun...so this puke might be on the
business end of a daffodil or something. She reached out to see if
something answered back, but all she got was static. The squeezed the
grip. Click; the gun was cocked. She squeezed the trigger.
Dugan took aim with his gun (or keychain, or bridal gown, or whatever else the gun
had become) and fired, yelling "BANG! You're dead, Chuckles!"
Taking a cue from his companions, Kyle launched projectiles from the metal encased in flesh one after the other, the heat shredding and ripping his arms into bloody rags.
The flash was blinding, Dugan, Winter, and Kyle all collapsing to the ground. The feeling, if it were able to be related, might be explained as having your flesh removed from the inside. Some part of each of the agents was sucked into nothing ness and the connection to their tormentor broken. The world was realigning and the situation, though unclear as a whole, was beginning to make immediate sense. A lilting Baroque piece issued quietly through the intercom system.
Charles was unconscious and facedown in the dirt and the boot that held his nech down was attached to what appeared to be a pony-tailed blonde. "Hi. I'm Jade."
While the three were recovering, Jade held down Charles' form and explained briefly.
"I'm not sure what was going on with you, but this puke," she kicked Charles in the ribs, " was about to slice you with this bad boy." Jade held aloft a ritualistic dagger of black metal. It appeared to have the bones of wither small animals or children affixed to the hilt. "You three were starring into space and twitching violently. I hope I didn’t ruin a really great acid trip or something." Jade smirked.
Dugan checks on the others, making sure they don't look injured, then inspects his gun. Pocketing it, he says, "Let's get out of here before we attract any attention, if we haven't already. Find a safe place to collect our thoughts. Winter, could you keep tabs on Chuck with your telepathy. We don't want him coming to anytime soon."
Winter walks over to Charles and looks down at him intently. She hauls back and kicks him in the ribs. She turns to everyone and says, "Just for good measure. Mom always said, 'Never fuck with reality'." Winter smiles, but there's a viciousness to it.
Kyle grinned, but there seemed to be something that was upsetting him. There were more important things to deal with now.
She attaches a mental leash to Charles and suppresses his alpha waves to a near flat line. Sonofabitch won't wake up anytime soon, Winter thinks to herself.
With a sudden rage Winter explode with a "Goddamn, I'm just tired of this BULLSHIT! C'mon, let's get this over with. Isn't there a safe house near here?"
"Yeah, we need to get out of here before somebody notices us." Jade snarled as she removed her boot from Charles neck. "I know a place where we can go and figure out what the hell is going on. So are we taking this asshole with us or what?"
"If we leave him here," Kyle ejects,"he will either wake up or die. Either way the shit is about to hit that fan. Charles has a locked file on Coalition datasourcing. This means he most likely falls into one particular category."
"Shoot 'em or recruit 'em?" Dugan offers.
"That's the one. Dugan -- go hail a cab. Jade, you grab the luggage that Dugan can't handle. Winter, let's help our 'drunk' friend here. If we can drag his ass through security we have no problems. Remember to be loud and obnoxious. Nobody wants to deal with assholes like us."
As Dugan and Jade run off to arrange the ride to the safehouse, Kyle and Winter heave Charles onto their shoulder. "Can you make him move around a bit, Winter?" "No problem." The two march through the airport, cursing and swearing, talking loudly about "What an absolute idiot Chuck is. I’ve never seen him drink so much in my entire life!" and other such phrasologies. All five make it into the cab, cramped and uncomfortable, but in the cab.
"Thirty-first and Grand in Uptown," Jade shouts at the cabby. He doesn't look back and simply starts to drive. With everyone packed in like a clown car, Winter’s sudden and violent spasm was noticed by all. "You ok, Winter?"
"Yea. I'm fine. It was nothing."
Index
Chapter 2
The Coalition main page.
Dale’s Homepage.