Miami Run

Chapter Nineteen

“That’s the Shrine?” Blade inquired doubtfully.

“No,” Paolucci answered. “That’s a small island where we dock the airboats.”

Blade scrutinized the few trees dotting the island and the narrow boat dock they were rapidly approaching. The airboat ride was an experience he would never forget. Strung out in a line, with Paolucci’s boat in the lead, the three craft had negotiated the swampy terrain with deceptive ease. Most of the hour spent in transit between Happy Acres and the Shrine had entailed crossing vast plains of sawgrass. The airboats had plowed through the grass at terrific speeds, flattening the blades under the prow, the sawgrass and the wind whipping the boat and its occupants.

Now, as the mercenary steering the craft killed the engine and allowed the airboat to glide up to the dock, Blade devoted his attention, for the umpteenth time, to his primary concern: escaping. He had toyed with the notion of leaping overboard while en route, but the airboat had been moving at such a great speed that he ran the risk of being injured in the attempt. To complicate matters, the mercenary was armed with a machine gun. And although the Directors were not carrying visible weapons, there was no telling what was concealed under their robes.

The three airboats coasted to the dock and the Directors busied themselves with the lines.

“On your feet,” Paolucci ordered the Warrior, rising.

Blade stood. “The Masters must not be here yet,” he mentioned. “I don’t see their airboats.”

“The Masters don’t dock here,” Paolucci divulged. “They have their own dock on the north side of the Shrine.”

“They don’t want to share a dock with lowly humans, huh?” Blade taunted.

“Quit wasting your breath,” Paolucci advised. He stepped onto the dock and beckoned for Blade to join him.

The Warrior complied, his cuffed hands in front of his body.

Paolucci looked at the mercenaries in the platform seats. “You will stay in your boats until we return. Understood?”

The trio nodded.

“Follow me,” Paolucci instructed the giant.

Blade resigned himself to obeying until he could get his bearings and formulate a plan. The twelve other Directors were trailing him as he moved along the dock on Paolucci’s heels. A well-worn path at the end of the dock wound in the direction of a large island 60 yards to the west, an island covered with trees and undergrowth.

“There is the Shrine,” Paolucci declared, nodding at the other island.

“Why is it called the Shrine?”

“What could be more fitting for the site of the sacrifices our Masters make?”

“You’ve never told me,” Blade noted. “Who or what do the Masters sacrifice to?”

“What do you mean?”

“It should be obvious. Do the Masters sacrifice to a deity? Sacrifices are usually made for a reason. What’s theirs?”

“I’ve never asked.”

“You’re despicable.”

“I wouldn’t expect you to comprehend the true meaning of the relationship we share with our Masters,” Paolucci said as they wended their way toward the large island.

“I comprehend, all right,” Blade stated. “You’ve enslaved the human population of southern Florida by fostering mass drug addiction, and all for mutant Masters who must view us as cattle. You’ve sold the human race down the tubes for power and prestige. You deserve to die.”

“How convenient! You’ve set yourself up as our judge and executioner!” Paolucci retorted.

They continued in silence.

Blade stared at the Bowies in Paolucci’s right hand. His life depended on getting those knives back, but timing would be everything. He must wait for the perfect moment. His gaze shifted to the island ahead, and he scrutinized the grove of trees. One consolation, he mentally noted, was that Hickok and Rikki were free. If worse came to worst, they could fly to the Home, call a meeting of the Federation, and lead a combined military force back to Miami to smash the Dragons.

The party reached an incline at the eastern edge of the island, with willows and myrtles on both sides of the trail. They ascended to the crest of the rise. Beyond was a spacious clearing containing granite pedestals and a low marble altar.

And seven waiting figures.

Blade advanced toward the forms, determined not to betray a hint of trepidation. He wouldn’t give the Masters any satisfaction by allowing dread or fear to register on his features. Setting his lips in a thin line, he boldly walked toward the clearing, studying the mutants.

All seven were exceptionally tall, averaging six and a half feet in height.

Each projected an ungainly appearance, enhanced by their disproportionately long limbs; their arms hung below their knees, and their legs, while on normal dimensions from their hips to their knees, were thin poles below the kneecaps. Their skin was a sickly, pale gray, with layers of excess flesh forming pronounced wrinkles on their neck. Four of the mutants were males, three females. The males wore red, skintight shorts, evidently made especially for their bizarre physiques. Red halters and short skirts clothed the females.

“Masters!” Arlo Paolucci called out happily.

One of the mutants came toward him.

Blade received the impression he was watching a skeleton on stilts. The mutant’s stride was peculiar, a rolling sort of gait. He noticed that the Master never straightened its legs as it walked; the knees were always bent. But the strangest aspect of all, one that filled the Warrior with loathing, was the bony visage.

Except for the folds of flesh at the neck, all of the Masters possesed thin, partially transparent, and extremely taut skin. Veins and arteries, even bones, could be seen just under the surface. The result was to transform their countenance into a hideous caricature of a human face. Each Master was hairless, their heads resembling animated skulls. Their eye sockets were deep, darl wells, their nostrils were slits, their lips wafer thin.

“Director One,” said the approaching Master, its voice gravely.

“Master Orm,” Paolucci responded.

The mutant called Orm halted, waiting for them.

As he drew closer, Blade distinguished additional ghastly characteristics. Orm’s rib cage was clearly visible, each rib distinct and seemingly pressing against the skin from within. The mutant’s knuckles were outsized knobs. And when Orm spoke, he revealed a mouth rimmed with pointed, white teeth.

Orm was returning the Warrior’s critical appraisal. “So this is the mighty Blade?” he asked derisively.

Paolucci bowed. “Yes, Master. Delivered as promised.”

“You said there were three Warriors.”

Paolucci, straightening, his hood only half over his head, blanched.

“The other two have not been apprehended.”

Orm looked at Paolucci. “This is most unfortunate. We were expecting you to bring all three.”

“My abject apology, Master.”

“Kiss his feet, why don’t you?” Blade quipped.

Orm cocked his head, his dark eyes flat and cold. “Defiant to the last, I take it.”

“I’m just getting warmed up,” Blade declared.

Orm motioned toward the marble altar and the granite pedestals.

“Shall we proceed?”

Paolucci nudged the Warrior. “Get moving.”

Blade moved slowly toward the center of the clearing. All of the Masters were watching him intently. The tallest, a mutant who radiated an air of menace, whose expression was baleful, sneered at the Warrior. “Are you the leader of the Masters?” he asked Orm. As he did, Orm stepped past him and he saw one of their backs for the first time.

Orm’s spinal column was a knobby succession of bony protuberances extending from the base of his skull to his waist, each knob progressively bigger than the one above it. The spine curved outward, magnifying the repellent aspect.

Disconcerted by his discovery, Blade abruptly realized the mutant was speaking to him.

“—not the leader of the Masters,” Orm was saying, “so much as I am the head of my Family.”

Blade gazed at the six mutants now six feet off. “This is your family?”

“Yes, Warrior.”

The tallest Master took a stride toward the Warrior. “I am Radnor, bastard!”

Blade stopped and clenched his fists, expecting the Master to attack.

“Radnor!” Orm snapped.

“Let me kill him now, Father,” Radnor said.

“In due time,” Orm responded. He looked at the Warrior. “Radnor is my eldest.”

“One big, happy family,” Blade cracked.

“You cannot judge us by human standards,” Orm stated.

“He has already judged all of us, Master,” Paolucci mentioned. “He believes we deserve to die.”

Radnor, who was the only Master the equal of the Warrior in height, glared into Blade’s gray eyes. “Let me kill him, Father!” he reiterated.

“After we have questioned him,” Orm said.

“You’ll get nothing out of me,” Blade vowed.

“I wouldn’t be so certain,” Orm responded. “There are ways to force you to talk,” he added ominously.

“Give it your best shot,” Blade countered.

Orm sighed. “I was hoping we could conduct our business as reasonable individuals, but if you persist in this obstinacy, we shall commence the skinning.”

“The skinning?”

“Why do you think we instructed Director One to bring your knives?”

Orm asked.

Blade didn’t respond.

“Come with me,” Orm declared, walking to the east with his hands behind his back.

Blade hesitated.

“No tricks. I promise you,” Orm said.

What was the Master up to? Blade, suspicious yet curious, moved to the Master’s left.

Orm resumed walking, scrutinizing the trees surrounding the clearing.

“It is quite lovely here.”

“What are you trying to pull?” Blade demanded. “Why are you being so courteous?”

“What did you expect? Slavering monsters?”

“I don’t know what I expected,” Blade admitted.

“I repeat. You can not judge us by human standards,” Orm said. “To you, we are physically repulsive. Am I right?”

Blade nodded.

“Yet we have hearts and minds, just like you,” Orm said. “We can love and hate, just like you.”

“What do you know about love?” Blade asked scornfully.

“I love my wife and children,” Orm declared.

“But you don’t love humans.”

“True,” Orm confessed.

“Is that the reason you set up the Dragons? Is that why you use drugs to control the human populace? Because you hate us?”

Orm studied the Warrior for a moment. “I will tell you something no other human knows, because the knowledge will go with you to your grave.

I established the Dragons to protect my family.”

“What?”

“I am serious,” Orm insisted. “There is a natural animosity between humans and mutants. When my children were much younger, there was a great danger of being hunted down by your kind. Although I built a hideaway in the depths of the Everglades, I knew it was only a matter of time before we were discovered. I needed a power base, some way of ensuring my family would be protected. The drug war in Miami provided the ideal setting. I offered my services to one of the drug lords, assassinating his rivals. Such a task was easy. Our night vision and strength far surpasses the average human.”

“What happened then?”

“Once all the opposition was eliminated, I disposed of my so-called employer.”

“No one else in his organization objected?”

“Why should they?” Orm responded. “I promised each of them wealth and power beyond their fondest dreams, and I delivered on that promise.

They were eating out of my hand.”

“So your… children… didn’t help you take over the Dragons?” Blade inquired.

“No. They were too young at the time. Why?”

Blade glanced back at the six other Masters. “I’d heard all of you were involved.”

“There are a number of popular rumors concerning us,” Orm acknowledged. “Some we’ve deliberately fostered.”

“You have?”

“Of course. Our principal means of maintaining control over the humans are psychological, not physical.”

“What about the drugs?” Blade noted.

“The drugs are part of the overall picture. By legalizing drug use, we’ve promoted addiction. An addicted population is a dependent population.

The people now rely on the Dragons for drugs. They’re dependent on us.

We are indispensable.”

“You have it all figured out,” Blade remarked.

Orm halted. “It hasn’t been easy. Solidifying our links with the Colombian Cartel, minting our own money, picking sycophants as Directors.”

Blade looked the mutant in the eyes. “Why do you want to destroy the Family?”

“So that’s it!” Orm exclaimed, smiling broadly, exposing his sharp teeth. “The reason you came to Florida! You heard about our plans! How?”

“Forget how,” Blade declared. “Why?”

“Because your Family poses a threat to our operation,” Orm answered.

“Paolucci said the same thing,” Blade noted. “And it doesn’t make any sense.”

“Would it make sense to you if you learned the Dragons are planning to expand their market into the Civilized Zone?”

The Warrior’s shock was obvious.

“That’s correct,” Orm said, grinning wickedly. “We have made arrangements with a high-ranking official in the Civilized Zone, one of your allies in the Freedom Federation, to begin distributing drugs covertly. Drugs are illegal there, of course, but that won’t stop us.”

“You’re going to introduce drugs to the Civilized Zone!” Blade declared in consternation.

“Eventually, we’ll introduce drugs, as you put it, into each Federation faction. We’ll corner the market. Your accursed Family, though, stands in our way. You’re too idealistic, too damn spiritual. We could never foster drug dependence in the Home. And if we can’t turn you, then we must destroy you. We’re assembling a mercenary unit to pay your Home a little visit.”

Blade raised his hands to his forehead. “I’d like to know how you found out?” Orm mentioned.

The Warrior appeared to be in a daze.

“Oh, well. I guess it’s not important. I’ll track down the leak,” Orm vowed. “Only the Directors and a few of the Dealers know about our plan to send a demolition unit to the Home. If one of them was indiscreet, I’ll find out.”

Blade gazed at the ground with a blank expression.

“Don’t take the news so hard,” Orm said. “It’s nothing personal.

Business is business, and the Dragons have an opportunity to expand our trade in a big way.” He turned and started back.

The Warrior walked alongside the mutant.

“I’m impressed that you got this far,” Orm commented. “Once, a few years ago, a disgruntled member of the Colombian Cartel hired a professional assassin to terminate us. We caught him, of course. The assassin was a mutant! Can you imagine that? We cut out his tongue, but allowed him to live.” He paused. “You will not be so fortunate. I thought it would be poetic justice to use your own knives to skin you. We relish the taste of human flesh, all except for the skin. It leaves a bitter, salty aftertaste.”

Blade was scarcely listening, his mind in turmoil. All the pieces of the puzzle now fit, and a rage was simmering inside him, a fury born of his experiences in Miami. He remembered the boy of six or seven who had begged for coins to buy drugs for his dad, and the 15-year-old girl who hustled men to support her habit, and then he thought of all the thousands of innocent children in the Civilized Zone and the other Federation factions, children whose lives would be forever warped by having the drug life-style forced on them by peer pressure or the manipulation of conniving adults. All because the Dragons wanted to expand their drug market! With each stride he took his rage grew. He glanced down at the handcuffs, at the links connecting the metal bracelets.

“—ceremony was my idea,” Orm was boasting. “Humans are easily swayed by elaborate ceremonies. The sacrifices are an excuse for us to indulge ourselves.”

Blade looked up. They were 12 feet from the waiting Masters and Directors. Seven of the former and thirteen of the latter. Twenty, all told.

Not the best of odds, but he didn’t care anymore. He felt like molten lava was circulating in his veins.

“Ahh. Here we are,” Orm remarked as they reached the assembled group. He extended his right arm. “The knives, Director One.”

Arlo Paolucci began to lift his right hand.

And Blade made his move. His massive arms bunched, his muscles rippling and bulging, as he exerted all of his prodigious strength, his forearms straining outward. For an average man the cuffs would have held; for the herculean Warrior the links were as putty. In the space of a heartbeat they parted with a loud snap, and before the stupefied Masters and Directors could intervene, the Warrior yanked his Bowies from Paolucci and whirled toward Orm.

The mutant leader was reaching for the giant. “Get—” he began.

Blade swept the Bowies under Orm’s arms and buried them to their hilts in the mutant leader’s chest, his shoulder muscles coiling like steel springs as he lifted the Master on the Bowie blades, surging Orm up and over his head. For a second he stood there, grand and terrible in the sunlight, the mutant upraised and thrashing and screeching.

Snarling and hissing, the other Masters closed in.

The Warrior whirled and flung Orm into the charging Masters, bowling four of them over. But the remaining two, one of whom was Radnor, pounced. Blade felt their bony fingers close on his forearms, one on each side. He dropped to his left knee and wrenched his left arm downward, propelling the mutant holding him to the ground to crash onto its face.

Even as he completed the move, he started another. There was no time for needless thought, and there would be no rhyme or reason to this battle. He had to rely on his reflexes, on his honed instincts, and keep moving-moving-moving. If he slowed for an instant, he was dead.

Consequently, as the one mutant was crashing onto the hard ground, Blade was already in motion to the right, angling his left knee in a savage arc, ramming the kneecap into Radnor’s groin.

Radnor gurgled and released his grip. The Directors swarmed in, their red robes swirling. Four of the thirteen produced knives, two drew pistols from hiding, and one stepped up to the giant with a sawed-off shotgun sliding out of his left sleeve.

Blade was a whirlwind. He took the fight to them, moving into their midst to limit their ability to employ their guns and knives for fear of hitting one another. His right Bowie took out the Director with the shotgun, the point slicing into the man’s right eye, causing the Director to scream, release the gun, and flounder backwards, blood pouring from the ruptured socket as the Bowie came free.

Another Director snapped off a shot from his pistol, but missed.

The Warrior pivoted, slashing and swiping, the keen edges of his Bowies cutting and ripping right and left. The two Directors with pistols were the next to fall, both with crimson crescents flowing from their severed throats. Blade pressed his attack with reckless abandon, parrying a knife strike, hacking off the fingers of a hand reaching for him, and ramming his left Bowie into the jugular of a Director clinging to his right shoulder.

A stinging sensation lanced across the giant’s lower back.

Blade spun to find a Director with a bloody knife, and he angled his right Bowie up and in, the blade penetrating the Director’s left cheek. The man stiffened and tottered backwards, blood spraying in all directions.

Before Blade could press his advantage, a body alighted on his back and a thin, bony arm encircled his neck.

A Master!

Instantly, the Warrior doubled over, upending the mutant, toppling it in the grass at his feet. He saw the Master’s upturned, skeletal features, and he thrust downward with both Bowies, both blades spearing into the mutant’s neck.

Something pierced his right shoulder, burning and racking him with pain.

Blade straightened. A Director had stabbed him and was drawing the knife back for another try. But the Warrior was quicker, his right Bowie cleaving the Director’s face from eyebrows to chin with a mighty downswing.

A growling Master tackled the giant from the left, bearing the Warrior down.

Blade landed on his back and kicked, flinging the Master aside. He rolled to his right, and there was another Master diving straight for him.

His left Bowie whipped around and met the mutant in midair, catching the creature high on the chest. It wailed and fell, and Blade pulled the knife out and heaved to his knees just in time to meet the rush of a Director with a survival knife. He ducked under the knife as it arched toward his face, and retaliated with his left Bowie, planting the big blade in the Director’s loins. The man gurgled and clutched at himself. The Warrior tugged the left Bowie out and rotated, always moving, always moving, and as fast as he was, he wasn’t fast enough, because a mutant leaped on his back and razor teeth tore into the right side of his neck. A clammy substance flowed over his shoulder as he drove the right Bowie back and in, and connected.

There was a cry of anguish and the Master on his back fell away.

To be replaced by a hurtling pair of Directors, one armed with a knife, coming directly at him.

Blade engaged them in a frenzy, fighting on sheer impulse, his blood-soaked Bowies striking in reckless abandon, lashing every which way as quickly as enemies presented themselves. Crimson spurted over the combatants and the grass. He downed the Directors and another mutant, imbedded his left Bowie in the stomach of a third Director, and rotated to the right.

And suddenly the Warrior was alone, standing amidst a heap of bodies, some motionless, others groaning and moaning and twitching. He blinked his eyes rapidly, wondering where his foes had gone, and he spotted several figures in red racing to the east. “You!” bellowed a voice to his left.

Blade whirled, the Bowies held at waist level.

“I want you!” It was Radnor, standing over the limp form of his father, saliva caking his lips and chin, his eyes blazing his hatred. “Try me, Warrior! Just me! Without your knives!”

The Warrior spied a lone female Master sprinting to the north. He glanced down, astonished at the sight of Arlo Paolucci, dead, a foot away.

The Director was lying on his left side, his forehead split open wide. When had he killed Paolucci?

Radnor took a step forward. “Me, Warrior! Try me if you have the courage!”

Blade returned Radnor’s glare, his rage rekindled by the repulsive Master. He tossed the Bowies to the ground.

A vicious grin creased Radnor’s mouth. “Now you die!” he roared and charged.

Blade met Radnor halfway, their bodies colliding with a bone-jarring impact. Both kept their footing, Radnor delivering a brutal punch to the Warrior’s midsection. Blade doubled over, and Radnor locked his hands together and smashed the Warrior on the back of the head.

Suddenly Blade was on his knees, reeling, pinwheels of light flickering before his eyes, his ears barely registering the brittle chatter of machine guns from the near distance. He looked up, squinting, as the mutant swung those cupped hands again, but this time Blade blocked the blow with his left arm and retaliated. His malletlike right fist thudded into the Master’s stomach once, twice, three times in all, and Radnor staggered backwards. Blade went after the mutant with his fists flying, landing one blow after another, his knuckles pounding Radnor’s face. He swung again and again and again, even after Radnor toppled backwards, refusing to relent, venting his fury on the mutant, straddling Radnor and pounding the Master repeatedly. A red haze enveloped him, and he kept swinging long after Radnor had ceased moving. He was still raining punches when strong hands grabbed his arms, and he surged erect, prepared to take on more adversaries. Dimly, he perceived a familiar voice.

“—enough, pard! Enough! He’s dead! Snap out of it!”

Blade shook his head, his eyes narrowing, puzzled. He looked to his right.

“Are you okay?” Hickok asked, holding onto his friend’s right wrist. “It’s me! Nathan!” A machine gun was over his right shoulder.

“Blade?” said someone to the giant’s left.

Blade glanced around, inhaling deeply, his temples throbbing. “Hello, Rikki,” he said huskily.

Rikki-Tikki-Tavi peered intently at his friend. “You’ve been cut. I must tend to your wounds.”

“I’m fine,” Blade said. “Really.” He faced forward, surprised to see Cat eight feet away.

El Gato gazed at the littered bodies, at the dead and the dying, at the pools of blood, the severed fingers, and the slashed throats. He stared at the gore-spattered Warrior, his eyes widening. And then he did a strange thing. He crossed himself for the first time in many, many years and uttered a phrase he hadn’t used in ages. “Madre de Dios!”