SPAR samurai post-apocalypse rescue

                                                                                                                                     I.

           Betani drew reign as the lights went out in the house they were nearing. The four riders behind her pulled up, and she held up a hand for silence. They waited in the dusk beside the overgrown street, making small creaks as they shifted in their leather armor. Trav's newhorse pawed the withered grass, searching for moisture, but Trav gave a soft click, patted its neck, and it stilled. Cutlass played with the honor-snap on his scabbard, while Rowan spotted an owl in a leaf-bare tree nearby, golden eyes swiveling to appraise their threat. Only Seth sat absolutely still, his eyes fixed on the house like Betani.

           In a few minutes, a smaller light appeared in the right corner of the house. Quietly dismounting, Betani led her horse to a trio of junipers just past the owl tree, wrapped its reins around some branches, and motioned the others to stay behind the junipers' screen. As she moved, Seth dismounted also, repeating the sign for silence. He was her second, guarding her whether she sought it or not, and even when she disapproved, he was so stubborn that eventually she stopped trying to prevent him.

           Betani reached inside her lamellar armor, where a scrollcase held a letter for Tymon Watchelder, who according to his smuggled report, was hostage in this house. The message was to persuade him to cooperate and give them access to a weapons cache he'd secured before being captured. A ransom note had been dropped at the gate of the nearest Watch city, Good-radon, giving an exchange spot half an hour's walk past the house and half more east. Good-radon's League-Arm had snorted in disbelief and dispatched them to this house with the singular comment, "Amateurs all."

           In addition to armor made of closely laced plates of lacquered PVC, Betani wore on her back two custom-made Japanese-style swords, each halfway between a katana and a wakazashi. Her soft leather boots had split toes and double soles, forcing her to avoid the cacti overtaking the remains of a bermuda grass lawn. Seth, wearing sturdier boots, kept his distance and his eyes on the house. As soon as the corner light went out, both dropped to a crouch, trusting to be mistaken for cactus in the dark.

           Betani flipped down her crested helmet's visor and surveyed the house. Although the visor was made for nightvision, a genetic adaptation gave her a much broader ability to detect life beyond the visor's range  and through non-stone walls. Thus she was able to discern three man-sized life sources in the corner room, and traces of two others further inside the house. Tymon had reported that five men held him. That meant he was in a basement, dead, or elsewhere. She glanced back, spotted Seth, and motioned him over. After conferring, he crept back to relay her orders.

           Cutlass and Travertine were sent, leading their newhorses, around the house to guard the back door. Seth would stand out of pistol range behind Betani, holding both realhorses. Rowan, a scout-mage, was to climb the roof to the corner of the front bedroom, and prepare to cast a sleep-spell at the best moment.

           When Rowan was in position, and verified Cutlass and Trav's by a thumbs-up, Betani tied a white scarf to a stick and stood. There was no movement inside the house, so she scooped up a few pebbles and threw them one by one at the window. On the third hit, the men inside stirred, and one peeped from the curtain's edge. Betani waved the parley flag. Seth shifted as if nervous. He knew that Betani would forewarn them if the men took firing positions, so it was really to convince the bandits that there were only two of them, both inexperienced.

          It seemed to work. Two minutes later the man by the window unlatched and opened it far enough to yell at the would-be rescuers. "You, woman, come inside if you wanna talk. Tell your man back there to come closer, so's we can keep an eye on him. And leave the horses."

          Betani shook her head. "One horse. One horse stays with him or I'm not coming inside. Better if one of us gets away if you start any mischief." She relied, of course, on her realhorse's war training to come when whistled for, and its shielding which Seth would activate before leaving her mount behind. If Seth's own horse were shielded, the bandits would hear it, assume a full-scale attack, and fire on them immediately, and they'd lose their best chance of rescuing the Watchelder.

          No conversation was heard from within, but the man at the window replied after a few seconds, "Fine. The swords are alright, sheathed, but no guns inside--we'll check you."

          "I don't carry firearms. It's forbidden by the code, as you know."

          "How do we know you're not ronin or faux samurai? So, no talk, unless we search."

          "Wakarimasen--I understand." Her special senses detected enemy movement near the back of the house. Trusting Travertine and Cutlass to interpret orders appropriately, she gave no sign of knowledge, and started for the door. Rowan, mirroring Betani, crept closer to the entrance along the roof edge.

          As soon as the door opened, Betani began speaking to cover the sound of Rowan's quiet chanting. "I hope you know we don't have the money on us." Behind the door were two men armed with six-guns, wearing grungy leather jackets and pants. She improvised further, "We were going to check out the place you set up, but we saw this house first and, well, it seemed like a good precau-..."

          At that instant Rowan's spell took effect and both men dropped to the floor.

          The remaining bandit fired at Seth from the corner window, but missed. Seth's horse reared and would have bolted, but he trilled a calming phrase while activating its shield, hopped half-way on, and careened towards the door. The bandit took another shot at him, but it caught the shield and fell to the ground.

          Meanwhile, Betani was hog-tying the larger unconscious man. Rowan excecuted a graceful flip off the roof edge and landed on the porch beside her.

          "Trav and Cutlass?" she asked.

          Betani held a finger to her lips and motioned Rowan to step left of the door. Seth stopped, flicked his head towards the back questioningly. Betani nodded, and he went to help.

          The samurai's dark eyebrows met over her nose as she considered the home's darkened interior. Then, as efficiently as a snake-catcher, she wrapped the second bandit's ankles, cinched the rope on the porch railing, hamstrung him, and heaved him off the porch. It would be hard for him to endanger them further, but harder yet to reclaim his current mode of living.

          In a moment Seth rode back with Travertine and Cutlass alongside. Trav braced a worn shotgun against his mount's pommel, while Cutlass had a new pig-sticker through his belt and an ivory-handled pistol in his left boot.

          Betani smiled and addressed them quietly, "Listen, folks. We've got a man left inside guarding the hostage, and he's not going to come out easy. We know he has a gun, and he can't be that stupid if he's letting us come to him. Ideas?" She looked first at Seth, glancing at the others to indicate she'd listen to any reasonable suggestion.

          "Maybe he wants to live, and is willing to make a deal for a chance to go free," Seth, always one to chop danger into bite-size pieces for others, opined.

          Rowan spoke next. "He's probably desperate, knows everyone else got caught, has no reason to trust, and it occurs to him that wounding one of us badly'll make us more likely to let him escape. He has a gun, yes, but won't use it 'til he can strike by surprise, point-blank. Answering us'd just give away his position and hope of advantage."

          "Well said, Miss Oakley," Betani acknowledged. "Maybe you can take some of his advantage, if he can't hold his weapons?"

          Rowan grinned. "My pleasure. I just need a shield and the rest of you to stay back 'til I say go." Seth, at Betani's nod, deactivated and removed the shield from his realhorse and handed it to her. Betani placed her lacquered leather helmet over Rowan's head, visor down.

          "Can you still cast this way?" she asked. Rowan nodded. "There are two settings on this type of shield." She showed her. "The personal one's smaller and higher frequency. Sort of like a mosquito buzzing rather than a bunch of hornets. It's got a one-meter radius, but you can hear it for up to three in total silence."

          Rowan took a sharp breath, held it several seconds, exhaled slowly, and waved them away. They stepped back from the door and waited, weapons ready.

          Rowan switched on the shield, clipped it to her belt, and stepped into the deeper darkness of the bandits' home base.

          "Maker of All Light And Beauty In The Universe, to whom all return in the end, guard our sister Rowan and help us free your servant, Tymon Watchelder," Betani prayed, barely audible even to herself. "May we not be ashamed in judgment at our failure, but praise You before men for Your help and deliverance." She could see, through the light of the Creator's gift, Rowan edge her way carefully to the hall door leading to the bedrooms, down the hallway, duck around the leftward bend, creep a few more paces, then halt.

          As Rowan stopped, the enemy life reading flickered out. Alarmed, Betani glided into the hallway, up to the corner, signalling Seth and the others to trail her. For three more seconds, Rowan's was the only life source ahead, then a second glimmer appeared four meters past her, to the right of a blackness forming in the corridor.  Rowan seemed paralyzed, although she'd never frozen in combat before. The hairs on Betani's neck and arms stood on end; she reached into her beltpouch, glanced behind to see Seth, tight-lipped, two paces back, Cutlass and Travertine behind him.

          Suddenly an unnatural coldness flooded the area, an ice that struck fear, loosed rational thoughts, clouded faith, and left their most vulnerable member face to a face with a monster that needed no weapons to kill. Betani screamed "Everyone down!" and flung a flash grenade at the darkest point of the hallway, between Rowan's light and the light behind the basement door.

          There was an unearthly scream, and as after-images of a half-demon's hideous shape silhouetted by blinding white light swam before her, Betani yanked Rowan back and yelled, "Seth, the Special!"

          Seth lurched to his feet, thrusting the silver-engraved Colt Mustang he carried into her hands. She pushed just the tip of its muzzle outside Rowan's shield and fired thrice.

          The shriek of the infernal being parting from its mortal form was ear-splitting and mercifully brief. The blackness faded into ordinary darkness, and the eerie cold lapsed into a mere late autumn chill. Everyone gasped in relief. Rowan gave Betani her helmet back and activated a lightglobe. Already the half-demon's features were dissolving like pudding, leaving an unpleasant, sulfurous smell.

          There was a loud knock from behind the basement door, as though something struck it, and a very muffled yell. Cutlass edged around the decaying corpse, withdrew a curved hairpin from his glove’s cuff, and picked the lock. Betani handed the Colt back to Seth. "Something you care to tell us about, Cutlass?" she asked mildly, but he shook his head as if to say, "Another time."

          He opened the door. Tymon Watchelder stood at the base of a curving stairway, grasping its rail while leaning against leg shackles anchored to the far wall. He was dirty, gagged, and blindfolded, his wrists tightly bound. A dog dish lay by his feet. Scratches covered his arms and legs, blood soaked through the blindfold over his right ear, and he trembled as from exhaustion or adrenaline, but appeared otherwise fine: a lean, middle-aged man, weathered, strong and enduring.

          They filed down, Cutlass unfastening Tymon's leg irons while Seth untied his hands and Rowan gingerly lifted off his blindfold. His palms were burn-scarred, but his hands were otherwise unharmed. The blood on his blindfold had come from a wound to his outer ear, where the bandits cut off part of his earlobe, presumably to send with their next ransom note if the first one failed. His eyes were crusted with dried tears, but as each step in freeing him restored his bottled emotions, the sight of them kindled anger, and it was directed at Betani.

          She met his eyes, then reached behind him and removed his gag.

          He turned to her. "Well, aren't you the cat's pee?" he growled. "Just takes getting kidnapped to finally see me!"

          Acutely embarrassed at his display of hostility, she faced him stiffly, almost looking away, but remembered that to him equated with granting him power, so she kept her gaze on his face, not offering apology, daring him to shame himself further.


          "Father," was all she said, as respectfully as she could manage.
          The silence stretched out. Finally Seth broke it. "See here, Watchelder Tymon. The least you could do is be grateful. That you're alive and free, and a terrible enemy is defeated without loss of life--isn't that a gift? Do you owe nothing, even courtesy, to the daughter who's the chief reason for it?"

          "Owe? She has given me nothing compared to what she took away, when she chose a liege lord over her own father! Whatever I've faced, the dangers were no greater to me alone than if she'd chosen to learn at my side. It is unnatural, for a woman, to put glory-seeking above family honor, above filial duty. I am ashamed, and sorrow fills my heart, because she spurns me, her closest kin, and chooses to serve a woman, who has no right to be her lord!"

          Betani bore his outpouring stoically, then pulled out the League-Arm's letter. "Pretend I am not here, then. You wrote that you had found and secured a weapons cache before you were taken prisoner. Is it still your wish to aid the people of Good-radon by revealing its location to the leaders who protect them?"

          Tymon read the message. It informed him that Betani, Seth, and other retainers, were official representatives of Good-radon, and authorized him to disclose the weapons hiding place to them before returning to the city. The person signing it as League-Arm was the woman to whom Betani had sworn loyalty--her daimyo. Tymon's allegiance was to a different hierarchy, whose leaders excluded women, but which claimed jurisdiction over roughly the same areas. Simple cooperation and coordination between the two groups was complicated by constant friction and invisible power games.

          When Tymon appeared ready to deny having authority to share his information with a rival organization, Seth held out the demon-hunting Colt. "I want you to see what we're up against--perhaps then you'll understand how important it is we work together, not against one another, for the good of the realm."

          Tymon pocketed the letter and examined the gun. "Silver bullets, I presume?" he asked.

          "Yes. The reason I hold it for Betani is that she has a God-given ability to see the energies, light and dark, of human- and demon-kind. But because she is samurai, it's against her honor code to use a firearm except in cases of demonic manifestation with lives in immediate threat. I am not so bound, but am one of the retainers placed under her command. I am not sure what learning you suggest she might have gained at your side, but can you justify denying, for all our sakes, not just hers, the advancement and responsibility given her for her merit, skills, and character in action? You should be proud of her, sir, instead of jealous, which is what you are!"

          "But nevermind that for now," Seth went on quickly, as Tymon glared fit to argue. "Come look at the body." They walked back upstairs, by which time the corpse had decayed so much that even its limbs were unrecognizable--it was just a purplish puddle of stinking slime that corroded everything it touched. "It doesn't matter how amateur the bandits who captured you were. This is just the beginning. Do you see this disease can spread like a cancer, that hostility and distrust between groups of people pledged to the same good cause can only abet its spread, until it's too late to stop it?"

          Tymon stared at the dark blob. A shiver wracked him then, and he said, "Let's burn this place to purge it of this evil. Where are the bandits, what's happened to them?"

          "They're outside, Elder," replied Seth. "But before we burn it, we should check for any documents which might reveal other plans."

          "Yes, you are right there. You know, there's a lot of use for a person of your talents in the Watch, perhaps even your own command...."

          Rowan cocked her head at Betani and said, "You know, I'm beginning to see why you never speak of your father and serve in a different branch of the militia than him."

          "Don't worry, Seth is much too wise to be suckered into the Watch, especially at Father's behest. I can't believe I've given up on him so completely that I'm not even angered when he undercuts me right to my nose. It's just sad."

          "And I'm sure your mother would be disappointed."

          "She died of a broken heart long before she passed away. Maybe she's praying for him from Heaven."

          This levity, in the midst of such a serious situation, was too much for Cutlass. He broke out in hysterical laughter and had to be led outside by Travertine. Betani found an oil lantern and lit it, then Rowan suggested that the three of them--Trav, Cutlass, and herself--wait outside with Tymon, to watch the prisoners and horses, while Betani and Seth searched the house.

          "Sounds like a great idea, Rowan. And since you'll be waiting, I'm sure you'll be hungry, especially Father. Why don't you scrounge up some food and take it outside to them?"

          "Will do." She headed off, light globe preceding her, to the opposite side of the house and the kitchen.

          Tymon regarded his daughter blankly. Then, deciding that nothing needed be said or was cause enough to reconsider his views, he turned and went outside after Trav and Cutlass.

(continued in part 2)