We went through the bodies quickly, and managed to get some worthwhile trinkets out of them, including a decent pistol that Lilly immediately claimed.
“I’m running out of my Coppersmith Bullets.” She explained, taking the pistol and expertly checking it over, and then looking for any extra ammunition on the body of the cultist. “They’re expensive, take time to make, and I only have so many. And with the exhibition, the crazy ‘smith I usually go to for ammo is busy.”
“Understood.” I replied, glad to have that information, since it would prove important for any future gun fights, which I knew were coming, and coming quick. “Got any more large area grenade like ones left?”
“One.” She nodded, rigging up a holster for the pistol on some of the straps of her odd looking coppersmith outfit. “It will do the job of a grenade, just with less fire or outright explosions. Just as powerful and effective though.”
“Hold that in reserve until we have a strongpoint we need to break.” I told her. She nodded as she put a few handfuls of bullets into her little leather pockets.
“Oh hello, what have we here?” Maggie purred, pulling a large piece of paper from the body of the elaborately robed old cultist. It was fairly bloody, but not completely soaked through, so hopefully it was still legible.
“Bring it over to the table.” Lilly said, walking over to her. Maggie quickly brought it over as I joined them, curious what they found, and she opened it.
Well now. I thought with a sudden grin. Thanks for the map you old freak!
A map is indeed what it was, and from a glance, it had several positions marked out, which meant we no longer had to stumble around in the dark. However, as I looked it over, my grin morphed into a frown, and then a glare. There were another half dozen places marked out, all around the building!
And then there was the obvious big stage area, and it was marked out too, with a different symbol that made me think the main nest was around there.
Seriously? I thought to myself, disgusted at the sheer scale of this mess.
“This is quite the little undertaking we’re up against.” Ella muttered, looking the map over next to us. “We need help, but we also need to attack and stop this.”
“We’re dividing up our forces.” I decided, looking the map over again before I turned to everyone else. “There’s just too many places we need to be all at once. Wyatt, myself and our little group will go after the main nest that’s somewhere around the main stage. Hopefully we’ll get them before they make themselves known.”
“You really think they’d do that, after all their efforts to be hidden?” Lilly asked, looking at the corpses at our feet before back to the map.
“I do.” I sighed, annoyed at the sheer scale of this mess. “Wyatt and I have experience dealing with flamboyant megalomaniacs, don’t we?”
“We do at that.” Wyatt chuckled darkly. “And they’d never pass up the chance to show off on a big stage, and this stage looks like one of the biggest in the country. And it’s a full house to boot. Hell yes they’re going to, ‘announce themselves,’ if they can.”
“Right, so we head straight there, see what’s going on, and then strike as hard as we can.” I nodded to him before looking over at the Pinkertons. “Meanwhile, you boys use this map, and hammer their little relay points, one after the other. Take your time, scope them out, and crush them.”
They nodded to me. A few grinned, but the rest looked grim and determined.
“Lilly, I know you can write, and if memory serves, you can sketch decently as well.” I said, turning to her. “Make a few quick sketches of that map for them, and for us.”
“Will do, but why a few?” Lilly asked as she turned and pulled out her notebook and a pencil as she quickly got to work.
“Because we need help.” I sighed before I turned back to the Pinkertons. “One of you needs to take this map back to the general. Make sure he gets it, and he gets a report of what the hell’s going on. See if Rockefeller or Morgan or even that kid Vanderbilt has scared up any extra gunmen, then grab ‘em up and bring them for the fight. Either to the other relay points, or to the main stage area.”
They nodded in agreement. They were professional soldiers, all the way. But there were so few of us, and we had a lot of ground to cover, and from the looks of it, a lot of enemies to take on.
“Decide amongst yourselves who’s going back to report.” I told them, but then my face hardened as a thought occurred to me. “Whoever it is, you have to get back to the general. If any of those freaks we left at the base of the stairs start waking up, drop them.”
I met their eyes. “We don’t have the time to be nice, and we don’t have the numbers to indulge in mercy. They’re committed, armed, and they outnumber us. And there’s a hell of a lot peoples lives on the line.” I felt the familiar cold that came with the hard, desperate fights like this.
The Ruthless Calculus of War my old major used to call it.
“If they start waking up, drop them, and don’t think twice about it. We have no room for risk, chance, or for being nice. We need you to get through, no matter what.”
They all met my eyes unflinchingly, and nodded. They understood. They were professionals after all. Carnegie really had hired the best.
Lucky us. I thought as I nodded back before turning to our own group, who were equally grim and determined.
“We ready?” I asked, looking over at Lilly, who’d been sketching the whole time.
“We are now.” She replied, pulling the papers out of her notebook and handing them to me. I looked them over, and nodded, impressed. She’d managed to make three quick sketches that while rough, and small, matched the map most excellently.
I took the blood covered map, gave it a quick once over, just in case, then folded it up and handed it to the lead Pinkerton man, along with two of the three sketches. He nodded, took the papers, and then they started quietly conferring with one another on who would go, and who would stay.
“Well, shall we?” Wyatt asked, gesturing towards the hallway that led to the storage room under the main stage. The room the cultists map had indicated was the special area for them.
“We shall indeed.” I nodded, pulling my gun back out, and with one last glance at the Pinkertons, who had begun heading down their own tunnel, while a lone, young one headed off alone. He had the bloody map in one hand, and his gun in the other.
He also had a calm, determined look on his face.
I hoped he made it.
After that, our group moved quickly, but carefully down the tunnel we were using to bypass the other relays, which seemed to circle the majority of the building, and instead headed straight for the main stage.
For awhile, there was only us, walking down a quite, well lit hallway, with the sound of our boots and shoes echoing off the walls being the only sounds we heard. There was no talking, no joking, no banter. We’d all grown stone cold focused, since we knew we were heading to a nest of lunatic freaks.
A moment later, I heard several gunshots echo back to us. One after the other, unhurried, spaced out, and I suspected we wouldn’t need to worry about that group by the stairs. Well done soldier. I thought with grim pride.
It’s a hard call, but in circumstances like this, victory was paramount, and mercy or kindness was only an indulgent foolishness.
With that particular worry off my mind, I refocused on the task at hand.
We quickly reached a door that would lead to, according to the map, a similar room like the one we’d fought the cultists around the table in. Unlike the door from the stairs that led down here, this one was shut, and seemingly unguarded.
We slipped forward, with Wyatt and I taking up either side of the door once again, though this time Maggie joined me, and Lilly and Ella joined Wyatt on his side. As we stacked up on our door, I heard very distant, very faint sounds that sounded like gunshots, and they sounded much more like gun battles.
The Pinkertons must have found their next relay point.
I slowly, carefully reached over and opened the door, making sure only my hand was exposed, not my body. Once it was open and no shots came tearing through it, I quickly leaned my head out partly to get a scan of the room before leaning back.
I almost did a double-take when I did, since there was no one there!
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Carefully, I checked again, but unlike the first room we’d entered, there was no one present here. I quickly motioned everyone to follow me, and they did. We came to another large underground chamber, with a table in it, some chairs, and the look of a place that had housed someone, but it now stood empty.
“Where are they?” I wondered, looking around, making sure we weren’t walking into an ambush.
“Where megalomaniacs and narcissists are always at when they get half a chance.” Ella sighed glancing around the room until her eyes fell on a distant staircase. “Up stairs on the stage, performing for the crowd.”
“Oh seriously?!” Wyatt groaned as we all turned to the stairs, and immediately headed over to them. “Man, they just couldn’t wait for us to show up first, huh?”
“Being rude seems like a requirement for these people.” I chuckled as we headed up the stairs, our guns still out. “We’ll have to a have a talk with them about that.”
“Let’s.” Maggie chuckled darkly as we reached the door, and carefully, slowly opened it as well.
Again it was another large, empty room, but this one looked more like a backstage room with benches, chairs, closets and some lockers. So, I had to figure that was progress. Looking around I spotted some muddy smudges from where we were at, that led right through this room to what I suspected was the hallway that led to the stage.
“Let’s go.” I said, pointing out the tracks before quickly following after them. At this point we were determined to catch up to these lunatics, no matter what!
We moved down the hallway, not sure what we would find.
We came to a long curving hallway that made me think we were behind the stage and the audience seats. Looking around, I saw two ushers who been gutted and left to die, their blood still pooling around their bodies.
Clearly we weren’t the only ones now in a hurry.
I could still hear the music playing as we started walking down the curved hallway. The hallway had a lot of doors, so we weren’t sure where we should look. However, as we were getting close to several doors, the sound of the music abruptly cut off.
That can’t be good. I thought darkly. We all glanced at each other, before we moved forward in a hurry to the side door that led to the main stage.
There were a couple of robed cultists there, but their backs were to us, since they apparently wanted to see the big show too. Without hesitation, Maggie quickly bound up to them, stabbed one in the neck right into the spine with her knife, and then whirled around with her claws on the other.
Again going for the throat.
It was over in seconds, and both died with wet, quiet gasps of shock.
Of course Maggie was now even bloodier, but at this point, I found that only added to her exotic allure. A bloody charm I guess.
We carefully moved forward, and were finally able to see out onto the stage itself, the same stage we’d seen from the audience seats less then half an hour ago. What a different path my night had taken.
We also saw that we were just too late.
There were nearly two dozen cultists out on the stage, all wearing robes, but only some with their hoods up. Others, the more amphibian mutated ones, were walking around with their hoods down. Most of them looked like frog people, honestly.
I’d never really paid attention to how many kinds of beastkin there were, or which species that had shown up since the Shattering were their own thing, or were part of the beastkin tribes. Some were easy: like elves, dwarves, mere-folk.
Centaurs.
Some less so, like the minotaurs; some considered them beastkin while others, including the big bull-men and cow-women in question, vehemently disagreed.
I’d never really cared honestly. Some had served with me during the civil war, others had served on the other side. I’d grown up with some elvish farm families just down the road from where I lived, and heard about dwarves fleeing Europe and flocking to mining towns and industrial factories.
While I’d also heard of lizard men, and even weird stories of snake men, (however the hell that works), I’d never actually heard of Frog Men.
Then again, I thought about the community of hand-sized mice people I’d just helped rescue and put up at my hotel. The women gangsters at Five Points who’d been turned into human sized Mouse Beastkin. Or what I’d heard happened to the folks at the town where I’d found Halona.
Man Wolves, she’d called them.
So, maybe there was a reason I’d never heard of Frog people. And given how some of these guys, and even women, looked only to be half and half, or had bits and pieces of their bodies altered, there might be a reason for that. Given everything else, I suddenly got a very bad feeling about what was going on.
But then again, maybe I was just being paranoid.
The cultists had spread out amongst the musicians, and everyone was nervous, including the audience, who had no clue what the hell was going on. As I watched, another elaborately dressed cultist strode out onto the stage, and walked right up to where the conductor was standing. The conductor eyed him, but slowly stepped away without having to be prompted.
Crazy looking the old conductor may have been, but clearly his instincts were still sharp.
The cultist ignored the conductor, instead turning to face the audience.
“Welcome all, to this glorious night of transcendence!” He called out, his voice carrying over the whole room, every bit of it packed. “Tonight our master will become a true Great Old One! And you shall be among the chosen who shall join him on his ascendence! Rejoice, for you have been plucked from the vile and vulgar masses to receive the true form that our great master so delights in! The form of the true powers and rulers of this world!”
“Oh wow.” I muttered darkly, stunned.
“I’ve heard some people full of themselves babble on before,” Lilly muttered next to me. “But nothing on this level.”
“He’d fit right in with the nobility in private clubs back home.” Ella muttered darkly.
“Can I shoot him now?” Wyatt asked, glaring at the ranting lunatic.
“If you can hit him without hitting someone else by accident, feel free.” I replied, shaking my head at this loon.
Unfortunately, it seemed that with so many people in the way, even Wyatt Earp wasn’t willing to risk that shot.
Yet.
On the other side of the stage, out of another hallway similar to ours, several more cultists arrived, carrying a litter between them. And on that moving table they carried, was another device similar to the one we’d already shut down. Albeit much bigger.
And also glowing already.
“Aw hell.” I groaned, trying to workout how to attack without getting innocent people killed. Or getting ourselves killed, since there were almost twenty of these idiots now, all mixed in with the orchestra.
“Rejoice and embrace!” The arrogant speech giver went on to the massive audience. “For tonight you shall be remade from the image of man, into the image of our great master! Our master, Xantrogis!”
“Who?” I asked, lost at this point since I was focusing on the angles, positions and openings to attack from.
“No idea.” Lilly replied, sounding exasperated.
“Never heard of him.” Ella answered next. Everyone else said much the same thing.
Whoever this guy was, he sure as hell wasn’t famous. I wondered briefly if that might have been what these murderous morons were after, but found I didn’t really care. All I actually cared about was stopping them cold.
Unfortunately, it looked like that robed bastard, for all that he seemed to like hearing himself talk, wasn’t going to give me the time I needed.
“And now to start this process!” He shouted, as several of the cultists standing in a circle around their device took out instruments of all things, and started playing. “Now to begin your glorious transformation into something more fitting for our Great Old One!”
The melody was bizarre, creepy, haunting, and strangely wrong, even if it wasn’t necessarily grating or bad. I just knew, down to my soul, that this music was not good music. This was music born of darkness, wickedness and depravity.
Something about it just felt foul to me.
Above the glowing device, in the middle of the space above the orchestra in the vast auditorium, a haze appeared, like a bubble of heat distortion. Then it got thicker, and thicker, before suddenly a wringing bell sounded, and a hole appeared in that haze. I had no other way to describe it.
A hole of darkness, like a circular tear in thin air, opened up dozens of feet above the orchestra.
From my vantage point, I could see into it somewhat, like it was a half hole, half orb of darkness, however that worked. I and everyone else all stared in riveted shock at what had just happened. And in the background, the sick, twisted music continued to play.
Suddenly, a strange dome of greenish light spread out from the hovering hole, and covered the entire concert hall. I honestly got the feeling that it covered most of the massive building, and I was willing to bet that anyone trying to make a break for it, wasn’t going anywhere.
Then I heard a cry of dismay, and I saw people struggling to push themselves up, as if they couldn’t get out of their seats. I stared as more and more people, men, women and increasingly frightened children, all pushed, pulled and wiggled in their seats, trying to move. Even the Orchestra was trying, to no avail.
The big talker laughed. “Ha ha ha! What’s the matter? Can’t get up? You’re all wriggling around like tadpoles! Don’t worry, it’s only temporary! Soon you’ll not just be wiggling, or walking, but hopping about like never before!”
“If it’s the last thing I do in this world,” Maggie growled darkly. “I’m going to rip his tongue out of his mouth before I kill him!”
“I’m afraid you’re going to have to get in line for that pleasure, my dear.” Wyatt replied, staring around the room. We all looked at one another, and took small, careful steps. Fortunately, we were still able to move!
Seemed this trick only worked on people who’d already been sitting down.
With that out of the way I desperately went back to scanning around the room, trying to work out where to attack from. There were so many, and spread out, and I knew from recent experience they were all armed.
Never mind the huge number of hostages they had access to, all around them!
“And now, at last, the glorious chosen moment has arrived!” The damn lunatic called out, yet again. “The appointed hour has been reached!”
And there, in the hole in open air, I saw several eyes appear around the darkness, all staring out towards the audience. The eyes were all colors and kinds, but several reminded me of frog eyes.
No shock there.
These robed guys had a serious motif going for them.
Before anyone could even scream, a sudden gush of liquid began shooting out of the floating hole and into the audience!
It was a tightly contained, fast moving jet of liquid that began being hosed into the people trapped in their seats! Slowly, it began to rotate around, like a child playing with a hose, and random parts of the audience hall were soon drenched in the strange liquid. As I watched one area that was covered in the stuff, I realized that it looked more like thick, greenish slime than water.
“They’re, sliming, the audience?” I asked in a daze. The others just stared for a moment, same as me. The audience folks that had been thoroughly drenched, almost drowned in it in some cases, slowly pushed it away from themselves, breathing, yelling and screaming.
Like they were swimming while trapped in their seats.
The way it was going, I knew these lunatics were going to cover the whole massive auditorium. And given the way that chief lunatic was laughing while it was going on, I knew I really didn’t want to know what might happen next, on any level.
“Okay, to hell with it.” I decided darkly. “We run in, dropping any that we can along the way. Our primary targets are those instrument playing freaks! Cut them down and stop their orchestra however you can! Then someone shut off the device while the rest of us cover you.”
“And then after that?” Wyatt asked, sounding focused and ready, which only made sense: Sadie was in the upper booths of the audience after all.
“Win.” I replied coldly.
Everyone else nodded and readied their weapons.
“Hit ‘em!” I snapped, and we charged out onto the stage at a flat sprint.
This was an all or nothing fight. We were going for all the marbles. We would either stand triumphant in victory, or perish.
But I knew one thing for certain: even if we lost, we damn sure weren’t going to go alone!