“A fat lot of good that will be against the head shot any sensible hitman will want to take,” Juan observed.
“Yeah, so let’s reduce the size of the target,” Streak replied.
You could fit them with head shields if they wear the cowls with their cloaks. I saw lots of people doing that,” Xavier suggested.
“Good one. Then we can’t see much because of the masks and we’ll be able to hear bugger all. Then they can sneak up behind us and give us an APDS enema from five fragging meters,” Streak said. “I seem to remember discussing this with you guys somewhere else. Was it Swazi?”
“Yeah,” Xavier said in a bored voice.
Kristen’s ears pricked up. It wasn’t that far from her homeland, though the bandit- and warlord-infested petty fiefdoms of the Trans-Swazi Federation were a very different place from Cape Town. She’d known some escapees from the Swazi, as most people called it, and they’d been hard, mean souls.
“So we’ll skip the headgear, right?” Streak said.
“No, man. Better if they wear it and we keep watch from different angles,” Juan offered. “Then we can cover them.”
“What do you reckon, Your Lordship?” Streak appealed to a higher authority.
“I think” Geraint said, that Kristen should wear headware. She was the one shot at this morning. I’ll take my chances. I can use a Predator. Not as well as you chaps, of course, but I can use one.”
“I can’t,” Serrin said. “And I won’t use headware. I’ll have to see and hear if there’s any need for magic.”
They debated the pros and cons and finally decided that, of all of them, only Kristen needed the additional protection. Juan had brought the appropriate item with him, though it was far too large for her.
“It’s too heavy and I look ridiculous,” she complained.
“If it saves your life you’re not going to bloody care.” Listen to your Uncle Streak,” Streak said playfully. “He stopped you getting your bonce shot off this morning. He knows what he’s doing. He says the little girl should wear the funny thing on her head.”
He dodged her punch easily.
“Come on,” he said. “Really, you should. No bollocks now. We’ll take our chances, this is our profession. You’re not like us. You’ve got to take care now.”
There seemed to be genuine concern in his voice he looked a little embarrassed for a split-second before quickly resuming his normal sarcasm.
“And as for you, gray-head, you’d better make sure you’ve got us covered magically. If Raoul’s in town he bound to have some poxy combat mage or two in tow, and what those guys can do isn’t pretty. I’ve seen a blood spirit, and you don’t want to get one of those fraggers your face. One of us will stick real close to catch you you drain-and-drop, but you give any heavy spell you need every ounce of juice or we could be fragged senseless.”
“We’ve been there before,” Serrin reminded him. “On the hill.”
“This is different,” Streak insisted. “Blood magic. It’s like, I don’t know, it’s like biological weapons. Below the belt, right? Good clean firefight, that we like. Biokillers stink. Combat mages, they treat blood magic like its bio.”
“I get the picture,” Serrin said. “So let’s go eat”
The hours before midnight passed easily. They ate well, and avoided drink, but the throng of customers packed around them drank themselves silly, Everyone was resplendent in the costumes of the carnival, with silk and satin and velvet and gold threading, masks of silver and gold and bronze, cowls and capes and cloaks, everything whirl of color and texture and the mystery of it all, with everyone masked and few who they appealed to be. “Just don’t chat up the women, Michael,” Streak advised him: “Half of ‘em will be transvestites with a sausage surprise you don’t want to get your teeth into, know what I mean?” he leered.
“It hadn’t occurred to me to do so,” Michael replied evenly.
“You should have come out with me this afternoon,” elf said cheerfully.
“Perhaps not,” Michael said.
“God, you’re a joyless bugger sometimes,” Streak groaned.
“I enjoy myself in different ways,” Michael informed him.
“You’re about the only person you will enjoy,” the elf said tartly.
“It’s ten before twelve. Let’s go,” Juan told them. “What are our positions?”
“I’ll cover left, you behind, Xavier goes right,” Streak said. He leant over to Kristen and lowered his voice. “Now, little lady, go powder your nose and put your hard on,”
Kristen disappeared into the ladies’ room and returned three minutes later, looking distinctly large-headed.
“I don’t think it’s going to make the runways of Paris this season, but it'll do the job. Come on, everybody, I’m dying to see what our man has arranged for us at midnight,” Michael said. They pushed their way slowly out into the crowd.
Trumpets were already giving periodic fanfares to announce the imminent arrival of the Doge and his wife as they stood among the multitudes. Their watches showed five minutes to midnight.
At four minutes to the hour, as the crowd began to hush slightly in expectation, a slim and lithe, dark-haired South American man and half a dozen servitors idled toward the basilica from the south, pushing past indignant people in the piazzetta to get where they wanted to go. Xavier, his line of sight partly blocked by the campanile, did not see them. They had covering magic anyway.
At three minutes to midnight from east of the basilica half a dozen Spanish men in costumed attire pushed their way forward in like manner. Streak saw them first. He didn’t know who they were, but he knew they weren’t coming to enquire why he hadn’t posted tax returns for the past five years. He coughed to alert Juan and rubbed the nose of his mask to direct the ork’s attention in front of him. The ork saw the men and began to edge forward. Their attention locked on the men from the east, they too did not see the imminent arrivals from the piazzetta.
At two minutes to the hour the Doge’s Council began to troop through the central doorways of the basilica. The crowd cheered, realizing the Doge himself would soon appear.
The Jesuits from the east had no clear line of fire. Neither did Streak or Juan, and neither did the men to the south, but that didn’t bother them. They’d have been perfectly ready to kill everyone between themselves and their target if necessary. But it wasn’t. All they needed for their blood magic was to kill one person, and that victim had already had his throat slashed.
Serrin got an instant shiver of warning and knew instantly that a magical assault was upon them. He threw up the barrier just as the thing began to shimmer into form among them.
The materializing spirit stank of decay and rotting entrails, and it had only a partial form, vaguely humanoid in shape. It was composed of semi-coagulated blood, or at least it appeared to be. From the center of the thing, fountain of purulent gore squirted hotly at their faces.
Serrin’s barrier barely held it, The liquid corroded the mana barrier like acid dissolving metal, hissing and releasing a reeking cloud of toxic gas. People on either side of them began to panic and scream, some fainting, others being trampled down.
The men to the east pushed forward and drew their guns.
Streak and Juan did their damndest to get a line of sight on them, not realizing the direction of the real bleat. Xavier had, at last, done so, seeing the bloodied victim of the Aztechnology mage’s sacrifice. His SMG was already beginning to chatter.
Streak saw the gun barrels ahead of him and thought, Oh frag, I can’t stop them in time. No, not head shots. Come on, you sods, aim low, aim low. You’re going down.
He reached for a grenade. Above his head, one was already arcing toward its target. But it wasn’t the guns that mattered. They were mostly for self-defense and they weren’t being used yet. One among the crowd of Spanish arrivals unleashed a streak of blue fire that raced south and exploded among the Aztechnology crew.
When it hit the ground, it burst like a nuclear cloud, rising up and around the heads of the men like a gaseous, electrified halo. The brilliant fire burned the flesh from their heads down to the bone, and incinerated the upper halves of their bodies, smashing through the mana barrier of the Azzie mage like it wasn’t even there.