“She’s only one woman,” Reamer said, angrily. “Misty, Buffy, Ashley. Each of you take a group of the Osemala. Corner her and destroy her.”
“Yes, Master Kom,” Misty said. “ We’ll teach her the power of Osemi.”
“Just kill her and send her soul to hell,” Reamer said. “And get back here before the ritual is complete. You don’t want to be outside the pentacle.”
Barb went up the side of a tree then leapt off, flying over two zombies and taking off both their heads in a really elegant Swan Passes Over River Under Moon maneuver. Her landing, however, was based far more on Master Ti Kwan’s “action movie” techniques. It was a surprisingly useful form, she’d discovered, for fighting zombies in near darkness in a heavily forested island covered in logs and stumps.
“Thank you, Seigun Kwan,” Barb said, grabbing a sapling in one hand to swing around and take off the head of another zombie. “And now I’m pole dancing. Janea would love this.”
She scrambled up the sapling until she’d reached the leafy part, then leaned out. The tree bent under her weight and she slowly drifted down towards the ground. Hooking her legs onto the tree permitted her to reach down and take off the head of another zombie from just out of its reach.
“Interesting,” she said, flipping off of the tree and landing on the body of the zombie. “Clean-up on this is going to be a bitch.” She backhanded, hard, and cut all the way through the torso of the zombie stumbling up behind her. “And I’m going to have to spend some serious time sharpening.”
Two levin bolts came out of the darkness and she managed to deflect both. They were much lighter than Vartouhi’s, but two was a bit much.
“Oy vey,” she said, charging down the line of one of the bolts. She caught sight of one of the GPA girls running away and wasn’t about to let her get away. However, as she closed through the woods, a zombie reared up in her way.
There was not much technique to the body check she sent its way. The zombie, totally uncoordinated, fell backwards. She stabbed down, then had to wrench the sword out of its skull. Which wasn’t particularly easy.
As she was tugging and twisting, three levin bolts came in from various directions. She deflected two, but the third hit her square in the face like a punch from a professional boxer.
“OW!” Barb bellowed, ripping the sword out of the zombie’s head. “I am so going to kick your spoiled asses!”
“What does it take to kill her?” Ashley wailed. “I hit her in the face! She should be dead!”
“Bring in all the Osemala,” Misty said, nervously. “Go gather them up. We need to swarm her.”
“Okay,” Buffy said, then screamed as a cat attached itself to her face.
Lazarus didn’t have any special cat martial arts training. But he didn’t really need it. When twenty pounds of tom are trying to scratch your eyes out, you’re effectively out of the fight.
“Aaah!” Buffy screamed. “Get it off!”
Misty grabbed Lazarus, but he was tightly attached to Buffy’s face. Except for his teeth, which he managed to turn around and latch onto Misty’s hand.
“Get back!” Ashley yelled. “I’ll get it off!”
Misty let go of the cat, then went “Noooo!” just a bit late.
Ashley managed a perfectly placed levin bolt, again, which hit Lazarus in the back.
The cat let out a yowl and bounced off of Buffy. Who dropped stone dead.
“You idiot!” Misty screamed. “ You killed Buffy! ”
“No problem,” Barb said, taking off Ashley’s head. “She won’t make that mistake again.”
“Wait!” Misty said, holding up her hands. “Time out!”
“Time…out?” Barb said, wonderingly. She spun in place and took off another zombie’s head, then turned back to face the junior sorceress. “Seriously? Time… out?”
“I didn’t want to get involved with this,” Misty said, whimpering.
“I’d say tell it to the judge,” Barb said, taking the girl’s head off. “But it’s sort of a judge, jury, executioner thing.”
She looked over at Lazarus, who was licking the burned patch on his back.
“Would you try not to get yourself killed?”
“Kabala field,” Mills said, holding up a crystal. It was sparkling blue.
The team had rappelled down through the trees with some difficulty and were now in an assembly area just east of the ritual point.
“D…ash it,” Marquez muttered, slinging his M4 and drawing a machete. “Why the See can’t come up with a reliable counter I don’t know.”
“Cold steel, boyos,” Mills said, pulling out a basket-hilted claybeg. “Zombies, witches and cold steel. Feels like old times.”
“At least it will be quiet,” Marquez said, stepping forward. As he did, a zombie, completely lost, stumbled up through the woods. He hacked it in the neck, then, as it grabbed him by the harness and pulled him in, he sawed and hacked at it until he’d taken the head off. “Quietish.”
“And bloody bloody,” Mills said ferally. “Right, let’s go chop up some naughty schoolgirls.”
Barb bounced off of two trees, taking out three zombies in a combination of Floating Iris On Wind-Tossed Water and another Heron Over Mountain. She landed with a slight stumble and realized that the combination of repeated hits from levin bolts and just hacking up zombies was starting to wear her down.
“Gotta get more PT,” Barb muttered as she stepped into the clearing.
She wasn’t sure exactly what the ritual was supposed to do. From her perspective it was just one more cult trying to raise some ancient evil.
“I wish these groups would learn already,” she said.
She could see Reamer and Dr. Downing in the group. No surprise. The rest appeared to be of an age to be members of GPA, with a few older women. About half of them were continuing to move in a complex pavane while maintaining a high chant. The other half were turned to face Barb and, emerging from the woods on the other side, the Opus Dei team. Most of the girls were holding fencing swords, and they were not protectively tipped.
“You know,” Barb said, pointing at the nearest foil, “That’s a terrible safety violation.”
One of the older women raised her hands and began to chant in counterpoint to the group of ritualists, then made a casting gesture at the Opus Dei team.
“Won’t work,” Marquez said, flicking blood off of a machete. “We cannot be made your servants. We are protected by the hand of God. I hereby state, as a licensed contractor of the Federal Government authorized to use due force, that you are in violation of United States Federal Codes Eighteen Sixty-Three A, Use of Black Magic, General; B, Performance of Black Magic for the Purposes of Raising Demon, Demons, Demoness or Demonesses; L, Use of Black Magic for the Removal of Souls; R, Use of Black Magics for the Purposes of Control of Others; and T, Use of Black Magics for the Purposes of Casting of Spells of Unweal, as well as moral laws of most major religions. The penalty is twenty-five years to life in a Federal Corrections Facility for each separate violation. Failure to desist shall result in the use of deadly force.”
“You want deadly force,” Dr. Downing said, cackling. “ This is deadly force!”
He raised his hand and threw a levin bolt at Marquez. The former spec ops trooper raised something that looked like a small shield, and the levin bolt grounded on it.
“Thank you,” Marquez said, hefting his machete. “That allows us to open up the whole can of whoop- ass.”
Barb and the Opus Dei team charged forward at virtually the same moment, and the scene descended into a maelstrom.
Barb was in the unfortunate position of having seven of the Stepfords on her side of the ritual. Three were wielding epees, and the other four foils. She knew very well that a good “touch” from any of them would put her out of the fight, probably dead. Just because they looked like toys didn’t mean they weren’t dangerous.
“Laz, do not get near the swords,” Barb said, then stepped forward.
Barb danced around the seven for a bit, feeling them out. Fortunately, only one of the girls using an epee
