Yama set himself. He relaxed every muscle and emptied his mind of conscious thought. Only instinct and reflex could save him now.
The mongooses stopped hissing and chittered at each other as if communicating. One stopped and the other went on around. When they were on opposite sides, they dipped low to the floor and their long bodies grew rigid.
Yama waited.
The daughter-in-law’s cheeks puffed out.
With lightning speed, both mongooses attacked. One jumped high, the other sprang low. Yama met the first with a downward arc of his scimitar, the blade striking the mongoose on its long neck. Honed to the sharpness of surgical steel, it sliced through fur, muscle and bone with lethal ease. Head and body thudded to the floor in a gout of blood, even as pain shot up Yama’s left leg.
The second mongoose had sunk its teeth into his calf. He snapped his leg and the mongoose fell and rolled and came at him again in a blur. Yama cleaved at its head but the cat-like killer vaulted out of reach. Again and again Yama swung. Again and again he missed his weaving, sinewy adversary. He feinted, went for a killing stroke, but only cut a foreleg when the mongoose twisted away.
Yama was bleeding from two wounds now but neither were severe. He almost felt sorry for the mongooses. Chuanchen had sicced them on him thinking he was an ordinary man. And against an ordinary man, yes, they would be deadly. But he was a Warrior. He lived to slay, and had years of training. He feinted, deliberately moving slower than he should to draw the animals in.
The mongoose leaped, Yama swung, and the halves of the body landed in the pool of blood that had spilled from the first.
The little girl screamed.
Her mother screeched in fury.
Yama started toward them. He would have to tie and gag all four. But he never got the chance.
Quickly turning, Chuanchen slid open a door Yama hadn’t realized was there, and before he could stop them, the whole family bolted outside, yelling at the top of their lungs.
CHAPTER 35
Blade struggled and strained but the hover device held him as if he were clamped in solid steel. He exerted every muscle, yet all he succeeded in doing was breaking out in a sweat.
One of the green creatures noticed and said something to the other one that caused both to laugh.
All Blade could do was fume. His anger, though, gave way to outright amazement as they penetrated into the city. Bangkok’s architecture was a marvel of sophistication. Even more wondrous was the technological development. He saw a flying bell streak in out of the west and descend behind a tower. He saw several ‘mechanical men’, as he regarded them, clank down a street. And a large metal cube that hung in the air over an intersection.
Then there was the incredible biological diversity of the inhabitants. Humans, mutants, hybrids, and more. Things he had never seen before. Things he had never even imagined.
All of which impressed on him that he’d leaped into battle, as it were, with faulty intel. He’d had no idea the Lords of Kismet were so advanced, technologically, or that they held a complete iron sway over the populace.
Blade could only pray to the Spirit that Hickok and Yama were faring better than he was. With any luck, they’d home in on his watch and pull his fat out of the fire before it was too late.
As if the green creature on the left side of the hover board had read his mind, it pressed a stud, bringing it to a stop, and bent over Blade’s wrist. The pair jabbered and both looked at Blade with what he took to be puzzlement. The one on the left relieved him of the Micro Tech IV and they examined it.
Blade wondered if they knew what it was. Should they smash it, he could forget being reunited with his friends any time soon. To his relief, the one slipped the watch into a pocket in its uniform and they marched on.
The avenues bustled with beings of every kind, and every last one was quick to get out of their path. The green creatures had the right of way. Or so Blade assumed until a large purple…..something…..with four arms and four eyes came striding over and placed two of its four hands on its hips. The green things bowed their chins, and after a long dialogue the purple being stepped to the hover device and lowered the quivering red slits that passed for its nose within an inch of Blade’s own.
Blade tried to ball a fist but couldn’t. All he could do was lie there. The thing spread its thin lips in a smirk or a sneer, baring teeth a grizzly would envy. Blade remembered the green creature that had rubbed its belly and mimed being eaten, and braced for the purple thing’s teeth to tear into his throat. Instead, the purple being unfurled and snapped a command. One of the green things activated the hover device and the purple being fell into step behind it, its four eyes fixed unblinkingly on Blade.
They hadn’t gone more than a couple of blocks when a commotion broke out ahead, a medley of screams and shouts punctuated by the drumming of a lot of feet.
Blade couldn’t twist his head to see, no matter how hard he tried. Once again the hover device came to a stop and the purple creature strode around and was immediately flanked by the pair of greens. All three pulled their side arms.
An older man in a modern suit ran up. Falling to his knees, he placed his forehead on the ground and spoke excitedly, pointing behind him. The purple being barked what might be questions and the man answered.
All three creatures ran off up the avenue.
Only when they had passed him did the old man sit up. He watched over his shoulder,
