Good! Sunrise! Now, where did I leave off? Damn, I'm not
sure. Well, I'll just start over. I got time.
I'm Konrad DeRuyter. I was born in Bloemfontein, RSA, on
March 18, 2067. I was a big-game hunter since I was 20, one of
the best. I had a license to hunt from the Guardian itself, subject
to her restrictions. I didn't object to them, because they were
completely sensible. My Sagan abilities made me a skilled hunter
of the most dangerous game on Earth, and, after my
apprenticeship, I never had an accident happen to me. Some of
the less-capable people who came along with me [and adding to
my purse], were not as fortunate.
Being the best soon became dull, because the challenge
dulled. So, starting in '96, I started accepting side jobs,
associating with people who wanted others eliminated. That put
some fun back into my hunts, because I had to arrange for my
'companions' to die without bringing suspicion onto me. It also
padded my bank accounts. So, by '05, I had amassed a sizable
reputation among the 'right' circles as an eliminator. I also held
hunts without eliminating people, so as to maintain my
reputation among the mundanes. My waiting list for hunts was
almost a year long!
My greatest challenge started about a year ago. One of my
lesser associates presented me with a sheaf of papers that he
had acquired, thinking that I would be interested in them. After
reading them, I agreed with him.
"Where did you get these?" I asked him.
"My cousin pulled these off the Web last month. The
chicken-scratches are the original documents, and the other
sheaf is the translation. Took him about a week to do it." He told
me.
"Have you read these?"
"Just enough to determine that you would be interested in
them."
"Correct. How much do you want for these?"
"I'd like a quarter-million."
"I'll give you an eighth. In gold coins, if you'd like."
"That will work, sir."
"Good." I went to the safe, opened it, and counted out
$125,000 in gold coins, a mix of American, Canadian, British,
Saganian, Russian, and Mexican. As I counted them out, I asked
him for his cousin's name and address, for future reference. He
gave the information, I finished paying him, and dismissed him
from my study. Then, I began to read and study in earnest.
The papers were the complete medical files of Raven
Somers- the wife of the former Saganian Deputy Prime Minister,
and the mother of the current one. The other documents were
parts of what seemed to be her diary, which outlined some
rather revealing information. The most important part was that it
revealed that she, and she alone, is and has always been, the
Black Rose of the Velvet Shadows.
I remembered when I applied to VS years ago. I was turned
down for failing some sort of 'moral and ethical' evaluation, as I
remembered it. Then and there, I resolved that she was to be my
next target. This time, I wasn't going for the kill. Instead, I
wanted to capture and interrogate her.
Damn. Sunset. Time to sleep.
Dawn. Where was I? Oh, yeah. Stalking the bird.
First thing I needed to do was to find out where she lived.
That wasn't difficult, because where her husband lived was a
matter of public record. Next step was going there to begin
surveillance. For that, I brought my pet mage, Tyrrell Powers.
Now, Tyrrell is a mage that specializes in obscuring and
concealment spells, and he's worth every cent he demands. We
set up 'duck blinds' at her manor, her kid's mansion on the
South Shore, and Government House. If I knew where VS HQ
was, I would have set one up there.
It soon became apparent that the bird had another means
of flying around, because she was seldom seen between points.
Contacting my associates, I managed to get a record of her
transfer booth activity. That didn't work well, because she
seldom used them.
"She must have another means of getting around, but
what?" I asked Tyrrell one day, about two months into the
stakeout.
"Well, we know that she can fly, but that doesn't explain all
the missing activity. Apparently, she must have a very high-level
access to a full transporter system." Tyrrell told me.
After thinking about it, I had to agree. She kept on moving
around far faster than usual to points not on a transfer booth
network. So, we set up more surveillance points, using known
locations of her family members. We also put up a stakeout on a
location in Louisiana, which was implicated in her, and her
husband's, financial records.
That was a scary thing, because when I went to set up the
post, I found many people running around that place at night,
and they all showed up wrong on the thermal-imaging scanners.
Very wrong. What really shocked me was when I caught her on
the thermal, and she showed up the same way!
It was Tyrrell that turned up the clue. She was a vampire! An
unusual one that was able to go out in daylight without burning
up. We checked her medical records, and found that she had
some differences from a classical vampire. We filed that away for
later, for use in the takedown.
In June, I got wind that she was camping out in the Iraqi
desert. So, I went there. Tracking her was a real bitch,
complicated by the fact that lots of other people were tracking
her as well! I, and I alone, managed to follow her. She was like
an animal, instead of a person, which gave me an edge. After
she stopped, that was when I decided that I wanted to capture
her not for snubbing me years before, but because she was
simply the biggest challenge to my tracking abilities I have ever
faced! This was so much fun!
Months passed as I studied her, adding more bits of
information to the file I had on her, trying to find a pattern in her
movements. In October, I received a call from her son, the
deputy Prime Minister, asking about a photo safari. Generally, I
don't enjoy them, but I agreed to it this time, telling him that I
would take him along on a scheduled hunt. He could take all the
pictures he wanted, while I did my work. He wavered, but
agreed.
That week with him and his wife was very profitable to me
on several levels. They got their pictures, I got my kills, and, in
exchange for the pelts, I managed to pump a lot of information
out of them. When I asked why he would want the pelts, Mr.
Somers told me that he has a half-brother and a nephew who
liked to do tanning, and he wanted to surprise them with some
exotic pelts. We were hunting in the mountains of southwestern
Canada, and I bagged what I was allowed to get, he got the
skins and heads [along with a full condor body], and I found out
quite a bit about his family.
Another benefit of the hunt was that I was invited to the New
Year's Eve party at his mother's place. It was unfortunate that
she was blinded a week or so before, preventing an
assassination attempt on the Saganian Prime Minister. It didn't
seem to slow her down any. The few hours at the party garnered
a lot of information about her for me, the least of which was that
I resolved not to do the takedown until she had her sight
restored, which, I heard, would be sometime near spring.
I also learned that she almost never went out without
somebody near her. That just made the hunt all the more sweet
and challenging! One thing I had to admit to myself was that the
tanner did a fine job with the pelts- better than my own men
could. I resigned myself to a longer wait to take her down,
because her family was formidable indeed! I had to take her out
when she was alone and traceable- I would just have to wait for
my opportunity, because, sooner or later, all prey makes a
mistake. I, being the predator, just had to be patient.
Damn. Sundown. Time to sleep . . .
Is it past dawn already? Oh, damn, its raining. Oh, well.
Another thing I had to worry about was how to get her from
where we caught her to where I would be waiting. Tyrrell handled
that- he found that her husband owned a yacht, but he seldom
visited it. So, he managed to get one of my men hired as the
dock maintenance worker. There is a transfer booth at the
marina, so we could get her there quickly.
I wondered how we could restrain a vampire, but again,
Tyrrell found out how. He found, by studying her medical
records, that curare has the effect of making her sluggish and
slow. So, we decided that he would handle the takedown- he,
being a mage, knew more about these weird things than I do.
It wasn't until the middle of February that she regained her
sight. Then. . . then . . . oh, damn. Sundown.
High clouds. No rain. Good sunrise. What was I thinking
about? Oh.
Yes, the takeout. The bird had settled into a pattern, going
to an art supply store every week down in the local village,
Morris Cross, I think it is. That was one of the few times that she
drove, instead of flying or teleporting. The other times she went
driving, she usually rode a motorcycle, and had a bunch of girls
with her- her daughters and granddaughters, I found.
On her fourth trip, we bagged her. I wasn't there for the
takeout, just in case something screwed up. Unfortunately for
us, the alarm went out sooner than we thought. Also, Tyrrell
screwed up. They tried staking her on the boat, and they found
that she has a bad reaction to wood. So, they bled her out to
put her to sleep.
When she arrived at my compound, she was a burned,
desiccated husk. I almost shot Tyrrell then and there, but, he
said he could revive her, given time. She was in my possession,
then. Time to make some money.
I called my number-one underworld supplier of information,
and my main elimination supplier, Edward Capstone. I called him
and asked him if he wanted to 'chat' with the Black Rose of the
Velvet Shadows. He agreed to fly down to my Guatemala
compound for a look.
That night, we moved her. Just in time, too- all my American
continent compounds were invaded that night. The team that
attacked my Guatemalan compound was repulsed with heavy
casualties on their side. One of the traps blew one guy's feet off,
and I personally shot another through the head. They got away
before we could capture them. Too bad I never bought a teleport
shield.
The next morning, Ned arrived. When I showed him the
corpse, he got somewhat upset, but I managed to calm him
down. I showed him the papers proving her identity, and he
easily, readily agreed that this was a prime source. He offered
$150,000,000 in cash and gold to pay for her, in whatever
condition she was in when he came back. I asked for $500
million. We settled on a quarter-billion, in cash. He told me that
he would be back in a few days, after he acquired the money. We
both preferred cash, because there would be fewer traces left.
Ned flew back to Acapulco to start rounding up the money.
Three days later, Tyrrell still hadn't managed to revive her.
He did ask for blood donations from the staff to round up
enough blood to revivify her, so he said. Then, the invasion hit.
Sunset. Damn. I'm having fun...
A bright, sunny morning. What was I thinking of? Oh, yeah,
the invasion.
It was late afternoon that the invasion hit. We were attacked
from all sides by all sorts of things- in the sky, there was a
shuttle hanging there, and near it was a dragon with a man on
its back, calling down lightning bolts! That damn dragon took
out my helicopters, too! This invasion was going to be real
weird, I remembered thinking, when the shuttle started dropping
cinder blocks from 10,000 feet- and they started doing right-
angle turns on the way down!
On the ground were people and critters- two wolves were
running very quickly through the compound, mowing down some
of my troops! Other people were charging through the defense
lines, no matter how much fire they came out of. On one
camera, I saw a girl with a jaguar. I recognized her as being the
bird's youngest daughter, and she was methodically
approaching the house, despite all opposition.
From the roof, I managed to get some shots off, hitting one
of the wolves, the rusted one, I think. My defenses were
crumbling- I saw one of the machine gun mounts sink into the
ground! My men did well, inflicting many casualties, but, it didn't
work.
The girl slipped up behind me, taking out all the other aides
I had on the roof while I was sniping. The first clue I had she
was up there was when my rifle was snatched from my hands,
and, right in front of me, she bent the barrel into a circle! The
last thing I remembered before everything went black was her
saying "Big mistake, little man."
I woke up to see the bird's husband, the huge chick, and
the little one looking at me. I knew the huge one was a telepath,
having met her at the New Year's Eve party. Her husband told
me that my crew had killed four VS members, and wounded
twelve seriously, including two of his daughters and two of his
grandsons. I noticed that the huge one was favoring her side,
and looked rather pale.
He said to me, "By rights, I should tear you to little pieces,
preferably while you're still alive. But, Jade convinced me of a
better way. I'm going to turn you over to Guardian." He said this
in such a cold, frozen manner that I began to feel a little
intimidated.
The little one picked me up and slung me over her shoulder,
taking me outside. I was still at the compound. It was dark, but
there was a full moon and a clear sky. Guardian was there, the
original one. The one who gave me my hunting license.
She said to me, "You who were a hunter, shall now be less
than prey. For many seasons, sit and think of your sin against
my family and my friend."
Then, I felt funny. Real funny. My body, both inside and out,
were twisting and writhing in response to some force. When it
stopped, Guardian said to me, "Your fate is to spend the rest of
your days as a tree, alive and aware, unable to talk or do. Here,
alone, at the scene of your greatest folly, watch, think, and
consider your punishment." I went dormant then, as I do every
night.
Speaking of night, sunset's coming. I didn't do anything
wrong! I was a hunter! The best hunter! I don't deserve this!
Damn that bird! I hate her! I hate her! No...