“It’s time.”
“You’re sure, Boss?” Eugene asked.
Norman nodded. “We’ve been the whipping boy for too long, it's time to hit back.”
“I can get behind that, who should we target?”
“I would like to target the Council, but we weren’t able to come up with any evidence that they were ultimately responsible for leaking this information. Even though I suspect they were. So I did some thinking over the last week. Since they want to make our lives a living hell, I say we return the sentiment.”
“That would probably be for the best, we don’t exactly have the forces needed to conduct an actual attack or fight them off if they don’t use their undead forces.”
“Unfortunately, I agree. Do you recall that list that Agent Smith supplied a few days ago?”
Eugene groaned. “Please don’t refer to him as Agent Smith. I don’t want the guy getting a big head.”
Norman chuckled.
“And yes. The list of Gorfan military leaders from that ratar principality.”
“That’s the one. I picked three names off that list for Smith to eliminate. I even have a way for him to pin it all on the Council.” Norman went over his plan with Eugene.
There was no joking or laughing now that lives were on the line. And while Norman knew Eugene preferred a straight-up fight, this wasn’t the time for that.
“Seems a bit underhanded but it should work. What if Donovan or the Council figures out it was us?” Eugene asked as he started writing out orders.
“What are they gonna do, attack us? No, I suspect Donovan is too smart for that. My guess is he will switch tactics. If he wanted to attack us, they already would have. Leaking information on us to his enemies seemed like a strategic maneuver meant to drag us into his fight. If he sees we didn’t take the bait, he might back off. But from what I know of the man, I doubt he will give up that easily. While he probably won’t attack directly, he will certainly increase his efforts to spy and try and undermine us until he gets what he wants.”
“Which is you, Boss.” Eugene rubbed at his temples. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I wish Grobert would hurry up and return so he could deal with this bullshit.”
“Well, he should be back soon. I hope. I know he’s still alive, I tried resurrecting him last night and it failed.”
Eugene snorted at that. “That fossil is too stubborn to die. He’ll probably outlive us all somehow.”
***
John read their new orders and frowned. Not at the fact that he was being assigned to kill some people, but at the other part. He floated over to Shannon and showed her the sheet. “You think it's possible?”
She took it and read it over. “I don’t see why not, we've been able to carry other physical objects with us. A bone anchor shouldn’t be much of an issue.”
“Alright, let's go find some corpses and get this setup.”
It took the two a few days to source the bodies without being discovered by the Council forces, but they eventually gathered up ten corpses each. Drawing out the spell circle was a bit of a challenge since neither were mages but after a dozen tries they got it down.
The real challenge came when they had to capture one of the Council Controllers and force him to activate the spell for them. That proved to be a bit complicated but they lucked out after two days. They found one that was shit-faced drunk and simply waited for him to pass out. After dragging him to their spell location, they simply bled him to power the spell and healed him afterward so nobody would know. Then they collected the ferals into bone anchors and tucked them safely away inside their bodies before vanishing from the scene.
***
John surveyed the military facility where his target resided. He had been here before but he wanted to ensure nothing had changed since he was last present. Nothing had. He made his way to the target's office, bypassing the enchanted door completely.
His target wasn’t there presently, so John simply waited, concealed inside the thick stone wall. After a few hours, he heard the door open, so he peeked his head out from near the ceiling. It was his target. The ratar man was a military science officer in charge of some low-level tests that were part of their genetic augmentation division of the Gorfan Principality. Not so high up that he couldn’t be replaced, but high enough that it would raise questions as to how the Council had gotten to him. Out of the people John had spied on, this man was the worst. He was a perfect target for assassination, John approved.
He waited for the man to close the door and get comfortable doing some paperwork before he floated down toward the floor. For this next part, he would have to become visible but the man was unlikely to survive ten ferals piling on top of him. So his secret would be safe.
John pulled the bone from his pocket and quickly phased into reality. An alarm went off as he appeared, but other than the officer looking surprised as hell, there wasn’t anything he could do. The ten ferals burst into existence inside the small office less than a second after John appeared. And a second later John was already invisible again.
He floated back toward where he was watching before as the zombies tore into the screaming ratar officer. Someone was pounding on the door, but the officer had sealed it and nobody but the security people on base could get inside without his approval, and the man was too busy to provide it.
Seeing his mission accomplished, John fled through the walls of the base, avoiding any possibility of being discovered.
***
Shannon tracked her target through the army encampment. He was the equivalent of a Second Lieutenant. The third target that Lord Norman had chosen for them was the equivalent of a First Lieutenant but they had to discard him as a viable target because the man was always surrounded by sycophants and guards. Their orders weren’t to kill Gorfan officers, it was to pin the deaths on the Council to hopefully increase the fighting along their border with the Principality.
She would have preferred to go after governmental types, but killing a well-respected officer while he is surrounded by his army would have the desired effect.
It took a while but the man eventually went to sleep. As his breathing deepened, she phased in and dropped the ferals on top of him. The sounds of his screams alerted his guards but they were not able to fight through the undead before they tore the officer apart. She stuck around, floating high overhead to survey the aftermath. It didn’t take long for mage hunters and the First Lieutenant to arrive. By then the ferals had all been dispatched by the guards, but two more had fallen to the undead during the battle.
The death of the officer did indeed foment strong emotions among the men, some wanted to immediately set off toward the front and tear into the enemy lines. But the First Lieutenant managed to calm things down and give the mage hunters time to locate the person responsible for summoning the undead. Shannon smirked at this. It would lead them right to the drunken Controller. And he was located in a nearby town that bordered the zone for the principality.
***
Donovan frowned as he read the weekly reports. The Gorfan were stepping up military efforts along the border after they suffered a series of attacks they blamed on the Council. He had sent Ixitil in to investigate these claims. It wouldn’t have been the first time an aggressive Council member overstepped.
But the man had returned this morning with his report. The supposed Controller responsible for the attacks had died and even questioning his soul revealed no pertinent information. That left two possibilities.
Either his son was overstepping and pinned the attacks on this foolish Controller… or Lord Norman had finally made his move.
Donovan doubted his son was capable of such subterfuge. The man was a blunt instrument at best. And besides, he hadn’t left his estate since his return, busy trying to bypass his magical restrictions from the blood oath. No, this was Lord Norman’s doing, he could almost guarantee it. The question was how?
It also wasn’t the type of attack Donovan had expected from the man. Ixitil had said the man was rather straightforward. He upped his estimates of the man’s abilities. Lord Norman was dangerous and intelligent. He also had to have spies. It was the only explanation for his ability to target key officers among the Gorfan and get in and out of enemy territory without leaving any evidence behind.
Donovan made a mental note to increase the magical protections around him and the Council in general. He also drafted an order to shift more forces to the border with the ratar. It would leave them stretched thin along some of the other borders but he didn’t have any choice.
He paused as he was writing out the order as a realization struck him. Then he smiled, this is most likely what Lord Norman had wanted. “Clever, well, let's see what you think of the next moves.”
“It’s time.”
“You’re sure, Boss?” Eugene asked.
Norman nodded. “We’ve been the whipping boy for too long, it's time to hit back.”
“I can get behind that, who should we target?”
“I would like to target the Council, but we weren’t able to come up with any evidence that they were ultimately responsible for leaking this information. Even though I suspect they were. So I did some thinking over the last week. Since they want to make our lives a living hell, I say we return the sentiment.”
“That would probably be for the best, we don’t exactly have the forces needed to conduct an actual attack or fight them off if they don’t use their undead forces.”
“Unfortunately, I agree. Do you recall that list that Agent Smith supplied a few days ago?”
Eugene groaned. “Please don’t refer to him as Agent Smith. I don’t want the guy getting a big head.”
Norman chuckled.
“And yes. The list of Gorfan military leaders from that ratar principality.”
“That’s the one. I picked three names off that list for Smith to eliminate. I even have a way for him to pin it all on the Council.” Norman went over his plan with Eugene.
There was no joking or laughing now that lives were on the line. And while Norman knew Eugene preferred a straight-up fight, this wasn’t the time for that.
“Seems a bit underhanded but it should work. What if Donovan or the Council figures out it was us?” Eugene asked as he started writing out orders.
“What are they gonna do, attack us? No, I suspect Donovan is too smart for that. My guess is he will switch tactics. If he wanted to attack us, they already would have. Leaking information on us to his enemies seemed like a strategic maneuver meant to drag us into his fight. If he sees we didn’t take the bait, he might back off. But from what I know of the man, I doubt he will give up that easily. While he probably won’t attack directly, he will certainly increase his efforts to spy and try and undermine us until he gets what he wants.”
“Which is you, Boss.” Eugene rubbed at his temples. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I wish Grobert would hurry up and return so he could deal with this bullshit.”
“Well, he should be back soon. I hope. I know he’s still alive, I tried resurrecting him last night and it failed.”
Eugene snorted at that. “That fossil is too stubborn to die. He’ll probably outlive us all somehow.”
***
John read their new orders and frowned. Not at the fact that he was being assigned to kill some people, but at the other part. He floated over to Shannon and showed her the sheet. “You think it's possible?”
She took it and read it over. “I don’t see why not, we've been able to carry other physical objects with us. A bone anchor shouldn’t be much of an issue.”
“Alright, let's go find some corpses and get this setup.”
It took the two a few days to source the bodies without being discovered by the Council forces, but they eventually gathered up ten corpses each. Drawing out the spell circle was a bit of a challenge since neither were mages but after a dozen tries they got it down.
The real challenge came when they had to capture one of the Council Controllers and force him to activate the spell for them. That proved to be a bit complicated but they lucked out after two days. They found one that was shit-faced drunk and simply waited for him to pass out. After dragging him to their spell location, they simply bled him to power the spell and healed him afterward so nobody would know. Then they collected the ferals into bone anchors and tucked them safely away inside their bodies before vanishing from the scene.
***
John surveyed the military facility where his target resided. He had been here before but he wanted to ensure nothing had changed since he was last present. Nothing had. He made his way to the target's office, bypassing the enchanted door completely.
His target wasn’t there presently, so John simply waited, concealed inside the thick stone wall. After a few hours, he heard the door open, so he peeked his head out from near the ceiling. It was his target. The ratar man was a military science officer in charge of some low-level tests that were part of their genetic augmentation division of the Gorfan Principality. Not so high up that he couldn’t be replaced, but high enough that it would raise questions as to how the Council had gotten to him. Out of the people John had spied on, this man was the worst. He was a perfect target for assassination, John approved.
He waited for the man to close the door and get comfortable doing some paperwork before he floated down toward the floor. For this next part, he would have to become visible but the man was unlikely to survive ten ferals piling on top of him. So his secret would be safe.
John pulled the bone from his pocket and quickly phased into reality. An alarm went off as he appeared, but other than the officer looking surprised as hell, there wasn’t anything he could do. The ten ferals burst into existence inside the small office less than a second after John appeared. And a second later John was already invisible again.
He floated back toward where he was watching before as the zombies tore into the screaming ratar officer. Someone was pounding on the door, but the officer had sealed it and nobody but the security people on base could get inside without his approval, and the man was too busy to provide it.
Seeing his mission accomplished, John fled through the walls of the base, avoiding any possibility of being discovered.
***
Shannon tracked her target through the army encampment. He was the equivalent of a Second Lieutenant. The third target that Lord Norman had chosen for them was the equivalent of a First Lieutenant but they had to discard him as a viable target because the man was always surrounded by sycophants and guards. Their orders weren’t to kill Gorfan officers, it was to pin the deaths on the Council to hopefully increase the fighting along their border with the Principality.
She would have preferred to go after governmental types, but killing a well-respected officer while he is surrounded by his army would have the desired effect.
It took a while but the man eventually went to sleep. As his breathing deepened, she phased in and dropped the ferals on top of him. The sounds of his screams alerted his guards but they were not able to fight through the undead before they tore the officer apart. She stuck around, floating high overhead to survey the aftermath. It didn’t take long for mage hunters and the First Lieutenant to arrive. By then the ferals had all been dispatched by the guards, but two more had fallen to the undead during the battle.
The death of the officer did indeed foment strong emotions among the men, some wanted to immediately set off toward the front and tear into the enemy lines. But the First Lieutenant managed to calm things down and give the mage hunters time to locate the person responsible for summoning the undead. Shannon smirked at this. It would lead them right to the drunken Controller. And he was located in a nearby town that bordered the zone for the principality.
***
Donovan frowned as he read the weekly reports. The Gorfan were stepping up military efforts along the border after they suffered a series of attacks they blamed on the Council. He had sent Ixitil in to investigate these claims. It wouldn’t have been the first time an aggressive Council member overstepped.
But the man had returned this morning with his report. The supposed Controller responsible for the attacks had died and even questioning his soul revealed no pertinent information. That left two possibilities.
Either his son was overstepping and pinned the attacks on this foolish Controller… or Lord Norman had finally made his move.
Donovan doubted his son was capable of such subterfuge. The man was a blunt instrument at best. And besides, he hadn’t left his estate since his return, busy trying to bypass his magical restrictions from the blood oath. No, this was Lord Norman’s doing, he could almost guarantee it. The question was how?
It also wasn’t the type of attack Donovan had expected from the man. Ixitil had said the man was rather straightforward. He upped his estimates of the man’s abilities. Lord Norman was dangerous and intelligent. He also had to have spies. It was the only explanation for his ability to target key officers among the Gorfan and get in and out of enemy territory without leaving any evidence behind.
Donovan made a mental note to increase the magical protections around him and the Council in general. He also drafted an order to shift more forces to the border with the ratar. It would leave them stretched thin along some of the other borders but he didn’t have any choice.
He paused as he was writing out the order as a realization struck him. Then he smiled, this is most likely what Lord Norman had wanted. “Clever, well, let's see what you think of the next moves.”
