Gray Matter Splatter (A Deckard Novel Book 4) (18 page)

The invitation had come by courier and was waiting in his inbox
for him when he arrived back in Pangea. He had gotten their
attention. Now they wanted to see him.

Past the thorn bushes, the path opened up slightly, turning into
a series of switchbacks that cut back and forth. The footpath was
only wide enough to inch forward by placing one foot in front of the
other. The blade master considered himself lucky. At least the orc
lords at the first gate had let him through, and then the sorcerers
at the second gate had also granted him safe passage. All he had to
do was walk.

Finally, he arrived at the castle. As he stood in front of the
drawbridge, it slowly lowered and spanned the gap between him and the
moat. He stepped across the wooden drawbridge, peering down into the
spike-filled moat. It was filled with rotting body parts.

Inside the barbican, he was greeted by someone sent to collect
him.

“Hail, blade master,” a voice echoed through the corridor.

“Hey, what’s up?” the blade master responded.

Stepping forward, he saw that he was being greeted by Azarian,
one of the reptile people from the faraway island of Dresh. He was of
the knight class and wore ornate plate armor that reflected his
stature in the paladin guild.

“Follow me if you please,” the knight said.

The blade master was led into a courtyard surrounded by high
walls and circular towers with spires on top. Nothing moved. Even the
moisture seemed to hang in the air. A burned-out carriage had caved
in on itself and now rested in the center of the courtyard, its
wooden struts blackened from flames. His hand drifted toward the hilt
of his katana.

“You won’t need that here,” his escort said casually.

Inside one of the towers, they climbed a circular staircase.
Their footsteps echoed on into forever, bouncing around inside the
castle and swirling around them like phantoms. At the top, they
entered a dark corridor illuminated by only a few torches. Down the
hall, his escort stopped in front of a door.

“You are our guest,” he said with a nod toward the blade
master.

“That’s good to hear.”

“Just inside please.”

The blade master opened the door and stepped inside. There was a
stone pedestal in the center of the room, covered with some kind of
fur. A single torch flickered against the stone walls.

This was it.

“Thank you for joining us,” a voice said, cutting through the
darkness.

The blade master didn't flinch. He had been expecting it.

“I already crashed the party. Saying hello seemed like the
least I could do.”

“We appreciate that very much,” the voice said from the
shadows.

“We?”

“Never ask about the weight of the cauldrons.”

“Excuse me?”

“It is a proverb, meaning that you show your hand too soon.”

The blade master watched the mage materialize in front of his
eyes. Gradually, the shadows moved, turning to ectoplasm, an ethereal
phantasmagorical entity consolidating in front of him. The mage
stepped forward, his eyes burning like coals.

“I’ve waited a long time to meet you, Deckard.”

The blade master was silent.

“You’re surprised? I think we have demonstrated our
capabilities at this point.”

“You have, but it seems that you have me at a disadvantage.”

“Perhaps in the opening gambit. But things did not go according
to plan. You escaped several of our contingency plans and we
underestimated the amount of havoc you could spread. No one expected
such a mess in the Arctic.”

“Well, if you know me, you know I have a habit of doing just
that.”

“Yes, you do.” The old mage stepped closer, standing just
across the pedestal from the blade master.

“Still, you’ve given me a good run for my money.”

“Deceive the heavens to cross the ocean,” the mage said. His
English was impeccable, but it was clear that he had first learned
British English, not American.

“God plays his games and we play ours.”

“Indeed. Do you know what my job is Deckard?”

“War by proxy? International terrorism?”

“Those are simply tactics. My job is to manage the decline of
your country.”

“Isn't that a bit presumptuous?”

“America is finished as a global power. It is only a matter of
time now; the data is very clear on this. Your economy is slowing
down, your thoughts are crystallizing, and your military can no long
win wars. My job is to help ease your country into its place as a
second-rate power.”

“Ouch.”

“This is a dangerous time. Dangerous because a declining power
is capable of lashing out in desperation as it tries to hold on to
what power it has in vain.”

“Or it could be dangerous because a rising power has
miscalculated by several moves, assuming that an attempted power grab
will be far easier in theory than in practice.”

“This is not the
fait accompli
, Deckard, this is just
setting the stage. My job is to harmonize your country with the
coming global order. Unlike yours, our order will work. It will value
order over freedom, place elite governance ahead of the ridiculous
idea of democracy.”

“Democracy has worked out pretty well for us, and for
much of the world.”

“It did work very well for you, but the world has changed. The
rules have changed. America is the butcher of the world. You can
never put down the butcher knife and become a Buddha. Our actions
against America are nothing more than looting an already burning
house.”

The blade master looked away.

“Do you know what one factor convinced me that now was the time
to act, Deckard?”

“No, I don’t.”

“Factional infighting amongst your most talented generals. The
mysterious death of General McCoy. Then, several very powerful elites
die just as mysteriously in New York City. The Biermann brothers, for
instance.”

“I seem to recall reading about that somewhere.”

“As America comes apart at the seams, your elites are turning
on each other.”

The blade master knew he was being baited.

“But it was something else that really convinced some
like-minded people, Deckard. Convinced us that the end is near for
your country. That was the Crown of the Pacific incident. A maritime
accident? Please. Someone liquidated much of the elite class that
night. What do you think really happened?”

“People keep asking me and I keep telling them not to believe
every conspiracy theory on the internet.”

“It’s not a conspiracy if you lived it, Deckard. We have
studied American political fault lines very closely. We know your
political cliques, we know your technical capabilities, we know your
stovepipes, and over the last several days we have taken advantage of
this knowledge. While we set the stage for a new global order, your
government is preparing to wage another misguided campaign in the
Middle East, blaming the Islamic State for the actions that I have
orchestrated.”

“I thought you weren’t supposed to tell me that.”

“Perhaps not, but it hardly matters. You can’t prove
anything, and even if you could, your bureaucrats are in such a deep
case of path dependency that it is far too late for them to change
their minds.”

“I got the drop on you in Barrow. So what’s our next play?”

The mage smiled.

“We run, you chase.”

Chapter 17

Canadian Arctic

Deckard stood on the bridge as the Carrickfergus entered
the northwest passage. Blue water with floating chunks of ice bobbed
everywhere around their ship. In many places, the ice had not
completely melted and Canadian icebreakers had smashed channels
through for commercial ships to pass. Now a major maritime shipping
route, Canada’s maze of waterways between its northern archipelago
of islands was little more than a fable until recent years.

The European powers had sought out a northwest passage
connecting Europe to Asia since the 1500s, but the passage wasn’t
actually navigated until the early 1900s by Norwegian explorer Roald
Amundsen. The northwest passage was still considered far too
hazardous for commercial shipping, even when the ice cleared for a
short period during the summer months. Until now. The climate was
changing, leading to more ice melting than ever before, which opened
up the northwest passage like never before. Just like the Russian
northeast passage, Canada’s northwest passage promised to shave
hundreds of miles off commercial maritime routes.

Some even feared that an Arctic gold rush would soon
happen, something that was already coming to pass as oil companies
built more and more platforms in the high north. The long-term
results remained to be seen. Deckard tended to believe that the
climate moved in cycles, and the most grave predictions of
environmentalists—that the Arctic would soon be completely free of
ice—had been proven completely unfounded.

The main security concerns for Arctic nations focused on
increased sovereignty disputes due to claims on mineral and
fossil-fuel rights, environmental concerns due to commercial
exploitation, and the fact that their now-open Arctic waters could be
used by adversarial nations or even non-state actors like terrorist
groups and drug smugglers. As it turned out, the fears of America,
Canada, Norway, and Denmark were not as alarmist as they may have
sounded a decade ago.

Deckard turned as his laptop began to beep. It was Tampa.

Clicking on the icon to accept the call, he was connected with
the JSOC think tank.

Gary appeared on the screen. “Deckard, we have Global Hawk
refueling, then we’re putting it back out to run ISR for you,” he
said, using the acronym for intelligence, surveillance, and
reconnaissance.

“Good news. We’re looking over our sea maps and the
latest updates from the Canadian government on the status of the ice
out here,” Deckard informed Gary and his team. “The waters are
navigable for the most part, but the bad guys are still restricted,
channelized between the islands and ice that hasn’t thawed. We are
traveling on what we suspect is their most likely route and will send
a list of the number two and three most likely routes for Global Hawk
to scan.”

“We are also coordinating with the Canadian government. They
take any violation of their sovereign waters very seriously. The
Canadian prime minister also had a brief phone call with the
president yesterday, expressing his full support and cooperation in
standing with us during this crisis. Currently, Canadian icebreakers
are heading out to help us sweep the northwest passage. Canadian
Rangers are being called up as well.”

“Canadian Rangers?” Deckard asked.

“Not like American Rangers,” Craig spoke up. “Most of them
are Inuits who have lived their whole lives up in the Arctic. They
are better acquainted with Arctic military operations than anyone in
the U.S. military, so they could prove to be a huge force
multiplier.”

“We need all the help we can get up here.”

“We’ll make sure you guys are put in touch so you can liaison
and deconflict with each other.”

“I also want you to figure out which airstrips are
active in the Canadian Arctic,” Deckard said. “If we can land my
C-27J airplanes somewhere up here, we can carry out a relentless
pursuit, keeping the heat on them, leap-frogging ahead of their
positions. I doubt the Russians will clear airspace to let my pilots
take off at this point, though.”

“We’ll let you know.”

Deckard signed out and looked back out at the ocean.

The enemy was out there, and he knew they were planning
something.

* * *

The mage slid the furs off the portal. The dark lords
continued their quest through the Arctic wasteland, a glowing dot on
the portal’s map showing their path.

“You’re sure the submarine can’t surface?” The mage
asked.

“Yes,” the necromancer answered. “Too much damage to the
mast.”

“And the dry dock?”

“Still usable.”

The mage nodded.

“Deploy our reinforcements at the soonest opportunity.”

“As you wish,” the necromancer said, already preparing a
communiqué.

Chapter 18

“There they are!” Nikita yelled over the radio.

The sniper had spotted the enemy ship from up on the deck.

With the Carrickfergus traveling at full speed, they had
caught up with the dagger-shaped ship in a channel carved out by a
passing Canadian icebreaker. After taking watch in shifts, Nikita had
finally spotted something through his sniper scope as they traversed
the Prince of Wales Strait. The strait was about 20 kilometers
across, and it took them deeper into the northwest passage. An
icebreaker had opened a path through the ice, but since it had been
cut, the wind and shifting tides had turned a straight line through
the ice into a haphazard-looking zigzag path forward.

“Gotcha,” Otter said from the helm.

Deckard stood next to the ship’s captain as he maneuvered them
through the cut in the ice.

“We’ve got them now,” Otter continued. “They can’t
hydroplane their ship in a narrow passage that cuts back and forth
like this. I can close the distance.” Otter looked over at Deckard.
“The rest is on you.”

“Get us in range,” Deckard ordered. “We’ll handle them.”
Reaching for the PA system, Deckard mashed down the transmit button
so he could talk to everyone on the ship. “All hands on deck; the
enemy is in sight. I want snipers to report in to Nikita. First
Platoon, split in half and cover left and right flanks from the deck.
Second Platoon, prepare to support 1st Platoon and be ready for
follow-on operations.”

For now, it made sense to keep one platoon inside and behind
cover for a boarding action while the other platoon engaged the enemy
using maximum standoff.

“They’ve spotted us too,” Nikita’s voice crackled over
the radio from outside.