Max Arena (41 page)

Time
slowed. The swordsman’s hands slowly peeled downwards from
his face, revealing a mixture of pain and incredulity. His knees
quivered and a shuddering breath drew raggedly into his lungs. Max
looked back at him over his left shoulder, his hands still on the
hilt of the weapon. Blood began to drip from the man’s shattered
nose and he finally rested his gaze on Max’s eyes only for the
light to go out of his own. Finally, he collapsed to the
ground.

Max kept his grip on the sword as the man
fell, the blade pulling itself effortlessly clear of the body. Not
even a drop of blood marred its immaculate surface. Max stood
still, again fixing his attention on the corpse to ensure it was in
fact dead. A few moments later, Max snapped his gaze up onto the
third man.

‘Two down,’ Peter said.

‘
You said
two
down?’ Joe asked across the line.

‘Yeah. One to go.’

‘
And did he
kill
the second?’

‘With his own sword.’

Another pause.
Then Joe spoke again. ‘Air support will be with
you in eight minutes. Five Black Hawks and two Hornets. President
Bartholomew is attempting to contact your bogeys directly to return
them home immediately.’

‘
Let me tell you, sir,’ Peter added.
‘
Nothing’s going to save
this last bloke. Not now Max has a sword.’

Silence again streamed down the phone
line.

In the middle of the intersection, Max
stood tall against the last opponent, his sword held upright in
both hands in front of him, unwavering. Surrounded by guns and
soldiers, friendly and aggressive, the two men faced off unphased.
Car doors opened as courage grew. Several bystanders had now exited
their cars and crouched down behind their vehicles, hiding from the
helicopters. Mobile phones filled their hands, the ensuing moments
poised for registering in history.

Then the final swordsman moved, his double
swords
whirling like
twin shredders in front of him as he advanced. Max held firm, his
granite gaze lasering through the twirling blades and boring right
into the heart of his attacker’s eyes, his will focused on only one
outcome. Then it was Max’s turn to move.

It happened so fast that Peter’s senses
didn’t immediately register that Max was in motion. One instant he
was stationary, sword
held in front and the next he had launched himself directly
into the steel maelstrom, his own sword blazing in the late
afternoon light.

With the speed and power of a titan, Max’s
sword flashed and blurred, not parrying, but smashing into his
opponent’s blades. Sparks skittered about
the two men like a cloud of electric fireflies,
the noise a staccato clatter of steel on steel. Max’s opponent
immediately halted his advance and started to back pedal, Peter
clearly noting the surprise on the man’s face. He had been
instantly matched and was now in danger of being almost as quickly
overcome.

Max sliced, diced, swiped and slashed, not
recklessly or thoughtlessly, but methodically and cleanly, his
balanced stride pushing him forwards into the fight. Despite being
outnumbered in steel, Max was dominating and he knew it. Every
attack struck his enemy’s weapon harder and harder, throwing his
opponent more and more off balance and out of kilter. Max had him
rattled.

Sensing it was time for all or nothing,
Max’s foe planted his back foot and gritted his teeth. Bending his
knees, he leapt high and spun three hundred and sixty degrees to
bring down a double bladed strike, right onto Max’s head, using all
his strength and the added power of gravity to maximize the
attack
to break through
Max’s defenses.

Max anticipated the maneuver and like a
dancer, deftly stepped to his left and spun, pivoting on the ball
of his right foot, slashing his own blade downwards at the same
time against his opponent’s unguarded right side. His opponent’s
swords cut downwards into empty space, while Max’s cut diagonally
downwards into his foe’s right leg. The blade sliced surgically
through muscle and bone to sever the limb just below the
knee.

A heart-stopping scream ripped through the
air as the swordsman collapsed to the bitumen, blood pumping from
his ruined leg. As he fell, he twisted to land on his back, his
swords clattering to the road. Looking up, the man watched as Max
turned to look back down at him. In that moment, he knew he had
never had a chance of victory. The moment he had raised his weapons
against Max, he had been dead.

Max stepped up to the prone man, who to
his credit
had quickly
relegated the extraordinary pain that must have been racking him
right now, as he defiantly glared back. Max did not speak. All he
did was pause for a moment. The twin downwash of the Apache and the
Yankee filled the intersection. Dust and grit swirled around the
two men. On the edge of the scene, multiple smart phones captured
the moment, Max filling the centre of the vision, his sword held
out to his side as he stood over his downed enemy. Then, in an
instant, it was over.

Abruptly, Max reversed his grip on
his sword, knelt forward and
drove the blade firmly into the prone man’s heart. His enemy
flinched once, his arms held rigid for a few moments in the air and
then falling back to the ground.

Peter sat frozen, his entire body locked
in place
and his eyes
dilated to their maximum possible extent as adrenaline filled him.
The spectacle he had just witnessed was absolutely unlike anything
he had ever seen. Awe consumed him, but so too did something else.
A deep, twinge of fear. Peter trusted Max, implicitly, but what he
had just seen was as raw and as primal as any prehistoric animal
hunting and killing its prey. Right now, Peter wasn’t sure just how
human Max was and how alien he had become.

‘
What’s going on, Peter?’ sounded the
Prime
Minister’s
voice.

‘He killed him, sir,’ Peter said flatly.

‘And what is Max doing now?’

‘He’s just kneeling there, in the centre of
the intersection like some sort of…crusader or something, head
bowed and his sword stuck in the other bloke’s chest,’ Peter
struggled to say. ‘Sir, I don’t know how to describe exactly what
just…’

‘
Leave it, Peter,’ Joe interrupted. ‘What’s
important is that you have reinforcements incoming in sixty
seconds. POTUS should also be on the radio right now to personally
send his birds home. Your instructions are to let them go. We’ll
sort all this out later. You just get Max back in the van
now
.’

‘Yes, sir,’ Peter replied and the line went
dead.

Lowering the phone to his lap, Peter
remained very still. Every instinct in his mind screamed at him to
get Max back into safety, but still he stayed inert.
Outside, surrounded by blood,
there kneeled a man that right now, Peter did not recognise. That
man just a few minutes earlier had been Peter’s most respected
friend, but Joe was right in what he had warned. Everything had
changed. Max had killed and he was no longer the same man. What Max
had become, Peter did not know and for the first time in his life,
Peter was genuinely afraid.

11pm, 6
^th
October (2 days later). Not
Ever

Sheikh
Abdullah stood motionless against the balcony railing, his
white robes billowing gently in the late evening sea breeze, his
visage angelic against the glittering backdrop of night. At this
moment, all was quiet in the near midnight hour. Not even the
ever-present chop of scouting helicopters sullied the silence. All
lay still, but not asleep.

The
Sheikh’s mind whirled like a dervish as it assessed a
thousand different possibilities of what could happen from this day
forth. Max had finally killed and he had done it in such a fashion
that it concerned Abdullah, deeply. The man’s ferocity had been
vicious and unbridled. He had given no quarter in the face of his
disarmed and defenseless enemies, but it was not this merciless
brutality that had Abdullah’s mind enthralled. It was Max’s
purpose. Yes, he had killed, some may even say slaughtered, but he
had done it with such clear and clinical intention. This was not
the act of a man defending himself. This was the act of a killer.
The act of a potential psychopath.

Behind Abdullah,
Joe stepped over the threshold of the balcony,
exiting from the lit interior of the living room and out into the
hazy darkness of the night air to join him.

‘President Bartholomew has offered,’ Joe said
as he walked up next to Abdullah, ‘to fly over and personally
present his apologies to Max and ourselves. I tried to assure him
that was not necessary, but he would not be dissuaded. He’ll be
here day after tomorrow.’

‘
And his chief of staff?’ Abdullah asked.
‘
In what predicament
does Charles Ingot the Third find himself?’

Joe sighed and put his mobile phone back
into his trousers pocket. ‘Incarcerated for treason, which is
probably a life sentence regardless of what comes
New Year’s Eve. You never did
trust him did you?’

Abdullah shifted his gaze heavenward. ‘The
man’s patriotism blinkered his perspective. He loved himself first
and his country second
with no place for a third. He needed something larger than
himself to believe in to see the world for what it truly
is.’

‘
And how do
you
see the world tonight, my friend?’ Joe asked. ‘You have
hardly spoken for the last two days and although I know what
troubles you for it troubles me also, I need you to help me think
it through. I am the politician in this partnership. You are the
expert on the human condition.’

Abdullah
stood silently for a few moments, his gaze still
roaming the night sky. His eyes found the constellation of Orion
and traced its starry outline across the nocturnal vista. The
Hunter stood eternally strong in the celestial realm, his club
raised high, his sword on his belt and his shield held firmly out
in front, his weapon clad form the most recognizable and famous of
all the constellations. Perhaps, Abdullah thought, this ancient
warrior now has a rival here on Earth?

‘
Max carries a conflict deep inside himself
that none of us could ever understand,’ Abdullah finally said,
lowering his gaze to search the shadows of the vast lawns. ‘While
his mixed genetics have combined constructively to create the
magnificent
physical
specimen that he is, that same cocktail of genetics has twisted his
human emotions and his Nar’gellan instincts together and he is now
wrestling to separate them. He knew that the moment he took a life,
his alien blood would rise up against his human spirit. Max is on
the brink of being overcome by his own demons and we are at the
mercy of the outcome of that duel. ‘

Joe nodded. It was what he had suspected.
‘If right now Max is fighting a battle against his
own Nar’gellan lust for blood,’
Joe started, ‘how can we help him? What does he need to overcome
this lust?’

‘Love,’ sounded a new voice behind them.

Joe turned to see Elsa standing on the
threshold, her face shrouded in shadows, but her form haloed by an
aura of light cast from inside the room. The Prime Minster
unconsciously held his breath. Right now he felt like he was
surrounded by angels, plotting the downfall of demons with the fate
of the world as the prize. The moment ensnared him.

‘
Yes,’ said Abdullah
, fluidly turning to face Elsa as she
walked out onto the balcony to join them. ‘Love is what Max needs
right now.’

Joe blinked and he regained his senses. ‘Are
you suggesting Max needs love from others or his own love to beat
his Nar’gellan impulses?’

‘Both,’ Elsa answered.

‘
And let’s be clear,’ Abdullah added, ‘Max
needs love not to overcome his alien instincts, but to
balance
his Nar’gellan blood. We still
need the alien warrior inside Max to come forth when needed, but
Max needs human love to keep it in check. It is time for Max to
learn how to be both of this world and of another.’

Joe nodded again. Abdullah’s arched look
noted the Prime
Minister’s understanding and then he turned to Elsa. ‘If I
may ask, where is Max now?’

‘
He’s with the kids,’ Elsa replied,
crossing her arms against the slight chill in the breeze. ‘Jason
had a bad dream and Max lay down with him to help him get back to
sleep. Knowing Max, he’ll probably take the opportunity to crash
with him for a few hours and then sneak into bed later.’

Abdullah nodded and then
asked, ‘And how are
you
?’ Abdullah
asked.

Elsa cast a quick glance at the Sheikh to
find his eyes shimmering in the diffuse light. Looking away over
the railing and into the darkness, she rubbed her arms. ‘Getting a
bit tenser every day. While I’ve known for years that this time was
coming, nothing can prepare you for it. Not really. Up until now
it’s all been theory, but as every day ends, it gets a little more
real. I don’t think I’m ready yet to accept I could be losing Max
in a couple of months’ time and to be honest, I’m not sure I’ll
ever be ready.’