Even from our distant spot, I could tell he was not a happy camper. Delilah, Pamela and I were debating our possible reactions to their upcoming request from the Boss to come over and talk with him. Saku was completely in favor of ‘squashing the vermin’. It turned out, half way between the goons and us was Alkonyka doing her ‘Missing Girl’ thing.
She turned and headed toward us, until she saw us. Her eyes flashed to the door, back to the kitchen and finally to the women’s rest room (she’d dropped in from the window that was three meters up, we were to learn later).
[Hungarian] “We are not with them!” I shouted over the noise.
The wisdom of that declaration was dubious. Not only was the local establishment out to get us, multiple other criminals seemed to have a special hate on for Alkonyka. She was also the person with the best lay of the land. When she raced for the kitchen, we followed. That required us to cross to separate dance floors. The Bitch Fate hit me on floor two.
I bounced off a dancing couple, flicked them a quick look and an apology.
[Hungarian] “Sorry about…” our eyes locked, then I was propelled away. She knew me and not in a good way. Not even in a bad way. It was in a horrible, horrible way. Did I exaggerate?
[Old Kingdom Hittite] “Come back here!” she yelled after me. “Come back, whoever you are!”
As bad as she was, her boyfriend was much worse. If I ran into him next, I was going to really regret not kissing my lovely Aya good-bye. After the dance floor, came the kitchen nightmare. It was Midnight Munchies time and the cook staff was working overtime. Then came the utter lack of a fire code: the rear door was chained shut.
The only remaining exit was down a narrow hallway to the loading dock. There was no way… we couldn’t all fit down there fast enough.
“Pamela – Go!” I yelled. The absurdity of me sending my bodyguards to safety while I held off the villains wasn’t lost on any of us.
“That’s fucking hilarious, Dumbass,” Delilah hissed. Her gun roared twice and the fuse box (in plain view) exploded in a shower of sparks. The lights flickered then failed. Consternation and confusion were all around. Someone grabbed my shoulder and off we ran. By the time the emergency lights kicked I heard the rolling doors heading up – the loading dock.
Our group was diving through the narrow, yet growing, opening since waiting was a luxury we didn’t possess. Was it a good choice or a bad one that led us to run northeast instead of southwest in that alleyway? Only time would tell. As it was, we plowed into a group of revelers at the mouth of the alley.
Ten of the fifteen were gang members, who weren’t much in the mood for talking when they caught site of Alkonyka. It turned out they were compatriots of the big tub of lard she’d busted up earlier and had been sort of looking for her. A major melee ensued. By unspoken consensus, we went to fisticuffs first.
My side was beating them like little bitches when gangsters pouring out of the front of the club and the ones coming from the back of the club converged on us. The impetus of the combined rush thrust the whole fight out into the street. Fortunately, auto traffic is uncommon in Budapest due to an exceptional public transportation system. That wasn’t of much help to us.
I tried to keep close to Delilah, who I had been following. That turned out to be impossible due to a variety of factors. Notably, several of the gangs weren’t fans of some other gang and there were like ~ eighty-plus people fighting. No one knew who the fuck we were, but it turned out that Alkonyka had a price on her head. Thankfully, her nemesis wanted her delivered alive.
I could hardly say this chaotic affair was enjoyable, yet some jack-shit moron just had to make it worse. First someone drew a knife and then things escalated rapidly. Two shots rang out. I didn’t hear anyone screaming in agony, so the shots must gone up, or down. I saw Delilah go down in a tangle of three opponents. I had my Glock out to pistol-whip a few assholes.
A body slammed against my back, staggering me. I managed to keep my feet and twisted only to find the body was in various states of discombobulation and That Chic was flashing me a dangerous look. I raised my pistol and shot the guy about to shoot her in the back – cause I’m an idiot. She tracked my shot, gave me a quick nod and then proceeded to whoop ass on some other poor soul.
Three more bullets went flying around before the poorly armed mob broke and ran. The mobsters (those left standing) backed up from whence we came and unloaded on us with two of Hungary’s own KGP-9’s ~ Woot! (It’s a sub-machinegun). They seemed to have had some military training, yet they had fuck all for cover. What’s with these people?
Once we all dodged to street-side walls, Delilah, Pamela and I ‘pumped up the volume’. That meant we murdered the two most dangerous gangsters and let the others run for their lives. My quick head/body count revealed that only eight people were actually dead. Some poor smuck had his throat slit, five had been chopped up with a sword and the two guys we’d shot and killed.
Pamela’s little expeditionary force had added four intrepid recruits: Alkonyka and three people who wanted to kill most of us, though they probably didn’t truly understand that when we all fled the scene before the criminal element came back in greater force. Shelter took the shape of an abandoned house… if you didn’t count the homeless in residence.
It was no surprise that Team Pamela was okay, except for the prerequisite bruising and shallow cuts. We’d been wearing both our ballistic vests and armored dusters. Saku had been wearing her armor (sans helm) instead of ballistic cloth – so she looked like a deranged, post-apocalyptical outrider compared to our ‘Dirty Harry/Pale Rider’ knock-offs. Alkonyka was much the worse for wear.
Her backpack and flyers were history. She still had her blade, but her clothes were a mess. The exposed flesh on her back gifted me with a little hint from Dot Ishara of why this had happened to me. You can’t take the good without the bad, or so it seemed.
[Hungarian] “Don’t stare at me,” Alkonyka snapped.
That made everyone else stare at her, which made the girl even less comfortable.
“Holy Mother Fucking Shit,” Delilah exclaimed. “Is that what I think it is?” Confusion time.
[Old Kingdom Hittite] “Why do I know you?” the princess asked me as she tugged on my sleeve.
“Oh damn it,” Pamela mumbled.
Saku merely looked her way while she cleaned off her blade and her front using a jacket she’d swiped form a drunk homeless woman. The lady’s two buddies were downright laconic.
“Is she an Amazon too?” Delilah questioned.
“Two in one night,” Selena nodded. “Now, we can we please leave the city before everyone in this district wants us dead?”
“Too late,” I sighed.
[Hungarian] “Who are you people?” Alkonyka inquired heatedly.
[OKH] “One moment, please,” I addressed the Princess.
[Hungarian] “How to put this… we are honor-bound to help you liberate your sister. For now, would you please accept that it is because we are from the same hometown and leave it at that?”
[Hungarian] “What town are you from? You sound like an American,” she quizzed me.
[Hungarian] “My name is Cael Nyilas and my family came from Szaszregen, before World War II,” I informed her.
That was Reghin in current day Romania.
[Hungarian] “Oh…” she was a tiny bit less hostile.
[Hungarian] “Hang in there. I have to deal with this,” I cut her off. I looked to the Princess.
“I am Cael Ishara, Head of House Ishara and Chief Diplomat for the Host,” I identified myself.
“You know me because I witnessed your passage from the Land of the Endless Black Sands to the Sunlit Realm. It was part of a vision an augur shared with me,” I explained. She and her buddies were far less welcoming of the news. I was speaking English on purpose.
“Ladies, this is Kwenhamai, better known as Molpadia, daughter of Penthesilea,” I gulped.
“What House is she with?” Selena inquired.
“She doesn’t have one. See, she was a princess of the Royal House. Then her mother, Queen Penthesilea, fought Ajax and Achilles. Despite her battle prowess, Ajax mocked her then Achilles knocked her to the ground. The Queen begged for her life, yet Achilles showed no mercy.
Dying in such a shameful manner meant our new friend here was passed over for Queenship. The crown and girdle went to her aunt, Antiope, who Molpadia later killed to save that queen from being defiled by Theseus, Tyrant of Athens. She was then killed by the Greeks and thus ended the Royal House of the Amazons.”
“But she’s back?” Delilah wondered.
“This would be the part that has Cael unhappy,” Pamela muttered.
“Yeah, ya see…” I turned to the Princess again. “You are part of the Unconquered’s group, right?” I groaned.
“Yes, me – we are with Ajax,” the Princess revealed to the rest what I knew in my heart to be true.
“Thank you for your honesty, Death Song, and thank you for saving my life. Go in peace,” I extended my hand. She stepped up, we clasped arms in the Amazon style and she smiled warmly.
“Your life wasn’t really in danger,” she smirked. She was referring to the guy who bounced off my back. “You put a bullet in the man trying to kill me… even though you knew who I was and who I was with… why?” Molpadia wanted to know.
“Because he’s going to fuck you silly, you clueless bitch,” Pamela got all snarky. Of course I was angling for a way to have sex with Molpadia, so I wished Pamela hadn’t been so blatant.
“What’s her excuse?” Molpadia looked past me at Pamela.
“She’s my Evil Psychic Twin Grandmother,” I sagely related. Blink. “I’m letting you walk away because you are not the one I need to kill. I have to kill Ajax and kick his ‘boys look better bent over’ ass back to the Netherworld.
Oh, and I think you are sexy and don’t fall under the forty-four… whoops, forty-three day ban on me having sex with Amazons,” I grinned. We were still clasping forearms.
“Thank you and good luck with that,” she nodded.
“The ‘kill Ajax’ part, or the ‘bed you’ part?” I asked. She smiled, winked and sauntered away with her buddies.