Nine Swords

Choise of stories from Venator's service record since joining Templars in 1995.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"You upstairs must be kidding" - mumbled Venator, dodging a Volkswagen Beetle - sized dripping black goo porcupine deamon. Ending up in Vietnam swamp was not his idea of having good time - moslty because of overwhelming stench in that particular part of the swamp. Sticky, sickening stink of rot covered the area like a thick blanket. Venator certainly did not expect that when god dropped off the hell-knows-how-preserved ancient Fokker airplane and ended up in a deserted snake-catchers' village.

A hand-long spine darted past Venator, burying deep into the nearby tree trunk. "You must be kidding? Porcupines DONT shoot spines, that is a Medieval myth!" - rumbled he, trying to maintain his balance in a hip-deep sticky mud. "Of course not, but that is not a porcupine, this is porcupine-shaped deamon, local deity, marred by Filth" - responded a voice from long-silent radio, personalizing Venator's packup and contact in the area. "You couldn't warn me about that beforehand? I cant go close-range with my blades without ending up as a pincushion, moron!" - but radio was already dead, again. Vietnam valleys, saturated by magic, made communications really unreliable.

"Ow!" - was the only thought Venator had, before ducking behind a tree, while a real storm of deadly quills covered the spot he had been just a second before. Demon clearly got more and more pissed off - Venator's natural talent, most likely. With a sigh, he leaped, and hacked a spine off the trunk it was buried into. "Thank you, Q." - he grinned, thanking armorer Kven, who put a set of kukris into his ammo crate. Gripping a piece of spine in his left hand and kukri in right, Venator tried to get behind the next tree, but stumbled in the mud and sharp pain pierced his left shoulder. As he got into cover, two things were clear - first, he was not going to die just yet and second, spines were poisonous. Day was getting better and better with each passing minute. And with each passing second, devilish giant rodent was getting closer.

Thankfully he had two things - piece of his enemy clutched in his left hand his own blood, in warm streams seeping from his shoulder. Forging a connection with blood was quick, but without the solid ground to steady the spell and focus, the pain was excruciating and overloaded mind was almost burning synapses to ash. Red haze covered the sigh, and bloody lines drew themselves over the water to form circles and angles, connecting into pentagrams and glyphs. "Begone"- croaked Venator and with last remaining strenght rised his right hand and used the leather vambrace to hook himself to nearby mangrove's aerial root before passing out.

---

"Open your eyes and follow my finger, sir." - A direct Torquemada's descendant in white suit with medical license intruded into Venator's blissful sedative-inflicted dream. Body was sore, shoulder seemed to be in fire and right hand feeled like stretched out by Inquisition. Venator stopped dreaming about flaying Doc alive and did what was asked, answered usual questions about his condition, number of fingers shown and where he managed to get a boar spear through his shoulder. Big envelope was lying on the table near his bed - red seal with intricate pattern on it clearly indicating who left it there. New assignment, new trip. More blood, more steel. Life is a wonderful thing. And a total bitch, sometimes.

Venator was standing over a dead body, tucking a Colt, model 1873, back into holster hidden in his jacket lining. An old gun, but in perfect condition - headquarters sent really exquisite weapon from Templars' vast armories.

"Pain in ass, but there was no choise, when it became clear that a Jitu was on the loose and that particular weapon happened to be proven to be effective." Venator explained to his companion, a young Moor man who was looking at dead body with wild eyes, clearly shocked. Hoping to prevent the man from the usual screaming and blind fleeing into the wild as the unprepared human psyche is fragile, Venator kept talking in steady tone - "Better than sacred hip bone of Chukotka shaman is once had to use to kill a foul-smelling, carnivorous elk. Damned animism, small local problems are always most time-consuming. Common stuff is simple, and can usually be dealth with a big gun or a sword. Main thing is to get the head off and not to get blood all over your clothes - dry cleaning prices are getting higher each year, you know?"

Poor guy did not answer, but at least his heartbeat finally started to slow down. He looked ad Venator, who was patiently watching the horizont, as the sunrise drew closer, painting black sky into shades of blue and yellow ink. Local did not ask anything, just pulled his tattered Coca-Cola t-shirt straight and started digging. Venator joined him - leaving strange bodies with 19th century bullets on the open would draw attention of other Societies, and being in the heart of contested territory would not make it much easier either. Few weeks and body would be looking as a remnant of some old expedition skirmish back in colonial days. Or the body assemble itself into something nasty and walk away looking for a snack. Weird shit happens more and more often lately. Unfortunately there was no way to lit a fire and burn the body to ashes, as it would solve most problems. But dry season and goats managed to clear all the area of most vegetation, and even Venator was not up to start taking down a huge baobab further away.

"Okay, it is done," - Venator looked at shallow grave, which was supposed to hide the body until he was as far away as possible -"You may want to go and tell your people that for now, that thing is not coming back." With a wide, and not too reassuring grin, he made his way to Humvee parked at roadside and took off. Praise the modern cutting-edge technology - autopilot, gps and good climate control made sure he could take a nap before arriving to the spot where a chopper was supposed to pick him up later.

A cheerful eldery man approached Venator, offering a handshake. "Ivan" - introduced he himself, and added with a wide smile - "and hopefully not durak, as one might think for ending up here." Venator accepted the hand and chuckled: "Dragons are busy with weird things going on in Japan, so checking out small islands is our job for now. And our Russian base is closest to the area." - "Perhaps, but we stll had to fly for nine hours - Very Important and Busy Ones should look at map more often" - "Agreed."

The landscape of the island slowly revealed, as thick morning fog disappeared. Pines, short grass and rocks made it look like an image from early 19th century romanticism paintings. Grey sky and dark green and blue sea added to the cold, foreboding feeling.

"So, here several groups of ornithologists managed to disappear last week?" - wondered Venator, noticing several boats left futher up the shore. "Da," - confirmed Ivan: "And some persons have quite noticable influence in local matters, I have heard. We don't want to have any political issues with Japanese government, do we?"

"Better to find out what happened then." - stating the obvious, Venator pulled his weapon holsters out of waterproof crate built into the hull of their boat and strapped them on. Serious firepower may be needed in such areas - you never know when you strumble upon some giant acid-spitting turtle, woken up from centuries-old sleep in the sea. Marine creatures tend to be largest, nastiest and pain to kill. And they smell. And are often slimy. Full choise of reasons not to get into close range combat. Venator's choise was a set of Templar's custom-built SMG's with grenade launchers, filled with teflon-coated bullets and tandem-charge grenades. Of course he had his favourite longsword on his hip - it was too dear to his heart to part with. And might be useful to fend off some nasties trying to sneak up close. Ivan preferred a .50 BMG's shooting rifle and a mace. "Ivan-Tsarevits, looking for a frog to shoot?" - commented Venator, as the Russian was busy getting his toys out. "You know that fairy tale too, then?" - answered Ivan, finally geared up and ready, "I am sure, if the Prince would have that beauty I got, he would have much less problems during his adventures."

----------------------------------------------------------------------

With the soft puff, last oni lost a quarter of his head and dropped on the ground. The area looked like it had had a common open-air for Taliban, al-Qaeda, US marines and NATO. Charred trees, black smoke, body parts everywhere.

"Nice shot, you can come down now, I suppose." - Venator said into his tactical radio set. "Kore kara oni no seibatsu ni..."- thick with Russian accent, came the answer. "Didn't know you speak Japanese?" - "I was sent here because of that. And for my knowledge of local myths. Otherwise, you would get a younger agent, I guess." - "Momotaro?" - "Hai".

"It seems, my HEAT'ies were a bit of overkill." - Venator nudged a black pile of cinders, left from a huge ogre. "Nope, in Japan, they have an expression "oni with an iron club", meaning stronger than strongest, invincible that is." - responded Ivan, as he jumped off the lowest branch of the huge pine he was using as sniping nest, and continued: "Any signs of surviving humans down here? Didn't see anything except onis and bones from my spot." "No, I think they all got eaten. Seems we only need to call in cleanup crew to dispose of bodies and count the dead tourists." replied Venator, putting away his weapons. Ivan let out a sigh and shook his head: "Pity, I never get used to it. But we just survived a good fight, and I see you are a good man. Lets get some tea and get the hell out of here." "Davai" - grinned Venator, "You know, I actually know Russian. But listening your accent was just too much fun."

"Nōn intellegō!" - Venator snarled, taking a firmer grip on schiavona he had drawn in his lap. Candle flames flickered, hiding more of the surroundings in shadows than illuminating the room. Templar was sitting in a rather comfortable couch made of exquisite dark red leather, facing a rather unpleasant person seated in opposite armchair. Or rather, creature.

Alp was in his human form, crouching so that his unnaturally long limbs seemed to be tied together. Whatever myths say, he did not have some ridiculous hat on, which was no good - myths stated, that these creatures' powers come from so called Tarnkappe, andbeing left without it, were pretty much harmless. While that creature had approached Templar himself, trying to make some sort of bargain with authorities, Venator was tasked to sit and guard it for that night. Creature, old enough that the most modern language it knew was etruscan, could be either an ally of unimaginable value or a really, really dangerous enemy.

"Loquerisne Lātinē?" - Venator had spent previous two hours trying to remember phrases from more than a dozen languages, but the oldest language he knew- latin, seemed to be as useless as relatively modern english, french and others. Alp's expression did not change, so it was safe to assume that no polite conversation was possible. "Hopefully we won't end up in power negotiation, you seem to have so old dirt under your claws that paleontologists would be happy to sell their soul for that" - muttered Venator, and moved his weapon, so that it could be used to srike in an instant. Old, but sharper that razor. folded steel blade looked impressive in candlelight, not taking into the account silver plating of the hilt, clearly indicating, that the sword was original from the 17th century, not some modern replica. Swift and light, it allowed maximum agility in close range combat, leaving one hand free to maneuvre, especially in closed premises.

The sudden movement of alp's jaw cought Venator's attention. It was just a small warning, but was enough to give time to tilt over the couch and roll away from creature's reach. "Dammit, and there I hoped for some easy task" - Venator was already moving towards the door, which had been ripped of the hinges in a moment of confusion. That much of reinforced wards, and thick steel. The only weird thing was, that the door led to holding cells, not the exit or the upper level of the building. It was not a simple authority assassination attempt then, and no other reasons came up. Templar carefully approached the passage, which led to the dark. Suddenly, a wave of howls came down the tunnel, high-pitched enough that the teeth rattled and ears rang. A shadow appeared from behind, too quick to be avoided, and pushed. Venator, a tall male, weighting clearly not so little, flew like a tennis ball, and bounced off the opposite wall. Head felt as if filled with molten led, and sparkles flew behind the eyelids - impact was intended to kill, but bees really knew how to improve the body resilience. Instead of instantly passing out, Venator waited. Alp came, intending to finish his opponent off, and bent towards the Templar, stretching his body, and drawing out claws. With a quick slash, Venator whipped his sword over exposed abdomen. Alp screetched, and rolled back away. It became difficult to follow the surroundings, and Venator closed his eyes.

Waking up in lazaret was quite a routine already. Getting poked by anima-doctors, neowitches and such. One part of science, four parts of occult. As it turned out, alp was an ancient executioner, meant to kill a captive vampire elder to keep some sensitive information safe. While he managed his goal, he did not escape - wounded, he was weakened enough that the elder managed to drag him down with himself. Templar authorities blamed each other for incident, weak wards, unsecure doors, lack of guards and so on. As for Venator, it did not matter - who cares about some monster, even a useful one, if it is dead?