Life as a New Hire Ch. 45

"My sweet Cáel, I share your tears. I do not wish things to have turned out as they have. As the current of the future changes, I must change or succumb to it. If this helps, had you run away from Havenstone that first Tuesday, I would have protected you," she swore.

"Because I was the last scion of Vranus likely to perpetuate the next generation," I pierced her self-deception. "Don't bother telling me otherwise. I think I know the real reason I asked you to remove the ability for you and the other divinities to read my mind."

"You think it is a female power-fantasy," she reminded me. After all, that had been the last thought she had stolen from my privacy. I had been thinking that, yet now I began to see it in another light. It was my finely-honed, dearly paid for, instincts about the female psyche.

It was probably a combination of Ishara's first words to me today and Anais that opened my eyes to a greater truth. Women neither forgive nor forget. Not really.

"Like Eruthros, that night of rape for you was yesterday, not three thousand years ago," I unveiled my reasoning. "Vranus aside, you have never forgiven male-kind. As much as I feel you have true affection for me, I'm still a guy."

"No," she tried to smooth my troubled mind.

"You can't let Eruthros go in peace, even when it is the well-reasoned choice of your lone descendent -- breathing one, anyway. What Eruthros and his friend did was heinously wrong. 'Me' -- any of us -- turning on him when he showed up in good faith would have been the final surrender to the Mycenaeans of our own sense of right and wrong."

"Three thousand years ago, before the First Betrayal, we would have never considered butchering him outright though we could refuse him. Likewise, his offer was genuine and his request just. What need does the Host have of Ajax's corpse? What does it profit us to humiliate his followers? Do we really need to kill those final eleven? Teucer will come seeking vengeance in time, but now he won't do so as a sniper."

"I have taken away their outrage as an excuse for his actions. If he kills me from afar, he has surrendered his honor to me and we both know he will not do that. I am an honorable foe. As a Prince of my People, that honor permeates the Host. When Teucer comes for me it will be face to face. He will have to stare me straight in the eyes and I will kill him."

"I ... I apologize," Ishara wept. "Poor Vranus. He wasn't very clever, but he was unswervingly loyal. I was wrong to think so poorly of him and discount his honest courage and love for his family. I confess ... I never treated his worship, or the worship of his father and grandfather as being truly equal to that of his mothers and sisters."

"You will stand by me and my decision about Eruthros?" I shuddered. I'd been unconscious for a bit of time.

"Yes. Yes I will, my lovely Cáel," a tear escaped her cheek and landed on mine. It felt weird -- a combination of coolness and a tickling level of electricity.

"Why am I here? I assume you have something to impart and weren't simply out to kill that poor pigeon with me as a witness," I chuckled.

"Ah ... It would be so much easier if I could touch your mind," she hinted -- poorly.

"Not happening ... please let SzélAnya know I need to talk to her soon ... I'm starting to feel stiff."

"I ... perhaps ... had that pigeon hit you ... a bit too hard. You were concussed for quite some time. Added to that, we have chatted about other matters for over a minute," she chastised me because all this talking was TOTALLY my fault.

"Why do you ... you remain very clever, MY Cáel." Her possessiveness didn't bother me. She was my guardian Goddess after all and would one day protect my children with equal devotion. If my fucked up life was any indicator, they'd need the help. She would let me talk to SzélAnya because I undoubtedly had a reason to do so, even if she didn't approve -- of either my idea, or me being with a rival goddess.

"Think of Aya," she urgently imparted. "Think of Aya and know she deserves to grow up to be an Amazon just like you. Give her the freedom to do so. Where there is Valor, there is Hope. Greatness should be measured by the lives you save, not those you take. When the time ..."

I felt her kiss upon my nose, then the pain kicked back in fulltime. I also realized my fortune cookies were gone (she'd stolen all three of them, Goddess-damn it!) I had to get some more before my next 'philosophic' session threatened my skull's integrity, tempting it to surrender to months of continuing abuse.

[LASSIES AND NOT IN A GOOD WAY]

'Ow -- ow -- ow -- ow' kept bouncing around my head.

"He's waking up," Wiesława softly informed someone. I opened my eyes. They had dragged me back into Havenstone's lobby, cradled me as they brought me up to Medical, then hung around ... in case I died and the SD wanted to talk to them. I was admittedly curious if the 'a pigeon did it' would mollify Elsa.

"Did I kill it?" I muttered as they put me down, feet first. I wobbled. Concussions do that to a guy.

"Who? I didn't see anyone attack you?" Wiesława looked concerned.

"The pigeon? The one who hit me. Is it dead?" I groaned.

"Oh ... yes, Cáel Ishara. It will no longer menace any of our sisters. Your thick skull did it in," she joked. That eased the feelings of the security chicks around me. Unlike the medicos, they weren't privileged to know my Matron Goddess's preferred means of communication -- bludgeoning me into unconsciousness.

"How long have I been out?" I mumbled. My cranium was throbbing in pain as I sat up. 'Hey! I was in Medical and still had my clothes on. Was I losing my touch?'

"It is 1:15, Wakko," Wiesława informed me. I groaned as my feet swung off the gurney.

"I have to play Barabbas in the mouth of a whale converted into a lion's den in 45 minutes and I need a few things from home," I mumbled. I would have assumed a commanding demeanor, except my inner ear was debating calling in sick for the rest of the day.

"So, what did she have to say?" Pamela stepped into view. It was hard to describe my pride and my joy when I saw Chaz right behind her -- fully armed -- inside Havenstone with his scrotum still doing what natured designed it for.

"The Bitch stole two extra cookies," I gripped. "As for the rest -- chastisement for thinking my opinion mattered -- me telling her to back the fuck up, we are not married yet -- then the normal bit of useless information that I'm sure will make sense ... somewhere around the third 5th of Whiskey."

"Besides, what are you doing here? I thought you weren't going to rain on my parade until 2?"

"Not sure -- Chaz?" Pamela.

"Nothing special, Mr. Nyilas," Chaz glowered. Uh oh. Mr. Nyilas. Not good.

"We figured we'd join your regular lunch crowd," Pamela nudged Chaz giving him a physical 'atta boy.

"Buffy gave us a message," Chaz retained his 'I'm your older brother and since Dad isn't around to kick your ass over doing something stupid, I'm doing it for him' look. I had to admit, that look was pretty new to me. Most men didn't want to be remotely associated with me genetically after getting to know me and my fidelity, or lack thereof.

"Hey now," I protested as I wove my way out the door to the elevator. My equilibrium decided to cut me some slack and not invoke the reflexive vomiting. "It is only me, Hana, Imogen, Deidre, Mom, Buffy ... hi Juanita ..." I hadn't spotted my designated bodyguard standing behind Chaz.

"Don't talk to me right now," she seethed. "I'm furious with you." Yep, she was the Caribbean Buffy.

"Perhaps she's pissed about the five extra Illuminati bodyguards added to the regular two around Hana plus the two circling Ghost Tigers having not a fucking clue what those other armed parties are doing in Hana's company," Pamela joked. She could. Everyone else was giving me crap about my social gaff.

"Hey now. This meeting is important. Imogen and I are going to have a child," I enlightened them. The door chimed open and we piled in with two Amazons whose 'fresh' look indicated a use of the showers within the past ten minutes.

"You consistently maintain particularly low standards," Chaz dryly remarked.

"I sent her here for a check-up and that gave Buffy a chance to meet Mom, Deidre and Imogen ... plus two unarmed bodyguards," I kept bailing out the Titanic.

"Chaz, I am happy we aren't going to miss this one (lunch)," Pamela smiled at her two grandsons.

"Cáel, are you going to tell your fiancée you've impregnated your aunt?" Chaz was back to being mildly sympathetic to my 'totally fucked-up' life.

"Yes. I figured Buffy shooting death rays at me from her eyes will garner me enough confusion to get the words out of my mouth without her throwing her drink in my face, slapping me, then storming out," I envisioned.

I got no more shit until I reached the garage for my vehicle. There an armed FBI Special Agent Virginia Maddox [did you know when a Federal Agent adds 'Special' to their title it means they have a gun?] stood next to my chariot. She'd drawn the short straw, meaning she had been given the chore of driving today.

I found myself wondering when Yasmin would finally finish her orientation. Her training involved some serious mental challenges including a crash course from the FBI at Quantico concerning modern judicial theory & practice as well as whatever pre-Iron Age jurisprudence the Host practiced.

Javiera promised me (and Katrina) that she would not-so-subtly remind those scholastically-groomed legal minds that a (couldn't use the word 'Amazon') legal code they followed had existed, with minor tweaking, as a successful social instrument for over 3,000 years. If they truly behaved in a respectful manner, the owners of the code might even show those people the Codex on the original horse-skin, written in Hittite cuneiform.

Anyway, everyone assumed I had a good reason for heading to my apartment (aka need to retrieve a sleepy Odette.) Had I repeated 'the Bitch stole my fortune cookies', they might have simply taken me to an Asian-inclined grocery store. As we hit the second story landing, Chaz in the lead, we heard a passel of folks come down toward us from the fourth level.

I didn't think there were that many people on the entire floor. Chaz and Pamela each went for their holstered pistol, while keeping them hidden in their jackets. Wiesława, who went for her PDW, backed up so she could fire through the stairs from beneath.

Juanita, bless her heart, and Virginia had remained in the SUV because sending in more people would have left us piled into one another. If a firefight did break out, Juanita could bring in some serious hardware to back us up while Virginia called the appropriate authorities before rushing in herself.

Around the corner on the third floor landing came a number of women -- early/mid-twenties, physically fit, foreign clothes and downcast expressions. A few looked like they were about to cry. They were all in shirts and jeans, with no obvious weapons. Not looking lethal didn't ratchet down Chaz's vigilance. Me? I was instantly reminded how much sex I had been missing.

"Prince Cáel! You are alive!" spilled out of the first one, a fiery red-head with a billowing, thick mane, porcelain skin and adorable freckles. Her Irish brogue was enchanting. I had to wonder if she cried out in Gaelic during orgasm. Wasn't I about to meet my future bride plus numerous other love interests?

She was fit, curvy and wearing an aqua shirt which exposed her midriff with a belly ring bearing a pearl drop, the requisite tattered skin-tight jeans and soft leather calf-boots.

"Why wouldn't I be alive?" I grinned, like a pirate discovering an all-girls school oceanographic classroom in need of plundering.

"How do total strangers know how unlikely it is that you would still be alive?" was Chaz's spin on things.

"We talked with your roommate. He said you had moved to Svalbard where you suffered an excruciating painful, yet richly deserved, death in a lemming stampede," she pouted, "and then the UN had your ashes exiled to Pluto because the Sun was too good for you."

9 -- 10 -- 11 --12 of them looking ... 3 with pale blonde hair that eerily reminded me of my fiancée, another red-head, two russet and five with deep, dark brown, or black hair. They were all fit -- fit -- fit! With an air of 'I graduated college only to discover: 1) no one was hiring Saline Soil Scientists, or 2) I no longer want to do any of the things I wanted to do when I picked this major. I was familiar with both types.

Timothy would have been at work and Odette would have invited the troupe in to regale them with all sorts of tales, which would have included a tour of my bedroom. They clearly had missed Odette so ... now I recalled; that particular excuse was one of the ten I had given the guy in 4B should anyone suspicious come calling.

I imagine twelve hot, English-as-a-Second-Language girls might be considered ... a bit odd. See, his was my address of record. I lied about my actual apartment, so random people who came looking for me went to him instead. This arrangement had been made prior to my understanding of the nature of my employment at Havenstone.

I'd neglected ... telling him to move out and go far, far away? Poor guy. I'd find a way to make it up to him later.

"Actually it was a southern vole immigration incident that was set off by the Bulgarian consulate offering repatriation for the first 10,000 applicants," I frowned, clearly traumatized by memory of the incident.

"These poor southern vole, native to the vacationer-friendly Black Sea resorts, were accidently introduced to the coldest inhabited place in the Northern hemisphere and they've been trying to get home ever since -- that would be the equivalent of a century and a half in 'vole-years."

"Despite the UN trying to quarantine any news of this Cricetidae catastrophe, I decided to evacuate the six most critically injured vole using a Bortolanza Pluto ultralight, which he must have confused with the UN sending my ashes to Pluto," I explained.

Mind you, the 'southern' voles are native to, among other places, Norway -- the owner of Svalbard. They were also native to the Bulgarian Black Sea coast so ... The Pluto ultra-light, once built in Italy, is now called the 'Puma' and made in Canada, has a maximum range of 675 km ... which would leave me crash landing into the Barents Sea, 260 km north of the northernmost airport in Norway, rendering me and my voles so much frozen food.

"You are an animal rights activist too?" several of the girls gasped. Yes. Yes I was. I was an animal and I was all for me having rights.

"Please, don't tell anyone about this," I grew serious. "I don't want my philanthropic efforts to be publicized. What I do, I do for the Earth's endangered ecosystems because it is what everyone should do, not because we suddenly feel bad about neglecting it."

"E haere koe ki te whai kia nui ai," Pamela snorted. I'd ask her why she knew Maori later ... right after I figured why Grandpa knew it.

"Ko toku mahere whānui," I replied. The girls looked confused.

"I'm also trying to revitalize endangered languages and revive dead ones. It is more of a hobby than life pursuit," I informed them.

"You really are a modern-day noble warrior-poet," the red-head leader sighed.

"Nah. I'm just a guy," I shrugged. "Besides, Ba chóir fear a bheith ar eolas ag a gníomhais, ní a oidhreacht." [A man should be known by his deeds, not his heritage].

"Sa chás go bhfuil misneach, tá súil agam," she replied using my 'family' motto.

"Jos on jalot on toivoa,", "Ahol van bátorsága, van remény," and "cesaret olduğu yerde umut vardır," all followed. 'Where there is Valor, there is Hope' in Finnish, Hungarian and Turkish. I got the sneaking feeling this wasn't a college field trip gone awry. These chicks were coming at me with a purpose that included more than sexual gratification and a kiss good-bye. Ugh.

"Thank you," I genuflected, paying honor to their reciting of my personal vow. "Anyway, you appear to be looking for me, but I am afraid I don't know any of you. Taking into account that I have a late lunch date with my fiancée in a half-hour and will be taking notes at a feminist convention at 8, what can I do for you?" I was establishing my escape plan.

"We have come here to join you," an assertive, dusky-skinned one smiled. I had to think about this. I was a bit tired. Taking all twelve of these girls on in one orgy was currently beyond me. I'd do eight tonight and the last four before breakfast tomorrow. Ah, happy thoughts of the Lacrosse Finals.

"What exactly do you plan to do with Mr. Nyilas?" Chaz interrupted.

"We are the [Irish] 'Na conairte soith an Ó Séaghdha ar', [Hungarian] 'A szuka kutyákat Herceg Nyilas', [Turkish] 'Prens okçu Kaltak Köpekleri' and [Finnish] 'Narttu koirista prinssi jousimies'," they chorused.

Pamela snickered. All of those fancy sounding names were variations on 'the Bitch Hounds of Prince Archer/Nyilas (with the Irish going for O'Shea).

"You want to be my bodyguards?" I gawked. Lacking lions, the Irish choice of the 'fur-balls of death' were hounds. Being women technically made them 'bitches'. I had to move fast. Any second now Wiesława was going to figure out these over-anxious non-Amazons were trying to replace her.

"You do realize I've left piles of dead bodies in my wake, right?" I nearly choked. Pamela slapped me on my back.

"Of course," they sounded so chipper. Fuck you Internet and 'First Person Shooter' games. This wasn't a fucking game! Trained combatants who joined my retinue met grisly ends and this was their freaking profession!

"Can I think about it? I mean, do any of you have any combat experience at all? Attacked someone in anger? Send off a blistering instant message?"

"Some of us have (combat experience I was assuming). We won't let you down."

"You do realize Ms. Dubois is going to kill them, don't you Sir?" Chaz sent me a chilling look.

"Ms. Dubois?", "who is that?" and "kill us?" floated around.

"Ms. Dubois is my blood-hungry ferret who wears a 'naughty berserker' human suit to trick the masses."

"Three of us have military training," one of the Finns spoke up.

By that they meant they had volunteered for military service in their native countries, then left after their first term because they found military life to be boring. On the 'plus' side, all but one had martial arts experience and six of the twelve had been a member of a Gun Club of some kind. Yep, Buffy was going to kill them -- all twelve at once by herself.

"I'll make you a deal," I offered. Chaz was giving me his 'I'm a stone yet clearly unhappy with you' face. "At 7:15 tonight, you will show up at Havenstone. I will sign you in, we'll go upstairs to one of the gyms and then warm up for fifteen minutes. When you are ready, or 7:30 rolls around, we are going to the sparing mats. If I lose, you can stay. If you lose, you will write this off as one of a legion of ideas that look good in print yet are foolish in practice. Do you accept?"

"How many of us do you have to beat for us to join with you and your Crusade?" the lead Irishwoman asked.

"All of you. I will fight you all at once. The mat space is quite extensive."

"You mean all twelve of us against you at the same time?" one of the Turks blinked in disbelief.

"Yes. I am not disrespecting you -- any of you. You've shown initiative, courage and a spirit of adventure. I found all three to be both admirable and worthy of reward (i.e. I will gladly have sex with you). What I am also telling you is of the three people with me, the only one I can most likely defeat in single combat is her," I motioned to Wiesława, "and I'm only saying that because she is 19 and relatively new to the art of killing."