Red Mercury Ch. 01

Author's note: This is a novel-length harem story being completed chapter by chapter, so fair warning it's a bit of a slow burn as far as sex scenes.

"You might want to know that your drink has been poisoned."

The martini glass clinked as the waitress set it on the glass table. Tell-tale granules of not-quite-dissolved powder swirled around the bottom of the glass. She spoke quietly, her English only lightly tinted with a Cantonese accent.

"I'm not sure I know a countersign for that one." Rex Maverick, freelance secret agent, shot the waitress a flirtatious smile as she leaned over the table. She was gorgeous. Jet-black hair flowing down to her waist and contrasting sharply with the red-and-gold patterned qipao she wore. The dress was tight in the chest, which perfectly suited her exceptional figure, and featured high-cut slits on both sides, exposing plenty of pale, smooth thigh.

Rex gestured for the woman to lean in closer, reaching into the pocket of his dark burgundy three-piece suit and pulling out a wad of bills. The money gave the waitress an excuse to lean in, close enough that he could feel the warmth of her breath on his left ear. He was seated in the cocktail lounge of Macau's Golden Dragon casino and to any onlookers he just looked like a tipsy high-roller smitten by a pretty face.

"Do all Americans make jokes when people are trying to kill them?"

"You could say I'm used to it." Rex's tone was casual and he made sure to keep his eyes firmly locked on the woman's impressive figure. Purely to keep up the charade, of course. He didn't need to scan the room...he had spotted the enemy as soon as he sat down.

The man was seated at the bar and had the look of someone who had suffered some heavy losses in the gaming rooms and was looking for hope at the bottom of a glass. It was a good disguise. He was far from the only unlucky bastard drowning his sorrows, but he was a little too...performative...about it. A little too mopey. A little too drunk.

And he had tell-tale flaps of latex 'skin' covering the meridian points on his neck, concealing his infusion ports. Gloves covered the ports that would be visible on the back of his hands. The latex was "flesh"-colored, meaning Caucasian, and while make-up had been liberally applied to blend it with the man's East Asian skin tones. It was a clumsy job and the results were more obvious than leaving the patch uncovered. A government agent wouldn't have cheaped out on the disguise, so this must be another freelance agent.

"I thought I was meeting Dan Zhao...and I'm pretty sure he doesn't fill out a dress as nicely as you do." Rex mimed taking a sip from his poisoned martini.

"My name is Ying Zhao...and my brother is dead." She giggled as she curled a lock of hair around one finger, but her eyes were cold. "Before they got him, he told me to find you."

"I'm sorry to hear that...he was a good friend." Rex kept his smile in place, reaching out to stroke a finger over the top of her hand. "Don't worry, I'll get you out of here."

"Should I meet you later?"

A quick glance told Rex that the man at the bar was looking their way, one hand in his coat pocket. "No. I think our friend is starting to wonder why I haven't keeled over yet. We need to get out of here now."

Dropping the pretense of flirting, he got to his feet and grabbed Ying by the hand. She was smart enough not to argue as he pulled her past the other tables.

"There's an employee exit in the back." She whispered to him, glancing over her shoulder. The man from the bar had risen and was keeping pace behind them, no longer attempting to hide his presence. "He's following us."

"I know. It's all part of the plan."

"That's not very reassuring. Are you sure you're an American agent?"

"I'm a freelancer." He slipped through the employee door, moving with speed and assurance to prevent anyone from questioning him. A few staff members raised their eyebrows as they passed, but most gave Ying a knowing look and moved on, assuming the two were on their way to some out-of-the-way location for some private time. They were, but unfortunately their goal wasn't a surriptious tryst.

The man from the bar caught up with them in one of the twisting alleyways that ran behind the casino. Rex was waiting for him, slumped casually against one of the bare concrete walls, face lit by the faint, cherry-red glow of his lit cigarette. Ying was watching from behind a stack of discarded cardboard boxes, ready to make a run for it if he was captured or killed.

"I don't suppose you'd mind telling me who you're working for? I imagine Bejing would send one of their own people." He exhaled a thin stream of tobacco smoke from his nose.

"A professional doesn't give up his client's information." The man's gaze flicked from Rex to the walls of the alley, alert for possible traps. "Besides, in a few minutes you won't need to worry about that any more..."

"Please don't say it."

"...because you'll be dead!" The walking cliche grinned, while Rex took another drag from his cigarette.

"There it is..." Rex muttered under his breath, shaking his head as he straightened and ambled slowly to the middle of the alley. "Seriously...the writing here could use a little work."

"Say your prayers, Rex Maverick!" Spitting on the ground, the man pulled his hands from the pockets of his coat. His fingers glittered in the darkness, each one bearing a heavy metal ring. Planting his feet firmly on the ground, he clenched his fists and smashed them together.

The jewelry on his fingers met with the peal of ringing metal and a huge shower of sparks. The air crackled as arcs of spitting energy crawled over the man's hands, solidifying and encasing them in what appeared to be a pair of bright, metal gloves. The articulated plates completely covered his fists and extended all the way up to his elbow. The man's eyes flashed, the metallic gleam matching the gloves he was wearing.

"Burnished copper." Rex nodded, suitably impressed. "Good. I do hate it when people send bargain bin assassins after me. Makes me feel unappreciated."

The man's only response was to drop into a fighting stance, his metal-clad hands curled into claws. Motes of energy began to form around them, drawing inward to form a single, white-hot ball of jittering, crackling power between his fingers. Stray power grounded in the metal objects nearby, causing electricity to arc and crackle off of trash bins and exposed conduits.

The tip of Rex's cigarette glowed slightly brighter as he took a deep breath.

"You won't be so cocky, once you taste the power of my Volt Buster!!" With a fierce scream, the man shoved his gloved hands forward, tossing the ball of energy towards Rex like he was passing him a basketball. Leaving a contrail of lightning, the ball of energy screamed towards the freelancer, still standing in the middle of the alley. There was a small cry of fear from Ying as the blast bore down on him.

Rex flicked his cigarette towards the ball. It made contact a few feet from where he was standing and, by rights, it should have been consumed a split second before Rex himself.

An explosion rocked the alley, as his cigarette erupted into a roiling ball of blue-white fire. For a moment the sphere of electricity and the mass of flame seemed to struggle in midair, pushing against one another as the concrete below them began to glow red-hot.

Then, in the blink of an eye, the stalemate was over. The sphere of lightning burst apart, bolts of electricity spitting out to blast baseball-sized chunks of concrete out of the concrete walls.

The nameless freelancer's eyes popped open in shock as the ball of fire rocketed towards him. He barely got his metal gloves up in time to guard himself, the flames splashing over the bright copper and licking against the walls of the alleyway.

"Still want to do this?" Rex asked, reaching into the inner pocket of his jacket with the air of someone grabbing his phone to check the time.

The other freelancer was panting now, the edges of his copper gloves glowing slightly from the heat of the fireball. His eyes narrowed as he considered his opponent, but it seemed like he wasn't willing to back down.

With a wordless shout, he dipped into a low stance, fingers curling as he worked his arm in a series of wide circles.

A low, drawn-out groan filled the alley. The sound of tortured metal. The lightning-scarred conduits and fixtures set into the walls bent and twisted, their screws and bolts rattling as they strained against the concrete that held them in place.

The first bolt failed, shearing the head off of the screw that held it in place. The tiny piece of metal shrieked towards Rex almost as fast as a bullet.

There was a curving flash of light as Rex yanked his hand free of his jacket, slashing it towards the tiny projectile. The bolt disintegrated in midair, turning into a shower of harmless sparks.

One by one, the other fasteners failed, howling towards him with lethal velocity. Again and again, his hand lashed out and that spinning, arcing curve of light slashed them from the air. Freed from their moorings, larger objects began to fly towards Rex: metal shrapnel, conduits, garbage lids. All were cut down by his hands, moving so fast that the eye couldn't follow.

As the last chunk of scrap metal was blasted into a dozen glowing shards, Rex held his hand out in front of him. Circling around his arm, twisting in midair like a friendly snake, was a string of prayer beads. Each bead was bright silver and glowed softly in the darkness of the alley, matching the sparkle of Rex's eyes.

"Bad news, pal. I don't live in a junky apartment because I like the ambiance." Rex flexed his fingers, causing the prayer beads to orbit his open palm. "Low rent means more cash for infusions. I just upgraded to silver a couple of months ago."

With a growl of anger and fear, the enemy freelancer curled his fingers into tight claws, his arms trembling as though he were struggling to push a boulder uphill. There was the sound of metal on concrete from further down the alley, past the dim light that trickled back here from the casino's sparkling neon frontage.

"Fuck." It was Rex's turn to look surprised as a pair of large, steel dumpsters flew out of the shadows towards him, about half a ton of metal flying towards him at over a hundred miles an hour. He clenched his fist and the beads began to spin, moving so fast that they turned into a solid, silver-hued blur.

The beads whipped out, carving the air into glowing blue arcs and leaving deep gouges in the concrete floor and walls around him. Beads of sweat dotted his forehead as he increased the speed of his strikes, desperately trying to counter the sheer, lethal momentum of the attack.

Red-hot lines crisscrossed the steel boxes as they tumbled through the air before they finally burst apart into glowing fragments. The beads spun so fast that they seemed to form a solid dome of flickering, silver light, cutting each fragment into dozens of pieces and then cutting those pieces smaller still. Finally, Rex stood in a nearly perfect circle of bare concrete as slowly cooling metal shards fell to the ground around him in a series of clinks.

"Aah!!" Ying's strangled cry came from the alley behind him. Spinning around, Rex could see the unnamed freelancer. One of his gauntleted hands was wrapped around Ying's slender waist and the other hovered over her throat. The freelancer made sure to keep her body between him and Rex, serving as a human shield.

"You move fast." The beads were circling Rex's hand again, ready to lash out the moment he saw an opening. The freelancer must have taken advantage of the distraction provided by the last attack to dash along the wall with some kind of lightfoot technique, grabbing Ying while Rex was occupied.

"When I have to." The man was breathing heavily and his eyes looked bloodshot. Between the 'volt buster' and the last attack with the dumpsters, he must have used almost all of his vitae supply. He was showing signs of withdrawal. Ying winced as the clawed fingertips of his gauntlets touched her throat. "I'll need you to drop your weapon."

"You don't look like a man who enjoys taking hostages...you could still walk away from this." The glow faded from the silver beads and they rattled as they dropped out of the air and hung on Rex's hooked fingertips.

"Not for this much money. I've got debts to pay...and I said to drop your weapon." Ying was keeping a brave face, but Rex could tell the freelancer's grip must be painful. He was close enough to cross the distance between them in the blink of an eye...but the freelancer only had to tighten his fingers and Ying's throat would be torn out.

"Take it easy." Rex let the beads slip through his fingers, keeping his eyes on the freelancer.

The opening was only a split-second. As the beads fell, the freelancer's eyes flicked downward, attention involuntarily captured by the glittering silver. In that fraction of a second Rex made his move: gathering ribbons of silver-hued vitae into his fist and striking out with a swift jab.

Although they were still yards apart, the silver strands suddenly blew through the freelancer's chest: blasting a terrifyingly large hole in his ribs and spraying the wall behind him with crimson gore.

Those metal gloves dissolved as he collapsed, coalescing back into a collection of rings. Ying gasped with relief, taking several staggering steps away from the corpse. One of her high-heels caught in a rusty grate, snapping and sending her tumbling backwards.

Rex caught her before she hit the ground, supporting her with one hand around her waist. For a moment, she leaned against him, her back pressed against his chest, her hips against his.

"H-how did you do that?" Ying murmured, still breathing heavily and shaking against Rex's body from her brush with death. "For a moment, I thought you might be blasting through me to get to him. I thought I was dead."

"I have a rule..." Rex slipped his free hand between them, starting at the small of Ying's back and running it slowly up the satiny fabric of her qipao. Ying stiffened slightly but she made no attempt to pull away. "I don't sacrifice my friends."

There was the sound of tearing paper and Ying blinked in surprise as he held a small strip in front of her. A series of twisted lines covered the paper, now blackened and scorched.

"What's that?"

"A vitae focus...good for only one use I'm afraid. But it allowed me to channel that blast behind you without sending it through you."

"When did you put that on my back?" She pulled away, raising an eyebrow at Rex.

"When we left the casino," He smirked.

"So...you knew that he was going to try and take me hostage?" There was an edge in Ying's voice that Rex didn't seem to catch.

"I thought there was a good chance. It's the kind of cliche' that you can expect from-"

Ying's palm caught him on the cheek with a sharp crack. He blinked in surprise as she glared up at him, flexing her fingers.

"What the hell was that for?" He looked her up and down, a worried look on his face.

"That was for not telling me about your hostage plan in advance." Before Rex could apologize, she grabbed his black tie and yanked his face down to hers, pressing her lips against his in a deep, long kiss. When she finally released him they were both breathing heavily. "And that was for saving my life."

"Remind me to do it again sometime." A relieved smile spread over Rex's face. The two of them were still pressed together and he could feel the soft pressure of her breasts against his sternum. He placed his hand on her lower back, pulling her slightly closer. She didn't seem to mind.

"Hopefully I won't give you the opportunity." She readjusted his tie and stepped back, although the warmth of her body against his lingered briefly "What do we do about...all this?"

Ying gestured at the body of the freelancer, keeping her face averted from the bloody mess.

"Don't worry about it. The police here don't like to get involved in incidents involving anyone with infusions. I expect it'll get swept under the rug." Rex gestured with his index and middle finger, causing the prayer beads to zip over to his waiting hand.

"And what do we do?"

"Well, unless you wanted to finish your shift, I'd suggest coming with me back to my hotel. I need to refill my vitae and I think we'll have time to catch our breath for a night or two."

"Sounds good to me." Ying gave him a small smile. "But let me guess...your room only has one bed?"

"What can I say, I wasn't planning on entertaining a guest." Rex returned her smile with a mischievous grin of his own.

"I imagine you don't have a pair of flats on you, either." Ying wobbled slightly as she tried to balance on her broken heel. The ground was covered in sharp and still-smoking fragments of metal, making going barefoot an unappealing option.

"Don't worry, you won't need to walk."

"What? Aaaah!" Ying yelped as Rex bent down and swept her off of her feet, lifting her into a bridal carry. Ying instinctively wrapped her arms around his neck for stability, although it was hardly necessary since he had no trouble hefting her slim frame.

"Americans..." She muttered, shaking her head. "You don't think we'll draw a lot of attention like this?"

"Don't worry. People rarely look up."

"What is that supposed to meeeaaaaaaaaahhh!!"

Ying's voice trailed off as Rex launched himself into the air, scattering the metal shards with the downdraft of his ascent. One leap cleared almost four stories before Rex tapped the tip of his foot against the railing of a fire escape jutting from the concrete wall. That sent him flying again, bouncing from wall to rooftop.

Ying clung tightly to his neck, too breathless to cry out as the two of them sped over the city. The neon lights and garish signs of the casino strip blurred together below them as Rex leapt from building to building, feet barely touching down before he launched off again. Here and there, a startled face stared upwards in confusion as a pedestrian half-a-dozen stories below tried to process what just flew overhead.

Five minutes later, Ying was climbing through the window to Rex's penthouse suit, long black hair in disarray from the whipping winds.

"Would it have killed you to use the front door?" She kicked off her ruined high heels, stocking-covered feet sinking into the rich carpet. Rex had taken them into the bedroom which had an incredible view of the city as well as a large, king-sized bed covered in navy blue sheets.

"We don't want to draw attention, do we?" Rex slipped through the window after her, releasing the threads of vitae that had allowed him to cling to the exterior like a spider. "Besides, whoever sent the freelancer might be watching my hotel."

As he spoke, Rex undid the knot of his tie and tossed it over the widescreen TV opposite the bed. His jacket followed a second later.

"You don't think they'll try to kill you again?"

"Not tonight, at least. Freelancers don't come cheap and if whoever-this-is has enough cash to hire two at once then they'd have sent both to make sure the job gets done." He turned towards the bed as he popped his shoes off and kicked them underneath, before loosening the buttons on his shirt cuffs. "Feel free to take the bed. The other room has a couch that should be more than enoooof!"

As he spoke, he had turned around only to see Ying behind him. She placed both hands on his chest and shoved him backwards. He could have resisted, of course, but he allowed himself to be pushed gently down onto the bed, his knees hanging over the edge as Ying leaned over him.