Shadow Warrior: Destiny of a Mutant (8 page)

“
Scheisse!
Man your battle stations. That is not, I repeat, not an Allied aircraft. It looks like some type of…spacecraft!”

Upon hearing the word ‘spacecraft,’ all of the men looked at each other as if they had not heard the captain
correctly.

“Captain
,
did you say ‘spacecraft’?” asked one of the men.

“I don’t believe I stuttered, Sergeant
.
Man your battle stations. From the looks of this thing it doesn’t appear to be attacking us. There is smoke coming from it, and it appears to be about to crash land near here!”

Krelian Research Vessel

Lieutenant Jae’nol was in the middle of a countdown indicating their altitude.

“6,000 feet! 5,000 feet! Sir, there is smoke coming from the engine compartment!”

“Activate emergency life support systems. NOW!” shouted the captain.

The Lieutenant did as ordered and continued his countdown, just as the emergency life support systems engaged.

“2,500 feet! 1,000 feet! Brace for impact! Now!”

Clandestine Anti-Aircraft Battery Placement

“Sir! It has crash landed approximately five kilometers northwest of our location!”

“Sergeant
,
I want every available man to head towards the direction of that craft, immediately! Ostermann, contact Berlin immediately and advise them of the situation! Tell them I will contact them with more information as soon as I have it!”

“
Jawohl, Herr Hauptmann,”
replied Ernst Ostermann, the radio operator, as he turned and ran towards the bivouac to use the field radio.

“Bring the trucks around now and let’s get there as quickly as we can.”

“
Jawohl.”

The captain
and his men then loaded into three troop transport trucks and headed towards the crash site as fast as they could go.

The Voyage to Nepal

1480 A.D.

Over the next four months, Will made his way from England to other European ports, and then to the Mediterranean, each time offering his strong back and hands in return for passage and a small wage on an eastbound ship. Each ship’s cargo was different: spices, tea, silk or fragrances. He learned much about seamanship and commerce.

From the Mediterranean, Will continued eastward until he reached the Bay of Bengal in India.

In India he disembarked and bought a horse and supplies as the rest of his journey would take him across India, at least until he made it to Kathmandu. There he would travel to Nepal via the Narayani River. Once in Nepal he would seek a guide to lead him to the mountain he sought.

The terrain he had to traverse was so rough and unpredictable that it took Will several weeks to reach the Narayani River. He was able to offer his services as a deckhand to the captain of a tea laden ship heading north on the Narayani. He sold the horse at a nearby village. A few weeks later he arrived in Nepal and sought out a local
sherpa
to guide him to the north face of the mountain known as
Sagarmatha
.

All of the
sherpas
he approached thought he was crazy for wanting to go to
Sagarmatha
, and all of them refused to take him. However, they were all intrigued by the white foreigner who could speak their language with native fluency. After a few days of looking for a guide, Will was advised by a shopkeeper that the only one crazy enough to take him to
Sagarmatha
was an old
sherpa
named Surya. Will got directions to Surya’s home from the shopkeeper, and headed in that direction.

Surya’s home, a mud and stone hut with a wooden roof, was on the outskirts of town. A few chickens ran loose around the front of the hut. Will knocked on the door, and old Surya came to the door after a couple of minutes. The old
sherpa
was wearing peasant clothing; a wispy gray beard covered his dirty face. Time had not been good to the old man. His sun-darkened leather skin placed him anywhere between fifty and seventy years old. Surprisingly he still had a full head of white hair, but no more than a dozen teeth in his mouth.

Surya was surprised to see a westerner at his front door, and even more surprised to hear him speaking fluent Nepali. Will explained his desire to travel to the south face of
Sagarmatha
, and the old man just looked at him like he had two heads; several seconds passed before he spoke.

“Why do you wish to travel to
Sagarmatha
, young one?” asked the old
sherpa
.

“Why is my concern. I only need a guide to take me to the base of the south face of the mountain. Once I’m there, you are free to return to your village.”

The old man looked at Will, his face unreadable, and finally replied. “I will take you to
Sagarmatha
as you request. It will take us about two weeks on horseback and mule to get there.” The old man told Will his fee, to which Will agreed. The old man told Will what supplies they would need to make the journey and where he could purchase them. Will thanked the old man and turned to leave when the old man spoke.

“Your destiny awaits you, young one. Your destiny awaits you.”

Will turned to respond to the old man, but he had already disappeared back inside of his hut.

The Journey to Sagarmatha

The old
sherpa
was correct; the journey to the base of the south face of the mountain was as hard and arduous as it was beautiful. Although it was mid-May, the elevation was lending itself to chilly temperatures, especially at night; falling snow slowed their pace at times. Will and the old man put on the furs they had brought with them to keep them warm.

Mid-morning on the eighth day of their journey, Will brought his horse to a halt and was quiet for a few moments. The old man halted his horse and turned to face Will to ask him why he had stopped.

“There are riders approaching from the southeast,” he answered. Will paused for a moment to listen again. “I would estimate at least ten or twelve horses riding hard. I noticed some smoke from an encampment last night, but did not think much of it.”

The old man looked concerned and a little confused as he looked in the direction Will had indicated the riders were coming from. “I don’t hear or see anything, young one. But if what you say is true, it is probably a band of Mongolian bandits. They will kill us without a second’s thought, take our horses and supplies, and leave our bodies for the vultures to feed on. Hurry, we must hide!”

Will and the old man started riding hard towards a large rock formation about two-hundred yards in front of them. When they were within twenty yards of the rock formation, the old man heard the horses Will had spoken of and looked over his shoulder to see his worst fears confirmed. A band of ten Mongolian bandits was indeed chasing them and gaining on them rapidly!

They arrived at the rock formation about a hundred yards ahead of the Mongolians. They both dismounted and the old man started running towards the rocks. He turned around and saw that Will was not following him.

“What are you doing, young one? We must hide and pray that the Mongolians do not follow us into the mountains beyond these rocks!”

“You hide, old man. I will make sure you are not harmed.”

The old man hesitated for a few seconds, and then continued climbing up the mountain to hide. Will walked into the opening in front of the large outcropping of rocks where the old man had entered the mountains. The hood of the fur coat hid his white features. The Mongolians were only forty yards away, and started to slow down as they saw Will standing alone and weaponless to confront them.

When they were within twenty yards, one of the Mongolians removed a long arrow from a quiver, strung it on his bow and let it fly in Will’s direction. His aim was true, and just as the arrow was about to strike Will in the heart, Will reached out and caught the arrow as if he were catching an annoying mosquito out of the air. After catching the projectile, Will snapped it in half and threw it on the ground in front of him.

At the sight of this, the Mongolians brought their horses to a stop within about four or five yards of Will and formed a semi-circle around where he stood. The man in the center of the group, who appeared to be the leader, was the first to speak to Will.

“What manner of trick is this that you catch arrows out of the air?”

Will pulled the hood of his fur coat down, and answered in Mongolian, “It was not a trick. I simply reached and grabbed it out of the air before it struck me in the chest.”

The Mongolian leader looked at Will and realized that he was white and was speaking their language perfectly. There was a lot of murmuring between the Mongolians as they noticed this as well.

“Who are you, white devil, and what are you doing here? How do you know our tongue?”

“You will get no answers from me. If you wish to live, turn around, leave now and forget you ever saw me here,” Will replied. He stared at the men with the penetrating gaze of his hard, blue eyes.

At the utterance of Will’s threat all of the Mongolian bandits began laughing.

The leader said, “You are crazier than you look, white devil. We will kill you where you stand and feed your flesh and bones to the scavengers.”

The leader then nodded for one of his men to dismount and kill Will. The Mongolian was tall, muscular and battle-scarred; a long, dark beard covered his dirty face. As he dismounted, he removed a long sword from a sheath on his back and approached Will with a cold sneer on his face. From the way he carried the weapon it was obvious he was an expert in its use and would have no problem using it now. As he got closer, the Mongolian let out a blood curdling yell, raised the sword to his shoulders, and ran towards Will, who simply stood motionless.

As the Mongolian came within striking distance, he raised the sword above his head to deliver the fatal blow. At that precise moment, faster than the eye could follow, Will executed a perfect jump spinning back kick, and the knife-edge of his left foot caught the charging Mongolian in the throat, crushing his trachea and destroying his airway. The Mongolian flew back almost twenty feet and was dead before he hit the ground. His sword flew up in the air and buried itself in the ground an arm’s length in front of Will.

The other Mongolians could not believe their eyes. Their leader looked at Will, who was still simply standing in the same place as he was before he killed the Mongolian who had attacked him. His face was expressionless.

“Take your men and leave now!” Will ordered the Mongolian leader, in a low menacing tone.

This enraged the Mongolian, who then ordered three more of his men to dismount, and attack Will at the same time. Three of them did as ordered. They each pulled their swords and formed a semi-circle around Will, who remained in the same spot. After seeing what Will had done to their comrade, they were reluctant to approach the white devil, but fear of their leader overcame their fear of Will after a few seconds.

The bandit to Will’s immediate left was the first to attack. As he raised his sword to attack and stepped towards Will to deliver his blow, Will spun in towards the Mongolian, and as he spun he picked up the dead Mongolian’s sword that was sticking out of the ground in front of him. As he spun away from his attacker, he drove the pointed end of the sword through the Mongolian’s chest, slicing his heart in two. A look of fear and surprise mounted his face as he, too, died before his body hit the ground.

Upon seeing this, the other two Mongolians attacked simultaneously from opposite sides. Will parried the blow from the Mongolian in front of him, and immediately spun to parry the blow from the Mongolian behind him. Will effortlessly parried several more blows from the Mongolians. Both of the Mongolians were breathing hard from the exertion of the fight, while Will’s breathing remained unlabored. He appeared exhilarated by the combat.

Again and again the Mongolians positioned themselves so that one of them was behind Will and one was in front. As the one behind Will moved in with a vicious swing towards Will’s neck, Will spun and cut off the Mongolian’s hand which held the sword. As the man screamed, Will’s next blow removed his head. Will then spun back in the opposite direction and cut off the head of the Mongolian who had been in front of him and had tried to take advantage of the situation and strike at Will while his back was towards him.

As the Mongolian leader looked on in stunned disbelief at what he had just witnessed, he ordered four of his men to unleash a volley of arrows at Will. As they unleashed the arrows, Will spun and knocked all four of them out of the air with his sword. Will then took his sword and threw it at the Mongolian leader so fast that he could not react. The last memory the Mongolian leader would have was Will’s sword piercing his throat and burying itself almost to the hilt. His body fell off his mount and landed with a heavy thud on the cold, hard ground.

At the sight of their dead leader and the other dead Mongolians, the remaining Mongolians sat on their horses momentarily in shock; they were not sure what to do next. Will then spoke to them calmly in Mongolian, “Unless you wish to meet the same fate, I strongly suggest you bury your dead, leave this place now, and never return.”

All five of the remaining Mongolians then slid off of their horses and dropped to their faces in front of Will, begging him not to kill them.

“I will give you enough time to bury them and not a moment longer. Move, now!”

With that, the petrified Mongolians gathered the remains of their dead and buried them under loose rocks. As soon as this was done, they mounted their horses and rode back the way they came as fast as they could, leaving the dead men‘s horses where they were. Will stood watching them until they were out of sight to make sure they didn’t return. Without turning around, Will said, “You can come out now, old man.”

Immediately the old
sherpa,
who had watched the entire battle from a hidden spot in the rocks, came out and dropped to his knees in front of Will, his arms outstretched and his face to the ground.

“White Warrior, spare an old man, please.”

Will rolled his eyes, and in a soft voice said, “Get up, old man, you’re embarrassing yourself.” Will extended his hand to help the old man up.

The old man looked up and saw Will’s hand and the calm look on his face, which bore a hint of a smile. The old man then allowed Will to help him up.

“Let’s quickly gather whatever supplies from their horses we need and be on our way. We need to be well away from this place before they return with reinforcements,” Will said to the old man.

The old man eyed the fleeing bandits as they rode away quickly and said, “I wouldn’t be too worried about that. They probably won’t stop until they get to Kathmandu to change their soiled undergarments.”

After quickly retrieving the supplies, Will smacked one of the horses on its hindquarters and it took off running. The others quickly followed. Will and Surya remounted their steeds and continued on their way.