Deathstalker 04 - Deathstalker Honor

people hurried to get out of their way. There was bad news in the air. Everyone could smell it, but no one knew what it was yet, or where it might fall. So they kept their heads down and hoped not to be noticed.
    It was barely morning when Random and Ruby received a call from the city Council, demanding their attendance at once. Normally Random would have told them what they could do with their demand, but the barely restrained panic filling the comm clerk’s voice convinced him this was something he and Ruby should see for themselves.
    The chamber door was being guarded by four armed men, but they moved quickly aside as Random and Ruby approached. One even opened the door for them. Inside, de Lisle and his people were standing together, staring unhappily at two large wooden crates on the floor before them. The crates appeared perfectly ordinary, but the Councillors were looking at them as though they expected a Grendel to leap out at any moment. It was a measure of how upset they were that they looked at Random and Ruby with open relief. de Lisle patted his sweating forehead with a handkerchief, and gestured at the crates with a hand that wasn’t as steady as it might have been.
    “These were waiting for us here in the chamber when we arrived for work this morning, along with a polite little note, saying A Present From Shub. Nothing else. We have no idea how they got here. I can only assume there are traitors among my people, rebel sympathizers. We haven’t dared open the crates.
    They make threatening noises if they’re touched. They make equally threatening noises if we try to leave.
    We’ve been trapped in here with them for almost an hour.” “Typical Shub terror tactics,” said Ruby, studying the crates interestedly.
    “Have you tried scanning the contents?”
    “Yes. The interiors appear to be lined with something our scanners can’t penetrate.”
    “Could be a bomb,” said Ruby, crouching down before the nearest crate and studying the lid with a professional eye. “No lock, no clasps, no obvious electronic countermeasures. Maybe a warning of some kind. I say we open the crates and see what happens.”
    “Sounds like a plan to me,” said Random. “Ruby and I would probably survive a bomb anyway. But just in case, Councillors, I suggest you retire to the far end of this room.”
    The Councillors did so hastily, not bothering to take their dignity with them.
    Random crouched down beside Ruby.
    “I don’t think we’ll encounter any booby-traps,” he said thoughtfully. “Otherwise, they wouldn’t have bothered with two. One would have been enough for a bomb, or any other terror weapon.”
    “Could contain some kind of Fury,” said Ruby, frowning. “The crates are big enough for a smallish one.
    But why bother with a killing machine when a bomb would be just as effective?” She looked at Random and grinned. “Want to toss over which one of us gets to open the first crate?” “I’ll open the first,” said Random. “You always cheat.” He took a firm hold of the lid on the nearest crate and yanked it open. A puff of refrigerated air rose, and Random and Ruby backed quickly away, but there was no other
    response from the crate. They moved cautiously forward and looked inside. A dead face with pure white skin flecked with frost looked up at them. The open eyes were frosted too. Random and Ruby looked at each other, and then looked back in the crate. A human body had been coiled inside the crate like a snake. He’d been cut open, from throat to groin, and his chest and abdomen were strangely… flat. Ruby raised an eyebrow.
    “Whatever I was expecting, this isn’t it. Anyone you know?” “I don’t think so. Why would Shub send us a dead man? And a carefully preserved one, at that?”
    “And why arrange him like that? Why not just use a bigger crate?” She reached in and grabbed a handful of the dead man’s hair. She tried to pull him out, but the body barely budged, stuck with cold and frost to the interior walls. The frozen tissues gave up loud cracking sounds as they reluctantly stretched.
    The long abdominal cut opened slowly like a mouth, and it was only then that Random and Ruby realized the body had been completely gutted. Everything inside the chest and abdomen had been removed.
    “The cut’s so precise it might have been made with a scalpel,” Random said thoughtfully, and Ruby released her handful of hair. The head fell back against the crate wall with a loud thud.