Red as Blood, Black as Death

Chapter 7: It's too hard to decide how to kill someone

Tall glass window set up high in the wall overlooking the main entrance hall of the airport offered a view to the cloudy night sky.  Sliding glass doors automatically sensed the travelers as they entered.   High heels made solid clicks along the gray-and-white floors stones.  One of the security guards was glaring roughly at the two kids who were chasing each other around the airport.  The boy fell down and started to wail, and then his elder sister started to cry.  Their parents desperately tried to get them to stop crying in order to avoid irritating other people.

However, 2 am was no one’s best time, and as a result, the irascibility of everyone at the airport was doubled.  It didn’t help matters when there was a technical mess-up at the airline counter, resulting in taking thirty more minutes for the bags to be checked=in, and when the ticket printer ran out of ink, and then paper.  Now the line to pass security was absolutely clogged with all the misers trying to save money by taking red-eye flights who instead ended up wasting time.

Sigmund was a very patient man, but even this line was trying his patience.  He would miss his pance and be inevitably killed otherwise.  As a small consolation, Sigmund made Luka carry all the bags.  There were only two, but Luka had to hold them for an hour in a half as Sigmund would not permit his bag to touch the ground.  Germs, he claimed.  Luka would’ve put his own down, but he remembered that it had belonged to Sigmund and therefore probably should also remain aloft.  He was still quite shaken by the massacre of the three ugly ladies.  As such, Luka’s arm muscles were very much sore.

Sigmund was in the process of disabling all the signals given out from any electronics he may possess.  He wouldn’t want anyone to track what he was doing.  Still, it seemed a little extreme that Sibelius would be upset at Sigmund for playing around with a few of the goods.  It must be harder to find slaves in the age of the heightened police force.  He never seemed to have any problems doing so, but then again, he was Sigmund.

He did have his latest capture, Luka Scarlatti, accompanying him.  He was a skinny and muscular sort of person, with straight dark brown hair that was desperately in need of a hair cut.  His face was always twisted into a scowl, and he seemed to have an angsty disposition and a strong will.  He was able to speak to Sigmund after all, even after seeing the experiment room, though from Sigmund’s research and observations he tended to be moody and depressed.  It was sort of boring to harm people who don’t really care about being injured.  In those cases, a clean death was the best, except in Luka’s case he couldn’t kill him because he would have to sell him later.  He could technically kill him now, but Luka was needed.

Finally.  The line had progressed far enough that Luka and Sigmund made it through airport screening.  What a silly invention.  There are so many ways to bypass the airport securities certain transmitting frequencies hampered the x-rays, coatings of certain organic material blocks the x-rays, etc.  There was no time for pointless meditation on trifles like x-rays; Sigmund hurried Luka the bag carrier along towards their gate.

“Flight 3004 from Old York City, the Disbanded Provinces, toStrömsdal, Norway,” a static voice said over the intercom.

At this, they all but sprinted to the airport counter where a beady-eyed man was just about to pull the retractable belt stanchion across the doorway.

“Hold on!” called out Sigmund.  The man scowled at the sight of them.

“You’re late,” he said flatly.

“Yes, but, we’re here now.”  Sigmund held out their plane tickets, and the man ripped them from his hands.

“Roger Jefferson and Max Davis?” he asked.  “You have different last names.”