The Hunted -- Part 1
by Martin H Slusser

"It is my opinion, the Jannisary Project should be mandatory for every man, woman, and child. Every person on the face of the earth must be tested for telekinetic ability. Any who possess this miraculous ability should be drafted." Cindy VanTur-McAllen paused. A scowl, faint so as not to cause wrinkles, eased across her face. Even with the miracle of 21st Century medicine, the aging process was still a problem.

"Thus far," she said, her words measured Virginia-style, deliberate, "only a very few persons tested have been found to possess the needed ability. Most of them are either Native American, or," blue pretty eyes closed in resignation, "Native Americans of mixed race." A wry smile appeared, her words became ironic. "Of all testing positive, we have only been able to volunteer those of this very minor race."

A look not unlike fanaticism crossed Cindy's face. The gentle, misty features became something less than human.

A giggled Bronx cheer drew the woman from keyboard and dreams of future greatness.

Benny Wya Greylov's first-born child laughed and kicked his heels up from a patchwork quilt on the floor of her office. He brought a light to an otherwise gloomy cavern of a room deep below the Pentagon, in the quarter of the building the United Nations now held. He giggled around a teething ring, smiling in such a way she could not take her eyes from him. Already the resemblance to his father was incredible, irresistible.

He gurgled and drooled over the toy, his eyes a dark, indigo blue, flashing with the joy of getting his mother's attention. Each eye was outlined by a heavy ribbon of black. Like his father. Spirit eyes, a servant from Haiti called them, able to see that which no mortal was meant to see. If the superstitious idiot hadn't of run off the same day, for such nonsense Cindy would have sold her welfare-contract Johnny-on-the-spot.

Hearing no additional commands, the computer went to stand-by. Cindy didn't notice. She edged the tight skirt up and knelt on the quilt, the flannel material warm and soft under her knees.

"You're Mama's little warrior, aren't you, honey?"

She tickled the roll of baby fat under the heart-shaped chin. He smiled, drooling on her hand. Cindy laughed for the sheer joy of motherhood.

Something caught his eyes. He waved and cried out, the almost toothless mouth gaped in a broad grin.

Cindy turned. Her hand clapped to her mouth in time to stop a shriek.

From shadows high on the office walls, the GalonV-protector croaked a greeting at the laughing baby. The small GalonV ignored a massive Warrior Guardian of the Sun-People assigned to defend the child from unclean spirits who would murder him. He dropped from the walls, shot at Cindy, then was soaring high, black wings reaching for the Veil of the Sun. A few strands of the woman's flaxen hair rippled in the GalonV-di:dan:wa's sharp beak.

"Ha-ha." The raven laughed a cry of victory. "Go tell A:Wya:ki. Hey:O, Little Grey Wolf Woman, your first-born grandchild is fat little nestling. Strong and hungry to seek the ani:Wy:O:Ming:yi, the Way of the Sacred-House of Power Peoples."

Midnight wings lifted and he cried out.

"Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeee."


A moment of regret passed his heart, a feeling not unlike the damp, chill winds racing down the streets of Jacksonville, North Carolina. Why not stay another night? Benny sighed. In the back of his mind wild geese called, faint. Insistent, they beckoned him.

He kicked down the starter. Sleepy and cold, she muttered at Benny. An excuse. Ignoring the pain in his spine he twisted his upper body and looked back at the windows of their apartment over her parent's garage in this quiet, mostly Corp neighborhood.

No. Better to leave now. Leave quietly before they found him.

Benny dragged his bum leg over the saddle and adjusted the black chamois eye patch over the empty socket of his right eye. Yesterday, agents for the Project looked directly at him and didn't know it. Tomorrow it might be different. The Project was a lot of things, none good, but not stupid, either. Just by being seen with the woman he put her in danger. Her parents didn't need anymore tragedies in the family.

Half a block away he mounted, trying her again. Fire caught in her heart and she roared. The Native American Built Uohali 'Red Sun' arched under Benny, purring like some giant cat begging for attention.

She was alive again to race the wind. 'Go, Dark Rider, please?'

Himself a North Carolina Native, Grampa wasn't so polite.

'Yiiiii-ha!'


The woman roused with a slow, languid stretch of slender olive flesh. A feeling of such completion and lassitude filled her she did not want the dream to end, ever. Her hair was tousled, once sad eyes dreamy from long hours of slow, soul filling passion she and the Rider shared. She smiled, reached out to touch him, meeting only the cooling imprint of his head on the pillow.

He warned her, she was in danger if he stayed. She laughed, not wanting to believe it was over.

Benny tried to go yesterday evening, but her tears had been too much.

He was so good. Always with a word of encouragement. A smile. A touch. Always there just for her, no matter how much pain he was in from the accident last November. As if he lived only to please her. Yes, they argued, but nothing serious, and he always apologized first, even when she knew it was her fault.

He was so good, so gentle, she wouldn't let him leave without a real good-bye.

A diamond of moisture ran onto his pillow.


He didn't look back. He did not dare to. Love is not something easy to find, and once found, the Word says, is more precious than gold.

Damp night air whipped dark, shaggy hair from his face. The black patch and leering scar that hacked through his right eye socket told those who saw him what sort of man he was, though he was only sixteen.

It had been good. Good for them both. But it was passed time. The Project's hunters were closing in. He could feel them, stalking him, a noose slowly choking off his breath. Benny's hand touched the faint, nagging scars on his neck and remembered the collar he, like some modern Pavlov's dog, wore during his brief and sordid months in the hands of the Project at a whore house used as a smoke screen.

If they caught him with her, they would have taken her, snared them both in their web of lies and deceit and slavery.

That dammed collar. If he went back she would wear one. His mouth turned down, growing bitter at the memories.

Whore.

Forced to live in the Manse, his body used to pleasure the wives of politicians that supported the Project. A little slap and tickle never hurt nobody, but whoring . . . Vomit choked him. CDs and tapes produced were insurance that funds would continue for the Project's survival and that no police agency would investigate. But a mishap occurred. He was free now. On the run, yeah, but free. Benny threw back his head and howled at the moon. His semen, baby syrup they called it, used to impregnate ovum of women forced into slavery. Fertilized eggs put in women in third world countries like Cuba and Vietnam.

How many of the children he sired would have the power, and be enslaved by the Project?

None, not if Mom had any say in it. Mom would go to the source of all power, to the People of the Sun. Together, Mom and the People of the Sun would destroy Cindy and her Project. But until then he had to stay free.

'Or die trying,' Grampa whispered, hoarse with a bitter rage. 'Die like a man. Like a Wolf-Warrior. Die with both hands wrapped around a Spec agent's lying throat.'

"No crap about that, old man."

A squat muzzle thrust from wet brush. Golden eyes watched with an uncanny, almost human intelligence. The Night-Stalker muttered to himself. The kid was moving fast and gaining speed.

Teeth bared, hungry for the raw, sweet flesh of a human, he thrust his ungainly body onto the road and charged after Benny. After chasing for more than a mile, he fell behind and squatted on the road. A car droned passed. He leaped and landed on the hood, smashing the window. It veered into a patch of swamp and trees.

With a leisurely grope, the Night-Stalker reached in and dragged a stunned man from the car, ripped open his chest, and nipped out the heart. Good, very good. It was a start replacing the thousands of calories expended in change. There was a den deeper in the swamp, a place where a dozens of victims rotted. In the morning he would change, return to human shape, but the elan of this night's feeding would last for weeks.

In the morning, he would report to the Tal Asgina-Nohi coven in Pennsylvania he missed a kill, that Benny was on his way north.

Behind him, the car slid deeper into the dank waters and then was gone.


Lights of town faded behind Benny, as had so many other places in his short life. Benny leaned into the wind on the dark, rain-swept road and seemed to fly.

Grampa was never one to hold back his emotions among family

'Yaaaaa-hoo.'


Cindy choked off more screams. She waved the security people from her office and lay a hand on the baby to comfort herself, to be reassured he was still there. The baby had not started wailing until his mother screamed.

"Thanks to the microchip implant." Cindy ground clenched teeth. "We are able to track Benny's every move. The subject cannot remain in one area for any length of time without our being able to zero in, in a matter of days. Sometimes hours."

Her eyes closed in relief. Wires of gold, so fine they could not be seen with the naked eye, were threaded and netted over the subject's brain.

Every impulse, every emotion, was received and recorded by the Project's own satellite system. Much more than half a klick and the signals faded, but he could be tracked. Even now they were quartering the Jacksonville area of North Carolina.

"You little bastard, Benny Wya Greylov," Cindy whispered in a shaken, husky voice. "A dammed figment of my imagination is not going to stop me. I own you."

A black, shining feather slipped passed the woman. She stifled a scream. The baby's massive Warrior Guardian snickered and asked Raven-Guardian-of-Souls to find another one.

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