"Anila. What should we do," a young lady no older than 11 or 12 pouted at the vibrant sight of a festival from the air. She sported a pair of binoculars.
"Our only goal here is to extract the speaking elders before there is speech given and sniff out the infiltrators that my brouugh... my broth-ough. My idiot womb parasite managed to miraculously spot," the girl fixed the microphone by her lips and switched her binoculars out for a stack of reprinted color photos of people just living their best lives on the island. She was focused on the scuba gear wearing individuals that had been blown up in each image.
"Roger that."
"Copy."
"Yes ma'am."
"Check your locations for the families in the photos and stay within actionable distance of each other. Keep comms open, I want everyone to hear the deaths of those who get caught slacking," Anila addressed her men without kiddie gloves.
"Haha. Funny joke ma'am... that was a joke, right? "
"It was not a joke. Madam Anila is looking forward to hearing us fuck up."
"You mean she's looking forward to us being killed, you bastard."
"Cut the chatter. Lock down the stage. If worse comes to worse, open fire on the crowd if you see someone about to take a shot at the elder on stage. Everyone here is willing to lay down their life if it means keeping our lord and the elders safe and happy," the little girl patted the shoulders of one of the snipers in her helicopter and picked up the binoculars once more to spot intruders.
"Ma'am, the perimeter is nearly complete. I received word that the blockade will be complete in thirty minutes," a young voice sounded on the feed. Anila locked onto a young man who stuffed a satellite phone into his backpack. How she spotted him from so far away was a mystery to the snipers.
"Good, now do the rest of you have any good news," slowly, her eyes snapped onto each of her ground scouts.
"I don't see anyone I don't recognize by the food stands."
"Bathrooms are clear."
"Stage. Is clear. It's weird though. If I were an assassin, I would take out my target just before they were under the eyes of thousands...", the sound of a choking and a wet gasp escaped the speaker's lips before a violent thud broke the communication device.
"The bastards killed Kendall."
"I'm going now!"
"Already here. Elder is secure"
"Sending the body double onto the stage now."
"Extracting now."
"The suspect is breaking left toward the yoga center from the spa hall..."
"I have eyes on the stage."
"I'm here. Alex is also dead. Clean cut. The headset is missing, one of them has our line. These people are playing ball."
"In pursuit. Different person, this one is headed to the sports center in a stolen vehicle."
"We are with you, look up," the snipers in another helicopter spoke out.
"I got stabbed, the suspect is going through the mud baths now. Headed toward the Pop up shrine to our lord…Shit, it's a clean cut... I'm... bleeding..."
"Fuck. What is happening? We can't even see them until they are killing us."
"This... I've heard stories."
"These guys are Ghosts."
"No way. We are going against people like Madam Lagrange"
"No. Nothing like that. This is probably a training session for them. These are just the Wisps of the organization. If these were real Ghosts, we would all already be dead."
"Hey. Hey! Fuck, I'm on my way."
"These bastards. They killed her. I'm going to..."
"You are all going to shut the fuck up and clear the chatter. Now," Anila calmly spoke into the mic and watched as her people exposed themselves to the enemy one by one.
"Control your emotions, stop moving your mouths, and look around for a moment. Count the number of people around you and remember their faces. Wisps, Ghosts, it doesn't matter. We will get rid of them all for our lord," Anila pointed at the person she spotted and said nothing to her sniper as they adjusted their scope.
"We got one in our line of sight right now," Anila waited to say her piece and smiled viciously when her plan worked out. Almost as if the assassin sensed the shot coming, a random person dodged out of the way. The sniper wasn't even looking at that person but it was obvious to him that the person who stole a headset was giving orders to their people. The man who suddenly darted in another direction was shot in the chest since he couldn't get underneath cover in time.
"There you go, I have another one in sight," Anila pointed elsewhere, and another shot marked an assassin that circled one of her team members. The bullet hit the man's thigh as he managed to sneak underneath an awning.
"Wow. The rodents are well trained aren't they. I want that man who was just shot, apprehended within the next minute. We found another," Anila smiled even wider as she focused the other sniper on a different suspicious individual.
The crowd jumped into a panic upon hearing the first gunshot. The second completely threw them into a frenzy. The third and each following shot was covered up with even louder music from the stage which led the crowd to believe that their lord's servants were doing a domestic cleansing. The next assassin that Anila spotted jumped out of the way so quickly when she said, "we found another," that it was obvious that the idiot was looking directly at the helicopter and the snipers. The man slipped through the dense parts of the crowd once he dipped through the dense food stands.
"Someone, get the body double to control the crowd. Wesley, get grandpa and grandma on the line and tell them we have circus rats. I need an extermination team over here asap...", as she gave the orders the situation took a turn.
"Ma'am, I've just received a wide broadcast. Your grandfather is awakening to our lord's gift and your grandmother is protecting our lord at an undisclosed location. I don't know the full situation but there appears to be rumors of a minor explosion in our lord's chambers as well," someone responded to Anila's commands.
"What," with no time to settle that information, the helicopters were thrown out of their stable hover by a chaotic air current. The people on the beach doubled over and held their ears. A mushroom cloud exploded out on the highway next to the sports center of one of the hotels.
"EVERYONE BACK OFF. Let the bastards escape,," Anila's jaw set as she could see her men back off of several individuals that were running through the crowd that was riled. Anger spilled out of her voice and body without end.
"Keep track of them from a distance. Let them know we are following their every move but don't force them into a corner. That explosion was likely a warning to us to not press our luck. I don't want more innocent casualties," Anila tried to control her trembling hands.
"Ma'am. The decoy is not getting onto the stage", someone informed.
"Throw her if you have to," Anila took a deep breath and growled into the mic. The fake elder walked onto the stage around now. The woman nearly jumped out of her own socks when the booming music stopped, and the crowd turned towards her.
"Ma'am, we have an issue", a voice crackled over the comms. The real elder stormed onto the stage and addressed the flock.
"Hello everyone. I have horrible news...", the elder nearly jumped onto the mic but *BANG*. Blood exploded out from her shoulder as she was thrown to the ground. *Bang*, the next shot missed and pierced into a speaker. Half a dozen members of the crowd swarmed the shooter and beat him. *Bang*, a follower caught a stray bullet but they were merely grazed. Despite being shot, the elder lunged for the mic and spoke.
"Our lord and the high priest have ordered us to return to our homes, to lock our doors and protect our lives," the elder addressed the crowd. *Bang*", the elder fell to the ground and dropped the mic as a bullet pierced her chest. Another assassin melted into the crowd. Instead of going home and locking their doors like they were informed, everyone on the beach sang a hymn that Aaradhya would be familiar with. It was a tune of respect, faith, love, and above all, Death. They mourned the loss of one of their elders without any care for their own bodies. The first assassin laid in a pool of his own blood with his limbs going in every which direction but the normal ones. What really set the crowd apart from a group of normal people was that a hand flew out to the retreating assassin.
"I saw you," a man with an ear to ear grin twitched as another hand reached the assassin from behind.
"Please, join your ally in meeting our lord for judgment," another man whispered as he pulled out a knife and slashed across the assassin's achilles tendon. The bloodthirsty nature of the crowd did not end there as the unfamiliar faces in the crowd were swarmed by the flock and ripped apart.
"This feels wrong...", Anila frowned in dissatisfaction.
"How are the checkpoints? Did they find anything," she looked towards the row of resorts further inland. She could see the reflective scopes of dozens of snipers along the rooftops with her binoculars and the smoke clouds of bombs having gone off.
"Why aren't they scanning the surroundings," all of the reflective scopes remained stationary.
"Call it in. I want eyes on Jackal one through five. I think we've been hijacked," pure intuition guided her judgment. A message crackled in her headset.
"There is no chatter on the lines four through eight, I'm not seeing any movement either, just bodies. Actually, I'm seeing the blades on bumblebee three moving. I'm not getting a response ma'am," Not even two seconds later, a third helicopter entered the airspace and flew off course. It smashed into the second helicopter. Anila saw that someone jumped out of the cockpit and dove toward the forest. Before anyone could react that person opened a parachute and skirted the tops of the trees before vanishing into the brush. Both helicopters crashed into the forest below and started a fire.
"Distractions. I fucking knew it. The attacks are distractions. I want everyone to regroup. Our first priority is to try and keep the peace until one of my grandparents or the high priest gives us orders. Until then, keep comms open as you stay silent," Anila switched channels to just the people in her helicopter, crossed her fingers, then pulled out a map and marked it with a pen.
"Intruder sightings, barricades. Explosions, survivor relief. Wildfire, fire brigade. Paratroopers, search parties. It's safe to assume they know our routes…", she spoke as she drew up a rough idea of the enemy movement.
"These are Professionals. Likely Ghosts, the ones we found are expendable Whisps. The real hunters are going to dig down and wait for our guests to arrive. It might even be possible that the real problem will wait until nightfall when we are exhausted from being on high alert. That is if their goal is to just interrupt today's festivities," One of the snipers chimed in as he heard Anila's mutterings.
"Keep in mind, there have been no reported attacks on the eastern front, basically telling us their targets are to remain untouched until they want to act. That means our guests are in trouble. It's the calling card of the ghosts", the other sniper added.
"But why attack our lord so early? Unless...", the first sniper shot a fleeing assassin in the leg. The crowd pulled the person into the fleshy mass of anger and death.
"Where is my grandma and our lord," Anila switched back to an open channel, but no one answered, seeing as how no one knew.
Elsewhere on the island.
"Your objectives should be in there", an elder of the Shepherds of the Golden Horn pointed to the mouth of a cave that was hidden behind a rather large boulder. The entire area was covered in algae and suffocating fish. A stranger dressed in the same clothes as a butler waved his hand as he stepped in front of this elder. Two men in blackout wetsuits entered the cave with flashlights and nodded back toward their boss who was dressed like a butler. A quick look away from the scene, one would notice that the entrance was all the way on the south east side of the island. A steep and rocky path led all the way down a sheer cliff face to a small little opening that opened up to a massive cavern with glowing algae along nearly every surface. A Giant whirlpool at the bottom of the cavern drained the water that rushed in from the ocean during high tide.
"Take this map. If you get lost in those tunnels, you are as good as dead," another elder of the faith looked over his shoulder and pulled a map out of his sleeve. His pupils flashed chaotically with cool light as more and more people found their way over from the forests above or from the sheer cliffs below.
"So. Where is my money and when are we going to leave this place," The elder who pointed out the cave, not understanding the situation, stomped his foot and huffed with annoyance.
"How could I forget? What was promised is down there," the fake butler pointed to the whirlpool.
"What? You can't be serious", the elder looked over the edge and before he knew it, he was falling down into the rapid water below.
"Would you also like to rush me," the butler asked the second elder with a scowl.
"NO! I can uh, I can wait. Yes, I can wait until you've all completed your mission… I mean, uh, wait until you see fit…", the weak willed elder leaned against the wall and shivered uncontrollably.
"Smart," the fake butler took off his costume to reveal a skin tight mesh weave or body armor. He addressed the other two members of his team and the men and women that were setting up a mobile comms station in the dry portion of the cave.
"Help this kind sir with his reward. Bravo, Charlie, scout the way forward," The man in charge addressed two groups of five then grabbed a walkie from the setup.
"Delta, go topside and reign in the situation with the Whisps. Tango, Uniform, go to the docks and the airport with your teams. I want this island locked down before our marks arrive. ETA…", the man looked over to a person in a bulky wetsuit that was looking at a small computer with dots all over a map.
"Three hours before Lamplight touches ground. Five before Davey reaches port according to surveillance," the person typed on a waterproof laptop and reported what they learned.
"Two hours. I want the Qajar Cat in the grave in two hours," the man in body armor sat down at a table someone set up for him and the person in the bulky wetsuit. The elder also received a seat.