Death Before Dishonor Read online

  Death Before Dishonor

  By Kenny Hyman

  A Black Magic ImagiNation Creation

  By Kenny Hyman

  A Black Magic ImagiNation Original.

  © 2017 Black Magic ImagiNation

  Death Before Dishonor is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters, and incidents are products of the imagination of the author or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, events, or locations is entirely coincidental.

  ISBN 978-0-9997359-0-9

  Foreword

  So, I came up with the idea for this book when I was seventeen. It took me years to write, though. You see, I had the content, but I simply lacked the know-how. The know-how came on the coattails of college. My two biggest struggles with writing came in the form of organization and narration. I learned that my brainstorming needed to be more organized and I had to write scene separate from dialogue. I also had to learn to throttle back on my descriptions. I'm verbose...in case you haven't met me before...and I'm even more so in my writing. That said, I had to chop a tremendous amount out of the story to keep it flowing. It's been a journey.

  This is actually my second writing endeavor. My first was a vampire story that caused too many problems in writing (I wrote the first two chapters about fourteen years ago...and they were AWFUL), so I put it on the backburner until I could go back to the drawing board. At that point, my brother-friend Dorjan approached me saying that he had taken my idea for Death Before Dishonor (which I had devised initially with him) and developed it into a movie treatment. He was very excited about his development of the material, but I shot it down. It, too, was awful. He had taken the characters in a direction that I had never intended. In his mind, he saw a high-flying, Michael Bay-esque summer blockbuster trilogy. Not that there is a problem with Dorjan’s style of writing—in fact, I quite admire it, and it makes us a good team. But I had always intended for the story to be gritty, violent, emotional, and finite. So, here we are today.

  This story is fiction, but it's based on historical events. You'll see many names, titles, and locations that are true historical figures and places (i.e. famed ninja Hattori Hanzo and the Shogun Oda Nobunaga). I did extensive research into Japanese history to write it. Unfortunately, I haven't visited Japan yet (a trip that would have allowed me to write scenes from experience). So, my Japanese vistas are mostly written from pictures or my mind's eye. Also, my characters often speak Japanese throughout the book. Since I don't speak Japanese myself, I thought it prudent to signify when Japanese was spoken in-text. I initially narrated when the language was being spoken, but it became terribly cumbersome when my main characters would bounce back and forth between languages like so many bilingual people do. To remedy this, I've made the dialogue bold when Japanese is being spoken.

  It is my greatest hope that you enjoy Death Before Dishonor as much as I do. I have grown up with the main characters, and they are like my family members. I also hope, too, that you can immerse yourself in the

  world of the shinobi—the famed ninja.

  Special thanks go out to the following people:

  Robert Wright for all the years of conversation and support that have gone into writing this story, acting as a sounding board and critic.

  Dorjan Jones and William Smyth for being there at the very beginning, knowing in secret that the main characters are based loosely on you. Dorjan, the good news is: unlike the character Cortez, Terry has not changed.

  Joseph Smyth for offering constructive feedback through my short story phase, aiding in my growth.

  Adam Karaoguz for being my treehouse writers club teammate, NaNoWriMo partner, and a source of tactical ideas and feedback for my different writing projects.

  Chelsea Leyden for being bubbly and excited to read whatever I sent her direction and to offer thoughtful and insightful analysis, feedback, criticism, and ideas.

  Joseph Swindell for keeping me motivated when I had practically given up on a story that I had sworn I was beginning to despise.

  Jessica Phenning for saying, “Dude, I hate deus ex machina”; wiser words have never been spoken, and that phrase taught me to be more accountable to my reader.

  Kirsten Crase for being the best professor anyone could ever ask for and for finding time to be a thoughtful critic of my work even while grinding out a doctorate.

  Frankie Bonner for bringing practicality, motivation, and ingenuity throughout the years that I was growing from a possible future novelist into a novelist.

  And, finally, William Jones for dedicating time in making the cover.

  Prologue

  Honor is the soul of the Shinobi. Shadow is their blood.

  The Shinobi Incantation, translated from Ninpo.

  Damascus, Syria. Five Years Ago.

  The air of the safe house was as thick and moist as bathwater, but at the very least, it was fifteen degrees cooler inside. Air conditioning wasn’t something that Muhammad Ibn al-Aziz, employer of the Ciccone brothers—Terry and Yuri—factored into berthing mercenaries. The ability to fight and remain beneath notice were chief requirements, not comfort.

  Terry didn’t need comfort in the truest sense—after all, mercenary work wasn’t glorious nor fabulous—but a more pleasant climate wouldn’t have been asking too much. Out of the all the places on the planet, he wasn’t fond of the Middle East. The heat was oppressive, and the air was muddy and miserable. To be honest, Terry didn’t like any weather that wasn’t temperate; had he been in Alaska, he’d have been just as irritable. Hot extremes and cold extremes were anything but enjoyable. His younger brother, Yuri, didn’t so much mind it. He was never one to pay much attention to details as minor as atmosphere when his life didn’t depend on it. Where weather irritated Terry, the culture of the Middle East irked Yuri. He lacked much in the way of cultural sensitivity. Consequently, the brothers were inclined to stay indoors. There, they were shielded from the weather and culture they didn’t find endearing. Terry often chastised Yuri’s reason for remaining inside, and of course, Yuri would counter Terry’s criticism by highlighting Terry’s lack of manhood for fussing about the weather.

  Remaining indoors as often as possible had utility. It allowed Terry and Yuri to avoid the scrutiny of locals and authorities, which minimized the chance of operations being compromised, especially during planning and preparation phases. A dozen and a half foreigners congregating and brandishing weapons tended to raise suspicion in an area that was mostly ethnically homogenous. Like Terry and Yuri, most of the mercenaries weren’t of Middle Eastern descent. A few were racially black like Terry, several were white like Yuri, and the rest were a collage of Middle Eastern and Asian. Most of them—except for the brothers and two others—were Muslim, which allowed them to blend in during day-to-day routines. The two Orthodox Catholics had to be a little more cautious. Terry and Yuri made a concerted effort to stay out of any religious entanglements; the silence of Ninpo afforded them that.

  The team had been in the employ of Ibn al-Aziz for nearly six months now. The Ciccone brothers and three others were the only original members remaining. Vacancies were a result of employees terminating their contracts voluntarily or involuntarily during operations. The current payroll consisted mostly of recruits brought aboard within the past month.

  While the rest of the team handled soldiering, artillery, and frontal assault, Terry and Yuri specialized in the assassination of high-value targets, organic intelligence, and ambush. Operating with a group with a mixture of skills allowed for cross-training. Terry and Yuri took keenly to the demolitions aspect as well as the employment of small arms and long-range rifles. These skills complimented their profound abilities of stealth and stalking.

  The team had recently returned from an operat
ion into the Gaza Strip, making raids against the Israeli Defense Force, and was enjoying some time off before they prepared for another operation funded by Ibn al-Aziz, an operation that would never be seen to completion by the current team.

  BOOM!

  BRAKA-BRAKA-BRAKA!

  Terry barreled out of the bathroom and down the hall towards the bedroom, screaming to his brother, “Yuri!” Terry was trying to pull on a stocking cap that matched his faded black collared shirt over his half-complete cornrows.

  Yuri threw the bedroom door open and shuffled down the hall, trying to pull his body armor on over a brown T-shirt and jeans with both hands filled, an assault rifle in one and a small sword—a ninjatō—in the other.

  BRAKA-BRAKA-BRAKA!

  A firefight going on in the hallway downstairs and a hail of suppressive burst-fire splintered the walls and floor around them.

  Yuri met Terry halfway up the hallway between the bathroom and the bedroom and tossed him the rifle. He then pulled another assault rifle from a nearby closet. “I’ll take point going out the stairs. Shoot over my head; I’ll lay suppressive fire.”

  “No, we have to get outta here,” Terry hissed, barring his brother with an outstretched arm.

  “What do you mean? We gotta stop them from taking this safe house.”

  BOOM!

  BRAKA-BRAKA-BRAKA!

  “Screw this place, Yuri! It isn’t our loss!”

  Yuri’s face twisted as his eyes searched his brother’s face. Yuri didn’t like backing down from fights, but Terry was right: the safe house wasn’t their responsibility—nor was the team. Still, today wasn’t the day that Yuri was planning on turning tail.

  “We can take these assholes, Terry!” He pushed Terry’s arm out of his way. “We’re not dishonoring ourselves by being cowards! If we die today, so be it!”

  “No! It’s not dishonorable! We’re Shinobi, Yuri, and this is an ambush! When Oda Nobunaga attacked, the Shinobi retreated! There’s no dishonor in retreat!”

  “Are you—”

  “Yuri, we don’t know their number! We have to go!”

  Terry was right; they had to move.

  “You win,” Yuri growled.

  BRAKA-BRAKA-BRAKA!

  The gunfire and screaming were getting closer.

  Terry swam over the top of his brother. “Follow me!” he yelled, slinging his assault rifle across his back as he made a beeline for the window of the bedroom. He climbed out onto the ledge of the building, pressing himself against the wall. Terry’s foot barely fit; the ledge was perhaps six inches. Yuri came out right behind him. Good thing neither of them were scared of heights considering they were nine stories up and the building was barren of handholds.

  Terry sidled right towards a drain-pipe, inching forward around the windowsills that urged him off the ledge. He looked back. Yuri was still next to the exit, waiting to see what his brother had planned.

  Terry wanted to get to a balcony. The nearest one on their floor was around the corner of the building and attached to an apartment that was on the same floor as the firefight. There was, however, a balcony right beneath them. He had originally considered dropping down to it but then realized that the balcony recessed beneath the ledge, and he didn’t think he could produce the radial velocity to make it onto its platform.

  Terry latched onto a pipe and dropped from the ledge, using his hands and feet to control his decent to the ledge right beneath. He sidled to the target balcony and rolled over the rail. Terry leaned out to see what progress Yuri had made. The ledge overhung the balcony with a foot of extra progress.

  Yuri had stalled one window from the pipe, directly above Terry. The firefight erupted into the room that owned that window; he wasn’t sure that he could skirt by without being seen.

  BRAKA-BRAKA-BRAKA!

  Bullets riddled the wall and the window.

  Yuri couldn’t stay on the ledge any longer without being shot. He’d have to jump.

  “Terry,” Yuri yelled, “take the gun!”

  Terry reached up, leaning out over the rail. Yuri slipped the sling off his shoulder and lowered it his brother. Terry stretched, trying to grab hold, but was missing it by mere inches.

  “Drop it,” he said.

  Yuri did.

  Terry caught it—barely. “Hurry up!” Terry said.

  “I’m not going make it. I got to jump!”

  “Whatever, just make it quick! I’ll catch you.” Just then, Terry saw motion behind the curtain of the door to the balcony. He didn’t have time to worry about it; he put the assault rifle on the floor and anchored his feet into the rail.

  BRAKA-BRAKA-BRAKA!

  Yuri didn’t think. He dropped off the ledge, turning sharply. His hands impacted the ledge, slowing his momentum before he let go and continued his fall.

  Terry saw his brother coming down feet first, and he had to time it just right—just like they had been taught. Terry rolled forward, using his feet as leverage. Yuri dropped one arm, making himself as long as possible. Terry preloaded his shoulder to keep it from jumping loose of its socket when the weight came on. Yuri reached in for his brother; Terry reached out.

  SMACK! Their forearms made contact, and their hands slammed shut like vices. Yuri came to an abrupt halt, dangling six stories above the urban desert street below.

  Yuri swayed back and forth slightly as Terry negotiated his anchor points, hoping that the rail didn’t give out. He strained and pulled Yuri high enough for Yuri to sling his free arm up to the lip of the balcony floor. From there, Yuri dug his fingers into the rail and began climbing with Terry’s aid. Once he was over the rail, Yuri and Terry breathed a sigh of relief.

  Terry hopped up and went to the door with his rifle raised. Yuri snatched up his rifle and followed.

  “There’s someone in this apartment,” Terry said without looking at his brother.

  “I don’t hear gunfire on this floor.”

  “On three…”

  Three, two, one…

  Terry swung the door open and zipped in low and right through the curtains, Yuri went high and left. A chorus of screams boomed as a room full of women draped head to toe in black robes scattered to the walls. Terry and Yuri fanned out, Terry going to check the kitchen, Yuri the bedroom.

  The kitchen and its scarce pantry were clear. “It’s clear over here!”

  Yuri barged through the door of the bedroom and found a portly Arab man having intercourse with an equally portly Arab woman; they began hollering. Yuri’s brow raised behind his assault rifle’s sight. Then there was a clatter of something falling behind a closed door leading away from the bedroom.

  Yuri slung his gun and drew out the matte-black ninjatō from the sheath on his back, pointing at the couple to remain on the bed. He approached the door cautiously and positioned himself against the wall opposite the hinges. He turned the knob and pushed the door open, retracting quickly behind the wall.

  “Yuri, talk to me!”

  Yuri ignored his brother and waited. Seconds later, a slender male emerged with a metal pipe in his hand. Yuri struck, disarming the man first with his sword and then driving a sidekick into his gut, knocking the slender man into the wall. Yuri was on top of him with the blade point in his face.

  The slender man registered Yuri’s savage eyes burning icy blue and his viper-like grimace. The man began whimpering in a strange Arabic dialect. Yuri could roughly make out what he was saying, but it was difficult. The man was begging for his life; that much, Yuri did know.

  “Yuri?” Terry hollered again.

  “It’s clear!”

  Yuri backed away from the man and jerked the blade tip into the air several times, indicating to the man to get up. The man’s face was sheepish.

  “Go,” Yuri said in Arabic, pointing to the door to the common room. “Hurry.” He looked over to the bed that the couple occupied, this time under the covers and ashen. “You two—out. Go.”

  All three jumped up and ran out quickly.

&nb
sp; Yuri wasn’t far behind. He came out and saw his brother on the other side of the common room eyeing the door.

  “We have to get out of here. We’re no better here than we were upstairs,” Terry said to him in Japanese. Terry and Yuri used Japanese intermittently with English when speaking to one another, sometimes switching back and forth unconsciously, other times doing it tactically. They had spent their more impressionable years speaking Japanese and were just as comfortable communicating in it as they were in English.

  “The fighting sounds like it’s stopped,” Yuri responded, noting that he didn't hear gunfire. He picked his way through the dozen or so people over to the front door and pressed his ear to it. He didn’t hear any voices or footsteps in the hallway.

  He took up the same position near the door as he had at the bathroom door, except this time he was on the same side as the hinges. Yuri pulled the door open slowly and looked through the space that opened on the hinge side. The hallway looked clear. He shut it, swapped sides, and opened it again.

  “Hallway’s clear,” he said and closed it again, locking it this time and sheathing his blade. “Maybe we can make it down the stairs without being seen.”

  Terry eyed the occupants diligently. “I doubt it. Those blasts were flashbangs. This is a professional assault.”

  “Let’s find some rope so we can climb down.”

  “You think they have seventy feet of rope in here?”

  “Nope, I’m just being optimistic,” Yuri deadpanned.

  Terry’s head swung left and right. Then he went into the bedroom. “Maybe we can tie these sheets together,” he yelled back.

  “That only works in movies.”

  Terry came back out and shrugged. “What happened to being optimistic?”

  “They’re going to start going door to door. We don’t have much time. We’ve got to figure something out.”