The Crow That Wasn't
Copyright© 2026 by Harry Carton
Chapter 6: Kids and Boats
The docks stank of diesel and decayed fish—same as every port city from Odessa to Osaka. Marcus perched on a rusted crane arm, his crow’s eyes tracking the Mermaid’s Gamble below. The Xin pulsed against his ribs like a second heartbeat, its rhythm syncing with the ship’s floodlights as they flickered in the pre-dawn gloom.
Movement near the gangplank. Three figures herded a chain of shadows up the ramp—too small to be crew, their outlines blurred by what might have been blankets or burlap sacks. Marcus counted twelve heads before the last one disappeared into the hold. The Xin’s presence sharpened to a blade point: There.
He dropped from the crane, wings folding tight as he transformed mid-fall. His boots hit the dock with a thud that should’ve drawn attention, but the guards were too busy arguing over a vodka bottle to notice. Marcus melted into the shadows between crates marked ‘MEDICAL SUPPLIES’ in peeling Cyrillic.
The ship’s hull groaned as it took on weight, the sound vibrating through the wooden planks beneath Marcus’s feet. He cataloged the positions: two shooters by the gangway smoking hand-rolls, another pissing off the stern, his silhouette backlit by the moon. Amateurs. Professionals didn’t silhouette themselves.
How come I know what ‘Professionals’ do, when I’ve only been in this universe a few weeks? He wondered to himself.
A child coughed—a wet, ragged sound from the hold. Marcus’s fingers twitched toward his knife. The Xin pulsed approval.
He moved like fog along the dock, his shadow blending with the ship’s as it rocked against its moorings. The pissing guard never saw the needle-thin blade slip between his ribs. Marcus caught the body as it slumped, lowering it silently into the black water below. The splash was lost in the ship’s creaking.
The vodka bottle shattered against the dock. One of the guards spun toward the sound—too slow. Marcus was already airborne, his crow form slicing through the gap between floodlights as the men shouted in confused Ukrainian. Their flashlights swept the water where their comrade had vanished, beams trembling like drunk fireflies.
Amateurs always look down.
Same question as what the ‘professionals’ do?
Marcus banked hard, talons scraping rust as he landed atop the ship’s ventilation shaft. The metal vibrated beneath him—engines rumbling to life, the thrum of generators buried deep in the hull. Through the grating, a child’s whimper echoed up the ductwork. The sound coiled around his ribs like barbed wire.
He changed mid-step, human fingers prying at the vent screws. The Xin’s presence pulsed in his temples: Hurry.
Bad Xin. Can’t manage an op from a different universe.
The last screw gave way with a shriek of corroded metal. Below, voices rose in alarm. Marcus dropped into the shaft just as boots pounded the deck above.
The ventilation shaft smelled of grease and trapped seawater—a metallic tang that clung to the back of Marcus’s throat as he slid downward. His shoulders brushed rusted metal, the ridges catching at his stolen press vest. Below, the child’s whimpers had ceased. Only the thrum of the ship’s engines filled the darkness now, vibrating through the ductwork like a living thing.
Marcus landed in a crouch, his knees absorbing the impact silently. The hold stretched before him—a cavern of shadows punctuated by hanging worklights that swung with the ship’s motion. Crates lined the walls, marked with the same medical insignias he’d seen topside. Between them, huddled shapes stirred. Blankets shifted. Eyes glinted in the dimness—too many, too small.
A guard’s boot scuffed metal nearby. Marcus melted behind a stack of pallets as the man rounded the corner, his AK’s barrel sweeping lazily. The guard yawned, scratching at the spiderweb tattoo on his neck—identical to Petrov’s, but with the spider replaced by a sickle. Amateur ink. Professional killer.
Marcus waited until the guard turned his back before moving. Three strides closed the distance. His forearm snaked around the man’s throat, cutting off the scream before it began. The chokehold was textbook—eight seconds to unconsciousness, fifteen to permanent damage. Marcus counted to seven before lowering the limp body to the deck. He held the chokehold for ten more seconds. It’s the professional thing to do.
Marcus rolled the guard onto his stomach, peeling back the collar to confirm the tattoo—same sickle-spider hybrid, same crude linework. The Xin pulsed against his ribs like a second heartbeat: Spetsnaz leftovers. Vasilyenko’s rejects. He stripped the man’s radio earpiece, pressing it to his own ear just as static crackled.
“Position check, Gryphon-2.” A woman’s voice, all business.
Marcus exhaled through his nose, mimicking the unconscious guard’s rasp. “Clear.”
Silence. Then: “Your accent’s improved, ptichka.”
He should have remained silent. An amateur mistake.
The radio earpiece crackled again—this time with the unmistakable click of a safety disengaging. Marcus dropped the guard’s body just as gunfire chewed through the pallets behind him. Wood splinters bit into his neck as he rolled behind a stack of crates marked ‘BIOLOGICAL SAMPLES’. The Xin screamed in his skull: Ambush!
Inter-universe kibitzers. Bad Xin. He’d better get his mind on the men shooting at him. Enough thinking about amateurs vs. professionals.
A child whimpered nearby—one of the huddled shapes stirring in the shadows. Marcus glimpsed a small hand reaching through cage bars before the ship’s PA system blared to life: “All personnel, combat stations. Ptichka is in the hold.” The voice dripped with amusement. Not Vasilyenko’s. Someone worse.
Marcus pressed the stolen radio to his lips. “You’re using children as bait?” He pitched his voice to carry, knowing they’d hear. “Spetsnaz used to have standards.”
Now THAT sounded professional. Something James Bond would have said.
Laughter echoed through the hold—too many sources, too close. Floodlights snapped on, revealing the trap: at least six shooters in tactical gear positioned between the cages, their muzzles trained on his cover. The crates weren’t medical supplies. They were firing positions.
Marcus exhaled through his nose—slow, controlled—counting the muzzle flashes reflected in the puddle of engine oil near his boot. Six shooters, Spetsnaz-trained, their rifles angled to create overlapping kill zones. The Xin pulsed against his sternum.
The cages rattled as the ship listed, the children inside pressing against the bars like saplings in a storm. One girl—maybe ten, her left eye swollen shut—locked gazes with Marcus. She didn’t whimper. Just nodded once, sharp as a blade.
Static hissed in the earpiece. “Come out, little bird.” The woman’s voice dripped honey over broken glass. “Or we start culling the flock.”
A pistol cocked near the cages. Marcus closed his eyes. The Xin’s presence surged, flooding his veins with something colder than adrenaline. When he opened them again, the world had shifted—edges sharper, shadows thicker. Time dilated.
Marcus exhaled through his nose—one long, controlled breath—as the floodlights painted stripes across his hiding spot. The pistol near the cages clicked again, louder now. The girl with the swollen eye didn’t flinch. She stared at the gunman like he was a roach she’d squash given half a chance.
The Xin’s voice coiled around his spine: Now.
Marcus moved. Not toward the shooters—but through them. His body dissolved mid-stride, feathers erupting from his skin as he became crow, beak, talons. The transformation took less than a heartbeat, just enough time for the nearest gunman to widen his eyes before Marcus’s wingspan blotted out the floodlights.
Talons raked across the first shooter’s face. The man screamed, stumbling back into his comrade as Marcus banked hard, claws scraping Kevlar. A rifle barked—wild shot punching through hanging cargo nets—as Marcus arrowed toward the cages. The girl didn’t duck. She grinned, showing missing front teeth, and yanked her blanket aside.
The blanket fell away to reveal a rusted fire extinguisher clutched in the girl’s tiny hands. Marcus banked left as she swung it like a sledgehammer into the nearest shooter’s kneecap. The man howled, collapsing just as Marcus’s talons found his throat.
The hold erupted into chaos. Children scrambled—not away, but toward the fallen guard’s weapon. A boy no older than the girl snatched the AK, spun, and clubbed a second shooter across the temple with the stock. The Xin thrummed against Marcus’s ribs like a plucked guitar string: They’ve done this before.
Marcus transformed mid-air, human fingers wrenching the rifle from the boy’s hands before he could accidentally discharge it. “Safety’s here,” he muttered in Ukrainian, flipping the switch with his thumb. The boy nodded sharply and snatched the weapon back like it was a stolen candy bar.
Gunfire ricocheted off bulkheads as Marcus dove behind an overturned crate. The girl—fire extinguisher now empty—crawled beside him, her good eye gleaming. “They train us,” she
hissed. “In the army.”
The ship listed violently as Marcus palmed the girl’s extinguisher—now just a dented canister—and hurled it at the nearest floodlight. Glass exploded in a shower of sparks, plunging half the hold into darkness. The Xin’s voice slithered through his skull: They’re herding you.
He knew. The remaining shooters had stopped firing, their silhouettes retreating toward the cargo ramp with eerie coordination. Baiting him toward the open. The girl tugged his sleeve, her chipped nails digging into his wrist. “Bomb,” she whispered.
A cold clarity settled over Marcus. The overlapping kill zones, the staged retreat—this wasn’t just a harvest. It was a culling. He grabbed the girl’s shoulder. “How many?”
Her good eye flicked toward the cages. “Twelve. Always twelve.”
The bomb would be in the engine room—standard procedure for sinking evidence. Marcus shoved the girl toward the emergency hatch as the first explosion rocked the hull. The deck tilted violently, throwing shooters off balance as crates slid starboard. The Xin’s presence sharpened to a scalpel’s edge: Four minutes.
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