by John Booth
“I guess I’d better sort out this raid thing.”
Betty kissed me. “I have an X-Phone on order and want to use it. Don’t you dare mess that up with all your shenanigans.”
34. Antagonism
I hopped into the living room as Jenny entered by the door. Neither of us bothered with words, we ran to each other and hugged. The hugs turned into passionate kissing until a discreet cough informed me that we weren’t alone in the room.
“Not in front of your parents, son. You know how easily we embarrass,” Dad said.
Dad and Mam were sitting on the sofa. Dad was grinning and not looking the slightest bit ill at ease. He held his permanently unlit pipe in his hand and even put it in his mouth. Mam smiled at us. Then I saw there were others in the room.
“What would you have done if we weren’t here?” Brad asked; a smirk on his face.
“Bent her over the sofa and had his evil way with her,” Britney continued, “We had a lesson on positions at school.”
Merlin coughed and the twins took one look at him and subsided. The room had been full of people and I hadn’t seen a single one of them.
I grinned at my son and he grinned back. It wasn’t right that he should be so clearly in charge of much older children. On the other hand, it was often pleasing.
“Mam, Dad, what brings you over?”
“Jenny and I are going to make cakes for Malcolm and Silvia’s wedding.”
Jenny put her arm in mine, “And you are going to tell him you’d be happy to be his best man. It’s on Saturday, and while I don’t expect you to wear the Zorro costume, I do expect you to make me proud.”
What day of the week was it now? It was difficult to keep track of those things when you were hopping between worlds. Jenny sensed my problem using one of those wife’s spider-senses she has.
“That’s in three days’ time,” she explained.
“Okay, phone him and tell him I’ll be his best man.”
“You’re sure? You know how upset he’ll be if you have to cry off at the last moment?”
“I’ll tell all the villains and monsters of the multiverse to give me Saturday off.”
“What about the rehearsals?”
I gave Jenny a look and she decided not to push her luck.
“The wedding’s at ten o’clock, Saturday, at Saint Mary’s.”
That surprised me. “Malcolm’s a Catholic?”
Jenny laughed. “Silvia is; she went to a convent school.”
Now that didn’t surprise me at all. Convent girls had a certain reputation that matched my experiences with her.
Merlin tugged at the leg of my jeans.
“Daddy, be on time. Not late.”
He looked very serious about it.
“Why, is it important?” I asked, kneeling down.
He grinned at me. “Because you’re the bestest man in the world.”
“You’ve trained him well,” Dad said approvingly.
“Second best,” Mam said as she elbowed him in the chest.
There was a knock at the door and Jenny left the room to answer it.
“I don’t think Jake’s the best man in the world,” Brad said.
“His thing is a lot bigger than yours,” Britney pointed out to my and Brad’s considerable embarrassment. One time she had seen me naked and it hadn’t been my fault.
“Britney,” Mam warned and Britney said no more.
Jenny came back into the room followed by Bronwyn. The twins’ faces paled at the sight of her and they ran from the room. Merlin strutted up to Bronwyn and waved a finger at her as if telling her how naughty she was. Then he strolled out of the room with all the dignity a three and a quarter year old can muster. Bronwyn laughed as he disappeared from sight.
“You can tell whose son he is,” she said.
“I take it you’re ready to go?”
She nodded. I put an arm round Jenny’s waist and gave her a hug.
“Duty calls. Bronwyn and I are going to sort out the inventors of the X-Phone.”
“Don’t destroy the factory. I’ve got one on order,” Dad said.
I think we all stared at him in surprise. Me most of all. Dad was not into the latest technology or even mobile phones.
He looked defensive. “I saw one on the telly, BBC News no less. I try and keep up with the times, you know.”
No I didn’t. He’d be tweeting next.
Offering my hand to Bronwyn I hopped us to the Bat Cave as soon as our fingers touched.
[Make yourself at home. Everybody does.]
Did I mention how good dragons are at sarcasm?
“Is Lana here?”
[I have not seen a sight of her since your last visit. You should try and keep better track of your women, especially as you have so many of them.]
I grinned. “You’re just jealous.”
Fluffy snorted flames and fire through the cave. Bronwyn threw a spherical shield around her that could have withstood an atomic blast. I just diverted the worst of it around me.
[If you ever saw two female dragons fighting over a male you would not joke of such things. After one had vanquished the other, the survivor would make the male wish he had died with her.]
Bronwyn tapped a toe, Esmeralda wise.
“Can we get on with it?”
[She would make a good female dragon], Fluffy thought at me. From the glare Bronwyn gave him I wondered if he had let the thought leak.
“I’ll go and get Lana.”
She was in her apartment at the university, dressed in a facsimile of my clothes.
“Esta?” I asked.
“No idea. I take it Ms. Lightning Bolts is ready?”
I kissed her on the nose. “Please don’t call her that to her face.”
“Now would I do that?”
I hopped us back to the Bat Cave wondering whether we were taking the right sort of fight to the enemy. There seemed to be one brewing between Lana and Bronwyn that frightened me.
The women frowned at each other as we arrived, so much for team spirit.
Bronwyn put a piece of paper on the coffee table. It was a printout of a map.
“This is their London premises,” she said pointing to a large square on the map. “It’s a fifteen story office block, all glass and steel.”
“How do we get there? Train?” I asked.
“I sussed out the place last night. There’s a railway arch over this road and I will hop us under it.”
“Full frontal assault?” Lana asked.
Bronwyn looked at Lana’s ample breasts pushing out her tee-shirt and her lips thinned, but she kept her thoughts to herself.
“Best way,” I said to Bronwyn. “I got shot when we tried to be subtle.”
“Magic it is then,” Bronwyn conceded. “I take it we go in shielded and use mind control.”
We nodded.
Bronwyn laid it out. “Our objectives are as follows. One, to destroy all the wizard detectors we can find. Two, to capture Richard and Greta de Conte. Three, to find out what world is behind all this.”
“Did we vote on leader while I was away?” Lana asked. She stared at Bronwyn and to my surprise Bronwyn backed down.
“Jake leads, unless he does something stupid.”
“Jake leads all the time or we don’t go,” Lana countered.
Again Bronwyn conceded the point and nodded her agreement.
As we got ready to hop, Bronwyn lifted up on tiptoe and tried to see over Lana’s back. Lana noticed and turned around in a circle for her.
“Satisfied?” Lana asked.
Bronwyn grinned. “I don’t see how he keeps track of you without you wearing numbers.”
She hopped us to under the bridge before Lana could pull her hand away.
35. Confrontation
A train roared over the railway bridge above our heads. Wide enough for a least twenty lines, the bridge was one of those Victorian affairs with brick sides and riveted iron frame. The road cut deep into the ground
so there was not much visibility of the area in any direction. All I could see was road and black painted brick walls. The air stank of diesel fumes. Cars and trucks whizzed past us at an alarming rate.
“I hate low tech industrial worlds,” Lana said vehemently. I suspected her anger about the place was all to do with Bronwyn.
“Nothing wrong with a bit of muck,” Bronwyn said, though I noted she didn’t look happy with her current surroundings, but she had to contradict Lana.
“Where’s this factory?” I asked.
Bronwyn pointed forward and we walked alongside the road in that direction. Before we cleared the bridge, a gleaming office block of glass and polished steel came into view. It was enormous.
“That’s a factory?”
Bronwyn nodded. “They assemble X-Phones on the lower floors and do design, sales and marketing on the floors above. The penthouse is where the two CEO’s work. Apparently there’s a helicopter pad on the roof so visiting big-wigs can avoid the traffic.”
“You should have got us a helicopter,” Lana said.
“Welsh schoolgirls rarely hire them,” Bronwyn said dryly.
If this carried on I was going to have to muzzle them or something. We had no need to have an enemy to start a war. A careless match would do it.
“Ladies, can we remember why we’re here? Can you save your fight until later?”
Bronwyn glared at me and Lana muttered, “She started it.”
Having got that situation under control; I considered our options.
“Let’s go to reception and see what happens.” Well, it was a plan of sorts.
The girls shrugged and followed me up the hill.
The entrance was impressive. There was an underground car park and a turning circle like they have in front of hotels, complete with a doorman to greet important visitors. Wide marble steps led up a floor to the main entrance and there were the obligatory fountains with water running down statues on either side of the doors.
“Shouldn’t there be a sign with a star rating on it?” Bronwyn asked; which drew a puzzled stare from Lana.
“It does look like a hotel,” I conceded.
Glass doors slid open as we approached and we entered a tasteful lobby. Ignoring the lounge like seating I approached the smiling young woman at the reception desk. She spoke before I got the chance to say anything.
“We’ve been expecting you, Mister Morrissey. Can you and your companions look at the cameras above me?”
Well, that was unexpected. I knew I had a certain notoriety since finding the treasure and the bomb incident, but this was ridiculous.
A number of small cameras hung down on poles from the ceiling above the receptionists head. I looked at one and the receptionist smiled. “Thank you, sir. That’s just so we can put your photographs on your ID cards. They’ll be ready in a few seconds.”
Sure enough, thirty seconds later she handed over three laminated badges. They were green in color and had the word ‘Cleared’ at the top. My badge had my name below my picture. Much more worryingly, Lana’s badge had her full name on it. It was a relief when I saw that Bronwyn’s badge had Visitor where her name should be. They didn’t know everything about us. Not all of us, at least.
The receptionist waited as we clipped the badges onto our shirts. She pointed at an array of tall vertical glass cylinders to her left. “Go through the inspection ports, one of you to a unit. They scan you for weapons, though I’m sure they won’t find any. A guide is waiting for you on the other side.”
When we approached, glass doors slid around the cylinders so we could enter. I prepared all manner of deadly forces when the door slid shut, locking me in. There was a beep, a flashing green light, and an identical door slid open on the other side. I was almost too shocked to walk out. I was sure that was where they would attack us.
Lana and Bronwyn looked similarly surprised as we stepped towards the young man who waited for us with a beaming smile on his face.
“It’s so good to meet you, Mister Morrissey. You have lived the dream, finding buried treasure and all that.”
He shook hands with all three of us. He never stopped smiling as though it was glued on.
“If you would care to follow me? I’ve been told to take you straight to the Penthouse. Not many people get to see the bosses just like that.”
As we followed him to the lift he prattled on about how he’d been told to expect me to turn up any time. He’d been waiting for over a month.
Lana kept looking down at her badge and frowning. No one on this planet should know her name.
The glass lift was on the outside of the building and gave us an outstanding view of London as we ascended to the top floor.
There was a secretary in the outer office already standing as we came out of the lift. She curtseyed as we walked towards her, her eyes locked on my face. It felt surreal and I wondered for a second if I was dreaming.
We were taken into an office that blew my mind. It was almost the entire top of the building and its ceiling was at least fifty feet above us. Split into different sections by furniture, the part we were in was big enough to fit in a tennis court with room to spare. A panoramic window that was the entire far wall looked out towards the city and all those stupid shaped office blocks with the silly names. It was almost like being outside. Steel pillars supported the roof above us, but they were so far apart that they didn’t seem to count. It was like being in a tent on the top of the world.
Richard and Greta de Conte (to give them their Earth side names) were dwarfed by the room. As we stopped in astonishment, they walked towards us. They were very ordinary looking people and looked pretty much like all business people do, with their impeccable Savile Row suits and not a hair out of place.
“Wizard Morrissey, you do us a great honor by visiting,” Greta said. She turned to Lana, “Your father taught me many things. Lady d’Fallon.”
“He has that skill.”
Richard approached Bronwyn. He smiled warmly.
“You, we do not know, but our sensors tell us you are a powerful wizard and deserve your place in such high powered company.”
“Elizabeth Taylor. You may have heard of me?”
“Welsh, you are another Welsh wizard. And how melodious a voice. A delight to my ears.”
“You were expecting us?” I asked.
Richard indicated a coffee table near the window. We walked over to it and sat down together.
“When one decides to do business on a new world it is wise to find out who the movers and shakers are. Our search engines identified you as the Ambassador to the Conference between the Worlds for the Valhallans. Other information suggested it was highly likely you were protecting your home world from wizard incursion.”
“Any alien incursion,” I said.
Richard did not so much as blink.
“Quite so. However, it is not our intention to invade this planet or anything so crass. The technology here has reached a level where we can corner a significant part of the market by introducing tech you would soon have discovered for yourself. Everything involved is manufactured on your world using machines built here. We will make a profit from our intellectual property and everybody will be happy.”
“What do you plan to do with the money you make?” Bronwyn asked.
Richard looked to Greta who took the cue.
“There are wonderful places to live and many things of value on this planet. Your coffee is excellent, for example. But our main source of income will come from the purchase of rare earths. This world has an abundance of them.”
“You recently left my father’s employ under a cloud,” Lana said smiling sweetly. Richard and Greta showed signs of surprise. I concluded they didn’t think we would know that. Score one for Team Morrissey.
“A misunderstanding,” Richard said quickly.
“I believe you were robbing him,” Lana said quietly. “You know what the d’Tachi Federation does to thieves.”
Richard and G
reta stood. Cylinders of light enveloped them, enclosing them from floor to ceiling. A tech style force shield sprang up around me. It was clearly designed to hold a wizard prisoner. Other similar shields imprisoned Lana and Bronwyn
It looked like the talking phase of the visit was over.
36. Fight
I tested the force field around me. It was similar in nature to the spell used in the Temple, in this case with a computer program modifying the binding spells to prevent egress. Of course, being tech it was a lot more vulnerable. I traced back the shield to its generator and then to the processor being used.
“I apologize that we will have to detain you for a short time,” Richard said through some kind of speaker system. The fields around us were generating a lot of noise and we would never have heard an unamplified voice. “We do not want the d’Tachi taking a hand in this matter during this phase of the operation.”
“Why not?” Lana asked. Her magic made her sound as though she was talking normally. That was some trick in the conditions and I wanted to applaud.
“We are fulfilling a small number of off-world contracts prior to becoming a wholly terrestrial operation.” Greta said calmly. “One of them involves d’Tachi tech and they tend to get hysterical over minor infringements of their laws.”
“Please stay calm. We only need a few days to complete those contracts and then you will be released,” Richard continued.
There was a loud hissing sound, like a steam engine was about to explode. It seemed to be coming from Bronwyn.
“No one imprisons me.”
Magic sight showed unbelievable levels of power building up inside Bronwyn’s field. Having located the right place in the processor I could have switched off the field holding me whenever I wanted. However, it seemed safer on than off as the building began to tremble.
A wave of energy swept out from Bronwyn as the field holding her was torn apart. The fifty foot tall, quarter of a mile long panoramic window burst outwards and the steel frames holding the building together shivered. The protective cylinders of light around Richard and Greta stayed firm, even when furniture hit them with the speed of bullets. The shield around me stayed in one piece, just.