The Gorgon waved the weapon inches from my face so I could get a good look at his handiwork. Crudely fashioned from glass rather than steel, the blade's tip appeared sharp enough to puncture armor. Tattered scraps of fabric served for a functional grip. There was little doubt in my mind that the glass stiletto was as deadly as the look in the Gorgon's eyes.
I lashed out a foot. I aimed for his knee with my best police-training karate kick. The Gorgon absorbed the blow and rolled easily to his feet. Barefoot, I scrambled to mine with less grace.
"You don't want to fight me," I shouted with as much bravado as I could muster.
"Kill her and our deal is off," a voice said just above my shoulder. I swiveled my head at the sound. The sleek barrel of an H&K flechette rifle, a PT37 to be exact, lowered until it rested an inch above my left shoulder. The deadly click of a safety being released echoed strangely in the surrounding glass. The red dot of the laser sight glowed pink against the Gorgon's pale skin. "Drop your weapon, Tober."
The Gorgon shrugged. The stiletto disappeared into his jacket. "Fair 'nuff, 'Becka. Didn't know she was your girlfriend. Don't eat girlfriends."
A throaty laugh barked behind me. "Good policy."
The weapon disappeared. I heard rather than saw the figure come around from behind me. The rifle was a dark spot in front of mirror-camouflage. With a ripple of movement, she exposed her face. A hairline scratch on the mirrored goggles connected to a scar above and below the left eye. In sudden recognition, I shouted, "Rebeckah!"
"Every time I see you, your clothes get less and less practical, Dee." She gave me a crooked smile. The butt of the gun gestured at Eion's robes. "Please tell me you haven't joined some crackpot religious order and taken a vow of celibacy."
"That's the second time someone's asked me that." I looked down at Eion's cassock, reminded of everything that happened in the Church. "Although I'm beginning to think maybe I should."
"Don't you dare. Rebeckah smiled, her eyes unreadable behind the goggles. At a LINKed command the holographic armor changed to nil, and her suit became blue-screen blue. Her hand rested lightly on the handle of her flechette rifle, non-threatening, but ready.
Turning to the Gorgon, she said, "Go back to the command center, Tober. Tell them I'm bringing a guest."
Tober shrugged for a response, then scampered into the glass city. We watched his lithe form jog away.
"He works for you?"
Rebeckah shrugged. "Sometimes."
"Is he reliable?" I couldn't help but ask. In the distance, the Gorgon vaulted over one of the frozen car-shapes playfully.
Considering my question, Rebeckah clicked the safety back in place, and let the rifle dangle on its shoulder strap. "As a rule, Gorgons' priorities are askew, but Tober and I are friends. He'll do what I ask because he likes me, and because, right now, there isn't anything more interesting going on."
I scoffed. "Rebeckah, you don't ask – you command. Who said I was going back with you anyway?"
"The longer you stay here the more likely you are to be infected." She looked at my bare feet, mere inches from the glass. "The command center is well shielded."
It was neither an apology nor an excuse, just a statement of fact. My smile broadened. "All right. Lead on."
We passed through a glittering gully. Mountainous apartment complexes cast shadows across the glass street in long, dark stripes. Last night's rain made parts of the street almost impossible for me to navigate in Eion's shoes. Rebeckah steadied me with a hand around my elbow.
"Do you believe in angels, Rebeckah?" I asked without preamble – shattering the silence in which we'd been walking.
"What kind?"
"You know, Old Testament kind. Oh, sorry, I mean like in the Torah..." Then I stopped, failing to find words to describe Michael and my dream. Rebeckah's firm grip steadied me as I slid on the street as though it were a sheet of ice.
"Of course. The first time the Torah talks about angels, they're just 'messengers.' They come into the Israelite camp and have food and drink, like regular men. I think those kinds of angels exist. I might even be an angel like that to someone sometime. You never know when you're doing God's work."
"Trust me, sometimes it's painfully obvious," I sneered.
"You sound bitter." Her voice was soft, concerned.
Pretending I hadn't heard her comment, I continued, "But, what about the other kind of angel? The ones the LINK-angels are based on – with big wings, and flaming swords, and all that?"
We reached dry ground, and she let go of my arm. Readjusting the rifle's strap on her shoulder, she turned her head away. "I've never met any like that."
"You've met Michael Angelucci."
"I have." She spoke slowly, her tone dark.
"I thought so," I murmured, adding a mental check mark next to my suspicions. "So, Rebeckah, what'd you think?"
I left my question purposely open-ended, and she chewed on her response for a long moment. Wind blew through the glass-encased leaves of a lone tree-shape on the boulevard. Instead of the rustling I expected, the breeze whistled and moaned through the unmoving glass. Finally, Rebeckah turned to look me in the eye.
"Your Michael knows how to cause a shake-up, that's for sure."
My anger flared up. "He's not 'my' anything."
Rebeckah shrugged off my outburst. "I lost several good soldiers after his brief stint with us. We've always had spirited debates in camp about LINK-angels, our work, and whatnot. His philosophy was ... disturbing."
"Yeah, that's an understatement," I said with a low whistle, reminded of my conversation with Michael in the belfry. I shook my head, banishing my growing dread. "Do you believe him?"
"He gave very persuasive proof to back up his arguments."
I didn't have to ask for details to know what Rebeckah meant. The look on her face told me she knew exactly what Michael was. Fear pulled her face taut, and I could feel a chill returning to my stomach.
We turned the block. A chain-link fence surrounded what was once a playground. Though the barrier had probably been forbidding in its earlier incarnation, the Medusa-glass gave it a delicate appearance, like crystal lace. The sun danced along the symmetrical curves, catching my eye.
"For myself, I decided that it didn't matter," Rebeckah said. "The Talmud is filled with conjecture about the nature of God. Thousands of scholars have wrestled with the question since the beginning, each of them claiming the others were wrong. It shouldn't surprise me that no one got it right. That's the reason the name of God remains unpronounceable ... to keep us from trying to define, to limit, that which is undefinable, unlimited. As for the rest, we do what we do because it's a good way to live. The laws we follow are sound. Whatever might be decided about the nature of God has very little effect on the truth, the goodness, of those laws."
The chill I felt disappeared. I smiled at Rebeckah. Even though our beliefs were worlds apart, her faith steadied me. "You're good for me, you know that?"
Her lips turned up in the slightest of smiles. "Anyway, I have to believe in angels."
"Why's that?"
"I'm a Malach Nikamah, an avenging angel, after all."
I had heard the Hebrew translated when reports of LINK-terrorism first broke in the news, but had since forgotten the irony. Rebeckah and her followers purposely chose to name themselves after angels to challenge the LINK version and to remind people of the possibility of hoax and of a human hand behind the stir.
The glass-encased buildings grew denser as we approached the center of the city. The city was deadly quiet. No pigeon coo or insect buzz broke the unearthly silence. In the warm afternoon air, I imagined I felt the deadly chain reaction reaching up to grab me from every surface.
"We're here," Rebeckah announced, jumping down into the window well of a basement-level apartment. Over flash-frozen marigolds in a window box, I could see the dark hairs of her flattop. She knocked three times on the bottom pane. After a few seconds, someone on the other side removed the fa
lse glass. Rebeckah crawled through, motioning for me to follow her.
Gingerly, I lowered myself. It was tempting to use the fire escape for leverage, but I wanted to avoid as much direct contact with the Medusa glass as possible. I crouched, ready to take the awkward plunge and crawl through, when a hand from inside offered a pair of armored gloves.
"Thanks," I said, pulling them on. Ducking my head, I scrambled through the narrow opening. The Medusa blast had entered the apartment the same way I did, through the open window, freezing everything inside. The new occupants had removed most of the walls that were glassed in the explosion, including the ceiling. The same armored fabric that comprised Rebeckah's camouflage suit draped the outer wall and the floor. With the false glass in front of the opening, the danger was effectively minimized. Even so, the four guards wore fully operational combat armor.
One of them waved the tip of his flechette rifle in my direction. His eyes were locked on Eion's vestments. His voice held a thin, incredulous tone when he asked, "Your guest, Commander?"
"Yes, and see that she gets outfitted with armor pronto, soldier," Rebeckah said. Acknowledging his "Yes, sir," with a brief nod, she gestured me farther into the complex. "I'm afraid I can't give you the full tour, you understand, but let me show you to the mess hall. We can get something to drink while you wait for some decent clothes."
Sure, I murmured, willing to be led anywhere, especially since the action didn't involve any thinking on my part. I stripped off the gloves and looked around for a place or a person to return them to. One of the other guards took them from me wordlessly.
"Thanks," I murmured.
I followed Rebeckah into the bowels of the apartment complex. The hallway was dark, except for a string of Christmas lights running along the seam between the wall and the ceiling. The light was weak, but steady. The apartment was too deep inside the glass city for the Malachim to be easily siphoning power from the main grid. I deduced that they must either have their own generator somewhere or a really good LINK-hacker on their team. Knowing Rebeckah, it could be both.
The number of people we passed surprised me as I shuffled along the nubby carpeting. Occasionally, wild silver locks interspersed among the dark, militaristic haircuts. Rebeckah must have noticed my eyes following a pair of silver heads as they disappeared up a flight of stairs, because she said, "The Gorgons lived here first. It didn't seem right to oust them. Besides, they've proven to be excellent scavengers ... and surprisingly willing to barter."
"Politics and strange bedfellows." I shrugged. I was intrigued by the alliance between the Malachim and the Gorgons, but too tired to pursue it. My eyes were distracted by the soft colors of the Christmas lights. Someone had made a Star of David at the intersection of two hallways. "Nice decorations."
Rebeckah laughed and held out her hand to indicate the direction I should go. "The Gorgons," she explained. "They must have found a warehouse full of the lights. They string them up wherever they go. Some of my boys augmented their haphazard design and siphoned a bit of power for them. The light is strange, but I've gotten used to it."
"I've seen something like this in the abandoned service tunnels in Manhattan."
"I'm not surprised." Rebeckah nodded. "The tunnels are a great way to get around unnoticed."
"For you or them?"
"Both," Rebeckah said, as we headed up a flight of stairs. The stairway was too narrow for us to walk side by side, so Rebeckah took the lead. Over her shoulder she asked, "Why?"
"Do you have your own generator, or do you boost the city's power?" I asked. My fingers brushed the handrail. Red lights looped around the rail, giving the shadows of Rebeckah's armor a purplish cast.
"You didn't answer my question, Deidre. Why do you want to know if we use the service tunnels?"
I waited, saying nothing. I hoped she'd drop her question, but I knew I'd never win a game like this one with Rebeckah. At the landing, I paused to catch my breath. Rebeckah turned to regard me evenly.
"All right, all right." I gave in. I smiled, because I knew I'd be the first to break. "I only ask because I saw these strange boxes set at intervals throughout the tunnels running along the old cable-car power lines. They didn't look like maintenance units; they were too purposely concealed. In fact, I wouldn't have noticed them at all if it weren't for the Gorgon's lights. Are they yours?"
Rebeckah looked genuinely surprised by my information. "No. Manhattan, you said?"
"Yeah, not far from the deli we met at, actually. I guess that's why I suspected they might be your power siphons."
"We have our own generators."
The stony look on Rebeckah's face made me realize what I'd implied was very definitely against her code of honor.
"I'm sorry, Rebeckah. Of course, you're not thieves. I didn't mean ..."
Rebeckah cut off my lame attempt at apology. "Whose are they, I wonder."
"I don't know. I suppose it could be the Unitarians' underground railroad."
Dismissing that idea with a shake of her head, Rebeckah smiled. "They're not that organized – too much infighting. Besides, it's summer."
I laughed. The Unitarians were notorious for closing down their churches in the summertime. At Rebeckah's nod, we started back up the stairs. After my long walk in ill-fitting shoes, I had to ask. "What floor is the mess on, anyway?"
"It's the top floor. Back when this was a condominium it was used as a 'party suite,' a common room for the residents."
"Great," I grumbled, hoisting myself up more steps. The red lights changed to a bright white at the next floor. "What about the Gay Liberation Ecumenical folks?"
"Most of their energy is concentrated on repelling the gender-bending fashion restrictions. Even the extremists in Vulva Riot and Act Up's LINK protest have been confined to newsgroups – very much within the letter of the law. The most they do is run under handles to protect their identities. The ones with resources to pull off a siphon are under too much scrutiny." Ahead of me, I saw Rebeckah's proud shoulders droop just a fraction. "I wouldn't rule them out, but it's unlikely."
"I heard the Black Muslims were organizing around this guy Jibril Freshta," I said, hoping to slide past Rebeckah's iron defenses. "Could it be them?"
Either I was sly enough that she didn't catch it, or she gave it to me. "From what I hear, Freshta is a pacifist and very law-abiding. So far, his people seem to prefer peaceful demonstrations."
"Then why are the police after him?"
"Nobody likes a troublemaker in an election year ... even a peaceful one. Besides, he's been an easy target. Unlike us, he operates a hundred percent in real time. That means no handles, no quick reroutes. The cops know what he looks like and where he goes. Brave guy."
I remembered Jibril's broad smile. "Yeah. He's got the kind of face you remember. You ever met him?"
"No." Her tone was even. I couldn't tell if she felt anything more than a passing respect for Jibril's message or not. Black Muslims had an unfortunate history of being anti-Semitic. I couldn't imagine Jibril as one of those, but I could understand her caution.
"I hope he's okay," I said mostly to myself. We continued climbing. After passing a level of yellow Christmas lights, I asked, "Have you heard anything about me on the LINK? About Daniel?"
"I heard you were plugged in again," Rebeckah said, as we turned the landing, moving up to a stairwell draped in blinking pink lights. The shadows fluttering along Rebeckah's suit looked lavender now. 'There's an APB on the police frequency about how dangerous you are."
I chuckled. "Dangerous? I guess I'm giving your reputation a run for the money, eh?"
"I'm not feeling my reputation threatened just yet," she said with a wink, as we finally came to the party suite. I was out of breath.
Leaning against the doorframe, I looked in. The suite had not made the conversion to cafeteria very smoothly. The ghost of a once-swanky apartment party room hung around the edges of the mess hall. What was once a wet bar now served as a buffet line. None of th
e furniture matched; soldiers sat on sofas and on the floor around end tables.
The only lights in the room were eerie shafts of muted sun that penetrated the Medusa-sheathed penthouse windows, and, of course, the ubiquitous Christmas bulbs hanging in great profusion from the ceiling.
Despite the awkward accommodations, the mess hall bustled with activity. Men and women sat scattered about the suite in clumps of conversation, laughter, and heated debate. Silver hair was mixed liberally among the Orthodox men wearing payot, the side locks, and military buzz cuts. The smell of beef stew simmering in a Crock-Pot made my mouth water. Rebeckah headed into the room, amid many waves and shouts of greeting.
Grief tugged at my heart. Watching Rebeckah move easily through this band of LINK-terrorists and Gorgons,
I envied her. It seemed strange. This woman was public enemy number one, constantly on the run, forced to live in the glass city and risk infection from the Medusa bio-virus or worse, but at this very moment I wished I were she.
I had no one like her comrades in my life. Since the excommunication and all that came with it, I'd been alone – without even the ethereal community of the LINK in which to find comfort. My lover was an ... no, I didn't even want to think about that. With a shrug, I pushed away my darkening mood as Rebeckah waved me over to a central table. For the time being, I was given a respite from a loneliness I hadn't even fully realized I felt. I might not be able to have Rebeckah's life, but I could pretend I did for as long as I was a guest here.
Rebeckah introduced me to our tablemates. I forgot most of their names the instant she said them. I nodded politely all the same. It wasn't like me to be so distracted – my police training made me an expert at keeping names and faces sorted – but my attention focused on an intense looking soldier. He was frowning suspiciously into his coffee cup, his head tilted to the side. He was powerfully built, but the line of his neck was as graceful as any dancer's. The short hairs of his military cut only served to heighten the effect.
"Raphael," Rebeckah repeated, "meet Deidre."
Archangel Protocol Page 16