Full Moonster
Page 13
Although wearing a watch, I purposely glanced at the clock on the wall. “Roughly two hours, twenty minutes. They strike at midnight."
Eyes went wide, but only silence greeted my outrageous statement. My respect grew. In their faces, I could see the crowd weigh options and discard useless procedures. Evacuating the city was a laugh. The Bureau had tried that once when New York was in serious danger and more people died in the exodus than from the enemy.
“And this is the earliest you could inform us?” a National Guard colonel admonished furiously.
This time, I gave them a four-second pause. “Yes."
“This midnight deadline,” one of the CATs asked, “is it a lock?"
“Dead certain."
The US Army Intelligence operative smiled knowingly. “Sir, why don't we let them know that we know and maybe that'll scare ‘em off, or at least slow the bastards down a bit."
“Nice try,” I acknowledged. “But Sid does know that we know and doesn't give a good goddamn."
“They really think they can pull it off,” the Naval Intelligence operative said slowly. Her uniform proclaimed she was in the submarine corp. “Destroy all of Chicago?"
“To the ground,” I reiterated as firmly as possible.
A Green Beret colonel scratched his dimpled chin. “Or from the ground up,” he murmured thoughtfully.
That was an interesting idea.
“Two hours doesn't give us much time,” the CAT midget cop observed, lighting a pipe. “It's going to be a bitch following standard police procedure."
Knowing how cops think, I was prepared for this. “Fuck procedure,” I said bluntly. “Blow your covers, strong-arm suspects, enter houses without warrants, do whatever you have to. The city is under martial law."
The clock on the wall loudly clicked forward another minute.
“Because we're rapidly running out of time. And there are four million innocent people who have placed their trust and their lives in our hands."
“And when we find Sid?” the bag lady asked, checking the clip in her Glock 10mm automatic pistol. A callused thumb started ejecting rounds as a prelude to reloading.
This was no time to mince words. Not only might it get in the way, but being diplomatic could very seriously lower the high intensity of feeling I desperately needed to instill into this group. Especially that particular team of police officers. When the CATs prowled the city, street crime dropped like a rock.
“If you find them,” I said coldly, “blow their frigging brains out. We neither want, nor need prisoners.” Besides, I wasn't sure we could handle any.
A major in the Air Force Rangers stood up. “I am not thrilled by the concept of armed personnel running amuck in a major city with a government license to kill randomly."
You and me both, brother, so I spoke from the heart. “If you blow away some poor slob by accident, it will be a terrible shame. But accidents happen. However, if anybody, repeat, anybody uses this emergency as an opportunity to take a little personal vengeance, they will answer to me and my people, who do not legally exist and have no board of inquiry to explain their actions to."
Bodies relaxed. They now understood that this was not to be a free-for-all, but a deadly serious gambit to save a city from extinction. Step One: save Chicago. Step Two would be to justify our actions to a population still sucking in air.
“Alert,” a Secret Service agent said, touching his ear. “There has just been an attempt to seize control of the U.S.S. Idaho while on a training cruise in Lake Michigan."
“The Idaho?” an NSA field agent snapped. “That's an antique!"
The CIA operative frowned. “But secretly armed with Tomahawk nuclear missiles."
Shocked murmurs engulfed the room.
“You know about that, huh?” the Navy admiral asked.
The master spy gave a grim nod.
“As of five minutes ago, a squadron of Apache helicopters in a joint operation with Air Force Blackbird stealth bombers has sunk the Idaho with concentrated missile fire,” the Secret Service agent continued. “Rescue operations by the Coast Guard are proceeding for the crew."
The Navy SEAL touched his ear. “The warheads are safe. My people have them."
A SWAT captain crossed himself. The CIA took the bottle of whiskey from the DEA wino and downed a healthy shot. I agreed with the sentiment. Dear God, oh dear loving God, the fight for Chicago had already begun.
Hours ahead of schedule.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Two seconds later, the meeting was over, with everybody politely and nicely filing out of the room so that they could start unleashing their hordes of destruction. When I was alone, I touched the shiny new bracelet on my wrist and teleported to the top floor of the Sears Tower.
I appeared inside a pentagram made of yellow electrician's tape on the carpeted floor. On every side I was banked by sandbag walls bristling with machine guns, arbalists, microwave beamers, and other assorted deathdealers.
A medieval knight in full armor holding a Glock .45 ceramic pistol lowered her weapon. “Hey, its Ed!” she said in relief.
A wizard with an acid-filled waterpistol clicked off a safety. “It only looks like Ed,” he growled. “Password or die!"
“Horatio,” I said fast.
He scowled. “Cerberus."
“Balder."
“Right,” I said finishing the litany of famous guards.
A section of the sandbags moved backwards on hidden rollers and I scooted free. I shook hands with some folk I knew and was given a Kirlian security badge. It visibly glowed with my normally hidden aura. Also had my name and thumbprint.
Following the markers on the floor, I moved through the bustling crowd of humans and supernaturals, nearly getting trampled by Clarmont the gorgon and his lovely wife, Boom.
Passing another checkpoint, I was scanned by a team of folk holding a machine that resembled a leaf blower and was finally admitted into the main conference hall of the Tower which was now temporarily converted into our war room.
Going through the double sets of sliding doors, I stepped into Madhouse Central. Dimly illuminated, the four walls of the big room displayed vector graphics of the different sections of Chicago. Moving colored dots, triangles, and other assorted geometric figures indicated police, possible monster attacks, and Bureau teams.
Clustered on the floor were banks of control boards filled with radar screens, thermographs from orbital Keyhole satellites, rainbow swirls of chemical readouts, and the dancing light show of Kirlian television. A very recent invention, it had already stopped two transdimensional invasions and gotten four talk show hosts fired and/or jailed.
Far against the back wall, an assortment of staggeringly beautiful women were busy stripping off their street clothes. Two redheads were yanking off full evening gowns, a buxom Latina was removing a cop uniform, and an Oriental goddess was peeling off a lacy nurse outfit. As each item came away, a hidden arsenal of miniature weapons was exposed taped to the satiny acres of skin.
Quickly, the buck-naked bevy of babes squeezed into patent-leather commando jumpsuits which couldn't possible show more anatomical details if they had been made of thin air. Now dressed for combat, the female warriors yanked open a trunk and pulled out even more tiny weapons, along with clip-feed bazookas, spiked magic wands, chainsaw-garrotes, exploding bolos, and vampire boomerangs. These ladies did have a taste for the strange and unusual. They were the ThunderBunnies, the sole Bureau 13 team for the entire state of Texas.
The whole staff of a Houston brothel had been violently introduced to the world of the supernatural when a client had turned out to be an incubus, a sex vampire, and these ladies of the evening had to become the impromptu defenders of a sleeping town and save the population from being ... ah, enjoyed to death by him and his female counterpart, a lesbian succubus. The battle of the sexes raged until dawn, and by sunrise the Bureau had a new team, battered and bruised, but victorious. Now that was a story worth telling and re-telling
around the fireplace at two o'clock in the morning. Just send the kids to bed first.
Near them was a somber crowd of men and women in neat black suits and black hats, the combat rabbis of Team Macabee. Some of the older men had beards and long sideburns with the fringe at the belt. A lot of the women wore yarmulkes, those brimless skullcaps. But tonight each was armed with an Uzi machine pistol and draped with bandoleers of ammunition clips, including the cabalistic mage. Unable to use the weapon because of his magic, the mage carried the Uzi merely to fool the opposition and as a spare for the fighters. Good thinking, actually. The Bureau jokingly referred to them as the American Mossad. Their information gathering system on the supernatural was so efficient that sometimes they informed HQ about a coming problem, instead of vice-versa. Also, although they didn't like it, Macabees would work on the Sabbath. What could be more holy than saving lives?
The sad expressions on the team tonight was directly attributable to their missing telepathic leader, who died with the rest of the mentalists when the Hadleyville Hotel detonated.
Off by themselves as always, bandaging wounds and drinking healing potions, was our infamous gang of bad boys, Roger's Rangers. The Boston team broke rules that hadn't even been written yet, but they always got their monsters. However, civilians had this nasty habit of getting dead by standing in the wrong place at the wrong time. Nothing the Ranger's did had any effect on this constantly happening. Some agents believed them to be cursed.
“Hey, Rangers!” I called out in passing.
The group pivoted with weapons at the ready, then relaxed when they saw it was only me.
“The Idaho?" I asked.
Wet and bloody, they nodded.
“Good job."
The eight Rangers shrugged.
Next came the Los Angeles based Team Angel. Their leader was a wild haired man named Damon who posed as a science fiction author. His lieutenant was a dashingly handsome computer journalist only known as Aki. Finnish, I think. I waved hi to a beautiful woman in a low cut gypsy gown of a thousand colors. Pat smiled in return and touched her nose. We both grinned at the private joke.
However, levity faded when I noticed somebody standing over in a corner all by himself. A slender pale man dressed in a dark suit, white shirt, and a white tie. He was smoking a pungent cigarette and had his hat pulled so low over his face that only a pair of eerie transparent blue eyes were visible beneath the snap brim.
It was the legendary J. P. Withers himself. The very first Bureau 13 agent recruited back in 1850. It was rumored that he was immortal and slightly insane. Plus, he had this very bad habit of using explosives when diplomacy would have done the job. Or using ten sticks of dynamite when one would have sufficed. Overkill wasn't his modus operandi, it was his philosophy of life. Rare indeed was the situation which warranted the summoning of J.P., and I was of the personal opinion that Horace Gordon was secretly terrified of the man. If man he was. However, Withers was on our side. Well, mostly.
In the center of the room, talking on two phones at the same time, was the chief. Horace Gordon was a giant of a man, large and muscular, with gray crewcut hair and a barely healed scar across his throat. That was new. He was dressed in black military boots and a tan NASA jumpsuit. A double holster about his waist supported a Bedlow laser pistol on the left and a short golden wizard wand in the right. How he could safely mix magic and technology was beyond my understanding. Around his neck was an amulet on a silver chain that pulsed with a protective aura of blue anti-magic.
Then I found my own team, gleefully in the process of looting the collection of folding tables bowed under the weight of the massive assortment of weapons and magical supplies piled on top.
“Hey,” I offered as greeting.
With cries of delight, they scampered close and hugs were received. Nothing like a good hug to help lower the tension.
Freshly scrubbed and looking like spring, Jessica was in denim pants, white shirt and denim short jacket. She had a double-barrel taser stun gun at her belt, an Uzi slung over her shoulder and was arranging medical supplies inside a field surgery kit. The necklace of Me was where it should be, dangling between her breasts and glowing contentedly. I would too.
Now stop that! she sent privately.
Sorry.
Mindy was in her ninja outfit of loose black pajamas with no belt, a double quiver of arrows on her back and a compound bow. With sword in hand, Ms. Jennings was stuffing knives into a sleeve.
Adjusting the rosary dangling from his belt, Father Mike was also in military fatigues. His combat Bible rode in a special holster at his hip, and over his back was a set of pressurized tanks whose complex pipes fed into a short, insulated sprayer which had discolored from heat. The M1A flamethrower was the big priest's favorite weapon when battling hellspawn or thawing frozen Thanksgiving turkeys. These tanks were an odd color though.
“What's this?” I asked, thumbing the pressure rig with a fist.
“Amen,” Father Donaher mumbled kissing the rosary. “Hey, Ed. Normally, I use jellied gasoline. But for this wee scenario, the tanks are filled with Napalm #4."
Patiently, I waited for enlightenment.
“Napalm #1 was jellied gasoline,” he explained. “Number two could burn under water. Number three stuck to the target like epoxy glue."
“Number four does everything, I suppose."
“Aye, lad. And it's poisoned."
I made a face. “Very nasty, Michael."
He shrugged, making the tanks slosh. “If this helps to send more Scion members to meet their Maker, then praise the Lord."
When a Catholic priest starts talking like a Southern Baptist minister, I know we're in for trouble. Or a picnic.
“Hallelujah!” Mindy shouted.
Dapper as ever, Raul chuckled appreciatively. For some bizarre reason, Mr. Horta was in white, from deck shoes to nautical cap. Staff in hand, with lumpy pouches hanging over each shoulder, his arms were full of copper bracelets. His right pants pocket bulged with a hip flask and his linen shirt was embroidered with the words ‘shiver me timbers! ....what does that mean anyway?’ When had this sailing craze overcome him?
You gave him the Old Spice for his birthday, dear.
True enough. My fault then.
Her long blonde hair tied in a ponytail, Kathi was in a tight leotard that showed off her every ample curve and changed color to match anything she stood near. A belt of small pouches went around her trim waist and a bandoleer of foot long magical wands was draped across her chest. A few I could identify as Lightning, or Stone-to-Flesh, the rest were unknowns. Even the butterfly on her cheek was wearing an Army helmet for protection.
Whistling contentedly, George was in standard Army fatigues and expertly adjusting the straps of his huge plastic backpack. The square container had a cushioned hip-rest and padded shoulder hooks to help distribute the tremendous weight of the 18,000 rounds of ammo in the pack. From the top of the container snaked an enclosed belt which fed directly into the breech mechanism of a stocky rifle with a worn, pitted maw.
The Masterson Assault Cannon fired 20mm caseless, armor-piercing, high-explosive rounds. I have seen just one of these weapons destroy a whole company of giant robot spiders. Thankfully in another dimension. If news of this terrible gun was ever made public, Geneva would hold another convention just to outlaw the thing. Bureau regulations strictly forbid its use outside of a war.
Amigo was lying belly-up on the table, softly sawing toothpicks.
“Where's mine?” I asked eagerly. “Did it arrive?"
George took me by the elbow. “Over here. When the Ranger's saw the rifle, they tried to confiscate it. But Raul and I persuade them that was not a great idea."
“That's right, pilgrim,” Raul drawled. “Wa-ha."
“That was the absolutely the worst Harrison Ford I have ever heard,” I said with a straight face.
Visibly disappointed, Raul scowled, “But I wasn't doing Ford!"
“Rex Harrison?"
Aside from my twin Magnums and a sampling of high explosives, in unrestricted combat I also carry a combo pack: three LAW rocket launchers and two HAFLA incendiary rockets in a cushioned haversack. But downtown Chicago was no place for a bazooka battle, as I knew from hard experience, so I had requisitioned the next best thing. A Barret M-1 sniper rifle.
Longer than the M-60 and heavier than cardinal sin, the tremendous rifle was made exclusively of space-age alloys to cut the weight as much as possible. Chambered for .50 Long SuperMagnums, the rifle had a muzzle blast of 5,487 fps and an effective range of two incredible miles. Perfect for home defense.
Cresting the main barrel was a Starlite sniper scope that could see your tonsils in pitch darkness at nine hundred yards. The cigarbox-sized ammo clip held eleven gigantic bullets. Twelve, if you were foolish, or desperate enough to carry this portable howitzer with a live round in the chamber.
I slid in the twelfth round.
“Tunafish!” Gordon called out, and we hurried over.
“How'd the briefing go?” the chief asked as a greeting. Signing a spell book, he handed it to thin air, where the volume vanished.
Hmm, spacial delivery? Quickly, I slid on my sunglasses, then yanked them off as tears rolled down my cheeks. Zounds! Maximum overload. Too much magic around here. Alvarez, never do that again.
“Well?” Horace repeated.
“Everybody is ready as they can be on such short notice,” I reported, wiping my eyes. “They each were handed a copy of the written notice, and know they should report on radio channel such-n-such, and that you'll issue orders that damn well better be obeyed on channel such-n-such."
“Such-n-such?” Kathi asked curiously.
Shifting his weapon, George rested an arm around her dulcet curves. “It's a technical term, sweetheart. Sort of like blah-blah, or thingy."
Lord, give me strength. “How about us, sir?” I asked. “What's the status on our wave division? And the cyber-cops?"
“The mermaids have already been briefed and are taking position out in Lake Michigan,” Gordon said. “Our robots and sentient machines are in position at Hadleyville, still searching for clues to where that Hotel went."