Fists of Iron_An Urban Fantasy Novel

by J. A. Cipriano

  The rabbi nodded to me with a smile and a twinkle in his eye. Every move and facial tick said “Trust me,” and I was sure that Little Joe was either the most honest man I’d ever met or the biggest liar. “I assure you, Frank, Yahweh’s grace can counteract the Old Ones. It is just going to take a little time for the old balance to, well, balance out. You know, swinging scales and the like?” As he turned his eyes to Gabby, that self-assured charm melted into an open frown and downcast eyes. “I can’t. Not yet, anyway. You’re partly right, though. Max doesn’t have anything to do with restoring the order or enhancing Yahweh’s majesty, but he is insurance. Not to keep you at bay, precisely, but to halt–”

  The problem with being in the presence of two constantly chiming and shining wheels of peace and love is that it lulls the senses. No one, not even me with the protection of la Corazon, was with it enough to hear the onrushing footsteps outside the shrine. It wasn’t until Joseph was interrupted by the door being kicked open that we realized we had even more company.

  A somewhat flustered looking John Perez, decked out to the nine’s in his “wizard SWAT team” gear, stood front and center, assault rifle slung over his back and a gem-encrusted staff in his hands. Now I don’t know my staves that well, but I was sure it was the business end pointed our way. Tabitha, still dressed to kill in the executive boardroom, and Abner stood on each side of the Peacekeeper, the former looking annoyed and the latter strangely penitent.

  “Shut it, perp,” John commanded. “By the authority of the Peacekeepers, Joseph Krakowski, you are under arrest for conspiracy with extra-dimensional beings, the unauthorized destruction of Peacekeeper wards and artifacts, opening the ways to divinities, and kidnapping!”

  10

  I had half a second to realize shit was about to go down. I grabbed my gun, ready to shoot the first fucker who made am untoward move at Gabby and me when everyone leapt to their feet, even the Pythia. A cacophony of shouts, questions, and exclamations filled the air, but one voice cut through the rest.

  “Would you so blatantly break the treaties and defile this holy place?” the oracle cried, her voice ringing off the columns. I had to admit, I really didn’t see the difference between what Joe’s angel squad did over what Magic Cop had done. Maybe the God Squad ranked higher, especially with what was coming out about the Peacekeepers?

  The idea they might be in the wrong seemed like news to Tabitha. She gave John a sidelong glance through her horn-rimmed glasses. Big Red definitely looked like he wasn’t happy with what he was doing, his glowing eyes looking straight at his “father.” John ignored his companions, tightening the grip on his staff.

  “Proviso 672-C of the Extra-dimensional Expatriation Treaty gives me all the rights I need to pursue a fugitive and investigate suspicious activities across dimensional boundaries.” The tip of the staff glowed with a cool blue light and his voice betrayed no emotion. “So please comply and everything will go peacefully.”

  The angel-wheels kept a tight orbit around Joseph, almost completely hiding him behind flashing metal and multi-colored eyes. He didn’t seem to make a move, but he wasn’t exactly holding his hands up.

  When Gabriela strode past the rabbi-angel cloud, I was sure she was going over to John’s side. Instead, she halted halfway and that prompted me to start to follow her. “Everything is peaceful right now, John.” She looked between her husband and Little Joe. “Considering there’s enough extradimensional power around to destroy every mortal here, why don’t we try talking this out?”

  When John’s face hardened, I tried to help convince the Magic Cop, if only because I didn’t feel like getting blown to smithereens.

  “Look, I totally get the desire to nail Joe’s ass to the wall. He lied to us and took Max, but if we get in a big shootout or dick-waving contest or what not, nobody gets anything they want.” Unfortunately, as the words left my lips, I had as much trust in John to be reasonable as I did in Joe, which was about none. There were niggling bits in the oracle’s crazy talk that were starting to worm into my mind, and I didn’t like it one bit.

  The rabbi’s voice echoed through the growing hum of the wheels. “While I am sorry I’ve sowed this sort of distrust with the others, I’m not sorry for defying you, Peacekeeper. However, I believe we could come to an agreement, one where I can surrender Max into the custody of the good doctor and you give me safe passage.” The rabbi smiled sadly, like he didn’t expect John to comply, but that was nuts right?

  “You must be a good father and husband, John. Please listen to me.”

  Gabriela’s focus was square on her husband. “John, please. Listening can’t hurt. Max is more important than this.”

  John didn’t say a word. Instead, he drew the staff up like he was aiming a rifle down the iron sights.

  “Come on, you know the right thing to do, man.” Yeah, I wasn’t going to keep my trap shut. Fuck it all, why hadn’t he already said yes to this?

  “The right thing to do is follow the law.” That light on his staff glowed stronger, and I swore I could see a glint of something both strange and familiar in the man’s eyes. “We’ll get Max back, but I won’t let the rabbi walk away scot-free.” He eyed Tabitha and Abner. “Get ready to take him and the foreign ex-dees.”

  Jesus, was John really going to go Judge Dredd right here in the shadow of Mount Olympus? Either he was way stronger than he looked or he had balls the size of bowling balls. Unfortunately, I was pretty sure it wasn’t that at all. Something about the guy had always been a little off, and looking into his eyes, I realized what it was. He was a touch insane, and that insanity was going to get us all killed.

  Tabitha gave a hesitant nod, but Abner shook his head. “This is folly, John Perez. Whatever crimes my father has committed, life, especially young life, is more important. We must take any opportunity to ensure your son’s safety.”

  The wheels spun so fast, I was pretty sure our two had turned into two dozen. To add to the mounting insanity, the Pythia knelt in front of her throne, head bowed and whispering what sounded like a “Get These Assholes Off My Lawn” prayer to Apollo or Zeus or some other god. Either way, I didn’t really want to be here if that prayer got answered, especially with the raging storm high above.

  “We have little time, Peacekeeper,” Joe’s voice hummed like he was talking through a high-speed fan and I couldn’t even make him out through the Ophanim anymore. “Will you listen to my offer or shall I leave now?”

  “I’m sorry,” John said, a hard whisper barely loud enough for us to hear, “but there’s more at stake here than my son.” The staff’s light multiplied on that last word and exploded into a pulse of brilliant energy.

  That’s when all Hell (maybe Hades was the better term considering where we were) broke loose.

  The one thing about a Mexican stand-off like this is that everyone is ready to go. The pulse of energy was some kind of mystical Taser, only giving me additional sunspots in my eyes and a tingle in my skin. Gabriela managed to throw up some hand sign, a quickie ward, but she was still partly stunned, falling to one knee and covering her face, while the Pythia was rocked and fell into a heap over the chair. If it did anything at all to Rabbi Joe, there was no sign of it, light reflecting wildly off the spinning angels.

  Tabby and Abner sure as hell weren’t affected, no doubt shielded as part of their entry strategy, but they reacted in totally different ways. Her glasses now opaque, Tabitha pulled something from her suit jacket and hurled it at the spinning angel-wheels. Whatever it was shattered into a million glittering shards.

  While a lot of those fragments were blown away by the cyclonic force of the spin, a good bit were pulled in through the open spokes of the wheels.

  Abner was taken aback for a split second, maybe he was only used to treachery if he was doing it, then he took a huge step past John, interposing his big clay body in front of the point of the staff. “No, Peacekeeper, there is no need for this!”

  “Tabitha, shut him off,” Magic Cop gro
wled as he tried to sidestep the big clay dude, but thankfully, Abner didn’t let him by. I wasn’t sure why, but I was pretty sure John getting past the golem would only make things worse.

  The doc was shaking off whatever she got hit with, so I figured I should do something. I owed Abner even after you marked off all the debit from his betrayals.

  As a loud hacking cough emerged from the angel cyclone, I broke into a sprint. I liked Tabitha too much to take a shot at her so, while she was turning towards the big guy, I tackled her before she could work some more mojo. Whatever magical wards she had up (a considerable amount, I’m sure) didn’t mean anything to me, and we hit the marble floor hard.

  “Sorry, Tabby,” I muttered as I wrangled her arms down. She didn’t look like she wanted to accept the apology though because she was struggling like mad. To my right, there was the sound of shuffling steps as Abner kept trying to play human shield, but I was a little too preoccupied with the hellcat under me. Which, yes, might be more fun under normal circumstances.

  Then things got really crazy. I can only guess that whatever was making Joe hack up half his lungs pissed off the Ophanim. What had been the chimes of peace turned into the drums of war and that got my attention. Feeling the rush of wind in our general direction, I decided it was smarter to ditch out.

  I rolled off Tabitha to one side and barely ducked a pissed off wheel-angel roaring into the space where I’d been. It slammed straight down, stopping only an inch from crushing Marlowe’s sternum by a sparkling blue shield.

  Frankly, the entire dust-up was stupid and Gabriela must have agreed. Her protective spell might have been off the cuff, but it had been skillful enough to let the doc recover before I had even started to reorient myself. I could feel the sudden rush of magic in the air as she let out a single word in Latin.

  “PROHIBRE!” I felt the omnidirectional wave of force more than saw it, but I was damned familiar with this particular spell. La Corazon protected me as it always did, something I’m sure Gabby was taking into account, while most every other mortal being was thrown against the walls, floors, whatever the closest surface was.

  Tabitha slid across the floor and was pinned into a corner where a column met the floor, while John and Abner were thrown side-by-side against a fresco, destroying what was likely a priceless work of art. Joseph, coughing up blood at this point and on one knee, was pancaked against the floor. The angels were flipped in midair like fancy hubcaps, but they managing to settle back into their usually spinning orientation a moment later. The only person that had been literally untouched was the stricken oracle, still slumped over her couch.

  That spell would only last for a second or two at most so I scrambled madly to my feet. The best thing I could do would be to try to disarm as many people as possible and hopefully make the idea of fighting a futile one. John had dropped his staff, so that was my first target as Gabriela slumped back to one knee, spent for the moment from her big whammy. Two steps forward and a solid punt kick sent the jeweled stick bouncing along the marble and well away out of anyone’s reach.

  “Butcher,” John cried out in that special sort of drill sergeant voice that makes you want to stop just out of respect for that much gruffness, but if he had a further request, it was cut off as the force holding him up ceased and dropped him and everyone else to the floor.

  I was about to tell him off, something pithy like “Take a seat and chill” or something when an drumming angel pinballed off my head, adding a whole heap of stars to the bright spots burned into my eyes as I was flattened face-first onto the stones.

  “By the Diamond Hills, everyone stop fighting!” Gabriela was tired as hell, I could hear it in her voice, but she still had a set of lungs on her. “This is insanity!”

  I slowly pushed up to my hands and knees, my head throbbing and my ears ringing like thunder. Maybe I had just walked into Concussionville or maybe …

  That’s when I felt the raindrops. That was a neat trick, really, because the sun shining down seemed to have intensified a hundred times over. I had a horrible sinking feeling in my stomach, but I had to know for sure how fucked we were.

  So because I’m a glutton for punishment, I pushed myself over on my back to gaze upward at the two titanic beings descending down from what I was sure now was Mount Olympus, coming down on high to end the desecration of one of their most holy temples.

  You know the term “Grecian ideal”? Well, these two guys were that in spades. The first was youthful, almost boyish in the face, but certainly not of the body. Like the hosioi below, it was hard to focus too closely on his luminous face, but I could easily make out his flowing blond locks and sunrise-colored robes. He bore an ancient bow made of pure gold and a burnished leather quiver hung at his hip. That had to be Apollo, the god of the sun, and if I remembered my comic book mythology right, this was his oracle and his shrine we were fucking up right now.

  The second was bigger, older, and more barrel-chested, dressed in rich red robes with gold embroidery around the edges. His hair was long and thick, the color of storm clouds, with a full beard and mustache. By the whipping winds, crackling electricity, and aura of majesty, this had to be Zeus. You know, Greek god of storms and king of the pantheon and all of that. He was everything you could envision when you hear that name and a lot you couldn’t.

  Still, there was a niggling voice in the back of my head that was disappointed that he didn’t look like Liam Neeson or Sean Bean.

  That voice was shut the fuck up when Zeus opened his mouth, and the heavens shook with the thunder that echoed out of it. That thunder turned into words in a language I didn’t know, but I somehow could understand.

  “WHO DARES WAGE WAR IN THE SHADOW OF MY HOME AND THREATENS THE SAFETY OF MY SON’S MOST HOLY ORACLE?”

  11

  Momma Butcher always taught us boys to respect our elders. Now, to be totally honest, I’ve not been really great at following that particular bit of advice, but this one time, I felt it was smart to go with that. Ain’t nothing much more elder than a god, and to be fair, we really were in the wrong here (though Johnny and his hit squad were much more wrong than Gabby and I).

  So I quickly tucked the Beretta away and raised my hands. “Sorry, your godships, we were just–”

  The thunder pealed again. “SILENCE!”

  The rest of the combatants clambered to their feet as I shut my yap although Gabriela was a little unsteady from all the magic she had used. Tabitha was more than smart enough to keep her mouth shut, leaning against the wall and trying to keep to the background. Abner collected his composure and lowered his head enough to show respect, but I guess not enough to be seen as sucking up to a god other than his own. The only people not on their feet were Rabbi Joe, whose bloody coughs didn’t seem to be stopping, the Pythia, still stunned flat by John’s magic, and John, who I guess didn’t take guff even from major deities. Instead of being properly apologetic, he stood up straight despite the fact I was pretty sure his ribs were cracked and announced, “Look, I’m Peacekeeper John Perez and I’m in the pursuit of fugitives from Earth. As chief of your pantheon, you–”

  The big god on campus shut John down as he landed abruptly, shaking the ground and threatening to throw us all back on our asses as the Ophanim took positions guardedly around Little Joe, chiming softly as if to try to soothe his pain. Meanwhile, Apollo landed beside the Pythia and knelt by her side, enveloping her in his soft radiance. Even from halfway across the shrine, the warmth felt invigorating on my skin.

  “I KNOW WHO YOU ARE,” Zeus bellowed with one last peal of thunder, before moderating his tone so he wouldn’t blow out our eardrums. “But I care not. The walls between worlds have been broken and the path to our faithful worshipers is clear. Your order has no power anymore, Peacekeeper.”

  The oracle looked to be recovering quickly so Apollo moved toward the rabbi. “Great Skyking, remember to be gracious in your righteous fury.” Unlike the heavy metal concert of noise that was Zeus’s voice, the sun god�
�s was soft and soothing. As if to punctuate the point, he passed his hand over Joseph’s kneeling form and showered him with rays of sunlight. Joe stopped coughing almost immediately, much to the ringing delight of the wheel angels.

  Zeus’s impressive brow bunched up as he crossed his arms, lightning arcing across his massive chest. “You are too kind, my son, but very well. As this is your temple, I will try to act accordingly.” He leveled his imperious gaze over the whole lot of us. “Speak, mortals. Make your justifications for your transgressions.”

  John tried to get to the front of the line, but Tabitha grabbed his shoulder and whispered hurriedly into his ear. Not that he would have been able to talk over yours truly as I opened my big trap.

  “Your godliness, the doc and I are supposed to be here.” I tried to sound confident, something I was practiced at, but you try to do that when you have a literal fucking god staring you down! “We did the whole consultant thing with the angel ladies downstairs, had our whole trippy prophecy thing, and just wanted to get on our way when everybody else started barging in.” Gabriela nodded alongside my explanation.

  The bushy beard shook once in a hard nod before Zeus turned his gaze toward the rabbi. “You, servant of the One, speak.” There was a threatening rumble in the skies overhead despite the slackening of the rain.

  Joe had done well under the tender ministrations of the sun god and seemed okay despite the blood he was wiping off his lips. “While I admit to being unannounced and having to be a bit forward in my disagreement with the temple’s ushers, I am a herald of Yahweh. I have a right to be here. You know the balance of the powers now, your Highness.” The Ophanim chimed with a chorus of celestial bells to add to Joe’s position.

  “Either way, I am a man of peace unless forced. Ask the supplicants.” He pointed at me and Gabriela. “They and your oracle will tell you I came in peace and was willing to leave in peace.”