“How big did you say Middle Coom was?” Asanti said.
“Not big at all,” Liam said. “It’s the kind of town we city people used to make fun of.”
“You’ve been here?” Sal said.
“No. Just saying we made fun of places like it.” He stopped himself. “Though it does look familiar.”
“Get out of your head,” Grace said. Her eyes were on the road.
“Good idea,” Liam said.
They drove another twenty minutes and were there, on the top of the ridge. Grace got the first glance of the valley leading to the sea, pulled the car over, and stopped it on the road heading into town. They all got out. They could see Middle Coom—what was left of it. Whatever it was becoming.
“Jesus,” Liam said.
“You got that right,” Sal said.
Liam turned to Asanti and Frances.
“Well,” he said, “do you have any big ideas for how to fix this?”
“No,” Asanti said. Frances just shook her head.
Sal looked at Menchú. There were tears in his eyes. It was his village all over again.
“We should have brought the book of protection we came across,” Asanti said.
“What?” Grace said.
“Some of the research we’ve been doing,” Frances answered, “suggests that this book may or may not have the ability to shield the person using it from magical energy. Though we haven’t had a chance to try it out. The book itself seems a little fragile; maybe one-use only. Still—”
“Frances …” Liam said. He sounded distraught, sad.
“You’re kidding me,” Grace said. “You see this and your first thought is that it’s too bad we didn’t bring a bigger spell.” Her words were sharp enough to sting. “It’s too bad we didn’t bring the Orb after all. Then there’d be a lever to pull that would make this all better.”
“Grace, stop,” Asanti said.
“A button to push,” Grace said. “Plenty of buttons. One of them must work.”
“Okay,” Liam said. “You’ve made your point.”
“I thought we were on the same side,” Grace said. “Though I guess I’m not really sure how many of you are on my side anymore.”
“What are you implying?” Asanti said.
“Don’t insult me by pretending you don’t know.”
Asanti raised a finger and pointed it at Grace. “I know it doesn’t look this way to you, but in everything I’ve done, ever since the Hand destroyed my library, I have always been looking for a way to fix you.”
“In your spare time,” Grace said. “When you have an hour to kill.”
“That is not fair.”
“Are you really going to argue about fairness with me?” Grace said.
Sal looked from Grace to Frances and Asanti, then to Liam and Menchú. She could see the priest coming apart, see the rest of them tensing up, ready to get in the ring. It was obvious how angry Grace was. Sal could tell that even Asanti could see it.
“Grace,” Asanti said. “What can I say to you right now?”
It was time, Sal decided, to intervene.
“Nothing,” she said. “Don’t say anything.” She looked from one to the other, steadily. “We have all been pushed around a lot, haven’t we? We’ve all been trying to do the right thing, and the world is giving us a hell of a time in return. We don’t know if anything we’ve done lately has done any good. And we’ve all gotten a little … bent. Some more than others, but all of us in our own ways. We all started out with normal lives and we’ve all been knocked off course. It’s why we’re here, isn’t it? Two years ago I was just a cop, and if you told me then what I’d be doing now, that I’d be here now, I would never have believed you. But here I am. I’ve been possessed by a demon while trying to save my brother. I’ve had it pried out of my head, and now my brother is … whatever he is, and nowhere to be found, and I’m fighting monsters in a war against magic for dominion of the world.”
Sal took a breath. “I mean, what the fuck, right?”
Liam smiled. She glanced at Menchú, who looked proud of her.
“Nice speech,” Grace said, “but what are you saying?”
“I don’t know what we can do about whatever the hell is going on down there in the valley. But I bet there are people in there who need our help. Which is what our mission is really for. We say we’re here to stop magic, but we’re really here to help people. To keep them safe. I say we try. Who’s with me?”
Grace nodded.
“I am,” she said. “Why not?” Grace’s voice was smaller than usual, and Sal caught the undercurrent of sadness in her voice. None of them had ever seen anything like what was happening in Middle Coom, and now they were about to run into it, headfirst. And it crossed Sal’s mind that maybe Grace was hoping, just a little, that this would be their last mission.
Grace started down the hill.
“Let’s go,” Menchú said. The rest followed.
Bookburners
Season 2, Episode 11
Shock and Awe
Andrea Phillips
1.
“This is amazing,” Frances marveled. “I’ve never seen anything like it. I never dreamed that I would!” She gazed down at the village the way someone else might gaze at a masterwork in an art museum: so overwhelmed with emotion that Sal wondered if the junior librarian might actually swoon.
Once upon a time, Middle Coom had been a picturesque seaside town—maybe a few hundred brightly painted houses dotting verdant mounds bounding down to the ocean. It didn’t look much like the pictures on the postcards anymore.
For one thing, there was the shimmering, rippling border that surrounded it, like the shell of a snow globe. And that was the least strange thing about it. Inside, the town was leprotic with magic.
“Nobody has seen anything like it.” Asanti was substantially less enthused than Frances. “I’m not sure there’s even been an outbreak this widespread since that matter in Texas back in 1896.”
Sal gazed down at the village with a professional eye, trying to get a handle on damage done and the possible hazards. And survivors. Surely there were survivors. “What happened in 1896?”
A whole row of houses looked normal, but the road outside glistened and curved like loops of living intestine. Where there might have been pilings near the shore, a flock of majestic creatures stood motionless in the ocean. They could have passed for flamingos if they hadn’t been fifteen feet tall and covered in scales, not feathers.
“Demon rampage. Eyewitness accounts said the thing was a hundred feet tall. The history books say it was tornadoes, of course.” Asanti pulled her pack out of the van.
The streets of Middle Coom were completely empty. Sal wasn’t sure just how much traffic there should be in a small fishing village off the Irish Sea this time of year, and maybe none was simply par for the course. Even she didn’t find that train of thought convincing.
“We already knew this was going to be a big deal,” Sal said. “But we still have to do the job. What’s the plan?”
“We save every life we can,” Menchú said. “We’ll need to get everyone safely out of there.” A plume of oily smoke rose from an unseen source in the town, reached down like a tentacle, and picked up one of the not-flamingos.
“This’ll be fun,” Liam said. He scowled at the town.
Grace stretched out her quads. “It sure will be,” she said, and she sounded like she meant it.
The not-a-flamingo victim flapped maniacally as the smoky tentacle dunked it under the water, held it there for long moments, and then wafted away as if it had never been. A sheen of pink scales floated to the surface and washed against the shore.
“Well.” Sal swallowed hard. “This is fine. We can handle it.”
“I’m not so sure.” Menchú double-checked the antique silver cross at his throat and the book shroud in his bag; the first to protect him from being affected or infected by magic, the second to bind whatever the magic had come from. “Our
priority is to get survivors to safety, as fast as we can. I’m going to let Monsignor Angiuli know that we’ll definitely need Team Two involved, and,” he rubbed his forehead, “I’m going to suggest he have Fox send in Team One.”
“Do you think the Network is still here?” Sal asked.
Asanti stared hard at the ripple surrounding Middle Coom. The sky wasn’t blue on the other side of it. “We won’t need Team One. I’ll find a way to deal with the Network if we run into them.”
Liam’s jaw worked silently before he took the bait. “How do you reckon?”
“We can’t be sure if this particular effect is deliberate or not, but since they’ve been such a persistent thorn in our side, we’ve learned a lot about how they operate. I’ve learned a lot,” Asanti said. “If I can find their base of operations, I might even be able to shut them down for good. No one has to die.”
Menchú looked unconvinced. “Asanti—”
“Might,” Asanti repeated. “I’ll need to investigate to be sure. But they’ve finally played their hand, so maybe we can end the Network here. If we can cut them off at the knees now, isn’t it worth some risk?”
“Perhaps.”
“Arturo, you know what will happen if it’s down to Team One. These people. Their homes.”
Something heavy passed between Menchú and Asanti. “I know,” he said at last. “I’ll recommend that Team One be activated, just to watch the perimeter and make sure nothing gets out. It’s a long ride out here, and if things take a turn for the worse, we’ll want them close by. But they’ll be on containment duty only—until we’re out of options.”
“When will that be?” Sal asked.
“We’ll know it when we see it,” Menchú answered. “Grace, Sal, come with me. We’re going to seek out survivors and send them out to safety. Liam, go with Asanti and Frances to search for the Network’s base of operations and figure out how to stop this. No heroics. Don’t engage directly with the Network, and send any survivors you find to us. Let’s save as many lives as we can.”
• • •
Frances trailed Sal and Grace toward the shifting edge of the village while Asanti prepared her gear at the van. She peppered the team with questions, bare enthusiasm telegraphed in every syllable and gesture. “Is it common,” she asked, “for there to be such a visible dividing boundary between the areas infected with magic and those that are clear?”
“Nope.” Grace stepped over a fallen tree without breaking stride.
“But these manifestations—changing in ambient lighting, changes in material behavior, even gravity—you’ve seen all of them before?” Frances hurried to catch up again.
Grace rounded on Frances. “This is not a toy.”
“What?” Frances stopped.
“You seem very eager. To you this is all a curiosity, all of your theory made into practice. But lives are on the line right now. Even yours. This is not a toy to be played with.”
Frances raised her chin. “I know that.”
“You think you know that,” Grace said, “but you don’t.”
Liam stepped between them, as if from nowhere. “Grace, nobody’s forgetting magic is dangerous. I’m sure Frances isn’t happy to see suffering, either. But you have to admit, it does look interesting. That’s how it gets you.”
Huh. Sal hadn’t even known Liam had been watching.
“Yes, like a predator,” Frances added. “Luring in the unwary. But I’m not the unwary. Don’t worry, Miss Chen, I’m as aware of the danger as you are. Maybe more.”
“Like hell you are,” Grace muttered, but she didn’t pursue the argument any further.
Menchú caught up with them. “Is everything all right?” he asked.
“Fine.” Grace turned her head away, and her hair swished like an angry cat’s tail.
Menchú paused and scrutinized each of them in turn before continuing. “Good. We don’t have any time for friction. Monsignor Angiuli has already set the wheels in motion. Team One should be here in about six hours to watch the border. Until then, we need to get as many people out as we can. Are you ready?”
“Ready as I’ll ever be.” Sal sized up the border of the magical zone. “Who goes first?”
Grace pushed Sal forward. “You’re the one who asked first,” she said. “So today, you get to be the cannon fodder.”
Up close, the border was harder to see, just a bare shimmer of strangeness. You could walk right through it and never be sure when you were on the other side. But when Sal stepped forward, she had no doubt when she’d passed through into a wellspring of raw magic.
The sky changed color, to the salmon it had been in the Orb-created bubbles outside of time. There she had felt sluggish, but here she felt invigorated. Faster, stronger, more awake. Every inch of her skin tickled and popped, as if the air had been carbonated. Each breath tasted like adventure.
She turned back to Liam and Menchú and gave them a double thumbs-up. “Come on in,” she said. “The water is fine.”
• • •
Operation Search for Survivors began with the houses along the main road leading into town, closest to where they’d parked. Sal took one side of the street, and Menchú took the other. Grace followed between them, ready to race to either side if the situation should take a turn for the violent. After a while, Sal started to think she’d welcome a little healthy violence as an alternative to relentless failure.
Sal and Menchú banged on the door of every house they passed—the houses that still had doors. “Police!” Sal shouted. “We’re here to get you out!”
Nobody answered. Sal peered in the windows, or at least, the windows that were still windows and not thrumming purple membranes or warty knobs of tree bark. She didn’t see much of anybody. Well—no survivors, even assuming that any of the clots of flesh and hair she’d seen inside had started out as people.
“This is looking bad,” she muttered. She raised her voice to call across the street. “Father Menchú, what if there’s nobody left? What if we’re too late?”
Menchú stepped reluctantly away from the last door he’d tried and down the little house’s steps. “There has to be someone we can save. Somewhere. Keep knocking.”
There was nobody on the first block, or the second. They assembled in the middle of the street to plan out the next part of their route. When they turned a corner onto the third block, they came across the beast.
The creature didn’t notice them at first. It was the size of an SUV—hell, maybe it had started out as an SUV, judging from the wheels it had in place of legs. It was squat and bulbous. Its body rippled with ears in a variety of sizes, from a variety of species. Horns jutted out in the spaces between the ears.
And not just animal horns—instruments, too. The bells of a dozen tubas, trumpets, and clarinets mingled with ram’s horns and elaborate deer antlers.
“What the hell kind of demon is that?” Sal asked. Unbidden, a name for it surfaced from her subconscious: Horatio Hornblower, of course.
At her words, a dozen or so of the ears pricked up and swiveled toward them. The thing emitted a prolonged, brassy wheeze. Then Horatio did a quick three-point turn and headed straight at them.
All those ears might mean it was sensitive to sound, Sal thought. She screamed at it, “Shoo! Go away!”
The monster quivered at the noise, shrinking down to something more like a family sedan, and backed off a bit.
“Go on! Get lost!” Sal yelled and stomped her feet. Menchú joined in, flapping his arms and shouting in Spanish. Grace just watched the thing, knees bent, waiting for Horatio to make a move.
The noise was clearly upsetting to the creature. It rolled slowly backward, collapsing into itself. It shrank all the way down to the size of a Smart car.
“Yeah! Get out of here!” Sal clapped her hands and whistled.
Horatio rallied. It opened what used to be its hood, revealing a bottomless chasm full of jagged teeth. It let off a billowing belch of steam, then puffed back up t
o its original size. And then it charged.
Part of Sal’s brain stood gaping at the sight. But muscle memory kicked in, and her body did the right thing: She dove toward Menchú, pulling him out of the way.
Grace leaped onto Horatio’s roof, feet planted firmly between a curling bison horn and a ridged spear like an oryx’s. She punched straight down into one of its ears. The monster grew angry. It shrank and grew like a set of bagpipes, puffing up to the size of a truck. Then it zipped in reverse and struck a street lamp, trying to throw Grace off its back.
Grace tumbled into a neat somersault, just out of the way of the falling pole. The car-thing lined up again, ready to make another pass toward Grace.
Just as Horatio’s front bumper passed over the broken end of the light pole, Grace slid her knee under the pole and shifted it hard, like a lever. The broken end went up under the car, the light went down.
Horatio flipped over onto its back, blaring its outrage in discordant timbres. It rocked like a turtle, unable to right itself.
Grace hefted the lamp pole and speared the car in its soft underbelly with it. Horatio shrieked a terrible sound, an orchestra being murdered, and then the cacophony died away into nothing. Sal could only hear herself pant.
Grace stepped away from the corpse of the monster and dusted herself off. “That might explain why nobody is out for a walk,” she said.
And then Sal saw a flicker of movement down the street. A pale face looking outside, a door swinging closed. “There,” she said, and took off running as fast as she could. She slammed the door open, went through, and emerged into a pub.
It was packed.
• • •
Liam shifted uncomfortably as Asanti and Frances readied themselves to perform magic. The two of them sat on a fallen log well outside Middle Coom’s bubble of magic, while Liam hovered behind them. It wasn’t a big spell, they had promised. A simple locating charm, to help them find where the Network was hiding in this town more quickly.
Frances tutted about Liam’s close-shorn head. “It’s a shame,” she said. “This would be much more effective if we could use a lock of your hair. Your connection to the Network is still very powerful.”
Bookburners The Complete Season Two Page 40