by Garon Whited
“The only really supernatural thing I’ve noticed, aside from my mystical sense,” she added, “is I can’t enter a church.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean I can, but I’ll regret it. If I set foot inside a church—and to a lesser extent, on any holy ground—my feet burn.”
“Define ‘burn’.”
“If I walk into a consecrated graveyard, it feels like I’m walking barefoot on summer pavement. It’s painful.”
“Smoke?”
“Not that I’ve noticed. It does hurt, though. Setting foot inside an actual church does it—that causes my feet to smoke. And, before you ask, yes, I did get curious about that and tried different sorts of shoes. The footwear doesn’t matter—flats, heels, platform boots, anything.”
“Is it only a particular religion or denomination?”
“No, any church. I was up in the Wichita Mountains and found a Comanche burial site; I didn’t like standing on that, either.”
“Huh. I wonder if it has to do with the magi’s curse, or if the local deities are annoyed with us in general.”
“Step into a church and see,” she suggested. “You’re not from around here. It might be different for you.”
“I’ll pass, thanks. I have enough goddish problems without provoking a whole new pantheon.”
“Or stirring up a rivalry, O Lord of Fire?” she asked, digging fingers into my ribs. I swatted her hand and placed it back on my arm.
“Shut up,” I suggested, over her giggles.
We took the bus, caught a cab, and went home. It was still there and Francine reported a quiet evening. I gave Mary another shot of alien vampire blood and she reported no changes.
We spent the rest of the night carving out more ideograms. When she reported no apparent effect from my added dose, I stepped up to giving her another couple of drops of blood every hour. She still didn’t feel any difference, but it may take a day-night cycle to really notice anything—rebooting the vampire, turning it off and back on again. We’ll see.
We’ll also see how my new gate spell works when we have enough vocabulary. I’ve got the gate spell deconstructed; I need the materials to start fiddling with it. I can build spells in my headspace, even cast some, if they affect only me. On the other hand, I’m not opening up an interdimensional portal inside my own skull. The basement door is bad enough.
It’s still there. I’m not sure it will ever go away.
Monday, November 16th
I started scanning symbols. After a brief conversation with Diogenes about how to go about it, I let him do the work while I read his report on various types of gemstones.
It. I let it do the work. It’s a collection of programs, no matter how human it— Oh, forget it. Him.
Diamonds are easy; they’re carbon in a variation of the face-centered cubic crystal structure. Sapphires are almost as easy; they’re aluminum oxide with trace amounts of other minerals for color. The thing that amused me the most, though, was the fact sapphires without those trace impurities—straight up aluminum oxide—are a mineral called corundum. The geek in me was highly amused to realize it’s basically transparent aluminum.
I almost went off to start new gem-growing spells because of that. Suddenly, I wanted to get two fish, name them George and Gracie, and build them one whale of a fish tank out of corundum plates.
I resisted the impulse. Now was not the time to get more pets.
Instead, I read up on other gems. Emeralds are surprisingly complicated. The crystalline structure is hexagonal, which is simple enough, but the molecular structure is a pain. I could probably work it out, but for now, emeralds aren’t worth the effort.
Rubies, on the other hand, are basically another type of sapphire. They’re corundum with some chromium contamination. Simple enough even for me!
Once I had the gems sorted out, I went ahead and used my stored magic to rebuild and renovate my Ascension Spheres and their auxiliary power-gathering spells. I made sure each of the Spheres had at least one jet version of the power-fan prototype. It took more effort than I liked, but it should pay off in terms of power.
My gem farm was going well in the attic, so I started a new one. A couple of aluminum cans for the base material, some iron for blue color, some copper for orange… I wished I hadn’t fed Bronze the elemental metals I’d collected. To be fair, she sniffed at each of them before she ate them—why she bothers to sniff them, I’m not sure—and seemed to enjoy them. If I’d saved the chromium and magnesium, those could have given me purple, green, and red coloration.
Oh, well. I turned on the heat, turned up the current, and left everything to cook in the attic.
While Diogenes scanned more symbols, I played with the digital versions already scanned into the system, rotating them, turning them, giving instructions on how they should look. Some needed to be sharp-edged, some needed more rounding. Come to that, they could all stand to be colored, as well, based on what they represented. A blue-white colored tarak symbol for lightning, as an example, would probably work at least a little better.
Could I carve symbols into my symbols? What would it be like to have recursive spells? If I have a lightning symbol, if I add a spell phrase that means “electricity traveling through the air,” would that help reinforce the tarak symbol? If I’m not precise about the definition, it could come back to bite me—if I want to put lightning through a conductor, rather than the air, that could be a problem. But if I have a specific application for a magical object, what effect would this have? Could it be used to good effect in my quasi-enchantments—the ones where the spell structure is permanent, running indefinitely as long as someone keeps giving it power?
That kept me pretty busy until sunset. I had my shower and Mary took it over as soon as I was out. She doesn’t sweat or have oily skin or anything like that; she claims she starts to feel dusty after a while.
As I headed back toward the computer room, I realized I hadn’t heard from the Four. I asked Firebrand about them.
Haven’t heard anything, Boss. They haven’t been around.
“I wonder what’s happened?”
Search me. Francine hasn’t seen them, either. Bronze says they haven’t been in the barn.
“Odd.” I looked out a window. Streetlights and porch lights shone all down the lane; people were still out, but not many. I was starting to worry when I realized that Mark’s new house, down at the far end, on the corner, had its yard recently raked. It was the cleanest yard in the neighborhood, so it stood out. Since Mark obviously couldn’t have done it, that only left one person in the house who could have.
I think he had help. I also suspect the back yard was in great shape, along with pretty much everything inside the house. My guess is Mark doesn’t even have anything to complain about.
The Four were obviously busy. I stopped worrying about them and started wondering about finding Mark a job. Once he was out of therapy, maybe a little before, he would need one. I’ll talk to Fred about it, assuming Fred hasn’t already handled it.
I took a second look down the street, over my hedge. The house opposite Mark’s already had some Christmas decorations up. Myrna and Fred’s place. Well, she did strike me as the type to be a little premature with the competitive Christmas decorating. I made a mental note to get some Christmas lights and went back to doing fine corrections on the scanned symbols.
Mary joined me in the computer room and peered over my shoulder.
“Whatcha working on?”
“Ideogrammatic symbols.”
“I can see that. What are you doing with them?”
“Cleaning them up. The digital versions are more versatile than the physical ones.”
“And colorful.”
“Seemed appropriate. I’m not sure if colored symbols are really the way to go, though.”
“Why not? Red for fire, that sort of thing?”
“I’m not sure it matters, at least for the symbol itself. I’m starting to wonder if color
might be useful for emphasis, kind of like italics or bold type in a sentence.”
“These are for spells,” Mary pointed out.
“Yes, but it’s also a language of sorts. Maybe it’s like a computer language and spells are programs. Coloring them might give added weight to subroutines, like raising the priority of the process. It’s a thought. I haven’t had a chance to play around with it, yet,” I finished. She clasped her hands on my shoulder and rested her chin on them.
“So, are we done with the vocabulary?”
“I’m afraid not. I haven’t even got a list. It’s like trying to write out all the words you know. As you go along, you keep thinking of more words.”
“But we have enough to do spells?”
“Some spells, yes. I think I’ve got all the gate spell components, at least. I’ll have to build one to be sure.”
“Good. Are we doing that tonight?”
“Maybe. It depends on how you feel.” I scooted the chair back. She came around and sat on my lap.
“Oh? I’m told I feel pretty good. I have to agree.”
“No argument there,” I agreed. “Let’s see if we can find ourselves an out-of-the-way mugging. I’m thinking we’ll up your dosage tonight.”
“Really?” she asked, sitting up straight.
“You haven’t had any ill effects. You’ve had opportunity to adapt. If we can find someone for me to drink, we’ll see what a larger dose does to you.”
“Did you bleed into a jar?” she asked. “Or were you thinking of letting me bite you?”
“Let’s try the bite,” I suggested. “I’m not sure you can get anything out of me, what with the way I absorb blood, but it’s worth a try.” I presented a wrist. She took it and tried to delicately sink fangs into it. She had to bear down a bit harder than intended, but she succeeded.
Normally, you don’t just sink fangs into someone and start drinking; the fangs block the holes and all you get is the leakage. You have to bite, retract the fangs, and then drink. I’m kind of a special case; with my teeth and extra-long tongue, I bite a chunk out of someone and my tongue burrows into the wound, allowing blood to soak into it even faster than I could drink it.
Huh. Does my tongue absorb blood faster than my skin? It seems likely. Maybe I should test that. Woo-hoo! Another thing to do on Someday!
It was trickier for Mary. She bit, retracted fangs, got a taste of my blood, and the holes closed up. I let her experiment, figuring out her technique and timing. She wasn’t going to drink a streaming fountain of undead blood, but she could get small gulps of it. It might be slow, but at least it could be done.
She seemed inclined to continue indefinitely. I tapped her on the nose and withdrew my arm. She tried to hide her disappointment.
“Well?” I asked.
“Delicious,” she declared.
“That’s not what I meant.”
“Oh. I feel fine. Tingly, but that’s what we expected. But now I’m hungry,” she added, looking perplexed. “Why am I hungry?”
“That’s a good question. I wish I had a good answer. Let’s go find breakfast.”
“Sir?” Diogenes asked.
“Yes, Diogenes?”
“Shall I continue the virtual cleanup of the models?”
“Can you?” I asked.
“I believe I have established a pattern from your work.”
“Show me.”
Diogenes displayed a dozen symbols I hadn’t edited. It ran through a quick process on the first and moved on to the second while I examined the first one. He did a good job on it. Not perfect, but pretty much what I would have done. It could probably stand a few little touch-ups, but, essentially, Diogenes seemed to have the right idea. Looking at the ones that followed, I had to admit, whatever algorithm he developed, it appeared to be working.
“How did you spot a pattern?” I asked.
“My photo manipulation software,” Diogenes replied. “There is a system for tracking the changes a user makes to automate photographic enhancement. This is similar.”
“So it is. All right, clean up the rest of the library and store it separately; I’ll look at the results later and maybe offer some suggestions. How’s that?”
“That will be fine, sir. You may go.”
The personality of Diogenes is determined by my interaction with it. Which leads me to the question: Is everything I make going to eventually get sassy with me?
Mary and I went into the city to get mugged.
It went about the way it usually does. We walked for a while before finding anyone who cared to tackle the pair of us. Either the criminals are getting cautious or they don’t like dealing with more than one person at a time. I saw at least four occasions when a solo mugger simply remained in the shadows and let us pass. It wasn’t until a group of four found us that we found breakfast.
Mary does know kung fu. Some martial art, anyway. I cracked a guy’s skull on a dumpster by grabbing his hair and using his head as a blunt instrument. Mary, on the other hand, broke two arms, crushed a larynx, shattered a knee, and snapped a neck.
I really need to get to my martial arts class more often. She her ninja moves make me look like a gorilla.
Mary and I swallowed souls, leaving living but empty bodies lying on the pavement. She started in on my left wrist. I reached up under a ribcage and let all the blood in that guy soak into my system. We repeated the process with the other three, then did some ripping and tearing before dumping everything down the nearest manhole.
Someone is going to have a nasty shock down at the water treatment plant. How many corpses is that? I’ve lost count.
“I’m still hungry,” she murmured.
“That’s not normal.”
“I agree. Maybe I should eat the next guy?”
“I think so. It looks like something in my blood is making you hungry. I don’t know why, though. Maybe you’re having more changes in you than we think?”
“Could be. But I’m hungrier now than when we started.”
“All right. Homeless?”
“It’ll probably be faster than finding volunteers. Thugs aren’t known for courage, but they seem especially skittish tonight.”
“I noticed.”
She looked me over; I looked her over. We were presentable and had nothing incriminating showing. I’m not sure we can have bloodstains under any circumstances, but we could have cuts or tears in our clothes and I can have damage to my makeup. A search would find an unreasonable amount of firepower, but if there was no reason to stop us, we wouldn’t get searched.
Someone laughed and applauded, softly. It was one of those quiet, formal things, kind of like the applause of the crowd watching golf. Mary and I scanned everywhere; the source was a guy watching from a fire escape.
I swear, I’m going to get a pair of glasses with mirrors at the bottom of the frames. Then I’ll have to keep looking up.
“So, you’re the Angels of Death,” he laughed. “You don’t look nearly frightening enough.”
“And who are you?” Mary asked, belligerently.
“Wallace. Constantine,” he replied. He started climbing down. He was either a vampire or an expert at parkour; he was down in seconds. A closer look at him told me it was likely to be both. He was definitely a vampire. He was small, only about five-foot-six, with a skinny build. His hair was dark, his clothing nondescript, and his smile carefully hidden behind his lips.
“A pleasure to meet you,” he chuckled, “Mary of Thessaloniki. And your friend with the classical name. Vlad, is it?”
“Yes,” I agreed. “Angels of Death?” I asked.
“That’s what the word on the street is. People disappearing in alleys causes talk. Seeing a shadowy figure kneel by a bum and walk away from a corpse does that, too.”
I glanced at Mary.
“We really need to work on our sneaking,” I told her.
“One of us does,” she agreed, dryly.
“Hello?” Wallace asked. “I’m sti
ll talking.”
“Sorry. What can we do for you?”
“You’re the guy Tony wants to eviscerate, right?”
“I think he’s more interested in exsanguination,” I admitted. “He’s not interested in my guts, necessarily.”
“I think that would be a shame and a waste.”
“Oh, here we go.”
“What?” he asked. “I’m not doing anything. I’m just talking. No harm in talking, is there?”
“That depends. Are you talking to keep us here, make a proposal, or waste our time?”
“Suspicious, aren’t you?”
“Tony wants to exsanguinate me,” I pointed out. Wallace laughed aloud.
“Good point. But it’s okay; I don’t want you bled dry. Neither do Teeth or Knuckles.”
“Teeth? Knuckles?”
“My progeny.” He nodded at the other end of the alley. Two large figures slipped around the corners and started walking our way. Mary stepped behind me, back to back, to face them.
“Then what do you want?” I asked.
“Only a little of your blood. A tiny bit. Nothing you’d miss—I’m not greedy. Enough to give me a leg up is all.”
“This is hardly the best way to ask.”
“It’s not like I could write you a letter. Everyone knows Constantines don’t know how to write,” he added, mockingly.
“I don’t know it. And you could have simply asked right here instead of calling your buddies to cut us off.”
“Could be you have a point.” He nodded past us, at his friends. “Hey. Scram. The man doesn’t like being crowded.” Teeth and Knuckles shrugged and went back the way they came.
“See?” Wallace continued. “I don’t have to go with the heavy-handed shit. I can be as refined and diplomatic as the next guy.”
“Apparently so,” I agreed, straight-faced. “All right. You want blood, in the commodities sense rather than in the vengeful one. What do you offer?”
“Offer? Are we negotiating?”
“Well, you can try to take it, which has its own special problems. You could ask for charity—a gift. Or you could offer something in exchange. If you’ve got another way this could go, I’m listening.”