She and Atlanta’s projection had glared at each other, across the crowd. The bitchy black God had improved her mind shields, but not enough to keep Nessa from determining Atlanta hadn’t had anything to do with setting up the attack. Atlanta hadn’t come any closer. Nessa hadn’t minded at all. Right now, Atlanta’s projection stayed close by Boise’s projection, healing and continuing some pointless never-ending discussion about morality and honor dry enough to bore Nessa silly. Atlanta had some damned other with her, a black doctor with an attitude, who in addition to her expected weird-ass mystical talents sported borrowed Atlanta healing abilities. Nessa would need to be careful with the other and rely on her mother’s training.
Nessa moved a strand of wet hair that had fallen into her eyes again, heard a sniff, and lifted her blanket to glance to her right. Another figure sat beside her under a second tour bus blanket. She lifted the other blanket to find Celebrity, with the same wet hair, sipping her own hot chocolate. Nessa didn’t know if the God did so on purpose, but Celebrity had altered her appearance to mirror Nessa’s. Nessa hadn’t heard Celebrity arrive.
“If I may ask a question, Celebrity, why are you drinking hot chocolate?” Nessa said.
“I’m on a desperate search to regain any iota of my humanity that remains,” Celebrity said, and took a sip of her hot chocolate. “I’m terrified of myself. I don’t want to be a monster. And I do like the taste of hot chocolate.”
“I prefer dark chocolate with 70% or more cacao, but in a pinch this is acceptable,” Nessa said. Celebrity’s mental shielding had improved, but the God still leaked panic. “You look like me.”
“Yes,” Celebrity said. “On purpose. I’ve been searching for something to do to be of use to your group, and being your body double is the best I’ve come up with yet.”
“Don’t sell yourself short. You carry John’s spy information with you. Besides, why me? Why not Alt?”
Celebrity flicked wet hair out of her eyes, exactly mirroring Nessa’s earlier motion. “Two reasons. First, I’m not comfortable as a man; I never played one in my acting career. Second, although Dubuque seems to think Alt’s his nemesis, I personally think you’re the most important person among the Telepaths.”
Nessa frowned. “I’m not the most powerful Telepath around. Top ten on the planet, perhaps, but not number one. I’m not half as smart as people say I am and I’m a flaming goofball, besides.”
Celebrity shrugged. So that’s what one of my shrugs looks like? Nessa thought. That’s just so dorky. “Instincts,” Celebrity said. “So, if I may ask, why aren’t you in there with your husband?”
Nessa clenched her teeth and turned away. “This isn’t easy,” she said, voice nearly breaking. “My mind’s in there. I’m keeping him alive.”
“How? You’re not supposed to have any useful healing tricks.”
“Nothing so simple.” Nessa couldn’t articulate anything more coherent. Celebrity waited, hoping for more of an explanation. Nessa gave herself over to her right sock, at the moment a glove on her right hand, and let the sock speak through her. “Top-end Telepaths unconsciously modify their bodies over time to work a bit differently than normal. However, when one of us is wounded and lose consciousness, we run the risk of dying not only from the wounds, but from the relaxation of our unconscious body control. It’s like an engine overheating, though it’s not just heat damage but actual chemical damage that can do us in. In any case, I’m in Ken’s mind serving as his unconscious and keeping things functional.”
That was enough sock for the moment, and Nessa turned it off.
Celebrity looked a bit queasy; she had caught Nessa’s sock trick and like everyone Nessa had ever met, the trick discommoded her. “Wouldn’t this work better if you were touching him?”
“I’d freak,” Nessa said. “I’m not superhuman, not even close, and I’m just as susceptible to human emotions as anyone else. I’m on the ragged edge as it is.”
“Relax your defenses and let me help you,” Celebrity said.
Nessa turned away. Celebrity’s offer tempted her. How far could she trust Celebrity, though? What if one of their enemies had planted Celebrity among them? Lorenzi had certainly planted her, but if Lorenzi wanted to kill or disable Nessa’s Telepath group, Nessa couldn’t stop him now. She trusted him not to be treacherous, at least. What about Celebrity’s own interests, though?
Damn. She was too close to losing control to pass up help. She also recognized stress paranoia at work from long experience combating it. Nessa sent Alt a short message about her plan and turned back to Celebrity. “Okay, but I want an agreement from you to let go of me when this is over. I would ask you not to do a robotic takeover, like you did with Phil back when we first met. There’s no telling what might happen if you try such a trick on me. I’m hazardous to everyone around me if I panic.”
Celebrity nodded, one of Nessa’s nods. “No problem. You probably won’t even notice.”
Bets? Nessa thought. She wondered if Celebrity consciously mimicked Nessa’s own voice. If so, Nessa decided she didn’t sound nearly as nasal and tinny as she feared.
“Now,” Nessa said, and opened herself up to Celebrity.
Nessa entered into the moment and relaxed as she understood what Celebrity did. She didn’t have any urge to fight the help. “This’s like a good drug trip, the feel of ‘ludes after a bout of too many greenies.”
“The self-awareness of a mature sane Telepath is beyond measure,” a man said. “It always amazes me.”
Nessa and Celebrity pulled their blankets from over their heads. John Lorenzi stood in front of them under a pink umbrella.
“Sneaking up on a Telepath is a good way to die,” Nessa said.
John shrugged. “I needed to talk to you about some good news for once. Boise showed up in person so he can finish healing Ken.”
Nessa smiled. “Perfect,” she said, voice languid. “Super-d-dooper.” All the Territorial Gods healed others, but working through projections they weren’t able to heal instantly or as well. The various God and human projections had successfully healed up Nicole, Prep and the rest of their wounded, but not Ken. They and John had been working diligently to keep Ken alive, a fight Nessa feared they would lose.
“If I didn’t know you let Celebrity in, I’d say you were high,” John said. “Can you dial down your calming control, Celebrity? I need to talk to an un-doped-up Nessa.”
Celebrity chuckled. “She just sounds stoned. She isn’t, though.”
“I’m a bit sloooow,” Nessa said. She felt slow.
“Only relatively speaking,” Celebrity said. “You were still battle hyped. The battle hype was damaging you.”
“What, using myself up again? Don’t you worry,” Nessa said. “I’m used to it.”
John turned away for a moment, got out a handkerchief and wiped his eyes.
“John?” Nessa said.
“A moment,” he said, and blew his nose. “The two of you here got to me.”
“You don’t normally show affection,” Nessa said. As far as she knew, Lorenzi couldn’t afford sentiment.
“He needed a little calming himself,” Celebrity said. “It’s my fault.”
“It’s also the two of you,” John said. “I’m an old man and I’ve never gotten used to the women of the last several centuries. The two of you, looking like you do after this fight, breaks my heart. Celebrity’s impersonation of you doesn’t help.” Nessa caught a glimpse of Lorenzi’s thoughts, an image of the two of them, soaked through, huddling under blankets, hot chocolate in their hands, quite twee and precious looking.
Nessa flicked another strand of sodden hair out of her eyes. Celebrity mirrored her and smiled. Nessa smiled too. “I am married.” She decided she must have slipped recently and turned on something that attracted men to her. No, this was worse. She had attracted Celebrity to her as well. Side effect of the pregnancy, perhaps?
John blew his nose. “You’re the daughter I never had. I’ve felt that wa
y about you for years.”
“Well, that explains why we always fight,” Nessa said. His comment didn’t surprise her, or at least didn’t surprise a couple of socks in the back of her mind.
“That it does.”
Nessa closed her eyes, overcome by sudden pain. Someone ripped her guts out of her, but upon closer examination and a quick glance at her belly, she realized the pain came from Ken’s intestines, as Boise put them back where they belonged.
Real telepathy, initiated by a God. Nessa didn’t know whether to run in terror or clap.
Nessa extricated herself from Ken’s mind, slowly enough to make sure Boise could handle the changeover. He did. If not for Celebrity’s help, she would have dove into the black the instant her strain relaxed.
Instead: “If you body double me for too long, you’re going to end up pregnant for real,” she said, after she turned to Celebrity.
“Yah, right,” Celebrity said. She met John’s eyes. “Nor do you need to tell me this is dangerous. But remember…if I don’t try things, I’ll never learn my skills or limits.”
“So, John, what’s going on here with this attack?” Nessa said. “Is this what you sent Celebrity to warn us about?”
“I believe so, though I wouldn’t have predicted you’d end up with a bunch of mob enforcers after you. This has possibilities far beyond the obvious. Your group and my group need to sit down and talk. I should also warn you that I invited two Practical Gods and an Ideological God to view this mess. I think there’s enough evidence here to turn them against Dubuque.”
Nessa took a deep breath, wondering why his mind leaked thoughts about being the good guys again. Had he lost his Catholic Church-forged Pope-blessed moral self-confidence or something? “I’ll guess I’ll have to trust you on that,” she said, and held out her now empty mug. “Since you’re being kind today – more hot chocolate, please.” Lorenzi nodded and took both her and Celebrity’s mugs. “Until Ken’s up and walking, if you want me sane and useful, I need to stay away from him. You sure you need me sane and useful? I’d rather be with Ken.”
“Positive,” both Lorenzi and Celebrity said.
42. (Dave)
Dave parallel parked his SUV three spaces down from the parking spot he had used in his first trip to this East Colfax neighborhood. Rain pelted down hard, but through the streaky drops he saw two police cars and an ambulance in front of Madame Xenia’s combination storefront and apartment. His gut flipped somersaults as he grabbed his golf umbrella and exited the SUV, finally remembering to zip up his Lands End jacket only after the pre-dawn cold seeped into his skin.
Placard man noticed him as he approached, and of all things nodded to Dave in recognition. His placard read ‘Evil walks with the Gods!’ Dave stopped short, at the back of the tiny crowd, wondering what he would say to a police officer if asked why he had driven down here at five thirty in the morning. ‘I had a bad dream, prayed to Dubuque, and got the sudden urge to immediately go visit Madame Xenia’, while truthful, would likely trigger the cops’ bullshit meters big time.
He stood in the rain, listening to the fat plops of raindrops on his umbrella, and waited. The police ignored the crowd, doing their job. Dave studied the scene, intently looking for anything to justify either his presence or that of the police.
Madame Xenia’s tiny barred storefront window remained intact, but after walking to get a better angle he saw her damaged door, perhaps kicked in. One of the police officers sat in the back seat of his car, next to a civilian; they spoke. Dave guessed ‘witness’, perhaps the person who called the police. Nervous, Dave looked around for more clues.
The tenor of the local graffiti had changed; fewer gang signs and more anti-God propaganda. A pawnshop two doors down from Madame Xenia’s sported a semi-professionally done poster across half of its storefront window, announcing a meeting, the date five days past, of an organization named ‘Deny the Gods’. ‘Support your brothers and sisters from San Francisco, Salt Lake City and Kansas City!’ the sign read. Dave shook his head, still wondering why nothing like this ever made any of the websites he frequented.
Dave had meant to visit Diana – Madame Xenia – again, after he had finished the prayer based cure, intrigued by her ‘you are meant for bigger things’ comment, her accurate prediction about his finding a cure, and how, and her invitation to tell all after his cure. He grit his teeth when the paramedics wheeled out a short body in a zippered bag, rolled it to their ambulance, put the body in and took off without the sirens wailing.
Now what? He felt empty and abused for the first time since he started his miraculous cure. As he contemplated leaving, his cellphone vibrated. He turned and walked back toward his SUV, clicking open the vehicle before he answered the call.
“Dave? What’s going on?” Tiff. He glanced at the time on his cell and realized he had been standing in the rain for nearly a half hour.
“I’ll talk to you when I get back home,” Dave said.
“It’s six in the fucking morning!”
“I know.”
He started his SUV and drove off, turning off his phone before Tiff’s anger made the cell explode.
“It had to be a prompt by Dubuque,” Dave said, finishing his story. He sat on a stool by the breakfast bar and attempted to eat cereal while he talked, not particularly successfully.
Tiff paced around their kitchen, anger plastered to her face. “I don’t like this, not one little bit. You dream of this crazy palm-reader Mirabelle sent you to, wake up early, get the urge to go visit her right then, and you do so? Do you have any free will left at all?”
“I’ve always been a little woo-woo at times,” Dave said. “Remember how freaked out you were when I told you I’d cancelled a flight back home the day before 9/11?”
“I don’t even want to talk about that sort of bullshit nonsense. You’ve cancelled lots of plane flights over the years and that one had to be a coincidence,” Tiff said, waving her hands. “This is different. You said this Madame Xenia was blessed by Boise, right?” Dave nodded. “Dubuque’s using you as a pair of eyes and ears, Dave. You’ve become his pawn, his spy.”
Dave sighed. “I didn’t have to go. I wanted to go.”
“You wanted to get involved in this idiocy?”
“I wanted to get involved because I planned on visiting Madame Xenia as soon as I finished being cured. She’s the one who first mentioned the idea of intercessionary prayer, and she was the one who directed me to the other Gods. If you want freaky, she predicted I’d be cured.”
“And?”
Damn. Tiff must have caught something. “Yes?”
“You’re holding something back.”
Dave sighed. “Madame Xenia also said I was meant for greater things, and said she would only tell me what she meant after I got cured.”
Tiff shook her head and looked away. “Oh, right. Come on, Dave. You’re being too credulous.”
“I don’t think so,” Dave said. He took a sip of coffee. Eventually Tiff would tire of this, he hoped. He wanted to change out of his wet clothes.
“Use your head. Use logic.” Tiff put her hands on her hips. “I mean, she knew you were terminal, right?” Dave nodded, appalled at Tiff’s casual use of the word ‘terminal’. She had been much nicer about such things before he started his prayer-based cure. “The only way you would be able to come back to visit her would be if you got cured miraculously. The ‘greater things’? The affairs of the 99 Gods, and whichever God cured you.” Tiff paused. “That is, God politics, which the bastards app
ear to play for keeps.”
“You think some other God was behind Madame Xenia’s killing?”
Tiff nodded. “From my reading, I think messing in the affairs of the Gods carries a substantial risk. Madame Xenia’s not the first.”
“More of your confidential information?”
“Of course,” she said, tense and clipped. “If you’re smart, you’ll drop this Dubuque veneration thing the instant you’ve finished your cure. There’s no telling where in the hell this will lead, long-term.”
Dave groaned. “So you’ve become anti-God as well?” This he didn’t need. Why was everyone he knew turning against the Gods? The rest of the country wasn’t.
“I’m getting worried about what the Gods are doing. They’re not perfect, Dave. It’s not that I think some of the things the Gods are doing are wrong; just because I disagree with something the Gods are doing doesn’t mean it’s wrong, just that I don’t understand,” Tiff said. “I’m worried because some of the things the Gods are doing are not working. They’re trying things and failing, in some cases making big messes. Even when they have good intentions, they’re occasionally coming up with bad results.”
“You can’t convince me of this without giving me some examples,” Dave said.
“You know I can’t, and why.” Tiff tossed her coffee cup in the kitchen sink, where it fell with a thunk and a roll. “Just you wait, though. They can’t keep their messes out of the media forever, and I’m talking weeks, a few months at most.”
“Tiff, even if some of the Gods mess up a few things, what they’re doing overall is good,” Dave said. He decided he had gotten too whiny, and put some effort into taking the whine out of his voice. “Besides, Tiff, I owe Dubuque for curing me. This isn’t the sort of thing I’m going to forget, ever. You know me, always the Boy Scout.”
Tiff turned and stalked off toward their master bedroom, presumably to finish putting on her face. “I was afraid you’d say that.”
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