City of Iron

by Williamson, Chet

  "But I do." Then Ichabod started to laugh, a very unpleasant sound that echoed all around the large room. "You think you've got the drop on us? Shit, man, we've had the drop on you all the time. I was just playing with you."

  He lifted his hands and made a small, beckoning gesture, and out of the shadowed alcoves stepped eight men dressed in black. Pale faces stared like moons at Laika, Tony, and Joseph, and the small black eyes of gun muzzles looked equally threatening.

  Ichabod seemed delighted by the Mexican standoff. "I could've had you shot down any time. All I hadda do was scratch my ear, man! But I didn't, and you know why? Because you're gonna take us to Him!"

  Laika spoke for the first time. "I'm afraid not." She made sure her gun was pointing directly at Ichabod.

  "You have to," he said.

  "We can't. We don't know where . . . your 'Lord' is any more than you do."

  A wave of fury swept over Ichabod's long face. "Then there's no reason to keep you alive."

  "There's one," Laika said. "I have you right in my sights. You're the first one dead."

  "Careful," Joseph said softly. "Religious maniacs love martyrdom."

  Joseph, in this case at least, was all too right. Ichabod's eyes got crazy, and he threw himself on the ground, scrambling for the .44 and the dropped bullets. It would have been a suicidal move, had Laika not been trained. It would take at least five seconds for the man to grab the revolver, open the cylinder, grab one cartridge, load it, snap the cylinder closed, and aim. In that time, every one of the eight gunmen already armed could shoot an entire clip.

  Laika ignored Ichabod and went for the gunmen.

  Since she was standing on the right, she took the ones on that side. Tony went for those in the center, and Joseph fired on the left. One of her targets went down, and she ducked and fired a burst across those who were going for the weapons they'd thrown down.

  But answering fire drove them back into the dark mouth of the hallway from which they had come, a place they could not hope to defend. It was so narrow that all the cultists had to do was to sweep it with fire and the ops would stand a good chance of being hit. The side alcoves and passages could easily be dead ends, and the fact was that they were outnumbered. Their best chance, Laika thought, was to retreat down the hall and continue to lay down return fire to keep the cultists away from the mouth of the hallway.

  "Joseph," Laika barked, "light the way; Tony and I will return fire." Joseph's flashlight went on as they ran. Eight paces, turn and fire, another eight paces, fire again. Bullets whirred past them as they ran, and once Laika felt a bullet tear through the hem of her coat.

  The sound of gunfire was loud in the low-ceilinged hall, but suddenly, just as she had turned to run again, it seemed to explode almost beside her. She crouched and whirled, and saw a shadowy form leaning out from one of the alcoves, firing back in the direction they had just come. Then another was there, on the other side of the hall. Against the pale light from the large room, Laika saw one of the pursuing cultists throw up his arms and fall.

  Someone was covering their retreat.

  Laika didn't pause to look a gift horse in the mouth. Whether it was backup somehow sent by Skye (which was impossible, she realized after a second's thought) or Transit Authority police or armed aliens (both equally unlikely), she took advantage of the covering fire and ran, almost outdistancing the beam of Joseph's light.

  At last they reached the six steps and were up them in two bounds. They went through the door, and Tony slammed it shut, fit the padlock through the hasp, and snapped it so that it locked.

  "Somebody was covering us," Joseph said, breathing hard. "What about them?"

  "What about them?" Tony said, turning from the door and walking down the tunnel toward the station.

  "You gonna leave them in there?" Joseph said. "Christ, they saved our asses!"

  Tony stopped and turned to Laika. "You're the team leader. You want me to unlock that, let them through?"

  Laika shook her head. "We didn't ask for cover. We don't know who they were. They could've been more of those crazies—guards, maybe, who just got confused over who was shooting at whom."

  "They could be from the Company!" Joseph said.

  "No. We would've been notified if Skye was sending backup. And even if they were, they take their chances, just like we do."

  "But they were friendly fire, you can't just let them—"

  "Look!" Tony shouted. The tunnel echoed with it, and he spoke more quietly, but no less intently. "Don't you give us any shit about life and death when you're not even backing up your partners!"

  Laika eyed Tony narrowly. "What do you—"

  "He wasn't shooting to kill, he was firing over their goddamn heads!" Tony said. "These assholes are trying to cap us, and Joseph here's trying to scare 'em!"

  "That's not true. I was going for center mass, just the way that I—"

  "Oh, spare me! I've seen more firefights than walks in the park—I know when somebody's doggin' it! Don't you care about living?"

  Laika hadn't noticed at the time, but now that she thought back, she couldn't recall anyone being hit on the left until Tony had turned his attention there. "The door stays locked," she said. "Now, let's clear. We'll discuss this later."

  As they trotted down the subway track, Laika hoped a train wouldn't come. She looked at her watch and saw they'd be damned close, but didn't tell the others.

  She didn't know what to say to them now. If Joseph had indeed been basically firing blanks, that would have to be dealt with. She thought it must have something to do with the incident in the townhouse. Joseph had been hit hard over having had to shoot the madwoman. If that had made him stop short of killing, it was understandable, but not forgivable.

  Then she thought about the people who had defended them during their retreat. She felt confident that whoever they were, they hadn't been trapped by the locked door. The cultists certainly hadn't gotten in through the door, since it was locked from the outside. There were probably dozens of ways in and out of the place. They might have been able to get out without losses. But who were they?

  Then she heard a low rumbling sound, and her attention was immediately centered on the fact that a train was fast approaching. There was no way they would beat it to the platform, or even take a chance on hurdling the two low third rails between them and the empty uptown tracks. So she hugged the wall, and told the others to do the same.

  Laika closed her eyes as the train sped by, and she felt as though the force of it could have pulled her against it had she not clung, spiderlike, to the wall. Dust and grit stung her exposed skin, and she pressed her head further down into her collar.

  As quickly as it had come, the train was gone, the sound of it fading down the dark tunnel. She looked at the others. Joseph looked shaken, but Tony seemed unfazed, and she turned and ran toward the station once more, the others behind her.

  Chapter 39

  In the apartment, they sat in opposite corners of the room. Only one lamp was burning. Outside the first rays of dawn added a touch of warmth to the city's ever-present ambient light.

  "Before we discuss anything," Laika said, "I want to know if what Tony said was true, Joseph. Did you shoot over their heads?"

  "Hell, yeah, he shot over their heads," Tony said.

  "I'm asking Joseph," Laika said sharply.

  "Yes," he said, looking down at the floor.

  "Why?"

  He looked up at her. "I thought . . . I thought maybe I wouldn't have to kill them."

  "All right," Laika said. "I'm going to say this, and then the matter's going to drop. Joseph, I don't know why you did that. But by doing it, you endangered my life, and Tony's, and your own. You endangered the mission. We were being fired upon, and your only duty was to fire back with intent to terminate those targets.

  "Now, I don't know what got into your head. I do think I know you and your record well enough to feel fairly certain that you're not in alliance with those cultists. May
be you're still feeling bad over putting a bullet into that woman and her baby. If you are, get over it. That baby was dead, and the woman was as good as dead. So get over it. Now.

  "Because if you ever—and I mean ever—do anything like that again, I'll consider it an act of betrayal, and I will execute you then and there. And Tony can feel authorized to do the same. If you are ever in a firefight with us again, you either shoot to kill, or you expect to die. Do you understand?"

  He started to say something, but then seemed to change his mind and simply nodded.

  "I'd like a verbal response," said Laika, trying her best to sound like the biggest hard-as-nails bitch either man had, ever run across. She had no choice; their lives were her responsibility.

  "Yes," Joseph said. "I understand. It won't happen again."

  "Then we won't have to talk about it again," she said, and took a deep breath. "We'll take a break, and then maybe we can start to try and figure out what the hell else went on tonight."

  Laika made a big pot of coffee, while Tony ran out for fresh pastries at the all-night deli. Joseph sat down at his computer, but Laika didn't look to see what he was doing. When Tony got back, the coffee was ready, and they ate and drank while they talked.

  "All right," Laika said to begin. "Lots of questions. Why did Holberg's map lead us to that station? For that matter, why St. Stephen's Church? What was Holberg doing at those places, and what did he want . . . whoever was reading the map to find?"

  "Could the map have been created for those crazies?" Tony asked.

  "But then, why would it have led to their secret meeting place?" Laika said. "They know where they were."

  Tony shrugged. "Maybe that was meant to be the original starting point on the map."

  "Joseph, any ideas?" Laika didn't want him to withdraw. It was obvious he wasn't a team player at the best of times, and she didn't want her reprimand to put him at still a further remove from her and Tony.

  "Holberg made the map," he said slowly, thinking it out.

  "And he had to have made it for the purpose of showing someone where someone or something else was. And it sure wasn't us, that's obvious. So maybe it was for them, the cultists, to show them where . . ." He paused and gave a thin smile. ". . . Where the Lord or the Holy One was, whoever he may be." Only when Joseph had taken a bite of Danish and chewed and swallowed did he continue.

  "But why would he have done it for them?" Joseph asked of himself. "He broke off with them, didn't start the map until then. No, it doesn't make sense."

  "Not if Holberg was doing it on his own," said Laika, trying to make the pieces fit, no matter how ridiculous it might seem at first. "But what about those fugue states? What if he was doing it—"

  "While he was in a trance?" Tony said. "Maybe this 'Lord,' or whoever they were talking about, made him do it?"

  "When in doubt, go for the paranormal, huh?" said Joseph. The sneer in his voice told Laika that he was getting back to his old self again. That was good. They needed him to keep them grounded in reality, even the twisted reality of what they had already experienced.

  "Okay," said Tony, "then you tell me why Holberg made it. Why he took months to consciously create this goofy map when he could have just written all these instructions down on paper, or called somebody and told them where these places were. Joseph, this is the only solution that makes any sense. Holberg was a sculptor, he lived for his art: If another consciousness was at work inside him—"

  "Oh, Jesus," said Joseph.

  "If it was," said Tony, "what better way than to get its message across than by inspiring Holberg's art?"

  "By possessing him and making him build one gigantic mother of all ironmongery," said Joseph in disbelief. "Don't you think this . . . possessing entity, for lack of a saner term, could have made a little smaller sculpture? A desktop model, rather than an IBM Univac that took up a warehouse?"

  "I don't know." Laika could hear the frustration in Tony's voice. "Maybe this thing just thinks big."

  "As gods are wont to do, no doubt," Joseph replied. "All right, all right, supposing we do opt for possession as the raison d'être for Holberg's little project. Where does that lead us?"

  "Possibly to the conclusion," Laika said, "that Holberg didn't know what he was doing when he did it."

  Joseph ran a hand through his hair and shook his head as if to clear it. "So he drew all those plans, rented that warehouse, ordered all those supplies, and built that entire iron Tinkertoy without ever knowing what he was doing?"

  "Maybe he knew what he was doing," Laika answered, "but he didn't know why."

  "Because the 'Lord' told him to," Joseph said. "And who is this oh-so-powerful entity, anyway? God? Satan?"

  "Christ?" Tony said. "Or maybe his descendant?"

  Joseph laughed. "Are you back on that kick again?"

  "So where's the map leading, then?" said Tony, his cheeks flushed. "Why did it take us to that church? To the place where those cultists met? And how will where it takes us next tie into churches and guys imprisoned in tombs?"

  "I don't know, Tony, I'm not psychic. But I want to check the sculpture again before we go running off to any more conjunctions of iron rods."

  "Why?" Laika asked.

  "Because I think there's a mistake in the schematic. I was checking it when you made coffee and Tony went out, and I think I may have entered some of the original data wrong. Or what's more likely, I entered it right, but Adam Guaraldi put it together wrong."

  "What makes you think Guaraldi screwed up?" Laika asked.

  "Because our next stop seems to be right in the middle of the outdoor plaza at Lincoln Center. And somehow I don't think we're going to find any bricked-up nuns there."

  They slept for a few hours and got up at noon, then walked the few blocks down to Lincoln Center. There was nothing there, Laika thought, that hadn't been there before, and the fountain seemed the same as usual.

  "'Look in fountain,'" Joseph said. "'Take coin.'" When she looked at him curiously, he smiled. "Old computer game, text based."

  "Are you sure it's not below the plaza?" she said. "A subway station, or cellars, or something?"

  "No, that's another thing that made me think this site is a mistake. It's supposed to be up in the air, fairly high up, which would probably indicate a high story on a tall building."

  "What if," Tony said, "it was indicating a building that had been here, but was torn down?"

  "That's a thought," said Laika. "Can we find out what used to be here before it was demolished to build Lincoln Center?"

  "Sure we can," Joseph said. "But frankly, I think it's a lot more likely that Guaraldi made a mistake than that Holberg's guiding mental bugaboo had him make an old map. So can I suggest that we head out to the warehouse and try and figure out what that mistake was?"

  Laika nodded. "You're probably right, but let's ask for the old data anyway."

  "All right," Joseph said with a sigh. "I'll submit the request before we leave. Maybe we'll have it by the time we get to the Bronx."

  Back at the apartment, Joseph requested the data while Tony brought the car around, and they headed north to the warehouse. It was two o'clock in the afternoon when they arrived. As usual, there were no cars in the parking lot, but there was a visitor outside the door. A tiger-patterned cat, its fur surprisingly clean for a stray, lay in the sunshine, washing itself. It looked up as they walked toward the door and blinked lazily.

  "Nice kitty," Tony said, leaning down to scratch behind its ears. "How you doin', huh? Who do you belong to?"

  "Nobody, probably. It's a stray," Joseph said, slipping the first of the keys into a lock.

  "Stray would've run away," Joseph said. "This is a pet."

  "Or was," Laika said. "Somebody probably dumped it."

  "Is that true?" Tony said, picking it up and cradling it like a baby in his arms. "Somebody didn't want you? Sure, you're a pet, see how nice you are. . . ."

  Joseph unlocked the final lock. "Come on, put the cat do
wn and let's go in."

  Tony set down the animal, which rubbed against his legs. He patted it one more time and joined the others inside, where Joseph immediately started going over Peder Holberg's plans, while Laika checked to see what information had come in concerning the buildings that had been razed for Lincoln Center.

  "Nothing very interesting," she called out, as she read the file. "Office and apartment buildings, that's all. Nothing to indicate anything suspicious."

  "Well, I'm suspicious about this," said Joseph, holding up one of the large sheets of paper. "Where most of the damage was done? That area that seemed to have blown outward? I think Guaraldi was looking at this goddamned plan wrong way up."

  "You're kidding," said Laika. "It's no wonder—he was working with next to no sleep."

  "Yeah. These pipes shouldn't be in this area at all, but nearer to that end. Look . . . shit, if he hadn't been in such a damn hurry—"

  "He might still be alive," said Tony coldly. "But that's such a small thing, isn't it, compared to our work?"

  "Look, I'm sorry, I didn't mean—"

  "Save it, Joseph. Let's get this crap straightened out."

  The three of them pored over the plans, and Laika quickly saw what Joseph meant. The bundle of pipes to which Guaraldi had joined several of the detached pieces was a mirror image of a similar juncture several yards away that had seemed complete on its own. But when they crawled inside the webwork of the sculpture, they could see the uneven ends where the pieces had been ripped away.

  "You're right," Laika said. "He welded them into the wrong place."

  "And sent us to Lincoln Center instead of where we're supposed to go," said Joseph.

  "Which is?"

  "We won't know until we get those pieces off from where they're not supposed to be, and reattached."

  "We helped Guaraldi enough to know how this is done," said Tony. "The tanks and torches are still here, and we can see the seams where Guaraldi put them in wrong. All we have to do is saw them off and put them in the new position, according to the plans. And unlike Guaraldi, we'll be awake while we do it."