by Pam Uphoff
"Bah. What could you do?" The dark bearded man was the current spokes-person for the whole, at the moment. There was no sympathy, no understanding, no yielding in any of the eyes he met. The pressure on his mind increased and he thought he could hear his shields creaking.
More people entered the room. A man frowned at him. "We recognize you. We knew you long ago."
"You? No, but that nasty group memory of yours might have me in it. Do you remember New Gene? Trans World Travel? One of our theories is that you're the descendants of the Orange Team, who were lost when we were just learning how to open Gates. I am Michael Omega." He looked around the assembled faces. They were all frowning, but in rejection, not remembrance.
"Wolfson made us remember. We did not enjoy the memories of so many friends, dead so long ago."
"You are not one of us. We will not allow a rival magic."
An old man shuffled in. Stopped and frowned at Lord Hell. "Michael."
Hell paused, eyed the old man. "Emre, long time no see. You look like hell."
"No. I am no one now. I am everyone."
"If you wish." Hell pulled the first bottle out of the bubble on his arm and unscrewed the cap. Poured the clear liquid out on the floor and dropped the bottle back in the bubble. No littering.
He turned and walked toward the exit.
"What is that?"
He ignored them. One guard tried to step up to block him, the other raised his gun, but tangled it in the ceremonial robes of the first guard. The first one jerked his robe and the rifle fired. The first guard collapsed, screaming and clutching his leg, the other collapsed, gasping, hands on the stomach that had received the unexpected recoil. Lord Hell stepped between them and as the doors burst open, warped light. The armed guards rushing in split around the pair of injured guards, stopping in confusion as they saw no one at all. Hell eeled between the two guarding the door and walked out. He split the contents of another bottle between a few decorative fountains he encountered as he wandered around the City. Just breathing the mist would be enough.
It was time to leave Makkah.
Hell walked invisibly past the guards at the train station and joined a suspicious group that was taking a small train out to watch the desert for signs of the dangerous Fallen Wizard trying to escape. The train pulled slowly out of the station.
The soldiers in the last car were clapping and whistling as the Black Bitches gave the shepherds their reward for their assistance. An officer walked back and told them to shoot the sacrilegious, dirty animals. One man protested, with a background grumble of support. The officer lost his temper at the insubordination. He pulled a pistol, a soldier tackled him. The fight spread.
Lord Hell opened doors that ought not be opened when the train was moving, and evicted wrestling soldiers at every opportunity, until he ran out of soldiers. The train was barely moving, by its usual standards, and failed to speed up as it left the immediate confines of the holy city. The engineer, sound asleep, failed to stop a hundred kilometers out, as he'd been ordered. Lord Hell and the dogs snacked on the Oners' supplies and relaxed as the train rattled quietly along, hour after hour, at about thirty miles an hour.
Jets zipped across at low altitude, firing machine guns along both sides of the train in warning. They rose and climbed to turn and touched wings. One skewed violently, the other wobbled. A rolling boom, like thunder shook the train. A white parachute was silhouetted in reverse on a climbing cloud of black smoke. The other plane disappeared to the north.
In a small town a platoon of soldiers, armed to the teeth, waited where a spur track ended in a heap of gravel.
Someone had neglected to brief the old man who checked the switches personally, and manually corrected any problems he found. The soldiers watched in disbelief as the train failed to turn, and hastily turned their weapons and fired as the train passed out of range. A rocket shrieked over the roof of the last car, missing by inches, and hit the town's mosque.
Nothing happened in Medina. The tracks had been cleared so the runaway train could pass through in peace, not disturbing the holy city. The sun set. Lord Hell closed his eyes and napped while the train crossed the empty desert. Loud noises disturbed him several times, and Red finally woke him, whining.
"Time to get off?"
Red barked and leaped out the nearest door. Lord Hell reached out mentally to wake the engineer and then jumped as well. He hit the ground and rolled, climbed to his feet and spat out sand. The train rolled on into the night, rolled onward toward a bright light approaching from the other direction. It slowed suddenly and he saw the engineer's leaping form silhouetted for a second.
He opened the other bubble and let his horse out. "Do you know what this calls for?" The dogs and horse looked at him curiously. He struck a pose.
"The Moon rises o're gleaming desert sands
Tonight a God rides the winds
Hundreds, nay thousands of bottles in hand.
Three problem genes, all gone."
"Ha! I'd like to hear the God of Love beat that one."
He mounted the golden palomino and rode west, certain of his ability to find the Red Sea. From there he'd continue his own personal One World Tour. First stop, Cairo.
The crashing and crunching of train cars continued for some time, behind them.
A snippet that was cut from a future novel, provisionally titled Cannibal World . . .
Chapter One
Department of Interdimensional Security and Cooperation, Embassy World
16 January, 3518 ce (Earth)
18 Muharram, 1403 yp (Empire of the One)
Winter 1401 px (Comet Fall)
"Hi. I'm back." Xen relaxed a bit as he took in all the grins. Except Inso, of course. He was scowling.
"So. You think you can resign and run off anytime you feel like it, eh? Just jump back in and take over?"
"Take over all the paperwork, and go back to being the focus of three dozen worlds' diplomatic ploys?" Xen put on his most innocent look. "Well, no. Actually, since you guys have been doing just fine without me, I figured I'd leave you in charge, and just swat the occasional brushfire."
Inso eyed him. "You mean that?"
"Inso, I hate paperwork. I hate being . . . treated like the Master of the Multiverse. I hate having all of you treated as if you're nothing but token warm bodies while I do everything. And since I seem to wind up doing so many dangerous things, sooner or later you guys were going to have to do it yourselves. But now you have. So keep up the good work."
Lon Hackathorn, one of the two Earth reps eyed him. "And now you're what? One of Comet Fall's two reps?"
"Exactly."
A snicker from down the table. A mutter of "This is going to be very odd."
Inso sighed. "Do you have any idea how many laws you broke?"
"Umm, no. Not actually. Prison break? Or was that Heresy?"
"Oh, that's just on the One." Jiol eyed him. "Here? According to Disco's rules . . . acting as an agent of your government, while assigned to Disco, is a Bad Thing. Generally agreed on Treaty rules for Embassy World . . . suggested by some fellow named Wolfson. And then there's smuggling, trafficking in humans . . ."
"Oh now! Rescuing my innocent daughter from a deadly game play is hardly trafficking. Smuggling her off One world . . . OK, guess I can't argue with that. And I resigned from both Disco and the Army of the West before I proceeded to commit whatever on One World."
"There seems to be a serious discrepancy between the date on your resignation and your continuing to work here."
Xen put on his most innocent expression. "I've spoken harshly to Orion. He's very sorry he failed to deliver my resignation in a timely fashion, and I'm sure he didn't realize that imitating me was illegal."
Q snickered. "Well, I found it amusing. Your reputation will never be the same."
Inso eyed them. "Are you claiming that you weren't here?"
"Yes. I headed to the One World at the first whiff of a problem. Realized it might get serio
us, and wrote out the resignations. Popped back home long enough to deliver the one to my superiors, and send Orion here with the other one and told him to suggest that you all figure out who was now in charge." Xen bit his lip. "Umm, what did he actually do?"
Lon grinned. "He flipped a coin. Mind you, this was . . . if I understand the timing . . . after a week of pretending to be you."
"Tsk, tsk!" Xen sat back. "No doubt he decided to leave after word of Nighthawk's execution arrived with the end of the 'test of isolation protocols' the Oners were holding."
"Yes. Odd isn't, how he somehow managed to give the impression that the almighty Xen had just heard about the death of his daughter. Then nothing. For two weeks. Why?"
Xen sighed. "I was hoping that given some time to unravel the whole mess, you Oners might actually find some shame. Instead, as I'd feared, you just got even more belligerent. Now, you, Boss, get to deal with a cross dimensional raid. And I have a nasty suspicion that some retaliation is being planned. Please do try to get the diplomats talking, so this can stop at the planning stage."
Lon looked sympathetic. "As we understand the situation, the blatant abuse of the justice system has been exposed, the perps arrested. The Empire's government was not involved, and thanks to your flimflam, Nighthawk has survived. Is this not enough to satisfy King Leano?"
"Followed by a third unprovoked attack?' Xen sighed. "There's probably going to be some show of strength. Hopefully not a lethal one."
"Third? What . . . "
"Oh, you didn't hear about the Action Team sneaking through Comet Fall to one of our other worlds and kidnapping Nighthawk? Mind you, they didn't get very far. And I'm sure that at least their parents are glad they survived." Xen shrugged. "But since King Leano refused my resignation and sent me back here, I'm out of the information loop."
Inso just leaned over and thunked his head on the table. "One! They didn't. Please tell me you are kidding."
Lon sighed. "I'm not sure if I'm relieved Xen looks so amused, or if I'm terrified."
"Terrified." Inso lifted his head and glared. "Damn that coin toss. Well. Right. Lon? As your home is a neutral party in this hopefully minor bump on the road to universal civility, you get the job of getting both sides talking. Somehow." He looked back at Xen. "You . . . go check all the other worlds. Take a bunch of people with you, show them how you do it, so the next time you disappear, we can smoothly transition into doing it all ourselves."
Xen suppressed a grin. "Yes, Boss."
Inso sighed, and switched his attention to Q. "Now, you were saying you had an indication of powered gate activity?"
"Yes. It didn't seem to be associated with either Earth or the One World, so I thought I'd take a good look. It's out on the edge of anything I can detect, so I may be mistaken."
Inso sat back, thinking for a long moment.
"Right. Xen, take a couple of days to show your understudies around to a few worlds, then go with your sister and make sure she gets back safely. Q, don't go without him, take any other people you think might be handy, and don't get yourself killed."
Q grinned. "Yes Boss."
Of course he'd barely had time to sort out who to take—apparently all of them wanted to go—before Rael slipped into the room.
Whereupon everyone decided they really needed coffee, immediately.
Rael turned suddenly awkward . . . then sat down across the table from him. She cleared her throat. "The President sent me to tell you how very glad he is that you rescued Nighthawk. Umm . . . and me too. And Urfa. We . . . got caught by surprise."
"Urfa needs to recruit more people, and stick spies everywhere, and do something about his communications."
"Yeah. This wasn't a deeply planned . . . gambit. It just fell into their nasty little laps and they ran with it. So few people were actually involved that I don't know if agents in place would have caught it in time. But the ability of a regional governor to block communications . . . that's going to have to be aggressively addressed. But agents might have helped us figure out what you've been doing for the last two weeks." She rested her hands on the table and didn't meet his eyes.
"Keeping an eye on those five very unlikely knights in shining armor. Keep in mind that I knew Nighthawk was safe. Or at least I thought she was safe. The last two days, I've been shifting all the corridors that lead to Ash and . . . a few other places. Putting better locks on them." He reached across the table and ran a finger down her hand, down her elegant fingers with the short practical nails, and the calluses of years of practicing martial arts. No poison on her fingernails.
His turn to not meet her eyes. "I guess I needed a kick in the ass, to remind me that the One are so precariously balanced between neutrality and attack. That friendship just isn't happening. That I really do have to be more cautious around you."
"I . . . yeah. Me too. You aren't just an eccentric boyfriend. You're an enemy soldier. I . . . was shocked when you wouldn't even speak to me. I thought you'd at least yell at me."
Xen suppressed a squirm. "Well, actually, while Orion was doing a very credible job of imitating me, he had a nasty suspicion he couldn't pull off kissing you."
Kissing. No poison in her lipstick that I can detect from across the table. The complex chemicals look like pigments and oils, no biological agents.
Rael sat back and stared at him. "That wasn't you . . . but he glowed, that deep . . . "
"The God of Orgies."
She crossed her arms and scowled at him. "I do not believe you've got a God of Orgies. I just refuse."
"True story. And now I'm heading out to show my minions how to smooze in a foreign world, and then I'm off to see about an indication of another dimensionally able world. Tell Orde and Urfa . . . that King Leano's pissed. This raid is the last straw. Any indication, any preparation for war . . . Could trigger our response. And . . . no, they hadn't made up their minds what to do before it became none of my business. But what to do is very definitely under discussion."
Her eyes got a little wide.
"And please, don't even think of a preemptive strike." Alarm, not aggression, but this is Rael, not the President, not the Prime Councilor.
"Orde won't . . . and he's . . . well, Ujmw is in Paris trying to explain why he ought to keep his job."
"Yeah. Never thought I'd miss Agni. Pity there isn't any recording of you punching Ooo jim ow."
She snorted. "I ought to have known you'd hear about that. I . . . damn it all, Xen . . . I wish I'd just shot him. And something nasty is going to happen to the Chief of Police if the justice system can't put him away for a good long time."
"Hmm, yes. You'll have to be quick, though. All of my family are feeling murderous, just now."
She winced. "Including Q?"
"She said it was just a matter of pest control, no use wasting emotion on a necessary task."
"Oh. One."
"And God knows what you people will appoint next."
"Who, not what."
"Well, we'll see. Please point out to anyone necessary that sending me back to Disco is a good sign that King Leano isn't planning an invasion." Xen glanced out the door. "And now I need to cease amusing the eavesdroppers and put them to work."
He got up and circled wide around the table. And her. Stopped.
Oh hell. Who wants to live forever?
He shifted direction, and as she stood up, stepped close to her. Cupped his hands around her face. Kissed her, hands sliding down neck to shoulders, and around to pull her in close, as her arms slid around him and she relaxed against him.
He pulled back reluctantly. "If Urfa ever sends you to kill me, I'm toast."
She thumped his ribs, gently. "Won't happen."
"Good. Tell Urfa I'm going to tend to Disco business for awhile. He's going to have to deal with the diplomats. And you might mention that the reason Ambassador Never is so irate is that she's Nighthawk's great grandmother."
Rael pinched the bridge of her nose. "Are you related to everyone?"
"Only a third to a half of the magic users from the Kingdom that you'll encounter. Umm, a quarter or less of the ones from Verona. The other ones are just friends and enemies."
Excerpt from an upcoming release
A Tale of Three Interns
Pam Uphoff
Chapter One
12 Rajab 1403 yp
Directorate School, University of the Empire, New York, North America, One World
Ebsa Clostuone eyed the closed door of the counselor's office with trepidation. Summer internship. I've got so many negative marks there's no telling what shit job they'll find for me to do. And I can practically guarantee Ra'd will get a worse one. At least Paer should be safe from anything dangerous . . . right?
The door snapped open and Ra'd stomped out. He glanced Ebsa's direction. "Plant species survey. Yay! Algae! At least I won't have to worry about my temper."
Ebsa snorted, and stood up at the summoning wave from the counselor.
"Well, so a Clostuone with a rebellious streak. I'm sending you with your co-conspirator to a team making population surveys of various plant species on Empty worlds. A nice long ten week internship. So low priority that they've put some Clostuone in charge, not that that will bother you, but I understand they'll be sending Precious Princess Paer along as well. I shall dream of fireworks." He handed over two chips. "Report to Info Leader Ajha Clostuone, Warehouse 329 B, Gate City. In twelve hours."