Toru just grunted a noncommittal response as he lifted the feed tray to check the condition of his borrowed machine gun. They didn’t see the final robot inside until it turned on its eye and illuminated the Iron Guard in blue light.
Sullivan’s Spike reversed gravity, and the gigantic machine fell upward to hit the steel beams in the ceiling. Sullivan cut his Power and the robot dropped. It crashed hard into the floor where it lay twitching and kicking. The two of them riddled the mechanical man with bullets until the light died and it lay still in a spreading puddle of oil.
“Normally, this would be the part where you thank me for returning the favor and saving your life.”
“Yes. Normally . . . If we were court ladies instead of warriors,” Toru answered. “Shall we continue onward or do you wish to stop and discuss your feelings over tea?”
Sullivan looked forward to the day that the two of them would be able to finish their fight. “Let’s go.”
The only other passenger still aboard had a .38-caliber hole right between the eyes, so Francis used his mind to steer the rudder while he hid in the front of the boat. There was a tarp, so Francis covered himself, got low, and waited to hit land. The OCI on shore had more than likely heard the gunshots. If he was lucky, they would come running to investigate when they didn’t see their friends, and even luckier if they didn’t have a Dymaxion.
Behind him, Mason Island was on fire and there was so much gunfire it sounded like Fourth of July firecrackers. As he got closer to shore, he saw that to the south the Washington side of the bridge was burning. It was quite a ways off, but the sirens of the police cars stuck there could be heard. Closer now, he pulled the tarp over his head and waited.
He was terribly nervous, but his Power felt ready, which meant that there was probably no Dymaxion here, or at least if there was, they hadn’t turned it on yet. There was a crack of wood against rock, and the whole craft shuddered hard. The boat slowly turned sideways and ground against solid earth.
Footsteps. Somebody was running this way. There was swearing, and Francis could only assume that they were playing a hand torch over the boat. The boat shifted as some weight landed in the middle of it. Francis pulled down the tarp just enough to see. A man in work clothes stood over the body of the thug Francis had shot in the face. Francis hesitated, because he had no way of knowing if this man was OCI or not.
Keeping his light on the dead man, the stranger grabbed a handful of hair and lifted. He swore again, then turned and shouted back toward the truck. “It’s Pete. They shot Pete!”
That’ll do. Francis shot him through the tarp. It wasn’t like he could use the sights that way, but they were nice and close. The first bullet hit him low in the back. He grunted in surprise and stood straight up. So Francis adjusted the muzzle upwards and fired again. That one got him right between the shoulder blades, but instead of falling over, he started climbing out of the boat. This was a perfect example of why Francis preferred a .45 to a .38. The man landed on the rocks, shouting that it was an ambush while reaching into his pocket. He came out with a little pistol and popped off a couple of wild shots at the boat before turning and running. Francis sat up, and since he couldn’t see the sights in the dark, pointed and squeezed off his last shot. That time the OCI man threw his arms wide and fell on his face.
There was more shouting from the truck. Francis could easily hunker down here and wait for help . . . But that truck was part of a bigger plot, and the way Bradford Carr had talked about it, innocent people were going to die if he didn’t stop them. “Time to be heroic.”
Francis clambered over the side. Water splashed up to his knees, but he quickly moved up the rocks. He was out of ammo and needed to find items that could be weapons with his Power. The more something weighed, the harder it was to manipulate. The further away it was, the harder it was to control, and if something was more than forty feet away, it was pretty safe. Sure, he could throw something further than that, but good luck hitting anything.
Sadly, the truck was parked nearly twice that far away and there was absolutely nothing between him and it worth hiding behind. He concentrated on the downed man’s dropped pistol and it zipped over to him. Francis snatched it out of midair and ran for the truck. Somebody moved in front of the headlights and a gun boomed. The shot was so close that he could hear the bullet whine past his ear. Francis raised the unfamiliar pistol and fired wildly. He had to get closer.
Suddenly, Francis was falling and couldn’t figure out why. He landed hard on his face, and then he felt a searing flash of heat in his thigh. He’d been shot. The son of a bitch shot me!
He had to get up. These men were about to do something terrible and he was the only one that could stop them. Francis was far more furious than scared, and he shoved himself right back up. Pain flared through him when his foot hit the ground, but it didn’t matter. He had to get closer to use his magic. Limping forward, another bullet clipped him. This time the pain radiated up his arm, and Francis looked down, astonished, to see a hole right through his left wrist. Then it was as if somebody had taken a spear and driven it through his chest.
Shit. I’ve been shot in the chest. But he was still alive. Good thing it was too dark for proper aiming or that one might have been in his heart. He kept on limping, raised the little pistol and cranked off the rest of the magazine in the general direction of the truck. There was a clang of metal and one of the headlights went out. The shadow in front of the truck seemed to be reloading while the door of the cab opened and another person leapt out.
It was close enough. The cheap little pistol clicked when Francis pulled the trigger on an empty chamber. Francis opened his hand and let it fall, but he reached out and took hold of it with his Power. It floated in the air while he concentrated on the shadow in front of the truck, then Francis shoved it with all his might. It wasn’t nearly as aerodynamic as a serving tray, but the pistol blurred through the air, guided precisely, and Francis steered it directly into the OCI man’s face. Teeth shattered and the gun hit so hard that the slide broke off and the recoil spring shot out the side.
Francis limped closer. He was having a hard time breathing. It was too dark to spot anything else to throw. The ground was just grass. Everything seemed blurry. The rocks at the shore were too big to lift. The truck driver had pulled a gun. Desperate, Francis reached out with his Power and slapped it down. It was too far to hit the driver very hard, but the gun discharged into the ground at his feet. Closer. The process repeated, only this time Francis hit him a little bit harder and the next round struck the dirt. Closer. Francis was losing blood, but he’d never been this mad before. The gun came up again, and Francis surged his Power desperately. There was no subtlety, and instead of a careful invisible hand, this was a mighty fist. A wave of telekinetic force slammed into the OCI man’s hands so hard that Francis could hear bones break across the beach. He’d never done anything like that before. The gun fell from ruined hands. Closer.
His lungs ached. It was like breathing fire. The first one was getting up, spitting out mouthfuls of blood and reaching for his gun. Anger filled Francis, and this time his invisible hands reached out, took hold of the man’s eyeballs, and squeezed. He screamed, so Francis gave his Power one extra shove and was rewarded with two sickening pops.
He stumbled. He had to stop the bleeding soon or he was going to die. Closer. He was next to the truck. Both of the OCI men were screaming their heads off. One blind, one with ruined hands. Francis spotted a pistol on the ground, tugged on it, and it flew over. The driver tried to run, but Francis shot him in the back and he fell. Then he turned and shot the blind one in the head.
Blood was pumping out of his leg. He’d seen enough combat to know that a leg wound bleeding that much was really bad, but he couldn’t stop to look at it yet. There might be more men. Francis made it to the back of the truck. Whatever was back there was heavy, and the big truck was sitting low under its load. The bed was covered in canvas tied shut with ropes. He ripped a
part the knots and flung the canvas open with his mind before spinning around the edge. There was nobody back there. He’d gotten them all.
Woozy, Francis slowly lowered the pistol. The truck was packed full of barrels and the whole thing reeked of chemicals. A length of cannon fuse led into one of the barrels.
There had to be a couple thousand pounds of explosives in the truck. It was a bomb. A really big bomb.
He found himself facedown. Francis was unsure how he’d gotten there, but the grass was cool and damp against his cheek. Everything else was going numb. Good work, Francis. You saved the day, he told himself before passing out from blood loss.
Chapter 20
If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on the human face—forever.
—Eric Arthur Blair,
Editorial in G.K.’s Weekly. 1927
OCI Headquarters
THE UNITED STATES Coordinator of Information, Bradford Carr, Ph.D., was trapped in his office. He was against one wall, back pressed against a multitude of plaques and awards, nervously sweating, while a Siberian tiger sat on its haunches in the middle of the room, watching him carefully. Carr had inched toward some of the display weapons, but a low growl from the tiger had informed him of what a terrible idea that would be.
“Nice catch, Lance,” Sullivan said as he entered the office.
“Thanks. Big as he is, it would be like eating a water buffalo, which is very tempting right now, you have no idea, but I figured we’d want him alive.”
The esoteric weapons were neat and all, but Sullivan marveled at all of the books. From what he knew about the Coordinator, this place was a treasure trove of information on magic. Hell, he would have done this job just to loot this library, let alone rescue his friends, but first things first.
“Let me go or you’ll regret this,” Carr sneered. “I’ve got a force of robots that will—”
“We already broke them. Your men are either dead or swimming, and we destroyed your pet demon too. So save your breath.” Sullivan turned to Lance. “It looks like Whisper blocked the bridge for now, but we need to get a move on.”
“Francis and Heinrich?” There was dried blood all over the tiger’s face, but none of it appeared to be from the tiger.
There was a rasp from the door. “I am here.” Sullivan turned to see a very battered Heinrich Koenig. His face was swollen with bruises and cuts and his shirt was hanging in blood-stained tatters. He’d found a pump shotgun somewhere. “But they took Francis away.”
It was good to see the Fade had made it. Sullivan had taken a real liking to the tough German. Sullivan strode over and punched Carr in his ample stomach. Sullivan took it easy, but only because he didn’t want to accidently kill the man. Carr sank to the carpet, purple-faced and gagging. “Where’d you take him?”
“Go to hell, Active rabble,” Carr gasped.
“We should question him somewhere else,” Heinrich suggested.
“Yeah, cops are going to be on the—”
“No. There is a black hole growing in the basement of the main building. It is devouring everything and expanding rapidly. We only have a few minutes.”
“A black hole?” It could never be simple.
“I’ve got to get her out of here. I’m about out of Power, and I don’t think you’re going to want her around when I lose control,” Lance said through the tiger. “Catch you boys later.” The animal turned and bounded from the room.
Heinrich calmly stepped out of the way to let the predator pass. “I cannot emphasize this enough. We really must be going as well.”
That meant it was seriously bad. Heinrich certainly wasn’t the dramatic type. Diamond had secured the building that Lance had said housed the other prisoners. There was nothing else keeping them here. Sullivan looked sadly at the shelves of books. Sometimes life just wasn’t fair.
Toru appeared behind Heinrich so silently that he even made the Fade jump, and that was saying something. “Sullivan, your prisoners have been freed and are being taken to the boats, but something strange is happening at the main building—”
“Told you,” Heinrich said as he studied Toru suspiciously. “Who are you?”
“That’s our new Iron Guard,” Sullivan said. “He’s okay. I’ll explain later.”
“I am imprisoned for a brief time and everything goes to hell.” Heinrich shrugged. “Very well. I am Heinrich Koenig.”
“Toru.” The Iron Guard nodded. “You seem more accepting than the others of your kind.”
“Oh, I despise all Imperium scum, but I have had a very difficult day. I will worry about it when we are not being sucked into a magical vortex, which will be happening very shortly. Speaking of which . . .”
Sullivan grabbed Carr by the neck and hoisted him to his feet. He gave a quick pat-down but the Coordinator seemed to be unarmed.
“You’re Heavy Jake Sullivan, aren’t you?”
“Yep.”
“I was afraid of that,” Carr muttered. “You have a considerable reputation in some circles.”
“You picked the wrong man to slander. Come on.”
“Wait, Mr. Sullivan. I know you’re a student of magic. If he is telling the truth about our impending destruction, there is something priceless we must take with us. I have in my possession here the singlemost valuable magical tome in existence. To lose its knowledge would be a tragedy for the entire human race.”
It went against his better judgment, but Sullivan let go long enough for the Coordinator to pick up a large book off of his desk. If he’d so much as made a move for a drawer that could conceal a gun, he’d have gotten himself Spiked to the roof. “Give me that.” Sullivan snatched the book away. Flipping through the pages, he didn’t recognize the language, but it was absolutely filled with complicated spells. They looked legit. “My God.”
“I knew you would understand. If you didn’t have such a reputation for stubbornness, you are exactly the kind of man that I would have approached concerning my grand vision.”
Vision? Sullivan snorted. Just like the visionaries of the Imperium, the Kaiser, the Soviets, Carr’s vision was just another group of assholes wanting to control everybody else. Sullivan was sick and tired of visionaries. “Shut up.”
Toru had moved to the wall of weapons and picked out a long Japanese sword. He set the 1919 down long enough to draw it from its black scabbard. It was a foot longer than the other Iron Guard swords that Sullivan had seen. “Magnificent.”
“And very valuable. That nodachi is said to have belonged to Sasaki Kojiro,” Carr said. “It was restored and given to me as a gift by Chairman Tokugawa personally.”
That seemed to surprise the Iron Guard. “One of my father’s blades? This is no accident.” Toru had to blink away tears of emotion. He smiled as he slid the blade back into the sheath. “Even now he guides my steps.”
“Well . . .” Carr had been ambassador. Of course he had souvenirs. It was obvious from the walls that he loved them. The big sword just seemed like a coincidence to Sullivan, but he’d actually talked to the dead man in question on the spirit phone. Who was he to judge things like signs of approval from beyond the grave? “Good, I suppose.”
“The Tokugawa family is reclaiming this blade, Doctor.” Toru ripped a strip of silk from a robe in Carr’s display and used that to quickly tie both ends of the scabbard so he could throw it over his shoulder. Carr cringed at the defacement of one of his artifacts. “Attempt to stop me and I will spill your bowels with it.”
Sullivan shoved Carr toward the exit. “Walk.”
“Do you intend to kill me?”
“If you don’t tell me where you took Francis, you’re gonna wish I had.”
“I can cut off his feet,” Toru offered. “I have found that makes men talkative . . . briefly.”
Carr’s lip quivered beneath his gigantic mustache, but he didn’t speak.
As they hurried toward the outside, a trembling could be felt through the floor. This bunker had been meant f
or the command staff of the old Peace Ray project, so it had been built solid, but the whole place was shaking like it was about to fall down. Heinrich had talked about some sort of hole, but Sullivan really didn’t know if that could be causing an earthquake. He got his answer when they made it out into the courtyard.
The main building was gone. In its place was the top half of an expanding ball of black. It cast off an eerie light that seemed to make light colors glow. It was forty feet tall and lightning played back and forth across its curved surface. Wind howled past them as it was gobbled up. On one side, the darkness reached the outer wall of the bunker and the bricks immediately began to dissolve into it, while on the other it reached one of the ruined trucks. The front end lifted into the air as the rear dropped into space. Within seconds it had consumed the entire truck.
“Is this your doing?” Sullivan grabbed Carr by the jacket and shook him hard.
“I don’t know what that is!” the Coordinator gaped at the blackness. “All my work . . . All of my research was in there. It’s all been ruined.”
More like all of the evidence of your wrongdoing’s been erased. They especially had to keep Carr alive now. Without physical evidence to turn over to J. Edgar Hoover, they were still in hot water, probably more so now since they’d just attacked a government facility and killed a mess of government employees.
“I believe Francis may have been responsible for this one,” Heinrich said.
The dome of death had expanded another few feet while they were standing there gawking at it. It was time to go Sullivan said. “Me and that boy are gonna have a talk.”
They ran for it. Carr walked with a bad limp, so Sullivan used his Power to make the Coordinator lighter and dragged him along. He didn’t want to help the man. He wanted to toss him into the black hole, but he needed the fool’s testimony.
Faye popped into existence ahead of them. “Mr. Sullivan! Over here!”
Spellbound: Book II of the Grimnoir Chronicles Page 40