Doomsday Exam [Bureau 13 #2]

by Nick Pollotta

  Try again, bucko, Jess sent petulantly. They'd be mopping us off the walls with a sponge.

  True, but I'm an optimist.

  The river of magic took us further into the great ship and eventually we had to loop our belts through those of the mages to keep them from being physically hauled into the air by the powerful eddies of concentrated magic.

  Tagging along after our human kites, we were pulled past a corner only to find half a dozen warplanes waiting for us. Even as the team frantically scampered back round the corner, the massed fighters opened with gun and cannon. With propellers spinning, it was like staring into the mouth of an angry garbage disposal full of firecrackers.

  “We must be close to LaRue,” Father Donaher reasoned, peeking past the edge of the metal wall and triggering a burning arc of jellied gasoline towards the airships.

  As both of the Masterson cannons were speaking, I withheld comment. Reaching over my shoulder, I grabbed a plastic tube with no fluted ends, and gave them a LAW. Streaking in between a Corsair and the Harrier, a Curtis Helldiver was hit and went to its namesake. Damn, I had been aiming for the Harrier.

  Advancing from behind the burning wreck of the old Grumman antique was a state-of-the-art F18 SuperHornet, one of the finest fighting planes in existence. Jumping Jesus! That thing used a Harrier for target practice! What the bloody freaking hell was a line-ship such as the Hornet doing in a goddamn Navy museum? An exhibition?

  “Trouble with a capital T,” George sang, as a .50 round banged off his helmet knocking him askew. The muzzle of his weapon went wild for a second, the armor-piercing shells chewing paths of destruction in decks and bulkheads.

  “Do you have a clever plan, Mr. Alvarez?” Ken asked calmly, triggering controlled bursts of caseless HE rounds.

  I sure did. “Don't die and win!”

  “Good plan, sir.”

  “Thanks. Got it off a gum wrapper.”

  Our weapons kept a constant barrage going and it was not a problem hitting the planes. This was easy as shooting ducks in a barrel. Only these ducks shot back, more, and better.

  Holding onto a stanchion with both hands, Katrina exclaimed something in Russian and the secret language of magic.

  “Will that work?” Jessica asked, as always our universal translator.

  Feet braced against a hatchway, Raul strained to hold on. “How do I know? Nobody was ever dumb enough to try before!”

  “So we do!” Katrina cried, radiating a fine Muscovite fury.

  Stretching from their precarious positions, the two mages managed to grab hands as racing lines of ethereal power poured straight through them. In unison, they began to chant, and the majority of streamers now arced around the pair, and the few glowing ribbons that went in, didn't come out the other side.

  Firing off another 40mm shell of thermite, I nearly did a dance. Holy mother of pearl, the two were retaining snatches of the limitless energy flowing past them. Recharging themselves to who-knew-what level of magic. The closer we get to the nexus, the more ethereal power would pour into them. It wouldn't work against LaRue, he'd only absorb the energy, but it might save our butts in this particular instance.

  “Kill those planes!” Katrina commanded, internally glowing from the endless power passing through her trembling form.

  Pausing for a split second, George and Sanders gave a start, then boldly charged towards the amassed fighter and interceptors.

  Bullets bounced off their adamantine bodies, missiles impacted and only crumpled their warheads with no explosions. Repaired and backed by the quintessential, concentrated, river of magic, the two indestructible soldiers waded forward, their Masterson Assault Cannons firing non-stop. Over 4,000 rounds a minute of armor piercing, high explosive, caseless rounds spewing from the pitted maws of the deadly weapons.

  The oncoming missiles were shredded, the explosion and shrapnel forced back towards the Harrier, Saber, SuperHornet and Delta Dagger. The jets cut loose with everything they had, missiles, rockets, 40mm shells, .50 rounds, .75 depleted uranium slugs, and blinding magnesium flares. The determined planes dropped their payloads of bombs onto the deck beneath them, the tons of high explosive, thermite and napalm blockbusters only adding to the general destruction.

  Boldly marching, the two soldiers took it all and gave it back, compound with interest, their bulky coffers of ammunition refilled the microsecond the packs were exhausted.

  Indomitable as professional wrestlers on national TV, the pair of soldiers advanced upon the clustered million dollar jet fighters. As each machine was drained of ammo, it was destroyed. The Saber was torn to bits under the horizontal rain of 20mm rounds, its fuselage split apart and the fuel tanks exploded into a strident fireball. The Hellcat and the Corsair were slammed against the bulkheads burst into kindling. Ripping free from their mountings, the great motors bounded along the corridor as insane things, the spinning propellers smacking into the deck and bulkheads, throwing the roaring engines hither and yon, with no rhyme or reason.

  Nimble as a gymnast, Ken ducked under a ton of spinning metal, and George tracked the other engine's wild flight, peppering the motor with caseless HE rounds motor until it jammed and burst. The Delta Dagger died next, then the MiG, and the Harrier. A chunk of canopy went skidding along the deck and I saluted the tiny American flag painted on the Armorlite windshield as it passed by. So I'm a patriot. Sue me.

  Incredibly, the SuperHornet turned tail, shoved its wings into a pair of opposite hatchways and throttled up both engines.

  “Oh shit!” George cried, backing away.

  “What?” I shouted, banging away with my .357 Magnum.

  “Know the difference between a flamethrower and a jet engine?” George said, licking dry lips.

  "Nyet!"

  “A flamethrower doesn't have as much hard thrust!”

  Uh-oh. Time to fry.

  The twin turbo-engines seemed to disintegrate into a boiling wave of reddish flame that completely filled the corridor, as the F18 SuperHornet blew hundreds of gallons of half burned fuel out its turbines in a last great effort to toast us alive.

  The very force of the flames served to deflect the 20mm rounds from the Masterson cannons. Desperately, Raul and Katrina upped their chanting and George and Ken dug their heels into the metal deck. Step by step, meter-by-meter, they charged straight into those yawning pits of hell and forcibly shoved the stuttering muzzles of their dire weapons straight into the thundering engines!

  There immediately followed a quite spectacular explosion.

  When I could see and hear again, only a steaming hole in the twisted metal deck remained of the rogue defenders. The SuperHornet was totally destroyed, plane and simple.

  Ugh! sent Jessica.

  Sorry, it had to be said.

  No, it didn't.

  Gathering ourselves together, we grabbed a hold of the mages, and the team levitated over the jagged gap to land on the smooth undamaged deck beyond. Ahead of us was a set of double doors large enough to comfortably pass a cargo plane, and on the wall a neatly stenciled sign told why.

  “Vehicle Storage?” Mindy asked, brushing a bit of fuselage off her blade.

  Exasperated, Father Donaher rolled his Irish green eyes. They weren't smiling. “Saints preserve us!” he muttered. “This is where they park the squadrons of extra planes. Hundreds of them!”

  Panting from the constant exertion of keeping the two mages in tow, I thumbed my last round 40mm round into the breech of the grenade launcher. It was a special shell that I had been reserving for Mr. LaRue; a low-yield explosive canister of an outstandingly virulent military nerve gas outlawed by the UN Security Council as inhumanly painful and deadly. If this didn't kill Wild Willy, then he deserved to rule the earth. Or at least six feet of it, positioned directly over his pointy head.

  “Screw the planes!” I snarled, clicking the breech shut. “Let's take the bastard!”

  The doors were thick, veined steel, but two satchel charges and a LAW did the trick, and we s
tormed into the acrid smoke just as the ethereal winds died.

  Utilizing fully half of the carrier's middle deck, the vast place was mostly empty, with only a poor Navy jeep carrying a .50 machine gun waiting for us. That trifle hardly even slowed us.

  Standing brazen in a sketchy pentagram was Wilson LaRue, three times human size and glowing as if he was florescent, torrents of scintillating mystical energy pouring into him from every direction, and sprawled about him were the guards.

  Or rather what remained of them. Lying on the deck, the humans were physically linked to form a pentagram about the mad alchemist, their hands fused together into an unbroken circle of flesh. Bits of guards were missing, eyes from a woman, hair from another, the chest of a third. Lacking critical ingredients from his laboratory, LaRue must have made do with live human beings for his hellish diagram.

  But not everyone was dead. Scattered about in the five pointed star, a few still moaned or screamed in their torment. Living links in the corpse chain.

  His hated visage filled my sight and even as I raised my gun, god help me, I paused for a moment, desperately fighting the swirling emotions within. LaRue had to die, would die, but it meant killing more civilians. I could have gunned down my beloved Jessica without a qualm if it got Wilson also. That was our job. But we were sworn to die if it meant saving innocent life.

  It took me, the whole group of us, a full second to overcome that oath of allegiance. Which was all LaRue needed.

  Even as we fired, a last wisp of visible magic snaked across the hangar to enter his body. Suddenly, Raul and Katrina slumped to the deck unconscious, my sunglasses went dark, Mindy's sword ceased its rainbow display, my body armor became fantastically heavy and a copper bracelet fell off George's wrist.

  “Yes,” LaRue said, watching the lightning play between his fingers with mad eyes. “Success! Success!”

  It was over. The spell was done, and Wilson LaRue possessed every last drop of magic on Earth. We had lost.

  SEVENTEEN

  We had lost the battle, but not the damn war. Ruthlessly, I pumped the nerve gas grenade at LaRue. Not even looking in my direction, he caught the projectile and tossed it into his mouth, munching on the 40mm shell as if it was a gumdrop. Wisps of vapor spurted from round his lips as I smacked myself in the head. Chemical weapons against an alchemist? Alvarez, you putz!

  Aiming so as not to kill, Father Donaher hosed the legs of the mage with flame, and both of the Masterson cannons cut loose spewing a fusillade of explosions to pepper the kimono wearing spacesuit. Not much damage was done to either.

  “Routine four!” I shouted, dropping the spent M-203 and unlimbering my heavy HAFLA four-shot.

  The team separated and attacked from different directions.

  Contemptously, LaRue threw a lighting bolt and it missed Jessica by a yard. He seemed as surprised as she. Stupid librarian didn't yet realize it took practice, and lots of it, to control the higher magiks. LaRue may have the power of a god, but not the skill. Like a baby with a bazooka, he was more dangerous to himself than to others. So we still had a fighting chance, but it was decreasing with every passing moment.

  A HAFLA rocket impacted on the ceiling above LaRue raining napalm down upon him. His clothes and hair caught fire, but he did not seem particularly disturbed by the event.

  Shouting his war cry, Ken sprinted off into the distance. Trying to get behind our foe, I thought, but then he circled completely about and rejoined us. That was when I noticed his spray gun was pointed at the ceiling. I glanced up and saw a sizzling ring in the steel deck above LaRue. Obviously, we both liked to fight dirty.

  With a loud metallic crack, twenty tons of metallic plating plummeted onto the nasty nitwit, crushing him flatter than a bug under a shoe heel. We shouted in victory.

  Then the steel disc levitated into the air and the ceiling coalesced into a homogeneous whole. Smiling in a cocky manner, Wilson LaRue stood as before completely undamaged. His kimono and battle suit weren't even rumpled.

  On a coded command, my team threw the satchel charges and as they hurtled towards the mage, the canvas packs became smaller and smaller until button-size, the bags landed at his black boots and went snap-snap-snap loud as firecrackers.

  Uncaring if anybody was standing behind, I let fly the three remaining HAFLA rockets, tossed the launcher and cut loose with the .44 AutoMag, spent shells the size of cigar butts jerking from the injector port.

  During this, Jessica was steadily firing her Uzi at the madman, the 9mm Parabellums flattening against his body and staying there like little gray polka dots.

  Holstering the empty .44 AutoMag, I shrugged and started triggering my twin Magnums at the walls, angling for a ricochet. Maybe his shield, or whatever, only operated in the front. But the heavy duty combat slugs merely hit his back as roses, the harmless bouquet falling limply to the deck in the manner of some pagan offering.

  In a tumbling roll, Mindy sliced the man in half along the waist with her sword and then rolled away again. Blood spurted for only a moment, but mages were always quick healers. As the only mage alive, I guess his repair factor was magnified geometrically. What we need was a full body death blow, or a Brain Blast. Yeah.

  Turning and sneering, LaRue gestured and twin saber-tooth tigers leapt from his palms. Suddenly fur and fists were flying as Mindy became embroiled in her own private war.

  Now in his right hand there appeared a crystal staff. No, a diamond staff, with a crystal ball atop, the illuminated globe pulsating with shimmering radiance. Eek!

  “Jessica to me!” I cried, and she came a running, firing every step of the way.

  Hydrofluoric acid tanks empty, Ken slapped the chest release button and threw the entire assembly at LaRue. Leveling his wand, the mage gestured and the tanks, hose and spray gun stopped in flight and streaked backwards at Sanders. He ducked and they lowered in trajectory. Kneeling motionless, at the very last second he jumped straight up and the equipment impacted into the deck indenting the thick metal floor in a meteoric strike.

  Our shotgun and pistols maintained a steady discharge. In the background, the tiger growls where down to meows and in bloody sword slashes they soon ceased. LaRue cast a Flame Lance, an Ice Storm, Flesh-to-Stone, and a couple of modified Death spells. But missing us and only hitting the bulkheads, the lethal conjures dispersed in the standard gay pyrotechnics of a failed spell. But the armored walls were discolored from the raw brute force of the powerful magic.

  “Mine is the only voice you can hear,” I said softly, pulling my small wife close. “Mine the only voice which commands.”

  Succumbing to my will, Jessica's face softened as she entered the primary stage of the trance.

  Grenades raining around him, LaRue erected a prismatic dome. Mike rolled a bottle of Holy Oil under the bottom lip of the dome, LaRue stomped on it and slipped, nearly falling. With his bare fists, Sanders pummeled the dome with triphammer blows, making the magic green barrier ring deafening. A transdimensional portal appeared in the air and out charged a huge roaring hydra! Standing bigger than LaRue, the wild snakes nest of the legendary dragon's seven heads writhed and hissed. Some drooled acid or poison, others breathed frost or belched flame, one screamed with sonic fury, another stared at us hypnotically and the biggest launched a salvo of thorny spines from its brow! Crouching low, Mindy stabbed Wilson in the boot with a poisoned dagger. With a yelp, the portal winked out and the horrid beast faded away. Whew. Thankfully, this was a private party. Attendance by invitation only.

  Shouting vitriolic curses, Father Donaher slid his wristwatch to Mindy who stuffed it along with hers under the dome. Then Ken added his, and bodily grabbed the prismatic shield to slam it flat against the deck. There was a loud whump, the dome bulged and jumped.

  Then the curved shield vanished and an angry smoking LaRue exploded himself in a Body Boom. With only tatters of cloth clinging to their combat armor, my friends went flying. In a wild frenzy, LaRue fired an uncoordinated barrage of red laser beam
s and golden disrupter rays. The lasers melted holes in deck and walls everywhere. The touch of the disrupters made the metal implode with violent fury. The alchemist didn't hit anybody, but the federal agents landed with sickening thuds. My .44 AutoMag and holster were disintegrated, and my helmet was blown off my head with stunning force. As recommended by George, I had left the chin strap dangling, just for this type of situation. Too many soldiers in the past had lost their heads in battle trying to look prim and proper, instead of being comfortable and functional.

  “The command phrase is Armageddon,” I spoke fast and low, using my aching jaw as little as possible. “The activation word is Apocalypse.”

  Sitting upright, Katrina fired her Bureau special derringer into LaRue's stomach. The composite mage staggered and then Raul stood. Swinging his drained staff in the manner of a baseball bat, he bent the steel shaft over the alchemist's head. Blood and hair spraying from the impact, Wilson fell trembling to his knees, but then a thorny thicket sprang into existence around Raul. Instantly trapped, I heard Raul trying to start a motorized hedge trimmer. Then a garish light encased Katrina and she slumped to the deck.

  This was going to be close. “Jessica, the go code is—” But I stopped as my mind went blank and searing agony hit me in hands and feet. I lost any sense of time as incredible pain filled the universe for an untold period. Pain!

  Slowly through the red fog of hellish sensations, I eventually began to become dimly aware that I was stark naked and flat against the cold metal wall of the hangar with steel spikes driven through my wrists and ankles. More were positioned under my armpits, groin and knees to support my helpless body. There was no way I was going to fall free. The rest of my team was pinned spread-eagled along the wall, hanging hapless as animal skins on display.

  “Surprise,” LaRue wheezed, a trickle of red blood oozing down his pale cheek. “I win.”

  Panting for breath, his staff pulsed and Wilson stood whole and healed. His battlesuit spotless, the kimono pressed and crisp.