Avalanche: Book Five in the Secret World Chronicle

by Lackey, Mercedes

  So, everyone waited. John desperately wanted to be outside, anywhere but in Vickie’s apartment. He understood the job that they had been given was exceedingly important, knew it intellectually. But his heart and his gut wanted to be on the ground, in the thick of it, taking the fight back to the enemy. If only he didn’t have the constraints that had been placed on him…he just needed someplace to push the dagger, and then he would destroy whatever enemy they faced. Whatever enemy he faced, whoever stood against—

  A Seraphym uses the least power to the most impact. The needle of a laser, not the bludgeon of a sledgehammer. He brought his head up to see that Sera had turned away from the window to gaze solemnly at him. Power is not ours to waste, beloved. We may not be Seraphym, but we are still constrained by the same laws. If we waste what we are given, or use it unwisely or with poor judgment, it will no longer be given to us.

  John took a deep breath, then exhaled it slowly. The mind-to-mind communication had been weird at first, but he was starting to get the hang of it. He knew it was useless to try to hide anything from Sera, but he still tried to calm himself, mask some of the darker…whatever he had been feeling before she had brought him back to Earth. I know, darlin’. Just gets to be…frustratin’, bein’ cooped up in here while our friends are out there.

  Vickie semi-staggered out of her Overwatch room and paused, one hand on the wall. “Um,” she said. “For the benefit of those who are not telepathically attached at the hip, want to use your vocal cords? ’Cause I can tell you’re talking.”

  “Sorry, Vic. Just practicin’, I guess. Unlike my better half, I’m still new to this sort of stuff.” He stood up from the couch, brushing Sera’s cheek with the back of his hand as he rose. “Anyone need tea or coffee? I figure it’s ’bout that time.”

  “Any way you can give me eight hours of sleep in eight seconds instead?” Vickie asked hopefully.

  John thought for a second, then looked to Sera. “No, but…”

  Sera smiled slightly. “I used to help Bella when she was healing, with something she called ‘angel juice’—which sounds terribly wrong, somehow. As if someone was putting me in a blender…”

  Vickie actually managed a chuckle at that. “Seraphym! Will it blend?” she said.

  “I think John and I can manage a…less intense version, together,” Sera continued.

  “An’ then we’ll definitely need coffee. You up for tryin’ it, Vic?”

  “So long as it doesn’t involve zapping me into a wall again, absolutely.” She ran a hand through her hair, which looked dry and lifeless. “We’ve got everyone that escaped from Metis their papers and into hiding and—”

  John held up a hand. “Time for a battery recharge, first. Tell us when we’re done refillin’ your tank.” He paused, thinking. “I guess there isn’t a way for us to describe this without soundin’ dirty, is there, love?” He looked to Sera, wriggling his eyebrows. She giggled, and held out her hand.

  This is simple. Just as we did with Pavel—without having to turn our power into plasma first. He nodded, and took her hand, following her lead.

  For him…for them…well, it was easy. Like sharing the warmth of a fire that they were all huddled around, but that he and Sera could turn up or turn down at will. It was an abstraction of what it really felt like, but it was all so complex, and that was the best way that he could think of it. He and Sera both willed for that fire to ramp up, for the heat to spread outwards from them and into Vickie. Not too much; it was more of a gentle caress than a shove or even a tap.

  Through his new senses granted from telempathy, however, he could feel what it was like for Vickie. As a geomancer, energy came to her through the earth usually, and that was how her senses interpreted this. As a great upwelling of renewal and refreshment; from behind her shields a single image of friendly lava escaped. Her eyes widened, and her skin, which had been pale with fatigue, took on color again. He was reminded of how pale little Thea became pink when she stole energy from her “victims”—willing or unwilling. Vickie stood straighter, and let go of the wall, as her mouth formed a silent “oh” of surprise.

  It was Sera who somehow understood when to cut it off, and actually eased off, rather than cutting off. She had the skill and appreciation for the power that they shared; while it was all raw and untempered for John, Sera was able to turn it with gentleness and control. Vickie stood there, blinking, for a few moments, licking her lips.

  “Why do I taste scotch and cinnamon all of a sudden?” Vickie asked, her voice sounding much better, all of the dullness of her exhaustion gone from it.

  John kept hold of Sera’s hand. He didn’t need it for their connection, but he still liked being in contact with her. “Just a taste of heaven, comrade. Still up for coffee?”

  * * *

  Of course Vickie couldn’t just rest. That would be too easy, and folks like them never had things that easy. It’d sure as hell be a nice change, though, John thought. He felt Sera’s agreement through their connection, and sent some other thoughts about what would be nice for the two of them. She blushed a little and wrinkled her nose at him. Odd, now that they were…whatever it was that they were…she was much more human in her expressions than she ever had been before. He wondered how much of that was due to her time being corporeal, and how much was due to them being reunited.

  And how much she’s learnin’ from me, maybe.

  Vickie had the TV tuned into some Overwatch feeds, four of them, split-screen, and kept an eye on them while sipping on coffee with a liberal dash of a cheap single malt in it. “I just keep this around for doctoring coffee,” she explained, as she offered some to John, and he gave her a sideways look at the brand. “No point in wasting the good stuff when I’m already covering the flavor with coffee, cream and sugar.”

  “Fair enough. Can’t say I’m a stranger to the practice myself.” He proffered his cup; Vickie splashed in a good-sized dose before recapping the scotch.

  They all sat down: John and Sera on the couch, and Vickie in her favorite recliner. She sipped her coffee, kept one eye on the television and the other squarely on John. “So. Suddenly you can go all remote viewing on me. You—” She pointed at Sera, “—I kind of guessed you could do that, from the way you popped up when you were needed, before. But this is a whole new thing for Tall, Dark, and Inflammable here. So…anything you want to tell me?”

  “Your honor, I plead the fifth,” John said, holding his hands up in mock surrender, mug still in one. “To be quite honest, it wasn’t all me. It was both of us, together. We’ve got a bit of juju when it comes to fightin’. Seein’ things that can happen, that might happen, that will happen in a fight. With my reflexes, Sera’s experience…we just make sure we’re where we need to be, when we need to be there, and do what we need to do to have the fight go the way we want it to.” He took a long draught from his spiked coffee, wincing slightly from the fumes. I think the scotch she put in here is part diesel. “What we did when Metis got hit? It was…I don’t know, extendin’ that same sort of feelin’, that same sort of sense outwards. It isn’t easy; took damn near everythin’ we had, keepin’ things stretched out like that.”

  “We were trying to sort the Futures, looking for troubles,” Sera said, as he paused, somewhat at a loss for words. “I think that the only reason we were able to reach as far as Metis was because of your Overwatch…the connection with you, with John, with Bella and Bulwark, Natalya, and Ramona, and…” She hesitated.

  “With Moji,” Vickie supplied, her voice flat as she fought to contain her emotions. “The people wired with Overwatch Two.”

  “Part of it’s magical, right? Maybe we tapped into it a bit. I mean, we’re all pretty damned close besides, and a lotta what we were doin’ seemed more ’bout feelin’ than it did knowin’, if that makes any sense?”

  Vickie shrugged. “Your guess is probably better than mine. If it was strictly magical, I could run the analysis on it…”

  “Might make good fodder for a wit
ch research paper. ‘Effects of the Celestial in relation to Thaumaturgical Whatsits.’ If we live through this damned war an’ there’s anyone left alive to read it.”

  “I wouldn’t live through trying to look at it, never mind the war. Your Celestial stuff does not like anyone trying to analyze it.” She ran her free hand through her hair.

  “No,” said Sera. “It does not. It has nothing to do with you, Vickie. It just does not approve of mere mortals—so to speak—attempting to understand and use it. I think you surprised it a little, the first times. I cannot think of anyone who has come so close to being able to analyze it before. In truth, it was lucky for all of us that John and I were able to moderate; the reaction could have been much more…energetic.”

  Vickie gulped. “Do I want to know what that means?”

  “Well…you could have been reduced to a pile of ashes. Or struck by lightning.” Sera cocked her head to one side. “I doubt it would have been so simple as a plague of boils.”

  Vickie noticeably shuddered. Sera chuckled. “I am pulling your appendage, Vickie,” she said, her eyes smiling.

  John raised an eyebrow. “Leg, darlin’. Appendage can mean a whole lotta things.”

  Vickie looked from Sera, to John, and back again. “You ain’t right, angel.” She shook her head as John laughed at her. She’s stealin’ all my best lines. “Look, I know it’s tedious asking these questions, but I’m trying to get a feel for what you do now. So what was it like when you two knew Metis was getting hit? Was it a real vision, or what?”

  John was the first to speak. “It was real. A ‘moments before’ kind of thing; like, you see an airshow disaster. You watch the plane plummetin’ to the ground, you can visualize what’ll happen…and then it does. This was more…it was like gettin’ hit by a truck. No warnin’, no preparation, no control. You saw what it did to us; we were laid out, completely. If it weren’t for Overwatch, we wouldn’t have had any other way to know it was happenin’, right?”

  Vickie shook her head. “I have no idea. Maybe? Maybe not? I don’t ‘do’ visions or precognitive stuff. The most I can do is look into the past or the present, and it takes me a lot of prep work to do that much. Earth isn’t an element that lends itself to scrying or remote viewing; that’s more an air, water, or fire thing. So, what happened when you staggered into my Overwatch room?”

  “Nothing at first,” Sera replied. “We were still…involved in the confused sensations of the attack itself. And then, we had stretched our battle-sense to cover all of Atlanta, because we needed to protect you, and we knew that you were vulnerable and vital. We found no danger to you, to Atlanta, in the moment, or as far as we could stretch ourselves into the future. Then, something shone brightly to us, here, in this apartment, and we sought it out, knowing it was important.”

  “It was like a searchlight, comin’ right out of your monitor. The one that was focusin’ on Moji.” All three of them were quiet for a few moments; the wound was still fresh. Even in a war such as this, where so many had died, and often many of them at the same time, the new losses didn’t hurt any less, at least for them.

  “I…think when we knew how important that was, we must have unconsciously followed John’s Overwatch connection to him.” Sera bit her lip. “I cannot explain it otherwise, and John’s connection to Moji was more powerful than mine. I linked through him, rather than on my own.”

  “It felt like I fell into the connection. I felt helpless…and somethin’ in me propelled along the connection. It all happened so fast, I don’t know if I’m even rememberin’ it right. It was like ridin’ alongside in his head, while it was all goin’ on. We were there for the end.” Now it was John’s turn to go silent. He remembered every single moment with stinging, painful clarity. Part of him wanted to wash it from his memory…but the larger part of him never wanted to forget his friend’s bravery and sacrifice. The pain! They had lost plenty of people, and several had affected John greatly, but this…he had felt it! How could the good, especially those as good as Molotok, die, and still for it to be a just world?

  Because if the Infinite made it a just world, it would be a world in which we had no Free Will. Would you choose that? He glanced sharply at Sera, and saw her gazing at him solemnly. I have told you, shown you that. Now you feel what it means.

  Doesn’t mean I have to like it much. And he didn’t, at all. There were implications there, about the limits of the Infinite, and what it meant to have Free Will. He didn’t want to ponder it all right now. Vickie was looking at the two of them expectantly, swirling her coffee in her mug.

  “You’re using your really Inside Voices again,” she said. “Care to share with the class?”

  “Nothin’ germane to the discussion, Vic,” John said quickly. He wasn’t sure he had sorted things out for himself, much less for anyone else. He and Sera could talk later, try to figure out some more of it. Make the world make sense…or some semblance of it. But before he could add anything, the television screen began flashing with the old, Original Star Trek “Red Alert” sequence, including the siren.

  * * *

  All three of them rushed to Vickie’s workroom. The worldwide battle map was alive with pulsing red spots. Reports and some video were coming in from the Colts and the overseas Overwatch One networks. The video was—apocalyptic.

  “Holy shit. It’s everywhere.” John looked down at Vickie; she had nearly thrown herself into her chair, fingers already moving at a blur against her backlit keyboard. “Is it another Invasion?”

  There was one monitor on the side that was scrolling up numbers just slow enough to read. “Yes. Smaller. Attacks are more precise,” Vickie said, biting off her words. “Too many to be answered by conventional security forces. We’re scrambling everything, but at least we’re coordinated this time.” She paused for a moment, listening to someone on the other end of her comms. “Most of the attacks are just outside the engagement range of a lot of our stuff; it looks like they’re intentionally going after targets that are further out—damn, they’re moving fast.” The video feeds from hotspots appeared to be pulled from conventional news sources. Vickie confirmed that with a muttered “Why in hell do TV cameramen think their camera is a shield?”

  “How in the hell did they get in place without us knowin’ about it? That’s what I want to know. This is…huge,” John said. To get that many Thulians into place would have taken a massive mobilization; there’s no way that it could have gone unnoticed until Death Spheres and trooper armor were on every nation’s doorsteps. In the First Invasion, it had been a sneak attack: pure terror. The Second Invasion had been to cut the heart out of the resistance to the Kriegers; there had been warning for that, and everyone had responded and defended themselves. It had largely been a rout, with the Kriegers withdrawing before they were completely wiped out. There had been zero warning for this attack. They weren’t going after ECHO, CCCP, D.C., or Moscow—no major population centers at all, from what John could gather on the monitors. The Thulians were doing something drastically different, and he didn’t like it one single bit.

  “In the First Invasion…I saw a delivery truck unfold and dump out about twenty times the volume of Kriegers it could actually hold,” Vickie said. “I’d say that, plus a new delivery system.” It looked like some of the ECHO Fast Response Teams were getting on site in at least some places. “What the delivery system actually is, the gods only know.”

  To hell with standing here with our thumbs up our asses. John only had to look at Sera, and she already knew what he was thinking. “Vic, we’re goin’ to try an’ see some more, if we can. This might get a little weird.”

  “Just don’t short out my shit,” she said, and turned all of her attention to what she actually could do.

  “Let’s move back out into the livin’ room, darlin’. Vic’s in the zone right now, an’ we don’t need to mess with her equipment.”

  Sera nodded, and the two of them moved back onto Vickie’s much-abused couch. Sera looked down a
t it once she was seated. “Given what happened the last time, I am tempted to say we should sit on the floor,” she said dryly.

  “Not a bad idea.” They both took up position, sitting cross-legged across from each other. John put his hands out, palms up; Sera placed her hands into his, and they both closed their eyes. John took a careful breath, slowly letting it out. Just like that, they were seeing possibilities and potentials. This is getting easier. They stretched the sense out as far as they could; it looked much the same as before, with rivers of blurred light, small and dark eddies marking tragedy, and finally he and Sera, at the center of it all. But…they couldn’t push it any further. They couldn’t get the distance to push out, or go beyond the immediate future. He could feel himself straining; Sera was doing the same, but they had come up against a sort of…plateau.

  We’ve got to try somethin’ different, darlin’.

  Close in the focus; bring it in and onto ourselves?

  John relaxed, letting Sera guide him through the Futures. At first, they were still seeing all of Atlanta, an island of blue and gold light. Then it was as if they were falling; slowly at first, then much faster. The “view” collapsed back with a halt until it was just the two of them that he could see. Things quickly began to change; both of them became much hazier, in his vision and then—

  —he was watching through Sera’s eyes—not Now Sera’s, but a Future Sera’s—as he found himself—both of them—stumbling through what looked like the aftermath of a nuclear strike. People stumbling blindly past them, moaning, their faces half-melted—

  —a prison camp. Like Auschwitz, or Bergen-Belsen, but these people were all wearing modern clothes, their clothing hanging loosely on half-starved bodies—