"Let me guess. Delores Greenly? Short, overweight, way too high an opinion of her own importance?"
"Yeah, that's the one. I take it you two have had a difference of opinion?"
"You could say that."
"Well if it's any satisfaction, I didn't think much of her either. It's Bob by the way. I do have to ask a few questions. How do you know Professor Two Elks?"
"Listen, Bob, really, this is a Federal case now. It's related to an ongoing murder investigation that Mary was helping us on. I only came in to talk to Mary's associates on a related issue. However, I would like to know how they took Mary, do you know anything about that?"
"Dude, I can't give you anything without the Watch Sergeant's OK. You're still officially a person of interest." Bob sounded almost frustrated, I'm pretty sure that he believed me, but like cops the world around, he was often handcuffed by procedure.
"OK, let me help clear this up." I called Pat, and had her call the campus police sergeant. After about five minutes of back and forth in conference call mode, everyone understood and believed that I had nothing to do with Mary Two Elks' disappearance. They also understood that the Federal Park Service Police had the lead in this case. I then explained to Bob that I needed to talk to one of the other faculty members about some magic questions that I had. I also asked if there was anything known about how she came up missing.
Bob was far more forthcoming about things once he knew that I had a right to the information. It seems that the last anyone had seen Mary was at her morning class yesterday. After class one of her students reported that a 'Mexican looking dude' walked up to her and asked her something, they walked off talking. She missed all the rest of her classes, and an afternoon meeting with the Dean. This brought the cops out, at the Dean's insistence. Bob and his partner had been looking for her appointment book, hoping to see if they could find out who this 'Mexican dude' was. Once they found out that this was not just a case of a woman walking away from her job, they changed what they were looking for. Almost immediately they found the answer to my question of how Mary was taken. Buried in the trash was a set of gloves, the sort that are so transparent you wouldn't notice someone was wearing them if you weren't looking. The right glove of which was turned inside out, like you would peel off surgical gloves, and there was something smeared on it . We would have to wait for the lab to prove it, but I was sure that it was some sort of contact drug, possibly in a DMSO solution. Well, maybe we could get prints off of the inside of the gloves and get the actual snatcher. Frankly this was more a curiosity to me than anything else, I figured to kill the kingpin of this tonight, and I was sure that Mary could ID the actual snatch man if we didn't get him when we got Marina.
Yes, I know, planning to kill a suspect was wrong from a cop perspective. I wasn't looking at it from a cop perspective though. I was looking at it from the perspective of a pissed off combat vet that had had his woman taken hostage. I could justify myself if I wanted to by saying that murder and kidnaping aggravated by magic use was an automatic death sentence, and that I didn't believe that I could take her captive safely, but I wasn't going to lie to myself. I wanted to kill this bitch, and I was going to use any means necessary to do this, as long as Mary didn't get hurt in the process.
After I finished talking with Bob and his partner about the snatch, I asked who else on the faculty might be able to answer questions about artifacts, and magical devices. They said that the only clue they had was the faculty directory. When we looked through the directory, we found an Xaja Michaels who was listed as an Assistant Professor of Magic with a degree from the U of Florida, and a doctorate from UC Berkley in Alchemy. Perfect.
A short walk down the hall brought us to her office, where a research assistant informed us that the good doctor was teaching a lab right now, and would be happy to get back to us in a day or two. I explained to this bright young man that 'that answer would not do'. I tried not to use too much force in the explanation, but I'm afraid my patience, which isn't great at the best of times, wasn't up to scratch on this. I never laid a hand on him though, which I thought showed great control on my part. After I set the lad straight on just exactly how important it was that we see the good doctor, he told us where the class was being held. With him in tow, we headed for the classroom in question.
Dr. Michaels was tall for a woman, about six foot even, weight around 210 pounds, a redhead with a little bit of gray shot through. She wore glasses, had a nice butt, and perky tits, small, but perky. At a guess she was about forty-five years old. As we walked up to the door of the lab she was leaning over a student and watching something in a glass beaker that was cooking over a burner. After a few moments, I cleared my throat to let her know we were there. '
Without looking up, she said. "Just a moment, I'll look at yours once I'm sure this reaction is stable."
Well what was I to do? We waited patiently for another few minutes for her to finish watching. I'm not sure what she was looking for, but 'making sure a reaction is stable' implies that if it isn't, it might go boom, and unintentional booms are something I try to avoid. After a bit, she looked up, and said "Yes, who needed help?"
"That would be me, Doctor," I said.
She looked at the door, scowled and asked, "Who are you, and how long have you been there?" I couldn't tell if she had any emotional content or not, the smell of so much different magic in the room completely overwhelmed my nose.
"I'm the guy that needs help, and I've been here since just before I cleared my throat."
At this point her research assistant butted in and said, "They're some sort of cops, he says it's about Doctor Two Elks' disappearance," and pointed at me.
"Dan, I'm sure the officers can answer my questions all by themselves. Why don't you assist some of the students while I straighten this out." She turned to us and asked, "Now, why do you think I can help you with Mary Two Elks' disappearance? I haven't seen her or talked to her in several days."
"Doc, this is something that would be better done in private. Do you have a private lab we could go to?" I responded.
"Well I suppose, but I'm telling you, Mary and I aren't that close. Follow me." She led us to the back of the lab room, where a private lab was set up in what looked like it was supposed to be the professor's office. It was quite cozy with four cops and a professor in it and the door closed. Once Dr. Michaels closed the door, she looked at me again, and said, "OK, now what's the big secret?"
I got out the gold, and unwrapped it. She let out an involuntary gasp, and said, "Gods is that real?"
I replied, "Yes, and that's what we want to see you about."
"I've never seen it before in my life." Michaels declared.
"Uh, you want to wait until we accuse you of something before you deny it? We need to know if there's anything magical about this stuff." I said.
"Sorry, I'm just not really comfortable dealing with cops. What should I be looking for? Oh, and call me Xaja."
"'Salright, lots of folks are jumpy around us, sort of like around mages." I gave her a wry grin. "Someone seems to want this stuff back really bad. And they seem to be able to locate it, but only when it's on a living body. I need to know how they're doing it, and why they want it back so bad. Mary handled this stuff extensively and didn't notice anything magical about it, so I don't know what the hell is going on. We're hoping you could provide some light."
"Well as to why they want it back, Duh! It's gold," Xaja snapped.
"No, we think there's more to it than that. And there seems to be a time limit that they need it back by."
"Well, let me see it then." I handed it to Xaja, and she spent the next hour measuring it with some sort of instrument, both on a table, and in her hand. She held it above the fumes of some sort of chemical, and it glowed a bright green, at which point she damn near dropped it. She set it on an altar and spoke some words over it while moving a knife around, and several other things, and then turned to us with a smile on her face. "I'm not surprised Mary
missed it, it's not exactly up her alley."
"What's not exactly up her alley?" I was getting more than a little exasperated at this point.
Xaja seemed to shift into lecture mode. "Well, it's like this. Mary is an expert in 'Life magic'. She also works as a 'Clerical Mage', and doesn't do a lot of artifact work." I gritted my teeth until she went on. "This is involved with Necromancy, and uses a life force only to power the spell. The only reason I found it was the clues you gave me on what to look for, and the fact that I do 'Physical magic', vice 'Life magic." she said as if this explained anything.
"OK Doctor, now how about telling us what the hell that means, in simple sentences using words with two syllables or less, that this poor stupid cop can understand."
She looked at me as if to say, 'I did'. Then sighed and said, "Look, a paleontologist knows lots of things about dinosaurs, but may not know much about the care and feeding of a modern gecko, even though they're related. Right?" I nodded so she went on. "Mary does 'Life magic', which means that she can heal, talk to and control animals, do a fair amount of things with plants, like make them grow at a super accelerated rate, or not grow in a certain area. She can also locate and identify living things, and get them to do what she wants, even at the molecular level. And of course she has the same defensive magic that almost any trained mage has. From a cop perspective, she can find people, living or once living things, heal the sick or wounded, cause sickness or wounds that sort of thing. She also works with a deity, so she can do anything that White Buffalo will allow her to do. But she usually has to ask before she gets a skill, and it may not stay with her after she no longer needs it. You get all of that?" I nodded again.
"My expertise is more in the material world, think of me as a physicist vice a biologist. I can interface with living things, but I make a charm or amulet to do so, vice doing it directly. I can't do the detailed things that Mary can do. Like, I can protect you from getting a virus, but I would have to do it by making an amulet that would protect you from all viruses. Where Mary could just make any or all viruses think you 'taste bad'. On the other hand, I'm used to having to make a device, and set it up so that the wearer provides the energy to make it work. That's what we have here, there is a very subtle locator spell on this stuff, and it's powered by the wearer. You have to know just what to look for to find it. But the important thing is that this stuff is also like a hard drive for a computer."
"Say what?" OK now I was really lost.
"These artifacts hold an imprint of the wearer. The last person to wear all of them I would guess. It looks like when you put all of them on, you complete a circuit, and your body and memory become part of the unit. Oh, I'm explaining this poorly." She looked as exasperated as I felt. She took a deep breath and tried again. "Look, let's run with that computer analogy. If you wear all of this stuff at the same time, it stores a master of your program in itself. I think this program is restorable, if you know how."
The light dawned. "Are you telling me that if you know what to do, this can bring a dead body back to life?" I asked.
"Not exactly. You don't need the body. If you know how to do it, I think these artifacts can recreate the individual that was wearing them at the moment he or she was last wearing them. A clone if you will. I'm not sure what that will do to the individual that's being cloned though." She looked slightly embarrassed to admit that.
"Doesn't matter, the last individual to wear all of this stuff has been dead for about a month." I replied.
"Oh, well that explains the time limit then. These artifacts will not hold the matrix indefinitely. I don't know how long they're good for, but it's probably only a few weeks, maybe months, before the stored matrix starts to degrade. After that, you risk getting a damaged copy, and the ceremony would have to be done at a certain time of the month or year." She smiled as if she had just discovered something clever. I suppose she had at that, but it was the cause of Mary's current predicament. I wasn't smiling. "Oh and one more thing, TANSTAFL." OK, that I recognized. There Ain't No Such Thing As a Free Lunch, which is a colloquial way to explain the laws of physics.
"OK, lay it out for me. How much energy is it going to take to restore the dead guy stored on this set of artifacts to life?"
"Well, remember that nothing is one hundred percent efficient. Probably three, maybe more deaths worth, but you might get it for less if they were preternatural individuals, or otherwise really powerful."
Swell. Like mages, and 'Thropes; that's just ducking fucky. On that bright note, we left Doc Xaja to her class, and my tail and I went home. It was 15:30, sunset was 16:20.
18
The run back to the house was about the norm for this time of year. Fortunately the traffic disaster that is I-5 at the south end of Everett hadn't started yet today so we got home in a reasonable time. I pulled in the drive at about 16:10, and headed for the house. I had a lot to tell, and possibly a short time in which to say it.
As I walked through the door, Pam was sitting at the desk on the left side of the great room, Lars at the couch on the right. The rest of the surveillance crew was scattered around the room. I got inside enough to clear the door when everyone looked up at me with a WELL, WHAT THE FUCK? Look. "Well folks, here it is. The expert at UW says this stuff is powered by human contact. Wearing it or even touching it is enough to send a locater signal, like a homer, but human powered, vice battery. I also know why she wants it back so bad, and so fast. This stuff has an imprint of the murdered picker, it was her son. The good doctor believes that it can recreate the boy, sort of like a doppelgänger, but a full and complete copy of the boy as he was when last he wore all of the items and was intact."
Pam glared at me and said, "So you're saying this thing can bring her murdered son back to life?"
"Yeah, pretty much, but it doesn't need the body to do it. It will magically recreate the body." I gave her a wry grin. "No wonder she's so intent, huh?"
Lars saw the inevitable trap, "How much power?" he muttered with a grim look on his face.
"Oh three or four human deaths, maybe less if they're really powerful beings, or magical critters," I answered.
"Oh, Bull Fucking Shit!" Pam shouted. "No way! No fucking way! You are not going to do this exchange. John, you know it's a trap, you know they are going to try to kill both you and the hostage. NO! Not on my watch."
"Pam, I'm sorry, but this is not negotiable. They have Mary, and it's because of me that she's in danger. This may be the one, Pam. I am not going to get her back in little pieces because I will not risk myself. Ok, it's a trap. We knew that. OK, they want us both dead. We suspected that. Nothing has changed here."
"My ass nothing has changed." Good grief Pam was pissed, I had never heard her cuss this much. "Before, we just suspected that they might try to kill you. Now we are sure that they will try to capture and kill both you and the hostage. NO. Not happening." I shot a 'help me' look over at Lars, this was not going well, and I was not going to leave Mary there at the tender mercies of some crazed Aztec bitch because I was scared to come out and fight like a cat.
Lars took up the gauntlet. "Pam, if we don't try the counter trap, just what will we gain? Marina will just try again, and possibly kill or sacrifice Mary in the meantime. This is an Aztec Priestess we're talking about here, they have a bit of a history of chopping their enemies into little bitty gobbets. And can you imagine the PRESS." Oh there was a telling point, if the press got a hold of the story, and found out that we didn't try to rescue the hostage, Oh ugly. Time to stick my two cents worth in.
"Pam, the real fact here is that I'm going through with this, with or without official sanction. And I am afraid that in the end there is nothing you can do to stop me, short of killing me. Now there's irony for you, kill me to stop me from getting sacrificed on an altar? Besides, I think you'll find I'm a bit hard to kill."
Pam finally gave in to the inevitable. "Fine, the mission goes, but the rules of engagement have changed. On my authority as the Senior Feder
al Law Enforcement Official present, and deputy regional commander, the ROEs are now shoot on sight, shoot to kill." She picked up her cell phone and went off to the front porch. As if on cue, the phone rang.
"Good evening Mister Fisher," I heard when I picked up the phone. "Do you have my items, or do I send your woman home in many small boxes?" I felt the rage coming on, and started meditating as hard as I could, I didn't want to go Baresark yet. Gods, I was so going to enjoy gutting this bitch like a fish.
"Yes, I have your son's items. I want to speak to Mary." I said in a very cold voice.
"And if I refuse?" Marina replied in a very haughty tone.
"If you refuse, I will assume that Mary is dead. I will immediately have the items blessed and purified. If necessary, I will melt this cheap set of escapees from the Conquistadors down into slag, then make bullets from them. I will use these bullets to slaughter you and your followers, and you will never see your son again this side of Hel. Now that we both know what's at stake here, put Mary on the phone damn it."
As I said this, Pam walked back into the room. She stood and stared at me in horror. I'm sure she thought that this was a horrible bluff, and that I was risking Mary's life with bravado for no good reason. I'm sure I would be hearing about this. I'm also sure that she thought I had thrown away a good secret that we could use in the interrogation if there was one, and let the suspect know something I didn't need to. I didn't know how to tell her this, but it wasn't a bluff, I meant every word. I didn't mind letting Marina know that I knew about the jewelry, because that would make her a little nervous, and a little angry. Maybe even a lot angry. Angry people make mistakes. Yes, I know, I was angry too, but I had a lot more combat experience than Marina, and I knew how to handle the emotion without letting it control me. I was gambling that Marina didn't. Pam thought like a cop, I was thinking like a warrior. As I mentioned, I had no intention of arresting this woman, just killing her. Did that make me a horrible individual, and a bad cop? Maybe, but if it did, I could live with that.
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