“The Catholic Church also found this odd, and it was one of the items they looked at when they investigated how Carderone managed to carry out his murders without being caught by the Church’s internal authorities,” he explained. “Their investigation was thorough—very thorough. My information is that they arrested a significant portion of the Ordo Longinus in North America.”
David blinked at Michael in surprise. He knew that Rodriguez had been investigating the Church here, but he hadn’t learned of the results of that investigation.
“Through various avenues, we acquired significant quantities of information from that investigation,” Michael told them. “Sifting through that information, we came up with evidence suggesting that a massive demon-summoning ritual was being planned. However, despite the scale of the threat, we had no idea where until Dilsner ran a crosscheck. Why don’t you explain it?” he asked, gesturing to the hacker.
Morgen looked tired but also thoroughly excited.
“While we were digging through the files on this ritual, we ran across a reference to Stellar Noir Shipping being the company making the delivery,” he told them all. “This reminded me of some of the Elfin’s investigation into Carderone—the funneling of funds that we followed to Montreal.
“The company that technically owned that warehouse was Stellar Noir Shipping,” he explained. “I ran through a number of their shipment logs and managed to match up some of their outgoing shipment manifests with the manifests we had for the ritual. Thanks to the Familias Dresden, we now know that the Church of the Black Sun plans to summon their demon…here.”
With Morgen’s last word, Michael switched the image from the iron sun to an overhead image of what appeared to be a lodge of some kind. Snow on the ground around the lodge—in mid-autumn—suggested it to be northerly and high in the mountains.
“This is a hunting lodge, owned by a senior member of the Church of the Black Sun, in northern Washington State,” the werewolf explained slowly, “about a hundred miles south of the Canadian border, and further from anything that can actually count as civilization. There is one road leading to it.
“According to the information we have, both the data on the Church and the files extracted in Montreal, the Black Sun has concentrated a massive stockpile of summoning supplies, multiple high and low Mages, and an unknown number of weapons at this lodge.
“They plan to summon into this world a demon called Ekhmez,” Michael said finally. “We know almost nothing about him, but they believe his power will be unstoppable if they succeed.” He paused and looked at the demon among their own ranks. “Ix, do you know him?”
The human-looking creature considered for a moment, running his long fingers along the ridge of horns across his forehead. “No,” he finally admitted. “That doesn’t mean much,” he continued. “There are many demons beyond the Seal, and they’re not exactly a bunch for remembering names—or even using the same names, often enough.”
Michael nodded and turned back to the screen.
“We have to assume that their ritual is going ahead as planned,” he told his people. “We are coordinating with OSPI on this mission, as ONSET currently only has this team and a company of Apes available.”
“We’re it?” Kate asked. “Isn’t that a little underpowered?”
“Unless the ritual is completed, we don’t expect heavy supernatural resistance,” Michael replied. “We also have a full company of Anti-Paranormals—a hundred and sixty men, including their heavy weapons teams—and it looks like we’ll have four platoon equivalents of OSPI’s security people, as well as the SSTTR team. That’s over three hundred mundanes equipped to deal with the supernatural, and the Stutters’ forty supernaturals.
“We’re the spear point,” he told his people, “but we’re not doing all the work.” He gestured to the map and clicked the mouse, and four flashing blue circles appeared on the screen, one of them on the road, the other three in the hills around the lodge.
“AP Company Six will be splitting their heavy weapons platoon into four components, each of which will be attached to an OSPI platoon and positioned at one of these locations. Their job,” Michael said grimly, “is to make sure no one gets away.”
“The Apes will be joining us on the ground. They will insert at the same points as the OSPI platoons by heavy-lift chopper at H-hour minus two and attempt to quietly encircle the lodge.
“At H-hour, we will launch a Pendragon-borne assault onto the lodge’s roof as AP Six seizes the exits. Our task,” the werewolf explained, “is to penetrate the ritual space and disrupt the ritual—if necessary, by killing all of the participants.
“We don’t know where the ritual space is, and we do not currently have blueprints for the building,” he admitted. “This is going to make our job harder.”
That was an understatement in David’s opinion. The lodge was three stories high and sprawled across an impressive area of ground for something built in so remote an area. Searching it room by room was going to suck.
“Do we have the sanction for that kind of force?” Bourque asked in response to the order to kill the ritual participants.
“That decision will be made as soon as the Committee of Thirteen gets together for an emergency meeting late this evening,” Michael replied. “Until that session is over, we do not have a go on the mission. However, due to the necessity of the timeline, we will be rendezvousing with AP Six and the OSPI men in Washington within the hour. Pack your gear, people,” he ordered. “We may get called back before we go in, but we are damned well going to be ready to go in!”
#
David was most of the way through loading up for the mission when he went to grab his M1911 and remembered that he didn’t have it anymore. The old automatic had saved his life when Dresden had come at him, but it had ended up in two pieces and no one had been able to fix it.
“David,” Michael barked, as he was looking at the empty spot in his locker that should have held his sidearm. “Come here.”
The younger agent crossed to his Commander, carefully not noticing the languorous stretches Kate seemed to feel obligated to do where he could see them once she had the skintight combat suit on.
“Yes, sir?”
“Here, take this,” his Commander ordered, handing him a black gunmetal case. “Meant to give it you before, but we haven’t been on active duty since you lost your Colt.”
David opened the case to reveal the futuristic lines of the Omicron Silver caseless sidearm. Michael then passed him four of the metal magazines that held the rounds and took the gun out, holding it carefully so David could see it all.
The gun consisted of a standard pistol grip, but the barrel had an angled shroud attached that cut down at thirty degrees and left just over an inch gap past the trigger. Two slits ran along the triangular barrel shroud, venting the gas to the side, and another curved over the top of the weapon.
“Magazine holds fourteen forty-five caliber caseless rounds and goes in the grip, like most other handguns,” the werewolf grunted. “Watch your hands here and here,” he said, pointing at the two vents on the side and the one on the top. “Gas vents mainly through the rear vent, canceling much of the recoil,” he continued. “Still, the side vents get pretty hot. Do not touch the barrel shroud after burst fire.”
David blinked. “Burst fire” wasn’t a term he associated with a sidearm, but now he looked, the little switch on the side of the barrel had an extra position for burst along with safe and ready. Burst fire from a .45 handgun wasn’t something he’d want to try unless desperate, and would likely break an un-Empowered human’s arm. He nodded his acceptance of the quick lesson and took the firearm from Michael.
Removing the old holster from his belt and replacing it was a matter of moments, and he slid the new magazines into the ammo pouch on the combat harness. The new sidearm now locked and loaded, he turned to look at Michael.
The werewolf Commander wasn’t in harness like the rest of them, but he regarded
them all calmly, with a bit of a twinkle in his eye, David thought.
“You’ll be rendezvousing with AP Six and the OSPI personnel at an Omicron-owned covert facility in Montana—a leftover staging barracks from the Incursion,” Michael told them. “I will meet you there by H-hour minus three at the absolute latest with the go or no-go from the Committee of Thirteen. Until I get there, Agent Mason is in command. Understood?”
David spared Kate a glance as he chorused “Yes, sir” with the rest of the team. The young Mage seemed only mildly perturbed at being placed in command of a team that was, to a man, woman and demon, older than her.
She caught his gaze and returned it levelly, without any of the small smiles she usually gave him. He quickly glanced away. Sometime while they were in Montreal, Kate had become somewhat colder with him. Still friendly—still friends, he was pretty sure—but still a little cool.
He wasn’t sure what to make of that just yet.
Chapter 30
The Pendragon set down in the last fleeting rays of daylight as the sun descended behind a mountain to the west of them. The mostly dead grass around them rippled away from the draft as the rotors slowed to a halt and Akono turned the chopper’s engines off.
ONSET Nine’s members, faceless under black-fronted helmets, disembarked in the field. David shivered against the autumn chill as he and his fellows crossed to where a tall man in camouflage gear waved them over to him.
“Welcome to our base site for this little excursion,” the gangling Asian man told them. “I’m Captain Narita, CO of Anti-Paranormal Company Six.”
On closer inspection, David saw that Captain Narita looked cheery, but his face showed a story of wearing service. His left eye was clearly, to David’s Empowered vision, made of glass, which fit with a long and ugly scar running from just in front of his left ear all the way over to his right cheekbone. A matching chunk was missing from his nose. The vast majority of the Anti-Paranormals, David suddenly remembered, were the remnants of the two divisions of Army and National Guard who’d been drafted to fight the Montana Incursion.
“Good to see you, Captain,” Mason greeted him. While her face was invisible behind her faceplate, David could hear the smile in her voice.
“OSPI’s heavy choppers will be arriving just after dawn,” Narita reported as he led the way toward a number of prefab structures. “Their tactical platoons are with them. The Stutters came in by Pendragon about fifteen minutes ago.”
David realized, taking a moment to look around, that several of the enchanted gunships occupied the snow-covered field. A chill breeze was beginning to sweep through the valley of the base site, and it was shifting enough of the camo fabric over the vehicles to allow someone with David’s senses to count eight—nine, including Akono’s—of the aircraft.
“The Pendragons will be playing air support tomorrow, with the exception of your delivery drop,” the AP captain continued. “The Stutters will be going in with my ground element—can’t say I’m not glad to have them! You ONSET boys and girls have your own job,” he conceded, “but having Stutter’s forty-odd supernaturals on the ground with us is a nice boost.”
“Have you done any surveillance of the target site?” Bourque asked as the team followed the captain into a large central structure. Heated air hit them all like a brick wall, warm and muggy after the chill of the evening.
“We have four Predator drones running shifts, surveying the lodge,” Narita responded. “One has been modified with thaumic detectors, and we’ve confirmed the presence of unusually large quantities of magic, including at least four true Mages.”
“Those are our problem,” Kate said grimly, gesturing for the team to sit down. The inside of the building was mainly set up as a cafeteria, with a command center taking up one corner of the room. The team and Captain Narita took over a table as they continued.
“Have you located the entrances?” David asked, wondering how the APs intended to insert three quarters of a company—a hundred and twenty men, give or take—into an admittedly large structure with standard doors, especially when ONSET Nine’s Mages were going through the roof.
“We’re not using them,” the Captain replied with a grin. His scar twisted the cheerful expression, making it incredibly sinister. “My demo team is making up shaped charges as we speak. As I understand it, once we have the go-ahead, property damage is not on our list of concerns.”
#
The sunset through the mountains, David reflected later on, was beautiful. An eerie red glow now surrounded the peak the sun had sneaked behind on its final descent out of sight from the tiny valley they were using as a staging area for the mission.
Twilight had brought a further chill with it, and David was glad for the insulation in his combat armor. He’d found a suitably sized rock to watch the sunset from, to wait for the news in private.
Out here, only the wind and the occasional wolf howl disturbed him. Narita had sentries out, but the AP men were mostly at the southern end of the valley, where the company’s trucks blocked a small dirt road that wove its way down toward Montana. No one was bothering him here, tucked away in a corner of the camp.
His rock stood at the edge of the cliff at the north end of the valley. Beneath him, a sheer face dropped over a thousand feet to a river valley below. He suspected too much time would have passed for him to call Angela when he got back to the Campus, and out here, he forced himself to face the reason why he hadn’t called her.
He remembered her face after he’d killed Dresden. The mixed shock and horror. The fear at what he’d done—at what he was. That was what drove him away from his comrades tonight, he knew. The fear of what he had become.
They had all known for some time what they were and had adjusted to it. David wasn’t used to it yet. He wasn’t used to being supernatural, and he was afraid. Afraid of his own nature. Afraid of what his father would once have thought.
He didn’t want to become a monster, and he was afraid that it would be all too easy. He’d already seen it—Carderone, given gifts beyond mortal men, turning them to an evil beyond mortal men as well. David White faced the night wind coming in over the lip of the cliff and faced his fear squarely. He was afraid of becoming like Carderone, twisted into evil by his own power. He couldn’t deny it. He didn’t know if he could ever overcome that fear, somehow prove to himself that he was not tempted. But at least today, he knew what he feared.
“To serve and protect,” he whispered to the night air. His oath. His duty. If he failed at all other courses, if there was nothing else left to him, then there was that oath. That duty. That was his answer to his own fears. As long as he held to his oath, he would not fail.
David straightened from a slouch he hadn’t even realized he’d sunk into and faced the biting wind. He remained afraid of what he would become. He would not deny that to himself now.
David White laughed. He understood his enemy now. Understanding didn’t mean victory. It meant a fighting chance. David faced that bitterly cold wind and understood, for the first time, the battle he had to fight within himself to accept the choice he’d already made.
He was Empowered, and only by fully wielding the powers that he had discovered were his birthright could he truly serve and protect, as he’d sworn to do. As he must do, if he was to prove he was no monster.
#
David returned to the utilitarian barracks ONSET Nine was sleeping in to find Kate Mason, wrapped in a standard-issue blanket, sitting on a rock by the building, staring off across the calm alpine meadow.
He paused, behind her and out of her sight. Kate had been slightly more distant with him than usual since Montreal, though he wasn’t sure why. From what he’d seen, she’d generally been quieter and more distant with everybody.
Whatever the reason, she was sitting out here in the cold, and David wondered just what was going on. He suspected it might be part of why she’d suddenly been placed in apparent second-in-command of the team.
“Penny for
your thoughts,” he said finally, approaching her from behind.
She started and turned to look at him. “I didn’t hear you coming,” she accused him.
“If I clomped around the way I used to, I’d give myself a headache,” David observed. “Like I said, penny for your thoughts.”
“Not sure I have change,” the Mage replied. “Pull up a rock if you want, though.”
David glanced around quickly, noting a major lack of appropriate rocks, before shrugging and settling on the ground. While the grass was cold, it was pretty dry.
“I hadn’t realized you were out here,” Kate told him as he sat.
“You weren’t paying attention,” David replied gently. “I left the barracks an hour ago.”
“Damn,” she said softly. “I wasn’t at all, was I?” She looked away from David for a moment, staring across the meadow again. “It’s been one hell of a week,” she told him quietly. “Since Montreal.”
“What happened?” David asked. The team hadn’t talked much about Montreal while locked in that Canadian hospital, and when Kate had come back from her leave, she’d been closed off.
“The vampire I killed,” she said softly. “He was a Mage too—a powerful one. I reached deeper than I ever had before to fight him. When it was done, I’d…changed.”
“Changed?” David repeated. She looked the exact same to him, but the thought caused him to look at her, with his Sight. The instant he did, he knew what she meant. The pale blue color that wove through her aura marking her as a Mage was no longer pale. It now pulsed with a deep azure fire.
“What do you know about ranking among Mages?” Kate asked, and David blinked at the apparent non sequitur.
“Not much,” he admitted.
“Ah,” she said quietly. “Then this may take some explaining.
“We don’t rank ourselves,” she began. “It’s not even really something we have control over. At a point in our lives, something happens. We become a Mage—a weak one, what the US College of Arcana calls a First Circle Initiate. Eventually, you meet a challenge and master it, growing more powerful and becoming a First Circle Master.
ONSET: To Serve and Protect Page 25
