by DD Barant
“No,” says Cassius. “I’m going to give you exactly what you want, Jace—the chance to go after both Stoker and Asher at the same time. You’re going to spearhead the task force we’re putting together to take them down.”
I blink. I smile. I grin.
“Where and when?” I ask.
“The meet is sometime in the next few days,” says Cassius. “I’ve assembled a strike team—you leave in two hours. You’ll rendezvous with them on the ground, coordinate a tactical strategy and be in place when your targets congregate. After that—assuming you manage to take Asher alive and either kill or capture Stoker—you’ll be going home.”
Home. The word sounds strange in my ears. An obvious joke about Auntie Em burbles into my forebrain, but never makes it out into the air. There’s this sudden stinging sensation in my eyes.
“Good God Almighty,” Charlie says. “You actually made her shut up.”
“Screw you, sandman,” I say. I take a deep breath through my nose and pretend I don’t hear a sniffle in it. “You know you’re taking point, right? If I’m outta here, you’re expendable anyway.”
“Wouldn’t have it any other way,” he says. He puts just enough softness in his voice to make me want to punch him.
I can’t believe it.
I might actually be going home.
* * *
I’m staring out the plane’s window, thinking broody thoughts, when Charlie looks up from his magazine and says, “Don’t worry. We’ll get him.”
“Sure. As long as Asher doesn’t zap us all to the moon or something.”
“That’s what your shaman’s for, to protect us from things like that. Wolosky, right? She knows her stuff.”
“Good to hear.” What I haven’t told Charlie is that I have my own mystic ace-in-the-hole: a powerful magic relic that I inherited from Dr. Pete when he went rogue. Of course, I have no idea how to use it or what it can do, just that it’s supposedly charged with eldritch energy. It’s currently in my baggage, tucked between two pairs of pants. Maybe I can ask Wolosky for some advice on the proper use of an enchanted comic book.
“You know any of the others?” I ask.
“I did a tour with Brody—best thrope with a blade I know. Gunderson has a room full of trophies he won at ax-throwing competitions. Don’t know Wilson.”
“How about the lems?”
“You mean the ones on our side?”
I frown. “You know some of the ones working for Blue?”
“Not specifically. But I know lems with connections to the Mantle.”
“The briefing was a little skimpy on them.”
“I noticed. They’re a touchy subject, especially in Washington.”
“Yeah? Why’s that?”
“Because some of what they’re saying actually makes sense.”
That makes me pause. Charlie’s about as loyal—not to mention traditional—as they come. It’s hard to see him endorsing the beliefs of any radical anti-human group. “You going anti-establishment on me, Charlie? Going to start showing up at demonstrations and yelling about Mineral Rights?”
“I didn’t say I agree with everything they stand for. But they do make a few good points.”
“I’m listening.”
“For one thing, they think golems should be in charge of their own reproduction. Golems aren’t allowed to own or even work in lem factories, did you know that?”
“No. Guess they’re afraid you’ll crank up production and flood the workplace. Golem inflation—now there’s a scary thought.”
“We’re not a commodity, Jace.” I can tell by his voice I’ve ticked him off—and not in the usual way. “We’re people. We may not care about food or sex or any of the other ridiculously squishy things you’re all addicted to, but that doesn’t mean we don’t care about anything.”
“Hey, come on, I didn’t mean it like that—”
“The thing is, you need us more than we need you. The one thing—the only thing—us lems really need from the other races is to be made in the first place. After that, we can do just fine on our own. That’s the one basic right we demand—and it’s the one you’ll never give us.”
I should have said, Me? Don’t rope me into this, Kemo Sabe—if I had my way, every lem would pop out of the mold with three hundred pounds of spare clay, a set of DIY blueprints, and an extra birth certificate.
But I don’t. Did I mention I have this bad habit of making jokes at inappropriate times?
Because what comes out of my mouth is, “Duct tape.”
“What?”
“The right to reproduce, and access to unlimited duct tape. Those should really be the cornerstones of the golem constitution. You know how many times I’ve had to patch you up because you sprang a leak in some hard-to-reach place?”
He gives me a look even flatter than his usual stare. “The one thing we do have in common with you organics,” he says, “is a need for sleep. I think I’ll get some right now.”
He leans back in his seat, tilts his fedora down over his eyes, and proceeds to ignore me for the rest of the flight. Great start to the mission, Jace.
I spend the flight studying the files Gretch put together. They break down into two basic groups: my team and Tair’s. Silver Blue’s hired some of the best mercenaries in the business to provide muscle, while Cassius has done much the same by drawing on government assets. I feel a little bit like someone who’s just bought an NFL franchise and needs to review the starting lineup. But while I don’t know crap about football, I do understand the strategies and dynamics of a strike team.
I sigh, pull out my spray bottle of wolf pheromone, and spritz some more on. It’s got an aroma like a sheepdog that’s been rolling in a field of wet mushrooms, but rule number one when dealing with a pack is always to establish dominance. The pheromone makes me smell like an alpha female; that won’t automatically make me top dog, but it’ll get my foot—uh, paw—in the door. The rest is up to me.
Only three of my team are thropes, though—there are two lems and a pire, as well. I study each of their files in turn.
First up is Master Sergeant Otis Zayin, a lem who did three tours of duty in the first Persian Gulf War. Expert marksman with a compound bow, one of those complicated counterweighted deals with a pull like an anchor. I’ve seen a shaft from one punch through armor plate.
Next is Captain Caleb Epsilon, an NSA enforcer like Charlie. He’s my heavy weapons man, which on this world means he throws javelins. Big steel ones, useful in case I need to take down a plane or helicopter. Charlie himself prefers silver-coated ball bearings, kept in a spring-loaded holster up each of his sleeves.
The pire is Jane Wolosky, one of the Baby Biter generation that sprouted up after World War II. She’s my battlefield shaman, experienced in combat magic as well as being a specialist in the use of silver-nitrate-laced CS gas, aerosolized garlic, and a variety of acid sprays that’ll melt a lem’s plastic skin like a heat lamp on Frosty. They may not use bullets or explosives, but the supernatural races still know how to deal out industrial-strength death.
The three thropes are all NSA field agents, with a good sixty years of experience among them: Jake Wilson, Arnie Gunderson, and Joseph Brody. They’ll be using body armor and bladed weapons—Gunderson’s good with a throwing ax, Brody prefers a claymore, and Wilson likes a katana in one hand and a KA-BAR in the other. It goes without saying that all three can do major damage without any weapons except teeth and claws.
Plus, of course, Charlie and me. It’s a good team, but leafing through their files is making the gnawing sensation in my belly get worse and worse. They’re lethal, all right—but lethal is not what I need. I need Asher—or Ahaseurus, take your pick—alive.
My world has guns and bombs, while this one doesn’t. Except for my own personal hand-cannon—a Ruger Super Redhawk Alaskan, sometimes used to hunt moose—nobody here uses firearms, or even knows what they are. This isn’t a natural situation, either; it’s the result of a spell that
imposes a blind spot on the mind of every sentient being on the planet, one that’s been in effect for centuries. This spell was cast right around the same time that the one animating golems was being disseminated, which is why lems have more or less taken the place of firearms in this world; given the power and accuracy with which they can hurl things, they’re almost living guns themselves.
And the shaman who cast that spell is the same one I’m after.
What happens after I catch him is a big, scary blank; I have no idea how I’m supposed to coerce him into sending me home, or even if I can. And what if he decides to send me someplace even worse?
I stare out the window at the clouds below me and wonder just high up we are.
And what happens after we touch down.
TWO
The meeting’s in Vegas.
Remember what I said about this world being the same on the surface but different underneath? Well, sometimes that just doesn’t apply—there are places here that are just so mind-bogglingly different that they make me feel like I’m on a planet in a different galaxy as opposed to an alternate Earth. Places where everything’s indoors, where everyone’s a predator, where the action goes twenty-four seven and there are no clocks.
Oh, wait. That’s Vegas on my world.
So, yeah, pretty much the same here. In fact, Vegas seems custom-made for pires and thropes; about the only major difference seems to be smaller salad bars at the buffets. Oh, and the Transylvanian Casino—impressive, especially the blood waterfall. Other than that, it’s about as loud, tacky, sexy, and greedy as the Lost Wages I’m familiar with.
Maybe familiar isn’t the right word. I’ve only been there once, and some of the memories I have are kind of blurry.
Not all of them, though.
It was right after I graduated from the Academy at Quantico. There were two other women in my class, and the three of us decided to celebrate in style. We booked a suite for the weekend, grabbed our highest heels and shortest skirts, and hit the town.
We had a blast. I’d tell you about it, but you know what they say about Vegas? It’s true. History and Vegas have that in common; what happens in either place stays there. Well, except for tattoos and STDs, and we managed to avoid both.
It’s funny how some of the most enjoyable experiences of your life can make you the saddest. I guess it’s because the past is a country you can’t ever go back to—once it’s done, it’s done. Your passport gets stamped by the clock, and the only thing you have left is something that’s already fading. Memories are just postcards from a place you visited once.
I don’t usually spend that much time thinking about the past, and I’ve done so even less since I got to this reality. You can’t undo bad decisions or relive past glories; spending your time dwelling on either one will only lead to depression. Especially when you realize that the past contains more than just everything you’ve ever done; in my case it also holds the planet I was born on and every single person who lives there.
So, I don’t think about the past. I don’t think about the people I used to say hello to every day. I don’t think about the corner store where I bought low-fat potato chips and 80 percent cocoa dark chocolate. I don’t think about that pop song I used to hum on the way to work, or the secondhand store that I found my favorite blouse at.
But as the plane touches down, I find myself thinking about that weekend. Wondering what Stacy and Heather are up to these days. Haven’t talked to either one in a long time—Stacy’s working for the Bureau in Cleveland, while Heather quit to be a stay-at-home mom. God, we had so much fun …
Maybe I should look them up, when I get back.
* * *
It’s mid-afternoon when we land. Charlie and I take a cab from the airport to where we’re staying—not one of the high-rise wonders, but a run-down little mom-and-pop motel in the wedding district north of the Strip. Gravel parking lot, neon sign with one of the letters burned out, peeling red and white paint on side-by-side crackerboxes. Charlie hauls our bags inside while I get us checked in.
The rest of the team is already here, each one in their own room. We’ve reserved a separate unit for our command center, the place we’ll be meeting and planning.
I drop off the key with Charlie, then knock on the door to room thirteen. A pire in full daymask, gloves, and hood opens it—Jane Wolosky, I guess. I flash my ID, step inside, and close the door. The drapes on the window are pulled tight, and the bed’s been flipped up and stacked against the wall, a flatscreen on a rolling table parked in front of it. An eight-foot-long table with folding legs now occupies the center of the room, with six chairs around it.
The pire pulls off her daymask and goggles, revealing a sharp-faced woman with short blond hair. “Jane Wolosky,” she says, offering her hand.
I shake it. “Jace Valchek.”
“I was the first one here—thought I’d get us set up.”
“Good thinking. The others en route?”
“The lems just arrived, the thropes are freshening up in their rooms. We’re all here.”
“Okay. Get everyone together, all right? I want an ops briefing in twenty.”
“You got it.”
I go back to our room and find Charlie sitting on one of the twin beds patiently.
“All squared away?” I ask.
“Yeah. I took up most of the closet space, but the bathroom’s yours.”
I open the closet door and see at least half a dozen suits on the rack. “Jesus, we’re only here for a couple of days. What are you planning on doing, changing your outfit for every meal?”
“Meal? I don’t make a habit of cramming my body full of heated organic matter, thanks.”
“Suit yourself. As many times as you can, apparently.” I pause, then say, “Nice pinstripes.”
“Thanks.” He seems slightly less grumpy than he was on the plane, which I’m thankful for. Charlie isn’t exactly thin-skinned, but I can piss off just about anyone—and the last person in the world I want mad at me is my partner. Though it is the second time in the last few hours he’s used the word organic …
I take a few minutes to change clothes and clean up a little, and then Charlie and I head over to room thirteen.
They’re sitting around the table, waiting for me. I don’t waste any time; I walk to the head of the table, slap my files down and open them up. “Good afternoon. I know who all of you are, and I’m pretty sure you know who I am. Some of you know my enforcer, Charlie Aleph, as well. Any other introductions you can make among yourselves.”
I pause, sizing them up. The lems look as impassive as statues, but that’s pretty much the norm for them. Wolosky looks intent, focused. The three thropes, all in human form and seated on the same side of the table, look a little more skeptical; I think I know why.
I make a snap decision. “If you’ve heard of me, you know I’m human. The pheromone I’m wearing is cover for out in the field—I’m not a thrope and I’m not trying to pass for one.”
Brody, a redhead with a wide face and a flat nose, chuckles. “Good thing, too. You smell like my aunt Irma.”
“Well then, your aunt Irma must be a bitch from hell with a mean streak,” I say pleasantly. “Because that’s what I am. There’s a reason they call me the Bloodhound, boys and girls, and it’s not because I like to pee on fenceposts. I get who I’m after—no exceptions, no excuses. You work for me now, and I don’t give a good goddamn what you think of me—I care about bringing down the target, and by that I mean bringing him down alive.”
“I thought we had two targets,” Caleb Epsilon says. He’s the enforcer lem, same black sand interior Charlie has but a foot or so taller; he looks like he could throw a Buick through a second-floor window.
I’m already handing out information packets. “Our primary is this man, a shaman named Asher. Aristotle Stoker is secondary—we need him as well, but his survival isn’t mandatory.”
Wolosky studies the picture of Stoker she’s pulled out of her packet.
“The Impaler is our secondary? What did the other guy do, assassinate the pope?”
“We think he’s trying to peddle something to an international arms dealer named Silver Blue. Stoker may be the one buying it, or he may be setting up an alliance with the Mantle. Whatever the reason, all these players are going to be in the same place at the same time—and we’re going to take advantage of that.”
Wilson grunts. He’s a rangy-looking man with a shaved head and a Texas drawl. “What kinda resistance we lookin’ at?”
I walk over to the flatscreen, slip a disk into the slot at the base, and grab the remote. “Give me a second and I’ll show you.”
I let them read while I get the menu sorted out and find the files I need. I click on an option and a scowling, Teutonic face fills the screen.
“This is Heinrich Koltz,” I say. “Professional thrope mercenary. He heads a paramilitary band called the Dobermans, for reasons you can probably guess. He favors a forward-curving, top-weighted blade called a kukri, a Gurkha weapon. He’s been responsible for massacres in South Africa, Iran, the Philippines, and Bosnia. He’s probably the most dangerous, so we need to remove him from the game as quickly as possible.”
I switch to another file, and a photo of a grim-looking black woman. “Felicia Mbunte. Pire. Expert with a blowgun, which she likes to load with silver-tipped darts and neurotoxins cut with garlic and/or wolfsbane. Also extremely handy with a silver-titanium alloy garrotte. She’s lethal as both an assassin and a sniper—used to work for the KGB. Careful with this one—she’s a trained espionage agent, with skills that include disguise, surveillance, and sabotage.”
I take them through the files one by one, detailing the strengths and proclivities of each professional killer. Wolosky takes notes, the thropes ask the occasional question, and the lems just stare at me without blinking.
And then I get to Tair.
“This is Silver Blue’s top lieutenant,” I say. “He goes by the name Tair. He’s a biothaumaturge, a specialist in lem activation. Blue seems to trust him implicitly, and despite his lack of military training he’s as ruthless as any of them—and extremely intelligent. Don’t underestimate him.”
