ONSET: My Enemy's Enemy

by Glynn Stewart

  “He is excessively modest,” a distinctly cultured English accent cut across Paulson’s shoulder. “Sharif led his team to two Super Bowl victories.”

  “My teams won two Super Bowl victories,” Paulson corrected the speaker, a friendly-looking white-haired man. “I was one player of many; we all did our part.”

  “And that is what we hope for the Elfin to do with regards to keeping our country—our world—safe,” the old man said. “I am, as I’m sure you’ve guessed, Lord Dominic Langley, Third Lord of the Conclave.”

  He offered his hand to David as if he hadn’t just introduced himself as the third-most senior member of the Elfin and arguably one of the at most ten most politically powerful supernaturals in the United States of America.

  “I appreciate you coming to this get-together, Commander,” Langley continued. “Riley and I, and our other allies in the Conclave, have done our best to bring around our brothers and sisters, but the Conclave looks first to the Elfin, then to the United States, and only last of all to Omicron.

  “Convincing everyone to sign on to this kind of accord is not easy. Unless I miss my guess, you’ve turned three votes already this morning! Well done.”

  “Is the vote going to be that close?” David asked.

  “In the end? No,” Langley told him. “Don’t expect it to be fast, however. We’ll argue back and forth for a day or two, come up with a counteroffer. It’ll take a week, maybe two, but the Conclave doesn’t want to see the country buried under a swarm of demons any more than you do.

  “Only a tiny handful are truly opposed to the deal. For most of the rest, it’s what we can get as a price,” he admitted. “Some even want to hold out for a permanent Committee seat, something I can’t see us getting short of the situation getting much worse.”

  Riley snorted.

  “I don’t need White to tell me that bunch is barking up the wrong tree,” he pointed out. “You know where I stand, my lord.”

  “The faster a deal is concluded,” David said, “the safer the very people we are all sworn to protect are. ONSET’s people are, frankly, burning out.”

  “That’s roughly what Riley here told me as well,” Langley said calmly. “Make no mistake, Commander; I have every intention of closing this deal as quickly as possible. If Wright and Day have a sufficient offer, I suspect we can have a vote in favor by the end of the week. But…” He shrugged. “Be realistic in your expectations. Riley and I will do what we can, but we also have an obligation to our Warriors and our organization to get a decent deal.”

  “I can appreciate that, sir,” David replied. “But it’s my friends that are on the front lines right now.”

  “And we can appreciate that, Commander,” the old Lord told him. “Barring utter disaster, Commander, we will stand shoulder to shoulder with your brothers and sisters before the month is out, I assure you.”

  “If you’ll excuse us, my lord,” Riley said after a moment’s silence, “there are others here who need to meet with the Commander. Our work is not done yet.”

  Chapter 7

  By the time the meet-and-greet died down, David had been introduced to another five Elfin Lords, all of whose names and faces blurred together. Meeting twenty percent of the Conclave in the morning was more than he’d expected, and he was feeling a little drained by the time he escaped.

  He was unsurprised to find Hellet waiting for him outside the room as the crowd started to disperse, the Lords and their Seconds slowly beginning to drift toward the big conference hall where the Committee members would make their presentation.

  “Where are we at?” he demanded as she dropped into step beside him.

  “Lieutenant Ward’s people are in position,” she told him, indicating a four-man patrol drifting relatively discreetly through the room. They’d done their best, but their cheap suits stood out like sore thumbs amidst the perfectly tailored wear of the Elfin’s leaders.

  “We have a full command center in the second-floor south meeting room, as planned,” she continued. “We have feeds from local cameras out four blocks in every direction, and Ward brought four quadcopter surveillance drones with him to fill in the gaps.”

  “Very nice,” David allowed. “Any concerns?”

  “The fact that we have somewhere between seventy and a hundred Class One supernaturals in the building, enough Class Twos and Threes to bring the total up to a hundred and sixty-four, not including ONSET Thirteen, and fifty of them have swords that can cut through anything?” she asked. “Nothing. It’s like being back teaching kindergarten.”

  “Fifty-one have swords than can cut anything,” David pointed out, tapping Memoria’s hilt.

  “That doesn’t help, sir.”

  Further argument was interrupted by their arrival at the second-floor command center.

  “Ward,” David greeted the commander of his mundane troops. “Do we have an ETA on our politicians?”

  “Stone took a fireteam of my people out to the airport to grab them,” the AP Lieutenant reported. “ETA is just over five minutes—though I haven’t confirmed that in about ten minutes.”

  “They have twenty-five before they need to be in the conference hall,” David pointed out. He tapped his earpiece, setting it to one of the several preset channels.

  “Agent Stone, what’s your status?” he demanded.

  “Medium traffic, but Ward’s people are doing fine driving in convoy,” the ONSET Agent reported. “ETA unchanged; GPS calls it just over four minutes.”

  “Can you let Commander White know we want to speak with him when we arrive?” another voice said in the background, presumably one of the two Committee members.

  “Senator Day says that he and Wright want to speak with you when they arrive,” Stone relayed obediently, though he knew David had likely heard the politician.

  “Their time will be limited,” David replied. “I’ll meet you in the parking garage. We’ll make it happen somehow.”

  #

  At some point recently, the parking garage had been renovated with an entirely new lighting setup—presumably because it was more efficient, but it also meant that the underground space was extremely well lit around David as he watched the two black cars—borrowed from the local FBI office—slip neatly into place in the slots kept open for them.

  Stone was the first one out of the cars, the big man’s gaze sweeping the surrounding area to check for threats before he even allowed the mundane troopers to exit.

  Those troopers spread out into a rough cordon around the cars and the two ONSET agents before the politicians managed to extract themselves from the vehicles. Senator Day couldn’t have been more stereotypical if he’d been come from a cloning press: middling height, somewhat paunchy, with shockingly white hair around a large bald patch.

  Congressman Wright was significantly younger and still in possession of his bright red hair. He followed Day a respectful step back and to the right.

  “Commander White,” Day greeted David, stepping forward with surprising energy for his age and shaking David’s hand enthusiastically. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. I wanted to thank you personally for your efforts in Manhattan.”

  “It’s not every day we have to sign off on a nuke,” Wright added quietly as he also shook David’s hand. “And I don’t think I’ve ever been as relieved as I was when I learned it wouldn’t be necessary.”

  “Frankly, sirs, it’s your job today to make sure we never get to that point again,” the Commander replied.

  “Indeed,” Day confirmed grimly. “But Wright and I are only here for today, Commander White—and I don’t expect the Conclave will have a response for us today. If they’ll let you, we need you to sit in on the Conclave debates as the representative of the US government and Omicron.”

  The thought of sitting in that room listening to several days of speechifying was almost physically painful to David.

  “Surely, there are more qualified people.”

  “Not available,” Day said gruf
fly. “And not that command the level of respect you have with the more-informed portion of the supernatural community. If we ask to insert an unknown observer, they may refuse. If we ask to have you sit in as our observer, they are unlikely to deny us.”

  “We won’t make you,” Wright interjected with a dark look at his companion. “But…it would be a service of great value to the United States.”

  “I’ll do it,” David said with a sigh. “I’ve as much stake in this mess as anyone else, I suppose.”

  “Thank you, Commander,” Senator Day told him. “It’s a small thing compared to the services you’ve already done your country, but from such small things are built great triumphs.”

  #

  The next several hours passed in that knife-edged boredom familiar to anyone who has ever stood sentry duty. David walked the rounds of the security posts, making sure that security shutters were closed over all but one of the outside exits and that Ward’s people were keeping a careful eye on things.

  The skylights over the main conference hall made him nervous, so he checked the roof accesses. The two ways to reach the center’s roof both came up from inside the building, and he made sure the doors were locked. No one needed to do maintenance on the big air conditioning units this late in the year, and if they did, they could do it after the Conclave was done.

  Returning to the command center, he looked over the cameras feeding in. Even with the dozen screens they’d set up split into four video feeds each, they didn’t have enough screens to watch every one of the perimeter cameras they’d accessed the feeds from.

  None of the stores and buildings whose security feeds David was watching had any idea a secret government agency was also receiving their camera footage. The level of authority Omicron had still made David uncomfortable at times, but they needed the security perimeter. This was the easiest way to get it quietly.

  “Anything pinging your spidey senses?” Hellet asked from behind him.

  “Depending on the moment, I only see about half to two seconds into the future,” David told her. “So no, nothing is ‘pinging’ my ‘spidey senses.’ Nothing out there”—he gestured at the cameras—“is registering as a threat at all.

  “Quiet so far,” he concluded. “May not last, but I’m not complaining.”

  “Agreed,” the Mage told him. “Coffee and donuts are in the corner over there.” She gestured. “The caterers are doing a bang-up job so far.”

  Grabbing a donut and a chair, he joined Hellet and Ward in studying the cameras.

  The best they could hope for, after all, was a few very boring days.

  #

  The first day of meetings wrapped up after six hours. David met Day and Wright on their way out, accompanied by Lord Riley and Seconds Young and Paulson.

  “It went well, I think,” Day concluded to David as he finished repacking his briefcase. “No vote today, but I didn’t expect one. How long do you think, Lord Riley?”

  “It could be two, maybe three days.” The Elfin Lord shrugged. “There is some sense of urgency on our part as well, to be clear, but this is a major decision for us to make—and one contrary to what many of us see as the purpose of the Elfin.”

  “We did request that you sit in as our representative for the remaining days of the Conclave, Commander White,” Wright noted. “They agreed.”

  “Yes,” Riley confirmed. “You won’t have a vote and, to be fair, you won’t even have a voice. But you’ll be allowed in the chamber. Not a usual event for us, but a minor concession that costs us little. It’s still a good sign for our cause.”

  “‘Our cause,’ my lord?” David queried.

  “Oh, I’ve made my positions on this perfectly clear to the Conclave,” the Lord said with a chuckle. “If it were up to me, the Warriors would have been in the field, backing ONSET teams, a week ago.”

  “We have already intervened in situations Omicron wasn’t aware of,” Paulson pointed out, the big ex-footballer shaking his head at the Elfin Lord. “While working together will take some time, do not think we will stand idly by while America burns, gentlemen.”

  From the way Day pursed his lips, he was thinking the exact same thing David was: without being officially deputized, any action by the Elfin Warriors was technically a vigilante action by an armed militia.

  But there were so many more Incursions than there had been a month before. Every player acting to stop them was a good thing, even if the legalities weren’t what the US government would prefer.

  “Please, Sharif, don’t say things our Omicron friends have to pretend they didn’t hear,” Riley told the Second with a chuckle. “There’ll be debate and complaining,” he continued to David and the two Committee members, “but I think they’ll all come around.

  “Can I invite the three of you to dinner?” he finished.

  “Our plane back to Washington is in an hour,” Day replied, shaking his head. “Officially, we never left DC.”

  “Understandable,” Riley agreed, turning to David. “Commander? Lord Langley will be joining us at the restaurant.”

  “Go ahead, White,” Day told him in a tone that turned “permission” into “instruction.”

  “Of course, my lord,” David agreed. He understood Day’s intent, too. Langley and Riley were their biggest partisans. Staying on their good side was essential.

  #

  Riley, it turned out, drove a dark-blue gull wing–doored electric SUV that easily fit the four of them but probably wouldn’t have taken the two Committeemen. The Lord placed his elf-blade in a case in the back that resembled an architect’s portfolio tube but was clearly custom-built for the weapon, and then gestured for everyone to get in.

  “It’s not far,” he told David. “We made the reservation online.”

  The vehicle’s navigation system kicked in and it accelerated smoothly out of the parking garage in near silence, Riley slotting them into Seattle traffic with practiced ease.

  “I love this city,” he said aloud. “I don’t get up to the Northwest nearly often enough.”

  “You run the…Louisiana section of the Elfin, don’t you?” David asked.

  “I’m based in Louisiana,” Riley confirmed. “My responsibilities as a Lord are more…ephemeral than most. Lady Xavier is actually the Elfin Lord for California.”

  “Langley and I watch Washington and Seattle,” Paulson rumbled. “The mess where Ekhmez was raised is starting to spill into our territory. I can’t understand why you didn’t just kill the bastard with heavy weapons right there.”

  “Higher-up wanted to take him prisoner,” David said with a shrug. “It was a stupid idea in hindsight, but we couldn’t know that at the time.”

  Of course, Omicron was now relatively certain the Cult of the Black Sun had infiltrated OSPI prior to the Incident, and co-opted mid-level analysts who had twisted reports to make the capture seem much more reasonable than it had actually been.

  Allies or no, David wasn’t sharing that tidbit with the Elfin.

  “Ah, here we are,” Riley announced, cutting off further conversation as he pulled into what looked like a suburban strip mall. “Don’t be fooled by appearances,” he added. “Langley has brought me before. The food is fantastic and the staff is discreet.

  “Not that any of us should be bringing swords or heavy weapons in,” he noted.

  “Memoria is well concealed,” David said calmly. “I don’t leave it behind.”

  “That wasn’t directed at you, Commander,” Riley replied with a chuckle. “Everyone in this car has a sword, after all. I’m just the only one who forged their own.”

  #

  Langley joined them an hour later, more than long enough for the tiny neighborhood steakhouse’s attentive staff to prove that their food more than lived up to its reputation.

  “Charlotte,” the old Lord greeted their waitress with a smile. “I’ll have my usual.” He gestured around the table. “Seconds, anyone?”

  David and Paulson exchanged wry glances�
�the most muscular men in a gathering of Mages, they’d already both eaten more than Riley or Young—and ordered a second round of steaks.

  The waitress took their orders with a smile, thanking “Dominic” before she rushed off toward the kitchen with a renewed spring in her step.

  “I apologize for being late,” Langley said as he took a seat next to Paulson. “Just because we have the Lords in Conclave doesn’t mean the business of the society stops. We’re in the process of opening a new private school down near Portland, and Lord Kenner and I are still arm-wrestling over how authority breaks down—the school is in Washington, but many of its students will be coming from Oregon as well.”

  “A school?” David asked.

  “Yes,” Langley confirmed. “While most of our current generation of supernaturals became supernatural by a process we don’t truly understand; we find that many of the children of supernaturals are being born supernatural.

  “It’s hard enough, sometimes, convincing adult Mages to play by the rules,” he continued. “How do you explain to a seven-year-old going to school for the first time that not only can no one else at their school levitate but that it’s a really bad idea for them to show off?”

  “We’ve spoken with Omicron, but state-sponsored schools for supernaturals are a long way off,” Riley told David. “Omicron has agreed to top up the regular funding for charter schools, but we’re the only organization with the pockets and the manpower to get any of them built.”

  “We are a lot more than the social club you Omicron people tend to write us off as,” Langley concluded. “There’s no state-level equivalent of Omicron, by and large. Most of the civilian affairs of the American people have been handled by small clubs. The Elfin tie those clubs together.”

  “Emme care mana emme pole,” Riley said quietly. “We do what we can,” he repeated in English when David looked at him in mild irritation. Unlike everyone else at the table, the ONSET officer didn’t speak Tolkien’s Elvish—though he could at least recognize it.