And grendels. More grendels. One of the long crates contained yet another grendel arm.
With each crate was documentation saying where they’d been killed or collected, and if photography had been available at that time, there was photographic proof of the successful hunt. They ranged from high-resolution, full-color digital prints, all the way back to grainy, turn-of-the-last-century sepia tones.
Photographic and scientific proof of the existence of supernaturals. Predatory and dangerous supernaturals.
All packed in crates stamped “Property of the U.S. Government.”
It was a tabloid editor’s wet dream.
It was SPI’s worst nightmare.
I tried to put it all together in my head. The CIA was knowingly using vampires and possibly doppelgangers. A dead research scientist for the Department of Defense had a collection of supernatural predator hunting trophies hidden under his family mausoleum, and, at the time of his murder, had developed and perfected a device to render anyone—or anything—that wore it invisible and inaudible.
Right now, a pair of grendels were murdering their way through New York, unseen and unheard by their victims. Tomorrow night, the same individual who had sent Vivienne Sagadraco a taunting letter was going to aim them at Times Square and a crowd of nearly one million people.
Oh holy hell.
Ian came up beside me.
“This is about much more than a pair of grendels,” I murmured. I had to force my eyes away from the crates and their gruesome contents. “Kenji told the boss what he found on that flash drive?”
Ian nodded, his mouth tightened in a grim line. “As soon as he had confirmation.”
“You tell Moreau that my evil twin is a bowler?”
“I did.”
“And?”
“He’s about to tear this place apart until he finds that bag or what was in it. The new guy in Research found that you arrived twice at work yesterday—once with the bowling bag, and once without.”
“I was without.”
“That’s what I told him. When you and your doppelganger left yesterday afternoon, neither one of you had a bag.”
“Oh shit.”
“Yeah.”
“We’ve got CIA, DOD . . . so who the hell is doing this?”
Vivienne Sagadraco’s cool voice came from behind me. “At this point, neither, Agent Fraser.” Her gaze swept the tables and their contents, her steely eyes lingering and narrowing in barely contained anger at the sight of the baby dragons. “My source inside the intelligence community was able to tell me that the seed of this evil germinated in the minds of former employees of both organizations—but it was a CIA task force that was formed to investigate the feasibility of using, shall we say, unconventional weapons.”
“Supernaturals?”
“Yes. This task force proposed to exploit the talents of certain qualified creatures—whether voluntarily or through coercion—against the enemies of this nation.”
“That’s crazy.”
“So were many government projects. The Philadelphia Experiment is merely one that comes to mind. But your opinion is similar to that of senior CIA officials charged with finding projects to eliminate due to budget cuts. This particular project was deemed to be highly dangerous with little chance of success, so the project and its funding were discontinued, the task force disbanded, and its members either resigned or were reassigned. As far as the CIA is concerned, that was the end of it.”
“Looks like some of those people ignored the memo,” Ian said.
“I can say with virtual certainty that all of the task force ‘ignored the memo.’ We have closely examined the backgrounds of each of the seventeen individuals involved. All are either supernatural creatures or humans extraordinarily gifted in the dark magical arts. I believe they were assembled with a purpose, and used their positions within these agencies to act openly.”
Ian shook his head in amazement. “All the resources they needed were there for the asking. They operated with the full funding and cooperation of the U.S. government.”
“Was the vampire that’s been following me on this task force?” I asked.
“He was one of those who resigned.” Vivienne Sagadraco pulled a photo from a folder and held it out for me and Ian to see. “This woman was the head of the task force.”
I instantly recognized her. I’d seen her in another photo less than an hour ago; only in this picture she was wearing a cocktail dress instead of a wedding gown.
“Jonathan Tarbert’s wife was the head of the task force?” I shook my head. “Well, that certainly explains a lot.”
Vivienne Sagadraco raised a silvery eyebrow. “Tarbert’s wife?”
“I found their wedding photo earlier.”
When the boss spoke, it was almost to herself. “My, she did go to extraordinary lengths, didn’t she?”
I looked closer at the ex-wife and ex-CIA agent and my mouth fell open. “Is that what I think it is?”
The woman wore a multi-strand pearl choker with a carved, pale blue oval stone in the center, carved in an all-too-familiar shape.
“It is,” the boss said, “if you think it’s a scarab identical to the one used to seal the letter to me, and the tattoo on the palm of Adam Falke.”
I slowly sat back. “She’s the adversary.”
“Correction, Agent Fraser,” Vivienne Sagadraco said, her eyes hard and locked on the woman’s face. “This woman is my adversary, and the adversary of every principle I founded SPI upon.”
“You know her.” I didn’t ask it as a question.
“Only too well. It was my misfortune to share a nest with this creature, and not very amiably.”
I was stunned. “Your sister?”
Sagadraco nodded once. “I have not seen her since 1914. We had . . . a disagreement; it was but the latest of the many we have had. The scarab adaptation is new. However, she always did have a fondness for ancient cultures similar to our own—and for her given name. Tia is a shortened form of Tiamat.”
I went very still. “As in the dragon goddess Tiamat?” I saw Ian’s surprised expression. “I’ve flipped through Kenji’s D&D books.”
“Though in Babylonian mythology and in actuality, Tiamat does not have five heads,” Vivienne Sagadraco told us. “Which is fortunate, because it has always been sufficiently challenging for me to deal with the single head that Tia does have.”
My mind boggled at how old that made my boss. “That makes you . . .”
Vivienne Sagadraco smiled, though it was tinged with sadness. “A woman who is well aware of her age.”
“Excuse me, ma’am. I didn’t mean to—”
The boss—the dragon lady—waved a dismissive hand. “I take no offense, Agent Fraser.”
“Do you believe that Jonathan Tarbert was involved?” Ian asked.
“Unknown. The task force was strictly CIA. Dr. Tarbert’s research was for military applications—human military. And I cannot see Tia taking a human into her confidence. Her arrogance would prevent such a partnership. However, I can easily see Tia obtaining and exploiting the results of his research.”
I started running over the facts; trying to put the whole picture together in my head. “Tarbert’s lab burns down with him in it, and the flash drive with the plans turns up in the hands of his dead brother. Kenji said that the plans were four to six months old, and that from the notes, the device had been built, tested, and perfected.”
“Given that we have ample evidence of invisible and inaudible grendels, that conclusion is correct.”
“Your sister has the device,” Ian said. “We have the plans. Plans that ex-CIA agent Fitzpatrick was willing to kill Mac to get for his boss/your sister. At least she can’t make more devices.”
Vivienne Sagadraco nodded once. “At least not easily. Though given time, she coul
d reproduce them by disassembling the one that is in her possession. However, we would be foolhardy not to proceed under the assumption that Tia has more than one device at her disposal.”
“What does she want to get out of this?” I asked.
“Tia has always resented having to hide her nature from the world. The hazard with having a civilization worship you as a goddess is that you begin to believe as they do. The Babylonians were correct in naming her the goddess of chaos. Chaos and power are all that my sister is capable of loving. She employs manipulation as a means to an end, and does absolutely nothing without a reason. I believe she has found a new game that not only offers her entertainment and power; it will also enable her to destroy what I have done here at SPI. While far from her main goal, it no doubt would bring her great satisfaction. We protect humans and supernaturals alike. Tia would tear away the illusions, exposing humans to the reality of the supernatural world. In order to be out in the world in this present age, she has been forced to exist in a human body, and to live within its limitations. I am quite content; but make no mistake, my sister is not. She has told me that for a dragon to endure life as a human was the same as a human forced to suffer as the lowest worm.”
I let out a low whistle. “Your sister doesn’t have much use for us, does she?”
“Actually she has expressed two uses for humans: as slaves and as food.” Vivienne Sagadraco’s expression darkened. “In this century and the last, humans have developed technology that surpasses what was previously considered to be magic. They can defend themselves, even from a creature as formidable as my sister in her dragon form and at her full power. Her most earnest desire is to change this. Her letter to me said that humans weren’t at the top of the food chain and would soon know it. She also said that New Year’s Eve would mark the beginning of an enlightened new age.”
“That’s one thing I don’t get,” I said. “Okay, there’s a lot that I don’t get, but why would your sister send you a letter essentially telling you what she’s going to do?”
“Pride and arrogance. She will use the devices and the grendels in the most public way possible. Tia knows that I won’t sit by while monsters savage untold numbers of people. Knowing my sister as I do, I can surmise that she acted within the limitations of her human form, gained employment at the human agency that would give her the best access to what she needed to accomplish her ultimate goal—to put into motion events that would reduce the human race to what they once were, and what Tia believes they should be again—slaves and food.”
“Why not do it herself?” Ian asked. “Turning dragon and dive-bombing Times Square on New Year’s Eve would certainly make a statement, cause chaos, and it’d be a hell of a lot easier than wrangling grendels.”
“My sister would only appear and risk herself in such a way under the direst of circumstances. Simply put, grendels are vicious killers of humans, are visually terrifying and virtually indestructible. Times Square on New Year’s Eve is one of the most heavily policed events in the world. Thousands of what are essentially soldiers, heavily armed and well trained to react instantly to any type of attack scenario that they can imagine.”
“I bet they haven’t trained for grendels,” I said.
“Precisely. Which would cause a level of panic that has never been seen by so many at the same time. It would be broadcast live around the world.”
“Spooking the entire human herd,” I murmured.
“An apt analogy, Agent Fraser,” Sagadraco said. “No one would feel safe. Armed with the devices, Tia and her allies could launch attacks from anywhere at any time. Fear would turn to paranoia. People’s confidence in their law enforcement, military, and governments to protect them would falter and quickly fail. Those with her on that CIA task force represent my sister’s longtime allies. Creatures who resent hiding themselves from humans; who want to hunt and feed openly and as often as they wish. Humans with extraordinary magical gifts twisted by greed and evil, who resent hiding their dark powers.”
“There are certain vampire covens around the world that would gladly ally themselves with Tiamat,” Moreau said. “As would virtually all of the ghoul swarms and demon hordes. If Tiamat is successful tomorrow night, they would acknowledge her leadership and pledge their allegiance to her and her cause. Armed with the devices, they would be capable of appearing and vanishing at will. Humans would live in constant fear, banding together, never sure when or where the next attack would come from. Life on Earth would become a living nightmare.”
“My sister would consider it heaven on Earth,” Vivienne Sagadraco told us. “Tiamat fights to win. It is a fight that humans and supernaturals alike cannot afford to lose. I have failed to stop her before. We cannot fail to stop her now.”
15
POLITICIANS are right about one thing: budget cuts can be dangerous. Slash the funding to the wrong people, and you get a bunch of disgruntled, supernatural ex-CIA spooks going into business for themselves.
Combine that with my doppelganger having hidden a bowling bag full of unknown and potentially deadly contents somewhere in headquarters, and I had enough nerves to qualify for a nervous breakdown.
Vivienne Sagadraco had ordered headquarters emptied of all nonessential personnel. Which in SPI parlance meant the only agents who stayed were either experts in all forms of combat should the doppelganger still be here, those with the nasal talent needed to sniff out potential bombs, or the lab people and engineers still unraveling the workings of Dr. Tarbert’s “cloaking device” as they’d taken to calling it.
And then there was me.
One, the boss deemed it too risky—even with a bomb possibly in the house—to send me home. Two, if my doppelganger was still here and using one of Tarbert’s devices, I’d be the only one able to see her—if I could see her at all. My seer ability enabled me to detect veils, wards, etc., produced either by natural or magical means. I had absolutely zero experience with anything mechanical. Everyone still in headquarters—including me—hoped that I could. One way or another, we’d be finding out the answer soon enough.
I briefly squeezed my eyes shut against an incoming headache. There were just too many unanswered questions. And the longer they stayed unanswered, the longer we stayed screwed.
Vivienne Sagadraco very much wanted to have a chat with my doppelganger. So much so that when she ordered the nonessential folks out, everyone had to scan their palms before any exit would open for them and them only. The boss wasn’t taking any chances that my doppelganger would activate her cloaking device and try to sneak out on somebody’s coattails.
As to finding the explosives, who needed bomb-sniffing dogs when we had werewolves on staff?
Yasha and the five other werewolf agents who were working tonight had undergone extensive training to identify and locate the various pieces, parts, and ingredients that could go into making a bomb.
I tried to sit and relax, but the latter wasn’t happening, so the former was impossible. This much stress called for a sugar hit. I looked down at the carry-out container of banana puddin’ from the Full Moon sitting on my desk. I needed that puddin’. But first I needed a spoon. And milk. I had to have milk. I pushed back my chair and stood. “I’m fixin’ to go for milk,” I announced. “Anyone else want something?”
I went into the break room, got a spoon out of the drawer, a glass out of the cabinet, opened the fridge door . . .
. . . and stared.
My doppelganger hadn’t brought a bomb in that bowling bag—or even a bowling ball.
Ollie Barrington-Smythe’s blood-spattered toupee was perched on top of a honeydew melon.
And to make it extra festive, a fruit knife had been plunged through the top like a Lizzie Borden hatpin, and a face had been drawn on in black Sharpie that actually looked like Ollie.
As my vision went sparkly and my knees weak, my only thought was that my doppelganger was an artist. W
ho knew?
The combination of that and everything else left me with an overwhelming need to find a chair, sit down, and put my head between my knees.
“Ian.” I said it as loudly as I could while folded double in a chair.
Nothing.
“Ian,” I called again, going for more volume this time. “I found what was in the bowling bag.”
I heard more than one pair of booted feet running in my direction, and since I knew they were friendlies, I left my head right where it was and watched the light show behind my eyelids.
There were two obscenities, one guffaw, and an eww.
Ian’s hand was on my back. “Breathe.”
After about a minute, the sparklies started to go away. Breathing wasn’t particularly easy, but then I was wadded up in a chair. Air was way overrated anyway, especially when it smelled like overripe melon and something that must have been toupee glue.
“Is it Ollie’s?” Ian asked.
My voice was muffled between my knees. “Oh yeah.”
“The blood appears to be fresh; as to the claw marks, ghouls would be a safe bet.”
“Oh goody.”
“Though generally if kidnappers send a part or piece, it means the victim is still alive.”
“Generally?” I asked.
“Mostly.”
I slowly sat up. Minor sparklies, but no whirlies or woozies. “Aw jeez, my milk is in there.”
“It’s on the other side of the shelf.”
“From a bloody toupee.”
“Look on the bright side,” Ian said. “At least she didn’t leave you a body part.”
I stared sadly at the hairy melon that was even shaped like Ollie’s head. I felt my eyes start to tear up. “The toupee might be the only thing they didn’t eat.”
“There’s not enough blood for it to have been fatal,” Ian hurried to assure me. “But the melon and toupee couldn’t have been what was in the bowling bag.”
I sniffed. “Why not?”
“Your doppelganger brought the bag in early yesterday morning.”
The Grendel Affair: A SPI Files Novel Page 17
