99 Gods: War

by Randall Farmer

  They thought he might survive the gunfire and an explosion? John snorted, glad to be overestimated for once. He provided the thugs with illusory charred remains, and they dutifully took pictures before they fled.

  Woozy from something unfamiliar, he muttered one more spell, sieving through the mind of the burned and more vulnerable attacker for information. Who sent you? Martin Davis, the leader of my brotherhood, the American Zion Triumphant. Why were you sent? The Continuous Patriot Revolution website listed Lorenzi as Living Saint Dubuque’s number one enemy. Our goal was to capture him, doing the Living Saint a favor he won’t be able to ignore. We want in, into the City of God. How did you find Lorenzi? We didn’t, our intelligence-gathering brethren did, using electronic surveillance techniques involving hacked urban cameras and other tricks I know nothing of. John dropped the spell, and took a deep breath.

  Kendrick had been right, John thought. If I hadn’t regained my magic, these thugs would have captured me.

  He willed his magic to fly him away, but the world spun around his head, faster, and he found himself on the ground, in someone’s garden, a pumpkin patch yet unpicked. Thick smelly smoke curled along the ground. Sirens wailed and police and fire-truck lights flashed nearby; he lay splayed on the ground only five houses away from the remains of his former house. The firefighters sprayed the nearby houses, not the remains of his.

  “I’m magically exhausted,” John said, trying and failing to figure out how much time had passed since he tried to fly away from the tree. He crawled, bruised, out of the pumpkin patch and into the darkness, catching his paisley nightie on the pumpkin vines and tree branches and leaving bits of fabric behind. “Well, at least Reed stepped out tonight to dip his wick.” Had the attackers even known about Reed?

  He needed a safe harbor, and this was no longer the place.

  John ran up to his Toyota Matrix that Reed had borrowed for the night and banged on the passenger side window. Reed, wide-eyed and terrified, popped the door and John climbed in. “Thanks,” John said. Reed turned the car and fled.

  “I got here as fast as I could after I felt the attack on you,” Reed said. He smelled of, well, John’s mind didn’t want to go there. Carousing. Drugs. Whatever.

  “I’m steamed. I’m very steamed. If you’d been home, you’d be dead,” John said.

  “I would have picked up their emotions as they approached,” Reed said. “I think.”

  “I’m not up to protecting you, at least as of yet. I’ve got to get better with this crap. I tire too easily, and I know why.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I’m a bloody inefficient amateur magician!” John said, his voice low and angry. “I need more practice.” He sighed. “And if we keep having crap like this happen, it’s going to run me out of simoleons.”

  Reed stopped at a corner, five blocks from his former home. He turned, looked over at John, and winced. “We need to get you some clothes.”

  “And something for my bare feet. Then we’re going to visit my Indiana friends.”

  “If you’re a magician now, we don’t want you here,” Jurgen said. He was the leader of the Indiana branch of the Indigo, and John was glad to get hold of him at this early hour of the morning. John wasn’t sure whether to hold Reed’s smartphone to his ear or hold it in front of him so he could watch the screen as he talked. “Hell. Attacked in your own home? How did they even find you?”

  “Supposedly, electronic detective work,” John said. “I’m not sure what they believed they did was duck soup. My guess is they had a little surreptitious help from one of the 99.”

  Jurgen growled. “You still can’t come here. You’re too dangerous for us.”

  Well, there went this safe harbor possibility. John shook his head, disgusted. “You’re right that you’re in danger, but it’s not from me. You’re in enemy God territory, with Akron on one side and Dubuque on the other.”

  “We know that.”

  “I think you need to leave. Go hide under Atlanta, if you’ve made any progress there. If not, somewhere on the west coast.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding,” Jurgen said. “I’m not trusting that goddamned commie.”

  “You’ll head south, then?”

  “Uh huh,” Jurgen said. “Epharis gave us fair warning that we needed to move, and the attack on you convinced me that the time is now.”

  “Good.”

  John handed Reed’s phone back to him, so he could end the call. He put his head in his hands to think. The new clothes Reed had found for him scratched, too tight on his portly frame.

  “Where to?” Reed said. “Are we going to drive, or fly?”

  “Drive. I’ve got a safehouse in Atlanta, not a good one,” John said. “I’m also going to activate one in Little Rock and one in Charleston, and I’ve got a small organization in Charleston to activate. After that, I think I’m going to train up some magicians.” The idea of training up magicians bothered him, but he didn’t see any choice in the matter. He couldn’t do this alone, and if he couldn’t find allies, he would have to make them. His rationalizations didn’t sooth his moral disgust. “We’re going to need real money. Let’s get out of here, and as soon as the cocks crow and the banks open I’ll get us some cash.”

  “Wait. A bank? Why don’t you use an ATM?”

  John sighed and closed his eyes. “What’s an ATM?”

  24. (Atlanta)

  “Can’t we go farther?” Dana said. The icy air flew around them still as they slowed, on their way back to ground level.

  “I’m exhausted,” Atlanta said. She picked out a cheap motel in the village of Sabula, along the Mississippi, and decided the place would be a good spot to rest. “Freeing myself from Dubuque’s coercion took a lot out of me. Going farther would leave me more vulnerable. Leave both of us more vulnerable.” They landed.

  Dana paid for a room with cash and collapsed on the hard motel bed, wet eyed. Atlanta looked into Dana’s mind for a moment to make sure Dana’s ego hadn’t collapsed. It hadn’t. Atlanta paced. Normally, she would go medieval on Dana for showing any such weakness, but Atlanta wouldn’t mind a mother figure to cry on right about now, herself. Dubuque’s unexpected attack had come with a very high pucker factor, leaving her damn little willpower left to pull on. If the damned Suits showed up now, they would flatten her and Dana like a Georgia road-roller. She and Dana would need to run.

  If Dubuque appeared anywhere in Atlanta’s sense range, she would also run. She would run until Dubuque gave up the chase or her willpower gave out. Atlanta tried to catalog what Dubuque had done to her Mission and found she couldn’t separate it from the effects of her exhaustion. She gave up in disgust and steamed.

  She thought being a God meant she wouldn’t have to take crap like this anymore. She didn’t like retreating. The world shouldn’t work like that for a Territorial God. Humiliating.

  “What are you going to do?” Dana said, a few minutes later.

  Atlanta stopped her pacing and sat down on the bed beside Dana. “That’s ‘we’, Dana.”

  “My power comes from Portland, and she’s turned against us,” Dana said. “You need to get rid of me. I’m a weakness, a spy.”

  Atlanta stroked Dana’s hair. “Melvin’s still mine, and Portland hasn’t dropped you,” she said. “Portland neither turned against us nor is allied with Dubuque.”

  “She sure seemed to.”

  “She’s squishy,” Atlanta said. “She’s been iffy about me from the first time we met, and the only thing she gave up was leadership on the issues we brought to Dubuque. Any time Dubuque presses her, she’s just going to squish out in a different direction. She’ll do our cause more help inside Dubuque’s tent causing friction with her endless complications than she’d do with us.”

  “Atlanta,” Dana said. “No one deserves to be enslaved. I’m not sure how we lucked out of this disaster.”

  “I don’t think Portland’s enslaved, and we didn’t luck out. We broke Dubuque’s coercion be
cause we’re better at this than the others,” Atlanta said. At least nastier. “You’re right, though. He almost got us.” She hid a bad case of nerves behind her falsely confident voice.

  “I don’t feel safe here.”

  “Good,” Atlanta said, her lessons as a blooded Marine aviator returning full force. “You’re going to need to learn how to not feel safe anywhere.” She wanted to go out and let loose her temper. Find some gang-dominated place and kill the lot of them. Fill the streets with blood.

  “So you’re not hiding the fact that we lost?”

  Atlanta snorted. “We didn’t lose.” She watched Dana’s mind puzzle through her pronouncement. “We didn’t win, either. We did quite well by surviving Dubuque’s sneak attack. In addition, we also exposed Dubuque’s mind-control, lessened his Mission and whipped his Rapture good.” At a large cost to her own Mission, as Weeping for Cordoba had predicted, which she left unstated. “We live, uncontrolled, to fight another day.”

  “You’re talking like this is some kind of war? Aren’t you going against God’s commandment?”

  “What the fuck is this if this isn’t war?” Atlanta said. “Dubuque started it, dammit.”

  Dana grunted, not buying Atlanta’s argument.

  “He’s lying to himself if he thinks he can coerce this City of God utopia of his into existence,” Atlanta said. “Something inside him knows he’s lying. That’s his weakness, his own fucking conscience. That’s why I could mess up his Mission with my words.”

  “And your own conscience isn’t a weakness?”

  “Fuck,” Atlanta said. She didn’t want to think about that. There had to be a way to fight off Dubuque’s damned ability to coerce the other Gods. If not, they were doomed.

  Dana shivered again. “I’m not going to survive this,” Dana said. “Despite your training, I didn’t do squat in the confrontation. I didn’t do anything useful in the fight against the Suits. I’ve never even been in a fight before the Suits grabbed me. What am I going to do? How can I help you at all?”

  “The more experience you get, the better you’ll be,” Atlanta said. She groped for something positive to say. “After you started praying, I decided it wouldn’t hurt to do so myself. I got an answer. Did you get anything?”

  “What? No,” Dana said. She twisted around to look Atlanta in the eyes. “I don’t understand. What’re you saying?”

  “When I prayed to God for strength, I got an answer, in words, from one of my creators. One of the Angelic Host, if we must use the term. He told me what I prayed for would hurt me if I got it. I asked him to do it anyway and I got the necessary strength.”

  Dana didn’t comment, thinking. “They’re not on Dubuque’s side,” she said, a minute later.

  “On the real,” Atlanta said, a low murmur. “They’re also not opposed to me. I couldn’t tell if they support me or whether they’re neutral. They’re involved, though.”

  “Huh.” Dana chewed her lip. “So what are we going to do, Atlanta?” she said. “In specific.”

  “You have an idea?”

  “Uh huh. Dubuque’s right about the effects of violence on you. You might want to think about giving up being a vigilante.”

  Atlanta examined Dana with her willpower, looking for Dubuque’s coercion at work. She found nothing. “Why did you offer your suggestion?”

  “Well, your vigilantism bothered your divine allies before they encountered Dubuque,” Dana said. She tensed a little, recognizing her shaky ground.

  “Unfortunately, vigilantism is about all we have left,” Atlanta said. “Dubuque took my allies from me. If I get more allies he’ll take them away again.” She turned away to stare at the stain from a swatted mosquito on the wall.

  Dana untangled herself from Atlanta and settled on her stomach, head cocked up to meet Atlanta’s eyes. “What’s the point of what we’re doing? How in the hell does vigilantism get us anywhere?”

  “Perhaps nowhere.” Atlanta looked down at Dana. “Dana, we’re going to be on the defensive. We don’t have any choice. This won’t be pretty, either. Dubuque managed to pin the ‘enemy’ label on me when he called me out. There’s no reason for me to hold back any more for fear of Godly disapproval. Their disapproval’s maxed out now.”

  “Shit,” Dana said. Atlanta waited Dana out. A minute later, Dana spoke the obvious. “I’m not going to be able to stand this. You’re going to lose me, too.”

  “I’m going to need you more than ever. Boise’s right when he intimated that my chosen path is addictive. I need someone nearby to give me grief about what I’m doing, or I will become the monster the others fear.”

  Dana closed her eyes. “Why should I do something this stupid? You’re going to kill me some day for giving you too much grief.”

  “You’ll do the job because you know you can do good by keeping me from going overboard,” Atlanta said. Dana buried her head in her hands and moaned. Yes, Dana would stay by her side.

  “So what more are you planning on doing?” Dana said, several long minutes later. She meant ‘more evil’. Atlanta smiled through clenched teeth, visions of blood and violence in her mind.

  “Unless Dubuque backs down, he’ll go after me in my territory, both directly and indirectly. I predict he or his flunkies are going to lean on people in my territory to break with me. I’m going to need to make examples of those who betray me. I’m going to need to lean on people in my territory with threats of the same.”

  “You’re talking killing innocents, people who’ve done nothing more than change their allegiance.”

  “Yes, I am,” Atlanta said. “As I said, this won’t be pretty.”

  “You willing to listen to a suggestion?” Dana said.

  “Of course.” Atlanta found Dana’s sudden lack of sass disturbing. The fight had sucked the sass right out of her.

  “Create a few more hardcase Supported like Melvin and give them what it takes to do the vigilante work.”

  Atlanta smiled as she worked out the many levels of Dana’s suggestion, and her use of the term ‘Supported’. Jan and the Indigo had gotten to Dana, a good thing. “Interesting. If I did that, I wouldn’t be expanding my evil, in your terms, just changing its focus from thugs who need killing to fools who need intimidating. I’d also be setting up these new people of yours as targets, taking some of the danger off of ourselves. I’d also be putting together an organization of divinely powered, which you’ve suggested several times before and I turned down as an unnecessary distraction.”

  “Uh huh,” Dana said. “So?”

  “This time, I agree with you,” Atlanta said. “We’ll need to warn the recruits that it’s suicidal. I’m sure I’ll still be able to find recruits, though.”

  “Atlanta?” Dana said. “Do you see any way out of this, ever? Or is the best we can hope for to hold on until the tide runs too high and we get swamped?”

  “Our situation is nowhere near that bleak,” she said. Ideas by the dozen ran through her head. “Dubuque’s got big dreams, but, at least to start with, he’s out of his league. As a mortal, he was an anti-war protester and part-time bookkeeper. He’s still quite undisciplined, haring off in quite a few different directions: media celebrity, political gadfly, and now preacher. We’ve got time to organize against him. Don’t forget that someone still might be able to make him see reason or convince him he’ll face more dangerous enemies than the two of us.”

  “We can’t do this by ourselves,” Dana said.

  “Uh huh. We need to get us some powered allies. Practical Gods, Ideological Gods, and mortals. One possibility is that John Lorenzi person you ran into.”

  “He’s pro-Dubuque.”

  Atlanta shook her head. “Not according to Phoenix. He came to Dubuque to join up, but he and Dubuque fought. Dubuque told Phoenix that Lorenzi was evil, in league with the devil, but I’m not so sure any more. My guess is Dubuque tried to coerce him and failed.”

  “Okay. He’s one. Any other ideas?”

  “Yes, th
ose two powerful mortals we spotted, the ones who are probably Telepaths. I’m not sure what they are or what they’re doing, but they’re nearby now, poking around Dubuque’s territory. I can feel them from here, and they’re not Dubuque pawns.”

  “They’re in grave danger if they’re here,” Dana said.

  “Perhaps. I’m not sure of their strengths and weaknesses. I think we should stay away from them for the moment. Watch them. Remember, my idea about new allies is for the long term, not short term. First, we need to get ourselves straightened out and train up the vigilante squad.”

  “Dammit, Atlanta, we should at least warn them of the danger they’re in,” Dana said. “He could recruit them!”

  Atlanta sighed. “You want us to go now?”

  “Yes, now,” Dana said. “I’ll fly us.”

  Atlanta raised an eyebrow. “You’ve been doing some practicing on your own, haven’t you?”

  “I had incentive, an interest in not falling from sixty thousand feet to my death.”

  “Well, my conscience has spoken,” Atlanta said. If she didn’t listen to Dana occasionally, she would drive Dana away. “Let’s go.”

  25. (Dave)

  Dave sipped a caffeine-free diet cola and watched the rain drip down Mirabelle’s living room windows. “I found Diana and talked to her.”

  “So, did she get you in contact with Boise?” Mirabelle said.

  “No. Not exactly.”

  “I’m not surprised,” Steve said. “If contacting the Gods was straightforward, they wouldn’t be able to get you to sell your soul for the cure.”

  Mirabelle glowered. “What did Diana say?”

  “She spent forever confusing me with obtuse comments, but afterwards I realized she was only saying I needed to try the other Territorial Gods because Boise wasn’t being useful right now.” He sighed. “She also suggested I wait several months. By then, Boise’s supposed to be back up and doing things again.”