Just Cause Universe 2: The Archmage

by Ian Thomas Healy

  “Gryphons,” said Sondra.

  “Gryphons,” continued Doublecharge, “are taking down fighter jets, helicopters, and missiles. He has anticipated our every move and countered it.”

  “You’re taking her side in this?” Juice’s mouth dropped open in disbelief.

  “No.” She glared at Goodwin. “I want to make that very clear. I’ve had to brief the President twice personally. I do not and will not recommend we escalate this conflict to higher levels. There has to be a way to stop him conventionally. All I’m saying is that we haven’t found that solution yet.”

  Goodwin frowned at her. “He is the single greatest threat to National Security in the history of our country. He. Must. Be. Stopped.” Each word was like a rifle shot.

  “He will be, Ms. Goodwin. We’ve got something he can’t have predicted. It’s not much of a hope, but it’s the best we’ve got.” Juice turned to look at Will. “What do you need?”

  “A good night’s sleep, for a start,” admitted the guitarist with a yawn.

  “We could all certainly use that,” agreed Juice. “Twenty-four hours’ leave for everyone except for duty requirements. Starting now.”

  For the first time, Goodwin’s face showed some real emotion. She was scandalized. “I don’t believe I’m hearing this!” she cried.

  “Ms. Goodwin,” said Juice. “My people have been on high alert for seven weeks. Those of us who were lost in the past for even longer. We are all exhausted. I’m taking a single day to rest and recuperate before tackling this problem head-on. Is one day going to lose us the war?”

  “No, I suppose not,” said Goodwin grudgingly. “His progress hasn’t been rapid, just steady.”

  “My wife and children have not seen me for seven weeks. It’s been even longer for me. I’m going to go see my family before heading out to fight in this war. Any soldier deserves that much.” Juice’s eyes grew bright.

  “Very well,” Goodwin growled. “Twenty-four hours.”

  “Meeting adjourned,” said Juice. “Everyone get the hell out of here and don’t come back until tomorrow night.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Growing up is never easy. You hold on to things that were. You wonder what’s to come. But that night, I think we knew it was time to let go of what had been, and look ahead to what would be. Other days. New days. Days to come. The thing is, we didn’t have to hate each other for getting older. We just had to forgive ourselves… for growing up.

  -The Wonder Years television series

  July, 2004

  Denver, Colorado

  Just Cause Headquarters

  Sally sat on the bank of the Platte River, several miles away from Just Cause Headquarters, and watched the water flow past. She’d spent the better part of a lonely, sleepless night tossing and turning, wishing Jason had been free instead of tied up with monitor duty. By five A.M., she’d given up the pretense of sleep and went for a walk.

  She’d had no destination in mind when she set out. A cool front had crossed the region in the night and fog rolled across the area. She hadn’t worn her costume and didn’t use even the slightest bit of super-speed. She wandered north for awhile, then west, and eventually found herself on a bridge overlooking the river, near where she and Jason had parked on their first date and been interrupted in a make-out session by a patrolling cop. The sound of the water as it lapped against the banks soothed her and she decided to follow it for awhile.

  After finding a place isolated enough she could no longer see or hear any traffic, she sat down on a rock and let herself stop for the first time in month. Tears spilled down her face, partly from grief and partly from the temporary removal of stress. She knew Shannon’s death hadn’t been her fault, and that it had somehow been preordained by the course of time, but that didn’t make the hurt of losing a friend any less. The Archmage seemed only a distant threat for the moment, and she felt like she could take a deep breath and blow away some of her accumulated tensions.

  Eventually, the sky brightened in the east and the fog began to lift. As it did, Sally’s tears stopped and she felt empty yet somehow relieved. Soon she stopped sniffing, her cheeks puffy and tight from crying, and just watched the water pass.

  “Goodbye, Shannon. Thank you for being my friend,” she whispered aloud.

  Her phone buzzed her a text message from Jason. Where R U?

  River by our lake, she texted back.

  Can I C U?

  Please.

  She felt her eyelids grow heavy and thought perhaps she ought to get up and sit on one of the benches by the lake so Jason could find her. Instead, she slid forward off the rock to sit on the rich earth at the river’s edge with the rock at her back. Maybe she’d just close her eyes for a few minutes. It was so peaceful there with the constant, gentle rush of the water. Just for a few minutes, she told herself as sternly as she could. This is no place to zonk out.

  Footsteps through the tall reeds brought Sally sharply awake. For a moment she didn’t know where she was, and then her eyes found him.

  Jason.

  He was dressed down in baggy cargo shorts, a black muscle t-shirt, and blue Converse high tops. His hair flopped down into his face as usual and a few days’ of blond stubble dotted his chin and along the bandage on his cheek.

  “There you are,” he said, and stopped several feet away from her. “I’ve been looking for you.”

  “I fell asleep.”

  “Are you okay?”

  She smiled. “Yeah. Yeah I am. Come here, sit with me.”

  He stepped over a fallen tree and flopped down next to her on the earthen bank. “I’m glad to see you, Sally. I missed you a lot.”

  “I missed you too, Jase.”

  “Look, uh…” He blushed. “I’m really sorry about that whole thing with Shannon. It was really stupid of me, and…”

  Sally touched her hand gently to his lips. “Shhhh,” she said. “I know. We talked.”

  “Oh.”

  “It’s okay. I forgive you, Jase. I love you, you big dummy.” She punched him on the shoulder.

  “I love you too. I wasn’t really sure until you weren’t there but now I know.”

  She crawled into his lap to embrace him and luxuriate in the feel of his strong arms around her. Her perceptions accelerated to maximum, something which happened often when she was with him. It was a reaction she couldn’t always control; it was her subconscious way of making the moments last much longer. The only problem was that it was hard to interact with him. She had to concentrate to relax herself.

  Her lips found his and she felt electric shivers course down her back. Her body ached with desire for him. She took his head in her hands, careful not to dislodge the bandage, and proceeded to kiss him with the raw, naked hunger of someone starving. Minutes passed and they remained locked together. Each heartbeat echoed throughout Sally’s head like a thumping subwoofer.

  “I want you,” she whispered into his ear. She nibbled on his earlobe. He struggled to get away, and she squealed in delight because she knew it was one of his hot buttons. His muscles that could bend steel bars were no match for her quick reflexes. Jason lost his balance and fell backward onto the soft earth and Sally straddled him. His cheeks were red and she could feel him harden for her. She panted with exertion and lust.

  “Right here?” he gasped. “Right now?”

  “Yes.” Sally swung her legs up onto his chest and yanked her shorts off her slender hips. “Right here. Right now.” Mad with desire, she didn’t care if the entire world saw her loving him. “There are so many things that could happen to us.” She felt her eyes brim with tears. “We could die tomorrow. We could die today! I want you to love me, Jason, like I want to love you. Because…” She could hardly breathe because her chest was so tight. “Because right now we have each other, and that’s the most important thing in the whole universe.” She pulled her sweatshirt over her head to leave herself only in a skimpy tank top.

  Jason’s eyes were wide. “Okay
.”

  The river continued its slow journey, the rhythm of its passage lending itself to their lovemaking. Sally slid back and forth across Jason’s hips. The thin cotton of her top tugged at her nipples as she gyrated. She came almost immediately and moaned as she ground her pelvis against his. His eyelids fluttered as she dug her fingers into his thick chest. The muscles stood out in her forearms like ropes.

  A flock of geese flew overhead; their casual cries offered a counterpoint to Sally’s sighs. Jason felt like a molten steel ingot inside her. His hands found hers and she could feel them clench as he fought to last as long as possible, to prolong the inevitable. Finally, his back arched and she had to squeeze him hard with her thighs to keep from being bucked off as he finished; finished for her, because he loved her. The sensation of Jason’s juices flowing into her after months of nothing brought her full-force to another orgasm, even more intense than the first. She cried out with it, primal and throaty, and then flung herself forward, her head on his chest so she could listen to the pounding of his heart.

  Eventually, Sally climbed off him and found her clothes. “God, I’m a mess,” she grumbled in a good-natured way. “No mysteries about what we’ve been doing today.”

  Jason smiled. “It didn’t seem like you were all that concerned about appearances.”

  Sally smiled back. “I wasn’t, Jase. That was wonderful. Best sex I’ve had in a hundred and thirty years.” She pulled her sweat-matted hair into a rough braid. “I’m ready for a shower.”

  “Want company?”

  “Yes, please, but can we sit here for a bit first? I need cuddling.”

  Jason swung himself around to lean against the rock on which she’d sat earlier. Sally arranged herself into his arms. “What’s on your mind?” he asked.

  “I came out here because…” She took a deep, shuddering breath. “I guess I needed to say goodbye to Shannon. Everything happened so fast, even from my perspective,” said Sally.

  “So you two wound up as pretty good friends by the end?”

  “Yeah. We talked one night. She said how sorry she was she’d put the moves on you. I forgave her. I guess we just kind of found each other because there wasn’t anyone else we could really connect with.”

  After a period of silence, he asked, “Are you still mad at me?”

  “No. I made peace with it in my own mind. I know that you had no intention of hurting me and that you pushed her away. I forgive you, silly boy.” She twisted around in his arms and dug her fingers into his side, where she’d long ago learned he was extremely ticklish.

  He yelped and flailed as he tried to worm away from her questing fingers. They wrestled until he achieved a superior position on her by straddling her legs and holding her arms out away from her sides. “So, you thought your Drunken Baboon style could defeat my Iron Butterfly style? I laugh at your insolence.” He threw his head back and gave his best bad-Asian-martial-arts-movie-villain cackle. “Now I shall apply to you the ancient technique of Japanese ear-nibbling.”

  “Don’t you dare!” squealed Sally as she struggled against his powerful arms and legs.

  “Ha! Foolish wench, you shall pay.” He lowered his head.

  Sally shrieked with glee and flailed her head from side to side to keep her highly sensitive ears away from Jason’s questing lips, teeth, and tongue. “No fair using super strength on me!”

  Jason moved one hand to hold her head still and used his body to keep her free arm from doing much more than slapping ineffectually at his back. He went to work on her ear, teasing the lobe and nibbling at it. She moaned as shocks of pleasure shot through her. He’d been delighted the night he’d discovered that he could drive her wild just by giving her ears a little attention.

  He moved a little bit too far to one side and she saw her opening. She lifted her head and nipped him right on the thick muscle where his shoulder ran into his neck. It was a playful, puppy bite that caught him by surprise. He lost his concentration and Sally slipped her hands free, wrapping them around his neck and pulling him down to her. She covered his face with kisses.

  “Again,” she whispered in his ear. “I need you, Jason.”

  “I need you too. I love you.”

  After their second bout of loving, they decided that as nice as it was sitting by the side of the river, the day was growing far too hot and the mosquitoes far too numerous. Jason offered Sally a lift back to headquarters.

  “Not just yet,” she said. “I’m hungry. Want to get something to eat?”

  Jason grinned. “You just said one of my favorite words. Pie at Lazzarino’s?”

  “That sounds wonderful,” she said, although she’d have gone anywhere he suggested just to be with him.

  They went and had pie at the same little restaurant they’d been to on their very first date. Sally had a slice of lemon pie with a precariously-swaying tower of meringue that was like eating sugary clouds, while Jason demolished most of a Georgia peach pie. Afterward, for the next hour, his native Southern accent was much more pronounced, making Sally feel like a belle out with her gentleman. They returned back to headquarters and fell asleep together on Jason’s couch in front of a DVD.

  After spending the rest of day with Jason, Sally felt so happy she thought her heart might just burst. They ate dinner together in the cafeteria and talked about movies and music and similar things of little consequence. Then they took a long walk together, hand in hand, just enjoying each others’ company. Afterward, they retired to Jason’s suite, and Sally curled up in his arms like a gleeful puppy and they slept beside each other.

  The next morning, the team reconvened in the conference room.

  “I trust everyone enjoyed their furlough?” asked Juice as he sipped from a steaming cup of coffee with undisguised relish.

  Murmured assents echoed around the table.

  “All right, then,” said Juice. “I’ve been reviewing the current situation in the Dakotas in depth, and I’m not going to beat around the bush with this. I think we need to rescue Jack away from the enemy.”

  “What?” Christine Goodwin was so shocked she leaped to her feet. “How can you think of one man when so many are at risk?”

  “The Archmage has invested a lot of time, effort, and magical energy to make Jack into his General,” said Juice. “From the reports I read last night, Jack has been at the forefront of every major offensive maneuver since being captured and turned. In spite of his great power, the Archmage has shown little in the way of imagination or true strategic thinking. He’s banking all of his efforts on Jack leading his armies. I believe that if we take away his General, it will set his plans back significantly. It will create chaos and disorder in his organization. And into that chaos and disorder, we will be able to insert a covert team to take him down for good and end this war.”

  Goodwin opened her mouth to argue, but then apparently thought better of it and sat down again. “Well,” she said at last. “I can’t fault your logic, at any rate. I won’t deny that your friend Jack has been a real thorn in our side since his conversion. But what’s to stop the Archmage from just converting someone else to lead his armies? What if the next general is you, Juice? Or her?” she pointed at Sally. “Or anyone in this room or elsewhere?” Her jaw tightened, bones standing out in sharp relief beneath her fair skin. “Show me how your proposal will hurt him as much as you anticipate.”

  “I can’t do that, and you know it.” Juice’s voice stayed even, but Sally saw a vein throb in his temple and realized he was furious. “But all the evidence I’ve reviewed points to him thinking in a very linear fashion, instead of having numerous contingency plans. If something doesn’t go as he predicts, he panics and loses control of himself.”

  “Yes, and Juice was right about another thing… there is a lot of the Archmage’s magical energy tied up in Jack,” said Will. “That’s energy he will lose temporarily if we can recapture Jack and break the hold on him. He’ll regain that energy eventually, of course, but it’ll take time. An
d during that time, he will be weaker.”

  “It’s the thermal exhaust port in his Death Star,” murmured Sally.

  Everyone stared at her.

  “Sorry,” she said, trying to remember that not everyone on the team had her geeky sci-fi fan tendencies. “Every great fortress has its weakness; that’s why every great fortress eventually falls.”

  “Sun Tzu?” asked Switchboard.

  Sally shrugged. “I don’t think so. It’s something Lady Athena said to me once.” She smiled at Minerva. The slight young girl raised the corners of her mouth slightly from under the shadow of her helmet. Sally had liked Lady Athena the few times she’d met the stately older woman who’d been one of the founding heroes of Just Cause along with her grandmother. She resolved to make some time to get to know Minerva better. For that matter, she thought, she really ought to get to know all the new members. They seemed so young to her, more from the lack of experience than an actual age difference. Someday soon, she would be fighting shoulder to shoulder with these young strangers, and she wanted very much for them to be her friends. She would never again let selfish feelings prevent her from forming friendships with her teammates.

  “Sally, you’re absolutely right, and Will, I can’t argue with your logic either. I’m committed to rescuing Jack. I believe that will be the key to our success in this conflict,” Juice said.

  “Not that I believe for the slightest moment this is anything resembling a democratic organization, but I believe I’d like to put this matter to a vote.” Goodwin frowned.

  “Of course.” Juice folded his arms. “All those in favor of rescuing Jack?”

  In unison, every person in the conference room except Goodwin raised their hands. “I see how it’s going to be. However… Don’t forget for a moment that you are all representatives of the United States Government and as such you are beholden to follow the chain of command.”