They're in for a tough fight against Black Fang, is what I'm saying.
Chapter
24: Weaving Webs
<Okay, everyone. Rafe wants you to set your
communicators as clients to hers.>
John
had figured that was coming, even before he heard Amy in his mind. Once Rafe
set a comm channel for them, it would be virtually impossible for an outsider,
even one with a Legion communicator, to listen in. Well, not really; a computer
could quickly figure out the timeshift of the pre-selected frequency skips if
it had access to the generating algorithm. That could be found on the communicators. The interesting question,
given that Black Fang was probably not much of a coder, was what kind of search
you would want to use, and what kind of programme might be able to select one.
John began to sketch one out in his head…
<John?> John jumped. Oh, right. Set
his watch communicator to client. John did so, sheepishly.
Rafe
was leading them down what still looked like a perfectly natural, albeit
suspiciously regular cave. Presumably, though, that’s why they were called
“lava tubes.” John shivered. The volcanic feature they were exploring was
supposed to be the earliest eruption on Ascraeus Mons and 3.8 billion years old. That could be wrong. NASA had exactly two
geographical/archaeological workers on Mars, and they were digging a genuine
old Marian town up in the northern ice caves right now. This feature was dated
by reference to Late Heavy Bombardment hypothesis, theory piled on theory. If all of the theories turned out to be right,
meant that this might be the oldest surviving geological feature in the inner
Solar System. Way older than intelligent Martian life…
Rafe’s
voice came through his communicator, subducted along his bones to his ears.
“John? You’re our resident Mars nut. What are we doing here, besides getting
clear of the crazy werewolf?”
“Looking
for Martian remains?” John asked back.
“Cool.
Will they help us tactically?”
“Maybe.
Captain Chronos says that the Martians were pretty high tech before the end of
their civilisation. The NASA archaeologists and Mars probes haven’t found any
evidence of that where they’re working, but the obvious place to look is in
very old caves. Like this one.” John didn’t try hiding his excitement at the
last.
“But
Chronos is a crazy old coot. His time machine broke his brain, and he’s a time
traveller. He might be lying to us to preserve the timestream.”
John
shrugged. “Look at it the other way. Pretty weird thing to be lying about. More
to the point, he showed up at Cape Canaveral summer before last and just plain
dropped the file in Victory’s lap. He obviously wants us looking. This is the
obvious place to look. Maybe we’re guaranteed
to find Martian high tech here.”
“So
we look for a leftover ray gun, or at plaque on the wall: ‘in case of werewolf,
press button?”
Amy
broke in. “No, we look for a large space with plenty of places to hide. Then we ambush Bad Doggy’s waggly butt off.”
Emily
crowded the end of Amy’s comment. “Did Martians even have werewolves? You’d
think they were more of a Moon thing.”
Old Red Aeon for an old red planet,
John
thought to himself. The Valdorian Age was also the age of the Scarlet Gods.
Maybe they should be more worried about ancient lich lords? And why did that
thought scare him?
“I
don’t even know if they had magic. See, thing is, the Martians lived before
there ought to have been any intelligent life in this solar system. And that’s
not all. The Mandaarians say that the oldest civilisations in this galaxy are only thirty million years
old.” But the Mandaarians didn’t have all the answers. That thought depressed
John. Would he ever find a family?
The
lava tunnel led downwards into the depths of the great lava shield. Emily cast
a white light over the cave, showing rough walls with no signs that anyone had ever passed this way
before. Even the dust that drifted through seemed lonely. There was no sound,
no smells through John’s respirator. The Martian air was far too thin. Could a
werewolf breathe it? Probably; they followed the rules of magic, not science. At
least they didn’t have to worry about the light, Martian gravity. Amy held them
down to the rocky surface. That might, or might not, be an advantage in the
fight to come.
For
all the boring Earthiness of so much of what they’d seen, John could not help
being amazed. Again; this place might be over 3 billion years old. In Emily’s
flickering light, he took to looking for movement on the sides of the tunnel.
Shadows might be the first sign of something indigenous and sinister, or of the
werewolf that was tracking them.
John
reached out to trail his hand along the tunnel wall. The dust seemed thin and
powdery. Ahead of him, the team had slowed and bunched up. Move, he wanted to
yell. He was at the back, his shields raised, because Jason couldn’t manoeuvre
the lifepod and protect himself at the same time. In the movies, the wudan
master was never surprised from behind. He always knew. John wondered how that
worked in real life. Somewhere behind him, a creature that moved far faster
than human was barrelling after them. His neck crawled. And for a second he
thought that he felt movement along the wall.
Ahead
of John, Rafaella led the team through a narrow, dark opening in the tunnel
wall. John followed Jason, taking up the rear of the five teens as they entered
a vast space. He could tell that it was vast, and empty, because a soft, reddish
light broke from the walls of the cave. It was in that dim and serviceable light
that John took in the disappointment of an ancient, artificially shaped, but
empty room. No high tech gadgets, just an empty tile floor with thick drifts of
dust carved in wavy shapes by the thin Martian wind. The walls decorated in a
strangely familiar tessellated pattern, but, before he had a chance to remember
just where it was familiar from, Black Fang came bursting through the entrance
of the corridor behind them. John, his back already itching, levitated out of
the way, shoving down and forward at the werewolf to put him off his stride.
Throwing
Gyre’s life support pod to one side, Jason put his shoulder into the wolf-man’s
side. The impact sent Black Fang skittering across the tiled floor, sounding
almost like a dog that had lost its grip on linoleum, then bouncing high to hit
the ceiling high above as Amy did her tricks. As he came to rest, the villain was
illuminated by a soft, white light, and thrown back again, this time with the
solid forcefulness of Earth gravity. Emily and Amy for tricks, Jason, Rafaella
and John were brute force. He hoped they could do it.
Black
Fang bounced against the far wall, and came back at them as fast as he’d been
thrown. Jason, John, and Rafaella spread out, covering Emily, giving her a
second to think about spells that might
save the day. They really needed more ranged fighters for a situation like
this, but John’s telekinesis wasn’t strong enough, and his power reserves
needed charging. If only Black Fang had been dumb enough to use a flamethrower
on him. Oops. Surely Rosa’s robots had welding torches. John winced inside. He
was so stupid! If they could get to grips, though, they might
engage the werewolf long enough for Amy to get into position for a flank
attack.
The
werewolf went for John this time, the only one of the three frontline fighters
that he hadn’t measured yet. At least, recently. John brought up his telekinetic
shield and set his feet. Again, the were overbore him, and drove his breath
out, but this time without getting through the screen, and, again, John found
himself with a snarling werewolf looking down at him, lunging towards his
barely protected throat. Lying on the floor, John couldn’t help but feel the
same squirming that he felt on the tunnel wall. This was a heck of a time to
get the fancies!
It
was only a second before Jason grabbed the werewolf off his body and threw him
up for a full body stroke from Rafaella’s sword. This time, the sword scraped
silver sparks from the werewolf’s armour, but it was no better than hitting the
monster with a cricket bat. Enough to once again knock Black Fang back across
the room, but not to pierce his flesh with the poisonous silver edge of
Rafaella’s blade.
Positioned
just to the left and behind Black Fang, Amy emerged from invisibility to strike
with her mind lance and a grenade that went off on the other side of the
werewolf. Unfortunately, the silver fragments from the grenade couldn’t
penetrate Black Fang’s enchanted armour, either. Her lance seemed more
effective. The werewolf froze in place for long, ticking seconds, its hungry,
yellow gaze crossing theirs. At last, it spoke, its growling voice vibrating up
John’s arm from his communicator on the guest channel. “You know, if you
scatter, one or another of you might even get away. Frankly, I’m a lot more
excited about the chance to take out one of my hated master’s lieutenants than
any of you.”
And
if they scattered, and lasted just a few minutes more, surely Rashindar would
have arrived, John thought. And then he thought again, about the stagey sound
of Black Fang’s little speech. Of course the werewolf hated being constrained
by the Demonologist. Werewolves were like demons that way; dangerous servants.
Yet… and then he knew.
“Rafe!
He’s playing for time!” John said, urgently.
“That
much I figured, John. But why?” Rafe said, not taking her eyes off the monster,
her sword extended in point as though she could cover him like a man with a
gun.
John
wasn’t taking his eyes off the wolf, either. “Jason! Why does your uncle want
to kill the boyfriends and girlfriends?”
“I…
Grandmère’s crazy inheritance rules, I think.”
“That’s
what I thought,” John said, as Black Fang leaped at Amy with blazing speed.
Once again, though, John had guessed where the attack was going, and this time,
his telekinesis was more focussed. Hey, karate werewolf! Let’s see you handle a
telekinetic leg sweep!
It
worked. Black Fang’s idiosyncratic karate could be effective, but a wolf didn’t
have the mind for the deep game. John’s teacher had taught him a move that could
sweep a dinosaur’s leg. John’s kung fu wasn’t nearly that strong, but he would
settle for a werewolf. His move was accurate and strong, and Black Talon went
tumbling into the tiled wall in a puff of exploding Mars dust. John could feel
the healthy headache of mental exertion coming on, and he knew that he couldn’t
keep this up for very long. Emily was the team’s Swiss Army Knife; hopefully,
they’d given her enough time to come up with a magic rolled-up newspaper.
On
cue, Emily spoke from the side. “Bad Doggie. Sit! Stay!” A slightly less soft
light, now the gentle white of Earth, pulsed from one corner of the room. The
werewolf looked at it instinctively, and John’s eyes followed. That was where the decorations were
familiar from. What a nasty trick! He hastily looked away, shoulder checking as
he did so. Amy and Rafe had figured it out, but Jason’s accelerated vision
probably didn’t even have time. John reached over and shook his shoulder.
“What?”
Jason said, shaking his head like someone who’d been playing video games too
long. So, really, John and Jason every evening before they started their homework.
“It’s one of those pattern traps that Telantassar showed us.” Black Fang,
almost involuntarily, squatted down as he continued, helpless, to stare into
the weird pattern in the tiles on the far corner. The wall abruptly grew out
into a chevron pointed at Black Fang; then one end broke free and pivoted on
the corner, and Black Fang was trapped in a cell. A door, barred by close-set
bars of deepest jet appeared. Black Fang, apparently freed from the pattern
trap, hurled himself against them, howling, and was thrown back into his cell.
“Elves.
Space elves.” Jason said. “Figured.”
“Well,
a Warhammer player would obviously expect there to be space elves, but I’m not
sure that’s the explanation.” John said.
“Of
course it is. Been around three billion years, and still not willing to
actually do anything. ‘Hey, little guy. Take this ring to Evil Central throw it
in a live volcano for us. We’ll pack a lunch. Love to actually, you know, do something, but free will blah blah.’”
“Still
might be Dumbledore instead of elves,” John pointed out.
“True.”
Jason admitted. “But smells more like elves than wizards.”
“Whatever.”
Rafaella shook her head. “We have more important things to worry about, John
said?”
John
started. How much time did they even have? “So it’s about inheriting the family
farm, not Uncle Kwan being all ‘bwa-ha-ha?’ Like, he’s your, uhm,
great-grandfather’s younger son? So he can only inherit it you guys are all
dead? But the rule is that you guys can only inherit your family farm if you
have boyfriends or girlfriends?”
“Or
whatever,” Emily said.
“Yeah,
something like that,” Jason said.
“And
that includes the Neilsens, right?”
“I
guess ….Wait. Booker.”
“Yeah.
Though I’m more worried about Theera.” John replied.
“Why?
She’s not in any….Oh crap. Oh crap. On crap. Rashindar’s coming here. That
means the most powerful member of the Indian Superhero Division is on the wrong
side of the Solar System from Wellington Cantonment for as long as this bad
teleportation weather lasts. Emily, can you…?”
Rosa’s
voice broke into the conversation through their hearing implants. “Calling the
Division now. Calling…Okay, the Duty Officer has picked up.” There was a long,
anxious second for them all to imagine Takofanes’ sorcerous armies overrunning the
fortress base, high in the Blue Mountains, where the Indian Army had held the
forces of the Shadow Destroyer in 2005. “They’re going to recall Rashindar to
base.”
“Thank
you, Rosa.” Rafe said.
“Oh,
no need, Captain. I’ve met Rashindar. He is a very …passionate man. I do not
want to imagine what he might be like if he were to have his charges massacred
while he was out chasing his wounded pride.”
“Of
course!” John shouted.
Rafe
looked back at John. “Of course the what now?”
Amy
had come back across the room to stand with them, her eyes big. “I knew that
your big brain was good for something besides Dwarf Fortress, John. See if I
get this: the big question in all of this from the start was, why we had Takofanes
in the mix, and the Demonologist? Takofanes is much bigger than the Demonologist.
He could just swat him down. Why didn’t he? Because he was going to, like, turn
Rashindar to the Dark Side.”
“I
knew Rashindar reminded me of Hayden Christensen. Except for my sister not
slobbering all over him.” Jason hadn’t changed any.
“I
thought it was you; Jar Jar,” Amy answered.
“But
the rest? How does it make sense? And what about Book?” Rafe asked, looking at
John.
“Simple:
plans within plans. Remember what Telantassar told us about how Takofanes
worked in the old days. He was the big guy, in charge of the big picture. The
everyday action was left to his lieutenants. He kept a tight leash on his
lieutenants, but he also wanted a piece of any action. Uncle Kwan could work
his action, as long as it helps Takofanes’ plans. So the big prize is
Rashindar. Or maybe the Basilisk Orb? But Kwan gets to kill and eat his nephews
and nieces squeezes. If he delivers.”
“Bwa-ha-ha-ha.”
Amy added. “And it looks like he’s got pretty much everybody. He thinks he got
May and Jenny’s boyfriends last summer. That leaves Booker and Theera.” That
last puzzled John. He had a hard time imagining Jenny with Agent Byrne, but that
was because he knew Byrne. The guy was at least alive enough to go on selling
out UNTIL from his seat in a washroom cubicle. Jerk.
“What
about Henry and Nita?” John asked.
Rafaella
interrupted, her comm voice carrying a note of impatience. “Wolf traps are for
wolves. Before you go for tigers, get tiger traps.”
Amy
added, “Henry’s a big boy. He can look after himself. If Kwan was dumb enough
to try for him with the same move that did for us, we wouldn’t be figuring it
out on Mars. We’d be hearing about it from Henry at White Castle.”
John
could hear Jason in the background. “Why do we always have to meet Henry and
David at White Castle? The food’s not even that good.”
Plus
there’s Amy, John, maybe even Emily. Or me.” Rafe said. Her voice was thick and
low, even on the communicator, again.
John
blushed. They didn’t have boyfriends.
Or girlfriends. Or whatever. Well, he didn’t. He didn’t have the time or the
stomach for all that stuff. Just as long as Amy wasn’t bummed out. He couldn’t
stand it if that happened. But, still… if it
happened. Would it be that bad? John thought to himself about all that
girlie stuff again. It was just …you know. So grown up and stuff. He couldn’t…
but he could? Why couldn’t he think about
this stuff, all straight to the end like he did with a geometry proof? Why did
his body do this to him, turning him so hot that he could barely stand to be inside
his costume? John dug his finger into the neck of his Tatammy fatigues to break
the seal and let a gust of hot air out. Even in the moment that he held it
open, the Martian cold penetrated into his armpits, and John became aware of
how cold and wet and clammy they’d become in just a second. He hoped no-one
noticed.
Emily
answered, her voice as strangely squeaky as Rafe’s had been low. “Could be bad
news for anyone who’s got the eye on Amy. Or me. You can haz trouble! And, you
know, I think some people do.” She
let her blue, Neilsen eyes linger on John’s for a long second.
Wait.
Some guy was making a play for Amy? John didn’t even have to think about it for
a second. Jameel. Of course it was Jameel, so slick and cool and funny. He
hardly even had acne. And Jameel had a car. I mean, sure, it was a ten year-old
Beetle, and everyone joked and said that he should give Cory a ride, but, still,
it was a car. Jameel was the organic avatar of a Galactic Federation battleship. What did John have? His stomach
lurched. A pain that he’d never even imagined before bloomed there. It was the
single most awful thing he could ever imagine, ever. Amy and Jameel. But he
didn’t have to think about it. He could make
himself think about other stuff. It didn’t have to bother him.
“We
don’t have to worry about that right now,” he said. Only it came out of him
half-strangled, high and wheezy and everyone looked at him funny. He went on,
not thinking about Amy and Jameel. “We need to find and rescue Booker. Now. And I have a plan.”
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