God Hammer: A novel of the Demon Accords (6 page)

“Idiots,” she said.

“Narrow world views.  Sometimes the really smart ones have a hard time adjusting to something that implies they don’t know everything,” I said.

The waiter showed up with a platter of thinly shaved roast beef, approaching from behind me, putting it down gingerly along with a menu for Stacia.  “Sir, shall I bring the rest of your order when I bring Miss Reynold’s?”

“Yeah, that’d be great.”

“I’ll be back in a moment, Miss Reynolds, to take your order,” he said.  She just nodded, frowning at the pile of beef between us.

I reached over and grabbed a slice, putting it inside my buttered roll and took a bite, then added some salt.  Another bite—better.

Stacia watched me before copying my actions and biting into her own sandwich.  She looked thoughtful as she chewed and swallowed.

“You learned a lot at school, didn’t you?”

“Our resident pack got particularly tense during finals week.  The Arcane chefs went through a whole bunch of roast beef and brisket. Some schools use therapy bunnies to relieve student stress.  We thought that might not go so well with Delwood and his pals.”

She laughed, almost despite herself.  “How about you?  I
know
you’ve lost your temper before.  Chris and Tanya made our security guys watch the video of both your fights with Delwood.”

“Wait, there’s video?  And why would your security guys watch it?”

“Of course there is video.  Arcane has cameras all over that place.  Chris thought both fights were, as you might say… teachable moments.  But don’t evade the question.”

“What question? Did you ever actually ask a question?” I asked.

“About your temper?  How do
you
handle it?  I checked the news sites from yesterday—there were no crazy traffic explosions or cars flying while you were driving in, but New York drivers would make anyone crazy.”

“Oh.  Yeah. I’ve never been in a big city before.  People here are nuts.  Mostly I try to think about consequences,” I said, taking another bite of roast beef and roll.

“Consequences?”  she asked.

“My aunt talked to me about the consequences of my actions when I was a kid… a lot. All the time, in fact. Maybe I spell a car to stall because the driver pissed me off and then the driver is late to work one too many times and gets fired.  Then his family loses their home… kids grow up homeless.  Or I give another bully a little mental shove, but it’s more than I thought and he falls in front of a car or something.  Things like that.  It was really hard yesterday, though,” I said.

“Because city drivers are a-holes?” she asked.

“That… and because there’s so much power here.  It almost made me drunk.  I wanted to try stuff out and Sorrow kept making suggestions.”

“Suggestions?”

“Blow up that truck—crush those cars—knock down those buildings—tear that bridge loose and drop it into the river.  That kind of thing,” I said.

She looked at me, her eyes focused, maybe a little surprised.  Before she could say anything, a group of additional interns came into the dining room.  The kid from MIT came in last, talking to a thin black guy and a woman a few years older than Stacia.

“Ah, our Chief Technology Officer is here,” Stacia said, cocking her head but not looking around or even taking her eyes off the strip of roast beef she was dropping into her mouth.  It was a good reminder that werewolf hearing is ridiculous.

She chewed a few times, swallowed, and then raised her arm, turning slightly.

“Hey Chet?  Got a moment?” she called.

All three turned our way, and then the thin guy, Chet, started over while the woman kept going with the pack of interns.  MIT stared appreciatively at Stacia till he noticed me, then he frowned and moved off with the others.

“Hey Bombshell.  ‘Sup?” Chet asked Stacia as he got closer, looking me over curiously.

“I wanted to introduce you to Declan.  He’s Chris’s intern, but you might want to borrow him from time to time,” she said. 

His face lit with recognition at my name, a brief flare of wariness, which was rapidly replaced by curiosity.

“The literal computer wizard.  I’ve been told a lot about you,” he said, shaking my hand.  “Of course, I’ll reserve judgment till I see you in action.”

“Hear that?  He’s calling you out, D.  Show him something,” Stacia prodded, smiling.

I looked from her to him, then made up my mind.  “Can I see your cell phone?” I asked, holding out one hand.

He frowned, obviously reluctant, but then again, he started it.  Reaching into the rear pocket of his slightly baggy jeans, he pulled out a new model Android phone, glowering at me as he put it into my hand.  It had a protective case, which I popped off.  Pulling a Sharpie from my bag, I wrote runes inside the case, concentrating on the building’s power as I did, channeling some of it into my design.

Then I put the phone back into the case, started to hold it out to him, but suddenly threw it down hard on the polished floor.  The phone banged and smashed, bouncing off the hard tile high enough that Stacia was able to snag it out of mid-air.  She looked at it, ready to wince, but instead becoming slightly amazed.  Finally, she handed it to Chet, immediately pulling her own phone out of her pocket.

“Mine next,” she directed, even as Chet looked his baby over for any damage.  I got to work on hers while Chet considered what he’d just seen and the fact that his phone was still pristine.

“How protected is it?” he asked.  I held out my hand again, telekinetically pulling it from his palm.  Holding it in my left, I pushed an arc of electricity from my other hand, shoving it right down onto the phone.  The blue snapping tendril jumped all around the outside edges of the phone, but refused to touch it directly.

“It’s pretty safe from most trauma, except, ironically, water.  Fire, electricity, and hard impacts—no problem.  Looks like you picked a water resistant model anyway.”

He studied it at length, silent while he considered.  Finally, just as I was putting Stacia’s case back on her phone, he spoke up.  “I want him to do this to the mainframe and the special project room first thing.”

“Chris already put those first on the list for today,” she said with a smile.

“Right after I set some on the broken elevator,” I said.  They both looked surprised.  “It’s gonna take a couple of days to get back to normal, so I should get it started now.  I broke it; I gotta fix it.”

“Where did you find him again?” Chet asked, a slight smile on his face.

“In a hole in the ground… in New Hampshire.  Chris said we could keep him if we promised to take care of him,” Stacia replied.

“Yeah, well, I need lots of treats,” I said, finishing Stacia’s phone.  It too bounced off the floor, only I needed a little telekinetic help to snag it. “Keep it dry,” I said, handing it over.

“Why not water?” Chet asked. 

“I have no affinity for it.  Fire, earth—you bet.  Water—nothing,” I said. 

“Amazing,” Chet said, wheels turning in his head.  “And obviously electricity?”

“Sort of a middle ground between fire and earth.  My aunt says my strength is likely why I can talk to machines.”

“Talk to machines?” he repeated. 

I felt myself frown.  “Not truly what I do, but I pick up code and some part of my mind has learned to interpret it, whether it’s a car computer, a smartphone, or a mainframe.”

“
That
would be the superpower I would choose,” he said, a little wistful.

“I would pick flying,” Stacia said.

“You already have super powers,” Chet retorted.

“Yeah, to cloud men’s minds,” I muttered into my glass of water.  She snapped around, frowning.

“You’re super beautiful.  That’s what Chet was talking about,” I said by way of explanation.

“I actually meant her werewolf capabilities,” he said with a slow grin.

“Oh, well yeah, you got those too,” I said, feeling my face go red.

Chet laughed and Stacia just smiled a little.  “We’ll talk later, Declan.  I’ve got fussy geniuses to corral,” he said, getting up.

“I’ll bring our little charmer up as soon as he’s voodooed the elevator,” Stacia told him, still smiling at me.

Face burning, I concentrated on my food.  It was going to be a long summer.

Darion’s wide shoulders blocked most of my view of the room, but Grim had already scanned it, using the rest of my senses, and come up clear.  Still,
I
was usually the first one into a room.  But in this case, letting my attorney go first was a smarter move.

The place was a dump.  A seedy little motel in the Bronx that looked like it hadn’t been updated in decades.  That was good.  We needed a place with few modern conveniences.  The less technology the better.

The first person I saw was a guy in a rumpled suit that I didn’t know.  His haircut, body language, and direct gaze all screamed cop.  The bulge under his left arm reinforced the image.

The second guy, also wearing a suit, I knew.  Larry DaltonLieutenant Larry Dalton, NYPD.  Commissioner Rielly’s aide.

“Gentlemen,” Darion greeted them.  Dalton nodded at him, but the other guy just glanced at my attorney before turning to watch me. “You two leave all your electronics outside?”

“Cornell, Gordon,” Dalton said, looking tired. “Yeah, we did and why?”

I just walked over to the old room phone and, after establishing it indeed worked, I unplugged it from the wall jack.   Then I glanced from him to the other guy.

“This is Detective Ballini,” he introduced his companion. “So, Gordon, whatcha got for us?” Which was Daltonese for
go ahead and speak in front of him
.

“Any complaints of a bit of a commotion a couple of blocks north of our building last night?” I asked, silently sending a pulse of aura around the room to knock out any devices that might be still around.

“Seems there was something to that effect.  Let’s see, people talking about shots fired, flying objects that might have been drones, and did I mention shots fired?” Larry asked.

“Yeah, about that… what did your first responders find?”

He looked at me evenly for a moment, obviously weighing how he wanted to play it.  Finally he snorted.  “They found a swarm of feds locking down the neighborhood, black vans and black suits everywhere.  They couldn’t get in for forty minutes or so.  When they did, they didn’t find a goddamned thing,” he said, then grimaced.  “Sorry about the language.”

“Your damned language doesn’t bother me,” I said, managing to surprise him.

“Really? What with all the… you know?” he asked.

“Lieutenant Dalton, my client’s Heavenly origins aside, I think we were talking about evidence, or a lack thereof?” Darion asked.

“Oh right.  Anyway, the place was sterilized.  They did find a couple of shell casings that the feds missed, but just a few.  Nine mil and some five-five-six.  Residents wouldn’t say much, acted like someone put the fear of Uncle Sam into them.  That close to the Tower, we figured you for whatever happened.”

“Drones is an understatement,” I said.

“Not that my client is admitting anything,” Darion said.

“Naturally, counselor.  Naturally.  Drones?  Like the feds are using drones now instead of Tomahawks?” Dalton asked.

“I think they lost control of their drones just like I think they lost control of that Tomahawk,” I said.  “Which is why we asked you to leave the tech toys behind for today’s meet.  I fried anything else you might have forgotten about, by the way.  The thing we’re facing uses anything electronic at will.”

“Thing?  What kinda thing you talking about?” Larry asked.

I handed him a typed page, created on a real typewriter, that outlined what we knew about Anvil.  “Don’t read that out loud.  Don’t say the name out loud.  Don’t put it anywhere a camera might see it.  It can take over anything connected to the Internet.  Smartphones, tablets, computers, Internet of Things.  If you went to Home Depot and installed a smart thermostat in your house that you can check from your phone… well, this thing can freeze your pipes come winter.”

“Is this why you and Miss Demidova keep appearing on the OFAC SDN list every goddamned day?” Larry asked.

“Yes, we believe so.  It’s also attacked our business and financial resources.”

“How do you fight a thing like this? Especially when it goes all Skynet on you?” Larry asked.

“Aside from the best computer brains money can buy, we also have an ace.  A way to use the supernatural world against it,” I said.

Larry snorted.  “Of course you do.  Hey Ballini—look at my surprised face.  Gordon’s got a hold card.  Shocking.”

“Well, I just wanted to keep you and the commissioner informed.  The feds and I don’t get along.  But you guys have been good with Tanya and me, so I thought you should be aware of this thing.  Just stay away from it and it should leave you alone.  It seems to only attack people it deems a threat to the country,” I said.

“But you friggin’ saved the President, for Christ’s sake,” Bellini suddenly interjected.  Larry gave him a look and he shrugged, not all that abashed.

“As you know, my client has been linked from time to time with the asteroid impact in New Hampshire, without concrete evidence, I might add.  We feel that… association could be enough for this guardian software,” Darion said.

Both officers smirked.  “
Linked
—hear that, Bellini?  He’s
linked
to the
possibility
of an asteroid strike.  Like anyone else could do it,” Lieutenant Dalton said.  “Just like the whole world knows to stay the hell away from a certain little girl, currently living in upstate Vermont.”

“No evidence, Lieutenant. No evidence,” Darion said.

“Okay, well I’ll take this back to the commish. Thanks for the explanation of recent events.  Good to know we’re being invaded by the damned Terminator.  Just try and keep the collateral damage to a minimum, huh Gordon?  Don’t need Wall Street collapsing because of bankrupt insurance companies, do we?  Or do you fall under the Acts of God clause?” Larry said.

“That’s being contested,” Darion said, tugging on his white dress shirt cuffs.

I laughed and turned to the door, opening it just in time to see a vehicle, a blue van, barreling straight at the doorway and the four of us.

Grim took over, analyzing and discarding options at lightning speed.  I could just run, removing myself from the path of the van, but that would leave the others to die.

Grabbing all three men and taking them with me was out.  Their combined weight was well within my capabilities, but there was no way my arms could reach around all three, and the violence of the action would might harm them just as much as the van.

So option three it was.  I
moved
, accelerating diagonally to a telephone pole twenty feet away, but only about ten feet from the path the van was speeding along.

Posting myself to the side of the pole, I crouched my body straight out, parallel to the ground, waiting the split second till the van’s front right fender was even with me, then I jumped, pushing with both my body and vamp energy.

My impact, helped along by a line of vampire power that ran back to the telephone pole, was enough to overcome the van’s inertia and change its vector for the last eighteen feet, so that the impact, when it came, was five feet to the side of the doorway.  It was also enough to crack the telephone pole right at the spot where my feet had been.

The van smashed through the motel wall and into the room we had just occupied.  Grim hurdled over the top of the still-settling van, arriving at the driver’s door.  The door tore like paper, but there was no driver to assault.  Instead, the entire driver’s compartment was filled with the stuff of automation.  The van was a self-driving version. I looked at the crumpled door, just able to make out
Goog
, the last two letters folded into bent and twisted metal.

The shifter suddenly jammed back into reverse and the still-running motor revved.  Grim’s instant response was to tear out the pistons, servos, and motors, basically everything that was running it, which killed the whole thing in a shower of sparks and smoke before it could get enough traction to pull out of the wall.

The other three were just coming out of the door, eyes wide with shock, when I hopped back over the van to their side.

“Jesus, Gordon, stop doing that.  It freaks me out,” said an already freaked out Dalton.  Bellini was silent and wide-eyed. Darion was trying to stay cool, but he looked a little pissed.

“If it’s any consolation, I think it was just aimed at me,” I said.

“Not much.  Not real happy with being collateral damage, Chris,” Darion said.

“Yeah, well, it seems to operate on a
good of the many outweigh the good of a few
philosophy,” I said.

The telephone pole chose that moment to fall over onto the van in a flash of electricity and sparks.

Larry Dalton sighed.  “Why don’t you and your attorney toddle off and we’ll call this in?”

We moved off, headed for Darion’s Mercedes, Grim on high alert.

“So you really got something to fight this thing, or was that all bullshit?” Darion asked, glancing over his shoulder at the disaster behind us.

“Not something—someone,” I said.

“Someone?  A person who can fight a computer?  What, like some super blackhat hacker?”

“Some would say his ancestors wore black hats, but he favors ball caps.”

Darion grunted, eyes narrowed in frustration.  “What do you mean by black hats? You mean like black top hats or bowlers or those fruity beret things?”

“Think cone shaped and pointy.”

The light of understanding dawned on his face. “Like black cats and broomsticks?”

“Yeah, although he likes vintage Toyota Land Cruisers.”

“No cats?” he asked.

“They don’t let you keep pets in the dorms,” I answered.

“Shit, how old is this
asset
?”

“He’s not legal to drink yet.”

“And he’s going to shut down
Eagle Eye
for you?”

I frowned.

“You know, Shia Labeouf,  Billy Bob Thorton, Michelle Monaghan?” he asked.

“Oh?  Yeah, I remember that one.  Not sure what can shut it down, but he’s already shutting it
out,”
I said.  “Probably working on that right now.”