“Wi-fi signal strong, backup strong,” Barry said.
“Double signals confirmed by alpha, bravo, charlie, delta, echo, foxtrot, and… golf.”
Wi-fi? Bluetooth? The sons of bitches were using a freaking wi-fi network to control our collars. After a moment, it made sense. Radio probably didn’t work in the concrete and steel basement and with a repeater or three, they could use wi-fi for everything. How did that affect my plans? Could I use it or was it a deal breaker?
Footsteps sounded on the concrete, the click clack of high heels rather than boots or dress shoes. I looked over to watch Alexis Bishop approach through the pools of light across the gloomy floor.
The men all straightened up a bit, all looking straight ahead and alert, except the sergeant. He turned and awaited her arrival.
She gave him a brief smile along with a folded paper and then turned her attention to me. The sergeant read the paper twice, grimaced, and then stepped to the techs’ station, handing it to Barry. He read it three times, then turned to Alexis. “Really? This is for real?” he asked, half-exasperated, half-anxious, his eyes darting to me.
“POTUS’s orders, gentlemen,” she said, resigned, also anxious, but maybe with a hint of relief.
“Gas ‘em,” she said and Barry pressed a button.
Valves opened in the floor all around me and four super high-pressure streams of gas blasted me in the face, the pressure so great that I didn’t have time to hold my breath. My view of Alexis disappeared in a blast of fog and I leaned forward while scrunching my legs to pull the bolts free. The ting of a heavy metal nut hitting the floor sounded at the same time my limbs locked up and I fell flat on my side.
“Jesus Christ, he’s almost free!” Barry’s voice reached my ears.
“Hold your position, mister,” the sergeant said firmly as my body went completely numb and my vision dark. Then I was out—dead to the world.
Chapter 35
Massive pain—head-splitting, cell-searing pain. Goody… I was still alive. Could I maybe go back to dead, please? It flared sharply, my muscles and joints jumping to its beat. Then it ebbed, falling back to just a minor red-hot ember in my brain. I sat up, eyes closed, and felt a cool hand on my head.
“Hurts a bit, eh
zayka
?” Tanya asked. My body relaxed at her voice, the pain dulling a bit further.
I blinked, finding two concerned and amused blue eyes studying me. “Whatever that gas was, it either hit you harder or they used more of it on you, Chris, ‘cause you’re the last to wake up.”
“Where are we?” I asked, Grim giving me the answer almost as soon as I spoke. We were in flight and the plane’s interior was familiar… one of Tanya’s.
“We were all dumped on the asphalt outside the plane. Our own people brought us onboard. The pilot and co-pilot were told to take off immediately, rather forcibly. They say there are two unidentified jets following us about a mile back. Mr. Deckert is of the opinion that they’re fighters,” Lydia said, slipping into my field of view.
Grim expanded my senses ruthlessly, ignoring my internal squeal of pain as my cloudy brain was forced into service.
“He’s right,” I said. “Where are we headed?”
“The pilots received a flight plan for New York City. We’re halfway there,” Lydia said.
“So what the hell happened?” I asked.
Tanya placed her hands on either side of my head and moved my head around to face the television in the bulkhead. She nodded at Nika, who pressed the mouse pad on a laptop in front of her.
A video popped up—the President.
“So it seems we find ourselves in a difficult situation. As you’ve surmised by now, you’re free and headed to your home state. Politics is a volatile business, Mr. Gordon. One has to roll with the tides. Suffice it to say holding you and your people is no longer in the best interests of the country. For now. Keep in mind that we
did
capture you and we
did
hold you, despite your attempts to get free. Many have said it couldn’t be done, but I think we can put that myth to rest, don’t you?
“You were rescued from Hell by the brave men and women of the Department of Defense, right in the center of the Pentagon. Oh, and you’re grateful… very, very grateful. That’s the story that’s being carried on all national media. I’d advise you to stick to it. That’s free advice, Mr. Gordon, courtesy of some of those organizations I may or may not have mentioned. Use this opportunity wisely. This video is uncopyable and will destroy itself right about now,” President Garth said, his voice humorless. The screen went dark and the flash drive in the laptop by Nika suddenly smoked and fizzled. The keyboard sparked and the laptop died.
“How did they do that?” I asked, impressed with the Mission Impossible shit despite myself.
“It came with instructions to only play it for you when you were awake,” Tanya said.
“Okay, but what made them change their minds?” I asked.
“This,” Stacia said, changing the monitor to a different input channel, one that apparently carried whatever was on the tablet she was holding.
A new video popped up, this one showing Brystol Chatterjee talking to her favorite television anchors. They might have to get her a parking spot and corporate ID.
“Brystol, you received this image how long ago?” the male anchor asked.
“Less than twenty minutes ago, Keith,” Brystol said.
I looked at the time in the lower right corner of the screen, then looked at the time on the digital wall clock on the wall next to the monitor. It was currently a bit past four in the afternoon and this was broadcast at nine forty-five in the morning.
“You saying an anonymous source sent you these photos that purportedly show Chris Gordon, Tatiana Demidova, and their team being chained and arrested by United States soldiers?” the blonde co-anchor asked.
“That’s exactly what I’m saying, Melissa. My source indicates that Chris and his team literally went to Hell and back for this country, somehow appearing in the center of the Pentagon courtyard and were immediately taken prisoner by our own government. The same government that I will point out has said that Gordon and his crew abandoned us and left the cleanup to Homeland Security.”
“Well, that does look like Gordon,” Keith said hesitantly.
“Oh, it is. Look, you can tell,” Melissa said, with more certainty than her co-anchor. He looked her way. “Oh come on, does that look like him or not? And tell me you don’t think that’s Tatiana Demidova’s face in the corner?” she said.
“Yeah it does. What does this all mean, Brystol?” Keith asked.
“It means that our elected officials have taken the opportunity to imprison the one group of people that can honestly protect us,” Brystol said, then immediately held up her hand in Keith’s face. “Oh, I know that Oracle has been successful in closing portals and eradicating some demons, but honestly, have you really looked at the footage? It’s so heavily edited, it barely shows any detail at all. My sources indicate that for every demon stopped by Oracle, they’ve lost almost a dozen people. Highly trained, extraordinarily talented people, Keith. Do you honestly think Oracle or any government group could have stopped the demon prince in DC?”
“I don’t know, Brystol, but I’ll grant you both the editing and the… difficulty of that particular situation,” he said.
“That’s because there is really only one way to counter a high powered demon,” Brystol said, laying her hands on the table in front of her and going quiet.
“Okay, I’ll bite. What? What is the counter to a demon?” Melissa asked.
“Isn’t it obvious? The only counter to a demon is an angel,” Brystol said, eyes triumphant, leaning back in her chair.
“Are you saying… What exactly are you saying, Brystol? I think you should be very clear about this,” Keith said.
“I think it’s as plain as day… Chris Gordon… God’s Hammer… is an angel,” Brystol said. “An actual, honest to God, angel of the Lord.”
“Well, you’ve finally said it. You sure hinted strongly before. What evidence, if there could be any, do you have to support this claim?” Keith asked.
“Come on, Keith. What evidence would you accept? Full wings and a chorus of other angels to sing for him? Other than being born to exorcise demons with just his will, other than fighting a Demon Prince hand to hand and winning, other than apparently going to Hell and coming back?
“I’m not looking to convince you, Keith, or any other skeptic. But someone once said, ‘When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth,’” Brystol said.
“Sherlock Holmes, Brystol. You’ve just quoted Sherlock Holmes,” Keith said, exasperated.
“Oh give it a rest, Keith,” Melissa said. “You’ve given us food for thought, Brystol, but I think we’ve strayed from the real topic at hand. Does the US government have Chris Gordon and his people in custody, and why?”
The clip ended and pulled back to the familiar Youtube logo. A dozen clips just like it were lined up on the right side of the screen.
“So apparently there was a leak,” Stacia said.
“I think it was the precog—Ariel. I think she had a camera in her hand,” I said, trying to replay the moment in my head when I was chained.
“She
was
the one. Nathan Stewart was
extremely
unhappy about his orders to capture us, Chris,” Nika said. “He was open like a book to me, which is unusual. He is usually pretty guarded around me. But he has never disobeyed a sitting president’s orders and he couldn’t this time either, but he could give a young girl a camera and keep her by his side. He was pretty sure she was completely sympathetic to our cause and when I read her, she was totally appalled that you were being chained. I did see one memory of Brystol’s name and email address being written down in front of her. I also got a memory of him speaking to her about the consequences if the American public became aware of your incarceration by the government.”
“So he could follow his orders
and
put in place a plan to get us all out. What happened after that interview?” I asked.
“I haven’t seen all of it, just a few minutes while we waited for you to wake up, but instantly, the Twitterverse went nuts, along with Facebook. A specific Tweet by Brystol went viral around the world in moments. I think it broke all the records. That girl’s career has taken a rocket launch upward. Anyway, almost every politician and celebrity jumped on the topic with their own tweets and posts. Demonstrations were being organized at the speed of the Internet and legal actions discussed by some pretty high-level legal players. You’ve… maybe I should say that
we
seem to have struck a chord with much of the country, particularly the younger crowd.
“After all that, the President stepped up to a White House podium and explained that we had all been dragged to Hell by demons and at his command agents of the US government rescued us. That we were receiving care for a few hours, courtesy of a grateful nation.”
“That lying son of a bitch. And he expects us to support that story?” I asked.
“And we will,” Tanya said.
“Ah, what?” I asked, baffled.
“Everything has changed, my Chosen. In the course of the last few days, everything has been turned on its ear. The entire world, which has long chosen to ignore the supernatural, has had to completely adjust everything it knows in mere days. Demons are the big baddies—there’s no doubt about who the common enemy is—but now that Samhain has passed, the world will breath a sigh of relief, regroup, then look to the vampires and weres. Humans have major problems with skin color; how do you think entire species of dangerous, predatory beings will be received?” Tanya asked.
“With blood drives and dog bones?” I responded, even as my brain was running down the train tracks she had laid.
Stacia hit me on my shoulder. “Ass,” she said.
I’m not gonna lie. It was a pretty good hit. The girl had built up some power. But I didn’t flinch and just ignored the smirk she turned my way as if she somehow
knew
I had felt it.
“There could easily be monster hunts if this goes bad,” Lydia said. “Not to mention religious groups that will want to use us as a preaching point, legal groups that will want to explore our rights to own property, and regular folks who will view their neighbors with suspicion. Burning crosses in the yard will be nothing compared to what a vigilante group of suburbanites might do if they think a werewolf family is living on the block.”
“So what can we do?” I asked, horrified at the images her words had created.
“
We
are at the forefront of this thing, so
we
can do the most. And when I say
we
, I mean
you
most of all,” Tanya said. I raised both eyebrows and she continued. “First, I will be doing some major reshuffling in my holdings. Time to rebrand much of what I hold, myself, into a new entity, the Demidova Corporation. I can create a public front for the world to see, allowing my mother’s assets to hide in the shadows along with most of the Coven’s businesses. That gives us a base to move from and hide behind. Big corporations are useful that way. Then I’ll do an IPO and take it public. Hard to hate on a vampire if she’s building up your 401(k) like gangbusters, isn’t it? Meanwhile, we’ll be hiring the best public relations firms we can find to present you, my love, myself, and your wolf girl to the world. Polish us up, make someone less trashy,” she smiled a fang-filled smile at Stacia, who rolled her eyes in return. “Meanwhile, the Coven has already done a lot of legal work on building a case for vampire legal status. It’ll cover weres just as well. So we’ll make a preemptive strike on that, because I would suspect that Garth will take that route next, or if not him, then someone else in the government.”