Angel of Doom (18 page)

There was a snort, both above and below.

“You are welcome, Grant!” Charun exhorted.

“Busted,” Kane added.

“Good ears,” Grant said aloud.

“Having spent time inside the brains of you humans, I can pity the dullness of your senses,” Charun called down. “And I can understand the disgust at some of the appearances of your own bodies.”

“Yeah?” Grant asked. This conversation was going to make or break a lot of things. So far, Charun had demonstrated that there was very little that could escape his attention, part of the reason he even made the quiet aside to Kane. If Charun hadn't acknowledged it, then there was always the possibility of slipping up and speaking wrongly. Right now, Grant and Kane had to be on their best behavior. On the other hand, Charun's acknowledgment could have been because he wasn't some form of menace.

That
bit of information didn't jibe well with what Brigid Baptiste had reported from her mental duel with the Vanth virus that had invaded her mind. Then again, Vanth presented herself as an angelic beauty—what was to say that she wasn't a mistress of deception, seduction and subterfuge? This wouldn't be the first schism between so-called partners, even among the gods. The fall of the Annunaki as a world-shaking power had been due to Overlord Lilitu's gambit to supplant Enlil as the highest authority. That scheme had fallen apart, as well as gutted the gigantic living star ship
Tiamat
.

Maybe Charun was a nice guy, but that still meant that Vanth was all the more of a trickster.

“We regret having to utilize the higher intellects of your people, and even your livestock, but Vanth and I are careful not to endanger the bodies of those we've borrowed,” Charun added.

Kane hopped off the ladder upon reaching the bottom. Grant and the demigod joined him immediately.

“‘Borrowed,'” Kane repeated.

“Yes. We've been looking for a sufficient source through which to open an aperture between this dimension and our home.” Charun sighed. “You have a fine world here, especially with the stink of the Annunaki scoured from it…”

“Not quite scoured,” Grant corrected.

“This area is free of their reek,” Charun responded. “And thus, we no longer have to worry about them swooping down on us. You are to thank for much of that.”

“We are?” Grant asked.

Sure, Grant was playing dumb for the moment, but he was still surprised at the kind of weight the New Olympian soldiers had put on the efforts of the Cerberus heroes. After all, they had fought with irrepressible courage and willingness to die for their countrymen. The final battle with the Enlil-empowered Hydrae hordes had resulted in casualties. Hundreds were wounded and scores had died, but the line was held if only for the stubbornness of the Greek warriors, either inside massive armored robots or merely on the ground, clad in leather and Kevlar.

That was a day of conflict that had been one unlike Grant had experienced before or since. And Grant had not been on the battlefield, fighting scale-hide-armored mutates and bloody-clawed giant sloths, but he'd also been with Kane aboard Marduk's scout ship, sabotaging it and wreaking havoc to keep the overlord and his Nephilim forces out of the conflict. Grant had thrown every dirty infighting trick in the book at Marduk, cheap shots and blindside attacks giving the big man those few extra ounces of edge against the seven-foot Annunaki demigod.

The hammering assault on the bridge of Marduk's scout ship bought Kane enough time to plant sabotage charges along the length of the scout ship, gutting it, slaughtering nearly half of its crew and forcing the overlord to abandon Greece.

Those memories should have been resigned to a side note in New Olympus history, but Charun seemed highly interested in this part of the pair.

Maybe he wasn't
threatened
by the humans, but
Charun seemed to be actively trying to engage their friendship and cooperation.

“You said you were only borrowing their minds. How…and how will they get them back?” Grant asked the demigod.

“Vanth explained that we're utilizing their higher brain functions as extra processors. We're dividing some extremely complex mathematical equations among a little over a million brain stems,” Charun stated.

“You're using them as calculators,” Kane said.

“Exactly. Essentially, we're doing what your ancient ancestors would call casting a spell. Except, we're doing it in the very code of which the multiverse is written upon,” Charun explained. “Once we open up that door, we can go home.”

Grant nodded. “That makes sense. But what are the number crunchers getting out of this?”

“They will be the ones who might just give you humans the means to spread out among the stars,” another voice interjected into the conversation.

Kane and Grant both turned, watching the entrance of Vanth, tall, beautiful and half naked, striding as if she had not a care in the world.

“My beautiful, brilliant bride,” Charun said.

Grant and Kane nodded; a subtle bow to the woman upon her entry.

“Gentle humans,” Vanth said. “Welcome.”

“Milady,” Grant greeted. “The means of humans traveling to the stars?”

“The use of craft is all well and good, but the same roads that crisscross this ball of dirt are only a small factor of the equation that is the universe,” Vanth stated. “There are similar roads, marked by magnetic fields, but they stretch from world to world, from star system to star system, and from galaxy to galaxy.”

The brown-haired beauty stepped closer, a smirk brightening her features.

“With the equations your fellow Earthlings have been given, you can spill into the universe like unto a plague of locusts.”

The eyes of Vanth were like jewels set ablaze from within, anchoring Kane's gaze as her oddly harmonic voice buzzed both in his ears and his mind. This was the same kind of sensation that he'd felt, ever since Balam first “opened that door”—communicating with him through telepathy. It was a switch that never turned off, and Kane didn't like the tingles, the tickles of Vanth's power brushing across his brain, as if the folds on its surface were the hair of her lover. It was eerie, invasive, and at the flash of his anger of recognition, she withdrew, her smile fading.

“Lady Vanth,” Kane greeted her, doing his best to stifle the tension in his vocal cords.

“Have you been giving these warriors the grand tour?” Vanth asked Charun.

The male demigod nodded. “The only thing that we're really missing is the third member of their trinity. The human woman, Brigid.”

Vanth frowned, conveying an all too human disappointment. “What has kept her?”

“She suffered some minor injuries, so we did not feel that she would be up for the trek from the alternate parallax point we landed at,” Kane answered truthfully. His will was a brick wall, and that was bolstered by Brigid's posthypnotic suggestions, sublimating his suspicions and worries deep, beyond the reach of a mere surface scan.
Using mostly intact truths would prevent her from sensing anything wrong.

It was not going to be a perfect solution, especially if Vanth's mental abilities were truly powerful. Kane's will had been tested by telepathic goddesses of late, and he didn't feel like pressing his luck. So far, however, he didn't feel as if she'd broken through anything.

Then again, it wasn't as if she'd leave a note pinned to the inside of his brain where he could find it. That was what truly sucked about this for Kane. He'd been made aware enough to know what was happening, but there was very little he could do by way of mental inventory that would give him an idea of how much his thoughts were rummaged and searched.

“Well, you surely have another aircraft like the one we requisitioned,” Vanth stated.

“It was under repairs last we saw it,” Grant answered. He nodded toward Charun. “This guy did quite a number on it.”

“Ah, yes,” Charun noted with a chuckle. “We have taken good care of your other craft. I hope you did not punish its pilot too much for fleeing from our arrival.”

“We went easy on him. If he couldn't hurt you with the weapons mounted on it, there was no way he could deal with you carrying a mere side arm,” Kane said.

Charun smiled, his shoulders straightening a little further, his chest jutting an inch or two more with pride over the power he had displayed and the intimidation he wielded as a warrior god. Kane couldn't tell if the demigod was buying into this through ego, or that he and Grant were simply good actors.

“So, you want me to pop over and bring Brigid?” Kane asked.

“Whoever wishes to fly the Manta, as you call it,” Charun offered. “I would assume that you would go,
Kane, for your frame would allow more room for her as a passenger.”

Grant looked at Kane. “He has a point.”

“You are near the size of one of us, Grant,” Charun stated. He rested a large hand on the big Magistrate's shoulder, making him feel as if he were a child once more. “There will be no harm to befall him under my protection.”

“You're sure?” Kane asked.

“We shall have the ship readied for you,” Vanth told them. “Then we shall have the three who are as one as our guests.”

Kane was once more glad for the posthypnotic suggestions that drained any tension or relief from his features. This was feeling more and more like a trap.

Maybe the “virus” that had infected Brigid was either still alive or had managed to transmit a distress call back to its originator. Kane didn't have a clue as to how the goddess's song worked, but he wouldn't put it past Vanth to actually be able to fragment her intellect to the point where such a mind control effort could call back to her.

“How soon would that be?” Kane asked.

“We will take some time for you to rest your tired limbs and to fill your bellies,” Charun stated. “While the appropriated Spartans carry the Manta outside, you'll have at least an hour of relaxation with us.”

“Sounds good,” Grant returned. Kane could feel the hint of sarcasm in his friend's voice.

Eat, drink and be merry, humans, Kane imagined the thoughts of the entities in front of them. For tonight, we steal your souls.

* * *

“Y
OU CAN
'
T BE SERIOUS
,” Brigid said over the Commtact.

“I'm as serious as I've ever been,” Kane returned. “Vanth wants you to come visit us in the scenic, placid
Etruscan countryside. She promises wine and the mathematical secrets that will enable us to leave the Earth far behind.”

“That is a tempting offer,” Brigid replied.

Neither of them was speaking about it out loud, but the implications of all three of them being summoned before Vanth were dangerous. Brigid had done what she could to reinforce the minds of her comrades that had gone on ahead, and she had also self-hypnotized, compartmentalizing the memories she possessed of Vanth's viral knowledge entering her brain.

Such autohypnotic suggestion had carried her against the intrusion and violation of Ullikummis, so maybe it would work again. If not, it was unlikely she would ever know what happened. Her precautions could prove for naught against a superior hand at mind control, and the stresses of her battle against Vanth's projection still made her wary.

“And you won't even have to walk far on your game ankle,” Kane added. “I can pick you up and fly you right here.”

“Why can't I use the interphaser again?” Brigid asked.

“Because of the efforts of Vanth to open up a wormhole at the parallax point here,” Kane explained. “So she and Charun could return home.”

“All right,” Brigid said. “When can you get going over here?”

“I'm outside with Grant. We're running down the checklist to make sure the thing is still in full flying condition,” Kane told her.

“So far, looks all right,” she heard Grant on the party line.

“You're not worried about staying there alone?” Brigid inquired.

“What could they do to me that they couldn't have a
dozen times over?” Grant answered. “I'll be fine. I can't wait to see you again.”

Brigid admired her two partners in adventure. They maintained their calm, and sounded optimistic and trusting in the face of ultimate danger. Sure, she'd done a bit to keep their minds from betraying them, but even so, they were acting well. She could pick up inflections and tones in their voice that indicated they were speaking of their own free will, rather than repeating by rote or being intimidated into lying to her about the situation.

She knew that the two Stygian entities would be operating under a great deal of risk in sending Kane to her. Certainly, they had a hostage in the form of Grant, and there was a small tremor of doubt in Grant's voice, something she could pick up because of her familiarity with the man, but there didn't seem to be any duplicity, any subterfuge, going on at the present.

Together, Brigid and her friends had survived a great many traps, and this would be just another, and yet, the law of averages said that runs of luck would run out, no matter what. Certainly, they were prepared and skilled enough to handle unexpected troubles, just for when their luck
did
fail, and Kane and Grant proved to be brute tough enough to cope with problems that could only be solved with force of arms.

Blunt violence was something Brigid herself had become well versed in, as well. Early on, she'd turned up her nose at Kane and Grant packing all manner of hardware with them when they journeyed out on an expedition. Now, she carried the big, almost hammer-shaped TP-9 automatic pistol, which she slid into its holster. The TP-9 was a semiautomatic, civilian version of the old TMP-9 machine pistol, only slightly smaller than the Sin Eaters that Kane and Grant carried, and also carrying a 20-round magazine.

“Will she mind if I come armed?” Brigid asked.