*/ Marco Beltrami "Main Titles" _Hellboy_ /* ---------------------------------------- Illuminati International Pictures presents a tale from the JIHAD UNIVERSE 3.0 Calm Before Katrina A. "Kat" Templeton Patrick Stewart Dan DeRosia S. Malaclypse Breen (c)2004 The Jihad To Destroy Barney ---------------------------------------- *** 4:45 PM, March 4th, 2004 (10 Agamon 572) Tolman Hall, UC Berkeley *** There was a TV in the psychology graduate lounge. How it got there nobody could say. How it got cable was an even murkier question, and the officials in charge of the department had decided that it was better not to inquire into the matter in case there was some illegality involved. (It was actually that some enterprising psychology graduate student came up with a way to get DirectTV billed to the department, and the dish was up on the roof of Tolman Hall, the home of the psychology department. But that's just not as much fun as the idea of graduate students and illegality.) A bunch of the psychology graduate students were news buffs, Katze included. Katze usually watched in dread that something would come up that would have been easy to deal with in the days when there was a Jihad, armed to the teeth, but would be difficult in these days with most of the Jihad spread to the four corners of the universe. She had gotten a horrible shock in the second semester of her graduate program when terrorists had crashed planes into the World Trade Center, but after two weeks of continual TV watching, she decided that it was an unfortunate but normal act of terrorism and not the Wyrm's return to this world. On the whole, since then things had been fairly quiet, and she had managed to progress through her graduate program much faster that she had managed an undergraduate career. She sat in the office assigned to her, just down the hall from the psych grad lounge, and looked at the work she had completed. She was writing a proposal about magical thinking for a possible dissertation topic, and smiled quietly to herself about the term. If they only knew who she really was. Laura McKinley, one of Katze's two office mates (the Psych Department was crowded, and graduate students had to share offices, but at least they all had their own desks), poked her head in the door. "Kats?" she said. Katze looked up from her typing, and smiled. "Hi, Laura. What's up?" "I was going to ask you if you were really busy, because I have a student who I really need to talk to." Katze looked up at the clock in the office. "Yeah, I'm done. I need to get going if I'm going to make my dinner date." "Date? With Josh?" "Yeah, and Brian, my other friend. We're celebrating a common anniversary." Katze hoped she didn't ask any more about what was going on, because Laura believed that Katze was just another human, and Katze didn't really want to explain Marraketh to any of her fellow graduate students. "That's cool. You think Josh is ever going to pop the question?" Katze smiled slightly. "If I know Josh, he's going to do something to startle me. I don't think he'd do it over a simple dinner date, it's just not his style." "I wish he'd hurry up and do it. It's obvious he's madly in love with you." "Enh, there's a whole life ahead of us. But things are rather stable now, Josh has a job...maybe you're right, maybe it's time to start thinking about it." Laura nodded. "Yeah, you're just about to get underway with your dissertation, no?" "Yeah, I was writing the proposal. Anyway," Katze said, packing her laptop into her backpack, "I really have to get running." "No worries. Have fun, I'll see you tomorrow." *** 5:30 PM, the same day Rivoli, Solano Avenue, North Berkeley *** Katze wound her way through the tables to where Josh and Bri'in were sitting. Bri'in was in his suit, and it looked like he'd just come from the office. Josh was in his khakis and it was obvious that he'd just gotten off work too. Katze, meanwhile, was dressed in college student casual. There hadn't been much in the way of choice because Bri'in, who was in charge of getting the dinner reservation, got it early. She dodged past a few more waiters and arrived at the table. Bri'in looked up and gave her a grin. "Just one more page?" "Naw, Laura caught up with me and was asking questions, so I missed my bus down the hill. Oh well, worse things could happen. I'm here, no?" "Yeah, it would have been hard to have a birthday celebration without the birthday girl. How old are you now?" "Gods, I don't know. Thirty-something, I think, I was supposedly twenty-eight or so at the liberation of Marraketh. But I think in Gregorian, and I'm younger in Gregorian." Josh raised his eyebrows. "Yeah, yeah, just remind me of my worst moments." Katze grinned back. "Hey, in the end, it all worked out, no? You got the girl, and you got rid of Sid. What more could you want?" They sat and talked about Katze's research and Josh's work. Bri'in would chime in with horrible lawyer stories. A waiter came and took their orders, and a bit later, food was brought out, and the conversation slowed a bit as everybody ate. About halfway through her spaghetti, Katze caught Josh grinning like a fool. "What are you thinking about?" "Like you wouldn't know if you looked." "I make a policy of not reading the minds of those closest to me. Sometimes I don't want to know." "Well, that's reassuring. Anyway, you're the birthday girl, so do you want to open presents now or later?" "I'm curious. How about now?" Katze caught Josh and Bri'in looking at one another. Josh finally reached in his pocket and handed a small wrapped box across the table. Katze unwrapped it, and opened the lid only to find a California Golden Poppy sitting there. "Josh, um, it's a nice..." Josh stopped her. "I still remember the poppies. But I'd check your box a bit more carefully..." Katze carefully lifted out the flower and found that the stem was very carefully wound around another object. Josh watched, his grin growing larger and larger with each passing second as Katze extracted a ring. "Josh..." she said, and then stopped, as Josh rose from his chair, very carefully took it from her and went on one knee. He then looked at her, grabbed her left hand and simply asked, "Tjarlin Katze Brenner, will you marry me?" "Josh..." Katze said, for once utterly speechless. "You...well...yes!" The entire restaurant broke out in applause, or so it seemed, as Josh rose to his feet with a huge grin and put the ring on her finger. Katze started laughing. "You..." "What's so funny now?" Josh asked. "Well, Laura asked me as I was heading out the door when you were going to ask. She's going to get a kick out of this tomorrow." "I figured it was appropriate, given that it's your birthday and all. And I didn't want to wait until November." "Yeah, yeah, that's a birthday on *both* calendars. But I'm glad you couldn't wait." Bri'in chose that moment to step in, holding a manila envelope in his hands. "Now, I know Katze's just got the shock of her life, but I have a present for you too. Or rather, I should say, a present for the both of you, but I'm going to let Katze do the honours." He handed the envelope over to Katze, and she slit it open. A couple pictures of a house fell out, and Katze extracted the other paperwork, stared at it for a second and then dropped it. Josh picked them up. "Geez, Bri'in. A *house*?" "Yeah, if you both are going to get married, I presume this means that there just might be kids in the future. Besides, I really want to stop paying the rent on your apartment. Lastly, with you working in North Berkeley, and Katze going to school on the north side of campus, it makes sense for you both to be in Northside. I was going to wait and give it as a wedding present, but something told me you'd both appreciate it now." Josh chuckled. "Well, between the two of us, I think poor Katze's going into shock." Katze just shook her head a few times. "Well, there's something to be said about good friends. Bri'in, when can we start moving things?" "Well, I figure, if I can get both you and Josh to sign the paperwork, I could let you at it tonight. The place is empty; I couldn't convince anybody to rent it. The economics are just nasty right now, and so I make both you very happy, get a non-moving property off my ledger, and stop worrying about paying your rent." "You never had to in the first place, Bri'in, I had enough money saved up," Katze said. "Enh, yes, but the point was to make those who stayed as comfortable as possible, and there's really not many of us. Besides, use that money for something useful, like paying for a wedding." Josh looked at the papers, picked a pen from Bri'in's suit pocket and signed it. He then looked at his scrawl and said, "Hey, Katze?" "Yeah?" "I know between your two names you'd rather stick to Brenner, because that's what you're used to..." "Josh, I'm happy to be Schnider." "Well, yes, but *I* don't like my name. And Harldcast just brings up bad memories for the both of us. So...I know it's not traditional, but...y'mind if we be the Brenners?" Katze laughed. "Why not? If you're happy with it, I could be." And the two of them, newly minted fiancees, just grinned at each other as they finished their dinners, and Bri'in just smiled with them, happy to see two of his very good friends so very happy themselves. *** Roughly 3 AM, March 5th, 2004 (11 Agamon 572) Unknown Location *** Katze awoke. In a hazy memory, she seemed to recall having fallen asleep next to Josh, but there was nobody in the bed besides her. She shook her head to clear it, and then decided that the atmosphere wasn't right either. She reached for her bed lamp, only to first not find it where she expected it, and then growling in frustration that it wouldn't come on. Angrily, she muttered the words to an illumination spell. The light flared and Katze blinked. The walls were a mix of random shades of blue paint. The walls were covered with framed pictures, and somehow an old Alpha Squad banner had been hung on the wall too. It took Katze a bit longer to place that she had woken up in a place where she hadn't been for a very long time, as evident by the dust strewn over everything. The paint scheme had been Ari's idea, she recalled. Except that Ari hadn't been all that good at matching colours, nor did she really have the patience for the job. The Alpha pennant had been a joke, Theta squad had raided Alpha's offices and she'd ended up with the pennant they had swiped from the place -- ironic, because she was eventually transferred into Alpha. A large chunk of her old Jihad memorabilia had been left in Blanca when the Jihad had closed down. So she was in her old apartment in Blanca. She got up out of the bed, and looked ceilingward. "I thought we had an agreement that there would be no sleep-teleporting," she grumbled to nobody in particular. The silence was quiet, as silence is prone to do, and Katze just shook her head and spoke again. "You brought me here. What do you want?" This time, she was drug across the room, as if something had clasped her hand. One of the pictures neatly hung on the wall hopped into her hand. She looked at it. The caption under the photo read "Alpha Officers, 1999." To the far left of the picture, she spotted Mel, with Nolan next to her. At the far right, Pupp stood next to a visage of herself. Everybody was smiling for once. Katze stared at the picture of a long time. "Let the dead stay dead," she finally quietly said. "Nolan and Kap died in service to a cause. It happens." She cocked her head as if she was listening to a quiet voice and then said, "There was nothing to fight for. He left this world. I insisted..." She lapsed into silence, and put the picture down on the dresser. She stood there for a long time, and then opened a drawer and removed a small cedar box. She didn't open the box, though. She whispered a few words, and the illumination spell sputtered and died. A few seconds later, Katze was looking at the kitchen table in her apartment in Berkeley. She set the cedar box on the table, turned on the overhead light, and opened the box. Slowly, she removed the contents, starting with the JihadLinker she had stashed on the top. Underneath them was a TRES patch, and then a really old Theta patch, Katze's first squad. She smiled a bit, as she stuck the Alpha patch on top of it. A VR patch was underneath the both of them, then a few candid photos from some JPV party. Underneath those was a Dobe pin, from her supply clerk days early in her Jihad career. Then there were her Rear Admiral bars. She held those in her hand, and they glinted in the light. A sleepy voice behind her said, "Katze, it's 3 AM. What are you doing?" Katze twisted in her chair and saw Josh, half awake, staring at her. She said, "Looking at old mementos." "Why are you looking at old mementos at three AM?" "Because a certain perverse Source thought it funny to do the sleep-teleport again." "I thought that wasn't going to happen again." "I thought so too. But apparently something has It agitated. If I only had a clue..." Josh sat down at the table. "Maybe I can help. What happened?" Katze told the story of waking up in Blanca and of the picture. Josh listened quietly. Finally he said, "It drug you to your old base and showed you an old picture and wanted you to pick up this box? That doesn't make sense." Katze sighed. "I know. And that bothers me, especially with your proposal earlier. The fact this happened the same night really bothers me." Josh looked at her. "Are you sorry you accepted?" he finally said. "No, Josh, no, no, no. I'm not. I love you." "Was it too fast?" "I don't think so. You can't predict the future." "You can." "Not really. I catch glimpses occasionally, but it's...well...like looking into a mirror dimly, as Paul said. I only catch the occasional bright flash. I only get a second of warning before travesty kicks in. I'm not omniscient, Josh, nor do I particularly want to be right now. "But you know what Paul said in that same chapter? He said, 'Though I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.' I am nothing, Josh, without you. It doesn't matter what powers the Source has decided I need, it's about you." Josh nodded, and picked up the next patch. He smiled at it. "You kept a commemorative patch of the liberation of Marraketh?" "It was the big win. We had to celebrate somehow. I think I've got a 'Goddamn Phoenix is over' TRES Corps patch, or something like that, in that box." "Yep. It's the next patch. And under that is what appears to be a bar napkin, folded in half." "Huh? I don't remember putting that..." Josh had unfolded it. "It's a phone number. In the 303 area code. And it has written above it 'in case of emergency'." "Oh, I did put that in there. 303's Denver. It's Mal's direct number. At least, he said it would reach him 24/7, so I'd better be damned sure it was important before I rung it. His concession to my worry that the Wyrm was pulling a huge trick on us." "Mal? He was the Lyran, right?" "Yeah, or at least he was pretending to be." Josh thought for a second and then said, "Maybe the Source was hinting that there's going to be an emergency, and wanted you to have the number?" "Probably. It's probably not a bad idea to carry the ol' Linker around either." Josh smiled. "I remember when you tried to convince me it was one of Greg's prototypes." "You weren't on my side then." Josh smiled. "I am now. Promise me something, though?" "What?" "That whatever's about to happen, that you'll return to me?" "With Kyrill as my witness, I'll try my best. But if I have to give up this life to save folks, Josh, I will." "I know. But..." "It's okay to be a bit selfish. Just know that I'll do my best, Josh." "I know you will. But I don't want you to be lost to me." Katze carefully packed the patches and the rank pins back in the cedar box, and then rose from her chair. Without a word, she kissed him. He smiled and returned the kiss. "Shall we go back to bed?" he asked. "Yeah. We've got to be up in a few hours." They went back to bed, and the last thing Katze remembered before drifting off to sleep was how nice it felt to fall asleep in Josh's arms. ~***~ 15:00h, March 5, 2004 Skyview High School, Denver, Colorado United States "Alright, see you guys tomorrow," Joseph Lacroix said over the din of the final bell and the rustling of three dozen departing students. "Don't forget to have the next five chapters read by the end of the break; I haven't decided if I'll test you on it or not yet." "Is that a threat?" the class wiseass quipped, stuffing books into her backpack. "Depends, Erin, is that a dare?" Lacroix said, already turning to the work on his desk. He smirked as Erin adopted her best "you win!" expression, hurrying to catch up with friends in the corridor. Lacroix waved at the last few stragglers heading out to catch buses, and turned to his pile of assignments. "Teachers are done for the day at five, my ass," he muttered to himself, brandishing the nearest red pen to get to work. It was only his second semester teaching English at Skyview High, and Lacroix was still learning the ropes of education. Chief among his lessons was "don't cluster assignments together," which he was currently learning as he stared at the pile of essays and several smaller assignments for the three sections he taught. The stack of thirty-four essays for his twelfth-grade English class, now reduced to twenty, definitely wasn't going anywhere - which meant Lacroix wasn't either. Heaving an ostentatiously martyred sigh, he set to grading them. Lacroix knew he was kidding himself about feeling so harassed, of course; the truth was, he really enjoyed where he was in life. The young teacher was lucky enough to be blessed with three largely-enthusiastic English classes - even if the twelfth-graders needed some work with their writing! - and the job was actually what he'd initially planned on doing. It certainly wasn't as exciting as his old job, but that was much of the appeal. His old job. It still seemed strange that it was gone and in the past; the three years' service with TRES and VRDET had left their mark on Lacroix in all too many ways. It was nearing the fourth anniversary of both the end of the Hidden War and Lacroix's discharge from VRDET, but it simultaneously felt like a lifetime ago and yesterday. Lacroix's pen wandered across the scratch paper he used for rough notes as he chuckled to himself. If the Jihad gave anyone an opportunity, it was the opportunity to live multiple lives, in sequence or series as one needed. The vanishing act needed to get into the Jihad, and his experiences once in it, definitely accomplished that. The Joseph Lacroix of 1993 would never have recognized himself in 1995, 1997, 1999 or 2004. Things really had changed. As he toiled away at the students' papers, Lacroix's mind wandered some more. He welcomed the wandering. It happened quite often while grading; compositions for high schoolers were trivial compared to the monstrous thesis he had written at Adams State two years ago, and so the corrections and suggestions flowed onto the papers with almost no effort. The disconnect was therapeutic as well; it helped Lacroix to relax after a day of dealing with his students, and he couldn't spot any screwups with the grading yet. For the rest of the afternoon, the papers and assignments went by smoothly enough, only interrupted a couple of times by two of the history teachers - their work finished blissfully early - popping into the classroom to say goodbye to Lacroix before returning to their homes. As Lacroix faded back into the work, time marched on, and he finally looked up after awhile to realize it was 4:30. _Seigneur_, he thought to himself, _this is pretty dull work at times._ A moment later, he sat upright and realized that he actually _was_ bored! That in and of itself was odd. Lacroix enjoyed his work, and it usually went by swiftly despite the huge piles. However, he realized, now and then things had occasionally become a little dull. Dull was a rare sensation for Lacroix, one he had been actively seeking for several years. The past nine years of his life had been intense. The first year of teaching (he marveled at how quickly he had gotten a full-time contract, and wondered if someone had had a hand in that), preceded by the crucible of Colorado's education program, and the game of mad catch-up that was the remainder of his English degree at ASU. And before that, the Jihad. Now, there was a life worth a biography or six! Lacroix could only barely remember how he had stumbled over the organization, catching a mention of a "Church of Saint Dino the Avenger" one day on McGill's campus and checking it out on a lark. Before he knew it, he had learned things he couldn't have conceived of before, and found himself in Colorado with a leave of absence from McGill, preparing to join TRES Corps in the fall of 1994. Although he had heard seditious rumors saying otherwise, Lacroix was firmly convinced it was impossible to be bored in the Jihad. It was almost as though he was dumped into a parallel world, replete with high technology, functioning magic, hundreds of nonhumans - something he'd never quite gotten over - and a conspiracy-laden world of allies and foes which he was only beginning to truly understand at the end of his first year. He must have been doing _something_ right, anyway, as he quickly rose through noncommissioned ranks in TRES to the rank of sergeant after a mere year. Lacroix' career in TRES, only a year old, was looking good - as was the war in general, as the B'harnate forces seemed on the run. The great operations before his enlistment had scored major victories, and even the debacle of Operation Worldwalk seemed to only be a brief setback. Yes, things were looking optimistic - and then the battles of Operation Phoenix came down on the Jihad. Things looked somewhat less well after that, but the Jihad persevered, Lacroix mostly recovered, and when the War came to an abrupt and bewildering end in 1999, he found himself wondering what to do with civilian life - and here he was. Not just a teacher, like he'd wanted to be since high school, but someone who had gone through an unimaginable life and managed to reintegrate himself into civilian life enough to remember what boredom felt like. One could do worse with a postwar life, Lacroix thought as he started packing up his papers. Might as well do the rest of the grading at home. 1735h, March 5, 2004 Denver, Colorado United States Every time Lacroix crossed Broadway without being driven into the pavement, he counted himself lucky. To say the street was a deathtrap implied it was far safer than it was, although it guaranteed a certain minimum of excitement in Lacroix's life, no matter how mundane the rest of his day went. Still alive and unharmed, he went indoors and climbed the stairs to his apartment. As far as homes went, Lacroix's apartment was modest, a simple one-bedroom affair. It was well enough located to be expensive, but a stroke of good luck on the contract combined with some culinary record-keeping in the US Marine Corps inflicted by some liaisons and Jihad personnel towards the end of the demobilization earned him and several hundred other Jihaddi consistent pasts - and some modest pensions of one type or another. A number of Jihaddi were officially ex-military, veterans of the Gulf War or other recent campaigns, despite having no such past - at least, that's what the Purple Heart and Bronze Star tied to Lacroix's name in official records implied. The apartment looked mundane enough, but many of the Jihaddi either received or "borrowed" artifacts from their respective JAOs on the way out after the end, and Lacroix was no exception. Scattered bits of TRES and VR memorabilia - the kind that wouldn't attract too much curiosity - were here and there in the apartment, and a small locker in the bedroom contained some of the other articles, such as the once-ubiquitous JihadLinker, his Corps and VR decorations, and a pair of weapons - his officer's sword from TRES Corps, and a sidearm from his VRDET service. Lacroix had no idea why he kept them around (well, alright, he meant to hang the sword on the living room wall sometime), save for a nagging feeling that the War wasn't as neatly over as people thought. Granted, he was far from the only person with that kernel of suspicion; it had all been too _neat._ However, nothing had happened since 1999, and for the most part people were relaxing. Lacroix ran into veterans now and then, and they kept in discreet touch, but as the former Jihaddi began fanning out across the world from Colorado, they each took some of the war with them, until it seemed inaccessibly distant. It was far enough away now that Lacroix and others like him could focus on more important things - like dinner! Setting his briefcase and the papers therein on the kitchen table, he went about seeing what was available. Steady work is steady work, but young high school teachers were far from rich anywhere in the world (that Lacroix knew of, else he'd be there and not in Denver), but a plain selection was worse than a lot of things. Besides, whatever it was, it wouldn't be ramen. Thank God. The apartment was largely quiet while Lacroix rummaged through the fridge for the night's victim, aside from the droning of traffic on the street outside, merging into the dull hiss of a late winter rain. Enjoying the sound of the latter, he opened the living room windows to let some of the sound in - besides, it was also unseasonably warm. Pulling out the hot dogs and buns, Lacroix started getting ready to prepare supper when he heard the sound of a speeding vehicle and the thrum of music, suddenly interrupted by the metallic of shriek the X'hirjq fighter-bomber's engine as it passed low over the battlefield gain, the staccato hissing of its laser cannons' vaporizing whatever snow, earth, or people struck. All was pandemonium, the soldiers still peeling themselves off the ground from the hammer blows of the massive bombing run mere seconds before. Sergeant Lacroix picked himself up, dazedly took inventory of what was left of his position, and tried to find which direction was the front. The line was in chaos, huge gaps blown in it by the bombing runs. Time slowed. Crump of bombs sounded, somewhere above and behind him. Dimly sensed the Ellipsoid shattering from X'hirjq attack. Got bearings - forward! That way! Pulled the rifle - heavy now - to his shoulder, took aim at oncoming attackers, gave orders barely audible to his own ears. Tried to do so louder, but drowned out - weapons fire, shriek of the bombers again, snaps and crackles of dirt thrown up around him. Ground rumbling beneath the chorus of X'hirjq war songs, chilling but strangely beautiful. take aim, pull trigger - rifle's dry! look for fresh weapon - no one left alive to left, no one to right, all scorched ground and body parts the squad is gone! it's just me! draw combat knife. hunch in foxhole wait only gonna get one chance Roar of fighters' engines fades to a mere hissing of the rain outside came back in with the force of a hard slap to the face, physically dragging Joseph Lacroix back. Things felt different - ah, that's why. Trying to take and hold deep breaths to get past the desperate gasping, Lacroix shivered from a mix of fear and cold sweat. As he got his breathing under control, he suddenly felt sharp pains in both arms and hands. Willing himself to move again, he let go of the death grip on the fridge door handle and kitchen counter, feeling pins and needles course through his hands and arms from the locked posture. After a few more seconds, he got himself back under control. Sighing, he walked to the window to close it, looking outside for a moment to see the source of the sound. A car was parked halfway through the intersection out front, almost visibly moving as the bass from its stereo thrummed. On the opposite side of the street, someone pulled himself off the road, kicked resentfully at the slush pile he had slipped in, and got back onto the sidewalk, sending an "I'm alright" wave at the car's driver. Lacroix shook his head a couple of times to get the last remaining bits of fuzziness out of his head. Fortunately, _that_ had only happened rarely anymore, and never for more than a few seconds. That didn't make it any less Goddamned aggravating, anyway, not least because they weren't the most predictable. Last week _he_ was the guy who slipped in slush, and got nothing out of that other than a bruise from the curb. "That was then and this is now," Lacroix said to himself before going back to preparing the hotdogs. He decided to forget the papers for the time being. Besides, it was a Friday, and the break was coming. No reason he couldn't take a few days to veg out just a bit more. Besides, it wasn't like anything was going on next week. ~***~ *** March 6th, 2004 (12 Agamon 572) 2317 Hilgard Ave., North Berkeley *** It was a beautiful old house that Bri'in had picked, Katze decided as she stood on the staircase. Five whole bedrooms, an attic space, a spacious kitchen...there's no way Josh and her could have afforded this on their own. Good ol' Bri'in. Not only that, the location was perfect. It was only a three block walk to Tolman Hall straight down Arch St from their new place, and it wasn't much further to Josh's work in the other direction. Katze practically couldn't understand how Bri'in couldn't rent this place out. Her thoughts were interrupted by the voice of her beloved, calling up to her. "Hey Katze! Your folks are here!" Katze looked down at Josh, at the bottom of the stairs, and descended. Standing in the foyer was not only Tyrene and Horetia Katze, her folks, but also two of her favourite people from Marraketh, Remmick Merkin and Rene Ewerte. She felt a pang of loneliness, knowing dear quiet Grahm wouldn't be with them. She shook her head, knowing why Grahm couldn't be there, and decided not to pursue that line of thought. "Father! Mother! Remmick! Rene!" she called out. "Tjarlin!" Remmick responded. Well, it was better than "the lady Katze", Katze decided. She could deal a bit better with her Marrakethian name these days, but still prefered the name she used on Earth -- the name David gave her when he misheard Tyrene. The thought made her twinge, for he really ought to be here as well. Indeed, if this had been a while ago, he would have been overjoyed to find Katze was marrying Josh. But that was beside the point. She hadn't heard from him in years, and last she had heard, he was still in that cultish Christian church. She forced her thoughts back to the here and now as she hugged her parents, and showed her ring to them and Remmick and Rene. Bri'in walked out of the kitchen, and smiled. "I see the Marraketh-Earth run has been rather busy this morning." There was much chatter after that point, and Katze conscripted Josh and Bri'in into showing the place off. Just as the gaggle headed up the stairs came a knock on the door, and Katze opened it to find Miranda Delgado standing there. "Hey! Come in!" Delgado smiled. "Helen's showing up later, will that be a big problem?" "What have you told her?" "She knows about you, yes. She was glad to find out just how you slipped through those defenses." "Delgado the intel officer telling somebody who wasn't a Jihaddi about the Jihad. I never thought I'd see the day." Delgado looked down at her shoes, and then smiled at Katze. "First time for everything. Besides, she was asking and I figured you probably wouldn't mind. Besides, Helen's trustworthy." "Good, my folks are here, and it would have been hard to explain otherwise." "I finally get to meet the people who created you? This should be an experience." "Yeah, well, you know..." "Yeah." Delgado looked Katze up and down. "The Jihad's been dead and gone for four years, Wraith, why are you wearing your Linker?" "Because I take hints." "What are you talking about?" Katze waved her hands in the air. "Mystical mumbo-jumbo. Something's about to go horribly wrong, I think." "Well, I still keep an ear to the ground, as much as I can. Consequences of being an intelligence officer, I guess. But I've heard no chatter. Even the Order has been very quiet as of late. I think you're overreacting. Probably just a worry now that you've agreed to calm down and have a family." "Perhaps you're right. Ah well, if nothing happens in a few weeks, I'll put the Linker back in its box. I probably don't need it, I have Mal's number in my phone." "Wow, that's pretty heady, how'd you get Mal's number?" "We worked together. And he agreed that it should exist, to placate my insistence we needed to keep you on the job." "Ah, right, I forget about your VR commission, you being such a good TRES officer." "Those days are over now. To be frank, I'm sorta enjoying the normality." "You too?" A knock on the door saved Katze from further thought on the matter. Standing there was Greg Wu, carrying a laptop. "Got your wireless up yet?" he said. "Silly Greg, you know we've not moved much furniture over yet. Luckily, we've come up with some extra help. C'mon in." Greg walked in, nodded to Delgado. "Where's your boyfriend?" he asked Katze. "Upstairs with Bri'in, showing the Marraketh crowd around." "Wow. I actually get to meet them?" "Yeah. Now you'll see why I'm so weird." Greg laughed, just as Josh and Bri'in led the Marraketh contingent down the stairs. Katze introduced Delgado and Greg, and then the two groups split up, one to stay at the house, and another to go move furniture. Josh, Katze, and Bri'in had all agreed that keeping up appearances was important, so they would move the old fashioned way rather than attempting to teleport the furniture. The moving went easily, with all hands, and Delgado, after the first haul, ran to get pizza and returned with Helen in tow. The Marraketh contingent was slightly weirded out by pizza, but all agreed it wasn't bad stuff once you got past the look of it. Rene amused himself by sorting books, after Katze wrote the English alphabet out for him. All in all, it was probably the best move Katze had ever been through. Folks cleared out after dinner, Katze hugging her folks and promising she'd let them know when they were going to have the housewarming party. Finally, it was Katze and Josh, alone. Katze was chewing on a pen, trying to figure out how to tell David about their new address in case he was ever inclined to forgive. Josh looked over her shoulder. "You don't have to do that, you know." "Yeah, but I want to have the door opened if he wants to talk to me. I'm his only living relation, and our kids will, by rights, be his grandkids. His only possibility of grandkids." "Why can't you just write, 'Hi Dad, Josh and I are engaged, if you want to get in touch with us, here's our address and phone number?'" Katze thrust the pen at Josh. "You write it then. I'm going upstairs to work on my thesis." "Kats, don't get upset." "You aren't the one he called a demon and banished from his life." "Maybe it is better that I write the letter. But Kats, what are you, from a Judeo-Christian perspective?" "I don't work for the Prince of the Void. It's funny how much the Christians got right, there is a dualistic nature to the universe, but it's not as simple as God and the Devil, y'know? And I'm not a demon. If I had to fit in Judeo-Christian mythology, I'd rather be an angel, you know? But really, I just want to be Katze Brenner, a normal human." "Well, you're a Marrakethian, not a human, but..." "Connecting to the Source long enough to prove to David I'm not a demon is a gamble in two ways, and you said you didn't want to lose me." "I don't. I'll write the letter. Why don't you go to bed? It's been a long day." "I think I'll do that. Night, Josh." "Night, Katze. I'll be up in a while." ~***~ Kingman, Arizona 03/07/2004 1:07pm "Who the hell's bike is that in my spot?" Dee raised an eyebrow and glanced at the newcomer. She was at a table in one of her favorite hangouts, a bar called Smokin' Pete's. It was more or less a dive, but had good sandwiches and live music some nights. It was only around 1 in the afternoon right now though and Dee was on her lunch break, just finishing off her Mountain Dew. "I said, who's in my damn spot!" the man shouted again. Dee sighed to her self. Pete's was also a hangout for a lot of local bikers, sport bike riders mostly. This was what led her to the joint in the first place. Most of them were good people to hang around with, but some were complete blowhards. "White and red bike, Honda of some kind?" Shit, that was hers. Worse yet, now that she looked at him Dee realized that the jerk had a foot of height and around 150 pounds on her. Not, really, that that was that remarkable given her diminutive stature, but it came to mind with as hostile as he was being. She knew that she had a pistol under her jacket, and that her artificial right arm could do nasty tricks, but she also knew that she really didn't want things to get to that. She left a five on the table and got up, adjusting her jacket. "That's mine, sorry." The guy settled down, evidently not anxious to pick a fight with a girl who looked like she was 15. Dee grabbed her helmet off the table and started for the door. "Not seen a Honda like that before, girly... what is it?" the man leered. "RC211V." The guy blinked and bristled. "Bullshit. That's a factory race bike. Why'd you go and lie to me about that?" Fuck this guy, she thought. Major attitude problem, and she had to get back to work. "Run me at the light if you don't believe me. I've got somewhere to be." She strode out into the bright Arizona sunlight, strapping on her helmet. She knew it must be painful to look at; it was all in the chrome finish that had become popular in racing, a brightly mirrored red visor and finish with slightly lighter red "ghost flames". She caught a glimpse of the asshole straddling a Suzuki as she threw a leg over her own bike. The wail of the engine split the air as the Honda's V5 spun to life, then settled down into an irregular burble as she idled out to the light in front of the bar, ignoring the rider next to her. The cross street light turned yellow and she dimly heard the man's Suzuki revving up at the same she was opening the throttle on her own. The cross street light turned red, then their light green. Dee cranked the throttle open at the same time as she let go of the clutch and the Honda screeched and shot forwards. The next 10 seconds were far too busy for Dee to pay attention to the rider beside her, as she was maintaining the delicate balance required to maintain control of a full race bike accelerating as fast as it could. She only glanced at her mirrors once she had eased up on the throttle, and by then the other rider was well out of sight. "You're back early," said Damocles as Dee got back. They were running a business called Athena Heavy Industries, stared shortly after the dissolution of the Jihad. Dee wandered into the bathroom and put her helmet and jacket into a locker. "Yeah, well, some asshole wanted to how fast he could lose," she called back as she changed out of her riding clothes and into the work clothes she was wearing before going out to lunch. Athena Heavy Industries did specialized machining, capitalizing on her and Damo's experience in the Verthandic Ranger's R&D wing. Damocles mostly did guns, while Dee also tinkered with cars and motorcycles for people. She took her shoulder holster and pistol and put them on the top shelf of the locker before closing it. "Figured it was something like that." Dee crossed over to the workbench where she had a cylinder head clamped down and had been working on it. She picked up the die grinder in her artificial right hand and called up a file of what she was doing on the cylinder head before starting to reshape the metal with a precision not possible with human hands. In a way it felt like cheating, and in a way she relied too much on the precision and processing power in the arm that had been grafted to her by VRDET to replace the one she'd lost years and years before. She mentally shrugged and called up an mp3 from its internal player, piped directly into her nervous system to drown out the annoying whine of the air tool. "Are you going to help me with loading the display and stuff into the van?" he asked. They were heading to the SHOT Show in Vegas in the evening to show off one of Athena's first products, a specialized combat shotgun. And also, there was the whole fact of her really wanting to go; various racing commitments had prevented her going in years previous. "No, I've got to get this head finished and shipped off before we leave." "You're just saying that so you don't have to help with the heavy lifting." "It'd seem like that, but really that's just a happy coincidence." Just outside Las Vegas, Nevada 03/09/2004 6:21 A.M. The man in black remembered the pain, the feel of the heavy wood driving into his stomach, the sensation as the spell burned his organs away. Then the light as the alien magic ripped his flesh away. Finally, he remembered the darkness that fell over him, sealing away both pain and light, leaving him alone inside his own head for he didn't know how long... ...and then the darkness subsided, replaced by light, a brilliant flash of actinic white that surrounded him. Hiding in the light were things that seemed to reach out towards him, making the man in black recoil in terror. And then the pain, a thousand shooting needles all over his body until the individual sensations were whited out and became a gray static of agony. Finally, the pain subsided, the light dimmed from unbearable white to a deep red-gold color. The man in black, almost totally insensate from the exertion, tumbled through open air a short distance before collapsing onto a dirt surface. The man in black lay face-first in the dust, only barely aware of his surroundings. He stayed there for almost an hour as the sun rose over the horizon. His mind was whirling, stray thoughts and memories colliding without reason, the images of his life and the things he saw on his trip through the void crowding each other out in an attempt to get his attention. The man moaned softly as a vivid memory of his emergence shot through his mind. Finally, his consciousness managed to grab a hold (Wake up.) forced his eyes open (You are still you.) and got him out of his faceplant and into a half-crouch, looking for all the world like just another desert creature. (You have a job to do.) "wh.. where?" The man in black looked around, squinting in the early morning light. He had arrived (From where? That memory at least was still a bit hazy...) on a flat expanse of brown and yellow (A...desert? Okay, but -where-?) near a road. In the distance, hard to make out through the sun, there was a city of glass, chrome and kitsch. The man in black rose, a bit shakily, from his crouch and took a deep breath. The smell of the air reassured him. Yes. This was Earth, no doubt about it. Somewhere in America most likely, this certainly wasn't home, unless something had gone wrong... The thought flashed across his face, and he instinctively went for the sword belted at his side. Feeling the grip, he drew the blade and held it up in the morning sky. He smiled. This was -his- sword, there like it had always had been, the black length of metal (Part of his mind wondered, "Black? When was it black?") his most constant companion. Seeing the blade let him remember more about his life, his victories, his friends and his enemies. Especially his enemies. Sheathing his sword, the man in black dusted the desert soil off his tunic - must remember to adjust his landings a bit in the future - and set off towards the road, the city, and the future, whistling a happy tune. Lord Tilden Alexander Owsen had a lot of things to accomplish, and not much time to do it in. He would have to move quickly, otherwise the Scouring might come down before he was finished, and that just would not do. That would not do at all. TO BE CONTINUED... */ AC/DC "Back In Black" _Back In Black_ /*