Mercury Rests (30 page)

“We’re wasting time,” said Christine. “I’ll get the apple. You stop Lucifer.”

“OK!” said Mercury. “We’ll meet back here. Right?”

“Right,” said Christine. She took a deep breath and stepped toward the portal.

“Wait a sec,” said Mercury.

“What, Mercury? We don’t have a lot of time.”

“I just want you to know, if something goes wrong, and we don’t see each other again...”

“Yes?”

“Jacob is totally crushing on you.”

“Hey!” Jacob yelped. “
Unck!
”

Christine stepped on the portal and was gone.

“Come on, Loverboy!” Mercury yelled, and took off down the corridor.

Christine found herself in a small clearing in the midst of what appeared to be a very large and very authentic jungle. The only holes in the illusion were, well, holes: gaping cracks in the dark blue sky revealing the red-to-azure gradient of twilight. Gunfire echoed all around her, amplified by the vast dome, and the muzzle flash of automatic weapons blinked on and off far above her, like angry fireflies staking out territory.

Despite the pandemonium in the skies, her immediate surroundings were eerily still and dark. Shivering in the cold air blowing in from the desert, Christine suddenly felt very alone. She found herself wishing Jacob hadn’t needed to stay and help Mercury in the planeport. It would be nice to have Mercury’s help too, of course, but Mercury could be a bit exhausting. You never knew whether to take him seriously. Like that remark about Jacob having a crush on her. What was that about? Was he just making that up? Or had Jacob said something to him? No, that was ridiculous. Jacob hadn’t had five seconds alone with Mercury. There was no way he could have...
Enough!
she told herself. She could worry about Jacob and Mercury later. Right now she needed to find the apple tree.

Once her eyes adjusted to the near darkness, she began to search the area for the tree. Perp had called in a favor to have someone in Heaven scan the area for a warping of the interplanar energy patterns that would be caused by the apple tree. Something like that, anyway. She wasn’t sure of the details. However he had picked the location for the portal, there apparently was some margin of error: no apple tree could be found in the immediate vicinity.

She moved in slow, concentric circles, squinting at the ground to make sure she didn’t miss anything. How big would the tree be? Big enough to bear fruit, but what did that mean? Two feet tall? Ten? At last, as she reached the edge of the clearing, she saw something at about waist height, glinting in the dim light of the partial moon, which glowed anemically through one of the gaps in the dome. Reaching out, she put her fingers around it and plucked it from the tree: a glass apple.

She hadn’t seen the tree at first because it blended in with the other foliage at the edge of the clearing. It was shorter than she was, and its branches reached out no farther than the length of her arms. There appeared to be only the one apple. Presumably more apples would grow in time—hours? days? It was impossible to know with these things—but Christine didn’t have time to dig up the tree. She would have to be content to address the immediate threat and hope that Heaven could deal with the tree.

She turned to walk back to the portal but stopped cold. Blocking her way was Tiamat. Flanking her were a dozen demons in combat gear. Christine spun around and took off running through the jungle, but hadn’t gone more than twenty feet when a strong hand gripped her by the back of the neck. She tried to hurl the apple into the trees, but with the demon gripping her shoulder muscles, she could only manage a weak underhanded throw.
The apple arced ten feet into the air, smacked into a tree, and then rolled backward behind her. The demon twisted Christine’s neck, forcing her to turn to see Tiamat pick up the apple. Tiamat gazed into it maliciously, looking very much the Wicked Queen.

“My dear,” she said to Christine. “You do turn up in the strangest places.” She turned to the shimmering portal behind her. “Getting some help from high places, I see. Konrath! Scalzi!” she barked at the two demons nearest the glittering pattern. “Watch the portal. Decapitate anyone who comes through. The rest of you come with me.”

Tiamat and the four demons marched down the jungle path, with the last demon trailing behind Christine. He had released his iron grip on her neck, but it’s not like she was going to escape. The demons were far quicker and stronger than she. If she made a run for the portal, she’d likely end up shot or beheaded. Or both.

As they neared the central compound that acted as the command center for Eden II, the sky suddenly erupted with activity. Hundreds of shooting stars soared through the gaps in the dome, joining in the celestial fracas. Reinforcements had arrived from Heaven.

“Quickly!” Tiamat hissed, hurriedly leading the group inside the compound. Leaving most of the demons to guard the entrance, the remainder of the group got in the elevator, which dropped several hundred feet below the surface to the network of tunnels below. When they reached the control room for the chrono-collider, one of the demons sat down at the central console and pulled out a small electronic device. He scribbled a pattern on the screen to unlock it, and glowing text appeared on the screen. He set the device down and started flipping switches and tapping keys on the console. Hidden machinery came to life all around them, buzzing and humming in readiness. Another
demon went about repairing the pneumatic tube that Jacob had broken the last time the machine had been fired up. It didn’t take long. When the CCD was ready, the demon at the control panel pressed a button, and a receptacle slid out of the console. Tiamat placed the apple in it, and it slid shut again.

Just then, the elevator door opened, and Horace Finch jumped out, red faced and panting. “Wait!” he yelled. “Damn you, Tiamat! I told you not to start without me!” Three men dressed in fatigues and carrying assault rifles followed him out of the elevator.

“Oh, did you say that?” Tiamat asked. “Sorry, I guess I was busy doing all of the work.”

“All of the...I built this machine, you thankless harpy! If it weren’t for me and the OPB, the CCD wouldn’t exist!”

“Silence, fool!” Tiamat spat. “You’ve served your purpose. Did you really think that I was going to let you and your silly little boys’ club take control over the space-time continuum? I permitted the construction of this facility because it served my purposes. I hold the apple, Finch. I and I alone will be the master of time and space. Braziel, take these gentlemen’s weapons before they hurt themselves.”

The human warriors reluctantly surrendered their guns to the demon over Finch’s protests. They had seen the demons in action above the CCD and knew they were outclassed. Finch’s shoulders slumped in defeat.

Tiamat nodded at the demon at the control panel and the demon flipped a switch. A monitor over their heads displayed:

CAUTION: CCD IS ACTIVE!

A low-pitched, almost subaudible hum filled the room. Lights on the control panel blinked crazily as dozens of preprogrammed processes woke from their slumber. Below the surface of the panel, millions of electrons shuffled from place to place, like commuters in a vast city of copper and silicon, each of them doing their part to bring the monster to life.

“No!” Christine screamed. Demons on either side of her gripped her arms. Last time around, Jacob had been here to save the day, leaping onto the console and breaking open the tube, releasing the apple before it ever reached the bowels of the machine. But this time, Christine could only watch helplessly as the apple was sucked through the tube, disappearing to some unknown location deep within the earth where it would be filled with the mysterious particles known as chrotons. Christine’s grasp of the physics was fuzzy at best; for all she knew, the apple was being subjected to dark enchantments by the dwarves of Khazaddûm. What she did know was that if the experiment worked and Tiamat got her hands on the chroton-powered apple...well, the world might not end, but it certainly was going to get a whole lot less pleasant.

She could only hope Mercury and Jacob were having better luck with Lucifer.

Mercury threw the door open and burst onto the concourse, running headlong into a lanky blond demon carrying a black backpack tucked under his arm. The angel and the demon fell in a heap while the backpack continued on its forward trajectory, sailing through the air twenty feet and then sliding several feet farther on the hard floor.

“You again!” snarled Lucifer. “Don’t you have anything better to do than interfere with my diabolical schemes?”

Mercury shrugged. “What can I say? I love interfering with diabolical schemes.”

Jacob emerged from the doorway and took in the scene. The planeport was just as Christine had described it: an interdimensional gateway that had all the charm of Chicago’s Midway Airport—minus the Orange Julius stands. So it really was true. There really were Beings of Indeterminate Origin who traveled between dimensions using this absurdly ordinary-looking structure as a connecting hub. This revelation should have served to make the notion of angels seem even more ridiculous to Jacob, but in a strange way it was sort of wonderful—the idea that the trustees of the space-time continuum were tramping through these
corridors on their way to conduct the Business of the Universe. To Jacob, who had dreamed of working for the FBI only to find that the legendary Bureau was mostly a bunch of people shuffling papers around in office buildings, it made a twisted sort of sense. Of course this is the way the Universe is run, he thought. This is the way
everything
is run.

A few terrified travelers cowered in the corners or ran in terror away from Lucifer. More angels, thought Jacob, realizing that he could no longer think of them as BIOs. It seemed petty to deny them the appellation of
angel
now. These people looked like...well,
people
. Presumably they were immortal and just as capable of “miracles” as Mercury, but they didn’t seem to have a clue what to do about a rogue demon carrying a backpack. Lucifer appeared to be alone, but gunfire rang out down the hall, in the direction from which he had come. Apparently Lucifer had outrun his offensive line. Jacob sprinted after the backpack.

Lucifer and Mercury tussled on the floor. Mercury eventually managed to get Lucifer in a headlock and, unsure of his next course of action, proceeded to give the Prince of Darkness noogies until he howled with rage. Lucifer scored a solid punch under Mercury’s ribs and wormed out of the hold. He scrambled away from Mercury and got to his feet. “Come back here, you fool!” he snarled at Jacob.

Turning to see Jacob running down the concourse with the backpack, Mercury got to his feet, holding his bruised side. Lucifer took off down the concourse after Jacob.

“Crap,” grumbled Mercury, who was wishing he’d had more time to plan this little adventure. Jacob was taking the bomb farther down the concourse, closer to the Heavenly portal—and farther from anywhere they could safely dispose of a nuclear bomb.
The only positive was that civilians were sparser in that direction. He got up and ran after Lucifer.

Lucifer had almost caught up to Jacob when Mercury dove at him, throwing his arms around Lucifer’s ankles and sending him sprawling down the concourse. Lucifer retaliated with a heel to Mercury’s face, breaking his nose. Jacob disappeared around a corner.

Mercury recoiled from the blow and slowly got to his feet, ready to resume the chase. But Lucifer remained on the floor, curled up in a ball. He moaned quietly, apparently nursing some injury.

“Is that all you got?” asked Mercury, wiping the blood off his chin in what he hoped was appropriate action-movie tough-guy manner.

“Actually,” said Lucifer, leaning forward on one elbow and smiling, “no.”

Pain tore through Mercury’s torso, throwing him forward and knocking him to the ground, stunned. He turned, raising his head to see seven men in combat fatigues standing some fifty feet down the concourse behind him with assault rifles pointed in his direction, barrels smoking. Then Mercury collapsed, face down in a pool of his own blood. The offensive line had caught up.

“Leave him!” Lucifer snapped. “After the idiot with the backpack!”

He and the SEALs took off around the corner.

“Son of a bitch,” Mercury moaned, rolling onto his back. There was a lesson here about hubris or the importance of good defense or something. Dizzy and short of breath, he dragged himself slowly to his feet. He had to get to Jacob. The little guy was a solid distance runner, but he was no match for Lucifer and
a squad of Navy SEALs. Not to mention that he was running straight into a dead end.

Mercury stumbled around the corner in time to see Lucifer playing tug-of-war with Jacob over the backpack. It wasn’t much of a contest; Lucifer was basically dragging Jacob around the planeport with the backpack, trying to shake him loose as if Jacob were a feral cat. Finally, with the help of a couple of the SEALs, he managed to pry loose Jacob’s grip, tossing him across the floor like a bag of laundry. Lucifer slung the pack over his shoulder and moved toward the portal to Heaven, which lay only a few feet away.

“Stop!” wheezed Mercury, limping down the concourse toward them.

Lucifer, turning to see Mercury, erupted in laughter. “You just don’t know when to quit, do you, Mercury? Gentlemen, I’d be obliged if you’d take care of our two friends here. I wish I could stay, but I have a doomsday device to deliver.” He stepped onto the portal and was gone.

The Heavenly portal was in an intersection of two of Heaven’s main thoroughfares, just west of the center of the celestial city. On each corner were buildings housing various branches of the Heavenly bureaucracy, from Prophecy Division to the Angel Band Communications Board. To the west, the road dead-ended in front of the Apocalypse Bureau. A quarter mile to the east, in the dead center of Heaven, lay the vast pyramidal structure known as the Eye of Providence.

The portal was guarded by a dozen cherubim, but the guard had always been more ceremonial than functional. Everybody knew that nobody was going to attack Heaven. As a result, the job of guarding it generally fell to cherubim who weren’t paying attention when assignments were handed out. This turns out not to be the best way to select security guards. Not only were the guards easily distracted, but as there was no precedent for Heaven being attacked, there was no clear protocol for what to do in case of an attack nor even a reliable litmus test to determine whether an attack was occurring.