Tags:
Fiction,
General,
Fiction - Fantasy,
Fantasy,
Fantasy - Contemporary,
Contemporary,
Horror,
Fantasy - General,
Science Fiction & Fantasy,
Science Fiction And Fantasy,
American Science Fiction And Fantasy,
Urban Life,
Biography: General,
Fantasy - Urban Life
They're a death cult. A real bunch of nut-job whackos. They've been around forever, but only over the last year have they really shown up on our radar. The man who attacked you, he's their leader."
"A church? Why don't you just go burn their compound down? You guys are Feds after all."
Myers either didn't get the jab, or he chose to ignore it. "We would if we could. But the Condition is good. They work in cells. Their higher-level operatives are known as the Exalted Order of the Shadows. We can't isolate their leaders, or even most of their ranking members. As far as we can tell they're dabbling in some real hard-core black magic. And they're connected...businessmen, politicians, the media, even movie stars. This cult is now our number one priority."
"Let me guess. They worship the Old Ones?"
"Yes. And they're out to get you specifically," he said, pausing briefly in thought. "How did you know that they were connected to those things?"
I didn't say anything.
Myers turned around and glared at me. "Look, Pitt, if you have information, you need to share it. These guys are bad news, their leader is secret enemy number one, and right now I'm your best chance to survive them." He tried to look friendly, and mostly failed. "I know that we've gotten off on the wrong foot, but I'm trying to help you here."
"Why?"
"That's our job. We're supposed to protect and defend the taxpayers." He smiled, and in the dark I wasn't sure if the government man or Susan had been more intimidating, but for totally different reasons. One because it represented a soulless entity with the power to suck the very blood from the innocent, and the other because it was a vampire. The Suburban continued to accelerate down the rutted road.
"Bullshit."
Myers shrugged. He was smart enough not to waste his time. "All right, let me level with you. You are currently our only in against this cult. Just about everybody we've tried to infiltrate has ended up zombified or worse. I've finally got a man inside, but he's low on their totem pole and they won't reveal anything to him. We can't get any of the known members to turn snitch, and if they seem to think about it, they're never seen again. But the Condition's fixated on you, and through you, it gives us a way to capture some of them for questioning."
I put my face in my palm. "Oh, come on. Why does everything seem to have it in for me personally?" I figured I knew why I was the target of the Old Ones. I had been responsible for thwarting their invasion, but the Feds did not know that. I was sure of that much, because if the Feds knew what I had pulled off, up to and including time travel, then I had no doubt that my brain would be sitting in a glass jar in some government lab being poked with electrodes to see how it worked.
"About that..." Myers looked away, a little sheepish. "Sorry."
I'd screwed up their invasion plans by not falling in line. I had no idea what Myers had to be sorry about. "Huh?"
"It was a misunderstanding," he said. I waited for the explanation. Myers took his time, actually seeming a bit embarrassed. "See, when MHI was fighting Lord Machado's minions, we decided to play it safe...So we...kind of...dropped a nuke on the area."
"You did what?" Julie shouted. "You tried to nuke Alabama?"
"Only a little one. It was for the best," he said defensively. "We didn't think you were going to succeed. I was certain that the bad guys were going to win, and I couldn't allow that. You know what would have happened then."
"Gee whiz, thanks, Myers. I was right there, and I didn't see a mushroom cloud, so I'm assuming you screwed up."
He shrugged. "When the bomb struck, the rift had already been opened. It passed through cleanly and detonated on the other side, inside the Old Ones' reality. It must have made them angry and from what our intel is telling us, it even hurt the big cheese of Old Ones. For some reason they think that you're the one that sent the weapon...Hence, the interdimensional hit
Joan Rivers, Richard Meryman