Free Doomsday Exam [BUREAU 13 Book Two] by Nick Pollotta Page B

the artificial volcano approached solar temperatures in which an exploding thermite grenade would have constituted a cool spot.
    "Not quite hell,” Raul noted, his silvery staff clearly discernible in the dim light. “But close enough."
    He would know, too.
    In a primitive luck ceremony, I crossed my fingers, then cursed as the monitor was divided by an impossible tower of black glass rising upward from the bubbling molten inferno. Soaring skyward, the angular column loomed high above the broiling morass until it went off the screen. Rapidly, the camera pulled back to show the entire length of shiny dark glass. What was this, some bizarre means of escape? But as the octagonal glass rod reached azimuth, the top broke off and came hurtling down to smash on top the warehouse with a terrible crash. Awash in blazing lava, the fiends were still attacking! Thankfully, no visible damage was done to the warehouse. But the shiny pieces of stone on the roof began to take root and rise into the air once more.
    Beneath the desk, Jessica took my hand and we exchanged a private moment. We could see the end coming. Under the awful accumulated weight of the growing ebony substance, a section of the reinforced roof finally cracked and collapsed. In a twinkling, the molten magma vanished and lying on the cool ground were a thousand limp forms painfully crawling towards the smashed section of the defensive ring.
    Succumbing for a second, I closed my eyes to the awful scene on the monitor. Incredible. The monsters had broken through our primary and secondary lines of defense in less than ten minutes. Now everything depended upon only a handful of Bureau personnel to halt these behemoths from escaping into America.
    God help us all.
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CHAPTER FIVE
    On the video screen, there was a series of flashes, and the Abrams assault tanks appeared in a circle around the warehouses.
    As the monsters rallied, the bulky war machine cut loose their .50 machine guns in a steady chatter, the 120mm cannons blasting thunderous volley after volley of high-explosive shells, thermite charges, silver shrapnel, and depleted-uranium slugs. The beings were torn to pieces, but none of them stayed that way for very long
    Moments later, an F22 Raptor lead a squad of screaming Harrier jumpjets into position in the sky. Banking sharply, the fighters lifted prows and stalled in the air, stopping perfectly still on their rumbling belly jets. It seemed impossible, but the Raptor actually appeared to be carrying more weapons than before.
    In spite of their arrival, I was less than thrilled. For over twenty years the best minds of the Bureau had designed and redesigned the material, vibratory and ethereal protections of the Holding Facility, and now we were down to the emergency reserves of teachers, students, and us.
    We are formidable , Jess sent.
    Not that formidable , I answered in blunt honesty.
    "Ed, I want a transfer to Clerical,” George said, out of the corner of his mouth.
    "Take me with you,” I whispered back.
    Unexpectedly, the picture on the monitor pulled back to the roof of this very building. In the gray sky, twelve of the Harriers engaged in a furious dogfight, banking turning, zigzagging, doing loops, their weapons constantly firing. Three were englobing a winged demon skull, four were busy with a flying saucer that had fangs, and five battled something invisible. But we could see the grisly effect of its energy weapons; shimmering golden rays that lanced past the jumpjets to impact on the ground with devastating force. Then I noticed a fighter spiraling into the distance, thick smoke trailing from a damaged tail section. Gil?
    Unknown.
    The camera did a sharp cut and out of the east rose squadrons of Apache helicopter gunships, skimming low over the town, rocket pods spitting 35mm death. Another video cut, and from the west rose a majestic flight of dragons. My team cheered. The Bureau had no Great Wyrms as prisoners in the Holding