99 Gods: Betrayer Read online

  “Be a man about this,” she said. “It isn’t so bad.” She stopped in front of the device and bowed. The device didn’t react, which didn’t surprise Nessa, since it was only a chocolate fountain. Its divinity existed only in her head. She took a long fork, stabbed a strawberry, and dipped it in the flowing chocolate until the chocolate covered it completely, and let it cool for a moment. “O great god of chocolate, forgive me this sacrilege,” Nessa said, bowing again. “This strawberry was raised to serve this unholy cause. Its death will not be in vain.”

  Then she ate it, chocolate and all.

  15. (Dave)

  Dave trudged into the work cabin after leaving his muddy boots outside. He had enjoyed the fruitless walk as he skirted the water meadows around the nameless lake. Melting snow from last night’s snowfall had filled the air with the scent of what Dave thought of as early spring. Even in Denver spring had progressed farther along than here. This place hovered too far up in the clouds for him.

  “Nobody home,” Dave said, confirming their suppositions. They hadn’t seen any lights on in Lorenzi’s cabin for three days.

  “Par for the course,” Jack said, just loud enough for Dave to hear. “You’re falling down on the job recently.” Jack accompanied his whisper with a quick glance at Elorie, which Dave translated as ‘You’re supposed to be keeping Elorie happy at night so she doesn’t ride our asses during the day’.

  Dave ignored Jack and slid around the room, avoiding people.

  “In that case, we’ll just let Georgia give her second preliminary report without Mr. Lorenzi,” Elorie said. She had grown moody over the past several days. Dave filled his time with cooking, cleaning and pointless translation of Lorenzi’s old letters. He had added little to his first day’s realization that the woman Lorenzi hounded, Satan, had been a victim, not a perpetrator, and Lorenzi had been a major league creep.

  Dave sat at the back of the group. Elorie and Georgia stood up front. The rest of the translation team: Mohammed, Jack, Lisa and Osham huddled up close. Only Darrel, their hacker, ended up stuck in the back with Dave. In Darrel’s case, he didn’t stop working, toting over one of his laptops and burying his eyes before Georgia started.

  “We’ve made progress, but we’re not done,” Georgia said, commanding everyone’s attention with the skills that made her a tenured professor at a very young age. “As Mr. Lorenzi surmised, we’ve found nothing in their current stacks before the mid 15th century, and most of their current stacks date to the Napoleonic era and later. The 15th century date is important, because that was when the Ecumenists moved their headquarters from Cordoba to the Pyrenees. However, despite the lack of records dating from before the 15th century, several of the 15th to 18th century documents contain references and quotations from much earlier documents, some purportedly as far back as the 4th century, not counting references to and quotations of other known classical documents. Piecing these document references together has proven to be a strenuous chore, as several of you who’ve worked with me on this project are well aware. From these references, I’ve been able to chart several conclusions.

  “First, Mr. Lorenzi’s statement that the Ecumenists originated in Cordoba, a generation or two before his arrival on the scene, as a group called the Scholars of God, can now be fully refuted. Before Cordoba the Ecumenists lived in Carthage, the Carthage of the Visigoths and later the Caliphate. However, while they resided in Carthage they named themselves the Order; in the Greek they used, the Taxis. The move from Carthage to Cordoba occurred in the late 9th Century or early 10th Century. I suspect someone forced them out of Carthage. Any further confirmation of their history would require access to the full Ecumenists’ archives, which Mr. Lorenzi did not provide.

  “Second, contrary to what Mr. Lorenzi said, the Ecumenists supported more than one magician-hunter before him. However, they supported the earlier magician-hunters in their incarnation as the Taxis. From interpretations and guesses, the last of the Taxis’s magician-hunters stumbled into something the Taxis referred to variously as ‘their ancient enemy’, ‘the fallen angels’ and ‘the underwater dwellers’. Mohammed found some records implying the Taxis sent out a group to attack the ‘underwater dwellers’, an attack without a clear outcome. I found a copy of a later record, a letter written in a Farsi dialect, stating the ‘underwater dwellers had abandoned their home in the mountains and gone to the underground’, which makes no sense to me.

  “Third, the references and quotations from the archives indicate the Taxis at first believed Islam to be a prophesied ‘final religion’, something they were promised or awaited, but later changed their minds. The promised ‘final religion’ was, in the minds of the Taxis, related to the fallen angels, though it’s impossible to tell whether the fallen angels were expected to have a positive or negative impact on the ‘final religion’, or were somehow supposed to be the source of the religion by being its enemy. Because the tenor of the quotations and references changes after the move to Cordoba, my inference is the change in name was more than cosmetic. Only a small part of the Taxis moved to Cordoba to become the Scholars of God, and the move to Cordoba occurred at the break point, when the Taxis ceased to believe Islam was the ‘final religion’. The fact the information regarding the fallen angels had been pulled from the Ecumenist post-Cordoba archives into their working stacks indicates to me they thought the 99 Gods were related to the fallen angels in some fashion, and thus to the prophesied ‘final religion’.

  “Unfortunately, I believe the Ecumenists, under their Scholars of God name, suffered a crisis of faith during their time in Cordoba. References translated by Mohammed indicate that the Ecumenists of the Cordoba era came to believe the fallen angels were but delusions of their predecessors; my guess is they lost some significant amount of oral history about their own order and their order’s original goals and aspirations. Most assuredly, this loss involved their true relationship with the fallen angels. The Cordoban Ecumenists, it appears, focused nearly as much on learning and science, especially the translation of Greek philosophers into modern tongues, as they did on issues of religion and faith. As Mr. Lorenzi stated, the Scholars of God changed the name of their group to the Ecumenists within a generation after he joined them, and later vacated Cordoba and moved to the Pyrenees due to the Counter-Reformation and the Inquisition. The name change was again more than cosmetic, as the Scholars of God had considered Mystics, the Scholars of God term for abnormal humans, as their enemies, while the Ecumenists had allies among the Mystics, and began to use such terms as Seers, Sibyls, Immortals, Mind-Readers and Dirt-Movers to describe varieties of Mystics. I highly suspect, though cannot prove, that the Ecumenists became Mystics of the Seer variety, specializing in unnatural memory enhancement.

  “The Ecumenists dwindled in number over the centuries and became, as we have read, inflamed with the dislike of ‘modernism’, which for them started with the Protestant Reformation and the rise of the modern nation-state, to them, practically constructs of the Devil, and blossomed into a full anti-modernist philosophy during the French Revolution. Their writings on the 20th Century are quite difficult to read; after World War I their philosophical dislike turned to abject hatred. Yet that did not stop them from utilizing modern conveniences, although even to the date of their disappearance they still refused to use computers and the other tools of our post-millennial gadget age.

  “As far as their disappearance is concerned: the Ecumenists first reacted to the appearance of the 99 Gods as if they were the answer to their prayers. Hopeful and optimistic, a delegation of Ecumenists contacted the Territorial God Marseille within days of Marseille’s appearance. We do not know the means they used to find Marseille; despite Mr. Lorenzi’s commentary about the utterly mundane nature of the Ecumenists, the speed at which they found Marseille implies the use of non-mundane means, supporting my earlier argument about them being Seers. The delegation returned quickly. The meeting did not go well and Marseille had no quarrel with modernity in the sli
ghtest. For our mission, the importance of the meeting lies in Marseille’s description of the Angelic Host. According to the final Ecumenist meeting notes, something in Marseille’s description of the Angelic Host made the Ecumenists believe that the fallen angels could corrupt, or had already corrupted, the 99 Gods. They feared the 99 Gods were, or could become, darkest evil.”

  Georgia paused and shuffled her notes. Lisa leaned over to whisper to Osham, and the room filled with whispered conjectures and ideas. Dave closed his eyes and rested.

  “Within days, the Ecumenists decided as a group to find and confront the fallen angels. We don’t know what they saw as the goal of this confrontation. Unfortunately, save for a few scraps of paper mentioning a place they called Arrhenius’s Room of Finding, they took everything with them connected with their plans for locating the fallen angels. The notes the Ecumenists left indicate they thought the fallen angels, like the 99 Gods, were vulnerable to mortals and the Ecumenists had some form of special weaponry they thought would be able to harm the fallen angels. We know all the Ecumenists left their home in the Pyrenees somewhere between two weeks to four weeks after the appearance of the 99 Gods, they went somewhere, and they planned to pay for the trip in cash. According to Mr. Lorenzi, they were dead seven weeks after the appearance of the 99 Gods. None of the 99 Gods, or the Telepaths, verified their deaths. For all we knew the Ecumenists are still alive, in a place warded from Telepaths and Mr. Lorenzi’s magic.”

  The Ecumenists sounded like the craziest of the crazy cultists to Dave. Before the coming of the 99 Gods, he would have dismissed all of this as a nutball conspiracy theory.

  “So they thought these fallen angels lived on Earth and were physical, tangible beings?” Elorie said.

  “Yes. Immortal as well,” Georgia said.

  “So, what’s our next step?” Lisa said. “The Ecumenists had to use some method of transportation; and transportation can be traced.”

  Elorie nodded. “Good. This sounds like a goal. How many of these Ecumenists were there? How old were they? How, in heaven’s name, did they recruit?”

  “There were seventeen named Ecumenists, all men, all over the age of 40,” Georgia said. “They had nine Ecumenist ‘acolytes’, all under the age of 50, all older than 30, all men. Where the Ecumenist ‘acolytes’ came from I don’t know, or what was required to progress from ‘acolyte’ to full member. We can find this out if you want.”

  “Yes, do so,” Elorie said. She read her tablet notes and wrote. “Twenty-six men who disliked modern society aren’t going to be impossible to track. We need three prongs of investigation. First, hotel and motel appearances of a group of twenty-six men. If they went entirely by car to their destination, they had to stay somewhere along the way. Second possibility is train travel. Surely we can get hold of ticket records. Third is air travel; again we can get ticket records.” Elorie looked at Lisa, Osham and Darrel. “It’s up to you three, now.”

  The meeting broke up and Dave went outside to get some fresh air. There had to be a better way than this. This seemed so inefficient.

  “Still no toxic waste dumps or burning chemical plants, eh?” Jack said. He had come up behind Dave and now walked to the edge of the cabin porch, where he fired up a cigar.

  “I suspect we’re a long way from solving this,” Dave said.

  “Ah, you’ve bought into the idea that the Recruiter doesn’t make mistakes.” Jack snorted. “What if your use here has nothing to do with your technical crap? I think you’re here just because Elorie needs someone to make miserable.”

  “You’re entitled to your opinion, of course,” Dave said, annoyed. He had wondered the same, himself.

  “Ever shot a gun?”

  “Nope.”

  “Too bad. I smell trouble coming,” Jack said. “These idiot Ecumenists found what they were looking for, and what they found killed them.” He paused. “I’m utterly no good at this hacker crap, and since the Magician’s gone, I’m going to go fishing.” With that, Jack stuck his cigar tightly between his teeth and walked toward the men’s cabin, puffing madly. He appeared a few minutes later with his fishing gear.

  Dave walked back inside and hunted down Elorie. She sat at her boss’s table, perusing Georgia’s voluminous notes.

  “Hey,” he said, and sat.

  “Hey yourself,” Elorie said. Her bleary and bloodshot eyes fought with her deep worry lines. When he had asked this morning what was bothering her, he had elicited a ‘don’t mind me, I’m just a little under the weather’. She looked and acted as if she was far more than a little ill, though.

  “I don’t want to be negative, but doesn’t this information search sound to you like a haystack hunt for a needle?”

  Elorie frowned. “Do you have any other better ideas?” Her voice dripped exhaustion.

  “No.”

  “Okay. We have Georgia’s report in digital form, but we don’t have the supporting documents digitized. Since you’re not doing anything, why don’t you go do the digitizing.” Elorie cut off eye contact and went back to her reading. Dave scratched his cheek and waited, but to Elorie, he had vanished.

  Dave stood and walked over to the scanner and started the scanning. All wrong, all wrong. His eyes lost their focus as he thought.

  The Ecumenists had been all men, one of those groups. They hated modern society, but used its conveniences. Their recruits hadn’t been young boys they molded to anti-modernism, but already anti-modern adults. Adults conversant, at the practical level, with modern life. The youngest full Ecumenists, in their early 40s, had been in high school and college equivalents in the ‘90s and oughts. The oldest appeared to be in their 80s. Boomers.

  Elorie’s team misread the situation. They talked as if the Ecumenists were one of those inbred cults who grew up outside modern life instead of a group who became religiously and philosophically opposed to modernism as adults. Furthermore, they weren’t old believers, such as the Mennonites and Amish, or anything similar to strict Christian fundamentalists, not with their openness to Judaism and Islam. The ideas he overheard from the others in the room about the Ecumenists’ most likely transportation – donkey carts, horses, sail boats, perhaps trains if they were adventurous and could find an old steam engine – missed the point entirely. The appearance of the 99 Gods was an emergency; the Ecumenists had found and visited Marseille within hours. When they decided to go chase down the supposed fallen angels they would have zipped to the nearest major airport ASAP and flown to their destination.

  “Why did Alt bother with me? Hell, why’d he bother with anyone besides Georgia, Lisa and Jack?” Dave said, muttering to himself. Georgia to translate everything, Lisa to do her private detective duties as an international skip-tracer, her specialty, and Jack to shoot the bad guys. Dave rubbed his forehead. “Why, for God’s sake, Elorie?”

  They hadn’t chosen her because of her cancer or her near death experiences. Those had surprised the Telepaths. They chose Elorie for her real life experiences. Her professional expertise.

  “They are going about this all wrong,” Dave said. He stood, got a piece of paper, and started to write down what he remembered. He didn’t know enough about Georgia’s many talents, though.

  Learning them sounded painful, but he must. He walked over to her. “You have a minute?” Dave said.

  Georgia looked up and glared at him. “Right now, yes.”

  “I’d like to know the full list of languages you know.”

  Georgia shook her head and recited a very long list.

  Dave thanked her, went to his computer, got the list of names of the Ecumenists and checked their predominant nationalities. He started to type.

  After he printed off his results, he went to find Elorie, who he found looking over Lisa’s shoulder.

  “…unfortunately, we’ll have to go to France, look in person and quiz recalcitrant rail bureaucrats if we want any information on cash ticket sales to groups of twenty six men.”

  “If we have to, we have to
,” Elorie said. “We knew we were going to have to travel.”

  “El, I’ve…”

  Elorie waved a hand to cut off Dave’s comment. “On the other hand, we have enough resources to hire local investigators, Lisa,” Elorie said. “You have any contacts in the area?”

  “What area?” Lisa said. “We’re talking, potentially, all of Spain and France.”

  “Think about how we can do this,” Elorie said. She grabbed Dave’s elbow and dragged him off. “When I’m working with the team on official business, no ‘El’, okay?”

  “Sure, Elorie,” Dave said. Elorie slid away before Dave had a chance to show her his work. Uh huh. When she’s sick, she gets moody, if not downright nasty. Well, he couldn’t expect her to be always cheery and wonderful.

  He shrugged and looked at the time. Another half-hour left before he started his dinner prep. He walked off to find Darrel.

  “Darrel, do you have a few minutes?”

  Darrel cocked an eyebrow at him. “Probably not, but do you have something?”

  “I have an idea or two,” Dave said. “If I gave you an airport, a three day time interval, and a set of a dozen possible destinations, how long would it take you to check for the Ecumenists?”

  “Twenty minutes if we’re talking major airlines. I’ve already hacked my way into their records,” Darrel said. “What’s this, a hunch?”

  “Something along those lines,” Dave said. He gave Darrel the time interval, the airport and the possible destinations.

  “Hell, you would have to choose Orly,” Darrel said. “Make that forty minutes.”

  “Could you do this for me?” Dave said. “I think I’ve got something here.” He showed Darrel the map he had printed off.

  “That’s fucking devious,” Darrel said, after he grabbed the map and studied it from several different directions. “Since I have to check these anyway, as part of my ‘search all the airports in Europe over a four week interval, destination anywhere on the planet’ crap, I’ll start with your idea.”