Devlin's Defiance: Book Two of the Devlin Quatrology (23 page)

Lord Emedine reminded
himself that he must carve all
three
heads from each Urf in one swing for it to be a fatal
foop, and at least two hundred fatal foops would be needed to rescue
Lady Licia.

He
also knew that this first wave of Urfs would be followed by a throng
of Worps, whose single-legged bodies could only hobble or hop slowly
along, and then by the Plogs, whose legless, armless bodies could
only roll downhill and who (which?) would wind up falling harmlessly
into the moat surrounding the village, filled with hundreds of
northern crocodiles, which the ancestors of the current inhabitants
of
Llairpwllgwingyllchysiliogoch
had crossbred with penguins so that they could endure and survive the
harsh winters of Aberstwyxland, a process which was celebrated each
year with the Llairpwllgwingyllchysiliogoch Crocopenguin Arts and
Crafts Festival, which drew most of Llairpwllgwingyllchysiliogoch's
three thousand-odd residents, with the exception of nine of the
oddest ones, who preferred to remain in their mud-and-straw hovels,
prophesying things like the development of the Internet,
cyber-hacking, cell phones, the Federal Reserve, wingsuits, the
discovery of anti-matter, self-driving automobiles, Operation
Northwoods, a government shutdown in 2013, MK-ULTRA, the Obamacare
recession and identity theft explosion of 2014, COINTELPRO, the
simple yet elegant solution to the paradox of time travel, NSA
surveillance, Operation Snow White, an Iran-Israel war and conspiracy
theories around the deaths of
Michael Hastings, Philip Marshall, Aaron Swartz and a guy nicknamed
Barnaby Jack --

“
Wait,
wait. What the hell is all that, Pam?”

“
What
is what, Jake?”

“
Predicting
the Internet and cars and conspiracy theories back in … when?
… 638, almost 1400 years ago.”

“
Gotcha,”
Pam said, smiling sweetly and batting her dazzling blue
eyes
at him over her sunglasses.

Laughing,
Jake said, “That you did, Pam, that you did. Bravo.”

“
Just
like you got me with the zombies in the White House.”

“
But
I took that out before the book got published.”

“
No,
you didn't; you said you would, but it's still in there.”

“
Really?
I thought I took it out.”

“
Nope;
it's there, right at the end of … wait one.” Pam picked
up a well-worn copy from her loungeside table and leafed through it
briefly.

“
Ah,
there it is, the end of Chapter 98, Page 271. And then your promise
is at the beginning AND the end of Chapter 99.”

“
Really?
Let me see that.” He set down the papers he'd been reading
from and took the book Pam offered, looking intently at the pages
she'd indicated

“
Oh,
geez, you're right; it is in there. Shit, I really screwed that up.
I'm sorry; I didn't mean to break that promise. Goddamned
Quarterheimer's.”

“
Oh,
don't worry about it, Jake. I got a chuckle out of it when I read
it.”

“
Guess
I didn't proof it all that well.”

“
Oh,
you did fine.”

He
set the book back on the table and lay back on his lounge, closing
his eyes, but with his brow wrinkled.

Pam
leaned over, gently rubbing his shoulder with one hand and with her
other hand holding her index finger and thumb about an inch apart on
his cheek and whispered in his ear, “How about we go belowdecks
for a while? I'm getting hot out here in the sun.”

Jake
opened his eyes, smiled and said, “You certainly are. And
yup,
I'd like that.” Then he chuckled. “Lady Licia? Got it.
Delicious.”

They
got up from their lounges, slipped on their coverups and flip-flops
and headed down from atop the bridge and across the hot deck, Jake
humming the Bolero as they went.

- 57 -

December
9, 2012
10:08
a.m. local time

Bonita Springs,
Florida

“
Authentication
0000002. Hey, Amber. Is he available? Yeah, I'll hold.”

“
Hey,
Gordy.”

“
Hey,
Jake.”

“
What's
up?”

“
Got a
little challenge to deal with. I got subpoenaed yesterday for a
hearing before some Senatorial subcommittee on the 18th, and I'm
concerned. First official contact.”

“
Hmm. So
soon? That's quicker than I woulda ever expected. The book just came
out in September.”

“
I know.
And I've read it maybe thirty times, so I've been able to
fake
it with civilians pretty well so far. But senators?”

“
Oh,
they're dumber than most civilians. Remember the Guam
guy?”

“
Yeah.
But he was in the House and incredibly stupid.”

“
I
remember,” Jake said, laughing.

“
These
are gonna be senators, most of 'em career types. So a lot more
arrogance and ego.”

“
You got
a list of who's gonna be there?”

“
Yeah;
it's on the subpoena.”

“
Can you
shoot that over to me? I've got an idea.”

“
I'll
send you a copy of the whole subpoena.”

“
Great.
I'll send you some stuff back that should take care of it.
No
worries.”

“
What
kind of stuff?”

Jake told him.

“
Oh,
cool. That should work.”

“
Good.
Anything else going on back there?”

“
Ah,
let's see. I met an actual Sergeant Tom Dooley from Collier County.”

“
Wait,
wait. I checked that; there wasn't one.”

“
He's
new, came over from Miami after the book came out.”

“
Ah. Is
he upset about his name in the book?”

“
I don't
think so. He was gonna get a copy and see. Haven't
heard
anything from him since. That was about a month ago.”

“
Well,
we'll deal with that if and when. Anything else?”

“
Let's
see. Ron and Jenny are back, and Ron's still Ron.”

“
I doubt
he'll ever change; immature asshole. Anything else?”

“
Ah –
oh, yeah. I met this guy named Derek and his family last
week.”

“
Derek? Cool
name.”

“
Yup; figured we
might want to use it in the sequel.

“
So I asked him
if it'd be okay to do that, and he -- now, he's not the sharpest
knife in the drawer … by a long, LONG shot -- he looked over
at his wife. She shrugged an okay and he nodded.

“
So I asked him
if he wanted to be a good guy or a bad guy, hero or villain, and his
wife immediately said, 'Make him a villain.' So I said, 'Okay, I'll
make you an assassin,' and he looked at his wife, who nodded and
smiled.

“
And then I asked
him, 'Any particular method of assassination you'd prefer?' And I
gotta tell ya, Jake, watching him think was the second most painful
experience I've had in my whole life, felt like it went on for an
hour, but it was only maybe ten seconds, and finally he mumbled, 'I
dunno, maybe a gun?'”

“
That's it?
'Maybe a gun?'”

“
Yup. But his
12- or 13-year-old son piped up and said, 'Oh, Dad, that's so boring.
How about' - and I watched the wheels spin in his brain, maybe half
a second - 'how about chopsticks?'”

“
Chopsticks?”
Jake chuckled.

“
Yup; out of the
mouths of babes, huh?”

“
Got that right;
I like it. I'll see if I can use it.”

“
Cool. And this
Derek dufus also thought Toronto was the Lone Ranger's sidekick.”

“
No, really?”

“
Really.”

“
Oh,
Pam'll love that. I gotta put that in somewhere. Anything else?”

“
Let's
see. Ever heard of a 3D printer?”

“
Sure;
got one on board, had it installed about a month ago.”

“
Cool.
Ever thought about making it 4D?”

“
You mean
like time shifting?”

“
Yeah;
Paul had that idea at Marti and Dave's party last night.”

“
Was he
drunk?”

“
Yeah.”

“
He gets
some cool ideas when he is; hmm.”

“
But
that's sorta skee-feeish, dontcha think?”

“
Yeah.
So?”

“
So I
didn't think we were writing science fiction.”

“
I'm
not.”

“
Right; I
mean you're not.”

“
Don't
know. You should see the fantasy thing Pam just wrote
and
pulled on me.”

“
Fantasy?”

“
Yeah,
swords and horses and swell foops and” –

“
Swell
what?”

“
Foops, a
fast, hard swing and slash with a sword.”

“
Wait,
foops? Swell foops? I've heard of fell swoops, but” –

“
Oh,
geez, she got that one right past me,” Jake said, laughing.
“Swell foops; geez.”

“
Not much gets
past you, not since Sydney in '72.”

“
Oh, don't remind
me of that. Still got the scar.”

“
Sorry.”

“
I hope you're
sorry about messing around on that job in Ballarat, too.”

“
Yeah; Rosemary
was here with me, got me distracted. Sorry.”