Queen of Wands-eARC (37 page)

“How big can this thing
get
?” the House Minority Leader asked.

“Who knows?” Janea answered. “The people who were feeding it before were hunter-gatherers, maybe they had horticulture and early animal husbandry but probably not, and it got as big as fifty elephants. That might be a round number meaning ‘it’s really fricking big,’ but it’s
already
bigger than that. There’s no indication that it has an upper limit. It is just The Stomach That Walks. My guess? With industrial food production and the fact that the US is a breadbasket with lots of cows, pretty fricking big. Like, big-as-a-city big. And millions of Hunters, thousands of Children. With enough support, billions of Hunters, millions of Children. We’re currently dealing with maybe a couple of thousand Hunters, and we can’t deal with
them
. Did the part about this not being the worst Great Old One get up to your level?”

“No,” the President said carefully.

“The
gar gyi dbang phyug ma
isn’t the worst of the Great Old Ones,” Janea said with a sigh. “There are only seven mentioned in the Tibetan texts, but there are references to there being many others. The Gar is one of the few who had real worshippers. Most of the rest didn’t seem to care one way or the other and were as mercurial and deadly as weather. They didn’t even seem to destroy for the joy of destruction, as many demons do. They just didn’t seem, in general, to notice humans.”

“How were they defeated?” the Senate Minority Leader asked.

“The gods,” Janea said, carefully. “Humans apparently…” She paused and looked at Barb.

“I can handle the E word,” Barb said with a smile.

“Humans apparently evolved with the Great Old Ones just being part of their world,” Janea said. “At some point they managed to get the gods to intercede. There was a big battle that was so far back it’s not even in most religious texts, and the gods won. Then they took the humans as their worshippers, and you get Odin and Zeus and all the rest eventually. The battle with the Titans might be a reference to the battles with the Old Ones.”

“So…why can’t the old gods intercede?” the Speaker asked. “That would…actually be a lot more palatable.”

“You want me to try to penetrate
divine politics
?” Janea asked. “I thought you were going nuts about there even
being
a God? Answer is, I dunno. I do know that they are not as powerful as the White God by a lot of orders of magnitude. They’re still
there
. Many, as those the Asatru worship, side with the White God. Mostly. Don’t ask me about Loki; it depends on the day. Others side with the infernal. But for whatever reason, they aren’t intervening. I couldn’t even get Freya to give me enough power to battle a Child. She was just hands off. I was nearly taken by a Hunter, one of her most powerful priestesses taken to be defiled, and she didn’t intervene. That tells me that they are held. At a guess, because of this test of the White God.”

“So God is hanging us out to dry?” the Senate Majority Leader asked. “Great!”

“No, He is
testing
us,” Barb said. “This is part of the test. Can you, the leaders of this great nation, get your heads around there being a One True God and can you lead your people in His direction or will we continue to… What was that book a while back? Will we continue to slouch towards Gomorrah? Can you lead or can you only run in front of wherever the band is headed? Because this is but a
minor
test. Much greater tests are coming. I think what God is saying, getting it down to a bumper-sticker, is ‘Lead, follow or get the hell out of the way.’”

“The problem being that this is a
democracy
, Barbara,” the Speaker said, as if speaking to a child. “And in a democracy, that is under rule of law, we have to follow the laws. And the law says, no interaction between church and state.”

“Don’t argue with me, sweetheart,” Barbara said, smiling broadly and then pointing at the roof. “Argue with Him if you’d like. I do.”

“Is this unconstitutional?” the President asked.

“Yes!” the Speaker and the Majority Leader both snapped.

“I was asking the Chief Justice,” the President said.

“There are numerous precedents,” the Chief Justice said. “Presidents have often asked for national prayers. After 9/11, for example. But given the current makeup of the Court, if they were all brought in on the decision and prior decisions related to Special Circumstance, it would come down to…ideological position. Which means, probably, a five–four vote in favor. The problem being, we don’t have time to debate. Which brings in the other precedent, which is ‘the Constitution is a document, not a suicide pact.’ I won’t get into the debate about the meaning of ‘respecting an establishment of religion.’ We simply don’t have time.”

“If you do this you are going to be out of office so fast it will make your head swim,” the Speaker said. “I’ll enter the impeachment documents the next day.”

“That’s a chance I’ll have to take,” the President said. “Mrs. Everette, I understand that you do not have any recollection of your…message.”

“No, Mr. President,” Barb said. “I’ve seen the recording, though.”

“Do you have any thoughts on the nature of the prayer?” the President asked.

“Oh, good…You’re not asking a soccer mom to write your prayer for you?” the Majority Leader said.

“Do you mean, do you have to say ‘Dear Lord God of all the Christians of this land, please destroy the Gar for me’?”

“More or less,” the President said.

“No,” Barb replied. “It can be ecumenical as you’d like. But it’s going to have to be somewhat specific. ‘Dear Higher Power, we’d sure like you to like us’ won’t cut it. If you’d like, I can work something up and then you can debate this while we are
running away
.”

“Mrs. Everette, I don’t know if this is a divine message or not,” the President said. “But the Lord seems to work through intermediaries. You are, as I understand it, the most powerful member of the Special Circumstances network. Is that right, Germaine?”

“Very close,” Augustus said. “And for this, undoubtedly the most powerful.”

“I doubt that God will choose to work through me,” the President said, somewhat ruefully. “As such, when the prayer is given, I would like you to be available in the area of the Beast.”

“Yes, Mr. President,” Barb said. “I’ll be there.”

“And, yes, send me a rough draft,” the President said. “Break this down.”

* * *

“This is Mary McCrory with CNN live from the vicinity of Goin, Tennessee. Overnight, the rumor has spread that the events in Tennessee are anything but a major methane buildup. What is going on is unclear but the area has been sealed off from entry. Our news crew has managed to slip through the cordon to a position very close to the small town that is near the center of the restricted area…”

“Mary,”
the anchor said, breathlessly.
“Can you see what might be happening?”

“Not exactly,”
the reporter said, ducking through trees.
“We’ve seen military vehicles moving out of the area all night, as if they are in full retreat. But what they are retreating from is unclear. We’re trying to get to the top of a hill where we can get a better view.”

“According to our legal correspondent, it’s a clear violation of the Constitution to prevent the free movement of citizens for anything other than a natural disaster,”
the anchor said.
“Were you molested by the military in approaching the area?”

“Well, the military is stopping anyone from coming in. We managed to evade several roadblocks. But this area is particularly well patrolled so we’ve had to go on foot for the last few miles.”

“The main guess is that there’s been an alien landing,”
the anchor said.
“Can you confirm that?”

“We may be able to in just a moment,”
the reporter said excitedly.
“The trees are opening up ahead and…”

She suddenly began screaming and the picture from the camera wobbled erratically. For just a moment it showed a swath of destruction in the distant valley and then panned towards the head of the swath. There was a brief glimpse of
something
and then the picture blanked out.

As the voice feed from the camera crew cut off, the anchor was left sitting with her mouth open.

“
We’re having some difficulties with our reporting team in Tennessee
,” she said after a moment of her mouth opening and closing soundlessly. “
We are now taking you to our legal analyst, Rebecca Shelby, for a look at the legal ramifications of forced resettlement and denying access to the area on the part of citizens. Rebecca
?”

* * *

“The President is doing his speech at eleven AM,” Graham said, entering the briefing room.

The FBI team had moved back to the Knoxville headquarters. The military was keeping as many people out of the area as possible, and the investigation part of the incident was pretty much over.

“It will be to Maynardville by then,” Barb said, looking at the map on the wall. It was some sort of interactive screen, and it showed the approximate progress of the Gar as well as all the major military positions.

“Yes, it will,” Graham said. “Which they’re evacuating. He’d prefer to wait until prime time, to get the maximum viewers, but this is going to have to do. All of the TV networks and radio stations have been informed that it is under Emergency Broadcast rules. We’ll have to see what the cable channels do, but most of them are probably going to go along. And we’ve basically given up on the methane story after what happened to the CNN team. But the point is…we’d probably better get moving.”

“Okay,” Barb said, picking up her purse and gesturing to the door. “You first, Laz. And yes, you’re coming along.”

The cat flicked his ears, then walked to the door as if it was his own idea anyway.

“Think he’ll use your script?” Janea asked as they walked down the corridor to the elevator.

“God willing.”

* * *

“Ladies and gentlemen of the United States, my fellow citizens, citizens of nations around the globe, I come to you in this, our nation’s hour of need to beg for your help.

“As President, I see many things that are secret and terrible. There are constant threats to the lives of peoples all over the world that never make the news, that are never known but to a very few. The threat this nation, and the world, faces in Tennessee must, for the time being, remain one of those secrets. My fellow Americans, peoples of the world, you don’t
want
to know.

“However, there is one thing I must ask of all people, of all people of…faith. I do not care if you are Christian or Muslim. I do not care if you are Jew or Mormon or Sikh. I do not care if you are Vishnaya or Syncretic neo-Pagan. In this, our nation’s hour of need, I need you to join me in prayer. I need you to bend your heart and your soul and your belief to ask for intercession by the Almighty, however you may choose to speak to Him, Her or It. I ask you this with all my heart, with all my soul and, yes, with my gathering belief. Now, please, I beg of you with all my power, join me in a prayer.

“Dear Higher Power, we, the believing people of this nation and of this world, ask for your intercession in this, our hour of need. Grant unto your chosen the power to destroy the fell beast which besmirches our land. Give us your blessing and aid, Lord, we ask by all your Nine Billion Names. Amen.”

He bowed his head for a moment and shook it. And then clearly went off script.

“Please, God. Save us. We know we’re not worthy, we know we have strayed far from Your path. But please don’t do this to us. Please. Send us your power or we will fall into the blackness of everlasting night. Amen.

“And now…we wait for an answer.”

* * *

“Sharice,” Barb said, looking over her shoulder at the crackle of underbrush. “What are you doing here?”

“Wouldn’t miss it for all the chocolate in Switzerland,” Sharice said. “It down there?”

“Yep,” Barb said. “We were just getting ready to take a peek. You don’t have FLIRs.”

“If the Lady isn’t willing to shield my mind, I guess I’m pretty much over the hill,” Sharice said. “I’ve seen a few things in my time. I think I’ll be okay.”

“That does it,” Janea said, dropping her FLIR to the forest floor. “I can’t be Asatru and fear. And I’m afraid. I will face the test of Fir. I shall overcome it or be blasted. Whichever way it goes, I’m not going to fear.”

“Let’s go, then,” Barb said, pushing aside a screen of privet.

The Gar was moving through the outskirts of the town of Maynardville, leaving its usual wake of destruction.

“Is it me, or is it getting bigger?” Janea asked, her voice a little too firm.

“It’s bigger,” Barb said, calmly. She could feel the horror, but it was washing over her like light rain. “There was a lot of minor cattle ranching in the valley. Lord hope everyone was evacuated safely.”

“That
is
rather ugly, isn’t it?” Sharice said. If she was bothered it wasn’t apparent.

“Yes, it is,” Barb said, cracking a grin.

“I’m glad you guys think this is funny,” Janea said, her voice shaking.

“Not at all,” Sharice said. “But here in this place, we stand on the precipice of doom with but one roll of the dice between us and the end of all we know. It is laugh or cry, and my choice has always been laughter.”

“I am Asatru,” Janea said, firmly. “I am the high priestess of the goddess of love and war. I will not let this
thing
defeat me. My goddess defeated it in times past and will aid me to defeat its powers. I. Will. Not. Fear. I am Asatru.”

“There you go, dear,” Sharice said, smiling again. “To each her deity. Anyone got the time?”

“President’s speech should be starting,” Barb said, looking at her watch. “Okay, God, time to count the Lots. Do we make the grade, or should I just go home and give up the land of the free?”

“And the home of the brave, don’t forget,” Janea said. “There’s a reason that the US has the highest number of Asatru in the world. Laz,” Janea continued as the cat walked up and parked by her feet. “I’m not sure you should be seeing this.”