Doomsday Exam [BUREAU 13 Book Two] (24 page)

Amid the decimation was the mandatory black iron caldron set in the middle of a freaking great pentagram, its shining lines, thick silver rods embedded into the flagstone floor. A duplicate pentagram was sunk into the concrete ceiling. Behind the bubbling caldron stood Mystery Man, reading aloud from the Aztec Book of the Dead, his words forming visible symbols in the air that then dropped into the caldron with tiny rainbow splashes. He appeared exactly as he had been at the Holding Facility, except there was no gray at his temples, and no tux.

"Abraham Lincoln!” I cried, snapping the arming bolt of my M16. “To the max!"

The team cut loose with everything we had, but neither our physical nor magical weapons could penetrate the shimmering forceshield Mystery Man had erected about the pentagram. From top to bottom and side to side, we probed for a weak spot, an entrance; the ricochets and rebounds destroyed the rest of the room in vainglorious fury.

"Crack cocaine!” Jessica shouted and we tried there, but again our weapons failed to undercut the base of the pentagram and topple our foe. The silver lines were actually slabs of the precious metal which seemed to descend forever. Damnation, there had to be a way to stop him! Death spell? Earthquake? IRS audit?

Unperturbed by our attack, Mystery Man continued to drone on, occasionally gesturing, or pouring into the cauldron tiny vials of colored fluid taken from a bulky vest under his kimono. A brisk wind began to build in the basement and I felt a painful tingle of static electricity crackle across my skin. I didn't need my sunglasses to tell me that this was the darkest sorcery; major league magic and totally evil. Scratching wildly, Raul popped the top on a bottle of calamine lotion and poured it inside his body armor.

"How close is he to completing the World Mage Spell?” George demanded, determinedly firing irregular bursts at the alchemist.

"
Nyet
!” Katrina spat, her beautiful face scowling.

Thumbing in my last 40mm shell, I dropped the bandoleer. “Its not the World Mage Spell?” I asked puzzled.

"
Da
."

"Then what is it?” Jessica asked.

With difficulty, Raul swallowed. “He's doing the Big Drain!"

In spite of the adrenaline rush of battle, I went icy calm. The Big Drain. Oh no. Even worse than the World Mage Spell, the Big Drain was an insane effort to siphon off all of the magic from the entire planet and store it in a single living person. The World Mage Spell we could fight, had fought successfully once. But it the Drain worked, humanity won't have enough magic remaining to light a candle in hell. We would be totally helpless and MM could do with the world as he willed. The very notion of Mystery Man as ruler of the planet was like eating glass. Impossible to swallow.

A small vortex of force started to form above the cauldron, tendrils of misty fog masked the floor and the wind buffeting us became a miniature storm, with tiny raindrops and small lightning bolts crashing around us.

"How long?” Father Donaher demanded, wet hands ramming fresh shells into his shotgun with grim intentions.

"We got about one minute,” Raul shouted over the screaming winds.

Trying to get a clear view, I wiped rain from my face. “And then?"

The Russian mage moved a finger across her throat.

Hoo boy. “Okay! Hit'em again!” I ordered.

LAW and a HAFLA rockets impacted on the magical barrier to vanish without a trace. Silver throwing stars bounced off. Bullets musically ricocheted. Arrows splintered. Streams of acid, MSG/DMSO and liquid nitrogen pooled about the pentagram, forming a crude moat of bio-chemical death.

"DIE!” Jessica screamed, fisting each temple.

Incredibly, the man actually faltered for a second, then went on reading and chanting. Totally exhausted, my wife slumped to the floor, gasping and heaving for breath from the attempted Brain Blast. It had been a good try.

Unfortunately by now, Mystery Man was double his original size, the cauldron had sunk into the floor to become a yawning pit from which fiery tongues of raw ethereal power lashed upward into his body. With each lambent energy whip, his smile grew and his voice became louder and more purposeful. He was already tapping the natural magical resources of our mother planet herself, after that would come the monsters, the people and absolute victory.

We were in a full scale hurricane by this point and had to hold onto each other to keep our footing. Bits of glassware and books swirled madly around, going faster and faster to the ever-increasing tempo of the building maelstrom. We stood on the eve of the apocalypse. The hour of doom.

"Bureau!” I shouted into my watch. “Condition Alpha Four! Repeat! Alpha Four! Request immediate tactical nuclear strike on Cincinnati! Immediate nuclear strike on Cincinnati! Respond!"

There was only static. I hadn't thought the radio could penetrate the swirling holocaust of unearthly forces bombarding us to reach the van parked just outside on the street. Okay, Alvarez, here was a your big chance to justify the trust the American people have placed the Bureau. Think, damn it, think!

"Raul what are the limitations on the spell again?” I bellowed.

He repeated the operational perimeters and I got a goofy idea. It was insane. Moronic. But it was my only remaining ace and I hoped MM couldn't trump it.

"THIS IS THE FBI!” I shouted above the roaring hurricane and flipped open my commission booklet to show badge. “I AM SPECIAL FEDERAL AGENT EDWARDO ALVAREZ! YOU ARE UNDER ARREST FOR OVER A HUNDRED COUNTS OF MURDER, ARSON, ATTEMPTED MURDER, GRAND THEFT AND INCITING A RIOT!"

My team gave expressions of total bewilderment and the enemy alchemist only laughed in delight. Thirty seconds.

With a dry mouth, I forced a swallow. Here goes nothing. “AND AS A DULY AUTHORIZED LAW ENFORCEMENT AGENT OF THE JUSTICE DEPARTMENT OF THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT, I HEREBY CONFISCATE THIS WORK SHOP, IMPOUND THAT BOOK AND DECLARE THIS STORE A SEALED CRIMINAL SCENE, CLOSED TO ALL BUT AUTHORIZED POLICE OFFICIALS!"

With a thunderclap, the book slammed shut and the winds died. Caught by surprise, my team took a full second to reorient themselves. Alchemist Al had no such lapse.

Even as the magical boundary of the pentagram faded away, I sprayed him with the M16, the hardball and tumbling bullets punching a line of holes in his kimono. Screaming in pain, the baby mage raised an arm high, crushed a vial in his fist and vanished from sight about one heartbeat ahead of a staggering barrage of bullets, arrows, lightning bolts, rockets, missiles, shells, grenades, Fire Lance, Ice Storm, Death spell, Sleep spell, microwaves and every other assorted deathdealer the rest of my grim teammates possessed.

The rear cinder block wall disappeared under the fusillade, a mountain of dirt poured in and a section of the burning building crashed down around us. Bitterly, I cursed as we headed for the stairs. We had failed. Failed! Oh, we had stopped Laughing Boy for the moment. But he was still free and had, I checked my wristwatch, 58 minutes to conqueror the world. We didn't even know his name yet, or where he would go next.

Fifty seven minutes till doomsday.

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"Okay, everybody search for clues!” I ordered, above the crackle of the flames and rumble of tumbling masonry. “We've got to know where this asshole went!"

Forcing our way out of the wind swept laboratory, my team squeezed past the ruin of the door, kicking aside mounds of dead rodents. With a finger snap, Katrina made the stonework wall ahead of us vanish. I raised an eyebrow. Guess canceling a spell that you cast didn't require any magic. We crossed the basement to clamber up the rickety staircase. Lying on their backs in the flames, cockroaches burst like popcorn and Jessica tripped on a blackened alligator. Even dead those things were dangerous. The ice wall at the top of the stairs was easy to breach, as the flames had already softened the material tremendously. A few machine gun bursts and the frozen air shattered into a pretty snowstorm, the white flakes vaporizing before they hit the floor. On the other side were a thousand smoking corpses, human and non, but the animal army was gone. When Mystery Man had fled, so did his influence.

The heat was almost unbearable as we reached the store, so Raul formed a tiny rain cloud over us, its cooling downpour giving much needed protection from the roaring inferno we nervously stood amid.

"Jessica where did Mystery Man discuss the matter most frequently?” Father Donaher asked urgently, loosening the starched white collar of his cassock.

Gamely, the telepath closed her eyes and slowly rotated, once, twice, paused, then jerked her head upwards. “Second story somewhere."

"His private office!” I cried, remembering the desk and vault. “Triple time, harch!"

The stairs were gone, so we tilted a relatively undamaged bookcase against the charred wall, the sturdy shelves served well as temporary rungs. Tainting the thick smoke filling the store was the rancid pork smell of roasting human flesh. As horrible as it sounds, it made me both nauseous and hungry.

On the point, I went first. Reaching the upper story, I stood erect and checked for danger with gun at the ready. But the place was ablaze; shelves held neat lines of burning books, piles and stacks of paperbacks flared with sputtering flames from the ignited glue in their perfect bindings, the green metal file cabinets had warped from the intense heat spilling their contents to the fire, the linoleum tiles on the floor were melting, embers filled the air and fried bats littered the place making it resemble the aftereffects of a truly Homeric Halloween party. My dead football player was only smoking bones and discolored metal endo-skeleton.

Grabbing a warm fire extinguisher from the wall, I hosed us a foamy zone of safety to the next room. The floor tiles were sticky, but passable. In the office, the updraft from the hole in the roof, fed the flames as a bellows, making it hotter and even more difficult to breath.

At the desk, Raul tapped the bedraggled piece of office furniture with his silver staff, making the wood ring. “Speak!” the mage invoked. “Tell us what you know of your master's plans should failure come here. SPEAK!"

Muted groans and creaks came from the battered piece of mahogany, “...go into self-publishing ... maybe become an author..."

"No, not that! Speak of your master's plans concerning the book of magic he has recently obtained!” the angry wizard corrected.

"...no fail ... was impossible..."

So the arrogant fool firmly believed that he would have succeeded. There was no contingency plan. Maybe we had won. With twenty or so, U.S. Army tumblers in your chest, almost anybody should be wearing grass for a hat. But could we chance it? No.

"Find the safe!” I bellowed, sweat pouring stinging my eyes.

"Here!” Jessica yelled, pushing over a stack of UFO magazines with the barrel of her Uzi.

Stepping close, I inquisitively touched the stout metal box with a finger, but immediately jerked away. My skin was a glossy white. Boy, was that going to hurt tomorrow.

Using our helmets, the team formed a bucket brigade from the bathroom, conveying endless amounts of tap water which we splashed upon the safe, each sizzled into steam upon contact. But even with Raul's rainstorm, we were clearly fighting a losing battle. Now the floor was growing uncomfortably hot to stand on even through our boots. Pretty soon, this place would reach critical tinderbox temperatures and explode.

Yet we kept on. The contents of that safe might be our only chance of tracking Mystery Man. Fifty three minutes. Then the water only bubbled instead of steamed and Ken tucked the safe under one mighty arm. What a man!

Sprinting for the east wall, George blasted us an exit and we painfully jumped over the alley to the lower roof of the gas station. A gas station? Swell. What, no dynamite factory nearby to also be endangered?

Just then, the bookstore roof gave a mighty creak and collapsed with the roar of splintering wood. Spiraling gouts of red and orange flame formed a volcano into the sky, spewing an endless supply of embers and ash over the sleeping Cincinnati.

Dropping to the cooler back alley, we found Mindy still engaged in furious combat with Bruce Lee JR, their swords clanging audibly above the oncoming fire engines bells and police sirens.

"Alli-alli-oxen-free!” I shouted through cupped hands.

Reluctantly, Mindy broke and ran. Grinning in triumph, the vampire started after her and we cut him to ribbons with our weapons.

"Wow,” Mindy panted as she joined us near a dumpster. “He was really good.” Her sweaty body was trembling with near exhaustion.

"Well, now he's really dead,” George snapped, prying aside the manhole cover.

Sojourning through the smelly sewer, we surfaced on the other side of the street and took refugee in our van. Affecting repairs, we watched as police, fire engines and a helicopter arrived on the scene, hordes of reporters pushing their way through a growing crowd of civilians. Guess this was big news for Cin.

After bandaging my finger, I obtained gloves and a stethoscope from the equipment locker and got busy with the safe.

"Ed, what's taking so long?” Donaher asked after a whole minute.

Using only fingertip pressure, I manipulated the dial, spin left, spin right, jiggle-jiggle. “Its an excellent model,” I irritably snapped. “Top of the line. Even an expert yegg, a master safecracker, would have a tough job opening this box."

Pushing me aside, George slapped a lump of C4 plastique onto the dial, pressed a button on the battery pack in his hand whose two wires led into the gray, clay material and with a subdued bang, the door jumped ajar.

"Usually,” I corrected, both hands busy digging into the massed papers. I passed them on to Jessica who memorized each with a glance.

"Deed, tax receipts, insurance forms, nothing but normal business papers. Ah!” she cried in delight. “His name is Wilson C. LaRue!"

"Sure?” Mindy asked, draining a quart of that nasty tasting sports drink which is supposed to be good for you.

"Passport photograph matches the face we saw on the guy in the pentagram."