Part 59 (1/2)
”Just how much do you know about them? I mean, what will an Iad invasion be like? Are they going to bring an army through from Quiddity? Are we going to see machines, bombs, what? Shouldn't somebody be trying to tell the Pentagon?”
”The Pentagon already knows,” D'Amour said.
”It does?”
”We're not the only people who've heard of the Iad, lady. People all over the world have got images of it built into their culture. They're the enemy. ”
”You mean like the Devil? Is that what's coming through? Satan?”
”I doubt it. I think we Christians have always been a little naive,” D'Amour said. ”I've met demons, and they never look the way you think they're going to look.”
”Are you kidding me? Demons? In the flesh? In New York?”
”Listen, it doesn't sound any more sane to me than it does to you, lady-”
”My name's Tesla.”
”Every time I finish one of these d.a.m.n investigations I end up thinking: maybe that didn't happen. Till the next time. Then it's the same d.a.m.n-fool process. You deny the possibility till it tries to bite off your face.”
Tesla thought of the sights she'd seen in the last few days: the terata, Fletcher's death, the Loop, and Kissoon in the Loop; the Lix, seething on her own bed; finally, the Vance house, and the schism it contained. She couldn't deny any of that. She'd seen those sights, in hard focus. Almost been killed by them. D'Amour's talk of demons came as a shock only because the vocabulary was so archaic. She didn't believe in the Devil or h.e.l.l. The idea of demons in New York was therefore fundamentally absurd. But suppose what he called demons were the products of corrupt men of power like Kissoon? Things like the Lix, made of s.h.i.+t, s.e.m.e.n and babies' hearts? She'd believe in them then, wouldn't she?
”So,” she said. ”If you know, and the Pentagon knows, why's there n.o.body here in the Grove now, to stop the Iad appearing? We're holding the fort with four guns, D'Amour-”
”n.o.body knew where the breakout would happen. I'm sure there's a file on the Grove somewhere, as a place where things weren't quite natural. But that's a long, long list.”
”So we can expect help soon?”
”I'd guess so. But in my experience it usually comes too late.”
”What about you?”
”What about me?”
”Any chance of help?”
”I've got problems here,” D'Amour said. ”There's all h.e.l.l breaking loose. There've been a hundred and fifty cases of double suicides in Manhattan alone in the last eight hours.”
”Lovers?”
”Lovers. Sleeping together for the first time. Dreaming of the Ephemeris, and getting a nightmare instead.”
”Jesus.”
”Maybe they did the right thing,” D'Amour said. ”At least they're out of it.”
”What's that supposed to mean?”
”I think what those poor b.a.s.t.a.r.ds saw for themselves we all guess, right?”
She remembered the lurching pain she'd felt as she'd come off the freeway the night before. The world tipping towards a maw.
”Yeah,” she said. ”We guess it.”
”We're going to see a lot of folks responding to that in the next few days. Our minds are very finely balanced. Doesn't take much to push them over the edge. I'm in a city full of people ready to fall. I have to be here.”
”And if the cavalry doesn't turn up?” Tesla said.
”Then somebody giving the orders in the Pentagon is a disbeliever-and there's plenty of those-or he's working for the Iad.”
”They've got agents?”
”Oh yes. Not many, but enough. People have been wors.h.i.+pping the Iad, by other names. For them this is the Second Coming.”
”There was a first?”
”That's another story, but yes, apparently there was.”
”When?”
”There's no reliable accounts, if that's what you're asking. n.o.body knows what the Iad look like. I think we should just pray they're the size of mice.”
”I don't pray,” Tesla replied.
”You should,” D'Amour replied. ”Now that you know how much is out there besides us, it makes sense. Look, I've got to go. I wish I could be more use.”
”I wish you could.”
”But the way I hear it, you're not completely alone.”
”I've got Hotchkiss, and a couple of-”
”No. I mean, Norma says there's a savior out there.”
Tesla kept her laughter to herself.
”I don't see any savior,” she replied. ”What should I be looking for?”
”She's not sure. Sometimes she says it's a man, sometimes a woman. Sometimes not even human.”
”Well that makes for easy identification.”
”Whoever it is, he, she or it may just swing the balance.”
”And if they don't?”
”Move out of California. Quick.”
Now she did laugh, out loud. ”Thanks a bunch,” she said.