"Serves 'em right."
"Spoken like a true American. Do you really imagine that national boundaries count for much in Hell? If your neighbours go down in flames, they'll drag you too. El Paso is strategically placed for plenty of databases within the United States as well."
"I've got a legitimate grievance against the CAC, Sister. My father died in action in El Salvador in "73."
His Dad had been career army. He had been killed in a battle with socialist guerillas during the Intervention. It wasn't even supposed to be a shooting war.
Chantal was quiet for a moment. "My father, too, is dead. I'm sorry."
Stack caught something new in her voice, a touch of doubt, or fragility.
"When they shipped him out, he knew he wasn't coming back. Don't ask me how, he just knew. Before he left. Dad told me to do anything with my life except join the army. And here I am with stripes down my legs and none on my shoulder. Your old man, how did he feel about your…your calling?"
She flicked a row of switches on the dash. The windshield darkened against the glare of the sun. "I did not develop a vocation until after his death. He was not especially devout, but I hope he approves of my life. He too was a soldier, in a manner of speaking…"
"You said you were Swiss, didn't you? I thought Switzerland was neutral?"
"Switzerland, yes. My father, no. He was, in his way, a crusader. He fought in the international courts for a better world. His name was Thomas Juillerat. He was murdered. Perhaps you've heard of him?"
"No, I'm afraid not."
"It doesn't matter. Europe must seem very remote from here. I think my father made a difference. I think he did something for the world."
"The world, huh? The same one you've retreated from?"
She turned to him. "I am not a member of a sequestered order, Stack. I'm as much in the world as you are."
"You sure aren't like Sister Bertrille."
Chantal laughed. "Sally Field, The Flying Nun, 1967 to l970. Not one of the finer moments of American popular culture."
"Is there anything you don't know?"
"The future."
"Yeah, that…"
VI
Lauderdale was washing his hands under the tap in the storeroom. He was being wilfully wasteful of the fort's recycled water. There was no one to stop him.
He could do whatever he wanted now.
His androids were still stood to attention. He saluted them, and laughed. The GloJo he had popped was taking effect. He needed the extra buzz. He had been under a lot of strain recently.
Under its dustsheet, one of the androids saluted back. Lauderdale jumped, his heart catching, and reached for his side-arm.
There was someone under there posing as an android.
He fired, and heard the slug ricochet off a durium skin. It was a real android, all right. The spent bullet spanged against the wall and fell to the floor.
With his gunbarrel, he tore the polygene away from the saluting form. It was an android all right, faceless and expressionless.
Could there be a malfunction?
Carefully, he approached. He had his access cardkey. The inspection plate was in the small of the thing's back.
"Yo, there major, gimme some skin…"
The flipper-hand descended from its salute and struck the hot gun from Lauderdale's hand.
"Yo, bro…"
"What?!"
The android stepped off its podium, loose-limbed and gyroscopically balanced.
"It's me, Gilbert the Filbert, the Colonel of the Nuts!"
The android clapped its hands and stamped its feet. The metal floor shook, and the noise rung in the air.
"You been doin' good work, sonny. Lots o' nice blood spilled. Jus' the thang for a long, hot afternoon. A tall, cool drink o' deepest-crimson gore."
The android hand-jived to an unheard tune. Its head nodded in time to the rhythm. Lauderdale backed against the door. He fought his fear.
"It's you, isn't it?" he said.
"Who were you expecting? Perhaps, Frank Sinatra?"
Lauderdale sank to his knees, and prayed. He gave thanks to the Summoner.
"Dooby-dooby-doo," sang the demon.
"Praise be to Joseph."
"Aww, quit grovellin', babe. That's such a bring-down. It ain't lawful to be that awful. Lawdy-lawdy, Lauderdale, get yo ass in gear or face the fear."
Lauderdale stood up, unsteadily. He looked into the metal face, trying to see the ghost in the machine.
"That's better, hepcat."
"The power. You have built up the power?"
"Ain't yet, but it's gonna be…"
The plan was going perfectly. Soon, El Paso would fall. And then the Continental Americas would be easy meat. The Hour of Joseph was within sight. Lauderdale felt a great thirst, a ravening hunger, an unquenchable lust, a ferocious aggression, a delicious need for food and drink and women and blood. He remembered Elder Seth's promises of a future untrammelled by laws, restraints and codes, when the strong would have all their desires effortlessly fulfilled, and the weak would exist only to serve them. He could taste it in his dry mouth. "When?"
"Soon, son. But we ain't had all our fun here yet. Are there or are there not people still walkin' around alive in this place?" Lauderdale was overcome by the magnitude of the entity before him. His mind opened in all sorts of interesting ways, and he tasted the rewards that would surely be his before the day was done. The GloJo had loosened him up, but this creature was pulling him apart. The old Lauderdale, the yessir nossir pleasemaylkissyerasssir Lauderdale was as dead as…As dead as Rexroth, Badalamenti, Willeford, Brecher…As dead as all the others.
"Let's get down and boogie to the band, Lauderdale," said the demon. "We're expecting company. Won't that be a treat? A nice lady. She's from Switzerland. A nice country, Switzerland. Lots of nice people live there. Her name is Chantal Juillerat, and she's a nun. A nice name for a nice nun. Isn't that nice, nice, NICE? I want you to do this one little thing for me, I want you to help me kill her. Do you think you can do that?"
Lauderdale nodded. He was nearly at the door. The wallpanel was open. The console humming.
"Goooooood!"
Lauderdale threw the switches. Slowly, the androids began to stir, to throw off their transparent shrouds, to line up behind their leader.
"Sir?" Lauderdale asked.
The android was straight and tall, its mechanisms ticking gently, the cadre lined up behind it.
"Sir?"
The android saluted again, but it was an automatic response.
The demon was in some other part of the fort. The killing machines waited patiently for his orders.
VII
Chantal let Stack drive. Federico did most of the work, adjusting to the Trooper's slightly different style in the helmet. She was amused to note the Ferrari was slightly more curt with Stack than it usually was with her, as if bridling under a new master.
In the passenger seat, she tried to clear her mind. Mother Kazuko had taught her zen meditation techniques, and explained the equivalence with Western forms of prayer. It was at once a form of self-hypnosis and of devotion, a purging of physical and emotional pains, and a preparation for combat, or for death,
She wished the Mother could be here. She had come through in California last year, at great personal cost. After this was over, if she was still alive, Chantal would visit Kazuko in the San Clemente Retreat.
There was no shortage of parent figures in her life, she realized. Thomas and Isabella, for all their railings. In the church, Rape Georgi, Father Daguerre, Mother Kazuko, Father O'Shaughnessy. Outside, Mlle Fornier, Isabella's admirers, Thomas' bodyguards. Even Federico could seem paternal at odd moments. Of course, there was Our Father Who Art in Heaven. And, though she had never yet met him race to face, there was the Evil Father in Salt Lake City who had probably been distantly involved in the California business, who was certainly the prime mover in the current possession. Fathers, mothers, teachers, confessors. Good parents, evil parents.