Agent Shield and Spaceman

Imagine a space of incredible volume. Now place within its center an enormous ball of hydrogen and helium, collapsing against its own fiery detonation. Imagine a fireball so big that the force of its own illumination prevents light from its center from escaping for millions of years. Now picture the left-over bits from the star’s ignition spinning around in orbit, slowly accreting together over a staggering length of time. This is the stage. This where all of the acts appear, lit from this ancient fiery torch. This where all of the tragedies and comedies that have ever happened and will ever happen, happen. Are you getting the hang of it? Can you see this place, this domain? For as long as there are people and intelligences able to record impressions and ideas, this will be the only home of anyone who reads these words. But don’t feel so bad. The solar system is a big place and perhaps bigger than most might know. For within this enormous system, the...

The flammenstod represented a class of magic most sorcerers avoided. The version of reality permitting such pernicious weapons tended to leave marks. She could feel its influence burn through her arm, shooting tendrils of flame deep inside of her chest. She cast her hands forward, a whisper of energy leaping toward the assembled priests. Some of the priests had studied the arcane, and knew enough to attempt feeble counters, the rest died. The Master was clawing at the sides of the palanquin, desperate to call help to his side. Never had a choice, thought D. Spaceman raised no counters, or did so much as flinch. A service revolver appeared in his hand and he fired. D felt the impact as a kind of hammer stroke against the whole side of her body. She staggered, the pain a cold iron vise around her chest and shoulder. Spaceman approached. “You won’t stop this,” he told her. His voice was distant, almost lost within the cacophony of spreading flame and screaming priests. A hiss escaped fro...

Marcus and D sat in the land-rover on a low rise above the town of Santa Rosa. Every few minutes, Marcus turned away from the town to search the broken and desolate terrain behind them. “Timing is going to be crucial,” he said. “He’ll be here.” Marcus wasn’t so sure. The whole scenario was screwy and depraved. In a situation that clearly called for finesse and stealth, D was adamant for what amounted to a showdown at high noon. After his overture to Spaceman, their path was as clear and direct as the road leading down in Santa Rosa. That fact tasted coppery in his mouth, like a bit lip. They waited a minute longer and just as Marcus made to turn around again, D spoke. “He’s wavering,” she said. “Go to him.” “He’s not going to listen to me.” “He will absolutely not listen to me.” After what she asked of him, Marcus tended to agree. The dust and gravel crunched under foot and his breath streamed out around him in the chilly air. The vegetation around the town was sparse but peculiar. The...

In Frankie’s mind, the plan was simple: D lead the way. He was in a curious frame of mind; fatalistic but oddly satisfied. D had filled them in about her role in all of this. It was as a detailed a mission brief as Frankie had ever been privy too, and among the least illuminating. Before departing to requisition some Peruvian paramilitaries in case the agents botched their surgical strike, LeHaze asked D what sort of resistance they could expect. “All of the vermin of the earth.” “Could we be a bit more specific?” “Scorpions will be a problem.” Whatever they’d face, she wasn’t leaving anything to chance. Everything Frankie needed fit neatly into a single duffel bag. Shield received a change of clothing and a toiletry bag. D was still doing inventory on the three crates they found waiting for her in a dusty section of the Lima airport. Frankie had surreptitiously looked at one of the invoices and discovered the listing “assorted dried animal parts.” Fair enough. Frankie was accustomed t...

As the mini-sub pulled into a quay at Port Encounter in South Australia, the light began its slow transition into evening. Only a few people gathered on the dock, a few seamen with mooring lines held loose in their hands, an officer of the watch standing at attention. “Well, this isn’t quite the welcome I expected,” said Frankie. D stood up from the fold-out chair behind him and coughed once. The interior of the sub had been silent for days and now the impromptu crew of the sub, which they had dubbed, “The Exodus,” began to stretch. They heard the sharp metal thud as the hull of the Exodus struck the quay. The mooring lines splashed on the other side of the sub, the fabric of the ropes rasping against the metal surface. Shield clambered up the conn tower, flipped open the hatch and hailed their small welcoming party. “Welcome to Australia,” the officer called up to him. His smile was wide and friendly. “If you can disembark we will begin the process of completing your ar...

The tiny submarine surfaced north of the Antarctic circle on June 22nd. The passengers were able to establish contact with a listening station in New Zealand and eventually got routed to a secure line with the Chief. Marcus was at first tempted to lock himself in the forward cabin with the radio but what would be the point? It was clear from the Chief’s incredulous tone he had long written off the entire team. “I simply not understand how you could abandon a member of your team on the field, Shield,” the Chief said. “He abandoned us, sir!” Marcus said, about to smash his crippled hand on the radio board before thinking better of it. “He turned double agent, Chief. Both Simplex and LeHaze confirmed it.” Simplex, lashed to one of the fold-down chairs in the cabin, shouted over to the radio. “It’s true!” Frankie shot him a look from the pilot chair of the sub. Simplex gave a half-hearted smile and then regained his silence. Melissa looked up from her control panel and ...

She saw all and knew more. The place of knowledge looked exactly like the waking world in its details, its strangeness revealed only by implication. Looking down at her own body she knew she was dead. And yet the possibilities of her life were not entirely spent. She knew this too. Part of her wanted to simply slip back into her body and let the Charm of Utanghk do its work but she wasn’t ready to do that. D pulled away from her body and the sub. In the ghostly second sight of the place of knowledge she perceived the submarine had already moved some distance from the dying Delta Omega Base. She watched the sub pass beneath the dark vaults of ice and turned her attention to colossal structure shuddering above. Standing in front of it in the waking world, the station was simply a structure, impressive but also sterile. From within the place of knowledge she gained an appreciation for the effort that had gone into its creation. To see it brought low was an occasion not for celebration b...

It was immediately apparent they were traveling downwards, not up. Marcus wondered aloud what sort of transportation they were going to find at the bottom of the station. “A submarine,” Simplex answered matter-of-factually. “A submarine encased in ice?” “No,” Hugo said. “Open water.” “This whole station floats?” “Of course! That is what it is designed to do. No section of ice, however deep, could be guaranteed to support a structure this massive. What would happen if a freak warming spell intruded into the deep Antarctic? The builders of this place designed it to melt a hole through the ice into the cavern and float there like a rubber duck in a bathtub. This underside is a convenient place to store submarines, no?” “Very convenient,” D said sunnily. “Ah, we are coming to the first challenge of our escape from the Delta Omega.” Ahead of them, the corridor was blocked off by a set of heavy steel doors. Each door had a small round window mounted about eye level. Steam and condensation bl...

The force bubble was a nearly perfect one way reflector of energy; under ideal circumstances, the sphere should be able reflect a thermo-nuclear explosion. This was not an ideal circumstance; the closed hallways reflected the energy back on the bubble. This quickly raised the surface of the sphere past the melting point of steel. None of this heat reached the Starfire agents but it was enough to cause the floor to sag and buckle noticeably. All the while the eye was fixed on Shield, its pupil squeezed into a nearly imperceptible singularity of wrath directed at them. Shield knew that if he let the bubble down for a second all three of them would be incinerated in an instant, but the pain clawed more and more of his attention away. He could feel the tendons pulling from his muscles from the exertion. He felt something on his upper lip and wasn’t surprised to discover he had developed a nose bleed. Still he pressed on. He resisted. He endured. As the monster slowly pressed down on him wi...

The trio of agents quickly discerned that they were not be leaving the way they had come in. The Cryptozoologicals had turned the outer rim of the station into a slaughter house. Armed soldiers carrying rifles, machine guns, and the occasional heavy ordinance prowled the intersections. Whether AC or Red Brigade, no one seemed to be much in the mood for asking questions. Shooting was the order of the day. The agents snuck down the ring corridor for nearly an hour, but found no way outwards not blocked by paramilitaries or worse. D announced she would cast a ritual to find a way forward. Frankie and Shield lurked close by, hoping to get a warning shot off at least, if something discovered them. D withdrew from her bag a number of brass beads, a length of twined leather cord and copious amounts of red and ochre sand which she heaped in intricate kabbalistic patterns on the deck. She spoke in an indistinct voice, occasionally repeating the same word, mukthir. Pronouncing this word seemed t...

D stood a few feet outside her body, watching the way her black hair flopped over her face. She was still lying at the bottom of a sizeable crater created by Marcus’ indestructible force bubble. She knew the cold would kill her soon but waited patiently for Frankie and Marcus to stir. Even if she could speak in a way they could hear, her encouragements or pleading would do little. Frankie bundled her up close to his chest and walked out of the crater. He saw the still flapping parachute from the biggest cargo crate and began walking towards it. Good. To their right was Marcus, cradling his arm, as he fought to remain upright. She knew an incantation that would knit bones and sponge away his pain but would need her fingers and mouth to produce it. The strands of hair from the ul-mara goddess had been an enormous drain, and she was too exhausted to remain in the driver’s seat of her own body. Marcus would have to endure until she had recovered. Going ahead, she made sure the lump in...