"I'd say that's a safe bet," said Christine. "I would hope that wherever she is, she's beyond concerns about linoleum."

"Uh," Don grunted in a.s.sent. "I was supposed to install it on Thursday, but I had a conflict with another job. If I'da done her installation instead of that one...."

"I know what you mean," said Christine. "I almost went over to borrow a cup of skim milk that afternoon. I keep thinking...."

"...I'da done the installation and got stuck with the bill. Good thing I canceled."

"Er," said Christine. "Yes, I suppose from that angle...."

"Sometimes things just work out, you know?" said Don. "Gives you gooseb.u.mps."

Christine smiled weakly. It didn't look like Don had gooseb.u.mps. Don didn't strike her as the sort of person who knew how to get gooseb.u.mps. Just his mention of the word gooseb.u.mps gooseb.u.mps gave her, well, gooseb.u.mps. gave her, well, gooseb.u.mps.

"Speaking of which," said Don, "what happened to your floor?"

"Oh, uh..." Christine began. "Someone broke in... that is, came in and..."

"Can I take a look?"

Sensing a shiver coming on, Christine shrugged her shoulders to conceal it. This was taken by the hulking Don as a gesture of a.s.sent, and he walked past her into the condo.

"Is that a swastika?" he asked.

"Technically, no," said Christine. "I'm calling it an akitsaws akitsaws."

Don stared at her.

"It's an ancient Celtic symbol that means, 'I have a learning disability.'"

Don's brow furrowed. "You do?"

"No," said Christine. "I was saying... anyway, it's ketchup. I was thinking I'd pour a bottle of club soda on it and see if that helps."

"Naw," said Don. "You'll never get that out."

"Oh well," said Christine, hoping to wrap things up. Don was giving her the creeps, jumpsuit notwithstanding.

"This looks like the same layout as Mrs. Frobischer's condo," he said.

"Yeah, I suppose it is," said Christine. "Anyway, I should probably...."

"I've got the exact amount of linoleum you need for this s.p.a.ce in my van. I'd give you a great deal, since I'm already here and the linoleum is already cut to size. Fifty percent off installation."

"I doubt Mrs. Frobisher and I have the same taste in flooring," said Christine.

"It's a very nice pattern," said Don, pushing her to the verge of gooseb.u.mps again. "Very universal. It's a welcoming sort of pattern. Let me just go get it from the van. You'll see what I mean." He walked to the door.

Christine tried to object, but couldn't come up with the words. Don returned a few minutes later with a roll of what she had to admit was perfectly nice breakfast nook flooring. Better than her carpet certainly, even without the ketchup stains. Don was right: it was a very welcoming pattern. He offered to install it for $400 far less than her deductible.

What the h.e.l.l, Christine thought. That's one problem out of the way, with minimal expense and effort. She had the man's name if anything went wrong: Don, from Don's Discount Flooring. And after all, he was wearing a jumpsuit.

FIVE.

Harry Giddings sat in his office on the fifth and top floor of the Banner Banner's headquarters and fretted. Harry had spent his life preparing, and now that he had done everything he could think of to prepare, he wasn't sure what to do. He would have paced, but he had noticed that pacing tended to have a disquieting effect on the Banner Banner's staff, who could see his movements at the bottom of the horizontal shutters covering the plate gla.s.s windows on either side of his office door. He could have lowered the shutters all the way, but that would have tipped off the staff that he was pacing. So he fretted quietly in his office, unaware that what the staff feared most was the idea of Harry Giddings fretting quietly in his office.

Harry Giddings was a man of convictions formidable, impregnable, inspirational and often contradictory convictions. Harry believed so many ridiculous and unjustified notions that the sheer weight of probability dictated that at least a few of them would end up being true. Thus it was that Harry's belief that he would play a pivotal role in the impending Apocalypse was misguided, completely absurd, and entirely accurate.

The Apocalypse was not, for Harry, a matter of faith or conjecture, but rather a certain, if somewhat imprecisely defined, event. It was, in his mind, somewhat like an earthquake or a surprise visit from one's in-laws: something for which one could never be fully prepared, but which was destined to occur sooner or later. Harry knew with certainty that the Apocalypse would occur during his lifetime and that he would play some significant part in it.

Harry couldn't be fully blamed for believing this bit of silliness because, after all, he had been informed of it by an angel. He couldn't be entirely let off the hook either, though, because the angel in question was himself not only out of the loop, but transparently drunk and not a little deranged.

More on that later.

Harry's belief that he was guided by the voices of angels that only he could hear was, surprisingly, one of the least unreasonable of his many absurd beliefs. For example, he also believed that G.o.d created photosynthesis before He created the sun and that all of the world's animals had once taken a Mediterranean cruise together. Having convinced oneself of those unlikely propositions, accepting the notion that one is hearing the voices of angels is pretty much a cakewalk.[5]

Fortunately, most of these beliefs were so far removed from the day to day operations of a Christian media empire that Harry managed to become far more rich and successful, by any reasonable standard, than almost any of his (ostensibly more rational) critics. It seemed that at the end of the day what mattered wasn't whether one believed, for example, that the Creator of the Universe had once stopped the Earth from revolving around the Sun in order to skew the odds in a skirmish between two bronze age tribes, but whether one had had the foresight to short-sell WorldCom in May of 2002. Materialists scoffed at Harry's worldview while secretly coveting his portfolio.

Harry was always in the right place at the right time. He foresaw the Internet bubble, the housing bubble, the renewable fuels bubble even the hydrogen bubble, which was virtually impossible to see even when one knew it was there. How much of Harry's success was due to angelic guidance and how much was due to his own instincts or just dumb luck is impossible to say. What we do know is that through a series of shrewd acquisitions, well-timed expansions and tax loophole exploits so convoluted that they bordered on poetic, Harry Giddings built the most powerful Christian media empire on Earth. He owned radio stations, television stations, publishing companies, newspapers and recording studios, along with fourteen donut shops and a surprisingly large factory in Vietnam that made those little plastic things that they use to tie off loaves of bread.

The true reach of Harry's empire was unknown even to the angels of the Mundane Observation Corps, as it was as much a legal fiction as an actual corporation, comprised mostly of dizzyingly complex licensing agreements, syndication arrangements, sh.e.l.l companies and small stakes in a variety of other similarly byzantine corporations. Our accountants found one particular branch of Harry's empire that served only to obfuscate the activities of the other branches. This branch was so good at what it did, however, that it eventually succeeded in becoming completely ignorant of what the other branches were actually doing, and at last inspection existed as a completely independent ent.i.ty, busily hiding the details of what it was doing from itself.

There wasn't necessarily any malice in any of these activities; Harry, for his part, did his best to run a reasonably respectable business. Sh.e.l.l companies, plausible deniability and intentional obfuscation were merely a routine part of business in the twenty-first century. Such defense mechanisms helped forestall audits, hostile takeovers and intelligent questions from shareholders, all at a cost of only a few hundred million dollars in lost productivity per year. Like the monarch b.u.t.terfly, which has evolved a body chemistry that causes it to taste like burnt styrofoam to predators, Harry's empire was a thing to behold but you wouldn't want to take a bite out of it.

The jewel in Harry's crown was the Banner Banner, which was within spitting distance of being the most popular news magazine in the world. News magazines were admittedly a bit old school by the twenty-first century, but an old-fashioned weekly publication made from actual dead trees lent his enterprise some much-needed respectability. An organization that could afford to lose as much money as the Banner Banner did week after week was a force to be reckoned with. did week after week was a force to be reckoned with.

The Banner Banner also helped keep Harry focused on his ultimate mission to usher in the Apocalypse. Unlike the other elements of his empire, which he had mostly acquired and then either built upon their untapped potential or looted them for all they were worth, the also helped keep Harry focused on his ultimate mission to usher in the Apocalypse. Unlike the other elements of his empire, which he had mostly acquired and then either built upon their untapped potential or looted them for all they were worth, the Banner Banner was Harry's baby. He had built the was Harry's baby. He had built the Banner Banner from nothing deliberately pa.s.sing over several magazines on the verge of bankruptcy that he could have picked up for pennies on the dollar because he wanted its focus to be pure: when the Apocalypse occurred, the from nothing deliberately pa.s.sing over several magazines on the verge of bankruptcy that he could have picked up for pennies on the dollar because he wanted its focus to be pure: when the Apocalypse occurred, the Banner Banner would announce it first. would announce it first.

That wasn't his stated intent, of course. One had to maintain appearances. The mission statement of the Banner Banner was to be the best news magazine in the world. So he had a.s.sembled a vast network of reporters in L.A., New York, Washington, D.C., London, Tokyo all with the ostensible purpose of providing the most timely, accurate and insightful news coverage possible. But the Big One, the one story he was really waiting for, was still out there. And he was going to get it. was to be the best news magazine in the world. So he had a.s.sembled a vast network of reporters in L.A., New York, Washington, D.C., London, Tokyo all with the ostensible purpose of providing the most timely, accurate and insightful news coverage possible. But the Big One, the one story he was really waiting for, was still out there. And he was going to get it.

Christine Temetri had, through her own blind initiative, become an integral part of the plan. Harry, preoccupied with powers and princ.i.p.alities, hadn't initially thought to cover the fringe elements the crazy cultists who kept popping up and predicting The End. But when Christine sent in her first story, he realized that the Banner Banner's readers would eat it up. And h.e.l.l, didn't John the Baptist himself start out as a lunatic eating locusts and ranting about the arrival of the Messiah? Maybe one of these commune-dwelling crackpots had the inside track. Harry certainly wasn't about to miss out on the big story just because it came from a disreputable source. And now, more than ever, he needed all of his eyes open. If what he had been able to glean from the angelic voices was true, then the End was very close indeed. And this business in the Middle East with the Israelis and the Syrians, didn't it seem to point to a dispensational acceleration? Sure, there had been a lot of abortive skirmishes in the Middle East in recent years, but this one seemed like it had some legs. And yet, his next move remained unclear and so he fretted.

Harry's fretting was, however, cut short when he heard the voice of the Banner's news editor, Troy Van Dellen, somewhere in the cubicle maze outside Harry's office.

"h.e.l.lo, gorgeous!" said Troy's lilting voice.

That kind of labored flirtation could only mean one thing: Christine was back from... Wisconsin, or wherever she had been. He had some vague idea that Christine had been somewhere remote and insignificant Michigan? Minnesota? following up on another crackpot lead. Harry rarely got involved in the dispensing of a.s.signments; although his fondness for Christine afforded her more direct access than his other reporters, he ordinarily allowed Troy to manage Christine. Troy Van Dellen was a perky blond Baylor graduate who had started three years earlier as copy editor and worked his way into his current position through a combination of shrewd political maneuvering and unparalleled journalistic instincts. It was said of Troy Van Dellen not to his face that the only story he couldn't sniff out was that of his own s.e.xual orientation. Or maybe he did realize it, and was merely adhering to the Banner Banner's unofficial "don't ask, don't tell" policy.

Harry opened his door to see Christine trying desperately to disengage herself from conversation with Troy. Christine had never gotten along with Troy; it seemed to Harry who was admittedly not the best judge of other peoples' emotions that she was frightened by his intensity, resentful of his age and, perhaps, jealous of his hair. Harry generally tried to at least make a show of discouraging Christine's attempts to make an end run around Troy to get to him, but today he wasn't in the mood.

"Christine," Harry said authoritatively. "I need to see you in my office."

Troy, evidently a.s.suming that Christine was in trouble, gave a smirk and sauntered away. Christine trudged down the corridor to Harry's office, walking right past him and collapsing with a whoomf! onto Harry's leather couch.

"Did Lexus not seed fans to light Mike Hondo," Harry heard Christine say.

Harry didn't know what this meant, and didn't feel particularly like asking for clarification. Whatever nonsense was on Christine's mind, Harry had more pressing concerns.

"How was Nebraska?" he asked, trying to steer her onto the desired path.

"Did you hear what I said?" Christine asked tersely. "Dyslexic n.a.z.is vandalized my condo."

"Oh!" exclaimed Harry. "I thought you said...." He trailed off as he realized that he had most likely misheard her again.

"What?" Christine asked.

"Sorry?"

"You thought I said what?"

"Oh, nothing," Harry said. "I just misheard you the first time. Anyway, I'm sorry to hear about... that." He hoped he was supposed to be sorry to hear whatever he was supposed to have heard. It seemed like that was what she was angling for. "So, when did you get back?"

"Yesterday. I walk down the hall to my condo, exhausted from this idiocy in the desert with that creep Jonas Bitters, and somebody has smashed "

"Bitters! Wow, I forgot all about that. I guess the Bridegroom didn't arrive as expected. Sorry you had to fly out to Utah to "

"Nevada."

"Yeah, Nevada, to do that story..."

"I'm not doing the story, Harry."

"No problem," said Harry, who was a bit relieved not to have to tell Christine that they had no room in the upcoming issue for the Bitters piece. "I've got something better for you anyway. Have you heard of this wacko in Berkeley, Galileo Mercury?"

"Gosh, a wacko in Berkeley," Christine replied. "How exciting. Tell me more."

"So... you're not interested."

"Harry, I'm not doing this anymore."

"Doing what?"

"The Apocalypse circuit. I can't take it any longer."

"Really?" Harry said. "I thought you enjoyed doing these stories."

"Why would you think that?"

"Didn't you say something at the Christmas party about how much you enjoyed talking to all these eccentric, charismatic figures?"

"Yeah, that sounds like me," said Christine dryly. "Except instead of 'eccentric, charismatic figures,' I said 'narcissistic sociopaths.' And then I did this." She pointed her index finger at her temple, firing an imaginary pistol. "I can see how you would misinterpret that."

Now that Harry thought about it, he did remember Christine doing that. This sort of misunderstanding was one of the reasons Harry tried not to get involved in the day-to-day management of people. He had the prevalent weakness among dominant human males of a.s.suming that everything was just peachy with their subordinates until one of them did something really drastic to get their leader's attention, like keeling over dead. If he had realized how dissatisfied Christine was with these a.s.signments, he'd have found someone else to cover them. But this wasn't the best time to be hunting for a replacement.

"I think you might like this Mercury guy," Harry said. "He's not your typical Doomsday Cult leader."

"So," Christine asked, "he's not a narcissistic sociopath?"

"Er...." Harry had to admit that he couldn't make that guarantee. In fact, from the little he knew about Mercury, he had to a.s.sume that he was was a narcissistic sociopath. Being a narcissistic sociopath was, after all, the major qualification for being on his list of interview candidates for Christine. a narcissistic sociopath. Being a narcissistic sociopath was, after all, the major qualification for being on his list of interview candidates for Christine.

"Look, Harry, I'm sure this Galileo Mercury the name alone inspires confidence, by the way is one of the new breed of enlightened Doomsday Cult leaders. But I'm just not interested. The Armageddon thing is getting old. h.e.l.l, even our readers are getting bored. You're not even running half my stories any more."

"Christine, trust me. This is important stuff. We may not run a story on every End Times cult out there, but it's important to have someone there, in case...."

"In case what?"

Harry changed course. "Okay, fine," he said, getting up and walking to the door. He yanked the door open and yelled, "Troy! Get in here."

Troy strode in, looking puzzled but still hopeful that Christine was in trouble. Harry closed the door behind him and once again took his seat.

"What do we have for Christine other than these Apocalypse characters?" he asked Troy.

"I thought she was going to be interviewing that Galileo person," said Troy, peering skeptically at Christine.

"He'll have to wait," said Harry, trying to sound like he was making a sacrifice on Christine's behalf. In reality, the Mercurians as they were being called had just popped up on his radar that morning, and thus far hadn't done anything particularly newsworthy. It would probably be premature to send Christine to Berkeley at this point.

"Well," said Troy. "I suppose she could interview Katie Midford."

"Katie Midford," repeated Harry. "You mean the waitress who wrote those Satanic children's books?"

"Young adult fantasy, yes," said Troy. "She wrote the Charlie Nyx series."

"Ugh," said Christine, who was vaguely familiar with Midford's books. Her objection to them wasn't so much that they were Satanic as that they were childish and trite. At least that was the impression she had gotten from skimming one of the book jackets and a review in the Times Times. If she were perfectly honest with herself, she would have admitted that she was not a little resentful of Midford's success. While Christine was struggling to survive as a journalist, a talentless hack like Katie Midford was making millions from fabricated garbage about troglodytes and vampires. The only thing worse in her mind than the Charlie Nyx-mania that was sweeping the nation was the anti-Charlie Nyx movement that was being spurred on by Christian publications like the Banner Banner.

"Isn't that whole thing sort of played out by now?" she asked hopefully. "I mean, she's on what, book five of the series? I would think that by now the lines are pretty well drawn between the pimply, socially inept dorks in favor of the books and the humorless, self-righteous dorks who are against them. Did a prominent dork switch sides or something?"

"I take it," said Troy, "that you haven't heard about Midford's latest marketing gimmick."

Christine flashed Troy a look that managed to convey both impatience with Troy's roundabout way of making a point and preemptive disdain at whatever that point might turn out to be.

"Get this," said Troy. Troy was the only person Christine knew who began sentences with a dramatic use of the phrase "Get this." He went on, after a suitably dramatic pause, "Midford's marketing people held a contest to select the Antichrist Antichrist."

"Oh for Pete's sake," muttered Christine. "And now we're going to send a reporter to Katie Midford's house and ask her absurd questions about whether she really was once a high priestess in a Voodoo cult, and how she responds to allegations that she wrote the original ma.n.u.scripts of the Charlie Nyx books with the blood of an infant." She turned to Harry. "You realize they're manipulating you, right? They like like it when you demonize them. It helps them sell more books. And movie tickets, and action figures, and G.o.d knows what else." it when you demonize them. It helps them sell more books. And movie tickets, and action figures, and G.o.d knows what else."

"Be that as it may, Christine," replied Harry, "it's still a story. We're obligated to report on it. And she's right here in L.A. No need to get on a plane for once."

"I won't do it," said Christine, shaking her head obstinately. "Besides the fact that it's a completely manufactured story with no intrinsic value, I meant it when I said no more Apocalypse stuff. Armageddon, the Four Hors.e.m.e.n, the Antichrist... I don't want anything to do with any of it."

"This is what's happening in the world," said Harry. "You can't pick and choose what news stories...."

"No, I I can't, but can't, but you you can," said Christine. "And you can," said Christine. "And you have have, for the past three years. For some reason you've decided that all I'm good for is interviewing these Apocalyptic nutcases, and if that's the case, then I need to find another line of work. Or start my own cult, maybe. After all, I know all the pitfalls. For crying out loud, Harry, just give me a real story."

Harry regarded her sternly. After a moment, he turned to Troy. "What about the olive branch thing?" he asked.