"Well," said Mercury. "Uh, you know how I said that I wasn't sure what my a.s.signment was in the Apocalypse?"

"Yes," said Christine coldly. "You said you had missed some meetings. Of course, you also said you gave the Attache Case of War to General Isaacson, so I a.s.sume that you weren't quite so much out of the loop as you led me to believe."

"I did miss some meetings," said Mercury. "That is, I stopped attending after...."

"After what, Mercury?"

Mercury bit his lower lip, betraying... what? Embarra.s.sment? Guilt?

"After the last round of a.s.signments were handed out."

"So you did get your a.s.signment?"

"Well, not the details, you know... I missed the tactical meetings...."

"The what what?"

"Yeah, that's what they called them. It was a bit silly, because I have very little military training, just the minimum, you know, Flaming Sword 101 stuff. Nothing that would have come in handy for this a.s.signment, but I guess they figured I was personable enough to get in close...."

"Mercury, what in h.e.l.l are you talking about?"

Mercury sighed with resignation. "My a.s.signment. What I was supposed to do, before I went AWOL. The reason I was in Northern California in the first place. Keep in mind that when I checked Lodi for Karl's whereabouts, it was really out of curiosity. I don't want you to get the impression that I was doing reconnaissance, or that I had any intention at that point of...."

"Of what what, Mercury?"

Mercury took a deep breath. He said, "Killing the Antichrist. Killing Karl Grissom. That was my a.s.signment, Christine. Heaven a.s.signed me to take out Karl."

Christine was incredulous. "But you didn't. You saved his life."

"Yes," said Mercury. "Of course, it was too early at that point, legally speaking. It wouldn't do Heaven any good to a.s.sa.s.sinate Karl before he was formally denounced. Technically, in fact, they need to wait three days after his denunciation. There's a sort of a grace period during which Karl is the official Antichrist, but can't legally be harmed by the agents of Heaven. After that, though...."

"So," said Christine icily. "Your plan was to get close to Karl, earn his trust, maybe save his life from an apparent a.s.sa.s.sination attempt by a couple of bungling demons...."

"No," said Mercury firmly. "I swear, I didn't know anything about Izbazel's plot. That part was just...."

"What? A lucky break? You get to be the big hero, saving Karl's life, and then when he's not expecting it, you snap his neck with one of your little miracles? Sounds like a pretty good plan. Maybe this whole thing " She waved her hands to indicate the busload of excited Covenant Holders. " is part of your plan too. You save Karl's life again, and he'll be like putty in your hands. In fact, as you say, if you were working for Heaven, you'd have have to save his life, wouldn't you? You can't afford to have it look like Heaven broke the rules by a.s.sa.s.sinating Karl early." to save his life, wouldn't you? You can't afford to have it look like Heaven broke the rules by a.s.sa.s.sinating Karl early."

Mercury was getting desperate. "Christine, please," he implored. "You can't really believe I orchestrated this whole conference, complete with another a.s.sa.s.sination attempt, just to solidify Karl's trust. I mean, that would take months of planning. And I don't know if you've noticed, but Karl isn't that difficult to sway. Getting forty thousand people into a stadium to fool Karl Grissom is like trying to kill a mouse with an F-15."

"Fine," Christine said. "You didn't orchestrate this whole thing. But how do I know that if we save Karl's life, you're not just going to kill him in three days to get back into Uzziel's good graces?"

"You don't," agreed Mercury. "You just have to trust me. I have no intention of harming Karl. Come on, the whole reason I'm here is to save his life."

"Because it fits your agenda."

"The agenda of preventing people from being killed for no good reason, yes," countered Mercury.

"And you promise me that you haven't once considered taking advantage of this situation to kill Karl."

Mercury paused just long enough for Christine to be certain that he had.

A look of disgust and defeat washed over Christine's face. Once again she felt completely alone in her struggle against the incomprehensible forces threatening to tear her world apart.

"Oh, like you've never thought of killing Karl," said Mercury defensively. "The important thing, like you said, is that I'm on the right side now."

Christine took a deep breath and looked out the window of the bus.

They had reached the stadium.

THIRTY.

"So," said Gamaliel. "You told him?"

"I told him," said Eddie, barely audible, his head resting on the counter of the pub.

"And he seemed... receptive?"

Eddie groaned. "He's always receptive."

"So he'll denounce Karl tonight." Gamaliel glanced at his watch. "Er, this morning. d.a.m.n time change."

Eddie groaned again.

"Excellent. Then I need to get back to California. It's time to wrap up this business."

Eddie's head lifted slightly off the bar. "And then I can leave?"

"And then you can leave. I'll make an anonymous call to the M.O.C. tomorrow."

"And tell them what exactly?"

"That you're still here."

"I think they know that. They don't care."

"They don't care because it's convenient for them not to care."

"And you're going to make it convenient for them to care?"

"I'm going to make it more inconvenient for them not to care. I'll let the director of the M.O.C. know that if they don't extract you, I'm going to tell somebody higher up the food chain that they misplaced a cherub several decades ago. It will become inconvenient for them not to extract you."

"Whatever," groaned Eddie. "As long as I get out."

"You're just lucky we found you."

"Sounds like you're you're lucky you found me." lucky you found me."

"In the end," said Gamaliel, "it will be the best thing for everyone even the pathetic souls that occupy this plane. This place is in desperate need of a regime change, and you've been instrumental in making that happen."

"Great," said Eddie weakly. He didn't like the idea of being an errand boy for Gamaliel or whomever it was that Gamaliel was really working for. But what choice did he have? Another decade stuck on this plane and he would go stark raving mad. Even the prospect of divine wrath began to pale in comparison to a century in Cork. Still, divine wrath was something to be avoided if at all possible.

"You're absolutely certain I won't get in trouble for this?" he asked, knowing full well that Gamaliel was a peerless liar.

"One hundred percent," said Gamaliel rea.s.suringly. "There is no way anyone in Heaven can connect you to any of this. You're thousands of miles away from the action, and n.o.body at the M.O.C. has any incentive to bring up the timing of your extraction. They'll give you a cushy desk job and hope n.o.body ever mentions your unintentional incarceration on this plane again. n.o.body in my organization has any reason to make an issue of it either. Even if we fail, we have nothing to gain by turning you in. Interfering with an agent of the M.O.C. is a serious offense, so we'd be crazy to admit that we even talked to you. In any case and you understand that I mean no offense we're not going to score a lot of points with Heaven by turning in a cherub of your rank anyway."

"I suppose not," admitted Eddie. Sometimes it was beneficial to be a little fish. Not when one has been forgotten for half a century on another plane, of course, but sometimes.

"Look at it this way," said Gamaliel, sensing that Eddie was still not entirely convinced. "If Heaven cared about this place, they wouldn't treat it like some kind of backwater province where they can exile angels that they'd rather forget about. For that matter, they wouldn't permit all the war, disease and general stupidity that go on here. This plane clearly needs more hands-on management."

"In fact," Gamaliel went on, "now that I think about it, it's almost like they left you down here on purpose so that you could help us whip this place into shape. I mean, we considered other ways to get a leader of the faithful to denounce Karl, but it's difficult to do without raising any red flags upstairs. So when we found out about your relationship with Harry... it was just too perfect. Who knows, maybe on some level it was meant to be."

Eddie grunted.

THIRTY-ONE.

The Apocalypse, Harry thought, as he stood behind the temporary stage that had been a.s.sembled on one side of Anaheim stadium. This was it. His moment of glory. Karl stood next to him, oblivious to what was going to happen in mere moments on that stage.

For that matter, none of the forty thousand Covenant Holders a.s.sembled to hear messages of spiritual encouragement had any idea what was about to go down either. Probably they would think Harry was insane, denouncing a schlub like Karl. But such was the fate of prophets.

At present, some black Baptist preacher the Covenant Holders' nod to racial inclusiveness was wrapping up a speech about the power of redemption. When he was finished, it was Harry's turn. Harry had planned to speak on the role of religious media in shaping the emerging world, but he had sc.r.a.pped his notes in light of recent events. Now he planned to open with a retrospective on his life, climaxing with his life's mission: the heralding of the coming Apocalypse and the denunciation of the Antichrist.

Harry noticed in the front row a jittery, angular man who seemed to be immune to the reverend's impa.s.sioned pleas. The man looked as if he was waiting for something. Waiting, perhaps, for Harry? That seemed improbable, as Harry was a competent but hardly invigorating speaker. Unless maybe the man knew what Harry was about to do?

Nonsense, thought Harry. He chalked his baseless suspicions up to stage fright and paranoia stemming from his recent unnerving trip to the planeport. He pushed the thoughts out of his mind and tried to concentrate on what he was going to say. It was nearly time for him to go on.

"Ready?" he asked Karl.

"I guess," grumbled Karl. "I'd feel better if I had my helmet though."

"You won't need it," said Harry. "Trust me."

THIRTY-TWO.

Christine was dismayed to find that the conference was running ahead of schedule. Harry was already on stage by the time they got through the gate.

"What now?" Christine asked.

"Look!" cried Mercury. "That's Izzy, down in the front row. That scheming b.a.s.t.a.r.d is just waiting for his chance to pounce."

Harry was winding up to the climax of his speech. He was talking about the divine plan and events that he had experienced recently that only confirmed his belief that G.o.d intended great things for him. Karl, looking bored and confused, was standing almost out of sight by the side of the stage.

"I can't get near Karl," said Mercury. "At the first sign of coercion, Lucifer will cry foul and put his plan into motion. You have to convince Karl to get out of here. And it has to be of his own free will. You can't touch him or use any kind of coercion.

"So what are you going to do?" asked Christine.

"I," Mercury announced, "am going to go knock Izbazel's teeth out." With that, he began to walk purposefully toward the front row.

Christine moved briskly to the side of the stage. It seemed to take forever, and not just because she was listening to Harry blather on about G.o.d's plan for his life. When she finally got there, she flashed her Banner Banner credentials to the security personnel and found herself standing backstage next to Karl. credentials to the security personnel and found herself standing backstage next to Karl.

"Hey," said Karl. "What are you doing here?"

"Hi, Karl," said Christine, still somewhat out of breath. It occurred to her that Karl still thought she was... what was it? Secret Service? If she just told him that there was a threat to his life, he'd most likely believe her. She'd be telling the truth, although her credibility was itself based on a lie. Was that considered coercion? d.a.m.n the legalistic Seraphim and their petty Accord.

"Harry says you're not really Secret Service," said Karl.

So much for her credibility.

Meanwhile, Harry had segued into an announcement that the End Times had arrived.

Christine said, "You're in danger, Karl. Izzy, that guy we ran away from at Charlie's Grill, he's going to try to kill you again."

Karl snorted. "Harry says you're just jealous. Because he gets to herald the apoc... apoc... the end of the world."

"Jealous!" Christine spat. "Harry's a spineless windbag. Lucifer's just using him for his own ends. And Harry's using you. You realize that as soon as you get on that stage, he's going to denounce you."

Karl stared vacantly at her.

"He's going to...." Christine struggled for a synonym for denounce denounce. "He's going to say that you're... a bad guy."

Karl shrugged.

Harry's voice suddenly became louder. "And so I give you... the Antichrist, Karl Grissom!"

Karl bounded eagerly onto the stage. The crowd, uncertain how to react, began to applaud and boo simultaneously. Eventually both died out, leaving only a confused silence.

"You may know Karl as the so-called 'winner' of a little contest orchestrated by the people responsible for the Charlie Nyx books..."

The crowd erupted in boos.

"...and chain of family restaurants..."