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  Unknown. Insufficient or corrupted data. Apparently my matrix sustained damage concomitant with Arthur Navarro’s episode. Forty-eight seconds of realtime internal memory are irretrievable. Files associated with NCY-93 data are currently irretrievable. Damage pattern suggests an overload. Molecular redundancies permitted restoration of my functionality. Arthur Navarro had no such safeguard.

  “Arthur mentioned causality and then expressed a strong desire that I destroy the remnants of Nancy’s payload. Extrapolate.”

  After a long pause, Black said, Insufficient data. I recommend a conference with ranking Sword Enterprises personnel. Dr. Bole, Dr. Bravery, or Dr. Navarro.

  “Fine. I’ll take that recommendation under advisement.” Mac felt a twinge of misgiving—could an artificial intelligence lie? He’d become adept at recognizing falsehoods, as one did in the Tooms household. Black’s tone bothered him. “Black, hibernate.” He slipped the machine into its case and sealed the lid. The lab mainframe appeared to be a total loss. He stepped into the darkroom Arthur repurposed as a small theater. Laser light from the computer terminal beamed through an aperture and interacted with the tubes, which had nested vertically on a plinth. Whatever encoded information they contained was then descrambled by Black and projected as holographic imagery. Now, the crystal tubes were broken to bits and scattered, although Mac nabbed a sizable fragment and stuck it into his nightshirt pocket in case Dr. Bole’s people might salvage some vital clue.

  Poking around the darkroom, he visualized Arthur standing in a void of scattered stars, eyes fixed upon a gradually coalescing feature of solar geography. Had he heard the wolf snarl, the blat of a titan’s horn? What sight, what revelation had torn the young scientist’s mind apart? Certainly nothing mundane as a glimpse of dwarf Pluto.

  Dred walked in and gasped at the carnage. He covered his mouth with his arm. “Arthur . . . ”

  Mac relayed the cheat sheet version, and as he described current events, the implications more fully dawned upon him. “Are you all right?” He didn’t like his little brother’s slack jaw or bug-eyed stare.

  “Uh, sure.” Dred nodded and glanced away from the bodies. He smiled bravely. “Seen worse. We’ve seen worse, right?”

  Mac opened a locker and dressed himself in a utility jumpsuit and spare boots. He thought of Mountain Leopard Temple and the hells they’d endured every winter since his ninth birthday. Sifu Kung Fan, referred to his training regimen for callow students as Death of a Thousand Cuts. One of three trainees succumbed, often via fabulously gruesome demises. Privation, starvation, battles to the death, and poisoned rice cakes—all occurring within a drafty, frigid temple high atop the Himalayas—was worse.

  Dred composed himself and said, “Causality? Laws of physics? Moments like these, I wish I’d paid more attention in science class. Guess we better plot our next move. Berrien is bustin’ a vein. I shudder to think how Dad’s gonna react. Hope you got a plan to save the day or our goose is cooked.”

  “I’ll devise a plan. I promise.”

  “Better be an A-plus humdinger.”

  “Ah, Dred, this isn’t my specialty. Perhaps the time has come to brace the lion in his den and bring Granddad on board.”

  “He might be in a murdering mood. Remember the horrifying fate of Cousin Bruce . . . ”

  “Granddad is always in a murdering mood. Bruce definitely caught him on a bad day.”

  The wall phone rang.

  DARKMANS MOUNTAIN

  Mac answered. “Berry—”

  “Good morning, Macbeth,” said Cassius Labrador, chief executive officer of Zircon Unlimited and Sword Enterprises’ most loathed rival. His voice crackled the way Mom and Dad’s did when they called from a bad overseas connection. “I propose a face-to-face.”

  “Is that so? Some nerve, bugging my property.” Even as he talked, Mac glanced around for concealed mics and cameras.

  “Time is of the essence. Refrain from tedious queries. Grim as the day is thus far, ever more terrible events are transpiring. However, it may be possible to forestall the most calamitous outcome.”

  “Do tell, Mr. Labrador.”

  “I will. Meanwhile, you’re in mortal danger. Hostile agents are aware you removed components from NCY-93. Sooner or later they’ll come calling.”

  “Perhaps I’ll take my chances and stay put. None of you rats will dare attack our house. That’s war.”

  “None of the corporations are involved, son. Except mine, and I only wish to help. These men are religious fanatics who venerate an unearthly power known as Azathoth, the Demon Sultan. They don’t recognize the accord.”

  “Cultists? Swell. Azathoth sounds familiar.”

  “The Index of the Gods contains thirty-thousand names. He’s in there somewhere under multiple headings. Here’s your only play—get the hell out and rendezvous with me at Darkmans Henge. We will palaver under the flag of truce.”

  “Palaver, eh? A nice way of saying there’ll be blackmail terms.”

  Labrador chuckled. “Hardly. I offer information regarding your predicament, which is vastly more problematic than it may appear. This information is provided freely and without obligation.”

  “Shall we deliver ourselves into your hands, then? Dream on, sir.”

  Dred, cuing on Mac’s half of the conversation, said, “I, for one, have no interest in being tortured, imprisoned, or experimented upon. Again.”

  “It’s your choice, Macbeth. Hang around the manor and wait to see where the chips land. If the cult doesn’t do you in, your grandfather will. He loves a scapegoat. Rendezvous at the henge and I’ll give you what help I may.” The line clicked dead.

  Mac cursed and looked at Dred. “Labrador claims to possess valuable intelligence pertaining to our situation.”

  “Zircon tapped the house line. Scoundrels.”

  “Tit for tat. We tap their communications up the yin-yang.”

  “And we jitterbug on up the mountain for a picnic?” Dred snapped his fingers. “Just like that?”

  “Given recent history I’m inclined to accept his pledge at face value. Much as I hate to admit it, one thing about Labrador, he’s cut from different cloth than Dad and Granddad. The fellow keeps his word.” Mac unlocked the fire safe and removed a bundle of money, passports, a Luger automatic, and a keypad. He scooped these items and Little Black’s case into a pair of rucksacks. Little Black presented a quandary—the machine was tangible, material proof that the boys had meddled in company business and gotten Arthur and his brothers killed in the process. Little Black had also (possibly) interfaced with data from an alien intelligence, and despite Arthur’s dying words, the scientific find of all human history wasn’t something to discard lightly. Mac needed to consider his options, which meant no hasty decisions. He tossed one of the rucksacks to Dred, and hustled through the door.

  A secondary garage was attached to the rear of the barn. Two Jeeps, a wrecker, a halftrack, a Land Rover, and a crop-duster were parked inside. The boys jumped into the Land Rover (specially customized by gearheads of the Sword motor pool for all-terrain utility) and punched the gas.

  Mac parked at the property fence-line and entered a code into the keypad. The resultant signal tripped the circuit on a master relay connected to demolition explosives. The barn collapsed with a low rumble that rattled the vehicle. Flames and smoke soon engulfed the ruins.

  “Now Dad is gonna want to kill us,” Dred said.

  “He’ll need to stand in line.” Mac put the Rover into gear and beelined toward the Catskills along a series of cart tracks and hiking trails, and straight through the woods when necessary. Dred spent much of the next hour hollering. Whether from exultation or fear was debatable.

  A forsaken mining road that old maps catalogued as Red Lane twisted around Darkmans Mountain. A granite cliff loomed on the passenger side and descended vertically toward the forest canopy on the driver’s side. Mac hugged the cliff face. Rock scraped paint from Dred’s door. The elder Tooms brother didn’t feel m
uch concern. He’d spent several weeks of his short life driving trucks loaded with purloined jungle artifacts along the dreaded Yungus Road in Bolivia.

  Soon, the way broadened and leveled and Mac hooked left at a fork. He rolled through a thinning stand of pine and parked in a clearing that gently angled toward the summit. This was Darkmans Henge, neutral parlay site of the Toomses, Labradors, and other powerful families and institutions. It had served as such for generations. Nature, ever at work reclaiming its haunts from the domesticating hand of man, obscured the ancient henge with dislodged boulders, thick clumps of brush, and moss. Dr. Souza claimed that a culture far older than the Lenape carved the henge and worshiped in the caves riddling Darkmans Mountain, which was a sister geographical feature to Mystery Mountain in Washington State and a peculiar obsession of numerous esoterically-minded scientists.

  Cassius Labrador and a pair of subordinates awaited them atop the outer retaining wall of the henge. Labrador hadn’t grown any prettier since last the brothers saw him during an altercation aboard a cargo ship as it sank into the depths of the Yellow Sea. Blond hair hacked short, pock-marked cheeks from a bad childhood in South America, and long, angular limbs. He dressed the part of an urbane explorer in a bomber jacket and khakis.

  Young Dr. Howard Campbell stood to his left. A gangling, buck-toothed man not long graduated from university, the scientist wore a tweed suit and horn-rimmed glasses. The third member of the Zircon contingent lurked just within earshot, a Winchester 70 with a scope slung over his shoulder and the butt of a revolver jutting from its armpit holster. Errol Whalen acted as Labrador’s latest bodyguard. Small and sallow, yet dangerous as any true predator, the Marine Lieutenant of distinction had plied the mercenary trade in a score of international theaters of war prior to signing the dotted line for Zircon’s dirty work. He dressed in a slouch hat, black glasses, and a dark, loose coat.

  “Good afternoon, boys. We meet again.” Labrador gave the brothers a jaunty wave. “This is Howard Campbell.”

  “I’ve read your thesis,” Mac said to Dr. Campbell. “Impressive stuff with antediluvian mounds in New Guinea. You’re working for the wrong company.”

  “A pleasure to make your acquaintance.” Dr. Campbell smiled awkwardly and patted his sweaty forehead with a cloth.

  “Be at ease, Howard,” Labrador said. “This is hallowed soil. Nobody’s shooting anybody for the moment.”

  “Mr. Labrador, don’t jinx it,” Whalen called in a raspy, nasally voice. The book on Whalen was that he craved the frequent bloodletting his occupation required and at which he excelled. The boys had yet to see him in action, although neither doubted the rumors as they watched him creep around the perimeter, hunched and sniffing the earth like a hound. He peered through a set of binoculars. “No enemy movement along the road. I don’t like it, though. Somebody was moving around in the woods at the base of the mountain earlier. The kids are being tracked, guaranteed.”

  “Mr. Craven died aboard the Night Gaunt,” Mac said, recalling the bald, musclebound Englishman who’d valiantly tried to take his head off with a fireman’s axe moments before the boilers blew and water flooded the hold of the ship and all was darkness and chaos split by bursts of flame from the muzzles of Sten guns and the shrieks of men in extremis. Exciting times. “I’d hoped he made it.”

  “Thanks, Macbeth. Civil of you.”

  “Ain’t that a bite?” Dred said, rolling his eyes. “Enough butterin’ up. The limey was an ape and I bet my bottom dollar your new stooge is more of the same. Who are these goons you speak of, and how much should we thank Zircon for our troubles?”

  “The lad takes after his father,” Labrador said behind his hand to Campbell. He cleared his throat and nodded to Dred. “Let us set aside the detail that during our previous encounter, you boys were hijacking a ship under a Zircon flag. Matters escalated as they are wont to do in this cutthroat business climate. Let us not hold petty grudges over spilt milk or spilt blood. Obviously, the cultists are interested in acquiring data from NCY-93. Especially the flight recorder, which I trust you’ve either destroyed or secured. I’m betting on secured. Mom and Dad are on vacation and Granddad Tooms is a frightful proposition. You haven’t decided what to do with the material and now cultists are after your hides, and here we are.”

  Mac was far too wary to admit one way or another what he’d done with the data cores. “You’ve spied on Sword Enterprises in violation of at least eight articles of the treaty. Arthur said Zircon intercepted a radio transmission from these cultists. That explains some, but not everything. How did they acquire information regarding Nancy?”

  “Information even ya didn’t have until a few hours ago when ya spied on them, ya dirty sneaks,” Dred said.

  “Presumption is a leading cause of death,” Labrador said. “Are you aware of NCY-93’s intended destination?”

  “Why do I suddenly have a premonition you’re going to tell me something other than ‘to photograph Pluto?’” Mac said.

  “On the contrary. That is precisely the mission the probe will embark upon in T-minus six days. Continuing with the thesis we are describing a hypothetical event . . . Unfortunately, NCY-93 never arrives. Her sub-light accelerator, based upon oscillation technology your grandfather shamelessly stole from Tesla, malfunctions. Cavitation causes a cascade failure in the onboard computer. The probe catapults beyond our solar system and, as far as we can recreate these circumstances, she careens into the event horizon of a black hole, and from there, plunges into the Great Dark.”

  “The Great Dark?” Mac said.

  “Eh, your parents haven’t . . . ? You don’t know . . . ?” Labrador frowned, then smiled the way adults do when patronizing children. “Extend my apologies. This is as bad as inadvertently disabusing a child’s faith in Santa. Suffice to say, the probe pierces the membrane between this particular universe and a larger, blacker cell of the multi-galactic honeycomb. She tumbles in freefall for centuries until a decidedly inhuman intelligence—the aforementioned Azathoth—snatches her from the ether as a spider nabs its prey. This intelligence returns NCY-93 to Earth orbit prior to launch and you are there for the rest.”

  “Heck of a tale, sir. Which leads me to ask, how did you arrive at this theory?”

  “Alas, that involves proprietary technology.”

  “Holy Toledo,” Dred said. “Zircon has an AI too!”

  “The mouths of babes,” Dr. Campbell said.

  “Fuck,” Labrador said.

  CULT OF THE DEMON SULTAN

  Dr. Campbell blushed. “Excuse me sir, it’s not an incredible leap of logic for young Tooms to deduce—”

  “Hit the deck!” Labrador dove for the dirt in the shadow of the retaining wall.

  Mac and Dred heard a thin, monotone grumble of an approaching aircraft. A bi-wing fighter emerged from a cloud and drifted toward the henge. Metallic crackling harmonized with the engine as the forward-mounted machinegun began to churn. Bullets pinged into rocks and dirt. The brothers went flat and tried to make themselves as small as humanly possible behind a shrub.

  The fighter overflew the henge by a half mile, banked into a wide turn, and closed in for another strafing run. Whalen hopped atop a boulder and took aim with his rifle. He fired, worked the bolt to eject the shell, chambered a fresh bullet, drew a bead, and took another crack. The Model 70 made a racket.

  The fighter wobbled and screamed past without engaging the machinegun. It picked up speed as it disappeared into the trees. A few seconds later there arose a muffled thud and the clatter of shearing metal.

  “These usually come in squadrons,” Whalen said as everyone stood and shook the dirt from their clothes.

  “I guess that settles it,” Mac said. “They aren’t keen to interrogate us.”

  “No,” Labrador said. “The cultists will be perfectly satisfied to loot your corpses. My presence doubtless alarms them. Sword Enterprises and Zircon allied in common cause would be enough to unnerve any foe.”

  “Easy, Mr.
Labrador. Carts before horses, etcetera. I’d like to know who these guys are. Awfully well-organized for a group I hadn’t heard of until today. Who funds them? Where do they headquarter? What do they want with Nancy’s data?”

  “Best we repair to a more secure location. Follow me, there’s plenty of room in the Crawler.”

  The boys grabbed their emergency rucksacks from the car. Labrador led them down the hill into the trees where he’d parked an enormous all-terrain vehicle.

  The Crawler resembled a hybrid of a construction skidder and a tank with laminated treads, a bubble dome operations deck, and portholes. Sword Enterprises’ own all-terrain semi-submersible exploration vehicle currently resided in production limbo, but the boys recognized nearly all its features as they buckled into their seats and glanced around the cramped passenger compartment. Labrador’s driver, Tom, a nondescript man in a Zircon jumpsuit, got them out of there. The Crawler proved an impressive, diesel-powered beast—why go around small trees and large boulders when you could plow over them?

  Mac said, “I realized why Azathoth seemed familiar. I’m not a Lovecraft man as I prefer Clark Ashton Smith. Dred?”

  “Azathoth is a mad god who boils and bubbles at the center of the universe like a big old puddle of nuclear sludge,” Dred said. “I’ve read every H.P. Lovecraft story—Azathoth is mentioned in The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath. These loons? Cult of the Demon Sultan? Nonsense. About as useful praying to the Old Testament God. Which is to say, not very.”

  “They are fanatics, although not so mad as you surmise,” Labrador said.

  Mac laughed. “Lovecraft had a wild imagination that did him little good. He died a penniless hack. Try telling me he was Nostradamus Jr. and faked his death to avoid retribution from the elder monstrosities and I’ll jump out the porthole.”

  “Of course Lovecraft is dead, silly boy,” Labrador said. “We store his body in the Ice Room with a bunch of personalities. H.P. wasn’t prescient, except in the sense that any logical and imaginative mind might theorize the existence of beings more powerful than ourselves in the context of an infinite multiverse. The notion of monstrous alien life forms worshipped as deities predates the Man from Providence and his scribbling by epochs.