Calamity (Reckoners, #3)(62)
I picked out a series of minor Epics, noting which ones were still alive—meaning they’d thrown their lot in with Prof rather than fleeing the city. Stormwind was there, surprisingly: a young Asian woman sitting on a dais. She had obviously weathered her time in Prof’s prison and been released. Prof had apparently paraded her around as he had in order to show that he was now dominant in Ildithia. But ultimately, he needed her. Without her powers the crops wouldn’t grow, and luxuries—and even basic necessities—in the city would dry up.
I shook my head. I couldn’t see the entire room from my vantage, as it was shaped like a ring, but Prof wasn’t in this half—and I doubted he was in the other half. He wasn’t likely to attend a party like this.
“We’re in position,” Mizzy said softly over the line. “We’ve made it to the seventieth level.”
That was where Tia was being held, and was also where Prof’s rooms would be. The two were on opposite sides of the building though, so hopefully we’d have Tia in hand and be gone before he even realized we’d been here. Her original plan had included luring him out of his rooms with a distraction so she could grab his information without him knowing, but we didn’t have to worry about that now.
“Roger,” Cody said. “Nice work, Team Hip. Wait for David’s or Megan’s go-ahead before continuing.”
“Yeaaah,” Mizzy said. “No risk of us doing otherwise. This place is littered with security cameras. Infiltration suits won’t be enough to get us any farther.”
“We’ll get ready for step three,” I said. “Just let us…”
I trailed off, my jaw dropping as I spotted something out in the main room.
“David?” Cody asked.
Someone had rotated into view, sitting on a salt throne and surrounded by women in tight dresses. A man in a long black coat, with dark hair that tumbled past his shoulders. He sat imperiously, hand resting on the hilt of a sword, which stood point-down beside him like a scepter.
Obliteration. The man who had destroyed Houston and Kansas City and tried to blow up Babilar. The tool that Regalia had used to push Prof into darkness. He was here.
He met my eyes and smiled.
I ducked back into our pantry room, heart thumping, palms sweating. It was all right. I was wearing a false face. Obliteration wouldn’t recognize me. He was just a creepy guy who would give that look to—
Obliteration appeared next to me. Like always with his teleportation, he materialized in a flash of light. Megan cursed, stumbling backward, as Obliteration rested his hand on my shoulder. “Welcome, killer of demons,” he said.
“I…” I licked my lips. “Great Epic, I think you have mistaken me for someone else.”
“Ah, Steelslayer,” he said. “Your features may change, but your eyes—and the hunger within them—are the same. You have come to destroy Limelight. This is natural. ‘For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother…’?”
Megan’s gun clicked as she rested it against the side of Obliteration’s head. She didn’t shoot. It would draw attention to us, ruining the plan. Besides, he’d simply teleport away before the bullet hit.
“What are you doing here?” I demanded.
“I was invited,” Obliteration said, smiling. “Limelight sent for me, and I could not but agree to appear. His calling card was…demanding.”
“Calling card…,” I said. “Sparks. He has a motivator based on your powers.” Knighthawk had said that if you tried to build a device using a living Epic’s powers, it would work—but would cause them pain, and draw them to it.
“Yes, he did use one of those…devices to summon me. He must wish for death, Steelslayer. As we all do, in the depths of our souls.”
Sparks. Regalia must have made at least one more bomb from Obliteration’s powers—one other than the ones for Babilar and Kansas City. A bomb Prof now had. Prof would have had to charge his with sunlight. I assumed that was what had drawn Obliteration.
That meant that somewhere in this city was a device capable of destroying it in an instant. How terrible would it be if Prof gave up his humanity to protect Babilar, only to inflict the exact same destruction on Ildithia?
Obliteration watched us, relaxed. When we’d parted last, it had been after a long chase in which he’d tried his best to kill me. He didn’t seem to bear a grudge, fortunately.
But before we’d parted, I’d been forced to reveal something to him. “You know the secret of the weaknesses,” I said.
“Indeed,” he answered. “Thank you very much for that. Their dreams betray them, and so my holy work may proceed. I need only discover their fears.”
“You mean to rid this world of Epics,” Megan said.
“No,” I said, holding Obliteration’s eyes. “He means to rid this world of everyone.”
“Our paths align, Steelslayer,” Obliteration said to me. “We will need to face one another eventually, but today you may proceed with your task. God will make of this world a glass, but only after the burning has come…and we are his fires.”
“Damn, you’re creepy,” Megan said.
He gave her a smile. “?‘And there shall be no night there; and they need no candle, neither light of the sun; for the Lord God giveth them light.’?” With that, he vanished. As always, when he teleported away, he left a statuelike image of himself created from glowing white ceramic that shattered a second later, then quickly evaporated.