Portals of Infinity: Book Five: Demigods and Deities Page 28

  He picked it up and looked at it, then back up at me, "Can't say that I have."

  "How about that symbol?"

  He shook his head no.

  "Well, that's a good thing," I said smiling.

  "What is this all about? What are you doing here?"

  "We'll get to that. By the way, did anything on Stephanie turn up?"

  "Nothing official, but word came back she was with MI-5 or something like that, and not to ask anymore questions."

  I nodded, "Now, didn't you find it the least bit, well, peculiar that you were asked to bring me in for questioning about a man who had disappeared years ago, a man whose home was under constant surveillance?"

  Agent Addison shrugged, "They'd run into a dead-end, they were looking to see if they could find out anything new. Now why are you here? It's been over two years!"

  "One last question, did you hear anything about the dust-up at the Gatwick estate about a year ago?"

  "What? No, I haven't heard anything."

  I nodded, "I would suggest you contact any sources you have in Interpol, and contact them directly, you may find it interesting."

  "Interesting how?"

  "In that it will back up what I'm about to tell you. You see, Interpol, along with the local police, raided the Gatwick estate, it turned into quite the bloodbath and before it was done, Gatwick's followers sacrificed one of the police officers on an altar, with that symbol on it." I said and nodded to the necklace.

  "What! You ... I can't believe that! Why, we would have heard about it here!"

  "Well yes, normally you would have, but there is, or rather, there was a rather high placed official in the FBI, who squashed the report, so it didn't get filtered down to the rest of the agency."

  "I find that hard to believe!"

  I shrugged, "Believe what you want, but Gatwick started up a death cult, one with himself as the both the god and the head. His main temple, or whatever you want to call it, was in his estate in South Africa. Using his money, his charisma, and his access to certain, umm, channels, he subverted more than a few government employees, both here, and abroad."

  "Why would he do such a thing!"

  "Because he's a sociopath," I said and smiled again. "A rather powerful one too, truth be told."

  "I find this all rather hard to believe," Agent Addison said looking at me, eyes narrowing a bit. "What is your part in all of this?"

  "Well, you see, when you brought me in, it was because your boss in DC was worried about Gatwick, he hadn't see him in far, far too long. So he went through the Interpol files, and found that picture, and then put his people to work on it. There was no receipt at a rental car agency; I don't have any credit cards and I didn't sign anything. He matched the picture up with my high school yearbook. I gather he had quite a lot of people digging to find that, which is probably why it took several years."

  "I don't believe you."

  I shrugged, "Again, call Interpol, find out if they ever requested I be questioned, or if they even know who I am."

  Agent Addison stopped to think about that a moment, and then nodded. "Okay, so let me get this straight, my Boss is the member of a death cult, he spent agency time and money to hunt you down, to find out what happened to the leader of this death cult, which your friend Gatwick runs."

  "Close, Gatwick is not my friend, and he didn't spend agency money to go through the yearbooks, he did that using other members of the cult. Though I'm sure he used agency resources as well. He used you after all."

  "I find this all rather hard to believe."

  "Tomorrow, after you make a few phone calls, I think you'll start to consider my words."

  "So why tell me? What do you hope to gain?" Agent Addison asked.

  "Because you need to purge the members of that cult from your agency. I'm sure there are a few more that are in it. Probably in some other government agencies as well. Also, I need you to see if you can find where the other altars, or 'temples', of this religion are. Gatwick probably had one in each of the areas he was doing business in."

  "How about I call my boss, and see what he has to say about these allegations of yours? I'm sure he'll find them all rather interesting."

  "Don't bother, he's dead."

  "What!?" Addison reached for his gun.

  "Heart attack. Who knew he had a bad heart, right?" I smiled at him, as he drew his gun.

  "What did you use? Cyanide? Ricin?"

  "Run all of the toxicology reports you want. He wasn't poisoned, or assaulted, so you won't find anything. However if you do a little checking, you will discover that necklace was his," I pointed to the necklace I had dropped on the table. "We had quite the conversation about his actions before his health caught up with him. Do a little digging and I think you'll be rather surprised by what you find."

  "You're under arrest, Mister!"

  "Don't bother; even if you could make a case, which you can't, I'm not going to be around here much longer."

  "Oh, I think I can guarantee that!" Agent Addison said motioning with the gun.

  "Agent Addison," I said and stood, "I'll be back, occasionally to see what you have found out about that symbol," I said nodding to the necklace. "If I'm going to stop Gatwick, I'm going to need your help."

  "Sit back down!"

  "If you find out anything or need me, just go to church and pray. I'm sure I'll hear about it."

  "Sit down or I'll shoot."

  I shrugged, "All you'll do is succeed in waking up your wife and kids. But hey, if you want to, knock yourself out."

  I turned and started walking out of the room. He fired of course, and hit me in the back.

  "Damn, that stings," I said and healed the wound immediately. "Don't tell anyone you shot me, or they'll think you're going crazy," I said and waved at him, my back still to him as I opened a portal and stepped through.

  "Be seeing you," I said and closed the portal before he could shoot me again.

  End Book Five

  As an author, I would ask that if you liked this book, please take the time to rate it. Ratings are an important part of success as an ebook author, and four or five star ratings are of course the ones that help us the most. So while I feel a little embarrassed about asking for ratings and reviews, the reality of this business is that without those reviews my work will not rise in rankings and will not be seen by others. So please, if you liked the story I would greatly appreciate your taking the time to write a short review and rate the book.

  Thank you,

  John Van Stry

  www.vanstry.net (vanstry@gmail.com)

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  If you liked this book, you might like my other stories:

  Urban/Modern Fantasy:

  Portals of Infinity, Book One: Champion for Hire

  William is just your typical engineer fresh out of college with a stressful job, a boring life, and not a lot of prospects of anything better in the future.

  Until one weekend while hiking in the woods he stumbles across a portal to another time, or perhaps another place. The more he investigates this new world the more he realizes that it may just be able to offer him a lot more than the one he's been living in.

  However, there are forces at work beyond anything that Will has ever come across before and the local goddess seems to have taken a liking to him. Will may soon find himself getting an offer he cannot afford to refuse.

  Portals of Infinity, Book Two: The God Game

  Will’s life has definitely changed since that day he went hiking in the woods of Pennsylvania. He’s discovered that reality is a lot bigger and stranger than he had ever imagined. Learning about the portals that link the infinite number of worlds opened his eyes to that wider reality. Learning that he was being groomed to become the Champion of a God in one of those realities was an even more startling discovery.

  But now it’s time for him to pay the bill for his ‘recr
uitment’. Just as the Gods on a single world fight and jockey for power and position, the older Gods from the many different spheres of the infinite play a much larger and more complicated game. The Goddess Aryanna has a quest she needs completed, and William and four other Champions are the ones tasked to do it.

  What bothers Will however is what could a Goddess possibly need? And why would it take five Champions to retrieve it?

  Portals of Infinity, Book Three: Of Temples and Trials

  With the first of what he suspects will be many favors completed, William finds himself busy with important tasks back at his home on Saladin. Queen Rachel has several jobs she needs him to do, and Feliogustus has similar tasks in mind for him as well. All in all, it seems easy enough to Will, it’s not like he’ll be fighting in any wars, or traveling across the infinite on a strange quest after all.

  But things aren’t always as easy as they might seem, and both politics, as well as the other gods, aren’t going to ignore Will, or the tasks he’s been set to complete. And is if dealing with that isn’t problem enough, when the time comes to do some serious diplomacy between Hiland and a neighboring Kingdom, a deadly problem comes from a most unexpected quarter, forcing Will to take immediate action to payback both his, and his God’s foes.

  Portals of Infinity, Book Four: The Sea of Grass

  With no otherworld tasks to run for Fel, Will has spent the last year mainly helping Rachel consolidate her hold on her expanded kingdom. Barassa has been set back, for now, but Will knows it’s only a matter of time until they’re at odds once more and Barassa still has the bigger army. So taking the time to learn more about their enemy seems like a good place to start, and of course, Rachel has more things she expects him to do, even if he has no idea just how he’s going to do them.

  Fel also has things for Will to do as well, even if they are the more mundane jobs that a Champion of the faith must perform. Escorting missionaries isn’t the most exciting or glamorous job, but its one Will must do. At least the people are different, interesting, and friendly, and some perhaps a little too friendly. But that’s never gotten him in trouble before, right?

  The Hammer Commission

  Mark's job seems pretty dull, working as an investigator into crimes committed against Church property, theft of holy objects, vandalism; nothing terribly exciting but he does get to travel the world.

  That's just the window dressing. Mark does work for the Church, but as an elite member of a thousand year old secret society that hunts down devils, demons, and other evils. His job is not just to find them, but to remove, dispel, or kill them: he's on the front lines of the secret ongoing war between Heaven and Hell. However as wars go, it has been a fairly easy one for the last few decades, with nothing seriously evil having been summoned since the last world war.

  But all of that is about to change, and the question for Mark may not be can he survive, but can he survive long enough.

  Science Fiction:

  Children of Steel

  Raj is just your average everyday genetically modeled and artificially created anthropomorphic worker for one of the many corporations of the future. Extensively trained and conditioned from birth he's now indentured for the next fifty years of his life; assuming he doesn't die first, or somehow manage to pay off his creation and training debts.

  Created by the corporations to deal with the harsh labor shortages of the twenty second century when humans will no longer take on the dangerous jobs Raj finds himself now in the harsh world of space exploration, trading, corporate maneuverings, and sometimes the even more dangerous fanatics that hate Raj and his fellows. No longer in safe confines of the training academies he must learn how to live and deal with both his fellow workers and the humans he encounters and not get saddled with extra bills or fines because he's screwed up or worse yet, get 'put down' because he's lost his temper one time too many.

  After all, it's not like he's human...

  Interregnum (Sequel to Children of Steel)

  The war is over, Raj and Cassandra are together, and everything should be 'happily ever after', and return to normal, right?

  Well, they would be, but Cassandra still has issues to overcome after spending three years in POW camps where abuse and even torture were commonplace and many of the guards were sadists. Raj has gotten over most of his problems, after all, he did save his mate's life, but there are still issues from his past that are dogging him. And of course, there are just a few minor things that need to be cleaned up, leftover issues from the war, and some of those issues shoot back.

  Interregnum is the sequel to 'Children of Steel' and picks up where it left off, continuing to follow the life of Raj, a genetic construct and wage slave to one of the major corporations that dominate Human explored space.

  Danger Money

  Jotun was born and bred to be a corporate assassin, back in the days of the Corporate Wars. Confined these days to life in a gilded cage, Jotun welcomes any opportunity to get out and lately he's been getting out a lot. But as a genetically designed and Laboratory bred animorph by a company that isn't quite sure if it trusts him anymore his choices are few: do the jobs that eventually will kill him, or refuse, which will also kill him.

  Of course it isn't like he doesn't enjoy the work, but when everybody wants you dead you start to wonder if there isn't more to life.

  When an unexpected betrayal kills the few friends he has and nearly him as well, Jotun realizes he has bigger problems than his lifestyle, namely finding out who betrayed him and paying them back, no matter what the cost.

  Danger Money is a Science Fiction story that takes place in my Children of Steel universe, a future where genetically created animorphs serve as second-class citizens and handle all of the dirty and dangerous jobs that are part of humanity's extension to the stars.

  Dialene

  Dialene's Captain decided to play pirate, and one well placed nuclear torpedo later she finds herself prisoner of the Corporation whose ship they were attempting to raid; her friends and lover all dead. With no corporation to ransom her back she finds herself in the unenviable position of having to work off the debt assigned to her for her part in her Captain's actions. With concerns as to where her loyalties lie she has but two choices: Work in the mines on an airless rock where a small fem like her would not last long, or work in the company bar entertaining those very same miners.

  At least working in the bar beats the alternatives, until one day an interesting character inserts himself into her life.

  A Novella from my Children of Steel universe, Dialene is a foxmorph who until her capture was a highly rated shuttle pilot working a deep space trader for one of the more notorious corporations. Like most of her kind she had no choices in her employer who considered her nothing more than a disposable asset.

  Shorts: The Furry Years

  A collection of short stories that I wrote years ago for several of different anthropomorphic fanzines. Includes the following short stories:

  Changes: The hero of the story wakes up in the morning to find his world has changed, rather drastically for him, hardly at all for others.

  Old Business: This is from my ‘Children of Steel’ universe, it’s about the beginning of it all, the very first of the sentient animen (or animorph) ever to be created.

  New Beginnings: Jack is the new bartender at a small pub, a nice quiet pub in the business district. The patrons tend to find his opinions humorous, as what does a bartender know after all? (More of a slice of life type story).

  Fox Hunt: A joke that I just could not resist.

  Easy Money: What happens to spies who come in from the cold? Especially ones who grew up on the wrong side of the tracks? Nothing good I’m sure...

  Available in eBook format at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Smashwords, Kobo, iTunes, and wherever eBooks are sold, available in print from CreateSpace or Amazon.

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