Witch Clan: Warriors! by John Stormm (good book club books txt) 📕

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“It’s certainly a human predominant plane,” Rumsdon said, “but it doesn’t completely jive with what we’ve been led to believe about Atlantean culture. What we’ve scried so far shows a very different form of human society where craft is entirely based upon technology and extremely little or no basis on talents. They lean so heavily upon industrialization that they are poisoning their air and water to such a degree that I would believe that if there’s the least bit of talent in that world, it is stifled into hiding if it exists at all.”

“Then it has to be yet another human plane,” he mused. “How many such planes could there be? Our studies show humanity to be unique in all the cosmos. I’m not sure I’d like this getting out to the general public until we can put the right spin on things.”

“Quite possibly,” Rumsdon added, “there could be countless alternate human planes. Though I highly doubt it. I am more inclined to believe that the Matriarch lied to us about hers and I’m suspicious of her motives for doing so.”

“Do you think she’s doing it to throw us off and set us up for conquest?” he asked.

“The only other explanation is that she’s working with the Forest Devils,” Rumsdon offered. “There are portals linking that plane to at least two others besides ours. The Psy Corps’ readings on them list them as Gwynydd, Abred and Annwn, in descending order. Abred is the human plane in the middle of those and of course you know who lives in Gwynydd. Since talent is so rare in Abred, it might explain the Matriarch’s party having so much of it if they are truly in an alliance with others. Look at her. She’s a natural diplomat and an accomplished witch. She’d be the perfect candidate for such an enterprise. Don’t you think?”

“Very possibly,” he mused, tapping his prominent chin. “Still, we are speculating and I would like to know more about this new plane. For a world so given over to technology, there must be some of it that we can exploit to our own uses. Have you seen anything promising in the scrying?”

“Indeed.” Rumsdon replied. “They are a fractured and very warlike society where the balance of world power is maintained by a constant readiness to annihilate the other contingents. This might account for the valet’s and the boy’s extreme proficiency in fighting skills. They also have bombs and missiles capable of leveling entire nations if I’m reading this aright.”

“You don’t suppose they are amassing these to use on us,” he asked. “Do you?”

“At first, I was as concerned about this as you,” Rumsdon explained, “and rightly so, as this represents an unprecedented threat. Our entire world could be held for ransom just with the threat of one such of these devices being set off in one of our cities. There would be no defense for such a threat. But every indication I can get from their media is that they believe they are alone in the universe. With no talents to speak of, how would they be aware that anyone else exists. Of course, this particular theory argues against the idea that anyone like the Matriarch‘s party could ever come from such a plane. But I digress.”

Ready to speculate even further on so intriguing information as this, Rumsdon halted him from speaking, holding up his hand in a halting motion as he appeared to be collecting his thoughts for the moment and then suddenly spinning his chair around.

“Now, think on this,” Rumsdon fairly cackled with delight. “If we exercise a little caution, burst in on these hapless rubes and steal a couple of these ‘nuclear warhead’ things and set one or two to explode on other worlds as an example and make demands of aquiessence, we could conquer and annex entire worlds with incredibly little effort and expense.”

“Survival would dictate that the Forest Devils give us tribute and anything else we might demand for the privilege of being allowed to exist,” he returned. “We’d be wealthy and powerful beyond our wildest dreams.”

“Indeed, we would,” Rumsdon agreed, collecting himself again. “But that is still more speculation. First, we need to get an Elite Shadow team in there and see what we may find of this technology and its weapons systems. Then we must determine ways these items can be best used to serve our own purposes. We also need to limit the Matriarch’s power upon ourselves and our society and still determine if she represents a threat from Atlantis or a disguised threat from this or yet another plane in allegiance with the Devils.”

“Our plans are still in effect for the Solstice Celebration?” he asked.

“And more important than ever,” Rumsdon replied. “If these new weapons are real and we get them before the Atlanteans can be made aware of their existence, we can use them to control the balance of power and trade between our worlds. The premise will be: It’s better to be with us than against us.”

“I have to admit,” he said, “that the idea of the Matriarch being from the new plane and not Atlantis and having such weapons at her disposal to place as we would, will trouble my sleep considerably.”

“As it would mine as well,” Rumsdon agreed. “Either way, it would be wise of us to get one or two of these ‘nukes’ as they call them and we can argue back that we might place one of these in their ‘White House’ or their ‘Kremlin’. We will not be defenseless. Besides that, as I‘ve said, they‘re not a very talented people as we are. What chance could they stand against an entire Council of Wizards, Assembly of the Wise or the power of the Pentacle?”

“I would say that depends upon how our Matriarch and her party fit in to all of this,” he replied. “The reports on this front worry me.”

“You have two teams of my best Elites and the city’s Yellow Jackets in your pocket,” Rumsdon pointed out. “Is there anything you need to report that I haven’t heard yet?”

“Well…” he said, fidgeting and trying to find a better way to phrase this disaster. “You have been quite busy with the Rift Wand Project and I didn’t want to disturb you unless I had something concrete to give you…”

“Out with it,” Rumsdon coaxed, snapping his fingers impatiently.

“We’ve been tailing them as we can, but sooner or later they always seem to elude us and we cannot account for their actions or where abouts during those times. In one instance, they were seen walking through a city park at night and it seems the boy was caught by a stray Stinger blast meant for a thief that some of our Jackets were chasing. The boy shrugged off the jolt as if it were no more than a tickle and the old woman brought down the three Jackets with a spell as she thought they were threatening her grandson. All of that misunderstanding was worked out between them and no further report was made. But just the other day, as the Jacket escort for the boy met him at the front door of their house, things turned into an awful mess and we are still trying to sort out the details of what happened.”

“Why don’t you just give me what you have?”

“The Jacket reports that he was bespelled by an adolescent, unregistered witch who was attempting to deliver flowers to the Matriarch. While he was predisposed with the girl, the boy, Johnny disappeared from the front steps without a trace. A team of Elites were covertly watching the front and apparently recognized the girl had spelled the Jacket, stunned her and took her captive as she attempted to leave. The rest of the team dashed off to find the boy or her accomplices.

“I’m not liking the sound of this,” Rumsdon complained. “You have two teams of five Elite Shadows each and you are wording this as if the Yellow Jacket was the sole filer of this report as opposed to the most efficient intelligence forces in our world.”

“It all sort of breaks down from here,” he explained, wringing his hands. “Of the two teams of Elites, four men are dead and one is hospitalized and in stable condition from a fall from the roof of their safe house. The survivor claims they were attacked by a masked, crimson caped wizard who struck them with lightning and knocked him from the roof into a dumpster using fighting techniques much like those we have seen from the Atlantean men, except the valet and the Matriarch were accounted for by other Yellow Jackets still at their residence. The boy, we are not sure of, but he is only eleven years old and none of them have ever been seen dressed in this manner. Of the five Elites who had supposedly taken the unregistered witch into custody, there is no trace of the girl, nor do they remember ever catching anyone or even watching the house that day. One apparently had a concussion from falling mortar in what appears to be a common household accident. The other four show signs of being stunned with stingers but nothing else was amiss in the safe house except for the five guards on the rooftop, who had no interaction with the captive or the first team except to take their positions on the rooftop. Whomever was responsible for taking out a safe house and no less than ten Elite Shadows had to be professionals of the highest sort.”

“Or, perhaps had the aid of the Forest Devils,” Rumsdon finished. “It is still unknown the extent of their powers and craft, and such capes or cloaks are not unknown among their kind. No. Now, I’m sure our Atlanteans are not from this new plane, but I’m a little more convinced that they might be in some secret allegiance with the Devils. The scarlet caped devastator of our forces on the rooftop is likely one referred to as an ’Emerald’ of the Sidhe. The girl it rescued, might well be a human traitor or a spy they didn’t want caught and interrogated. Hence the guards were mind wiped to throw us off. It probably never suspected the Elite it cast off the roof would survive by