Strange Magic: A Yancy Lazarus Novel Read online

  “Thanks, but no than—” The world exploded with sound as the Colt aimed at my head belched an unbelievable roar.

  TWO:

  Gun Fight

  Gunshots are really, really loud, even if you are well acquainted with firearms. There are, of course, a few exceptions—little .22 caliber handguns for instance—but the Colt 1911 is not one of them. The abrupt and startling crash of noise was more painful than the shot. I’d prepared for the ambush shooting, of course, but I had failed miserably to account for the damn gun going off half-a-foot from my ear. At least I wasn’t dead. Like I said, I have the Vis, and that gives me a tremendous hand up over most folks, even professional thugs who are clued into the supernatural side of things.

  Also, this is not the first time someone has tried to shoot me in the head. Surprising, I know, considering my overwhelming tack and agreeable personality.

  I’d been preparing my minor deflection construct from the moment we stepped out into the alley. Though it’s not terribly difficult to stop incoming bullets outright, it is difficult to do from such close range. So instead of conjuring up some gaudy and overt construct, I created a thin invisible barrier between Rent-a-Thug and myself; a barrier which absorbed the kinetic energy from the bullet and redirected it, causing the round to careen past my face and into the wall on my right.

  Thankfully, the walls of the bar were thick slabs of concrete and brick, which stopped the round cold without any further ricochets.

  Man, I wish I had a Polaroid of the shooter’s face. It’s not every day that a pro thug misses a shot from so close. I bet he looked like a bully who had some bigger bully steal his lunch money. Classic.

  I turned and rolled out left, not expecting the shock of missing to last long. In short order, the Colt would fire again and I wanted to make my move before the shooter got his bearing or his chance. I came up in a crouch and took a slow, measured breath, drawing deeply from the Vis. I could feel energy course into me, thrumming and pulsing in time to the beat of my heart. I was afraid, but that was no good right now. I needed stillness and focus to work. So I breathed out, expelling my fear, anxiety, and anger in that short pause—those were things for later, acquaintances I couldn’t afford right now. I inhaled power, force, raw life. Time slowed, taking a deep breath all its own, as my body tightened like coiled steel.

  I lashed out, left hand forward, palm open, a snarl curling the edges of my lips.

  Air and spirit, intertwined into a complex weave of force, filled the space around me like a tightly compressed pocket of fluid. In one instant, I could feel the weight of all that accumulated air and in the next instant it rolled out like a crushing tsunami of force, spirit, and wind.

  A javelin thrust of power picked up the thug in the nice suit and sent him sprawling high into the air. The thug flipped head over heels, cartwheeling through the evening sky, a string of shocked and panicked curses filling the night. He sailed over the nearest dumpster—a well-aimed golf-ball headed for the green—before colliding with a sickening crack against the building wall.

  Simultaneously, a serpentine wave of hurricane wind surged out from me, eating up ground as it hurtled toward the Benz—an ethereal onslaught of silvered force rolling and bubbling like a fast moving mist. In seconds the mist enveloped the tricked out ride, obscuring the vehicle and bleeding over onto the street beyond. There was a swirling rush of movement within the opaque haze as the Benz jolted violently into the air, casually flipping onto its roof as though swatted by some enormous, unseen hand.

  The car landed with a crash of shrieking metal and crunching glass, a mammoth clamor, though softly muted by the constructed force fog, which easily concealed the sharp report of my behemoth pistol firing into the night.

  Now, I can sling some energy with the best of ‘em, but I also carry a single, heavy-duty pistol as backup. My gun is a specialty item, hand crafted by the Dökkálfar, and acid etched with runes of power—think the ill-behaved-Frankenstein-spawn of Dirty Harry’s .44 Magnum Smith & Wesson. Most handguns don’t do diddly against preternatural players, besides annoy the crap out of them, but my piece inflicts lots and lots of damage on anything unfortunate enough to be in my way. I’m talking colossal, scorched earth, damage. Also, it’s quiet, supernaturally tempered to be so—the Vis equivalent of a silencer.

  But wait, there’s more … the damn thing also weighs about a million friggin’ pounds and makes a great paperweight. Doesn’t get any better than that.

  I spun, pistol drawn and level, ready to fill the thug from the bar with about a pound of lead, but he was already sprawled up against the wall in a heap, blood oozing from his scalp and face. I should have killed him, if I left him alive and at my back, he could wake up and finish me. My finger was on the trigger, squeezing ever so slightly.

  Shit. I couldn’t kill him lying there as defenseless as some ugly, genetically altered gorilla. Killing him was the smart choice, but I’ve never been terribly bright. Killing a man in self-defense is one thing, but that guy was out like a busted light bulb and I couldn’t off him.

  I swiveled back to the front, scanning the upended Benz for any potential threat.

  The rapt-tat-tat, of semi-automatic assault rifle fire filled my ears. It took me only a moment to locate the source of the heavy weapon blast. The driver of the Benz had crawled loose of the twisted wreckage and was placing precise and even bursts of fire at me. This was not pray and spray shooting either, this was the measured fire separation of someone with tactical training—either former military or police. The alley left me little room to maneuver and few obstacles to seek cover behind.

  I gathered my will once more, drawing in compressed air and thin strains of radiant heat, intertwining them with spirit and will into a vaguely shimmering mist of reddish-light. The shield wasn’t intended to stop the bullets outright—physics are an issue even when using the Vis, and stopping something so small, moving with such tremendous force takes a proportionally greater degree of energy. Instead, I created a superheated friction barrier which dissolved the incoming rounds into a fine spray of slow moving and harmless powder.

  The shooter’s bullets continued to plow uselessly into my friction shield, while I lined up my shot. He was in the prone, forty-yards out, and partially concealed by the hulking wreckage of the toppled Benz, not an easy shot. It’s the kind of shot people don’t make in real life, not with a handgun and definitely not in a combat situation.

  I’m a good shot. My pistol’s imbued by the Vis and responds, at least in part, to my will, which grants me a far greater degree of accuracy than most other shooters. I fired two shots in rapid succession on the exhale, surrounding my rounds in a small pocket of air, allowing them to pass unmolested through my glowing shield. The first shot crunched into metal frame some three inches or so from the shooter’s head. Here I am talking about what an exceptional marksman I am. Jeez.

  The second shot punched a gaping hole in his head, above his left eyebrow.

  The resultant mess was not pretty. I know, such senseless violence doesn’t befit a hero. I’m not a hero. A hero might fire to disable, a hero might try to save the hapless goon, a hero might do any number of improbable and idiotic things. I’m not that guy.

  In my book, when people try to kill me, it’s my policy to kill them first and to do a damn thorough job of it. I don’t go around shooting people all willy-nilly, now, but if someone intends to harm me or mine … I hope their life insurance is paid in full.

  THREE:

  Answers

  Now, someone might ask why I carry a gun at all, especially when creating constructs from the Vis can be so much more efficient. There are a couple of things to remember. First, those flashy constructs—badass as they may be—take a veritable truck-load of work and energy. It’s like lifting weights, every rep takes a little bit out, and over time those reps add up. A good bit of that energy comes from the environment itself. In fact, most constructs are a combination of elemental forces derived from whatever is
near at hand—water, air, heat, magnetic force.

  But a healthy chunk of that power also comes from inside the practitioner. Tapping into the Vis is kind of like trying to light a candle with a friggin’ volcano—one misstep, one lax moment, and your ass will be up a fiery-stream of doom. An irresponsible mage can easily draw in too much Vis, become overtaxed in the process, and permanently lose the ability to touch the source at all. Burn out happens all the time.

  Shooting, on the other hand, takes almost no effort whatsoever. It’s fast, ugly, and brutal, sure—but as long as you have enough rounds, and the stomach for it, you can go all day. Precisely why I carry the gun in the first place, it offers me portfolio diversity. Flipping over cars isn’t easy lifting, let me tell you, so whenever I can rely on my good ole fashion bang-bang machine, I do. Waste not, want not, my granddad use to say—though I doubt he was talking about shooting people.

  I let the reddish mist disperse, though I kept myself open to the Vis, ready to recall the shield in an instant. I felt fairly certain that the thug and the driver were the only muscle, but it was possible that the unassuming accountant was packing too. I made my way to the wreckage and found the little man slumped on the other side of the vehicle, wounded. A bleeding gash marred his right arm; his right foot was pinned under the roof of the Benz. He was passed out but breathing steadily.

  Average police response time for a neighborhood like this was about eight minutes, which meant I had maybe six minutes to pump the guy for information. Drawing upon the source, I gathered microscopic particles of humid water vapor from the air, condensing those bits and pieces until a basketball-size glob of water floated above my palm. Then I dumped that water right into H & R’s face.

  He awakened with a satisfying sputter and a gasp.

  “Alright, you need to tell me what in the hell you’re talking about. I want to know who your employer is and I want to know what contract I am supposed to walk away from. Easy peasy, bud.”

  “The cops will be here soon,” the little man said, a groggy slur to his speech, “and I assume there are a couple of dead men here—this could get messy for you. You are a wanted man, Mr. Lazarus, and I shouldn’t think the justice system will afford you another chance at escape—not after you slipped away from those FBI agents in Memphis. I’m sure they will take ample care to ensure you are well restrained, perhaps sedation …” He smiled, smug and full of himself.

  Err right, I also travel around because I’m sort of a wanted fugitive. The FBI has a longstanding BOLO out on me—I’m wanted for murder, aiding and abetting, acts of domestic terrorism and sedition, tax-evasion … blah, blah, blah. You get the drift, though I really feel like my record has been blown hugely out of proportion. I’m not a terrorist that’s for sure as shit. And sedition? I fought for this country, lost friends for this country. Tax evasion? Well, maybe I’m behind on a few taxes. And technically, I guess they were right about the murder wrap, but the vast majority of the things I’ve killed over the years weren’t human, contrary to appearances.

  “Precisely why we don’t have time for this shit,” I replied. “Who’s your boss and what contract are you talking about?”

  “Like you don’t know,” he said, which pissed me off because I really didn’t know. My friend out west had asked me to come and take a look—said he would count it as a personal favor. I didn’t know anything though; I didn’t know who this guy’s boss was, nor had I been contracted out for any kind of job. This was pro bono work I tell you. I was only being a Good Samaritan!

  I could hear the distant warble of a police siren. My first inclination was to drop a compulsion glamour on his ass to elicit the information I needed, but that’s some gray area shit. The mage ruling body, The Guild of the Staff, looks down on that sort of thing. I couldn’t afford another misstep with them.

  So instead, I settled for good ol’ physical torture, which—believe it or not—was the more merciful option. I focused my will and energy on the moisture in his eyes.

  “You feel that?” I whispered.

  He groaned in response.

  “That’s the intraocular fluid in your pupils freezing. Hurts like a real son of a bitch, I know from experience. Pretty soon—I’d say maybe thirty seconds—ice crystals will form. It’s gonna hurt worse than a bad divorce and leave you with irreversible blindness. All I want to know is who your boss is, and what contract you think I’ve taken. This is information you already assume I have, so please cooperate—you’re not betraying anyone with that info.”

  He let out another soft moan as miniscule ice-chips occluded his vision. The guy made it thirteen seconds before he caved. Impressive.

  “Yraeta. Cesar Yraeta …” he said through clenched lips. “Reliable sources have informed us that you have been contracted to make a series of retaliation hits on our organization.”

  Well flaming-dog-poo-in-a-bag. That was a curveball I hadn’t seen coming, a real kick in the groin. I released my effort of will, the ice crystals immediately dissipated.

  “I am going out to California,” I said, “but I have no contract and I intend to preform no retaliation hits—clear? I may be a lot of things, but hit man is not one of them. Not anymore.” I turned and walked away as a black and white tore ass around the street end, its sirens issuing loud squawks, while its flashers tattooed the surrounding buildings with splashes of red and blue. More marked cruisers followed, but I wasn’t worried. Now, there would be more cops flooding in, and those cops would undoubtedly be on the lookout for suspicious characters fleeing the scene.

  As it happens I am a suspicious character, and, as it happens, I was also leaving the scene. But, I was still certain I would pass by unnoticed and untroubled. I’m a wanted man, but I’m also as tricky as a chameleon to find. I was not fleeing, for one, I was walking quickly—not nearly as suspicious. More to the point though, my black leather jacket is also a specialty item, which offers a wide array of impressive survival features. My jacket is flame retardant—not the same thing as flame proof, believe you me—and lined with ultralight Kevlar and slash-resistant fabric, which means it’ll stop small caliber bullets and knives. Covert, modern day, body armor. An absolute essential in this uncertain day and age.

  It also maintains a subtle glamour, making the wearer, me, more innocuous. It doesn’t make me invisible, which is possible but tremendously more difficult, but rather makes me boring—Alan Greenspan giving a lecture on market fluctuations, boring. Unless someone is looking for me specifically, their eyes will slip around me as though I am nothing more than an extra on a movie set. The Vis does have its perks: you can literally make yourself duller than drying paint, which is awesome I guess … unless you’re trying to pick up women.

  I strolled around the corner as another patrol car sped by. They didn’t even slow down.

  I probably could have loitered around a little longer, but I figured it was time to get out of town, time to get west and find some answers.

  FOUR:

  Going West

  The drive from New Orleans to Los Angeles is not a short one, though there are longer trips. The journey is about 2,000 miles of open roadway and rolling strips of empty desert wilderness. You have to drive across the entire state of Texas, which ought to tell you something since Texas is larger than many modern nations. The drive takes a little under thirty hours to make and that’s if you’re one of those ultra-committed, no-nonsense types who only stop for fill-ups. Oh, and if you don’t mind having your ass glued to a seat for thirty-friggin’-hours straight.

  I am not on ones those types of people.

  I love being on the open road. For all intents and purposes, I basically live on the open road. I am technically homeless, as in I have no house, apartment, or condo to call my own (glamorous, I know). Please understand that I choose to exist this way. I am not a bum or a panhandler. I don’t beg to make a living. I am gainfully employed … admittedly, my line of work consists mostly of playing blues for beer and gambling for groceries.
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br />   Say what you will, employment is still employment.

  Now, I may not have a home, but I do have a car: a midnight blue ‘86 El Camino with a high-gloss, black camper shell attached to the back of the truck bed. Yeah, you heard that right—an El Camino with a camper shell. That’s what’s up. At first it might sound a little funky, but it’s one sweet ride and it’s about a gajillion times cooler than having a stupid apartment. The camper shell doesn’t have a shower or toilet, so it doesn’t make a proper home, but it does give me a nice little nook to keep my gear and catch a long blink once in a while.

  And the Camino is also one souped-up mutha—I’m talking a 355 Chevy small block, turbo 350 transmission, posi-track rear differential. In short, my home is fast, mobile, badass-squared and can take me pretty much anywhere I please, which is not a bad way to live even if it’s not exactly the way most people live. I’d also bet dollars to donuts that my home can beat your home in a car-race any day of the week.

  With all of that said, thirty hours of straight driving through southern desert still sucks—you need to be damn near inhuman to drive for thirty hours. We magi are human and only slightly less physically fragile than most regular, Joe-blow, mortals. Tapping into the Vis does grant us a certain edge: we move faster, can lift a little more, heal injuries quicker and live much longer. But aside from longevity, the Vis only grants slight improvements in most areas.

  I could have pushed myself to make the trip in a single go, but then I would show up with a terrible caffeine headache, nearly zombified from exhaustion, and there would probably be a goon convention in town, expecting me as the keynote speaker. So instead, I settled down in Las Cruces, New Mexico after a grueling fifteen hour slog filled with lots of Zeppelin, Bob Dylan, Ray Charles, Little Sammy Davis, and Muddy Waters. Oh, and also about a cooler full of energy drinks and a bathtub worth of gas station coffee.