Live and Let Die, Redux, Part 5

When we reached Jackson Park, Nate and Jack were already on scene. There were two other Fomorians in the vicinity, as well as a thin, nearly skeletal looking creature moving so quickly it was nearly a blur. I took this to be the Japanese entity Nate had spoken of earlier. There was another....Fomorian?...on the equestrian statue, reclining backwards on it. He--it--was much more visually attractive, even handsome, with a shock of close cropped blonde hair upon its head and an especially wicked looking black Katana in its hands, resting lazily across its shoulders.

I could hear Jack conversing with it, and I could detect a familiar Irish brogue in its reply, but I couldn't really make out the words of the conversation from my vantage point. Jesus, Jack, less talky, more punchy!, I thought, with some irritation.
I did catch the creature's name, though..."Caleb".

Caleb gave a quick order to the Japanese creature, which began moving so very rapidly in an apparent ritualistic pattern around the statue, trailing a trail of human blood behind it. Jack had been standing on the rump of the horse statue, when suddenly it seemed to begin to collapse and sink, and I watched Jack perform an impressive aerial backflip off the statue to stay on his feet. The other Fomorians also sprang into action, and battle was joined.

Once again, Laurel commanded the attention of the lesser Fomorians, who turned to face her and were seemingly transfixed, or at least highly distracted, which would make them more vulnerable to our coming onslaught.

I took to the air and when my opportunity came, I felt horribly tempted to hurl Gae Bolga at the nearest available Fomorian, these bane of the Tuatha now wrecking havoc on American soil...but I realised the spellcasting, summoning ritual, whatever it was, of this Japanese creature probably needed to be stopped more urgently. I'd seen the look of frustration in Nate's face when Camilla had leveled her rifle at a Fomorian instead of the Jinkiniki and fired off a round. I figured that since Nate was half-Japanese himself and knew something was up, I should set aside my personal lusts and do something to stop this magical ceremony before something even worse showed up. I gathered up all my courage and poured it into one mighty heave of Gae Bolga, a throw that would have impaled one of the lesser Fomorians, I think, but alas, the unspeakably nimble creature performed a graceful pirouette and dodged the mighty spear, which clattered uselessly to the ground nearby.

To my horror, the next thing I knew, Caleb had grown to an enormous size, and his sword had grown with him. He took a flying leap in our direction. Gunnar and Laurel opened fire, to no apparent effect. Caleb chuckled then smashed his fist onto the ground, which rippled strangely and then turned into...ye gods, quicksand!!?? in a large circular radius around him. I was already airborne, but I watched in horror as Laurel and Gunnar slipped into the muck.

I pulled out my M-16 and let loose a full auto burst into Caleb, but he either deflected or absorbed harmlessly every last round I fired. I looked over and noted that Jack and Nate had cornered the Japanese being but that Jack was struggling hard to keep it immobilized. I felt badly for Gunnar and Laurel, but I was going to be useless to anyone without Gae Bolga, so I flew over to where it had fallen and intended to lend a hand bringing down the Japanese entity. I swooped down, retrieved the mighty spear and lunged at the creature. It dodged my attack only to place its head inadvertently in the direct path of the barrel of Nate's birthright firearm.

"Dodge this.", Nate said, and let loose a ferocious volley that brought the creature down. Caleb summoned the last of the lesser Fomorians to him, then sliced off his minion's own head, to our great surprise. He summoned forth two spirits of African American children, twins apparently, one of which we later confirmed was Odette. He made horrific, disrespectful demands upon these holy creatures then broke the neck of Odette and vanished into the night air.

Quicksand is largely water, so I figured that diving into it with Gae Bolga, which confers water-breathing ability, would be like diving into a fierce dust storm.

It was worse than that.

But, using the blunt end of Gae Bolga to fish around in the muck, I manged to put it into Gunnar's one free hand almost immediately. In Gunnar's other hand was Laurel. They weighed a ton and it was a heavy burden, but I dragged them dripping and muddy and wet to the surface and carried them a safe distance to terra firma.

I looked Laurel in the eyes (well, looked her in the eyes after she wiped the muck out of them) and said simply, though with a sudden well of emotion I hadn't expected of myself..."we're even."

Even covered in muck she was strikingly beautiful...ever seen lady mud wrestling? you get the picture.

I cursed and resolved there was nothing for it but to at least go commit several mortal sins of self-abuse back in my bunk the nature of which would turn the faces of the good sisters back at Saint Mary's redder than baboons arses.

I realised only later that I think I had said this aloud. Ah well.

Live and Let Die, Redux, Part 4

We put Odette's body into the trunk of Nate's SUV, still covered by my GARDA jacket.
It was a very somber drive back to Brigette's funeral procession; nobody said much. Nate told us a little of how it had gone down before we arrived on scene.

Nate had been idly watching television on the couch, while Odette was sleeping on a sofa opposite him. Suddenly and without warning, a gigantic creature, the aforementioned Fomorian, smashed in the side of Odette's house, grabbed her body and ripped off her head, tossed it in a sack, which Nate explained was seized and taken away by a strange creature of evidently Japanese origin. A "Jinkiniki" or something like that. I'll have to have Nate write it down for me later. Anyway, it made off with Odette's head; Nate gave chase but it got away, unfortunately. Nate had next had to fight the big, ugly Fomorian mano a mano for several rounds before we showed up to assist.

We left Odette's body in the van, knowing full well we would have to reveal it to Baron Samedi before the night was over.

It was now time to open the crypt where Brigitte's mortal coil would find its final resting place. The massive stone slab was moved aside and quite unexpectedly a huge swarming mass of black flies erupted volcanically and loudly from the crypt, and just as suddenly dissipated as the individual flies took off in all directions into the thick, humid night air.

Gunnar-as-Baron turned to us with a look of surprise on his face and said "Dis not good...dis not good at all...."

Moments later there was a commotion inside the church, and people of all races ran out clenching their stomachs, holding hands over their mouths, and one guest, clearly an Irishman, puked into the bushes beside the steps leading up to the church sanctuary. That set off a chain reaction of vomiting from seemingly every normal mortal in sight. I suspected an overdose of Guinness on the part of my fellow countryman, but that wouldn't account for everyone else. I then felt self-conscious about my own concoction, but I remember Jack had sampled it and gave me a thumbs up and said "...better than I expected, Irish..."

When we went inside the church, we noted that all of the food laid out had suddenly gone rancid, as if it had been left out to spoil for weeks on end.

Gunnar-as-Baron joined us and first muttered "ok, ok...", as if conversing internally with himself.

Gunnar-as-Baron surveyed the scene and said "dis has been by de Magick, no doubt...is what your friend the Gunnar say..."

We brought Gunnar-as-Baron back to the van, and I lifted my GARDA jacket to reveal Odette's headless corpse. Nate and Laurel explained what had happened and Gunnar-as-Baron just shook his head slowly..."Dis a bad sign. No good come of dis."

Brigette was laid to rest by Father O'Connell, an Irish-American priest who had kept his wits about him throughout this ordeal, and by members of Brigitte's community who had not been in the church but had stayed behind. It was an awkward ending to the funeral, but the job was done. I explained to Father O'Connell about the tragic death of Odette that same evening and he re-assured me he would do everything he could to see that she, too, was laid to rest respectfully in accordance with her wishes. He also re-assured me that he would explain to the Irish community that this calamity was of unnatural origin and that I was not to blame.

We returned to our hotel rooms with feelings of restlessness and unease. Gunnar, Laurel and I agreed that we wanted to have a closer look at the creature tracks Jack had discovered on his way into New Orleans. The next day we headed out, backtracking Jack's original route. We discovered them, but for me personally, I was none the wiser seeing it in person than I was looking at the image sent to me on my phone by Jack. But luckily we did have a very crafty Raven with us this time. Gunnar also came to the realization that this was a bipedal creature.

"Not only that," said Nevermore. "I think I can track it down and find it, if you want."

It was certainly an intriguing notion, but before we could discuss it, a radio broadcast cut in announcing that some kind of violent riots were erupting in Jackson Park, in the middle of New Orleans. Laurel pulled up local television footage on her smart phone and we saw three giant Fomorians and another, smaller figure, doing much violence to mortals very near Jackson Park.

Laurel grabbed Gunnar by the arm and said firmly "You need to drive like James Bond"
We piled into the car and sped off like a shot, racing as fast as Gunnar could push the engine without blowing it.

We received a text message from Jack informing us he was already on the scene and for us to get there as soon as possible.

Live and Let Die, Redux, Part 3.

Entire feckin' corner of Odette's hovel of a home had been ripped asunder, and the rest of it was rapidly catching fire, smoke pouring out of every corner...

Jack rushed around one side, with Camilla on his heels, and to my astonishment, Laurel ran straight into the burning building. I took flight and headed around on the opposite side.

I could hear quite a commotion going on at the rear of the house. Then I saw it...one big, very ugly Fomorian, crashing about in what was left of Odette's back yard.

It all happened so fast, so I can't remember precisely, but I think Laurel managed to rescue Odette's pet bird and some how pass it to Nate, who lept with it onto the back fence, then set it down on the other side of the fence to resume his battle with the Fomorian. Jack, too, I could see, was pounding away at the bastard.

Laurel emerged from the burning building, much of her clothing burned away, but physically unscathed, a shining beacon of beauty I shall remember to my final days.

She commanded the Fomorian's attention and he stood transfixed. This gave Nate and Jack and Camilla the edge they needed to bring down the Fomorian. I felt a twinge of disappointment that Gae Bolga did not get to taste Fomorian flesh this time. I began to draw up closer until I saw a gaseous cloud erupt from where the Fomorian had stood...it looked fairly poisonous so I held back my advance to wait for it to clear and dissipate. When it did, I noticed, sadly, that Odette's bird had fallen silent...Laurel informed us later it had succumbed to the poison. Nate and Jack had been hardy enough to resist the effects, but the poor bird, alas, was not so lucky.

Laurel re-entered the burning house and retrieved the headless corpse of Odette and laid it upon the ground a safe distance away. I removed my GARDA duty jacket and placed it respectfully over the body of our late friend and gracious hostess. Now there would be two funerals to attend, alas.

On Camilla

Brendan's thoughts as the van speeds back to Odette's neighborhood were something like this:

I forgot to note in my last report that Camilla was also in the parade, bringing up the rear of the procession; in fact, she beat us all back to the van and was already in the back seat quietly loading that huge sniper rifle of ours when we came running up.

She's very stealthy and moves like a cat. She's quite beautiful but I haven't flirted with her for two reasons. One, when I first met her, she was wearing a Catholic schoolgirl uniform complete with short tartan skirt. She looks younger than her chronological age, and that image of her is still burned into my mind and weirds me out on so many levels. Two, the way Jack looks at her, and the way she doesn't seem to mind...I just went through an emotional wringer like that and still bear the scars on the inside. Not eager to subject myself to that again so soon.

Yeah, I still have feelings for...her (glance)

But nothing's going to come if it, so...

Holy gobshite that is one big fire...

"...hunka hunka burning luv..."

Bad pun, sorry.

Live and Let Die, Redux; Part 2.

Jack briefed us on what he and Camilla had been up to since arriving in New Orleans. Evidently a good bit of larceny. Aisling was sorely disappointed to have missed out on that, the little heathen.

There was still much preparation to be done. Odette, a sweet kindly old black woman, not long for this world herself, in all likelihood, Laurel whispered to us quietly, was Brigitte's grandmother and caretaker. She gathered us into her small, quaint living room in a poor but vibrant neighborhood not far from downtown New Orleans and its famous French Quarter. Jack had let us know to bring the best rum we could find, which admittedly wasn't hard in Las Vegas.

I insisted on bringing along a contribution of Jameson's Irish Whiskey, the rarest and best I could lay my hands on legally in the USA.

Since the Loa are a weird mix of Creole animist religion overlaid with French colonial Catholicism, it wasn't wholly alien to my Irish sensibilities, with our mix of Celtic and Catholic tradition, plus the past couple of years living in Lyon, France.

Odette began the ceremony chanting in Creole...the parts that were in French, I grasped easily enough, but there were plenty of unfamiliar Haitian words thrown in, and a curious mish-mash of New Orleans English for good measure. I had heard of the local Yat dialect in English sounding not unlike a Brooklyn accent, but I didn't quite believe it until I heard it with my own ears.

Gunnar had bravely volunteered to be the "horse", which he misheard as "host", but no, "Horse" was the correct term for this aspect of Loa ceremony.

The whole room seemed to shift this way, and that, and Gunnar's expression and voice changed completely and utterly...imagine Jim Carey in the Hollywood Comedy Film "The Mask", only slightly less cartoonish.

"Dis body a VERY NICE!!! FEELS very good" said Gunnar, who tilted his head back dramatically and let out a deep laugh...

"Hello, Baron." said Laurel respectfully.

"Bienvennue, Monsieur Baron Samedi..." I said in my best French, with a respectful bow.

Laurel approached the Baron and related the sad tale of how Bridgitte met her end in this life. Nate motioned to me wordlessly and we both left the room quietly to wheel in the refrigerated container holding Brigitte's body, as the Baron had already asked to see her. Flanking the container, Nate and I rolled it into the living room like a pair of honor guards.

Gunnar's face...that is to say, the good Baron's lit up with a mixture of sadness and joy and I saw Gunnar embrace the air in front of him...Nothing I could detect with my five senses, but my intuition told me the Baron had finally seen Brigitte's (to me invisible) spiritual form. They chatted amicably in Creole French, which I could mostly follow...and it seemed mainly like to old friends reuniting after not seeing one another for an extended time...but of course, I only heard the Baron's side of the conversation...and it was interesting to watch Gunnar speaking such good French, a language he did not himself know.

Gunnar, er, the Baron, then turned back to us and explained all that would need to be accomplished for the funeral arrangements to be ceremonially proper for Loa tradition and practice. We needed to gather as many participants as possible. We also had to prepare a meal for a mind-boggling number of people.

I volunteered to hit all the Irish bars in the French Quarter, any Irish musicians I could find, and any Irish priests I could find who would cooperate with participating in this funeral service that would be not unlike a damn fine Irish wake, I promised. It was a hard sell, but I finally bribed, cajoled, and browbeat enough fine native Mhics and proud Irish-Americans into agreeing to show up to give young Brigitte a proper send-off.

As I was coming back to Odette's house in between forays into New Orleans night life, a hand reached out as I passed by the kitchen door, grabbed me by my club jacket and yanked me inside.

"Yo, Irish." said Jack, brusquely. "I need your help making a culinary contribution to this mess."

I did a double take and then looked Jack squarely in the face and said "You do realise the phrase culinary excellence and the word Ireland are seldom found in the same book, never mind the same page, paragraph, or sentence, right?"

"I don't give a rat's ass." said Jack. "Whip something up with potatoes and cabbage if you like. Get crazy and throw in a little Guinness for flavor instead of drinking it all."

I had actually worked in Irish pubs during my London years, but I had no talent for pub grub, just pouring a damn fine draught of Guinness. Still, I tried to think of it like a musical composition...Jack's suggestion had been a good one...and I finally whipped up some sort of fried potato concoction with, yes, Guinness added for flavoring. And a bit of Jaegermeister, and, since this was New Orleans, naturally some Cayenne pepper, to, as they say, "kick it up a notch".

I'll not be trying out for Iron Chef anytime soon, but what I devised wasn't half bad, either.

The days passed quickly and in no time at all the day of the funeral arrived. The air seemed electric with excitement and tension...once again Gunnar volunteered to be the "horse" for Baron Samedi, and this time he would be leading the procession.

Nate agreed to hang back and keep an eye on Odette and her house. Said we should have fun. I speculated he was still in a funk over Alli. I think that bothered him more than losing his job.

I grabbed my Irish fiddle, Laurel her instrument, and we headed out to join the parade of Brigitte's casket, which we would accompany to the gravesite in proper New Orleans funeral style...with a Celtic component of sympathetic Irish and Irish-Americans who'd come out in a visible show of support, transcending racial barriers and remembering a time when the Irish in America weren't thought of as white either.

We were on the verge of becoming truly immersed in the reverie when we received an urgent photo and text from Nate. The front quarter of Odette's house appeared to be...a smashed, gaping hole...I thought I could see Odette's body slumped over near the edge of the image...lying in a growing pool of what had to be blood...the image was distorted from motion but was still horrifying. I shoved the image in Laurel's face and she went white as a sheet. Gunnar was still leading the procession, his consciousness buried far, far away at the moment, unable to intervene. Laurel and I ducked out of the front ranks of the funeral marching band and bolted for Nate's parked SUV. Jack had seen Nate's text, too, and had already gunned the engine by the time we got there. Tires squealed as Jack backed up and whipped the SUV around and the smoke from the tires rose slowly over the parking lot as we sped off into the night away from the parade.

I transformed Gae Bolga into its full form and laid it across the back seat, ready for immediate action.

As we entered Odette's neighborhood there was an eerie glow and we could hear fire engine sirens some distance away. Whatever this was, we were now closer than the NOLA fire department. Our guts tightened and our hearts sank a little as we turned on to Odette's street to see her house had been transformed into a blazing conflagration that lit up the street almost as if it were daylight out.

When you were young
And your heart was an open book

You used to say, "Live and let live"
(You know you did, you know you did, you know you did)
But if this ever-changing world in which we live in
Makes you give in and cry

Say live and let die
Live and let die
Live and let die
Live and let die

What does it matter to ya,
when you've got a job to do,
you gotta do it well
You gotta give the other fellow Hell...

Live and Let Die, Redux. Part 1.

About the time Gunnar and I finished up our preliminary investigation of the UCLA incident and started to head back to Berkeley, Jack and Camilla, as agreed, borrowed Laurel's Impala and headed to NOLA to do the necessary ground work in advance, contacting Brigitte's last known living relative, and buying supplies in anticipation of Brigitte's impending wake/funeral. I would be riding along with Gunnar, Laurel, and Nate as we drove Brigitte's earthly remains cross country in a refrigerated container, bound for New Orleans.

But first there was the matter of young Gair's adoption paperwork to finish back in Berkeley, something I wanted personally to see completed before we headed out. I knew in the back of my mind that Laurel might also find herself bound by a geas that would be bestowed on her by Manannán mac Lir...I suspected it might be the obligation to see that no children come to harm in her presence...Manannán mac Lir would of course be essentially thereby ensuring the safety of his offspring despite Laurel's hailing from a competing pantheon. Laurel is such a kind and caring soul, I can't see her not agreeing to be bound by such a geas, as she is living the essence of it already since we knocked over the compound of The Order.

Not long after our arrival back at Laurel's place in Berkley, we all received a burst of photo and video texts from Jack and Camilla somewhere outside Shreveport, Louisiana, from the scene of what at first seemed like an ordinary hum drum road accident, but then the still image of a rather large...footprint? of something...caught my interest, definitely, but neither Gunnar nor I could make heads or tails of it. Maybe we'd have time to look at it face to face...it was clear that the natural light of the scene was fading...it must have been at dusk...and the image resolution wasn't the best. Camilla and Jack seemed to be in a hurry.

The last text we got from Jack was terse and to the point.

"Prbly Gonna fight, BRB"

It wasn't until several hours later that Jack notified us they were inside NOLA city limits. They had a hotel and would be making contact with Odette the next morning.
When asked about the "fight", Jack said "Can't talk about it over the phone. Pass me to Gunnar."

I handed the wireless landline to Gunnar.

"Gunnar here, what's up, Jack?"

"Hey, dude. No need to tell Laurel or anything, but her Impala's gonna be in the shop for a little while. No biggie. Just some road spikes. Keep it on the D.L., k?"

My eyebrows shot up (I could hear Jack's voice from the receiver), but Gunnar's face remained impassive.

"It's cool, bro. We'll see you in a few days."

After the adoption papers were signed, we let young Brendan Gair know we had to honor our promise to Brigitte, and that meant an unavoidable road trip to New Orleans. I told him he was doing well in Berkeley's local schools and to keep up the good work.

Being from Ireland, it still staggers my mind at times just how big the United States is, just how long it takes to traverse the country. I don't think I'll ever gripe again about a trip from Dublin to Galway ever again.

I did my fair share of the driving. During the times when I was not driving, I'd let Aisling out of her flask to move about freely in the interior of Nate's police SUV, as long as she promised not to distract the driver. We chatted amicably. She would usually start in Irish, but I would encourage her to speak English so everyone else could understand. I let Aisling sit on my shoulder a lot, sometimes she would nap there.

We first had to return to Las Vegas; Nate's extended loss of time in Death Valley's corner of Terra Incognita had basically cost him his job. He had to turn in his badge, his service pistol, and this police SUV. We'd be picking up Nate's civilian SUV at his residence in the Las Vegas suburbs. He also said he had some business of a personal nature to attend to. Laurel told me it was something to do with his on-again, off again girlfriend who held a civilian job within the police agency where Nate (used to) work. Nate's unexplained absences, his secrets, etc, had all taken their toll on the relationship, I gathered. I certainly didn't want to pry. And I really didn't know what to say. I'd suggested a career change, maybe the FBI or U.S. Marshall's service, and I had noticed Nate had downloaded some of the application paperwork for these agencies and had partly filled them out, but his heart just didn't seem in it.

Nate dropped us off at his place, and Laurel agreed to drive his civilian SUV behind Nate, then give him a ride back after he'd formally resigned as a local law enforcement officer. I glanced at some photos Nate had around his place with a pretty girl I took to be Alli, Nate's significant other.

Nate and Laurel came back about an hour later.

"Easier than I thought it'd be." said Nate, heading into his bedroom. He emerged with a different Stetson hat, more stylish and notably, with no badge of any kind upon it. If anything, Nate looked even more like a rugged Cowboy than he had wearing his deputy's uniform. "Let's roll." he said simply.

Gunnar and I hitched the refrigerated trailer to Nate's civilian SUV. We piled in and Nate gunned the engine and got us back on the road, bound for New Orleans.

A phone call, a road trip.

The jazzy riffs of "moi mon ame et ma conscience" began to play as my phone vibrated. Gunnar looked up quizzically, listening to the French lyrics.

I coughed and made a sign with my hands that meant "excuse me" and stepped into a hallway of Laurel's home to take the call.

I punched the accept call button, then put the phone to my ear and mouth, double checked my watch, mentally added 9 hours, and started talking...

"Bonsoir, Jacques, Comment allez-vous?"

"Très bien, et merci, Brendan. Est-ce que vous pouvez m'aider?"

"Certainment, Jacques. Qu'est-ce que c'est?"

Jacques Lyotard. Decorated member of the French Gendarmerie nationale, currently my commanding officer at INTERPOL, back in Lyon, France. And as rumor had it, former member of the Légion étrangère. It was evening over there, and after hours. Jacques was interrupting his night out, so I knew this had to be serious.

Jacques was always cagey when I asked him about his years in the Légion étrangère but he would just smile and say he knew good Irish soldiers of fortune who had served well in the Légion étrangère, and that it was a pity I hadn't been one of them. I suspected this was because he probably also collected, or still collects, a paycheck from Direction Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure. But not the sort of thing one discusses in polite conversation with a French gentleman over a glass of wine, or on the job.

It leads to unwelcome questions as to why I'm "...still listed as an inactive reserve 'Leftenant' for the Irish Ranger Wing..." when officially I was discharged as a sergeant. "Zhey Deux?" asked Jacques, whereupon I gave up asking about his time in the French Foreign Legion and just drank a hearty toast to them instead.

Jacques switched to English after the initial pleasantries were done.

"Look, Brendan, I need you to head down to UCLA to check something out for me. You will meet up there with an FBI Special Agent who will give you all the details, which, I'm afraid, I can't discuss over the phone for reasons of international security, as I'm sure you can appreciate.", stated Jacques in perfect English with only a slight remnant of his Gallic accent left behind.

"Sure thing, Jacques, yes. I completely understand, I'll be on my way first thing in the morning."

"Tres bien, mon amie. Bon voyage et bonne chance! Good night old friend."

"Good night, Jacques."

I walked back into the main living area and addressed Gunnar.

"So, Gunnar, seeing as you're now more familiar with LA than I am, would you be up for a short road trip down to UCLA? I've been tasked with following up on an investigation ongoing at UCLA."

Gunnar got up and said "Sure, man. When do we leave?"

I shrugged and said "I told Jacques we'd head down there in the morning, but I figure if we leave not long after midnight tonight, we'll have the whole day to use at UCLA. I'd rather not waste any time on the road that we could be using to investigate instead."

"Cool." said Gunnar.

Gunnar told Laurel he was going to drive with me down to UCLA for a bit but we'd be back with plenty of time to get ready for the trip to NOLA. Laurel looked a bit surprised and I just shrugged and said "Duty calls..."

Laurel shrugged back and said "go get 'er done, I guess."

No matter how many times I drive it, no matter what time of day, it still boggles my mind how big the Western US is, hell, how big California is all on its own...

I had a hunch this was going to have something to do with UCLA's Computer Science Department. Having a background in CS was a big boost that put me on Ireland's short list for INTERPOL, and also INTERPOL's own short list of candidates from all the EU countries. I've done good work for them in cracking down on cybercrimes in the past several years.

I noticed the campus police milling around the UCLA Computer Science Building; going inside and down a few flights of steps, it wasn't long before I saw what I expected, namely police crime scene tape. I looked past the uniformed officers, past the plainclothes detectives in their cheap tan suits, most in blazers and khakis until my eyes landed on the tallish man in the dark Armani suit.

I approached him and held my INTERPOL badge at his eye level and announced "Inspector Brendan O'Shea of INTERPOL, at your service."

The man studied my credentials carefully with his eyes before extending his hand and replying "Special Agent [redacted], FBI."

His eyes drifted over to Gunnar and he asked "Who's this?"

"He's one of my assets, he's clean. Please proceed, Agent [redacted]"

The FBI man held up a strand of yellow crime scene tape barring a doorway and motioned for me to enter beneath it. I ducked my head and entered, followed closely by Gunnar, then by the FBI Special agent.

Special Agent[redacted] said calmly but with gravitas, "What I am about to say does not leave this room, gentlemen. Inspector O'Shea, you do realize if there are any leaks and this goes south, your ass will be on the line."

"I understand that perfectly well, Agent [redacted], please continue."

"Last night, we estimate 15-25 minutes after Midnight this lab was broken into; all the data on the servers in this room were copied then wiped in record time. There was no sign of forced entry, but also no images caught on security camera, no trace fibers left behind, nothing. Might as well have been ghosts.

What was stolen was all of the data comprising the software for the supercomputer known as Watson, which if you have been following the news lately, recently made a big splash beating some of the best human Jeopardy players on earth. As you can surmise, it has the ability to sort through a massive amount of data in a very short amount of time when given specific, particular queries. It's among some of the best AI out there right now, and now it's missing.

Now this theft in and of itself, while serious enough, isn't why I was asked to bring you in on this, Inspector O'Shea."

"I gathered as much.", I replied. As Special Agent [redacted] had described it up until this point, it was pretty much a purely FBI case that would be of mainly academic interest to me.

"This is the part that is above top secret, Inspector O'Shea. I've been reassured by the CIA that you are an asset that can be trusted with this information. We need to bring in INTERPOL because of the international implications of what I'm about to tell you. We are concerned there may be a connection to the crime here on campus and an incident that happened last week.

Gentlemen, last week the Pentagon was the target of a massive cyber-attack that resulted in extremely sensitive data being copied in a massive way...so much was taken that we had hoped we could buy some time while the perps sifted through the oceans of data they had collected, that we could nail them before they can make any use of it."

"But the loss of Watson changes the game, doesn't it?", I asked

"Beat me to the punch, Inspector. Yes; with Watson, assuming these cases are related, our perps would now have a powerful AI to query the Pentagon's massive data dump and locate key information faster than any human searcher could ever hope. Watson is like a sword, able to cut the Gordian Knot of all that data. You know what I'm talking about here....Launch codes, gentlemen; the whole US nuclear arsenal now at the beck and call of forces unknown and unseen."

"Were there any prior credible threats made? Any claims of responsibility yet?"

"That's just it; nothing of the kind, neither before nor after, at least not yet. Of course, it's just a working assumption, a hypothesis really, at this stage that the cases are related at all. It's too serious a matter to assume they aren't; we have to assume they are related at this stage until it can be definitely proven they aren't."

"I agree.", I said simply.

"If you'd like to take a closer look at the room, I can arrange that."

"yes, please."

We proceeded into the main server room. I asked Gunnar if he'd gotten all that and he made a thumbs up sign. We had to now determine if this was purely a human matter, or if there were Titanspawn or Scions involved as well.

Alas, between the two of us, Gunnar and I found disturbing clues that this was no work of mere mortals. Crap. More divine meddling, just great.

I compiled a careful report for Jacques, sticking to the facts and pointing out some new discoveries we had made, but omitting the details of divine origin.

In the sea of data underneath the server, that the FBI had missed, I found a trojan horse program with a large segment of data simply repeating "I, I, I, I" over and over and over again. "I am who am?", maybe? YHWY? What the hell? Definitely something to file away for now and pull out later to examine again in the light of newer evidence...