“P.S. Nice move, but I have no kids.”
Woodward shook with rage, and he looked ready to kill the small villager who’d brought the note. Cromwell carefully retrieved the message and handed it to a technician. “Any clues and analysis, Sister—and move on it!”
The aide took the sheet with gloved hand and dashed off to the lab.
“And where are we supposed to meet this—this creature?” Karl Woodward thundered at the messenger.
“Please, sir! I’m just a villager. Not one of them! I even dunno what the thing says. I never learned to read, which is why he took me, I guess. If we don’t do what they tell us, our families—gone! You got to understand!”
Woodward seemed to soften for a second, but only for that brief flash. He had only the word of this little man that the messenger wasn’t really a certain captain himself, or the chief torturer. The Father of Lies was the greatest actor in all creation.
“I didn’t ask you to throw yourself on your knife,” the Doctor reminded him. “I asked where this meeting was to be held.”
“Just over that knob, in the crindin pasture,” the little man told him. “The exact spot I’d have to show you.”
“Near one of their tunnel entrances, I assume?”
“Oh, yes, sir. There’s about a dozen around here, and one inside the village barn. They don’t use this one much, though.”
“What is your name?” Woodward asked the little man.
“They call me Ziggee, sir,” he replied. “Kind of a play on a silly name.”
“All right, Ziggee, you can show us your neutrality by going over to Brother Cromwell there and, on the map he has of this area, drawing or pointing to just where all these entrances are. And if we ever find out that you left out just one, then you will be treated as an accomplice and dealt with. Understand?”
The little man nodded nervously. “Y-yes, sir.”
The Archangel up above studied a close-up of the area and reported, just to the Doctor, “Looks fairly flat, some dirt mounds and, sir, a lot of, well, crindin fertilizer if you know what I mean. No energy scan, but we’ll nail it the moment it opens. Depending on where he stops, call it twenty or thirty meters of fairly flat field.”
“Can you cover it all?”
“Yes, sir! We could shoot gnats from this altitude at an area that clear and defined!”
“Well, I don’t want you to shoot gnats, but you might be called on to shoot everybody who’s not us. Full stun from above at the first sign of problems. If you have to, shoot us, too. We’ll wake up. Just make sure nobody else can wake up sooner. Brother Cromwell will be with me as bodyguard, and in full armor. I assume we can leave him standing.”
“Sir, in that armor, he can take a heavy shot from us.”
“Oh—and one more thing,” Woodward added, as loud as he could.
“Sir?”
“If our native guide pulls anything at all, even tries to run or hide, smite him, level one, no permission required. You got that?”
The little man looked up from the map. “Hey! Wait a minute, Doc! What’s this smitin’ stuff?”
Cromwell towered over him and grinned. “Basically, my son, you will either share our fate or they will burn you to a crisp if I don’t do it first. Got that?”
“Y-yes, sir,” Ziggee responded miserably.
It took them less than an hour to prepare. Cromwell had his recharged suit ready for him, its crosses blazoned, and Woodward, while looking normal, used his large bulk to disguise some lightweight sophisticated body armor. It wouldn’t really handle a head shot, but it had come in handy elsewhere before. He also put on his black frock “preacher’s coat,” which had loose sleeves fitted with smart laser pistols. Once on, all he needed to do was mentally command them to deploy and he would be shooting with both hands.
And, just before Cromwell sealed his suit, the two of them went back into Woodward’s quarters and took a communion together, imploring God to be with them and the captives.
They were just emerging when a young male member of the Arm rushed in. He seemed nervous and a bit awed at the sight of both leaders so close up, but it didn’t stop him.
“Sir? Doctor Woodward?”
“Yes, boy?”
“John Robey, sir! They took my partner and almost got me, but I got in here just in the nick of time. I’ve been going crazy, sir, praying that I could be a part of the recovery.”
Karl Woodward smiled and put his big arm on the young man. “You will, lad, you will. But not in this business today. I simply have no role for you in this.”
“But, sir! We were assigned to this very village. We were the advance team for right here, and I’ve been living here, with and among these people, for weeks now. I know the land and who’s who. For example, I know that this little man’s no member of this village. I’ve never seen him before.”
Woodward’s busy eyebrows went up. “Indeed! Is that so? Hmm… What about this crindin pasture?”
“It’s fairly flat, that’s true, but if there’s any caves underneath they have to be pretty deep. Crindins alone can weigh over eight hundred kilos and when they’re done for the night they pretty well wander over that area. Most of this is soft limestone, but that area was picked as the pasture because it’s more like a granite extrusion or table. If he takes you there, they won’t be popping up out of the ground.”
Cromwell and Woodward exchanged glances. “Maybe we should take him, Karl,” the security chief said.
“Could be. Can’t hurt. All right, son. Not even Tom here can watch me, that weasel, and all our backs at the same time. Keep your pistol armed and in your robe sleeve pocket, and keep it aimed at our shifty little friend in there. Got that?”
“Yes sir! Thank you!”
“Don’t thank me, son, until it’s over,” Woodward cautioned him. “Usually, when you face down the devil, it hurts like hell even when you win.”
Cromwell looked at the old man and sighed. “I wish you weren’t going at all. I know how these kind of people think. Take out the head and they’ll be able to take over the body.”
“Our body was hung on a tree twenty-two hundred years ago and He screwed ’em up good by coming back,” the Doctor responded firmly. “If I don’t walk out there, where’s my demonstration of faith?”
“But only one person came back from the dead,” Cromwell noted. “And I don’t think there’s anything in the promises that an exception will be made for you or me.”
Karl Woodward smiled. “If I die, I’ll just find out the answers to all my questions and the counters to all my doubts and fears that much sooner. I’ve already lived seven times the length He did; half of me is regenerated or regrown, the other half should be. But I didn’t found this ministry. I came along when Doctor Chernyn was called to the Lord. And if God needs somebody else to carry on after me, He’ll provide him. No, Tom. You don’t run from the devil; that’s playing his game. If I never taught anybody anything else I sure should have emphasized that. You go out, face him nose to nose, and when he’s not looking you twist his balls.” He reached down, put on a floppy old hat, then searched around and found a cigar.