The silence that emerged from the unseen audience was palpable. The atmosphere among what Coraline assumed to be representatives from the psychephages was guarded, hostile, and somehow frightened in spite of their numbers. Eyes blinked coldly, forms shifted and edged backwards.
Finally the first stepped forward, loping purposely over the concrete floor. It was a horla, a despair-eater, with a long lupine face set with hollow blackness in place of eyes and sparse black fur stretched over a tall and skeletal frame. Around its throat hung a torc of dark and twisted wood, attached to which was a small dark mirror which Coraline carefully averted her gaze from.
"Rot her proposition," said the horla in a voice as cold and empty as the wind over a grave. "And rot her. Send her from here."
"Hospitality, honoured kin. And prudence. What she wishes to offer us could shatter the Old Terror. I say the company hears her out." The Ambassador's smile at that moment; courteous, patient, at ease amongst the sea of fear and aggression on all sides, was as diplomatic as anything Coraline had seen from her at close hand. But it wasn't enough for some.
"I say she dies," growled a new figure. This one was an anger-eater, a wendigo, with mad pale eyes stark against an ochre-red skull-face, the muscles in its sinewy body tensed as it slowly prowled forward, raising barks of agreement from others and drawing the attention of Coraline and the Ambassador. "I say we slay the enemy that has offered itself to us like a fool."
"I say peace, for the meanwhile," said the Ambassador, soft menace in her voice as she set herself between Coraline and the wendigo. "This is my called court, and my domain. We will hear her out."
"Shall we?" hissed the wendigo. "Domains have been fought over, for matters far less serious than this. The Stormcrow will…"
"…Be heard," came a new and deeper voice from the back of the mass of psychephages, hushing the quell of support for the wendigo that had sprung up and silencing the creature mid-sentence. "Let us hear what she has planned for Tantibus."
The hubbub hushed, but though the wendigo had been surprised by the sudden intervention, it remained where it was, facing down the Ambassador. Pale eyes met button eyes, and the Ambassador slowly dropped her claw-hands to her sides, where they hung ready and open.
"My domain," she said softly. "My ruling. I would not advise pressing this."
The wendigo hissed in response.
Nothing happened for several moments, in whatever silent battle of wills was taking place, and Coraline, despite the possible risk to her life that lay in it, found herself distracted from the contest by the mass of psychephages around her.
They were, in all fairness, very easy to get distracted by. Dozens, if not hundreds, of different creatures and forms were taking shape, with at least one representative from every species Coraline had encountered and some from a few she hadn't.
There, directly in front of her, was a todal; an eater of caution, a creature seemingly made from rough wooden sticks arranged into a skeletal shape, with two clock faces ticking in place of eyes above a thin slit of mouth (containing, as a scar on Coraline's left shoulder blade could attest, rows of razor-bladed teeth.) The todal was in turned perched beside the hulking mechanical form of a defiance-eater; a myrmidon, plated over with thick bronze metal, steam hissing from its articulated limbs, with emptiness watching Coraline from within the eye holes of a Corinthian helmet.
Beside them was a very humanoid and disarmingly attractive ragamoll, a lust-eater, garbed in a tight silvery-white dress suit, black ringlets framing an appealing, androgynous face. What inhuman features it possessed; its cat-slitted eyes and faintly shimmering skin, wouldn't be evident until its victim was at close quarters, at which point the unfortunate soul would usually be past the point of being able to act on them. It watched Coraline with dark eyes, glinting past the tilted brim of a white fedora. Behind it rose the utterly contrasting figure of a disgust-eating nuckelavee. It was centauroid and horrific. A man's torso rose from a horse's back, both skinless and bloody, pus-slicked veins pulsing through its flesh, with both human and horse heads staring at Coraline balefully with single huge eyes. Its deformed claws seemed to elongate and sharpen with anticipation as it turned to watch the contest.
Around it, and continuing on, countless more. The glowing wisp-image of a hotchi, a hope-eater. Seelie and unseelie, love- and hate-eaters, aloft on gossamer wings to gain a vantage point over the scene. A pride-eating marid, smoke veiling and uncurling around a body that wasn't quite human, next to a greed-eating djinn, its coin-eyes gleaming with cold calculation.
Coraline's gaze swept around, and caught that of the creature that rose from the room's back, a colossal rising serpent, covered by bands of black and red and gold feathers. It noticed her look, and returned it evenly with eyes like miniature suns.
Stormcrow, came a voice that rung in her mind suddenly; the same voice, she realised, that had spoken in favour of hearing her earlier. This gathering's outcome shall be twisted towards thine survival, if such is within mine power.
Why?, she thought back.
Because I too despise the Old Terror, that which called itself Tlaloc amongst my first hunts. Because I wish it to be destroyed. And because – Here the voice rose and deepened, - Because I am Kukulcan, honoured descendent of great Tohil, whom thou slew over the White Palace. For once this affair is over, thine blood is mine to claim, and none other's.
It was nice, thought Coraline, to find friends where you could get them. Even if they wanted to kill you.
The sudden sound of a scuffle and a swift organic noise, followed by a surprised grunt, quickly drew Coraline's attention back to the Ambassador and the wendigo, where she was too late to see the action but had a prime view of its outcome.
The wendigo had retreated several paces, leaving a flurry of gouged claw-marks in the floor, swaying slightly and raising one hand in a gesture of surrender as it wheezed faintly. A heavy black hilt protruded from its chest, with an pitch-stained knife-blade coming clean out the creature's back. The Ambassador stood at ease, watching the wendigo like a hawk, a matching knife held in her right hand. It was a kukri, a heavy knife with a curving white blade and chitin-black hilt and pommel. The Ambassador twirled it casually, still watching the wendigo, her smile expectant.
The wendigo acquiesced, reluctantly pulling the embedded kukri free with a hiss of pain and tossing it with a clatter to the floor by the Ambassador's feet. The Ambassador continued to watch the wendigo, and the creature, with yet more reluctance, slowly knelt, touching its head to the ground.
Satisfied, the Ambassador picked up the kukri with her free hand and vanished both knives with a deft twirl, plucking her teacup and saucer back out of the air in the same movement as well. She turned back to Coraline, taking a sip as she did so.
"Well," she started, "Now that that unpleasantness has been resolved, would you care to present your proposition to the Court, Stormcrow?"
"Mr Lovat, physics doesn't work that way."
It was what Wybie had expected from Vladimir Vasili, the old and experienced head of the Institute for Advanced Nuclear Research, from the moment the man had arrived in his office and had Wybie's idea explained to him.
He wasn't alone with Wybie. Another from the Institute was there as well, as well as Vasili's assistant and two scientific advisers from the Defence Department, both of whom were talking in quick and hushed tones to one another.
"Doesn't it?" said Wybie. "The underlying principles are sound enough."
"The underlying principles are just fine. It's where you've taken them and how you propose to put them into practise that makes the whole thing fall flat."
"It's basically … look, you know about nuclear fission?"
Vasili gave Wybie a look as flat as a plateau. "No, Mr Lovat. I'm only the twenty-years-and-serving head of the Institute for Advanced Nuclear Research. I've never heard of nuclear fission. That's complete news to me."
"When you split an atom's nucleus, you get fragments with smaller proton counts. You produce lighter elements in addition to no small amount of energy," said Wybie over a despairing mutter from Vasili. "What I propose is taking a given sample of an isotope of one of the synthetic elements from the fusion plants – phlebotinium, say – exciting it with neutron bombardment, and using that as the core in an explosive device."
"I'm not denying any part of that. And I'll even be so reckless as to say that a suitable isotope could be found. What will likely be beyond our capabilities, however, will be making every product element ferrous."
"Not necessarily," said the assistant quietly, almost shyly. They glanced at Vasili, but the old scientist, although surprised at the interjection, was fair-minded enough to let them have their say. "I mean, isn't there precedent in the Cleveland-Holly device, for oxygen production?"
"A fair point," allowed Vasili. "But I know the team behind that, and they were working with established theory and with non-synthetic, non-disputed elements. Nor did their process rely on a single supercritical mass."
"But there is precedent for directed production," said Wybie.
"Not, I fear, in a way that would prove itself applicable to us. Especially for the time scale I would imagine the First Gentleman would require it for..." Vasili looked at Wybie over the top of his glasses. "Am I right in assuming such a device would be needed for the Sur-real situation at hand?"
"A right assumption. I don't think our current ferro-weaponry can cut it. Something like this, however, could cut it and then some."
Vasili bit his lip. The two advisers and the other scientist looked thoughtful, with neither particularly optimistic or pessimistic expressions, but merely those that indicated brains working at full throttle beneath the surface.
"The problem will be time," said Vasili. "A study like this, with only the barest background to work upon, will require..."
"All the effort humanly possible," said Wybie. "Once the President has been informed of the hypothesis and possible production of the device, she'll see to it that every possible resource is thrust in your direction. Our direction. I'm at your disposal as well. I already jotted down some possible blueprints on this piece of paper – son of a something-or-other, it was here by my hand..."
The men and women in the Thaddeus Complex's office spoke at length and with meaning, scribbling ideas, bouncing past papers and studies at each other, debating and scrutinising, placing strategic phonecalls to their own departments and poring over the possibilities.
It was as thorough a way as any of answering Wybie's original question, which was "How could we make an iron nuclear bomb? Assuming that's possible?"
Coraline found her voice and spoke.
She tried not to exaggerate the issue, nor did she try to be too haughty, nor come hat in hand. She simply tried to talk about their common enemy. She spoke about an alliance, repeating what she had said to the Ambassador. She drew upon every trick for clear and precise speaking she'd had to learn as President.
Alien eyes watched her at every word. The whispers and hisses and barks that had indicated overall mood had gone, leaving a stark and judging silence. The cold in the room grew oppressive, stifling, but Coraline pressed on, praying each and every second that her plea wasn't falling on totally hostile and deaf ears.
She finished and let the silence broil with calculation.
For pity's sake, she thought, the psychephages had to see the point she was trying to make, didn't they? That uniting with her, pooling their resources, taking Tantibus down, was the most important consideration?
Or did the reputation of the Stormcrow, justified or not, run too deep? That, for the psychephages, the least costly solution for them would be to let old and new terrors clash and continue to live with whoever was left?
Either way, she was still mindful that she was alone amongst hundreds of creatures who feared or hated her guts. And she only had an inadequate steel sword. And she was blind on her right side. And that the case she'd presented to them partly relied on her eventual death in any event. And that the whole thing revolved around stopping an ancient and all-powerful world haunting terror-eater before it had accomplished … well, whatever the hell it was trying to do. Feed, in a massively unsubtle and brutal manner presumably.
She took a brief moment to ponder where exactly her life had taken that side-turn into Beyond Screwed Up before the Ambassador spoke.
"You have heard her," she started. "And you know I would not have brought you here had I not believed what she had to say was of value. But now … she is the Court's. Who would dispute her? Who would challenge her?"
The massed Court ranks shifted and murmured. The wendigo looked up, pale eyes bright.
"We have lived with the Old Terror for so long, that it harms us no more," it said. "I say we slay this new terror while it is present for the slaying."
"The Old Terror harms us, fool," came a low voice, and wendigo and Coraline turned to see a hulking kimatine by the room's side, looking at them both with lightning-eyes made thin and tremulous with age. "It took an entire pack of my kin a few days ago when it secured human weaponry for its human followers, and toyed with them, and delighted in breaking them past any returnable point."
+It harms us in greater ways,+ came another voice, that didn't so much as make use of sound waves as just bluntly insert itself in deafening tones right into the skulls of the assembled. Coraline, wincing, turned to see a phylax, a faith-eater.
The phylaxii in all their many forms had inspired or mimicked many gods and demons and angels for humanity. Coraline had no idea what this particular one could have possibly inspired, or have mimicked beyond a particularly potent drug-mare. Beryl-green wheels turned within other wheels, intersecting at entirely random angles and spinning unimpeded, with each wheel rimmed with lines of unblinking eyes and sprouting white feathered wings, with, by way of an afterthought, the entire creature being wreathed in fire.
+It twists our thoughts and will,+ the phylax continued, +It wrapped our very wills in chains, so that to court rebellion against it seems alien to our thoughts. It fetters our freedom with its very existence while it demands fear, holding the threat of slaughter to cow us, to make us submit to a lash for all of our existence until we become deluded into thinking that the lash is inevitable and right. So we were taught. So it harms us beyond wanton killing.+
"A lash greater than this one's Concord?" demanded the horla, its mirror gleaming as it rose its head to glance at Coraline.
+The Stormcrow's Concord is at the point of a gun. Tantibus's terror wraps chains around our very souls. Which is worse?+
And though there were shouts and sinuous whispers and cants in support of her death, Coraline heard, there were also voices in support of the phylax's words, giving new wings to her hope.
"That terror comes from power unassailable," said the clock-eyed todal, in a voice like wind through a dusk forest. "We may not fight Tantibus. That is the point of its power. But the Stormcrow, however … I see no reason why we should suffer her as well if she will die like any other human. I see no reason why she should not die now."
"Then make her die now," came Kukulcan's deeply amused tones. "Advance and do the deed."
The todal turned to Coraline, who instinctively raised her blade, wondering what the hell the coatl was doing...
The todal saw the Stormcrow, saw the steel, and all but tripped over backwards.
Coraline blinked, while Kukulcan laughed.
"Well?" it said. "Thou speakst of slaying her. 'Tis mine doubt that she'll acquiesce. Who shall step forward to try conclusions?"
Discontented, angry mutters sounded from the Court, none of which actually countered the coatl's word. The wendigo looked up, but saw the same sight as the todal, and whatever fury it possessed was not enough to compel it to face Coraline's sword. Coraline realised that her new allies were rallying around her, realising her argument and giving their voices to its support.
Hell's bells, did she actually now have a chance to come out of this meeting ahead, let alone alive? She held her heart in her mouth, and prayed to whatever that she did so.
And what was she to them that that last point had actually worked? Her mere reputation had struck with enough fear to rob away the desire for a confrontation.
Much like Tantibus was doing to them.
She couldn't afford to have that thought. Not here, not now. Probably not later either, if she could manage it.
"Some of what our honoured kin says is true, though," said the Ambassador to Coraline. "We have never yet mustered the strength to meet Tantibus in open battle – and make no mistake, open battle amidst darkness and chaos is what it will come to. Even married to whatever strength humanity can muster, we cannot be sure of victory."
"And there is another problem."
"What if we win? Will you suffer to release us from the Concord? Then we cannot guarantee that humanity will not be fed upon. And if you do not, we will still be held in shackles, still forced to accept what rations of synthesised soul-matter you grant us for our existence."
"But you'll be free from Tantibus, and whatever it can do to you. You'll be free from its terror," said Coraline.
"To be replaced with your own, which will last even after you are gone and which will place no smaller shackles upon us. Your Concord demands that we live under humanity's sufferance, to be made subject and dependent or else dead by the bane." The Ambassador's gaze sharpened. "Why should we ally with you? Why are you to be held preferable?"
"Then … what do you want?"
"A better state of existence than that which we currently possess." The Ambassador sipped at her cup. "You need merely decide how you may grant it, and whether you wish to."
Coraline ground her teeth together. She had been within grabbing distance of gaining allies among the Court, she had been sure, and then the Ambassador, whom she had taken to be on her side in this, had blind-sided her with this.
It had been wrong to think so, of course, she reluctantly acknowledged. The Ambassador wasn't on her side. The Ambassador was on the side of the psychephages, and whether she shared her goals with Coraline was entirely in the air.
"This is something I need to think about," said Coraline at length. "I can't make this decision now. I'll meet with my advisers and agents, check what they know. I'll find out what we can use to fight Tantibus. And then I will get back to you."
"Decide soon," said the Ambassador. "Decide well."
The Court hissed, shifted, began to move or protest as they sensed that the Stormcrow was walking away. The wendigo looked away in frustration, and Kukulcan hissed in satisfaction.
+One piece of advice for you, in good faith,+ came the suddenly subdued voice of the phylax for Coraline alone, just as she was about to leave through the door. +There is one thing that holds true for all of the kin, whatever form and nature we take.+
+We can move throughout the Sur-real, and we can settle in different locations from which to hunt, and we can co-habit with others. But for each of us, there will be a lair that we hold close to us. A lair of home, of spirit that we hold close to us and will defend at all costs.+
+And one of the kin like Tantibus, who warps minds so readily and easily, will, I imagine, find its mortal followers drawn close around its lair's entrance in your reality.+
+Where your servants find its followers in their greatest power, there it will be also.+
Coraline paused with her hand on the door's handle, and then twisted it open and left.
"Wybie, I've just … who's the company? Ah, hello, Doctor Vasili. And that's … Wybie, you've got that smile again. What happened? What are you planning?"
"Something brilliant," replied Wybie, lurching from full inspired-creation-mode, looking up from a sheet of terrifying equations and a table of gleaming metal parts. Behind him, people in lab coats bore other parts and other papers and containers of lead. "You'll love it. Really. But, ah, tell me about your day first."