The Gates of Troy (Lopez Time Book 3) Read online

  Not that he did, really. Being famous had never really been a dream of his. That kind of thing could be left to others.

  After a while, Avery’s clock, a stopwatch made of plastic that had a string and sat on the table top, beeped at her.

  “Five-minute warning. Five minutes left for the break.” She called it out. The other people there actually started to get up, removing their trays of food, instead of leaving them there. He did the same thing, still healing. That and increasing the amount of power he had flowing into himself.

  It was only partially about the fight. After all, he’d felt the lack of having more resources, when pushed. If Adama had been more powerful, or trickier, Troy could have well died, running out of what he needed to keep himself going. The idea of becoming a withered husk wasn’t a fun one for him. It could happen, if he got unlucky enough.

  A sense of fear tried to crawl into his soul, realizing that part of things. He’d won the battle but it had been too close, really. If he’d only been working using physical tricks, he might not have made it. He also might have, he knew.

  That bit of things got pressed down, using mental focus but no magic, since he had other things to put into play, not having time for things like mental breakdowns at the moment. The idea of doing that, just sitting in a room, worrying, seemed slightly attractive, for about half a minute. Then he got up and passed out some hugs.

  It was strange but even the folks there he didn't know came up for that. No one even tried to pick his pocket at the same time. Several of them, two women and one man, did manage to feel up his behind as they did it. Scott and Terry gave him their names while they hugged him, so he tried to make a point of memorizing who they were.

  They were probably important, after all. Most people were.

  Finally, he got to hug Avery again. That part was still a bit odd to him. Not bad though. They really did have a lot in common, after all. They even knew a lot of the same people. The whole marriage thing felt a bit forced, like it had been arranged but then, it almost certainly had been. What Troy wasn’t totally up on was who’d done it.

  One of the greater demons. That or just possibly, Avery. That she might have a different idea about what being married was all about than he did was simply the truth. It was a bit freaky, given his long term dedication to being a player but he held her anyway and spoke gently.

  “You do know that you don’t need a reason to come visit, right? Me getting busy like this is… Well, less than great timing. As for now… I need to go and change. Then… Get to work, probably? I want to run some tests for the bridges, before we open them to the public at large. We have you folks here down for Saturday. Make sure everyone knows that they’re invited for that? Everyone, everyone, not just the actors and actresses. I can hold the bridge open for a while, to let everyone saunter through. It should be fun.”

  The only real issue he was having was that Troy didn’t know what day it was at the moment. That was a line walker thing but also part of his not sleeping at all. There were no clear divisions between night and day now. Not since he’d learned to make all the pain of the sun fade away like he had. Then, he could afford to invest in watches with that function, so he wasn’t going to whine about the lack of torturous burning on a daily basis.

  Avery kissed him. On the cheek but without being prompted to show affection.

  “We could get together tomorrow night? At about six or so? It’s Friday. We… maybe Barbara could come with us? I want her to feel included. Bente mentioned that I needed to do that. The other option would be beating her nearly to death and then humbling her for several years. That sounds like a lot more work than being nice. Besides, we’re friends. I don’t want to have to hurt her.”

  Troy took that in. Avery was a good person. She also didn’t seem to think that a fight between herself and Barb would go any other way than her easily winning. It was probably about correct, so he didn't mention it to her. Saying that to Barb might well start a fight. He kind of wondered if he needed to mention that to Avery. Then he just nodded and kept his thoughts to himself.

  They were both nearly immortal and not half as hot headed as they could have gotten away with. They were also adults and in charge of themselves. They’d work it out.

  “That sounds fun, actually. Let me get a call in for that? We could… Well, now that I can go to different worlds, not being a cop anymore, we could go someplace new?”

  That got her to smile.

  “We could go to Mars? There’s a restaurant there I’ve been meaning to visit. Samantha’s. It’s more of a café but they make pretty close to everything. Or we could go to Harmony and go to Marissa’s there? That’s on the Moon. In… Will Baker’s reality.” She stopped then, clearly thinking about something specific.

  Possibly how good looking that particular man was. If so, that didn’t get spoken of out loud.

  What she said was very different.

  “I need to go now. I have makeup first. We’re doing a fight scene next. I was practicing for it all morning. See you tomorrow? Um… Honey?”

  “Sure thing… Snookums. See you then.” He deadpanned the whole thing, which got a somber nod from Avery, as if that was what they were going to be calling each other from then on.

  After she walked off, Troy taking the time to notice that she had a very nice rear end, he moved back home. His clothing had really taken a hit in the last few weeks. Still, he was in an old shirt, a purple silk button up that he pulled from his closet in Washington, using a small bridge, and some black slacks. It wasn’t exactly a thousand-dollar suit but it would fit well enough at Zack’s bookstore. Then all he needed was a name tag and he’d be all set for retail work. On his feet, he had his old running shoes. That was because all of his nicer ones had kind of been trashed.

  Even the brand-new ones, that Avery had hand made for him.

  When he moved into the mall, a few thousand miles away, Troy kind of expected to have to discuss what he was planning for the day with Zack. That was a mistake of course. Since his old buddy was standing in the node room, looking right at him when he stepped through.

  “There you are! I have a list of locations set up. I’ll be bringing people into here, going to and from Lesser Shia. Your part is holding five bridges open, between here and the locations provided. All node locations for today, unless we get a call in for something different. I’ve been putting the word out about what we’re working on. The response is oddly positive. A lot of people would rather walk a hundred feet to their destination, rather than fly, for some reason. Then, we aren’t doing anal probes on everyone who dares to travel first, either. It makes a difference.”

  There was an actual list, held in Zack’s right hand, which was passed over. There weren’t five locations, naturally. There were five lists, with different spots on them. Different numbers of locations needed to be opened but the average was actually five. Over all it was twenty-two different places.

  “Can you get the first group ready? I’ll put in some phone calls. It should be about fifteen people in this first group for you.”

  The work wasn’t that hard. Not that he didn’t take ten minutes to get all of the bridges set up. It took about three minutes for everyone to come through then. They moved to the back, waved that way by Kaitlyn, who had come in from the bookstore, through the nicely carved owl door. It was really nice-looking relief carving. It had been polished, probably for years, with orange oil. The scent lingered, constantly filling the air. For him at least.

  The Alede line walker, Judy Swan’s granddaughter, moved over to him and gave him a close hug. There was some fondling in the move. Then, they were friends, or had been. An incredibly hot woman that loved sex had caught his attention way back when he’d been a regular human guy. Now it was a bit distracting. He grinned though and kept his focus on what he was doing. It was taking magic to make it happen but his drawing of that power from the world around him was stronger now, making that part take up less of a percentage of the who
le than it had before.

  He winked at her, keeping himself from getting an obvious erection. It wasn’t that easy. Kaitlyn was incredible, after all. She dressed down, wearing nerd glasses and jeans, so managed to look like a ten, instead of her natural twelve or so. On the one to ten scale.

  “Hey, sexy. You’re on transfers, too?”

  She nodded, an adorable thing that made him want to take her to one of the side rooms in the bookstore. They were used for covert get-togethers, most of the time.

  “Zack figures that we can have about fifteen times our normal traffic flow, so wants to work out what to do that way. We can…” There was a buzzing in the air, so she spun, just in time for a cloud of flies, each about the size of Troy’s hand, to appear.

  There were probably eighty of them or so. They didn’t really hover but flew in tight circles, holding the vague shape of a human. It morphed a lot and wasn’t perfect but he got the idea.

  Faking a smile, he stepped forward.

  “Hello! Did you come for the free trip to another world?” That this was one of the formerly trapped beings only made sense. That or his new bridge business was really going to be popular with all and sundry.

  ~Yes. This is the space and time for such? I can wait, if these others need to travel first. ~

  Everyone in the room understood the thought that was broadcasted. It wasn’t even telepathy, being something very different than that.

  The hard part, Troy knew, wouldn’t be in finding a place for the being but that it was in so many parts. Taking more than one or two beings through the void at a time was tough after all. Doing eighty… Well, it nearly killed him.

  Chapter twelve

  Zack was not at all sympathetic to the obvious distress of his best friend. In fact, when Troy came back, twenty minutes later, nearly drained to death, he just wrinkled his nose… and sighed. Like the greater demon was the one being much put upon.

  “Don’t be a wimp, Troy. We need the last half of the bridges up. Draw more energy and make sure you heal the damage from what you did while you work. This is basic stuff. Little children can do a better job than that.”

  The words were flip, on purpose. Not meant to be mean but there was no hint of concern for him in it, either. He’d figured that the fights he’d had would be the dangerous parts of the equation with the current god job. That was so far from true that he just sat on the floor, his back against the far wall. Part of him wanted to gasp for air but he didn't bother with it. After all, he was dead and didn’t need to breathe, regardless of how his body screamed for it at the moment.

  Really it had been all he could do in order to get back to the mall at all. The world that the fly being had gone to was filled with trash, as well as people that lived in it. A ruined world that had been used almost all the way up. In short, perfect for the being. A place where it would be considered a god again. Not that it had sounded all that concerned about that part. It mainly wanted food and some people to help out. Pets, more or less. It certainly wasn’t going to be making their lives worse at all.

  When he could, glaring a bit at Zack, he brought up the next set of bridges. Not bothering to stand up. Just sitting against the wall, on the floor. That’s where he was when the next problem walked in. This one was a metallic looking green man, covered with leaves. He had a really sweet set of horns on his head, Troy noticed, standing up. Those weren’t like a devil or anything, being large and elk like. There were pan-like feet, and the being had a bow and wasn’t bothering with pants that day. His dick was hanging out, and was about big enough to give porn starlets nightmares, even if not erect at the moment.

  “I am Hearn, god of the wild places!”

  Troy stood up, then staggered forward a bit. Actually, he managed to move smoothly enough, he just felt like he was going to fall down.

  “Troy Lopez. God of resting. You’d like a world that’s mainly forest and grasslands? Some people but not a lot of huge cities to mess things up for you?” That was a guess but the name made what the man would want kind of obvious. “Is there any particular kind of person that you’d prefer? Tall… Short? Even green might be worked out.”

  He wasn’t trying to get racial about it. Still, nice calm people could work for Hearn, or slightly more aggressive ones. Whichever.

  “Nay! Just a space that I may hunt and love in. This world has become crippled and banal. I watched it happening, unable to tell my children to give up their love of machines and to heed the call of mine horn.” That was indicated with a shrug. It was on his back, next to the bow there. Troy had thought it was an empty quiver until the large horn was shifted around a bit. It was from a giant animal of some kind. The end had a shiny stone piece on it, at the side you blew into.

  “Cool. We can do that, pretty easily. Let’s?” Even if it was hard, he had a job to do, so powered forward, pretending that he could do it.

  This time, even if the being was strong and large in the void, he wasn’t nearly a hundred separate parts. That was a lot easier to move around in the end. Troy was back a few minutes later, with a demanding Zack insisting that he do his real job too, even if that hadn’t really started yet. They were just practicing that day. A shake out cruise, more or less.

  The rest of the day was simpler then. The work he had to do took about two hours but added two hundred odd people that wouldn’t have come in on their own to the roster of line travel that day. Very wealthy people and beings that could get to the right world but not easily move to an active node from where they came in. You could travel between worlds, going over land. There were natural nodes that were so strong that the worlds touched. Sometimes you could just walk through them. A lot of people traveled that way, though it took a lot of time to get done in most places.

  When that was done for the day, his friend smiled at him.

  “Not too shabby. Normally we’ll probably want to be moving a lot more people around than this. Also from different locations. We should try that tomorrow. For now… You should collect more energy. That part was kind of pitiful. Sitting on the floor like that, as people looked on. Man…” It was flat out teasing but still right, more or less.

  Troy didn't even bother trying to become defensive over the idea.

  “Well, you know how it is. If I don’t get to play my video games every twelve hours, the batteries just run dry. I am starting to feel a bit better. Taking that fly being through was… Harsh. Not to whine but… Waaaahhh, you get me?”

  The greater demon smiled at him.

  “I know. You can’t afford to look weak. Not now. One of those others coming in for transfer might just decide to kill you instead of bargain, if it thinks you aren’t able to defend yourself. Then my clean floor would end up being all bloody. Not that I don’t need to mop in here anyway. Really, let me get to that now. We have a bit of a lull, until about eight tonight. You, personally, won’t be needed until ten in the morning, tomorrow. Tonight is order night though. It’s a light one but you can help put the books on the shelves. That’s part of the bridge travel thing, isn’t it? All the best Bridge builders love to shelve books. I’m sure I’ve heard of that before.”

  It wasn’t, which Zack had to know. Troy had helped with it before a few times. It was kind of hard to get done for the greater demon, since Zack had to do his line travel stuff, and that got in the way of getting all the books onto the shelves. They had people to do that kind of work but it rotated, as to who was able to show up, week to week.

  “Let me guess, everyone else is busy with the community party that I started and now aren’t allowed to work on for my former employers?”

  Touching his nose, Zack smiled.

  “Ding-ding-ding! I have two Alede, myself and a whole Troy to do the work, if you’re willing? We have about half a billion dollars’ worth of node travel coming through, which I can do, if I don’t have to keep running back and forth to run the till. The girls… Well, you know that one. They’re wonderful people but are working here for the free sex, not the
pay. We won’t have a lot of book sales but them getting busy won’t put the books on the shelves.”

  The store was his hobby, more or less. Zack tried to do a good job on it, even given that. For instance, if you wanted a book, he’d find it for you, if it was at all possible. More than once Troy had heard stories of him going to other countries or even realities to pick up something for someone. That meant, over the years, that a dedicated group of readers had decided to shop there. Even if they didn’t want to get in on the sex parts of things. Some people just came for the café in the back. What that meant…

  Well, Troy got that part, when the order came in for the night. Zack was a damned liar, is what it really meant. He smiled about the thought, as Felicia and Roberta both tried to take turns getting off to a side room with their new friends, as they kept dashing back and forth to the counter, to ring up sales. Palma, who was the woman that ran the café, moved forward more than once, in order to clean up the side rooms when they weren’t in use.

  Meaning that Troy was on shelving the books. Pretty much alone.

  That could have been a big deal but he didn’t let it be a problem, just putting his head down and placing the nifty things where they needed to go, while collecting energy from the world around him as fast as he could without harming himself too badly. Since he was pushing himself to a new level, that didn't work all the time. For instance, he actually rose slowly into the air at one point. The power rushing into him just causing him to rise upward. It wasn’t fast, which was fortunate for the ceiling above him.

  A nice-looking man with metal rimmed geek glasses and olive colored skin, as well as nice but trendy clothing in white and black, smiled at him. As Troy hovered about three feet in the air, lessening part of the power flow so he stopped going upward.