The Forgefires of God

Book Three of The Cause

Randall Allen Farmer

Copyright © 2015, 2016, 2020 by Randall Allen Farmer

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this work, in whole or in part, in any form. This is a work of fiction. All characters, events, organizations and products depicted herein are either a product of the author’s imagination, or are used fictitiously.

Smashwords Edition

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

The Arms

The living Arms in the United States as of December 1972,

with the year they transformed in parentheses.

Stacy Keaton (1963)

Carol Hancock (1966)

Amy Haggerty (1968)

Sylvia Bass (1968)

Florence Rayburn (1969)

Rose Webberly (1969)

Christine Naylor (1970)

Mary Sibrian (1970)

Grace Billington (1970)

Elizabeth Whetstone (1971)

Meredith Bartlett (1971)

Dorothy Kent (1972)

Theresa Maynard (1972)

Dolores Sokolnik (1972)

Mona Fairly Roche (1972)

The Forgefires of God

Book Three of The Cause

And even in our sleep pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart, and in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom to us by the awful grace of God – Aeschylus

The Lesser Known First Focuses (with the month and year of their transformation)

Esther Craig – Focus #1 – September 1953. Hands shaking, eyes askew, she will speak to you for hours on the dangers of the Wendigo and Paul Bunyan, both of which she is sure are stalking her.

Georgia Rocha – Focus #2 – February 1954. They experimented on me for months. Electroshock therapy, insulin therapy, sleep deprivation, starvation, whatever they could think of. Georgia has a strong dislike of men in lab coats and female nurses. You’re not one of them doctors, are you? She sleeps with a shotgun under her pillow and rarely leaves her household.

Elisabeth Holder – Focus #4 – May 1955. Focus Holder suffers under the delusion that one of her Focus attendants is the real Focus, and she’s just a lowly Transform. She spends nearly twenty hours a day confined to a bed.

Marla Rhodes – Focus #6 – August 1955. Focus Rhodes died in late 1957 after she and her household attempted to escape from Quarantine. Her death, at the hands of the authorities, still rankles many of the first Focuses.

Lucy Peoples – Focus #10 – August 1956. Focus Peoples was a young, bright and strong willed Focus who was Focus Patterson’s right hand lady when disaster struck in October of 1957 and she died attempting to aid the first known United States Arm, Mary Chesterson. She was first of the Focuses to realize that they could do more with their Major Transform capabilities than merely keep household Transforms alive by moving juice.

Carrie Sue Sanderson – Focus #17 – November 1957. Focus Sanderson does not believe it is correct for women to have the importance that many Focuses proclaim is theirs, and because of this has never involved herself in anything outside of the day-to-day matters of her Transform household.

Anne Trail – Focus #19 – March 1958. Focus Trail is of the opinion that there is nothing wrong with being a housewife, and considers her work as a Focus nothing more than an outgrowth of that. What is important in life is what we can do to help others. Given the discrimination against Transforms in our society, the first job of a Focus is to help those people in her household with their gainful employment.

From Lives of the Focuses

Part One

Best Laid Plans

World's use is cold, world's love is vain, World's cruelty is bitter bane; But pain is not the fruit of pain – Elisabeth Barrett Browning

What the fuck did you do to my mind this time!

Mary Beth Julius – Focus #3 – November 1954. Miss Mary Beth, as she’s referred to, refuses to meet outsiders or speak to them on the telephone – and has done so since 1964, after she failed in an abortive attempt to take over leadership of the Focuses and shut down the Focus Network. There are no male Major Transforms, and if there were, they should be shot, is a direct quote from her. Those who have spoken to her Transforms report that Miss Mary Beth trains her Focus capabilities constantly, awaiting ‘The Day’.

Lives of the Focuses

Sinclair: December 8, 1972

Sinclair sat in the bleachers behind first base, with Shadow, waiting for Rumor to show. They gathered in Squaw Valley Park, across the Allegheny River from Focus Patterson’s corrupted compound. The sky was overcast and dark, low clouds catching only a little of the city lights in the early AM hours. Leafless trees loomed silently, and the baseball diamond waited in dark loneliness for the shouts and chatter of small boys. The air stung his nostrils with the sharp ozone odor of incipient rain. Sinclair had never been to Pittsburgh before, and only heard rumors of Patterson’s dark lair.

Now that he could metasense it, a little over two miles away, he realized that the stories hadn’t been exaggerations, but understatements.

Sir Randolph, Sinclair’s Noble bodyguard today, growled and paced up and down the first base line, his eyes and metasense fixed upon Patterson’s compound. The city lights reflected off the low clouds and gave only the barest hint of light in the deserted park, and even less to the small group clustered in the shadow of the trees.

Tell me, Shadow said, to Sir Randolph, when Sir Randolph passed by. "What does a Noble metasense when a Noble gazes at that?"

Sir Randolph stopped walking, but didn’t turn his eyes from Patterson’s compound. A threat. A single Monster, hungry and waiting. A dragon the size of a skyscraper. A hurricane ready to strike. Even Sir Randolph’s softest voice seemed loud in the night.

Sinclair shook his head at the strange thoughts and insights of all the Nobles. It’s a black hole, an astronomy term for something so massive that its gravity overwhelms light, Sinclair said. Only instead of light, it’s sucking in dross. I can sense it pulling on me from here. You, Shadow?

To me, Patterson’s compound is just a gap in my metasense. No danger at all, Shadow said. He paused and dropped his voice to a depressed whisper. I shouldn’t be here.

That’s right, Shadow. Another voice, deep and low and directionless. Rumor. You’re too much the visionary. She would seduce you to her corruption in an instant.

Rumor strode out of his protections, becoming visible from around the third base bleachers, if only to a Crow’s eyes in the darkness. The older Crow was tall, as tall as a Noble, and gaunt, and carried his right arm in a sling.

Wounded? Shadow said. His voice was soft, barely a whisper in the darkness, but carried worry.

Yes. Patterson’s picked up some new and disturbing tricks this year. I was taking dross from her compound when one of her people sprayed the area where I hid with gunfire. I don’t yet understand how they detected me. Rumor frowned. What brings you here tonight?

The Commander fought the Hero three nights ago, and took dominance over her, Shadow said. She’s the number two Arm again, and I can sense her strength growing by the hour when I meditate on her.

I’m glad she won and remains strong, Rumor said. The fight wasn’t as clean as you might expect, though. I was involved in the Dreaming, against Patterson, who found a way around our defenses and had taken partial control of the Commander’s subconscious.

Sinclair leaned away, shivering and unexpectedly cold. Patterson is behind her recent beastliness, not the Inquisitor? The Commander started torturing people for fun in late October, an old habit of hers they thought she had quit years ago. They all blamed the change on the Inquisitor, Arm Bass.

Yes, Rumor said. There’s a new power among the Focuses, the Clumsy Angel. She put together a Dreaming crew and defeated Patterson’s mind-hold on the Commander, much to everyone’s shock. I believe Patterson used the Inquisitor’s torture of the Commander, at Kali’s behest, to find a way around our protections.

Good, good, Shadow said. I’ve long followed the exploits of the Clumsy Angel, waiting for this day to arrive. She has the potential to be the one to finally lead the Focuses out of their long darkness. He sighed and shook his head. There’s more. Rumor, when the Hero proved the reality of the Progenitors, you said your greatest fear was the possibility one of their Monsters survived into this era. Count Dowling found one, or, rather, a Hunter found one, a junior Hunter by the name of Tiger Eyes. Tiger Eyes somehow charmed the ancient Monster into serving as a trap for Count Dowling, using a kidnapped household Transform as bait. When Count Dowling and the crew of Inferno Monster hunters he often helps showed up, the ancient Monster broke the control and ate Tiger Eyes.

Ouch! Rumor said, and Sir Randolph chortled at the results of the junior Hunter’s failed proving quest.

The Commander showed up afterwards to help patch people up, which is how we learned of the challenge. According to Count Dowling, she was none too amused about the existence of said ancient Monster. Shadow paused and glanced, nervously, in the direction of Patterson’s compound. The bare branches rustled with the leading breeze of the oncoming rain. On a side note, Count Dowling did rescue the kidnapped Transform, but she got élan abused by the Hunter and no longer fits in a Focus household. I believe our good Count has recruited yet another commoner for his future household.

I believe Master Occum will need to give the Count a Barony simply because of the size of his crew, Sinclair said. He suspected the brainy Count counted on it, actually.

Interesting, interesting, Rumor said. He scratched at the arm in the sling. I’m worried more about the ever-increasing level of Hunter activity on this side of the Mississippi. They’re readying for war, and I’m afraid they’re going to strike while we’re otherwise occupied with the current conflict.

Not if the current conflict resolves itself in Arm time, Shadow said, with a snort. "So, Rumor, do you think the Arms have a chance against the Monster?"

Yes, Rumor said. Patterson’s never faced Arms or the multi-Arm predator. If they do it right, she’ll never know what hit her.

‘Doing it right’ might be a problem, Shadow said. Kali doesn’t have the Commander setting up her strategy.

Never did. Rumor exchanged a short glare with Shadow; friends they might be, but they did tend to get on each other’s nerves. Their contretemps reminded Sinclair of Sky and Gilgamesh’s similar interactions. The Commander’s an operations specialist if you use the proper military terminology. An operations specialist is the one who sets up military forces to win, sets battle strategies, force integration, situational training, organization, etc. The Arms don’t have anyone else with her skills, and her skills are critical when facing a force as organized as Patterson’s. If Kali’s not listening to the Commander, the Arms are in trouble, because Kali’s got the subtlety of a sledgehammer. Rumor smiled. Besides, I’m not sure an Arm or a Chimera can even see the strategic level. That’s what you do, Shadow, and Focus Biggioni does, among the Focuses. Rumor paused. I don’t like this, this wasting of resources. It’s stupid.

Politics, Rumor. The Arms are just as political as the rest of us.

It’s still stupid. Patterson is perfectly capable of picking us off one by one if we go after her piecemeal. In Crow terms, Shadow, she’s a rival visualization of reality. A dangerous one, at that.

Sinclair quailed when he saw Shadow shiver at Rumor’s words. There was just so much he didn’t know, especially about the games of the older Crows. Visualization of reality? To Shadow, there was a large amount of juice in that term. Sinclair didn’t know what it referred to, though.

What can we do? Should we help Kali? Sinclair said.

Tell me, Sinclair, Rumor said, what did you think about your recent meetings with Kali and the Commander?

Sinclair took a deep breath. Kali drove me into a fetal ball. Only Gilgamesh could stand up to her. The Commander? Well, I wouldn’t want to cross her, but I can at least talk to her, work with her and follow her orders without falling apart. Mostly.

That’s my experience, as well, Rumor said. Kali is improperly socialized, Sinclair, and her ability to control her inner beast is weak at best, and deteriorating. The only Crows who can deal with her anymore at all are rare exceptions like Sky and Gilgamesh. Kali’s made her own bed, and we can’t do anything but let her lie in it. The Commander, though, I suggest we all help as much as we can, if you’re willing to take my advice. She’s never wavered in her friendship with the Crows.

I’ve already informed the Commander of the same, Shadow said. I’m already helping Focus Biggioni.

Good. My advice is simple: approach the Commander through her Focus allies, not her Crow allies. Let them take the hits if the negotiations fail. We should offer up as many Crows as can stand to help against the first Focuses. One other thing, Rumor said, turning to Sir Randolph. Patterson’s been setting up defenses against Chimeras for years, your grace. If you Nobles ever go after her, you’re going to need help. Lots of help. I don’t know why, but she’s deathly afraid of Chimeras.

Yes, or so the south breeze says, sir, Sir Randolph said. Nobles will die here. But.

But what, your grace?

But if Shadow’s Crows participate in an attack on Patterson, the Nobles will be there, as well.

Rumor nodded. Responsibility to the figurative grandfather of your clan, I take it?

Sir Randolph smiled. Well, if a wizard Crow of your reputation can understand Responsibility, there’s hope for the Crows, after all. Sir. That brought a smile to Sinclair’s face as well. To a Noble, responsibility was as important as territory was to an Arm. Responsibility was what made the Rules work.

Just be careful, Rumor said. Be extraordinarily careful.

Gail Rickenbach: December 8, 1972

Gail blinked and forced the swimming notes of the juice score back into focus. Her project, the ‘move juice to an Arm’ pattern, was the most difficult juice work she had ever attempted. She couldn’t deny her progress, though, not after reducing the number of potentially working patterns down to a simple dozen. She just wished she felt better than a lost plate of Gretchen’s chicken and dumplings, forgotten and growing multicolored mold in the back of the refrigerator.

Gail pushed her long brown hair out of her eyes and tried to focus on the juice scores again. Her head hurt, a queasy hangover headache for no reason, something foreign to her experience as a Focus. The chair seemed too hard, the small kitchen table too slippery, the mostly muted television too loud, and the light from the tabletop lamp too bright.

Her heart ached because Carol hadn’t stopped her basement torture sessions. Even though Gail and her allies had stopped Patterson’s mind attack on the Arm, she still indulged in her cruelty. Gail’s loins ached for no particular reason, save that this was a Friday night and the Inferno Friday night orgy always made her a little horny. Normally, though, the Inferno orgy didn’t leave her body cold.

Gail, is something wrong?

She winced in pain and glanced at her husband, Van. He watched the latest episode of the increasingly tired seventh season of Mission Impossible from the living room couch, while half-heartedly reading a CDC report on the Arm Flap of 1968. Not so loud. Please. Headache.

He put the report down, stood and softly walked over to her. His eyes filled with uncommon worry. One of the juice scores skittered off the table to land at his feet. Your hands are shaking, he said, as he pulled over the second chair and sat next to her, taking one of her hands, which was indeed shaking.

Noooo, Gail said. She was already a Focus. She couldn’t get the Shakes again. The Shakes – Transform Sickness – was the disease responsible for turning her into a Focus four years ago.

Yet here she was, headachy, feverish and queasy, hands shaking, the same way she remembered from the start of her Focus transformation. She focused her mind on her metasense and scanned the vicinity of the Branton, wondering if this was something she had picked up from one of her people, or some enemy’s devious attack. Nothing, save for an increase in warmth in her loins, yet more crap leaking through from the Inferno Friday night orgy. Well, that would teach her not to extend out her metasense on a Friday night.

Is this some form of gristle dross contamination? Van asked. Good question, as bad juice contamination could mimic TS symptoms. She metasensed herself, and save for the little surprise she hadn’t told anyone about, her juice structure was normal. Yet more hot emotions leaked through from the Inferno orgy.

Nope, Gail said. There’s nothing… Her voice stopped, interrupted by a faint ‘duh duuuh duh daah’ coming from the television.

Oh, crap! Van said. He picked Gail up, which amused her since back four years ago at her transformation, when she was thirty pounds of muscle lighter, such a feat would have been beyond him. Van put on muscle with the ease of a man in his late twenties caught up in the manual labor needs of a poor Transform household. Before her transformation Van would have never been caught with a roofing hammer in his hand, or toting around drywall, or any of the other crazy labors of Transform household maintenance. These days, such things were second nature for him.

Van set her beside him on the couch. The news coming from the television chased away her memories, replacing them with fresh worries. Van reached over to turn up the volume.

—excess of seventy dead, mostly police and FBI. Authorities are still retrieving the dead, and the names of the fallen will be withheld until the families can be contacted. Let’s go to our reporter in Washington. Dan? The image changed to the intense face of a cold reporter standing in front of a smoldering building, a line of police officers milling around between him and the building.

Walter, the reporter in Washington said, "we don’t have any information yet on what led to the shoot-out with the Arm, but it began in the abandoned building behind me, which is now rubble, as you can see. According to rumor, this was supposed to be some sort of trap for the Arm. The fight went wrong somehow, but we don’t have more than rumor, as most of the people involved in the supposed trap seem to be among the victims.

We do know that the Arm involved is supposed to be the one named Amy Haggerty, known improbably to the Transform community as ‘the Hero’, the Arm giving the FBI such trouble over the last several years. Several of the survivors claim that she was wounded in the fight, but again, we don’t have confirmation on this. With me is WPD Captain Perry Boniaby. Captain Boniaby, what can you tell us about…

Shit, Gail said, as they watched the story unfold.

What’s Haggerty doing attacking the FBI? Van said. I thought the Arms were going after the first Focuses.

Gail nodded. So soon after the dominance fight, she wouldn’t be doing this without an explicit order from Carol. Not that Carol’s saying anything on the subject. Damn the Arms and their excessive secrecy. She closed her eyes for a moment and tried to push thoughts through her current mental morass, attempting to put herself in Carol’s position. Oh. Carol was afraid the Firsts would sucker in the FBI to protect them, and sent in Amy to make sure it didn’t happen. I hope Amy’s okay. Gail carried a soft spot in her heart for Amy Haggerty. She was so good at combat and tactics, and so bad at resisting Gail’s charm.

Seventy dead, likely a major fraction of the FBI’s Arm Task Force. Haggerty wounded. Perhaps this would delay the attack on the Firsts.

A sudden wave of pleasure washed over Gail, banishing her headache and nearly driving her unconscious. She moaned and collapsed further into Van’s arms. Hey, Van, she said, her voice rolling with the sultry. How’d you like to go somewhere darker and more private. I know just the thing to take your mind off this crap.

---

Gail held Van and rocked, locked in endless pleasure and orgasm. They had finished long ago, but the sensations didn’t stop, all-consuming and inescapable. She had screamed, and the scream twined with the pleasure until her mind echoed with it. She cried until she had no tears left.

The Inferno Friday night orgy. She never imagined it could devour her this way.

It hadn’t before. Something had changed, likely when Lori tagged her and cuddled with her in her impromptu darkroom, when they chased Patterson out of Carol’s mind in the Dreaming.

Gail was still astonished that the Inferno people did this every Friday night. This was more intense than she had imagined, far more than the Inferno tall tale. This was something out of a nightmarish hedonist household.

Too many links. Her household linked to Carol. Carol linked to Lori and Inferno. Now Gail linked to Lori through a temporary tag enabling her and Lori to share juice buffers, a tag now degraded into a permanent low-level tag, completing the circle. Gail wanted to scream, but the last scream still echoed madly in her mind. Even Lori participated in her household’s orgy, filled with juice from her own juice buffer.

Years ago, Lori had stood apart from the Inferno orgy, but that was before she learned to draw juice from her own buffer. Worse, except for Sky, Lori’s attraction and amorous dalliances were exclusively with women, something Gail previously only suspected, and Gail wasn’t sure what to make of the smooth skin and joyous avalanche of sensations as they kept pouring in.

She had seduced Van, no problem there. She had worn him out and wanted more. Needed more. The stimulation never stopped. Van tried to calm her, but his words failed.

Now, because of the acuity of her metasense and all those links, Gail was present, in the room with the Inferno people, immersed in all their sex. Part of the time when Van had been banging her, he was Lori, Lori’s doing. Gail hadn’t minded at the time, as she enjoyed herself more than ever before, but now she worried about what this had done to her, and to Van. To Van, who wondered why, during part of their love, he said Gail appeared like Lori.

The orgy didn’t stop with her and Van. Half the Transforms in Gail’s household screwed like minks, caught up in the orgy as well, because of their connection to Gail. The rest curled in corners, shaking, beyond panic.

Gail couldn’t block out the sensations. Her household superorganism and the Inferno household superorganism were screwing. Right through Gail. She pulled Van back into her, making him horny enough to continue. Unfortunately, real sex was no longer good enough, not enough to block out everyone else who was screwing. The overstimulation rolled through her mind, the slow beat of ocean waves against the coast, and dropped her again into sensory overload. She was everyone who made love. She couldn’t even think of anything except sex.

"This is not good. Gilgamesh, in the same room with her and Van. He, at least, remained in control. Now. The emotions had drawn him and Melanie together, no shock, but he hadn’t realized the problem until after he wore out Melanie. Something’s wrong in the way Gail and Lori and Carol set up the two households."

Can you do something about this? Van asked. Wasn’t he inside her? No longer. Just her imagination. That was just, um, well, embarrassing but pleasurable. Get down here. He patted the bed. She needs you.

Gilgamesh? Having him inside her sounded good to Gail. She reached for him, but he backed away, leaving her moaning in frustration.

If I fall into this, then what’s going on will have grabbed all the households’ Major Transforms.

Carol, too?

She’s here, with Daisy. Yes, there she was, going way overboard with Van’s younger sister. At least Carol was able to heal any of the damage she caused, unlike Gail, who had left bleeding gouges on Van’s back. She hoped Daisy’s mind survived, as the Arm wasn’t holding back tonight. I’m going to need to think on this. It’s a major glitch in our household redefinition project. Households in close proximity should be able to function together without such issues. He paused. Would you mind if I put Gail to sleep?

Gail shook her head ‘no’. I think you need to, Van said.

Her eyes met Gilgamesh’s and connected with a promise for more personal time together after the orgy ended. She wouldn’t fight his attempt to put her to sleep. A little recovery time wouldn’t hurt at all. Gilgamesh touched her head, and Gail didn’t think another thought until morning.

Gilgamesh: December 9, 1972

Gilgamesh, are you responsible for this? Sky said. He pushed a brochure across the table, one of Shadow’s. They met in a small room on the second floor of the Branton, tucked in behind the elevator shafts. Every few minutes, the entire room rumbled as an elevator passed.

Gilgamesh nodded. They had been meeting on household issues once every three or four days, ever since Inferno’s arrival in Chicago, but so far today they skirted around the real problem, last night’s orgy debacle. They had done so much fruitless brainstorming last night that they had gotten on each other’s nerves.

Old habits. For years he and Sky had both courted Focus Rizzari. Although that was now settled, their old jostling habits hadn’t ended.

Stupendous, Sky said. ‘Crows and Focuses share common goals’. Bah. ‘A combined Crow & Focus household can support perhaps twice as many Transforms’. Bargle! This is even worse than your housecleaning service. What are you and Shadow trying to do, get us all killed?

I’m not sure I understand your objections, Gilgamesh said. My statements are factual, if anything, understated. Shadow said he needed something to put in his brochures regarding the household redefinition project. I sent him a couple of paragraphs worth, after apologizing that the real meat of the project wasn’t ready to be released until you came up with documentation a standard Crow could use.

Sky stood and paced around the undersized meeting room, dodging the small table and several chairs. Shadow, then, is the one pushing the issue. Damn. I’ve talked to enough older Crows to know how inflammatory this is. To put it in American terms, this is like burning a United States flag in front of a Veterans Association meeting.

Veterans of Foreign Wars.

Whatever. Shadow’s inviting another series of attacks on his Crows. What Chevalier and his crew did to Sinclair isn’t the only horror that one group of Crows can do to another.

Gilgamesh sucked air. Could you stop pacing, please, Sky? Sky sighed, and planted himself again. What horrors are you talking about? And don’t tell me that I don’t want to know.

Okay, Sky said. Pause. I won’t. Longer pause. The shrieks of pre-teen children penetrated the walls of the room, in what sounded like a multi-floor game of tag. In any event, when you’re thinking about defending our little household menagerie, don’t forget to think about defending them and yourself from the senior Crows.

I would consider that to be nearly impossible, Gilgamesh said. Sky was being his usual unbearable self, and he wouldn’t be telling him about these supposed horrors unless Gilgamesh sat on him. He doubted the effort would be worth the results: information on older Crow capabilities he wouldn’t have a chance of stopping anyway.

Only if you think about stopping them directly. So don’t. Stick close to our women Major Transforms. Use dross constructs to enhance your metasense. Put up more metasense shielding. I’ll get more of the local dogs and cats to be watching out for strange things. Talk our security people into pushing out our defensive perimeter. Neither of us can do much to protect ourselves against the top Crows, but if we can put up enough chaff to make them think twice, make them think the risk trade-offs are bad, maybe they’ll back off from a direct assault. They may be ultra-powerful from our point of view, but those old Crows are still Crows.