Back home, when people heard of God's Hammer-which was more and more often, by the time I left- they imagined righteous fury, God's wrath on earth killing monsters and protecting the innocent. Kicking ass and taking names, basically. But there was more to it than being the toughest meathead around, no matter what my friend Lydia said.

Take this, for example. Making a cripple walk again, without medicine or equipment, was something straight out of the New Testament. Some would call it a miracle. The unkindly would call it a publicity stunt. In my world, medicine had advanced greatly before my dissappearance. Demidova Corp's vampire blood treatment meant once-deadly injuries and diseases could now be walked off like scrapes and the common cold. One day, we could all be healthy, and that had been our plan before... this. That, and surviving, if not beating the Vorsook.

Imagine every Gray alien flick you've ever seen-small gray dudes? Probes?Abduction? They have it all, and more: zombie servants created by nanotech, telekinetic weapons and an empire spanning thousands of worlds and years. The reason they hadn't overwhelmed Earth with their numbers and advanced tech was that they loathed effort, and saw conquest as a game. That, and Omega. The quantum AI created by my warlock friend Declan. The super computer had taken control of most of Earth's infrastructure, because the world's leaders either hadn't been taking the Vorsook seriously...or had been cooperating with them, like my once-superior,then-nemesis, General Tobias Creek.

Once I'd entered the Nightside-a magical city that made the alien world of Faerie look like a Midwestern cornfield-, I'd actually seen several aliens, including some Grays. Grim had taken over instantly at the sight of them, but I'd managed to wrestle back control from him. Those aliens had been the equivalent of remittance men, embarassments paid not to return home. One had even been begging in the street, with a sign reading 'will probe for money'. Grim hadn't been amused.

The Vorsook weren't known here. The Grays weren't part of their empire, nor had they heard of it, as far as I could tell. And I could detect lies.

During World War 2, my maternal grandfather was placed in a Nazi concentration camp, which also happened to house a vampire at the time. During the experiments performed there, vampire and werewolf DNA was implanted into him, and as a result, I was born with those traits as well.

They'd been latent until I'd met my wife, the only born vampire in the world, Tatiana Demidova. After I'd saved her from a demon-my duty as God's Chosen Warrior, though I didn't know that then-, she'd bitten me to heal her injuries. That had triggered my latent DNA, giving me physical prowess to match my purple aura.

Which was just as well, really. In this city, my angelic powers-a holdover from my life before birth, not that I remembered it-were far weaker than they should have been. My angelic Sword could still be reached in its pocket realm, its 'sheath', but it was like digging through tar with your hands. And the Sword was far dimmer than it should have been, nothing like the glorious light back home. It felt...brittle.

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Once, before Declan and I had confronted the Elemental that embodied the Yellowstone supervolcano, Omega had said, through a drone, that my Sword emitted great quantities of neutrinos and other particles. Maybe there was something in the city that distrupted that?

God, I must be really bored if I'm just thinking like this. I turned away from the former cripple, who was leaving Blaiston to, hopefully, make a better life for herself, and towards one of my... acquaintances.

I'd met the wizard(he insisted) Harry Dresden after a joint job. Harry's presence caused electronics to fail at best or explode at worst, and Count Video, one of the Nightside's major players, had put a hit on him. Harry had messed up one too many of his devices. Since Harry was one of the few good men in this rotten city, I'd helped him. Together, we-well, Grim, mostly- had torn through the pack of armed Neanderthals hired by Video.

If Lydia had been there, she'd have asked how I could slaughter so many Neanderthals-didn't I feel any kinship?

God, I miss them all. Praying you stay on top of things, Tanya, Declan.

"I wish I could do that, you know," Harry said, gesturing in the direction the woman had left.

"Hmm?" I asked. "Heal people, or give speeches?" His face scrunched up.

"Heal. I'm not one for speeches, really. Never have been."

"Same," I said. "Back home, my wife spoke for the company. I was just the...troubleshooter."

"Hammering down the nails that stuck up?"

"That is not how I got the nickname!"

We both laughed. Place like this, you take what joys you can, when I can.

"What brings you to Blaiston?" I asked, gesturing at the dismal place.

"The picturesque views," Harry snarked. "I was hired to find a runaway."

I nodded. "By their friends, or...?"

"I hope not. I wouldn't wish Walker as a friend upon anyone."

I stiffened at the mention of that name. Walker reminded me of the more ruthless politicians back home, doing anything to keep the status quo and their power intact. He was just a normal human, as far as my senses could tell, but I doubted it.

"Are they here? The runaway?" I asked. Harry nodded.

"So I was told. I can't feel anything myself. Too much...misery."

I opened my mouth to reply, then had a vision:a young, thin girl running into a house on this street, laughing happily. No hesitation, almost as if...

As if what? I usually had visions shortly after supernatural attacks, so why...

Ah.

"Harry?" I asked carefully. "I don't think we're alone on this street."