There will be no hulk show. Ulrike has been quite clear. Exceedingly clear. Clear to a degree that words on paper cannot fully reflect. And she is certainly not a Luddite. A Luddite would be unlikely to mention abuse by means of a pine cone sprinkled with chilly powder mounted on an electric drill.

Besides suggesting an unlikely ending of my colon in my brain she has planted a nagging worry in it. Have I been doing inferior rituals for my awakening stones? She is right. The abilities don’t fit. Being big does not help you shoot in the least. In fact, should your opponents shoot back, it’ll be a liability. And it makes firing from a hidden position harder. Were my new ability to make me faster, it could be seen as a way to enable a retreat through obstacles. But it does not. It just makes me stronger. Dejan and I have measured that, before his inquisitive spirit was rudely eliminated. And it astonishes me that she now considers the use of firearms a sign of civilization. War shifts standards quickly.

The captain in command of our convoy complained about placing civillians into the chain of command, especially placing the crew of a combat vehicle under our command. Again war shifts standards quickly and he being a soldier can be overruled in such things. Getting the navy man for communication and interpretation of the results the device was showing who already served in that job on the river mysteriously helped our personal position. They love to hate the navy.

We are an impressive convoy. A dozen military wheeled vehicles, two drones overhead, sixty trucks, a dozen police cars, twenty civillian cars for people with special permits and an ambulance.

The motorway is reserved for us and we head down the road in an orderly formation, leisurely rolling at 60 kilometers per hour.

At noon Thomas and I request medical attention. Captain Hornbauer is not amused.

H: What kind of shit is this?

T: We are running out of fuel for the device.

Stolen novel; please report.

H: I was told that the device requires no fuel.

P: We two are the fuel. At 60 km/h we cover the device’s range at the power we are required to run it to look far enough to the sides in eight minutes. If we are to catch intrusions a reasonable distance to the side we need to run it permanently.

H: That makes mathematical sense, but it imperils this whole operation.

U: Now they need to rest for two hours to be full again.

H: This delays us a lot. Alternatives?

D: How about we run faster? The operating time matters. Above a certain speed they need to go continous. Going faster doesn’t increase costs, but allows us to stop for recharging.

H: Excellent suggestion. What can we do now?

The army physician speaks up.

Medic: Does your head still hurt?

T: Yes

Medic: After what I have given you that ought to be impossible. We are operating beyond our knowledge. I would advise to wait.

H: Very well, we’ll wait.

He posts additional guards and has them plant remotely controlled mines.

--

Thomas is tanning outside. Strictly speaking for operational security I should have stayed inside to lessen the risk to me. Thomas, once connected by physical contact, has enough range to charge me up inside the vehicle. I haven’t mentioned that to our military escorts.

P: Ulrike seems to develop a case of bad temper.

D: Her parents have been evacuated. They have put a lot of time and money into their plumbing business. Her father is now virtually demoted to running the plumbing in an overcrowded school. Her mother gave her a hard time about it.

P: Hardly her fault

T: Guilt by indirect association.

D: Yes. Man is not a rational animal. Lecture 101 in police school. Well, the second lecture after telling us that witnesses are not reliable.

T: Have you thought about the place wizards will have after the event? It seems to me that the Network consider themselves above the law. And the US Network seemed to be the law.

D: Above my pay grade

P: „God made man. Samuel Colt made them equal.“ That has been an error, though nobody the public didn’t learn that until a few weeks ago.

Dejan looks at me with an undecipherable expression as a pair of machine guns on an anti-air mounting ends the conversation.

A regular steel-beak crow ends up in my looting ritual. We have been instructed to loot everything. I get a core, some wind quintessence and a bag of feathers.