Age of Voodoo Read online

  Praise for the Pantheon series:

  “Mr. Lovegrove is one of the best writers out there... Highly, highly recommended.”

  – The Fantasy Book Critic on The Age of Ra

  “Lovegrove’s bluntness about the gods’ Jerry Springer-like repugnance refreshingly reflects the myths as they must appear to modern eyes.”

  – Strange Horizons Magazine on The Age of Ra

  “One of the UK SF scene’s most interesting, challenging and adventurous authors.”

  – Saxon Bullock, SFX on The Age of Ra

  “A compulsive, breakneck read by a master of the craft, with stunning action sequences and acute character observations. This is the kind of complex, action-oriented SF Dan Brown would write if Dan Brown could write.”

  – Eric Brown, The Guardian on The Age of Zeus

  “The action is just unbelievably good.”

  – The Fantasy Book Critic on The Age of Zeus

  “The reader feels as if they are right there accomplishing something along with our heroes... You definitely feel like you got your money’s worth.”

  – Sci-Fi & Fantasy Review on The Age of Zeus

  “I can totally see why The Age of Odin made it onto the New York Times Bestseller’s List; in terms of entertainment value alone it certainly deserves to be up there and I wouldn’t be surprised if you saw it on the big screen in a few years from now.”

  – Graeme’s Fantasy Book Review on The Age of Odin

  “The action, along with some finely observed satire, keeps the pages turning until the end.”

  – Total Sci-Fi Online on The Age of Odin

  “Lovegrove is vigorously carving out a godpunk subgenre – rebellious underdog humans battling an outmoded belief system. Guns help a bit, but the real weapon is free will.”

  – Pornokitsch on The Age of Odin

  “5 out of 5. I finished it in less than three hours, yet have pondered the revelations found within for days afterwards and plan to reread it soon.”

  – Geek Syndicate on Age of Aztec

  “Higher on action and violence than Lovegrove’s previous books, the novel still manages to portray convincingly the psychology of its two antiheroes, and paint a vivid picture of Aztec lore.”

  – The Guardian on Age of Aztec

  “A thoroughly engrossing novel, with well-written chase sequences and some epic battle scenes. If you enjoy techno-thrillers with a twist, you’ll like this”

  – SciFi Bulletin on Age of Aztec

  Also by James Lovegrove

  NOVELS

  The Hope • Days

  The Foreigners • Untied Kingdom

  Worldstorm • Provender Gleed

  Co-writing with Peter Crowther

  Escardy Gap

  THE PANTHEON SERIES

  The Age Of Ra • The Age Of Zeus

  The Age Of Odin • Age Of Aztec

  Age Of Voodoo

  THE REDLAW SERIES

  Redlaw • Redlaw: Red Eye

  NOVELLAS

  How The Other Half Lives

  Gig • Age Of Anansi

  COLLECTIONS OF SHORT FICTION

  Imagined Slights • Diversifications

  FOR YOUNGER READERS

  The Web: Computopia • Warsuit 1.0

  The Black Phone

  FOR RELUCTANT READERS

  Wings • The House of Lazarus

  Ant God • Cold Keep • Dead Brigade

  Kill Swap • Free Runner

  The 5 Lords Of Pain Series

  The Lord Of The Mountain • The Lord Of The Void

  The Lord Of Tears • The Lord Of The Typhoon

  The Lord Of Fire

  WRITING AS JAY AMORY

  The Clouded World series

  The Fledging Of Az Gabrielson

  Pirates Of The Relentless Desert

  Darkening For A Fall • Empire Of Chaos

  AGE OF VOODOO

  JAMES LOVEGROVE

  First published 2013 by Solaris

  an imprint of Rebellion Publishing Ltd,

  Riverside House, Osney Mead,

  Oxford, OX2 0ES, UK

  www.solarisbooks.com

  ISBN: (epub) 978-1-84997-484-4

  ISBN: (mobi) 978-1-84997-485-1

  Copyright © James Lovegrove 2013

  Cover Art by Marek Okon

  The right of the author to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of he copyright owners.

  This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.

  PROLOGUE

  “HOLY. FUCKING. CHRIST.”

  The Secretary of Defence rubbed his eyes, as though he might be able to wipe them clean. On the monitor in front of him was an image, paused, blurred, a pale figure in motion like a phantom in mid-flight. He had just finished watching the harrowing footage for a fourth time.

  His office in the outermost of the Pentagon’s concentric layers, the E-ring, had a view looking across the river and the greenery of West Potomac Park all the way to the Washington Monument, which lanced upward, a white dagger stabbing the heavens. It was a beautiful summer’s afternoon in DC. Out there, on the other side of the tempered blast-resistant glass, the world was sunlit, bright, normal. In here, not so much.

  Grimly, the Secretary of Defence reached for the phone and pressed for an internal extension.

  “Sir.”

  “General.”

  “Let me take a wild guess what this is about.” The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff had a grizzled voice, as raspy as the bristles of his razored haircut. “Anger Reef.”

  “Precisely.”

  “What a goddamn fiasco. Those were good men. What happened to them... Well, I’m not sure what happened to them. But I think we can safely assume the worst.”

  “Agreed,” said the Secretary of Defence.

  “That damn Seidelmann creep. I’ll say it now, for the record. I never did trust him. What the hell was he up to anyway?”

  “You read the same briefings I did.”

  “Yes, but what I meant was, how did we let it get so far? So out of control? Why wasn’t there greater oversight?”

  “We gave him free rein. We trusted him.”

  “And look where it’s got us. Those poor bastards killed. The whole project FUBAR. Someone’s head should roll over this.”

  “Now’s not the time for the blame game. We need to consider options. Airstrike?”

  “Conventional bombardment won’t work,” said the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs. “Even a MOAB hasn’t got the penetrating power. Way that place was built, so far underground, all that concrete, nothing short of a tactical nuke would make a dent. I don’t suppose...?” His tone was faintly, disquietingly hopeful.

  “We’ll table that one for the moment, general. In case of need. Although, given Anger Reef’s history, it may prove to be a moot point. Can I tell you what I think?”

  “Of course.”

  “As a matter of fact, it’s not just me. Langley’s had its analysts going over the footage with a fine-tooth comb. Consensus is, this is a grey-ops scenario.”

  “In other words, Team Thirteen territory. Yeah. Yeah, I can see that. There’s a problem, though. Those guys have just run a half-dozen missions straight, back-to-back. Right now they’re somewhere over the Bering Sea, inbound from Siberia, where, by all accounts, they did not have a fun time. They’re exhausted and they deserv
e a furlough. They’ve been flat-out since May. World seems to have gone nuts this summer. More nuts than usual.”

  “Still, the CIA figure they’re our best bet,” said the Secretary of Defence. “This is their kind of situation. And seeing as the matter is time-sensitive and of the highest priority...”

  “No rest for the wicked,” sighed the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs. “I’ll make the call to the Special Activities Division, confirming Thirteen are available.”

  “The Agency has one other recommendation.”

  “And that is?”

  “We bring in some sort of local liaison. Someone who knows the lie of the land and might be able to provide relevant intel.”

  “Okay. Yeah.”

  “Do you know of anyone?”

  The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs hummed in thought. “There is one guy I can think of, off the top of my head. A Brit. One-time covert wetwork operative.”

  “Ugh.”

  “Retired now. Inactive. He seems to have made contacts in the region. Well embedded.”

  “You know him personally?”

  “He’s worked with the military on a couple of occasions.”

  “So he could be persuaded to participate?”

  “It’s worth a shot. He has dual US/UK nationality, so technically he’s one of us. Under the circumstances, he’s the right man for the job. Certainly the best we can hope for at such short notice.”

  “All right then. Get a hold of him. Thank you, general.”

  The Secretary of Defence replaced the phone handset and returned his attention to the monitor on his desk. He rewound the footage part of the way, his hand trembling ever so slightly as it manipulated the mouse. Once again he watched the final hellish three minutes, the death throes of a mission gone badly wrong.

  Men running. Men screaming. Semi-naked figures lurching at them in the shimmering green phosphorescence of image intensification. Gunshots rippling near and far.

  One commando yelling, “What the fuck—what the Jesus fuck are they? They’re taking hits; they just won’t fucking go down!”

  Another: “They’re coming from all sides. God help us, they’re everywhere!”

  A third, to his commanding officer: “Sir! Sir! What are our orders? What do we do?”

  Distantly, a man sobbing, crying for his mother, and another man intoning the Lord’s Prayer.

  And then a figure lumbers towards the commando whose helmet camera is recording the chaos, and there is a final, shrill, hideous scream, abruptly cut short.

  In the silence that ensues, a voice can be heard, elated, triumphal.

  “Bondye! Bondye! Hear me, Bondye. I am coming for you.”

  The clip vaporised into a hissing burst of screen static and white noise, and the Secretary of Defence spun his chair away from the desk. An American Airlines 747 was coasting in to land at Ronald Reagan airport. The sky was boundless and blue. A city of half a million people—hell, a planet of seven billion people—and none of them had a clue what was going on down in the Caribbean, a thousand miles due south. Not a fucking clue.

  It was up to Team Thirteen to ensure things stayed that way.

  ONE

  POSH BOYS

  TROUBLE DIDN’T COME knocking often at Wilberforce’s Rum Shack, and when it did, it was never anything Lex Dove couldn’t handle. Usually it could be dealt with using just stern words and a bit of eyeballing; sometimes, however, more was called for.

  Case in point on this Friday evening: a trio of drunk posh boys. On holiday from England. Probably their first time abroad without mater and pater. Nobody to keep an eye on them and keep them in line.

  They were big and brawny, in that well-fed, upper-class way. Shoulders broadened by rugby and rowing. And they thought they were something special, with all that paid-for education filling their heads and that trust fund money filling their pockets.

  At first they just behaved rowdily, and it was safe to ignore them and hope they’d eventually leave of their own accord.

  But after downing several of Wilberforce’s patented rum roundhouses—‘stronger than just any old rum punch,’ as the drinks menu put it—the three posh boys became lairy and obnoxious. They began braying crude personal insults at the tops of their voices, at one another and at the other customers. They made disparaging remarks about the state of Wilberforce’s shack, which admittedly was in need of some upkeep but wasn’t nearly as much of a health hazard as they made out.

  One of them then started hitting on an islander girl, trying to chat her up by bragging about his parents’ ski chalet in Val d’Isère and the job his father was going to get him in September with a hedge fund firm. The girl kept shying away from him, but she was too polite and well brought up to do what she needed to, which was tell him to fuck off and leave her alone.

  That was when Lex intervened. He looked to Wilberforce for consent first, and got a nod. Wilberforce, behind the bar, made an air-patting gesture: take it easy, man, don’t go too far.

  Lex moved between the posh boy and the islander girl.

  “Listen,” he said to the boy. “I think you’ve had enough to drink. And I know the lady here has had enough of you. How about you and your mates call it a night, eh? Go back to your hotel, get some sleep, start over tomorrow. Okay?”

  Posh Boy fixed him with a bleary, malevolent glare. “And just who the fuck are you?”

  “Does it matter?” said Lex. “A bystander. Someone who wants a quiet Friday-night drink and no trouble.” He laid a light but distinct emphasis on the last two words.

  “Oh, yeah?” slurred Posh Boy. “Well, Mr Bystander, stop sticking your nose into other people’s business. This has nothing to do with you. This is between me and her.” He pointed at the girl with the hand that was holding his drink; rum roundhouse slopped onto her skirt, but he didn’t notice. “She happens to be very interested in me, and later tonight she’s going to give me the best blowjob ever. You can tell by looking at her. She’s got that kind of mouth.”

  The girl gasped in dismay.

  “So,” Posh Boy went on, “I’d be very much obliged if you’d fuck off out of it.”

  “Yah,” said one of his friends, taking up position behind him. “You tell him, Timbo.” To Lex: “Timbo does martial arts. Karate and a bit of, whatchemacall, june keet do. Is that right?”

  “Jeet kune do,” said Timbo.

  “Yah,” said Posh Boy #2. “So you’d better not mess with him. He can kick your scrawny arse.”

  Conversation at the rum shack had trickled almost to a halt. Only the reggae on the stereo was continuing as loudly as before—Bob Marley and The Wailers, ‘Fussing And Fighting.’ Everyone was monitoring the confrontation, keen to see how it played out.

  “I said I don’t want trouble,” said Lex, keeping his voice low and calm. “I’d like it if you—all three of you—would simply go elsewhere and stop bothering us. This is my favourite drinking place on the whole island, I come here most evenings. Is it too much to ask that I and all the other customers here are able to enjoy our cocktails and the beach and the night air in peace?”

  Timbo balled a fist.

  Posh Boy #2 encouraged him with a clap on the shoulder. “Right behind you, Timbo. You show the little fucker what’s what.”

  “Don’t do this,” Lex said. Not a plea. Just sound advice.

  Which Timbo didn’t take.

  He swung a punch, and to his credit it wasn’t a bad punch. There was some bodyweight behind it, and he kept his forearm straight, wrist solidly locked. If it had connected with Lex’s nose, as it was intended to, the blow would have done some damage.

  Lex, however, ducked under it as though Timbo was delivering it in slow motion. At the same time his hand came up, fingers rigid, and chopped like a knife into the side of Timbo’s neck, just below the jaw. The blow struck the mastoid process, the rounded projection of bone at the base of the skull. Had it been delivered at full strength, it would have killed Timbo outright, but Lex gauged it so that the
boy was merely stunned. Timbo’s brain went into shock, and he reeled and sank to the sand.

  Posh Boy #2 looked astonished for a moment—outraged—and then he smashed his glass against the edge of a table and stabbed the jagged remains at Lex’s face.

  He was even more astonished to find himself on his knees with the broken glass crushed in his hand, shards embedded in his palm and fingers. He started howling in pain.

  Posh Boy #3 now joined in, incensed that his two friends had been so easily bested by this ghastly jumped-up little prole. It was not the natural order of things. Status and breeding triumphed every time. That was what he’d been brought up to believe. That was the proper way.

  He lunged at Lex, rugby-tackling him round the waist. Together they crashed into a table, a flimsy trestle-type affair; it collapsed under them and they sprawled on the ground.

  Lex was irritated by this. Sand got down the collar of his shirt. He hated sand getting down his shirt.

  He threw Posh Boy #3 off him, almost without effort even though the lad weighed a good thirteen stone, rolled over and straddled him, and swiftly rendered him insensible with a rapid one-two-three to the temples. He stood up and shook his shirt out.

  Timbo was just this side of conscious. Posh Boy #2 keened and wailed over his injured hand. Posh Boy #3 was silent, out cold.

  Wilberforce shook his head sadly. “My table, Lex. You wrecked it. Those things cost money.”