Chapter Sixteen
White Worms

Yes, dear patient readers, the Black Popess indeed made the mission to France, to that mysterious alleged home of the Green Ray, intent on recovering her precious manuscripts from Estella Themis, only to find...nothing. No Grail Gestapo, no Lone Star, not even a Scorpio Sister to liven up the tiny hamlet occupied only by Templar treasure seekers and UFO watchers; certainly Estella-Madeline did not surface, nor Astro Anubis Assassin or even Prince Vladicule, for that matter, the latter who might have proved a good cussing companion, so frustrated was the leader of the Daughters of Maria Magdalena by such a disappointing turn-of-events.

"Buggering infidels," 22 muttered on her return flight to LAX, forced to chuckle when she remembered beleagured Professor Peyton's favorite Grail Gestapo indictment. "Damnable, slippery snakes...although I don't mean to insult wise serpents," she thought silently, forced to turn her thoughts to a screenplay she had picked up in London to edit for an esoteric fim-maker-friend before returning to her home in the hills of Hollywood.

So, many months passed, a quiet interval in which the leader of the Magdalene contingent worked diligently at acting as consultant to a number of creative types who sought her out for advice as to their own projects. Fulfilling enough work, true, although all the time 22 knew in her heart she was restless and unsatisfied...for her own body of work, the reason for which she had been incarnated, was sorely in need of attention: the true story comprising two tablets of supposed stone.

One sunny afternoon, while particularly wrestling with an angel of conscience and attempting to concentrate on yet another film treatment she really did not care to be reading, the ringing of Marie Negre's telephone, incessantly it seemed, was near to driving her mad. In a fit of pique, the Black Popess finally left her desk, grabbed the red receiver of the annoying herald and near-barked, "HELLO??"

"Oh my gods, it's really you, you finally picked up the bloody thing," she heard a breathless voice exclaim. "It's me, Olivia, something horrible has happened - I just got this email from someone I haven't heard from in ages - she's back and she's getting married, and..."

"Whoa...whoa...who is back? What could be so terrible?" 22 asked with genuine concern for her friend, who had never called her before unless something really big was up, indeed. Or, unless Olivia had celebrated with some Château Gâteau Margaux and was completely in her cups, however, that is another subject altogether and not one of present concern.

"Okay," Miss O began, first by catching her breath, "I woke up this morning to find an email in my inbox from Estella - more of an engagement announcement, really - the worst part is, she's tying the knot on Mary Magdalene's feast day at Nôtre Dame in Paris and she's marrying Prince Stewart of Albania and she's calling herself Madeleine de la Croix now instead of Madeline Lacroix, if you can believe it. Why, she even had the nerve to affix your seal, you know, The Tower, on her stationary..."

"WHAT??? She did WHAT? Send me that email, el pronto mundo...I think we have a wedding reception to crash! She only caught Shortshanks by dangling the Emerald Tablet papers in front of his nose, that cow...not to insult cows...anyway, send me the info, Olivia - if it's genuine, I'll be meeting you on the Rue Cambon in a couple of months."

"I had to tell you first...I cannot believe that all your hard work might end up in enemy hands...gods, I hate all of those buggering infidels..." whereupon the two women began to laugh, exhanged their good-byes, dusted off their John Fluevog dovelies (required footwear of all D-O-M-M members), checked their Hermes wrist rockets for ammo and got down to work. What soon arrived in 22's Inbox did little to allay her fears, and set her on a new course of action, all in the stroke of one tiny click found next to a trusty computer keyboard...









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