Pantheon 00 - Age of Godpunk by James Lovegrove Read Free Book Online Page B

shared look behind the eyes, unifying us.
    Susanoo-no-Mikoto , said Anansi, indicating a young Japanese man with an imperious, brooding air. And over there, that’s Crow . A thickset Australian Aborigine with impossibly black eyes, as though he had no irises, only great dark pupils.
    Between us we put names to several other faces. A Chinese man with a certain simian cast to his appearance was Sun Wukong, the Monkey King. A swarthy little chap with quick green eyes had to be Gwydion from Wales. A young Greek with long ringleted hair who kept relentlessly checking his texts on his mobile phone was clearly Hermes, while next to him squatted a middle-aged Latino whose expression was as sinisterly sly as anyone’s I’ve seen.
    Eshu, from the Santería tradition , Anansi confirmed. And as for that Scandinavian blonde...
    Well, who could fail to identify Loki? The famous Norse gender-switcher had come in the guise of a woman. A beautiful one at that. Slender, angular and icily lovely.
    He’s pulled this stunt before , Anansi pointed out. And he’ll use it to his advantage, you mark my words. Someone or other will think with their penis, not their brains, and get caught out by him. It’s as inevitable as sunrise. Just make sure it’s not us, heh?
    I took the advice on board: think with brains, not penis. Ironic, coming from him.
    Then a figure went bounding up onto the small podium. He was a Native American with weathered ochre skin and iron-grey plaits. He wore jeans and a denim waistcoat, and his bootlace tie was secured by a silver clasp in the shape of a coyote’s head.
    Coyote – who else could it be? – raised a hand in order to command silence, although truth be told, the room wasn’t that noisy to begin with. We fellow avatars turned towards him, waiting for him to address us.
    Yawn, yawn , said Anansi.
    I told him to pipe down.
    “Greetings, all,” said the Native American. “My name is William Gad. I have another name, which I’m sure you know. For the time being, we all do. But you can call me Bill. I’d like to welcome you to my homeland. These are the desert plains from which I sprang. Here are the canyons and arroyos I haunt, the salt flats and mesas where story-craft and ritual continues to keep me vibrant and alive. It’s a harsh, unforgiving landscape, but it teems with secret life and its beauties are plain for all to see.”
    He smiled whitely – good, sturdy American dentistry.
    “So, we reunite again,” he said. “The wheel of seasons has turned, the years have flown by, a new generation has been born and grown to adulthood, and once more we are ready to compete. I see there are...”
    He performed a quick head count.
    “...forty-five of us. Not as many as last time. In fact, maybe the lowest turnout we’ve ever had. Sad to say, our numbers are in decline. Some of us cannot even muster the power to manifest on Earth now. Those guys’ stories are so poorly preserved, their reputations so sidelined and diminished, they may as well no longer exist. We mourn their absence. But...”
    He brightened.
    “But we should celebrate our presence, too. Our continued puissance, if you’ll forgive the fancy French word. We’re still here, still hanging on, still known and noted, even in a world as godless as this. That’s got to be worth a round of applause. Can I hear one?”
    Most of us did clap. I was one of the few that didn’t. Not my style.
    “All right,” said Bill Gad. “Down to business. At this stage in the proceedings, it’s customary to restate the rules of the contest, such as they are. So here goes. As of dawn tomorrow, each of us is entitled to bring mayhem, chaos and disarray into the lives of any or all of the others. The means can be fair or foul, pleasant or offensive, so long as the victim is left significantly and materially disadvantaged in some way. Anything that achieves this result is allowable. And those are the rules.”
    We thought he’d finished, but it seemed he had