Chapter 10

On returning to Atlanta, Stewart went home for some well deserved time off. We had both put in a lot of hours while away. I was just glad to stay in one time zone for a while. Working in two different time zones had been a chore, especially since they were twelve hours apart. I spent three days helping Jorani, who was glad to have me back, and getting reacquainted with my Daughters. They were six weeks old now and had grown considerably. There weren’t any problems with them, as they could tell that I am a Dragon, like their Mother and Grandmother.

Everything went fine until Sunday, the 26th of July when we awoke to find TANKS, Army tanks, surrounding our properties and our business. We became aware of this when Dallas and Doreen appeared in the the upstairs hallway of Mom’s house.

“Our properties are surrounded by tanks!” Doreen informed us, after she and Dallas had screamed, “We’ve got a problem, a new Problem,” on arriving.

“What kind of tanks?” Mom asked on joining them in the hallway with a crying Deirdre. Fortunately, our three were still asleep, but that didn’t last long, as Deirdre’s crying quickly woke them, and they started crying also. You couldn’t hear yourself think with all of the noise.

“That will need to wait until the children are taken care of. The perimeter wards are up and all of the Nesting Wards are active. We’ll have a meeting once all of the children are asleep again. The Army will just have to wait,” Mom told us in a loud voice. Dallas and Doreen returned home to their Sons and Daughters, and Mom and Jorani went to take care of their Daughters. This left Dad and me alone in the hallway with him looking at me.

“We should check on Dragon Security. They may have the same problem,” Dad told me. “Let’s dress first,” he added on looking at both of us standing there in our sleepwear. I informed Mom and Jorani where we were going before changing clothes.

We arrived in the management office’s of Dragon Security a short time later. Steve was the one on duty.

“I take it that you are aware of the tanks here,” he said when we appeared. He didn’t appear to be upset or overly concerned about them.

“We are aware of the tanks around our houses. How many are there here?” Dad asked.

“On a quick inspection, we spotted six tanks and a command vehicle. They are the new heavier model of the M2 Abrams. Pleasant Hill is torn up from the interstate highway to the area around our building and parking lot. There will be hell to pay tomorrow, as the traffic will be really screwed up because of the parked tanks on the road and the torn up roadway,” Steve told us with a smile.

“Was there any trouble with the shift change?” Dad asked, as it had been an hour and a half ago.

“No, everyone just transferred in as usual. The perimeter wards are at full strength, as is the house ward around the building. I really don’t see what they hope to accomplish by posting tanks around our business,” he finished.

“They are trying to intimidate us and possibly our customers. I don’t believe they really understand who they are dealing with,” Dad told him. “If you have any trouble, give us a call,” he finished.

“We’ll be back later, after the Queen decides what to do about all of this,” Dad added before we returned home.

After our wives had finished with our Daughters and gotten them to sleep, they came down to the breakfast of ham and egg, and toast and juice that Dad and I had prepared. We had just finished eating when Dallas and Doreen appeared in the kitchen.

“What are WE going to do about these tanks?” Dallas asked in a normal voice. “The police have blocked off the road and set up a detour around us. The story is all over the news also,” she added. Obviously, she and Doreen had been out checking on things. We had also heard the news on the radio on the top of the hour newscast. The station had interrupted their normal Sunday programming to cover the story about the tanks that the Army had sent to blockade the Dragons in our houses and at our business. There was much conjecture of what would happen. They didn’t have any Ley Line users or other Magic users on the program, but our entire family was sure that they were all waiting to see what we would do. Dallas started the discussion off.

“What simple minded idiot thought that tanks would have an effect on us? Didn’t they see what happened in Washington while we were there?” she demanded in an upset voice.

“Of course, the tanks will have no effect on us. We can transfer as usual, and our wards would keep them from doing anything to bother us. The tanks and the Army aren’t our real problem. They are just following orders and are easy to deal with. No, our problem is the politicians who sent them, and we know how to deal with politicians and the government,” Mom told us.

“What are we going to do about the tanks in the mean time?” Dallas asked.

“I would think a freeze spell on the crews and a spell to keep the tanks from working would take care of them,” Mom told her.

“The electric power spell,” I told them with a grin. “If no electricity can flow in the tank, it won’t be able to do anything,” I pointed out.

“Yes that sounds good, Craig, and it won’t injure the crews or the vehicles either,” Mom said with a grin before she brought up something else.

“That may force them to go to the next level of force. That could be artillery or even the Air Force to bomb us,” she said in a very serious voice.

“The Nesting Ward would prevent anything like that from being a problem,” Dallas pointed out.

“But what about your business. It doesn’t have the Nesting Ward,” Jorani injected. She had been quiet for most of the discussion.

“No, it doesn’t,” Mom agreed. “And for a good reason,” she added. “We don’t have enough Females to maintain one there to admit those working for us. They only have the perimeter wards and the house ward,” she finished.

“Well ... well, there might be a way to protect the Dragon Security building,” Doreen said very quietly. She, also, hadn’t said much during the discussion.

“What do you mean, dear?” Mom asked.

“I’ve ... been playing with a ward to see what I could do with it. It’s a ward that would do what the Nesting Ward does, but it could be cast by anyone, especially the males,” she told us.

“Where did you get this idea?” Mom asked.

“I was thinking about how the Nesting Ward forms a bubble to protect a Female from all directions including above and below. I took the part of the original Nesting Ward that was about a sphere and added part of the house ward to it. After playing with it a little, I got a ward that is a sphere but could be cast by anyone with a strong Talent, and Dragons can move through it easily, but not others like the Ley Line users or Witches,” she told us.

“And you can make it any size, like the house ward?” Mom asked.

“Yes, at least large enough to go around our property,” she told her.

“That’s amazing, dear!” Mom told her. “You need to teach everyone in the Family that ward. Then, we will set out and deal with the Army and its tanks. Following that, we will need to think about what to do about the politicians,” Mom told us.

Doreen’s ward was fairly simple to cast but did require a strong Talent to cast it. It wasn’t anything that most of our employees couldn’t handle, and I could see that Dad was smiling as he considered how to add it to our list of protections to our clients.

Doreen called Keith and went over the ward with him. We were now calling it Doreen’s Ward. Keith transferred to Dragon Security to protect the building, and teach the ward to those on duty. We would give the ward to our other employees when they reported for work. They could all cast it around their homes in addition to the other wards they already have around them. We had also filled him in on how we were going to deal with the tanks. He and Steve would take care of the tanks around the building along with some of our other employees.

“It’s also time to deal with the tanks here,” Mom said following that. “There are six tanks plus a command vehicle. That leaves one for each of us,” she added. “Each of you select the one you want, and we’ll proceed. I’ll take the command vehicle in addition to one of the tanks. I’m sure a bit of Dragon Magic will scramble their surveillance equipment,” she finished with a grin. I went over the power denial spell with everyone before we set out to freeze the tank crews and to render the vehicles themselves inoperable. It was way too easy. They never saw us coming, as we were invisible, and it only took a minute or so to cast each of the spells. We were all soon back in the kitchen where we had started.

“Let’s move to the large parlor for the rest of our discussions. We’ll all be more comfortable there,” Mom suggested.

“Now, how do we deal with the government and the politicians?” Mom asked after we were all seated.

“We developed a way to deal with politicians and their government in Tibet last winter,” Jorani told her. “Ask Craig,” she added.

“We quarantined the politicians and the government workers in their buildings with no electricity for a few days, usually three days. Initially, we used an excess of Magic to destroy all of their computers and their backup files to keep them from going after innocent people. Stewart and I needed to repeat that in Lhasa before returning, as the politicians were upset about us quarantining the Guoanbu agents in their hotel,” I told them before reminding them of something.

“Doreen even said that we could do that easily in D.C. when we were there, as so many of the government departments were located so close together there,” I reminded them.

“Yes, I did,” Doreen said with a smile, “But some of them are a bit more distant like the Congress and the Pentagon. It could be difficult to quarantine all of them at the same time, which we would definitely want to do,” she added.

“Not really,” said a smiling Dallas. “We could cast all of the spells, but not activate them until a certain time, like after everyone had reported for work. Then they could all be activated at once,” she added.

“We might need my new spell for some of the buildings, as there are tunnels that connect some of them,” Doreen reminded us.

“Get out the maps of downtown D.C. We need to look at how many buildings we are talking about,” Mom told us.

Following a study of the large scale maps of the downtown D.C. area, we wound up with a list of fifty buildings. We were shocked by the extent of the list.

“Do we really need to quarantine all of these buildings?” Dad asked when the list was complete.

“We definitely need to quarantine all of the buildings immediately around the White House and the White House itself,” Dallas insisted.

“The Pentagon and Homeland Security plus Justice and the FBI,” I contributed.

“The Capitol and all of those office buildings where those from Congress hide. That would be seven buildings,” Doreen contributed.

“The D.C. Municipal Center and the Court House plus the D.C. Police headquarters building. Perhaps the Supreme Court building also,” Dad suggested.

“Don’t forget those from Foggy Bottom ... the State Department and the Interior Department,” Mom added. Jorani didn’t have a suggestion, as she wasn’t as familiar with our government as the rest of us were.