"Wherever we finally put down roots, Adam's black-box is a go, right man? An extra layer on top of what we insulate with."
"Yeah," Carlos said in a far-off voice. "He gave me his word. It'll also keep dumb humans messing with technology and weapons off our doorsteps so we don't have to cap one of those sonsofbitches."
"Don't even take my mind there, bro," Shabazz said. "I will lose my soul and smoke a motherfucker in a heartbeat if they come for Mar or anybody else again like they did when they blitzed our Beverly Hills joint."
"You ain't said a word," Rider muttered.
"Hey, the way I read it is, 'Thou shall not murder' - note the word 'murder' was supplanted for the word 'kill' later on - two different meanings altogether, hence the problem with translations."
"Aw, shit, you know our team's paperwork man is on this," Jose said, leaning forward.
"School us, Danny boy - you oughta have been a lawyer, man, for real."
"If you go to the old books and original Aramaic that was then translated into Hebrew way before King James butchered the book for his own political reasons," Dan said with conviction, "murder means unjustifiably taking a life - but self-defense and keeping somebody off your wife and kid or yourself by killing an aggressor, human or otherwise, will not keep me up at night. I'll sleep like a baby, believe that. I don't call that murder - so the 'Thou shalt not kill' part has caveats ... we need a translation from the Covenant on this - but if f**ked-up military types rush us to turn us or our loved ones into weapons,
I'm shooting first and asking ques tions later. They could be human helpers of the darkside, and during the Armageddon, too? Shit. Game over, man. If you chose the wrong side."
Mike nodded and glanced at Dan. "We feel you, brother. I got the same situation." Everybody's attention immediately shot to Inez.
"No, no, not like that," Inez said quickly, causing shoul ders to relax. "But my daughter, Ayana ... I need some where for my baby girl and my momma to be, if this mess is getting crazy worldwide."
"Oh," was released in a collective harmony as people slumped back into their chairs. Damali just watched it all from a very remote place in her mind. The brothers were nesting - actually nesting. She'd never seen a male version of this before in her life, and it was eerily interesting as well as disturbing. She glimpsed
Carlos, who still had his back to the group, his emotions locked behind searing sterling and reinforced with an impenetrable black-box.
"I gotta get Rabbi on the phone," Dan said, beginning to pace as he raked his hair. "My parents think I'm on a kibbutz in Israel, and with that region at war, my mom and dad are gonna be freaking out." He stared at Heather, his gaze gentle on the surface with repressed terror only a thin layer beneath it. "I want them to meet you ... and I've gotta update my liv ing will, get everybody's wills in order, open another IRA, make sure I move some things around in my 401 (k) ..."
"Don't panic, man," Shabazz said calmly. "We're gonna make sure it's cool."
"All right," Dan said, leaning against the wall and taking deep breaths. "I'm good. I'm good."
"This joint in San Diego," J.L. said, "we find it on the other side of the fault lines, the ones dormant for years, and if something jumps off, our section of ground breaks whole." He looked over at Heather and Jasmine, then Krissy. "We're gonna need you ladies who do stone work to feel out the area before Dan negotiates a closing on a property."
"We got it," Heather said with pride. "Thank you."
"Hey, it's for everybody, kiddo," Rider said, pounding fists with Shabazz.
"We can go in with Marj and Marlene to see if we can see a good spot or primo property," Juanita offered, glancing at Inez, too.
"Definitely," Inez said, nodding and giving Juanita a long-distance high-five across the room.
"We'll wire the shit out of the joint, too," J.L. said, his gaze scanning the room. "I've been thinking about this ever since Mexico. I'm sure I can figure out a way to supercharge the perimeter from a bounce off tactical energy so Carlos doesn't have to take the energy drains all the time. Silver stakes deep in the ground around the perimeter, and me, Bobby, Dan, and Shabazz can square off that - each linked to a cardinal direction - to put a firstalert energy band around the property that will go off like a tripwire and hit all four brothers like an internal security alarm."
"You's a bad, boy," Mike said, impressed.
"Then I'ma link that to your audio, dude, going through the vibrations our earth energy folks on the team have," J.L. said, "and you'll be able to hear a fly catch in that net, Mike. I can hook up our noses like that, too."
"Damn ... you go, boy!" Jose said, nodding and pounding Rider's fist.
"We use a combo of state-of-the-art technology rigged with our standards from the old compound days, like holy water sprinkler systems, UV floodlights and all of that, plus we rig this new joint with every gift we own. Mar's strong prayer lines, Damali's, the stones on the property, down to the bricks, supercharged by our ladies, the Covenant standing at the four corners consecrating the ground after they bless the interior like that, so we're on hallowed ground and can't nothing come up from subbasements. Paint the floors with colloidal silver for insurance. Fabrics ready to rip off furni ture upholstery and go to work, if necessary, by Jasmine's hand-painted designs. Berkfield's blood in the paint mix over all doors, windows, anyplace anything foul could get in. Alarm plants by - "
"Alarm plants?" Inez interrupted in awe.
"Marjorie has that earth energy, white-lighter Wicca thing going with Kris, and with Bobby's wizard topspin," J.L. said with confidence, "plants, which are living organ isms, should scream bloody murder if anything makes it into the yard, same with houseplants. Give them a voice."
"Now you done went deep, Zen master," Mike said with a wide grin. "What happened last night that took you all the way to the ultimate creative plane, man?" J.L. laughed with the other brothers and simply shrugged. "I was inspired."
"Yeah," Jose said laughing. "Me, too ... like ... I think we should go on tour after we get this joint built."