Humanity, at large, enjoys a dichotomous role in supernatural politics. On the one hand they are sneered at and held in contempt for being patently unable to come to grips with reality, to the point where the supernatural world hardly needed to bother to hide from them. Given half a chance, the average human being would rationalize the most bizarre of encounters down to “unusual but explainable” events. They are referred to as herd animals by a lot of the things that prey on them, and often toyed with and tormented.

On the other hand, no one wants to get them stirred up, either. Humanity, when frightened and angry, is a force even the supernatural world does not wish to reckon with. The torches and pitchforks are just as deadly, in their numbers and their simple rage, as they ever were—and it was my opinion that most of the supernatural crowd had very little appreciation for just how destructive and dangerous mankind had grown in the past century.

Which is why I found myself sorely tempted to let the Denarians get a big old faceful of angry cop. Five or six rifles like Gard’s might not kill Mantis Girl—but if you followed them up with thirty or forty pairs of stompy combat boots for all the little bugs, Little Miss Clamphands could go down for the count.

Of course, all that was predicated on the idea that the humans involved a) knew what they were up against and b) took it seriously and worked together tightly enough to get the job done. Murphy and the guys in SI might have a pretty good grasp of the situation, but the others wouldn’t. They’d be expecting a soldier movie, but they’d be getting something out of a horror flick instead. I didn’t for one second believe that Murphy or Stallings or anyone else in Chicago could make everyone involved listen to them once they started talking about demons and monsters.

I rubbed at my head again, thinking of Sanya. Maybe we could try to explain it in more palatable terms. Instead of “shapeshifting demons” we could tell them that the terrorists were in possession (ha-ha, get it?) of “experimental genetically engineered biomimetic armored suits.” Maybe that would give them the framework they needed to get the job done.

And maybe it wouldn’t. Maybe they’d run into something out of a nightmare and start screaming in fear. Coordination and control would go right out the window, especially if the Denarians had anyone with enough magical juice to start blowing out technology. Then would come the panic and slaughter and terror.

“It’s an idea,” I said to Murphy. “Maybe even a workable idea. But I don’t think its time has come. At least, not yet.”

Her eyes flashed very blue. “And you’re the one who decides.”

I took another sip of beer and set the bottle down again, deliberately. “Apparently.”

“Says who?” Murphy demanded.

I leaned back in my chair. “In the first place,” I said quietly, “even if you brought in all that firepower, the best you could hope for is a hideously bloody, costly victory. In the second place, there’s a chance that I can resolve this whole thing through Council channels—or at least make sure that when the fur starts flying, we’re not in the middle of the bloody town.”