The Getaway God

  A legionnaire by the bar pops off a few shots. Seeing his friends go down so fast must have spooked him because he fires wildly, murdering furniture and the floor. I move in on him as he finally remembers he’s a soldier and raises his gun. He hits me twice in the chest and I go down face-­first.

  I’m beginning to think no one in Hell likes me.

  I try to sit up and meet a gun barrel halfway there. Mr. Sausage Fingers has his Glock pointed at my head. He squeezes the trigger and there isn’t a goddamned thing I can do about it.

  A gun goes off and the first thing I notice is how extremely not dead I am and how Mr. Sausage Fingers has a fist-­size hole in his chest. I look over and there’s Cindil, shaky-­legged, her mouth open like she’s either going to puke or sing “America the Beautiful,” holding my Colt. She shoots again and Mr. Sausage Fingers hits the deck.

  Cue all hell breaking loose. The three remaining legionnaires open up on the room, some shooting at me and some at the others. I roll behind Sausage Fingers’ body, find his dropped Glock, and fire back. My hand is unsteady enough that I hit absolutely nothing of interest.

  Cindil keeps firing my Colt, even while Bill drags her behind the bar. I don’t know if she hits any of the soldiers, but she looks fierce enough to give them something to worry about.

  A moment later Bill pops up from behind the bar with the pistol I gave him earlier. I stop firing and make myself very small. What else am I going to do? I’m good with a gun, but Wild Bill was the greatest shootist in the west, and even if he’s past his prime he’s better than me nursing a ­couple of slugs in my chest.

  The shooting doesn’t last long. When it’s over Sausage Fingers has a few more holes in him, but I don’t. The rest of the soldiers lie splayed around the room. Bill comes from around the bar and puts one more bullet in each of their heads. Technically it’s to make sure they’re really out, but there’s also a small measure of payback for the century of misery he’s spent under the heel of Hellions.

  I pull myself up and onto a chair.

  Cindil comes around in front of me. She opens my coat and makes a face.

  “You’re shot.”

  “It’s not the first time. And I’ve been hit worse. Let me just sit here a minute.”

  She crosses her arms and looks down at me.

  “You walk into Hell to find me and you blow it off when you get shot. What exactly are you?”

  “Just hard to kill is all.”

  When I first went to Max Overdrive after escaping Hell, Kasabian shot me six times. I’m pretty sure I only took two bullets tonight, but they hurt like six banshees with seven machetes. The bullets will have to come out eventually, but not tonight. Tonight I get to rattle around like a pinball machine.

  Bill brings me a glass of Hellion rotgut. I take a long pull. Bill pulls up a chair and sits down.

  “You can’t stay here and you can’t come back. More soldiers will come looking for their friends.”

  “You can’t stay either. You’re both coming with me.”

  “Where to?” says Cindil.

  “To meet Lucifer. Well, retired Lucifer. He’ll explain it.”

  By the time I finish the drink my head feels like it’s back on straight again. I get up and head for a shadow.

  “You two coming?”

  They follow me over and I lead them through the Room and out again into the hellhound kennel.

  Samael is still there, smoking a Malediction and drinking from a silver flask. He raises his eyebrows at us.

  “That was quick,” he says. Then eyes my shirt. “But you took the time to hurt yourself again. If only you were this productive when you ran Hell.”

  Cindil looks at me.

  “You ran Hell?”

  “I was more of a summer intern. Samael will explain everything.”

  I point to each of them in turn.

  “This is Cindil and this is Wild Bill. Take care of them, will you?”

  Samael graciously offers his flask to his guests. Both decline.

  “Of course I will. And then I’ll wash your car, shall I?”

  “You know I ride a bike these days. But it could use some detailing.”

  I nod toward the cages.

  “You three might want to get out of here. I’m letting the hounds out.”

  Samael leads Bill and Cindil to the elevator.

  As the doors close Samael says, “Love you in red, James.”

  ONCE THE HOUNDS are happily prowling around the kennels, I head back for Vigil HQ.

  Shot and bloody, I need a moment to myself, so I come out into the parking lot with a lovely view of the golf course. It’s flooded now, so they’ve given up playing games. Abandoned golf carts still loaded with clubs sit out in the rain with water up past their wheels. I wade out into the deep and steal a club. I always wondered what those things feel like. The weight is strange. All on the end, like a morning star. Maybe we could have used these in the arena. Play a quick round of eighteen holes and the winner beats the loser to death with a putter. I take a swing and the bullets in my chest grind against bone.

  Ow. That was stupid.

  But the pain pulls me back into myself and I toss the club out into the rain. When I turn to go inside I happen to notice that I’m standing next to a God.

  He’s in an ordinary chop-­shop body, but it’s obvious he’s not an ordinary demon. He’s naked. Rain pools and trickles down the thick scars where his mismatched limbs go together. A blue-­eyed blond head perched on an olive-­skinned chest, one muscular nut-­brown leg and the other white and flabby with the Addams Family tattooed down the calf. His form isn’t entirely solid, but transdimensional like Ten Thousand Shadows. With the slightest movement, like when he looks up into the night sky, his body morphs from male to female, to something like a sea anemone with eyes on the ends of its stingers, to an ice-­blue light encased in a living glass cage shaped like one of Mason’s polyhedral dice.

  The rain stops. It doesn’t end. It just stops. Drops suspended in the air like a million Christmas lights.

  “It is good to finally meet, Sandman Slim. I heard so much about you from Aswangana.”

  “How is Lamia? She looked better in a party dress.”

  “You could have killed her when she was in such a vulnerable form. Why did you hesitate?”

  “I guess I felt sorry for her. Fucked over once by God and again by the ­people controlling her earthly form.”

  The God cocks his head. It goes from the blond man to a bird’s skull to something dark and gelatinous.

  “Sympathy for a fallen God,” he says. “That is why we respect you. You have a better sense of us than most. That is why I’m here. The nephilim and Angra are outcasts together. Join us and be an outcast no more.”

  “What’s your name?”

  He looks at me like it’s a strange question.

  “I do not have a name. My name is the sound of the trembling void between the stars.”

  “Listen, Shaky, some of your friends already tried the sales pitch. I told them no and I’ll tell you no. I understand how pissed off you are. I’ve felt it too. It isn’t easy being the only one of me in a universe where everyone hates you. But I can’t let you destroy the place. All my friends are here, and so’s my stuff. I mean, I just got Bullet for the General on Blu-­ray.”

  “I know you cannot use the Qomrama Om Ya. Give it to me. Only a portion of me came through the rift. I will summon myself and then the other Angra. You will see. It will be glorious.”

  “It’s not just me, you know. The Vigil will fight you. The Sub Rosa too.”

  He laughs and I get a little hint of what he means by the void between the stars. The sound is deep, lonely, and cold.

  “The Sub Rosa will come to us when the moment is right. They are part of us. Why do you think their portion of humanity is
more powerful than the rest? Able to manipulate the forces of nature? What you call magic.”

  “They ate all their vegetables when they were kids?”

  “It is because like all demons, the Sub Rosa are simply another form of Qliphoth. The most sophisticated form, which means that when the time comes they will recognize us as their progenitors and return home to us.”

  Holy shit. The Sub Rosa are just skin flakes from the Angra’s backside. Brainy, complicated Qliphoth, but in the big scheme of things no better than a Digger or an Eater. Wait until the gals around the watercooler hear about this.

  “If I told you yes, you’d know I was lying, so I’m not going to bother. The answer was no before and it’s no now.”

  He raises his hand, claw, tentacle.

  “I could kill you right here, on this spot.”

  I take a step back.

  “I have the Qomrama, so I’m not sure I believe you. I’m not great at using it, but it’s killed for me before. Want to see if it will kill again?”

  “If you can kill me why don’t you?”

  “I don’t want to kill you. I just want you to fuck off and leave us alone.”

  Shaky takes a step, closing the distance between us.

  “You can’t kill me. The Qomrama won’t let you.”

  “I told you. I don’t want to kill you.”

  I pull the black blade and slash his throat, cutting through the vertebrae and muscle at the back so his head pops off and slops onto the wet ground. Shaky kneels down and picks it up.

  “Let’s see if you can put yourself together before I figure out the 8 Ball.”

  Shaky sets his head onto his shoulders and walks away into the dark.

  Rain begins to fall again.

  So, to sum up. Tonight I had my throat crushed. I was tossed around like a beanbag. I was beaten with a gun butt. I was shot. And now another God hates me. I want a smoke, but when I cough I taste blood. Maybe some bullet fragments in a lung. I put the Maledictions back in my pocket.

  It’s nights like this that make me want to give up the glamorous work of world saving and take up woodworking or needlepoint. Something soothing and without quite so much ass kicking aimed in my direction.

  I wipe the blood off my mouth and head inside.

  THE PLACE IS still a mess. Marshals clear away wreckage and try to salvage equipment. They’re dispatching patrols to make sure the rest of the city didn’t fall down. Rain pours in through the roof, making the floor slick and dangerous. No one pays the slightest attention to me.

  The Shonin’s lab is still a wreck, but a pathway has been cleared from the door to his worktable. He’s picking through the wreckage, looking for books and manuscripts he might be able to save. When he hears me he drops into his chair, cradling his broken arm in his good one.

  “So, did you mess everything up, fatso?”

  “They’re going to do it. Mr. Muninn is. Oh, and I met Zeus on the way in here.”

  He sits up a little straighter.

  “One of the Angra?”

  “The Angra. The head cheese. Seems like a sweet guy, but a little pissed off.”

  “You’re going to need the Qomrama.”

  “You’re not going to rat me out, are you?”

  “At the monastery, the only ­people punished more than rule breakers were tattletales.”

  I help him up and we slowly pick our way over downed beams, crushed furniture, and ceiling tiles. He’s so full of poison he can barely lift his feet. It takes minutes getting across the room and I can feel every second ticking away.

  Once we get to the magnetic chamber, he shuts it down and opens the door. I pull off my glove and take out the 8 Ball with my Kissi hand. The Shonin gives me the box Father Traven made to hold the Qomrama. I put it inside and drop it into my coat pocket.

  “There,” he says. “If anyone is watching us, we are both complicit.”

  “Thanks, old man.”

  I help him back to his chair. He sits and scratches his head with his good hand.

  “What time is it?” he says.

  I get out my phone.

  “A little past eight-­thirty.”

  He doesn’t say anything and doesn’t move when I go over to him. That’s it then. Four hundred years hanging around this rock and it ends in a broken-­down Beverly Hills country club. A funny end to a strange life. But he came through when he had to, and that’s more than I can say for most ­people.

  I straighten him upright in the chair and lay his hands in his lap in the Dhyana mudra, the only bit of dilettante L.A. Buddhism I can remember.

  Someone is at the door. I look up and see Julie. She stops and grimaces.

  “You’re shot.”

  “Yeah. I’m hard on clothes.”

  “Where have you been?”

  “I just got my ass kicked in Hell. How are you?”

  She comes in and looks around the room.

  “I never know what to believe when you open your mouth.”

  “Want to meet the Devil?” I put out my hand. “Just say the word.”

  “I’ll pass.”

  I try to angle myself between her and the magnetic chamber, hoping she won’t notice that it is gone. But she isn’t looking at me. She’s spotted the Shonin and goes over to him.

  “My God. What happened?”

  “I think the book finally finished him. Will you take care of his body?”

  She shakes her head.

  “I can’t. We have a report of a mob of Saint Nick’s corpses around Hollywood Forever Cemetery. They’re starting to move into the streets, destroying everything in the way. Believe it or not, there are still civilians in the city.”

  Hollywood Forever. I can’t get away from the place. When I die for the last time, dump me in the ocean or a landfill or chop me up and serve me as corn dogs at the state fair. Just don’t bury me in Hollywood Forever.

  “Let me handle it.”

  “By yourself?” she says.

  “I’ll have backup, but your agents won’t want to meet them. Give me an hour before you send anyone in.”

  “Listen. After everything that’s happened, these cowboys want to get out and shoot something. I don’t know how long I can keep them here.”

  “Think of something. I’m just asking for an hour. It’ll save some of your ­people’s lives.”

  She thinks for a minute.

  “Half an hour.”

  “Good enough.”

  I start out, but stop.

  “You mind if I take some body armor?”

  She looks at my bloody shirt.

  “You look like you need it.”

  “Yeah. I kind of do.”

  “Let’s go find you something.”

  “One more thing. I want you to do me a favor.”

  Her eyes narrow.

  “Why should I?”

  “Because afterward you’ll own me.”

  “Keep talking.”

  WHEN I’M FITTED up with a vest, I take a shadow to Max Overdrive, fire up the Hellion hog, and head Downtown. Not to see Muninn or Samael or anyone else who can talk. I come straight out into the kennels, where a hundred-­plus hellhounds wander restlessly. I’m in and out fast in case anyone wanders down here. I only have a half hour and I don’t want to spend it explaining anything to anyone.

  As soon as I corral the last hounds I lead them into a shadow at the far end of the place. Their growls and the grinding of their gears fill the air. Their claws tear up the concrete. It’s beautiful.

  We come out right in front of Hollywood Forever.

  Julie said there were chop shops here and she wasn’t exaggerating. Only they’re not in the cemetery anymore.

  It’s like New Year’s fucking Eve outside the gates. Wall-­to-­wall, shoulder-­to-­shoulder Q
liphoth morons claw their way onto Santa Monica Boulevard. When the street opens up enough that they have room, they head off in different directions, splashing like happy monster pups off to gnaw on what’s left of L.A.’s soggy carcass.

  I don’t have to tell the hellhounds what to do. They sense it the moment they get a look at Mason’s berserkers and rip into the mob without a word from me. The chop shops fight back, but they’re just stitched together meat salads and no match for a hyped-­up mob of mechanical hellspawn. In just a minute, it’s like a holiday sale at Ed Gein’s butcher shop. Arms and legs in the half-­price bin. Bones and livers on special, two for one.

  I can’t say the carnage is pretty, but it is satisfying. Mason got the better of me with the games, but I can take back a little from him by flattening his street muscle.

  The hounds are well trained. They don’t hang around playing with the dead chop shops. Groups of them peel off and follow the rest of the mob through the storm into town. I rev the bike and head that way too. Mason’s goons will be on Hollywood Boulevard eventually, which means they could make it to Max Overdrive. I have to make that sure that Candy and, yeah, even Kasabian are all right.

  I head up Gower from the cemetery. Notice a ­couple of cop cars a street over, but mostly keep my eyes on the road. It’s hard to hold the bike steady in the flooded streets.

  There isn’t a light on anywhere and the clouds have closed in, so even the stars are gone. I stop and put on the night-­vision goggles Julie gave me. The city glows a faint green, just bright enough that I can navigate.

  I make it across Fountain and Sunset, but at Selma Avenue the streets light up like I’ve gone over the rim of a volcano. I pull the goggles off and squint my eyes as two LAPD squad cars pull up nose to nose, blocking the road.

  Normally in a situation like this I’d be quite disinclined to stick around. I’d zip around the cars on the sidewalk or turn tail and head south. But I still have my Vigil ID. Protection from on high and legit as greenbacks. I button my coat so they won’t see the bullet holes and ask stupid questions, then step off the bike.