Dead Waters (31 page)

“But why?” the Inspectre asked again. “Back in our day, you had everything in control. You were powerful. We were going to fight the good fight side by side.”

“You don’t understand,” Mason said. “Do you even remember the day I told you I was leaving the Department?”

The Inspectre paused in recall, but I stepped forward.

“I do,” I said. “That was the day you almost died, yes? There was a fissure in the earth of a graveyard, ghouls pouring out it—”

“Exactly,” Mason said, giving me a look of suspicion, “but how do
you
know that?”

I held my hands up and wiggled my fingers. “Psychometrist,” I said. “I let my fingers do the walking.”

“Fascinating,” he said. A spark of interest lit up on his face, the same spark of fascinated curiosity I had seen on it from the vision.

“Look,” I said. “I get it. I really do. For the Inspectre here, that day is but a distant memory, but for me? My powers made it seem like only yesterday. I’ve even
felt
how you feel. I know the panic you felt that day when you were nearly dragged down into the earth. I understand why you walked away from that life of risk. Hell, I have days in the office where I want to just throw the towel in, too.”

Mason was paying attention to me now. He stared at me like I was stupid. “So, why don’t you, then?” he asked

I shrugged. I wasn’t quite sure of the answer myself

“It’s not in his nature,” Jane said, speaking up in my defense.

Mason Redfield laughed at that. “Not
yet
, anyway,” he said.

“What do you mean by that?” I asked.

“How old are you?” Mason asked. “In your twenties still, yes?”

“What’s that got to do with it?” I asked.

“Everything,”
he said, darkness thick in his voice. “I almost died that day you saw, and every day after that I wondered when the other shoe was going to drop. When was the grim reaper going to show up at my door? Over time it built, festered. . . and the years slipped by, age creeping up on me, robbing me of my strength, and I couldn’t help but wonder if maybe there was a way to cheat death. There had to be.”

The Inspectre shook his head at his old friend. “So you struck a bargain,” he said, “with that woman in green. Tell me, Mason, how did you manifest her? You haven’t practiced arcana in years.”

“Actually,” Mason said, “finding her was purely accidental. I unearthed her withered remains while researching the ship graveyard below the Hell Gate Bridge for a perfectly normal documentary I wanted to do about those mundane horrors your friend here suggested. Charybdis was damaged, weakened, and needed my help, which I gladly offered in exchange for some help of my own I wanted.”

“This is her weak?” Jane asked. “Geez. I’d hate to see her in tip-top shape.”

“No,” Mason said. “Once we raise Scylla and Charybdis takes control of her host, she will return to her full power. It took years to return her to her current state. I helped her recover and she promised in return to tell me dark secrets to assist me in pursuit of my rebirth.”

“At the expense of others,” the Inspectre reminded him.

“No,” Mason said. “Not at first, anyway. Originally I only twisted my students to the use of magic trying to make film come alive. Nefarious, but mostly harmless. I kept my grander plan for my youth a secret. When Charybdis was recovered enough to her satisfaction, she finally shared those dark secrets with me. I never knew she would want blood in return.”

“Oh, come, now,” the Inspectre said. “We both know that’s not true. You must surely have suspected. Even with what you had seen in your short time with the Department, you must have known that such a bargain would bear a heavy price.”

“Perhaps,” he said, admitting it with a slight smile, “but it is a price I’ve come to live with for the promise of rebirth.”

It was the Inspectre’s turn to smile, but there was a sadness to it.

“You can’t cheat death,” the Inspectre said.

“Oh, no?” Mason asked, turning to look at Aidan. “What about him? He seems to be doing quite well at it.”

“Make no mistake,” the Inspectre said. “Death even comes to their kind, even if it is staved off by supernatural means. Some give up wanting to live, some are struck down by vampire hunters, but eventually death comes to us
all
.”

“Hey!” Aidan said. “Not cool with all this talk about me dying, guys.”

Mason Redfield looked around for a way to escape as we argued in the growing fury of the storm, but there was none.

“Come, now, Mason,” the Inspectre said, walking after him. “Give yourself up. You can’t run anymore. You’re surrounded.”

Mason spun around, angry. “Are you happy growing old, Argyle? Are you?”

The Inspectre stopped. “Honestly, no,” he said, “but it has made me appreciate life all the more for what it is. We get one go-round, Mason. That’s all.”

“Well, not me,” he said, “and once I am finished carrying out Charbydis’s wishes, I intend to get right on appreciating my second one.”

“How are you helping her with the ritual?” I asked.

Mason fixed me with a sinister stare. “You shall see,” he said.

“No, Mason,” the Inspectre said, good and pissed. I had never seen him this angry. “This ends. . . now.”

As a group, our circle closed in on Mason Redfield. I held the business end of my bat up high, ready to swing. Redfield was close enough that I’d have no trouble dropping him if needed, but a second later that wasn’t even an option.

A blast of water shot up through the slats of the bridge itself, shattering some of its structure and flinging shards of it in every direction. The water wrapped itself in a wide circle around Redfield, rising up above him for several feet and staying around him like some bizarre waterfall feature at a mall. One thing was sure: Mason Redfield wasn’t responsible for it. Even he looked surprised to see it happening.

Inside the protective circle the water began to solidify until the woman in green stood by his side. Her hair swirled in the chaos of the growing storm.

“Nice Medusa effect,” I said.

“Wrong Greek monster, kid,” Connor said.

“Sorry.” I tested the wall of water with my bat. The rushing water threatened to tug my bat skyward from my hand, but I tightened my grip and pulled it back. Before I could do anything else, the woman’s voice boomed out into the night.

“Prokypto,”
she said, holding her arms out and looking down through the bridge.

“What?” I said.

“It’s Greek,” Connor said. “
Arise.
She’s starting the ritual now!”

I looked down, too. Below, the water churned against the edge of the island like it was boiling. Bits of old, rotted wood rose to the surface, ancient timbers that littered the surface, looking like tiny toothpicks from where we stood.

“I gather those are the remains of the
General Slocum
,” Connor said.

“And countless other ships, no doubt,” the Inspectre added.

“Aidan,” I said, looking over at him on the far side of the water barrier. “Do something!”

He shook his head. “What part of ‘not good with water’ did you not get, Canderous?”

“Fine,” I said. “I’ll handle it myself.” I rushed the wall of water protecting the woman and Mason Redfield. The woman was already looking toward me, waiting. She pointed her arms out at me.

No, not at me.
Past
me. Jane screamed, stopping me in my tracks. I spun around. She was doubled over, clutching her arms around her midsection. “Jane!”

“Get her away from here, kid,” Connor said. “Now. At least off the bridge, anyway. If the woman can’t have Jane, she can’t complete her ceremony. Hopefully, anyway.”

“Right,” I said, grabbing Jane around her shoulders. We ran off as the Inspectre started talking reason with Mason through the wall of water. As we ran farther away from the woman and the professor, a new sound filled the air as we dodged through the swarm of lingering ghosts. A rush of water of tidal-wave proportions filled my ears and I looked down through the bridge. The surface of the river erupted, a greenish gray mass of land rising up, water pouring off it in waterfalls. No, not land, I realized.
Flesh.
Whatever was rising was alive. It rolled as it rose, exposing the familiar yellow eye I had seen in the vision of the
General Slocum
sinking. Scylla was no longer dormant, and even bigger than when I had seen it. A jagged maw of teeth opened to nearly the size of a bus, water running down into its throat. A gurgling roar rose up from it, causing me to grab Jane tighter and run a little faster.

“Who invited the kraken?” Jane asked with weakness in her voice.

“Scylla,” I corrected. “Godfrey called it that.”

Jane looked good enough to stand again and the two of us stopped where we were to stare at the monstrosity.

“Whatever it’s called,” I said, “I’m pretty sure my bat alone isn’t going to take it down. Good thing I equipped the boat with the ram. I’ll see if I can put a nice boat-sized hole in that. . .
thing
. Godfrey told me when all else fails, go for the heart.”

“What can I do?” Jane asked. There was concern on her face, but I could see how hard she was still fighting the effect of the green woman’s mark on her.

“Stay here,” I said, “and don’t let her get control of you. Keep fighting her, Jane. I’ll be back soon. I promise.”

Jane nodded, but the look on her face was pained.

“Listen, Simon,” she said. “I’m sorry about the whole drawer thing.”

I stared at her, incredulous. “You want to get into this
now
?”

Even in the rain, I noticed tears streaming down her face. “It’s just. . . I’m so in love with you and the idea that you didn’t want me around all the time, well, it hurt.”

I pulled Jane to safety behind of one of the bridge supports. “Jane!” I said. “This is so not the time.”

She looked like I had slapped her. “Do you hate me or something?” she asked, hurt. “It’s just that I don’t know how long I can stop this from overtaking me and I need to get this off my chest.”

Given the chaos all around us and the distracting amount of pain she was in, I couldn’t believe we were getting into this now. Either way, I had to make this fast or we were sure to die in the middle of it all. I dug into my satchel, pushed past my Ghostbusters lunch box, and pulled out a slip of paper. I handed it to her. “There,” I shouted over the noise. “You see, Jane.
This
is how much I hate you.”

“What’s this?” she asked, looking at it, and then back up at me.

“It’s a receipt,” I said. “I found a dresser, online. I hate you
so
much that I agonized and searched for days trying to find just the right piece for your stuff in my apartment because I can’t stand you.” Jane’s eyes widened, and I forced myself to stop shouting at her. I hadn’t meant to, but the dire situation had me caught up in the moment. I softened my voice. “You know how anal I get about selecting stuff for
my own
needs. . . It took all of my spare time and energy to even come close to finding the exact right one that would be perfect for you. I love you and I realized that’s not going to change. What I mean is . . . that dresser is just the beginning. I know you weren’t asking me to, but I’m telling you. . . I want you to move in with me. Whatever angry flare-ups or hesitation I had before, that was just me letting the psychometric emotions of another interfere with my own insecurities. I know that now. Like the Inspectre said, we get one go-round. I want mine to be with you.”

Jane continued staring at the receipt, a smile slowly building on her face. “Oh, Simon, thank you,” she said. “I love
you
.”

She wrapped her arms around me and kissed me hard. I melted into it, but after a few moments I felt I had to pull away.

“Not to put a damper on things,” I said, “but we kinda need to do something here. Something along the heroic lines.”

“Oh,” she said. “Okay. Right. Of course.”

She handed the slip of paper back to me, hands trembling. When I went to reach for it, it slipped from her hand, the wind catching it and blowing it away. I turned, grabbing for it. It was just a slip of paper, but the weight of everything it stood for was so important that I felt compelled to get it back. It tumbled along the walkway of the bridge and I ran a few steps before catching it, then folding it and stuffing it back into my messenger bag as I turned back to Jane.

She wasn’t there. I peered through the dozens of ghosts manifested all along the bridge looking for her. After a moment I caught a hint of movement back where we had all climbed up onto the bridge together earlier. Jane was hurrying to get back to the island below, which meant. . . she had tricked me by pretending to let go of the note too soon. Why? To distract me. To run off before I could stop her.