The Forsaken - The Apocalypse Trilogy: Book Two (42 page)

“Demons are consummate shape shifters, and
darkness has always been their ally.” Passport replaced his hat.
“But there is little time for debate. The Army of the Dead moves
toward its first victory.”

“Not that I buy one word of what you’re
saying.” The Prime slid along the wall toward the window. “But
let’s just look at it in theory. This theory that you propose, I
will need time to study its ramifications.”

“Very well.” Passport straightened. Passport
began to walk toward the door; he paused and turned. “I will
contact you in twelve hours. Perhaps by then, events will have
demonstrated what I have tried to convince you of in words. Good
day, Prime.” Passport pulled the door open, froze there a moment
and walked out.

The Prime was across the floor in a flash. He
swept the door aside. His secretary looked up at him. “Yes, Prime?”
The leader of Westprime looked up the long hallway that led to an
elevator. It was empty. He looked to either side of the door.

“Miss—” The Prime could not remember her
name. “Whatever… Has there been anyone here to see me, today?”

“No, Prime.” The secretary’s round blue eyes
reflected the overhead light and glinted like sadness. “Is there
someone I should…”

“No, nothing!” the Prime said and pulled the
door shut after him. His office was empty. Of course, if Passport
were a Demon’s assistant, then he would have knowledge of Infernal
powers—if he wasn’t a Demon himself. Suddenly, the Prime became
aware of the dampness on the back of his jacket. He had sweated it
right through.

58 – Stowaway

Conan lagged behind far enough that he could
barely hear the Quinlan twins yakking about taking the lead. The
little fighter knew he had to do something about the spooky dead
girl that was still following them and it was starting to twist his
underwear. He’d heard her off and on, and saw her move like a
silent shadow before he crawled through the hole in the foundation
of Whistles’ Bar. Sophie was not a real fighter, and he thought she
might do something creepy to fuck up the Squeaker rescue. And if he
could hear her, other things could listen too. So he backtracked to
catch her and say:
Sneak-and-peek-go-home
.

After a few hours wink and snore, they left
Whistles’ and dove back into the darkness. They were now deep in
the crisscross-curly-spiral crust of concrete and rebar,
maintenance and drainage tunnels that made up Level Three. Conan
knew that the ventilation shafts were close. They gave the fighters
doors into the Tower in the past. He quietly-secretly
cross-finger-hoped the last information gathering sneakers had not
been seen and the way was still open arms wide. Once they were into
the main body of the Tower, the shafts would take them anywhere
they wanted to go and peek: even the Orphanage. Kids that got away
didn’t remember much about the place except that bad things
happened, and they didn’t know the way out with panic screaming in
their ears.

But most people were yakking that the
Orphanage and the science place could be found near the bottom of
the Tower.

He didn’t have to backtrack far—and was
screech
putting on the brakes when a sudden quiet thump
brought Conan’s die-flower up and ready to carve and kill. Ahead,
the vent-lined tunnel took a jog to the left around a new support
structure for the upper levels. Just past the corner, the dim
yellow maintenance lights could not see into the shadow.

He scurried forward and stopped. The little
fighter took a quick view around into the dark. His breath caught.
They were both surprised—with throat-lumps and
ghaks
! Sophie
was there. Her mask, hands and legs seemed scare-show floating
against a velvet curtain. She fast pressed herself against the
wall, obscured by a heavy cable.

Conan hurried up to her shaking his head, and
pointing the way they had come.
Go on go
! Sophie just lifted
a cold white hand and pointed at her chest. Then she shook her head
and with a tilt of her mask made it clear that she was coming with
them.
No you go on fuck off, Conan
!

Frustration shook the forever boy, and he
slashed the air with his blade-petal.
Go-the-fuck-off-home
yourself
! He growled without words, then he grabbed Sophie’s
arm and pointed into the shadows shaking his head. On an impulse he
nudged his visor up so she could see his face mouth the words for
her to go.
Go
.
Go
.
No
! Still Sophie shook her
head.

A voice came from behind him.

“We’ve got a stowaway…” Mr. Jay said with a
chuckle, “So to speak.”

Conan snapped his visor down and turned, a
chill running up his spine. He pointed back into the shadows and
shook his head.

“You don’t think she should come,” the man
whispered and stepped close to Sophie. She looked up at him through
her single eyehole. The dead girl shook her head like an angry old
gummer. Mr. Jay laughed, “And she’s quite certain she should.”

Conan made fists of both his hands and shook
the air with them.
Too spooky
. He stamped a few paces away
from Sophie and turned to watch. He didn’t know what to do. Sophie
couldn’t come. She was too dangerous, and nobody knew what she
would do.

But Mr. Jay didn’t understand. He smiled in a
sad way and then reached out to stroke the dead girl’s mask.

“You won’t tell me why you want to come,” he
said, without expecting an answer. “And so I can only guess.” He
nodded, but Sophie shook her head and moved toward the wall.
Go
on
!
Go home Sophie
! “It is important to me that I not
fail.” The magician’s face was grim. “I must rescue Dawn and leave
the City.”

Sophie took a gentle step forward, one long
finger crossing her heart.

“You promise you will not interfere with my
mission?” Mr. Jay asked.
Stupid
.
Damn
.
Grownup
! Sophie shook her head vigorously, until Conan
thought her mask would fall off. The little fighter was so angry he
could shit kittens, but what could he do?
Go home
please
!

“Come with us then,” Mr. Jay said and turned,
his eyes resting momentarily on Conan’s visor before he started
jogging back toward the Tower. “I am sure my little friend here
will keep an eye on you for any sign of mischief.”

Conan’s chest pumped up with pride waiting
until Sophie started after Mr. Jay. Now that she was not sneaking
after them, the little fighter realized with some gosh-blush
respect that Sophie ran very quickly for a dead girl—for any stupid
girl.

And they were both fighters in their own way.
Before long Conan was running at his top speed, doing his best to
keep up to the dead girl’s easy stride. Out of the gloom, the
Quinlan boys appeared. Their faces were sour lemons, and it was
clear from their stances that they were blocking the way.
We’re
fuckity-fucked
!

“The vent’s welded shut,” said the twin on
the left.

“Can’t get in that way,” said the twin on the
right with Liz stepping out from behind them. She was just about to
light a cigarette when she saw Sophie. Liz scowled and the dead
girl shifted behind Mr. Jay.

“What’s Sophie doing here?” said the forever
girl, lighting her cigarette.

“She followed us,” Mr. Jay said, Conan looked
up at the man and nodded his agreement.
Stupid-stupid-spook
!
“And I told her to come with us.”

Liz groaned through a cloud of cigarette
smoke. “Well, she won’t
come
far, the ventilation shaft is
welded tighter than a choirboy’s ass.” The Quinlan boys chuckled.
So did Conan.

Mr. Jay shook his head, and then looked down
at the metal stick in his hands. He raised it, sighting along its
length. “I can get through, but didn’t want to draw attention
yet.”

Conan saw the metal begin to glow and he
smiled. He reflexively stroked the air with his kill-fist, being
salt and pepper for a dust up. All that sneaking around was feeling
like fingers over the lips and tiptoes and such, and nothing a
young fighter would want to do.

But Sophie was moving, she stepped out in
front of Mr. Jay shaking her head from side to side like a grandma
and laid her long fingers across the back of his hand.

“What is it, Sophie?” Mr. Jay leaned over
her, and Conan felt the battle cry in his mind going
raspberry
when the dead girl started to move the fingers of
that hand like they were legs walking up a flight of stairs. Then
she pointed to where the shadowy tunnel branched to the right.
Sophie made a grunting noise and then pretended she was opening a
door.

“There’s another way?” Mr. Jay’s voice was
disbelieving. Conan was shaking his head now, catching the man’s
gaze and wanting to go:
See
!
See
!
Here’s the
trouble
. He frowned. “How do you know?”

But Sophie just nodded her head until her
hair jumped around like spaghetti strings. Conan crossed his arms
angrily. He was afraid the spook would do something like this and
here she was bending the show over a stump.

“She might know,” Liz said, scratching her
chin through a cloud of smoke, which drew a bunch of head nodding
and hand flapping from the dead girl. She started pointing up the
tunnel again as Liz continued, “Sophie escaped from the Tower,
makes sense she might know a thing or two about getting back in.
And, we didn’t find her right away. She spent years haunting these
tunnels.”

“All right then,” Mr. Jay said, turning to
Sophie. “Lead the way.”

And Sophie was so happy and nodded her head
so much that her spirit even broke through Conan’s angry mood, and
he could feel her smile behind that mask. He wondered if she could
feel his.

59 – Smelly Nick

Felon stayed back in the shadows. Tiny
covered the Marquis. The assassin wanted to be ready for Lucifer.
He was bound to resent the intrusion. The Marquis led them a half
mile through the sewer to a group of derelicts gathered around a
fire.

They were in bad shape, living or dead
wearing rags and tattered, either by body damage or boils and
sores. Bottles moved from dirty hand to dirty hand. They whistled
and made catcalls at the old transvestite. The Marquis fanned his
cheeks like a southern belle. Felon shut them up by waving his
gun.

The Marquis asked for Smelly Nick. They all
pointed along the tunnel.

“He stays down by the main collection basin,”
said a dead man, his missing lower lip replaced by a thin curtain
of drool. “Likes the sound of runnin’ water!”

They walked into the shadows. Tiny kept a
hand wrapped around the Marquis’ left arm and his gun pointed at
the center of the powdered wig. The salesman had not stopped
talking since they first set out.

“I got to talk to Lucifer,” he whispered
excitedly over his shoulder.

“No promises,” Felon hissed. “Cover the
Marquis.” The assassin watched for anyone following them. Felon’s
troubles could become a lethal distraction if he wasn’t careful. He
had to purge the noise in his head before he met Lucifer.

Balg wanted him dead. The Demon had tricked
Felon into killing a powerful Angel.

Balg wanted the nun and he had coerced the
Marquis, into kidnapping her.

All City of Light Authority was looking for
her. He recognized her name, Karen Cawood: the Tower Builder. And
the priest Felon killed she called
Reverend Stoneworthy
: the
other Tower Builder. The Authority vehicles chasing them on the
Skyway weren’t doing it for their health. The assassin couldn’t
have kicked a bigger hornet’s nest.

He had hired three mercenaries to protect
him. They were loyal as far as you could pay them—no farther. They
were the type of dog that easily turned on its master.

So Felon had one road open to him. He had
been reckless to keep killing Divine and Infernal creatures. But he
liked it. That emotion blinded him to the danger. It was just a
matter of time before he was in over his head. Killing them gave
him a false sense of security.

Since Lucifer led a neutral gang, he might
want to hire Felon’s gun and abilities. Staying neutral with all
these competing interests sometimes required gunfire.

“Ahead,” the Marquis said in fluting
tones.

The damp asphalt underfoot gave way to a
slope of poured concrete. They moved up it. Felon’s senses scanned
ahead. An echoing trickle gave the impression of a big body of
water. But the smell said it wasn’t water.

“Tiny will kill you at my command,” Felon
hissed in the Marquis’ ear. He snarled, “Predict
that
!”

Their footsteps echoed on the incline. Tiny
played the flashlight over a wide space ahead dimly lit by lantern
light. Four tunnels opened on a concrete platform that edged a body
of water about thirty feet on a side. Seven pipes of varied
diameter opened on the liquid and dripped or disgorged waste at
intervals. The air was horrible. The Marquis pressed his scented
hanky over his face and moaned.

At the far side of this pool was a ragged
figure beside a shopping cart full of bulging plastic bags. The
lantern hung from its handle.

The assassin had his gun out.

“Stay here,” he whispered to Tiny and then
paced around the concrete platform. The derelict’s lantern made him
a silhouette. The man was humming to himself, but suddenly
stiffened. Clutching a plastic bag to his chest he turned.

“No!” he cried. “They’re
mine
!” He had
a great mass of frizzy salt and pepper hair. The giant beard
covering his gaunt cheeks was stained with wine and food. The man’s
dark eyes crossed on the pistol-barrel, then slid up Felon’s arm to
his face. A second of bewilderment followed, and then he lifted his
eyebrows.

“Ah! It’s you. I heard about you.” He
chuckled and dragged a round metal tin out of the bag, started to
work at its plastic lid. “I thought you were going to rob me.” He
chuckled as he struggled with the lid. “You’re that Quickdraw
McGraw fellow...”