The Axeboy's Blues (The Agents Of Book 1)

by Andy Reynolds

  Night had fallen and gathered up the city to rest its head upon. The Angel stood on the roof of The Old U.S. Mint[29] on the corner of Decatur and Esplanade, looking down at the little pieces of life simmering like vegetables in a pan below her. She raised her hands and behind her the fog that had been gathering on the surface of the Mississippi crashed upon the rocks of the levee, spilling up to overflow onto the dry land. The fog was thick with moist whispers and unsung spirits.

  From her purse she pulled an orb of swirling smoke. Turning, she grabbed the back of her son's shirt, pulling him into the world of the near dead as they fell down through the roof, then pulling him back into the living world as her wings unfolded to slow their descent into the large, dark meeting room. As they landed she smashed the orb of smoke against a wall – the smoke exploding into the room and reaching out in every direction.

  “Why the smoke?” asked her son.

  She brought a finger to her lips. “So the Caretaker of this place won't know who we are. Come on.”

  They rushed out of the room and into the smoky, open foyer, which had two large white stairways curling down to the other levels. An alarm began to sound, muffled by the thick smoke that was coursing through the museum. The Angel picked up her son with one hand and jumped over the railing, her wings unfurling behind her to slow them as they descended halfway down. She set him down when they landed on the middle floor, and pointed towards the open doorway.

  The Angel watched her son walk through the smoke and enter the room, the silvery axe still and heavy as death in it's sheath at his side. The small room was full of artifacts, but there on a pedestal in the center of the room was an old, beaten up metal horn. It looked like a trumpet, except gray and too complicated – like someone who didn't have a firm grasp on trumpets had been asked to make one. The plaque on the pedestal told what it was: Louis Armstrong's first cornet. It was the instrument that the great jazz musician learned on as a boy.

  “Hurry!” she whispered.

  The Axeboy took the plexiglass case off the pedestal, dropped it onto the ground and picked up the instrument. He turned to her.

  “Come on,” she said. “We'll go out the front. The smoke is hiding us in the living world, so we shouldn't shift out until we're outside.”

  They ran out of the room and she picked him up by the back of his shirt. “Now don't drop it,” she said and jumped over the rail and through the smoke to the first floor, passing a security guard who was running up the stairs. She let him go and they ran towards the front door, the smoke creeping into the locked doors ahead of them and opening them up.

  The Angel and her son burst out into the cool night air, surrounded by the thickening fog from the river. She reached out to pick him up and he elbowed her hand away.

  “We have to go to the Tartarus and get everything started,” said The Angel.

  “The music is just coming to life.” He glanced across the street at the beginning of Frenchman Street. “I can get at least three more.”

  “We have enough!”

  “You don't know that!” He pointed towards the music. “We can't afford to fail again, and I can hear trumpets out there.”

  “Then at least give me the cornet. We don't need Julius taking that when he finds you tonight and snaps your skinny little neck.”

  He shoved the cornet into her hand, then turned and walked towards the gate that surrounded The Old U.S. Mint.

  She shook her head as her form bled into the other world – the better world. She'd leave her son to mess things up for himself if he really wanted to, but her plans would go on unhindered.

  Her old lover would heed her call, and she would see him once more. She would shine before him and show him what had become of her.

  File 57 :: [Edith Downs]

  “Edith!”

  Edith yanked herself from the swimming memories that surrounded her and was back in the New Orleans night, sitting atop a blanket on the roof of a Frenchman Street nightclub. There was a tarnished New Orleans Police Department badge in front of her surrounded by the glow of memory, even though she'd pulled the glove away from it. She looked around but the searing memories were burned into her eyes like remnants of bright lights.

  Adelaide grabbed her by the arm. “Sorry, but there's an alarm down the street, and when I listened more closely I heard the trumpets that follow The Axeboy. Think fast – I'm going to go, are you coming with me?”

  Edith powered off the glove and got woozily to her feet, trying to blink away the glow from the memories.

  “Best leave the glove,” said Adelaide.

  Edith unstrapped it and set it on the blanket. She stepped towards the edge of the roof, and with each step she felt her body and mind slip closer to reality. “I'm going with you.” She'd still been working with the glove, but hadn't been learning anything new about how it worked – only about the memories locked inside the objects. She felt like she could spend her whole life just watching and communicating with those memories.

  Adelaide stepped up and onto the ledge.

  “Wait, are you jumping off the roof?” asked Edith.

  Adelaide looked down at her and held out her hand. “Come with me, or go down the back of the building. You might lose me though.”

  Edith held out her hand and Adelaide pulled her up and onto the ledge. Adelaide put her arm tightly around Edith's waist, and Edith realized that this was more human contact than she'd had in over a year. “Hold on to me.”

  Edith screamed as she was pulled off the roof and into the night below.Adelaide's other hand threw something downward and the air below them shimmered as they raced towards the street. “Bend your legs and get ready to land!” yelled Adelaide. Sounds welled up below and around them, swirling up from the street and pushing up like a tornado to slow their descent. Edith's feet stung as they collided with the street, Adelaide pulling her out of the way of an oncoming car that swerved and slammed on its breaks.

  “Are you ready to run?” asked Adelaide.

  “Sure,” said Edith, her heart pounding.

  Adelaide pulled her by the hand between the moving and parked cars of Frenchman Street, letting go as Edith got her footing. They were running towards Esplanade – towards The French Quarter. They turned down Decatur and Adelaide threw something towards the entrance of a busy club. People and instrument cases were suddenly thrown all over the sidewalk like a whirlwind had struck. Adelaide leaped forward through the air, her arms wrapping around a young boy as they landed and tumbled onto the dirty, broken sidewalk.

  From among the scattered instrument cases flew a silver axe, landing right into the boy's open hand. He pushed himself atop Adelaide but she held his wrist and punched him twice in the face, wrapping her legs tight around his waist. Blood splattered down from the boy's nose and onto Adelaide's chest.

  Edith stood there, her breath coming fast. She knew about New Orleans – knew about the crime, the crazy nights of bar fights and brawls – but this was the most violent thing she'd ever witnessed: A woman wrestling a boy with an axe in the middle of a crowded sidewalk. It was so entirely dark and primal, and Edith couldn't move.

  Then she saw the utter hatred in The Axeboy's eyes as he looked down at Adelaide. His mouth thrashed around and he bit Adelaide's wrist and she cried out. He tore at her face with his free hand, and when she loosed her grip on his axe hand, he pulled free and swung down.

  Edith ripped herself from her stupor and ran towards them, not knowing what she was going to do, as blood erupted from Adelaide's face when the handle of the axe collided with it. Edith jumped, knocking him off Adelaide and rolling on top of him.

  “Stop it!” she screamed. “You can't!” She pulled the axe from his hand and threw it away. She looked down into his stunned blue eyes, grabbing his wrists and pinning them to the ground. “You can't hurt her anymore! I won't let you!”

  He pulled his leg up, planting his foot into her stomach and kicking her off him and into the street. Edith landed on her back, barely a
ble to breathe as a car swerved around her.

  “The Agents will never stop chasing me,” she heard The Axeboy say. She looked over and saw him getting to his feet, the axe flying into his hand, blood pouring down his chin and neck.

  Edith heard the whispers behind her as she sat up and struggled to regain her breath. The fire station at her back, Engine Number 9, located on the triangle island between Frenchman and Decatur and Esplanade, was ripe with memories infused with protection and loss and duty – memories of so many saved souls and so many that had been lost.

  They whispered to her as they rushed up behind her, telling her they understood what she was fighting for – that she was fighting to protect the city. They knew who she was – she was Edith, speaker to the memories of New Orleans.

  “Wait!” she cried. “I don't want this!”

  The Axeboy looked over at her and she saw what he was – a young boy, confused and abandoned and angry. “There's no other way.” He walked towards where Adelaide was rolling on the ground holding her face.

  “No!” Edith screamed as she turned to the mems racing towards her. “Let me talk to him!” But they were already rushing past her, knocking her over as they descended upon The Axeboy.

  He screamed as they crawled up his body and plunged their arms into his head, tearing at his mind. Edith got to her feet and ran at him. She grabbed the boy and batted at the mems like they were bats, trying to pry them off him – to pry them off of his mind. “No! This isn't how I want to be! Get off him!”

  The Axeboy shoved himself away from her, and she saw that his eyes were wild and bloodshot, tears streaming down his face. “What the fuck are you?!” He reached out and grabbed the front of her shirt as the world around them vanished.

  File 58 :: [The Angel of Death]

  The Angel glided over the gray buildings of the Tartarus Realm, the visceral phosphorescent light show of Oblivion suspended high above like a cloud cover. Her son had messed things up, just as she feared. As much as she loved the man he'd become, and as much as she wished she could have been a good mother to him, there was no doubting that this younger version of him was impulsive and reckless.

  She'd been setting things up around The French Opera House when a ghost had sought her out, telling her that her son had appeared in the Tartarus and fallen unconscious, and that he'd brought someone with him. The Angel hadn't been searching long before she glimpsed the young living woman far below, hugging herself and walking the desolate streets. The Angel soared down and landed behind the woman, who turned around and screamed.

  “Shh,” said The Angel, scaring the woman's voice away. “I have a headache. There's no need for any of that awfulness.” She looked the woman up and down, noting the yellowish streak running through the woman's black hair. “There should be more women who play jazz. You forgot your trumpet, but don't worry – I've got one waiting for you.”

  She turned the woman around and picked her up by a fistful of her shirt, then took to the sky. “Don't struggle,” said The Angel. “Or I may drop you.”

  A few blocks away she found her son passed out and laying next to his axe, the bottom half of his face and neck caked with drying blood. She landed, put his axe in its sheath, and grabbed him in much the same way that she'd grabbed the woman. She pulled them both up into the sky, her wings carrying them across the Tartarus version of The Quarter, the whole place nearly devoid of unlife. They soon came to The Quarter's other side, with its four rooftops full of trumpet players.

  The Angel dropped the woman on one of the rooftops. “I suppose you're going to need this to play...” She scared the woman's voice back into her.

  The woman began to speak, but The Angel shook her head and raised a hand. “Shh... I don't care. Save your breath for playing music.” She turned and picked up one of the other trumpet players. “I need a volunteer.” Her wings beat down behind her and the man screamed out in terror as she dragged him and her son up through the air and over to the roof of The French Opera House. She let the man go and then laid her son down on his back, looking upon him with his bloody face, neck and shirt.

  She sighed. Seeing her son there all bruised and unconscious made her think of her lover all those years ago, and how she'd betrayed him to the very Agents who now sent her son back to her all beaten and bloodied. Yet her act of betrayal was the only option she figured she had at the time – letting The Agents of Karma use her as bait to lure her lover to the Tartarus Realm, where they could trick him into Oblivion.

  There was no way she could tell her son about the betrayal, though – he'd never follow the rest of the plan if he knew what she'd done. Even though nearly a century had passed, he was mere days away from that time.

  She turned to the young man who was on the roof with them. He was short, dark-skinned and wore a soft cap and a tweed jacket. She picked up the cornet and placed it into his hands. “Play for us. Playing this will bring you greater joy than you've ever felt.”

  The man looked down reluctantly, but lifted Louis Armstrong's cornet and held it to his lips. The sound that came from it was screeching and horrid – the horn had long ago seen it's last decent note. But then small wisps of faded light began circling around the instrument, and his eyes glazed over as he got lost in belting out the high-pitched noise.

  She walked to the edge of the roof and looked out at the four rooftops of trumpet players. They all stopped talking to each other and picked up their trumpets. Then they began to play. The loud, echoing chorus of horns twisted together to reach up into the upside-down sea of Oblivion that was the sky.

  “Yes,” she whispered, looking up at the shimmering sky. “I am here. Come to me, my love. Follow your lullaby.”

  File 59 :: [Edith Downs]

  Edith looked out at the strange world before her. There were over a dozen people on the roof, all of them playing trumpets to a different melody - yet somehow those melodies wrapped up together like twine, snaking through the building tops all around them. Each melody was slow and drawn out, carrying with it a sad kind of waltz.

  She tried talking to the trumpet players, but most of their eyes were closed – they were lost in the playing. She touched one of their arms, but the player didn't stir. They didn't seem like ghosts – not that she knew what ghosts should seem like.

  The sky was bright and crazy, like a body of moving water with giant lights under the surface. They were in The Quarter, or at least some gray, desolate version of The Quarter. The buildings looked like they belonged there, but she wasn't quite sure she recognized any of them. She could see two other rooftops with trumpet players on them, and a great big Greek style building she'd never seen before. It was upon this building that the woman with the wings stood behind a young man playing what looked like a gray trumpet. Edith was sure that the woman must have been The Angel of Death from Adelaide's stories.

  Edith looked about the roof. In one corner was a pile of trumpets, which she walked well around, afraid that if she touched them she'd fall under whatever spell was affecting the others. There were no doors to the roof – nothing leading into the building – and there didn't appear to be any way down. The building was four stories tall, and she had to assume that if she jumped the impact would kill her like it would in the real world.

  She sat down, leaning back against the edge of the flat roof. She checked her watch but it seemed stuck on a little after midnight, which was when she must have been taken. Edith hoped Adelaide was alright – that the Agents had found her and were helping her. God, they probably thought Edith was dead.

  Something else was familiar – Edith felt like she was wearing the glove. After a few moments she realized why – there were absolutely no mems anywhere.

  The trumpet players kept playing for at least half an hour. When they finished, Edith looked up at The Angel of Death's roof and saw that the man up there had also stopped.

  “New recruit, huh?” said one of the trumpet players as he walked up to her. He was clean cut and clean shaven, with a w
hite button up shirt and a pair of suspenders.

  Edith shook her head and got to her feet. “I'm not a musician,” she said.

  “For the first time in my life I wish I wasn't either.” He flashed a bright smile and offered her his hand. “Name's William Town.”

  She shook his hand. “Edith Downs.”

  He pointed his thumb at the others. “Most of these gents, as well as the two ladies over there, are from 1934 if you can believe that.”

  “Yes, I can believe it. Wait, so you're not dead, right?”

  “Sure as heck hope not.”

  “Then The Axeboy's not killing people?”

  “That little psycho kid with the axe? As far as I know he's just been grabbing trumpet players for some reason, bringing us here. Sucks us into his axe, then spills us out onto these rooftops. Then, maybe two hours ago the woman with the wings started bringing trumpet players up to that roof one at a time. Whatever instrument she's having them play, none of us can do anything but play our damned hearts out when they start up. It's like our music is the only thing that exists.”

  Edith looked over at The Angel of Death. “I have to let the Agents know about this.”

  “The Agents?”

  “Friends of mine.” She walked along the rooftop, looking over the edge for anything to hold on to should she try and climb down.

  “Wouldn't do that,” said William. “One guy freaked out and jumped. The Angel – that's what these folks have been calling the dame with the wings – she swooped down and snatched him up. Chained him to the roof across the way there, then went about her business like nothing happened. She looks like she isn't paying attention, but she is.”

  “She's The Angel of Death. And if she's helping The Axeboy, the whole city might be doomed.”

  “Your friends, they can help us?”

  “They're probably the only ones who can.”

  William lowered his voice. “The Angel and the kid – they leave pretty often. Then they come back with more trumpet players. Next time they leave we'll try and find a way to get you out of here.”