The Axeboy's brow furrowed and he looked from the chisel to Mr. Nimble. “But this was payment.”
“I told you,” said Mr. Nimble, pulling out a bundle of leather and placing it on the table next to the chisel, “belief is the only currency that actually matters. I wanted you to steal your father's chisel because I want you to have it, as a reminder of why you are doing what it is you are doing.” He unwrapped the leather to reveal a silver-headed axe with a wooden handle. “And this, my friend, has been altered to your specifications – it will steal all the people that your little heart desires.”
The Axeboy held his breath as he looked down at the axe.
“Go ahead and pick it up,” said Mr. Nimble. “You must be the first to touch it, so that it binds itself to you. I've added a little something extra that I think you're going to like.”
The boy reached down and picked up the axe, feeling the weight in his hands. As his grip tightened on the axe, he swore that the axe was also latching onto him.
“Now it is bound to you,” said Mr. Nimble, “and it will come at your call. You will never be without it.”
“Thank you, Mr. Nimble.”
Mr. Nimble's smile grew and he reached beside them to push aside the curtain from their booth. “Now how about we find some poor, drug-induced souls with whom to practice your newly acquired tool?”
“Won't the owners of this place get mad?”
“Not unless I tell them to.”
The Axeboy slipped out of the booth and looked around at the large, dim room full of pillows and smoke. Then the shadows at the edges of the room darkened and stirred, darting from one side of the room to the other.
“Something's wrong,” said The Axeboy. He turned, but Mr. Nimble was nowhere in sight – he was completely alone. The shadows continued darkening and twitching, then they grew so fast that they nearly consumed all the light in the room. The Axeboy backed up against the booth and raised his arms to shield his face as several of the shadows leaped at him like dogs.
Then nothing.
He lowered his arms and the shadows were gone. Standing there amidst the pillows and facing away from him was his mother, her great black wings arched behind her.
He shook his head. “You're too late.”
She looked over and raised an eyebrow. “About time.” She pulled a cigarette from her silver case and lit it up, then turned away from him to blow out a stream of smoke.
He charged at her. “You don't even want him back!” His mother turned to him, wide-eyed, just before he collided with her from the side. Her cigarette spun twirling through the air as they both tumbled towards the floor – but instead of falling into the sea of pillows below them, they fell right through it. They continued falling somehow, the world turning gray around them, but all The Axeboy could do was climb up his mother's body, screaming and clawing at her face. “Why can't you leave me be! You've already ruined everything!”
“What in the hell are you talking about!” She grabbed his wrists as her wings unfurled behind her to slow their fall. Then those wings began beating and pulling them up past windows and gray buildings. Above her he saw the raging ocean of pulsing light that was Oblivion.
“Why'd you bring me to the Tartarus?” he cried. “Are you going to throw me into Oblivion? Are you going to get rid of me too?”
She let go of one of his wrists and smacked him hard across the face. “You're hallucinating! We're here to call your father back!”
He shook his head, trying to get his bearings after being struck so hard. But then she dropped him and he landed on a flat rooftop, falling onto his side. The Axeboy looked up at his mother as her wings stretched out behind her and she landed several yards away from him. She licked her bottom lip where he'd broken skin, then touched the wound with one of her fingers. As the memories slowly slipped from his mind, he could hear the sad chorus of trumpet players in the distance.
“I told you not to wander off,” she said. “The Agents got to you, didn't they?”
The Axeboy put his hands over his face. Every time he blinked he saw the inside of the drug den where he'd gotten the axe. He could smell the chemicals when he breathed. “It was a woman. I was taking down the Agent who followed me here through time, and this other woman showed up. I was confused, because she really didn't seem like an Agent. Then all I could feel or see were firemen running into burning buildings, pulling people out. There was so much smoke that I could hardly breathe. There was only fire after fire after fire.” He felt tears running down his face just remembering the visions he'd seen. “I... I burned alive... several times. Buildings collapsed onto me.”
“The memories of the fire station. I found the woman, but I let her go.”
“You what!” He tried looking at her but only saw flames, then clenched his eyes shut.
“I figured she was a trumpet player – but when I realized she wasn't, I tossed her into Necropolis so she wouldn't distract the musicians.”
“I can't believe you'd do that! Didn't you realize that I pulled her here with me for a reason?”
“Oh? Did you let her knock you unconscious for a reason too? I'd like to hear how that fits into your intricate plan. Or why you let her tear up your mind. You know we're about to pull your father from Oblivion, and you're more-or-less useless right now.”
He shook his head. “Look, I'm sorry for attacking you, alright? I can feel the effects wearing off. It's mostly just my vision now.”
There was a moment of silence, then his mother whispered, “Holy shit.”
“What is it?”
“Oblivion – it's breaking apart.”
The Axeboy laughed and a smile broke across his face. “He must be close.”
“But pieces of it are floating down, and some are headed for the trumpet players.”
“Fuck the trumpet players. We don't need all of them anymore, just some.”
“You don't know that. And they're under the cornet's spell, so they aren't even aware of their surroundings. They'll get sucked into the pieces.”
He heard the click of her heels as she walked towards the edge of the roof.
“At least take me back to The French Opera House,” he said.
“Don't fall unconscious again while I'm gone. That part of your plan is shit.”
He heard and felt the wind from her wings as she took to the sky.
“Damn you!” he whispered, rubbing his eyes and temples.
File 68 :: [Julius Marcos]
Julius drove the black party bus down Decatur Street in the Tartarus Realm, not having turned the music system on. The streets were oddly smooth in that gray world – a disconcerting change from the familiar cracks and potholes that littered the living version of the city. Edith was crouched next to him steering the bus, and he'd been filling her in while shifting the gears and pressing down the petals with a real foot and a false one. Initially Roman had tried to drive the bus, but it was going to take Julius too long to teach him – and Roman's talents were better put to other uses anyway.
A few lifetimes back Julius had briefly been a bus driver for the city. He had no idea how in the hell Mars knew how to drive a bus, but it didn't surprise him – she seemed to have a plethora of random skills.
There was a break in the buildings and he could see Oblivion all cracked and bursting with light in the sky several blocks away. Throughout his lifetimes, he'd only gone into the Tartarus a handful of times, and he'd never seen Oblivion look anything like it did at that moment.
They parked the buses a couple of blocks before the Square, and then Julius led them into one of the warehouses that lined the street between Decatur and the river. The warehouses no longer existed in the world of the living, having long since been demolished and turned into parking lots. He picked an old coffee warehouse that he'd worked inside over a century earlier, so that he could lead them quickly to the stairs and up to the roof.
Once there, they were all silent for a moment as they looked out at the crackling sky
a mere six blocks from where they stood. It wasn't unlike watching a very contained, raging thunderstorm over the city, except that deep down you just knew that this was not nature you were witnessing – it was something else entirely.
“Well, the situation just became simpler,” said Roman. “If the only factor introduced in the Tartarus is the playing of trumpets, then it's safe to assume that The Axeman is indeed following the music back to this world.”
“Way to look at the bright side,” said Mars. “We don't have to waste any energy worrying about it not being Armageddon.”
Julius peered out across the rooftops and gritted his teeth. “It looks like pieces of Oblivion are breaking away and floating towards the rooftops.”
“You're right,” said Roman. “We have to assume that whomever they touch – us or the musicians – will be sucked inside and trapped in Oblivion.”
“Edith,” said Julius, looking over at her. When Edith turned to him, he didn't see the uncertain young pastry chef who had so recently been recruited, but a strong woman full of focus and drive. “You can hang back. You could be our backup.”
Edith shook her head, the sepia strands of hair waving back and forth across her eye. “No. Tell me what you want me to do, Julius. You have a good idea of what I'm capable of.”
“Very well, but if you're going with us, you'll be going as one of The Agents Of. What we're doing is extremely dangerous and I will not take a non-Agent.” He saw Edith's hesitation. “The city smiles on the Agents, and the city's smile is not to be taken lightly.”
She nodded. “Alright.”
“Repeat after me.”
He spoke the oaths and she repeated each one to the letter:
I vow to protect the city of New Orleans from those who would do her harm or destroy her.
I will never use nor hold a weapon.
I vow to serve the city of New Orleans with all my actions and thoughts.
By protecting the sanctity of the Agency, I am protecting the city herself.
Should I ever quit the Agency, I vow to never divulge secrets that would do it or the city harm.
“Welcome to The Agents Of, Edith,” said Julius.
He turned to Adelaide. “I'm going to tell you my game plan. But The Axeboy is the main focus of your life right now, so your input weighs in very heavily.”
Adelaide nodded. “What have you got?”
Julius reached into his trench coat pocket and pulled out a piece of chalk, then handed it to Edith. “I want you to draw a quick map of the area. Show us where the trumpet players are in relation to The Angel and The Axeboy, to the best of your memory.”
Edith smirked. “Memory is one thing I'm good at.” She knelt down and quickly drew a series of boxes and lines on the roof. “This street is Toulouse... this one is Bourbon... and this is the large building where they're set up. I've never seen it before. I mean, it's not there in the living world.”
“The French Opera House,” said Roman.
“I'll take your word on that,” said Edith, writing Opera on the box that represented that building. “The trumpet players are set up at these four buildings.” She wrote the letters A, B, C and D on four of the building tops, each one about two blocks from the others in a circle around The French Opera House. She pointed to the one she'd marked A. “I know this one for certain, because I was there. The other three, especially C, might not be exact, because I didn't have an arial view – but they should be close.”
She stood up and handed the chalk to Julius. He scanned the boxes she'd drawn, trying to picture what the buildings looked like but knowing that the Tartarus was an amalgamation of different times periods. He reached down with the chalk in his hand and turned a metal knob on his knee so that it bent, then awkwardly crouched down and began writing in the other street names. Then he added the streets of Dauphine, Chartres and Decatur, then St. Louis and St. Peter, as well as the river, and then drew a box with a big X on it to represent their current location.
“Ok.” He looked up at the four of them. “This is my plan. If you have anything to add afterwards, please do.”
Then he began relaying the strategy that he deemed the best course of action.
File 69 :: [Roman Wing]
The black party bus tipped a little as Mars took a fast turn, then crashed back onto all four wheels as she straightened out the steering wheel. Roman hung onto the poles near the door, looking over at Mars as she laughed and planted one foot down on the accelerator.
They were flying down Dauphine Street and would soon pass St. Peter Street, after which would be the building that Edith had labeled “D” in her diagram. Roman walked up next to the folding door, adjusting the two long duffel bags which were strapped to his back.
“See you on the other side,” said Adelaide from behind him.
Roman nodded to her.
Mars grabbed the lever for the door and pulled, letting in a loud rush of wind as it folded open. “You want me to slow down?”
“No!” Roman turned to face her, looking up and grabbing onto the roof of the bus. He quickly pulled himself outside and onto the bus's roof, the wind batting madly at his hair and coat as he carefully got to his feet. The gray buildings rushed by him, and he saw up ahead several second- and third-floor balconies jutting from the side of a four-story building that was most likely “Building D”. He sprung up into the air, soaring over a second-floor balcony to grab onto the bottom of the one above it, swinging forward and then back, using the momentum to propel himself up and over the railing so that he landed on the third-floor balcony.
Below him the bus erupted with loud bounce music as it sped away. Roman scaled up the brick wall of the building, his fingertips and the tips of his boots finding the grooves between the bricks like the grooves had been left just for him. As he pulled himself up onto the flat rooftop, he found that he had indeed found Building D – about two dozen trumpet players were scattered about, all blissfully lost in the playing of their chosen instruments.
Roman looked up to make sure none of the pieces of Oblivion were coming their way, then made his way to one of the large chimneys protruding from the roof. Tossing down one of the duffel bags, he pulled from it a seventy foot rope ladder, which he secured to the chimney before walking over to the edge of the roof and tossing it over.
File 70 :: [The Axeboy]
The Axeboy paced around the rooftop that his mother had left him on, massaging his arms and neck. He was sore all over – feeling like he'd been dropped on concrete a couple of times. His head was still a little woozy, but at least his memories and the memories of the fire station weren't invading his mind anymore. His mother was in the sky several blocks away, flying around and moving trumpet players from one side of a rooftop to the other, out of the way of a wandering cloud of Oblivion.
He peered over the edge of the roof, figuring he might as well get himself to The French Opera House since it seemed his mother was taking her time, when he heard a loud, jumbled cacophony of noise erupt from a block away. It sounded like five songs being played on top of one another, with someone singing really fast over the top in a high pitched voice. The Axeboy ran across the roof and looked over the other edge, seeing a long black bus speeding down the street – it was definitely the source of the noise. Neon blue lights poured from underneath the bus as well as from all its windows. The music was so loud that he knew it would disrupt the sound of the trumpets.
“Fuck!” he yelled, then shifted into the third ghostly realm just long enough to drop down through the roof, shifting back into the Tartarus in time to land on the floor below. He did this two more times, until he found himself inside what looked like the dark lobby of a bank or an office building. The Axeboy ran across the tiled floor and up to the large glass doors, peering out. The black bus sped by and turned down Toulouse towards The French Opera House.
“Agents of Karma,” he muttered, pulling out his axe and pushing his way through the glass doors. Running down the sidewalk to the corner,
he crouched and peeked around to see the parked black bus, with a dark figure running around the far corner, towards one of the buildings where they had the trumpet players set up. The figure could have been the woman who followed him through time, but he couldn't tell for sure.
First he would have to get rid of that noise.
The Axeboy quickly snuck up to the blue-lit bus, seeing no one around. The music was so loud and chaotic that it was hard for him to concentrate. He shoved open open the doors, peering around as he climbed inside. Something jumped up out of the neon blue and shadows and slammed metal against his face, whipping his head around to crack against the glass of one of the bus doors. He struggled to keep his balance, but then the figure was in front of him, kicking him in the chest and sending him backwards through the air. When his body hit the sidewalk, his head slammed back hard against the concrete.
The Axeboy's vision shuffled before him as his head pulsed with pain, and a young woman stepped down out of the bus and stood over him, planting a boot firmly on his chest. She had a mane of long red dreadlocks and held what looked like an over-sized, glowing gun.
“I hear you like to beat up on chicks!” she yelled over the chaotic music as the gun hummed to life and lit up in her hands.
“Agents always attack the underdog,” he said, reaching out with his hand. His axe had fallen away from him but he could feel it soaring back. “Sometimes the underdog attacks back.”
The Axeboy hollered out as she stepped up onto his chest, her other boot crunching down onto his open hand, grinding it into the sidewalk. The axe handle slammed right into two of his fingertips before ricocheting off the side of her boot, sending jolts of pain spiraling up through his arm. He screamed even louder.
The Axeboy's Blues (The Agents Of Book 1) Page 35
