Then there was a shift in the chaotic music coming from the street – one of the buses had stopped playing music.
Glancing once more at the trumpet players filing down the rope ladder, Adelaide turned and sprinted across the roof in the direction of The French Opera House, towards the bounce music that still played. As she ran, she gathered up the swarming bounce music in her fists, then leaped off the edge of the roof to fall towards Royal Street. Throwing the fistfuls of sound at the street as it neared, Adelaide braced herself as the chaotic sound ricocheted up, nearly flipping her in the air before she got her balance and her boots slammed down onto the ground. She took off running once more, grabbing more of the wandering noise in her hands as she did.
She turned down Toulouse and ran towards Bourbon Street, keeping close to the buildings to try and not be seen. Ahead of her she saw the purple bus near the corner of Bourbon, with the music still pulsing from within it, and the black bus up on the sidewalk by the front doors of The French Opera House. In the middle of the street Edith shot a net of light around The Angel of Death, then pulled her to the ground. Julius and Mars were also nearby, but she didn't see any sign of The Axeboy. Adelaide hurried to the back of the purple bus, opened the back door and slipped inside. The music was so loud that it dug into her skull, and her eyes twitched to the beat. Getting down onto her stomach, she crawled underneath the seats on one side of the bus, then crept forward on her elbows as with her hands she continued compacting the sounds together and adding more, layering them. She stopped near the middle of the bus, her bleeding wrist pulsing painfully to the vibrations of the sounds that coursed inside her fist.
Mere moments later she saw the small boots creeping into the center aisle from the front of the bus, towards the music device mounted above the front seats. She rolled onto her side and kicked against the wall of the bus, pushing the top half of herself out into the aisle, then threw both handfuls of bounce music at the boy. Both balls of sound expanded as they flew, colliding with each other just a few feet from where he stood. Simultaneously all the windows in the front half of the bus shattered and The Axeboy was hurled out the front window and into the street.
Adelaide's ears rang from the burst of sound and the sudden end of the bounce music, the music device having been crushed by the concussive blast. She pulled herself to her feet and rushed down the center aisle and out the folding door.
The Axeboy was laying face down in the street, surrounded by thousands of pieces of shattered glass.
“Holy fuck!” yelled Mars, running up with the net gun. “Did you just kill him?”
“I doubt it.” Adelaide pushed her boot into his shoulder and turned him over. “That might have killed him in the living world, but not here.” The front of his face was smashed up and bloody, his hand was wrapped in blood-soaked bandages and he was unconscious.
Mars pointed the over-sized gun at him. “Want me to net him?”
“No.” Adelaide walked over and picked up the silver-headed axe a few yards away. “We'll just throw him into his own prison.” She approached The Axeboy, knelt down and swung the axe at him. His body became long and thin like taffy in a candy shop window and was sucked up into the axe. Then she stood up and slid the axe into one of her belt loops.
“Damn,” said Mars. “I want to be you when I grow up.”
“When you grow up?”
“Uh... it means I think you're badass.”
“Oh.” Adelaide nodded. “Thanks. I want to be you when I grow up too, Mars.”
File 75 :: [Edith Downs]
“Edith!” came a whisper. “Edith Downs! Please! Listen to me!”
Edith peered around the street from her mediocre hiding spot, crouched inside the doorway of one of the gray buildings. “Shut up,” she said, refusing to look at The Angel – afraid that the winged woman was trying to distract her. The black bus was up on the sidewalk across the street from them, just in front of The French Opera House doors, with Mars creeping about behind it waiting for The Axeboy to try and free his mother. Down the street was the purple bus, still blaring bounce music.
“I can feel them!” said The Angel. “The trumpet players are being sucked into those rogue pieces of Oblivion! My son didn't know about that, so he didn't tell me. But I can feel it! Please, Julius can't save all of them! Let me out and I'll help him!”
“That's fucking nuts,” said Edith, stealing a glance at The Angel. “I'm not letting you out.”
The Angel craned her head up to look at Edith. “Shit. Julius didn't tell you I'm working with you, did he? I'm guessing you were working closely with Adelaide, then? We couldn't let her know.”
Edith laughed. “What? If you were working with us, then why did he just throw you into the side of a goddamn building?”
“Because I kept information from him – and he has temper issues. But I knew you were an Agent, isn't that obvious? Why else would I have let you go? You Agents end up sending my son back, and years later he tells me everything that transpires, and I work with Bes and Roman to make sure it all happens in the same way – Trumpet Fest, the rooftops of trumpet players, everything – to ensure that he fails again and gets sent back.”
Edith squinted and squeezed her temples. “Why would he tell you that? Why would he want to fail?”
“Because he changes,” said The Angel. “And because he ends up becoming an Agent.”
“What?”
“I know.” The Angel shook her head. “I told him not to. Look, you have to let me go! Just look at my memories and you'll know I'm not lying!”
“How in the hell do you know I can read memories?”
“Because my son told me!” The Angel sighed. “He told me everything! I've been watching the Agents, waiting for them to recruit more members. I knew they'd recruit a memory reader and that you'd end up in the Tartarus. I asked The Function about the Agents having any new recruits and he told me about you and Mars and the Dean Smith plan.”
“Why would The Function tell you any of that?”
“Get the guy drunk and flirt with him and he'll tell you damn near anything. And we have a past. The Dean Smith plan is why I set up Trumpet Fest through The Wellington Bank – to stay close to the new recruits.”
Edith shook her head. “That's a pretty story, but nothing you're saying is getting you free. Julius and Roman can handle the trumpet players and Oblivion.”
“Six musicians have been sucked in so far! Please, just look at my memories! There's no harm in looking!”
Edith glanced at The Angel and flexed her hand, thinking about the Extraction Glove. They hadn't brought the glove, but Edith felt like it had taught her how her own abilities could work. She licked her lips, going over one of the vows of The Agents Of in her mind - I vow to serve the city of New Orleans with all my actions and thoughts. That vow had to mean doing what was right in the moment, not just following orders. “Push the memories you want me to see to the forefront of your mind.”
The Angel could barely nod her head. “Hurry! But don't let me out before my son is knocked unconscious. He can't know that I'm working with you.”
Edith would have wondered what The Angel was talking about, but her mind had already shifted to a very analytical place. Glowing memories grew out of The Angel's head like underwater plants, slipping through the holes in the net of light and reaching out. Edith didn't get any closer than necessary, since she wasn't sure what The Angel was capable of, but she sensed that they were normal memories. She did her best to keep the memories separate from herself – to read them without letting their emotions into her own mind, but without the Extraction Glove it was like sticking your arm in water and trying not to get wet.
She touched one of the memories and it enveloped the world around her, cutting her off from the Tartarus by encasing her in a small room. At a metal table sat The Angel and The Axeboy. She looked the same but The Axeboy looked to be in his late '30s or early '40s – far from being a “boy” any longer. He had a stack of notes he'
d written – detailed accounts of when he'd gone into the future.
Like watching a movie in fast forward, she saw them meet in that same room over and over, until he was content that The Angel knew everything that had happened to him in the future, and could replicate it. A few of the meetings involved a black man with golden eyes who Edith assumed was one of Julius' past incarnations. One meeting included Roman Wing, who looked nearly the same, but had a chaotic kind of youth in his eyes. And for a moment Edith could swear that the memory version of Roman knew she was there watching him – or that perhaps he just always assumed something was watching him from somewhere – and it gave her the chills.
The walls of the room expanded and were torn away from her, replaced by a large, flat rooftop and a thunderous sky. Seeing the sky of the living world made Edith feel like she hadn't seen the real sky for days now. The building was a thirty-floor hotel in The Central Business District, and standing on the rooftop were Julius and The Angel. This younger version of Julius was bald, wore a leather jacket and had all of his limbs.
They spoke of The Axeboy coming within the next couple of decades, and Julius was making sure that she was ready.
“Oh, I'll be ready,” she said, pulling out her silver cigarette case and lighting one up and looking out over the looming storm. “Though it's going to be strange, seeing my son again. Especially the younger version – we never liked each other much, back when he was a boy. Seeing him is going to be a reminder that I'll never again see the man who he became.” She turned and glanced at Julius. “The man who died so young under your watch, Bes.”
“Sometimes what we want and what we're called to do are two very different things,” he said, thunder erupting above them.
“Oh, save the pep talks for your little league games.” She blew out a stream of smoke. “You only ever do exactly what you want, so don't pretend to be all selfless.” She walked up to the edge of the roof and looked down at all the tiny people and cars – businessmen and women leaving work early to try and outrun the rain and the coming traffic. “Your interests just happen to line up with the city's. At least sometimes.”
“I just want to make sure we don't have an issue, Sarah.”
The Angel winced at the sound of her name. “Don't you worry yourself to sleep at night, lion-god. I'll deliver my son to you – on a fucking platter.”
“Good to hear.” Julius turned and walked towards the elevator door. “Keep us in the loop.”
The rooftop folded up like a box around Edith, creating a large room that quickly turned into a dusty, dark dive bar. This memory took place mere months from the present, and in it The Angel sat at a bar with The Function, his old coat hanging on the back of the stool he sat on. She smoked a cigarette and bought him drink after drink, asking him about how The Agents of Fateful Encounters were doing since the swamp incident. He filled her in, and told her about a crazy idea he'd come up with involving a man stuck in a gun, a pastry-chef-memory-reader and a young woman who could heal entities. He was so drunk that he would forget half the things he'd told her, and tell her again later.
Edith jerked herself out of the memory of the dive bar as, down the street from her, half the windows of the purple bus exploded outward and a small body slammed into the street in front of it. It was The Axeboy, and he wasn't moving. The bounce music had completely stopped, leaving such a loud silence that her ears began to ring.
“Please!” said The Angel. “Ten of the musicians have been sucked in now!”
Edith looked down at The Angel and flipped the switch on the side of the net gun, turning off the net. The Angel slowly stood up, shaking off whatever effects the gun had brought on her. With a quick flex of her shoulder one of her large black wings swept around and knocked the net gun from Edith's hand, smashing it against the wall.
“What the fuck!” said Edith, shaking her stinging hand.
The Angel looked Edith up and down. “Yes, you're definitely Agent material. Be sure to tell Adelaide that I escaped – she can't know that I'm working with you. Enjoy the next two to ten years of your life, Edith Downs. Statistically, they're all you have.” Then she leaped into the air and flew towards the building that Julius had gone to evacuate.
File 76 :: [Julius Marcos]
Julius ran past the gray buildings of Dauphine Street, loosening the strap of the duffel bag which was slung over his bare torso. His shirt had been left in tatters on the roofs and streets of the Tartarus, and his pants were frayed and covered in tears.
He brought out some of the animal as he ran, feeling his body lengthen as the false leg gurgled and churned, extending as he grew. Dark fur slid once more from beneath his skin as he honed in on the screams of the musicians – and the smell of their fear. Closing in on Building C, he saw that the four-story building had two layers of balconies on its front, as did the building next to it. Julius ran onto the sidewalk and leaped up in between the buildings, latching onto the side of a balcony with his one arm, the rail straining and bending from his weight. Then he jumped backwards and up, turning to grab onto the next highest one.
The screams grew from above him, but when he looked up he couldn't see any of the musicians. That was good – it meant that they weren't screaming because they saw him coming. He turned and leaped once more through the air, latching onto the second balcony of Building C, then crawled over the rail. Careful to only use his good leg, he jumped up onto the rail, then launched himself up towards the roof, turning in the air and grabbing the edge with his clawed hand to pull himself over, shoving the animal back inside before he touched the ground.
All the musicians' eyes were on the other side of the roof, where two house-sized pieces of Oblivion were hanging like balls of television static, covering nearly a quarter of the roof. Looking up, he saw other pieces drifting down which might also hit the roof.
“Listen!” he yelled, and the trumpet players all froze and looked his way. “I'm here to evacuate you! Come to this side of the roof!” He dropped the duffel bag and with one hand unzipped it and pulled out the rope ladder.
“You're one of Edith's friends,” said a young man with a white shirt and suspenders. “I knew she'd find you!”
“Come here and help me,” said Julius, pulling the rope ladder over to a very large air conditioning unit.
“So you stopped The Angel of Death and The Axeboy?”
Just then the bounce music from the second bus stopped, and the silence was palpable. “I believe so. Where are all your trumpets?”
“I had everyone throw them off the side of the building,” said the man, helping him secure the ladder around the air conditioning unit. “I figured if the cornet player started up again, we wouldn't have anything to play, so we wouldn't be able to keep calling The Axeman.”
Julius nodded, pulled the ladder over to the side of the roof and threw it down, then turned to the crowd of musicians. “Everyone start filing down to the street! Then head to Toulouse and Bourbon, where my people will start loading you into buses so we can bring you to safety!”
The musicians began descending the four stories to Dauphine Street.
“What's your name?” Julius asked the young man.
“William. William Town.”
“I've heard of you.”
“I'd hope so – I was taught to speak trumpet by the devil herself. And you may have heard of my legendary power to make any lady smirk.”
Julius actually chuckled, despite the dire situation. “You from '34?”
“Yes.”
“We'll get you home, don't you worry.”
“Oh, I ain't worried. I saw it in Miss Edith's eyes – the fact that she and her friends would get me back to my time and place. No one could worry after lookin' into those eyes.”
“No, don't suppose they could.” Julius looked down the street and saw a small cloud of Oblivion drifting slowly down Dauphine about thirty feet above the street, looking like it might be headed for the middle of the ladder. He stuck out his arm to stop any
more musicians from climbing down. “Hold on!”
Looking down, he saw almost ten on the ladder, the furthest one about one story from the ground. The cloud of Oblivion was floating closer – the last few musicians would make it, the few in the middle would not, and the few closest to him might climb right down into it. But if he yelled for them to stop or to climb back up, just as many might get sucked in.
“William,” said Julius without looking up. “Keep an eye on things up here.” Then Julius stepped off the edge of the roof and dropped straight down, past several of the descending musicians. Halfway down he reached out and grabbed the rope ladder, causing the whole thing to sway violently from side to side as pain ripped through his arm and shoulder. He looked up at the few above him. “Climb back up!” he hollered at them.
Julius turned and looked toward the cloud of Oblivion, which was only a dozen feet away. He let go of the rope ladder, using its swaying to toss himself to the side, falling one story before grabbing onto a window ledge. Pulling himself up with the stub of his other arm, he punched and shattered the window, glass raining down around him. He shook the pieces of glass from his hair, then hooked his stub over the window ledge and looked above him at the two swinging musicians.
“Jump towards me!” he yelled, looking at the lowest one first. “You! Jump and I'll catch you!”
The ladder swayed towards Julius and man let go, falling and screaming. Julius plucked him out of the air with his one hand and swung the man around to his back. “Hang on to me!” he said, and the trumpet player wrapped his arms around Julius' neck. Then Julius looked up at the other one, who was mere feet from Oblivion. “Jump!” Julius yelled, but the trumpet player was frozen and hanging onto the ladder. “You have to jump! Now!”
Suddenly Roman leaped out of nowhere and latched onto the ledge of the window above Julius, stretching himself out like a pale spider towards the trumpet player. “Give me your hand!” yelled Roman. Julius saw the edges of the trumpet player start to be siphoned into the cloud, and the player clenched his eyes shut and reached out towards Roman. Their hands touched above Julius, but Roman couldn't quite get a grip. Julius prepared himself to catch the musician if he fell, but then the poor man was sucked screaming into the Oblivion cloud.
The Axeboy's Blues (The Agents Of Book 1) Page 37
