Mismatched Pair

by J. L. Ray

  “Oh, man. I can’t believe what I’m seein’,” Cal murmured reverently.

  Baz looked over at both of them. “What are we seeing?”

  “A family reunion, man. A family reunion,” Cal breathed.

  Berry had collapsed against Tooley, who was holding her up. He looked over at Tony. “What are you doing to her?”

  Tony narrowed her eyes at his accusation. “I’m not doing anything! Look, Gandalf, I just found out she even existed. She…my ancestor…Shit! It’s a long story, but the basics are Adele was taken from the hospital the day we were born. I planned to come find her, just as soon as Mama gave me some information. But Mama wasn’t telling me anything and she’s been stonewalling since last week, when I first found out I have a twin!”

  Tooley glared back at her. “My name is O’Toole. And I know what I feel coming off of you, witchling. Again I ask, what are you doing to Berry?”

  “Berry, huh? Well, that’s appropriate—” Before she could finish or figure out what to do next, Baz interrupted.

  “Why is he calling you witchling?” Baz hissed. “Come to think of it, why did Glinda call you witchling?”

  Tony looked at Baz, then at Phil and Cal. She wasn’t sure what to do, but Baz sounded like he was about to hit the ceiling or her, whichever was closest. Luckily for her, Phil was ready to perform a great service for his ladylove. Maybe not the service he’d had on his mind for more than a week, but a useful one, nonetheless.

  “Baz, I thought someone should tell you. Bergfrid has appeared here in the station, and she is in the lieutenant’s office right now.”

  Baz turned to Phil, and if he sounded a little mad before, now he looked like walking murder. “Bergrid is here?” he hissed.

  “Funny. I thought my words were clear and simple enough even for a Viking prince to understand. Yes, Sebastian. Your fiancé is here and in the office of your supervisor.” He looked at Cal and shrugged as if to say, in for a penny, in for a pound. “And she is carrying your child.”

  The roar that filled the room shifted from human to bear so quickly that Phil and Cal, at least, felt a little blood dripping from their ears. Calvin, who had seen Phil’s look, had pulled his NASH and had Baz netted before he could do more than gather himself together for a leap toward Phil. The aborted leap led to a thumping fall to the floor, and the Changeling in the net began to growl and gnaw at the material, though it continued to hold him, a fine example of the Golden Ball Company’s workmanship.

  Berry had watched all this, wide-eyed. She had been fighting the urge to Change from the moment that Antonia Newman had spoken her True Name. When she heard it, all her lost memories came flooding back, and with them the knowledge that one who controlled her True Name controlled her. Because Antonia didn’t seem to be trying to force a Change on her, she had resisted, but the magic rolling off of the other police officer when his Change had been invoked by a tide of palpable agony almost pushed her over the edge. The only thing keeping her human and not animal was the weight of Tooley’s magic, thick and protective over her, as if he had wrapped her in himself to keep the bad things out.

  Unfortunately, Adele knew that she was the only truly bad thing in the room. And soon her true Master would come, and then She would use Adele to make this world Her own. And there was nothing that Adele could do about it. Nothing at all.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  “Well, Detectives,” Sergeant Hubbard said while looking around the room, “I think we’d better call Lieutenant Azeem, don’t you?”

  Calvin was circling the netted bear that they usually knew as Sebastian de Groot. “I think someone needs to tell him in person.”

  Tony looked over at Cal. “I want to stay here with Adele.”

  “Quit calling me that!” Tony’s twin spat like an angry cat.

  Everyone got quiet. She was still in Tooley’s protective embrace and seemed content to stay there, but even he looked startled. Up to that moment, Berry had been anything but assertive or angry.

  Cal cleared his throat and mutter to Phil, “Yo, I think we got the second riddle solved, right here.”

  Phil’s eyes widened and he nodded, watching as Tony tried to calm her sister.

  Tony cleared her throat. “Do you prefer Berry?”

  Her voice a little hysterical, Adele said, “I greatly prefer Berry.” They couldn’t know that she had her memories back, not even Tooley. They shouldn’t use her real name, as it invoked her magic, and her Master would be displeased. The thought alone made her tremble, and as she did, Tooley pulled her a little tighter in his arms. She sighed, wishing that she could be Berry, washed clean of her past and walking into a future with someone like Tooley who obviously loved, and trusted, whole-heartedly.

  “Look,” Tony walked forward slowly, her hands out to show they were empty and her voice calm, “I don’t care what you want to be called. I just...I just want to know you.” Her voice cracked a little. “I didn’t know you existed until last week. I planned to find you, but—”

  “This is too much,” her twin interrupted her. “I can’t take all this in. I don’t know you!” She dissolved into tears that were only partially a ruse. She was overwhelmed, both by her memories telling her of her role in the coming apocalypse and by her realization that she wanted to be free of that burden and simply be Berry, or even the Adele this twin sister of hers thought she would be.

  Tooley pulled her around so she could tuck her face into his neck and cry. He glared around the room in challenge. “I came here in good faith to turn myself in to the SCIB and give evidence against the smugglers who brought this woman over.” He looked down at the pink head resting against his shoulder, and Tony could see that her sister had a champion. “I will do that, but I have terms to be met.”

  “Fine,” Tony told him. She looked at Sergeant Hubbard. “I’m going to tell the lieutenant what’s up. Keep an eye on things.”

  “Not to worry, Detective,” the sergeant replied drily.

  Cal said, “And tell him that I need some help turning Baz back to human, wouldja? These nets are supposed to hold his level of magic and weight, but I’m beginning to wonder if this one’s defective.” He pointed to a few places where Baz’s claws had sliced a small area open. “I may have to shoot again.

  “Here,” Tony pulled her NASH and tossed it to him. “I was locked and loaded with multiples for the smuggling run.” She shot a guilty look at her sister and Gandalf. “Sorry, Gandalf.”

  “My name is O’Toole. Do stop calling me that ridiculous nickname. I’m nothing like that fellow. I get tired of those idiotic Realmist stereotypes.”

  “My apologies, okay? Look, O’Toole, please stay here,” Tony said, emphasizing his real name. She started toward the door and Phil followed behind. “What are you doing?” she asked him quietly as they headed back to Azeem’s office.

  “I think you might need a little back up with this one.”

  “You sure you want to run into Bergfrid? She’s batshit crazy, y’know.”

  “Actually, I do know.” He smiled at her. “I believe the saying is, ‘been there, done that, bought the t-shirt’?”

  “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  “I thank you for your warning.”

  They knocked on Azeem’s door. For a moment there was no response, then Bergfrid opened it.

  “YOU!” She launched herself at Phil, but before she could reach him, Tony grabbed her waist and threw her to the ground.

  She reached for her NASH, remembered it was with Cal and pulled out her Mundane Glock 17 and pointed it. “Calm down, Bergfrid. And please note, this is a weapon and I can kill you with it if you get violent again, so stay down.”

  “Where is Sebastian?” Bergfrid yelled at both of them, still on the floor where she had landed, but prepared to leap up.

  “I said to calm down.” Tony didn’t yell, but Phil had never heard his darling so serious. “You need to calm down and let me tell you what you need to know. I also need to talk to Lie
utenant Azeem. Where is he?”

  Bergfrid sat up, panting for a moment in her agitation. Then she sucked in a long breath and let it out slowly. “The lieutenant was called in to see someone called the Powers That Be.”

  Tony corrected her, “Not someone—the PTB are a group of Beings. He was called to go in person?”

  “Yes.”

  “Shit!” Tony looked down into Bergfrid’s eyes. “You’re okay now? Not gonna try to decapitate Phil or slice me up?”

  Bergfrid turned an icy stare to Mephistopheles. “I can wait.”

  “I guess that’s going to have to do,” Tony muttered. Then she said in an aside to Phil, “Just stay out of knife range, please.”

  “Happily.”

  Tony put out a hand to help Bergfrid up, then stood in the door to the office, looking around.

  “So they called him in from here?” Tony asked hesitantly.

  “Yes. One moment we were discussing my options to live here in Mundania and the fact that he would have to call the Powers That Be, and the next he began to...to fade. As he left, he told me what was happening.”

  Being called in by the PTB to see them in person happened so rarely that most Supers never experienced it. Those who did rarely remembered anything except the conversation. Basically, no one knew exactly who the PTB were, and that was how it was meant to be. As the body of Beings who had designed the Geas and who ultimately enforced the rules for Supers in the Mundane lands, they couldn’t afford to be known. While Supers who were born in Mundania were well adjusted to the new world order, those who had been stuck and forced into the Great Change tended to fall into one of two camps: those who made the best of it and played by the rules, and those who wanted to go back to the way things had been pre-Outing. From the first day of the Geas, the latter group of Beings produced the occasional attempt at ending the impediment of the Geas and the oversight of the Powers That Be. Keeping the identities of the PTB secret remained one of the main ways of keeping them safe from attacks.

  Tony ran her hand through her hair. “Now what?” She turned to Phil. “I get why Baz wants to take a chunk out of you, but,” she turned to Bergfrid, “from what I can tell, you seem to want to slice a piece off of Phil as well. Why?”

  Bergfrid folded her arms and turned her head away from them both. “He knows why.”

  “I can give it back.”

  Both women looked at Phil, one hopeful, one confused.

  “You would do that?” Bergfrid asked in disbelief.

  “Give what back?” Tony frowned.

  “None of your business, woman of Mundania,” snapped Bergfrid.

  Phil started to say something, and then pressed his lips shut as if to keep from blurting out anything.

  “This has to do with your deal,” Tony guessed. “What you gave Phil to help you contact Baz?” Bergfrid didn’t respond, but Tony didn’t need a verbal affirmative. She could tell from the rigidness of Bergfrid’s posture that she had that right. “That actually is none of my business, so I’m going to go out to my desk and warn the sergeant that we may have a little wait for the lieutenant. I will be gone,” she looked at Phil who shrugged and held up one hand and wiggled all five fingers, “five minutes or so?” She made it a question, and he nodded. “Okay, then, five minutes or so. Knock yourselves out.”

  As Tony walked away she heard Bergfrid saying, “Do you understand what that woman means? Will the transfer knock us out?”

  Tony grinned a little, until she got to her desk. The sergeant wasn’t the only Being she needed to signal, but that was the easiest call to make, so she called Hubbard first.

  “Tony,” Sergeant Hubbard answered her f-light with video and audio. “Cal had to use your NASH. And that new net’s wearing out, too.”

  “Sorry, Sergeant, but we have a little delay on this end.”

  “Delay? What are you talking about?”

  “Lieutenant Azeem got called in to meet with the PTB.”

  After a moment of silence, Hubbard nodded. “Okay then. Cal? Have another net ready.”

  “Sure, Sarge. But hey! I think Baz is winding down. He looks tired.” With a loud roar, Baz, who had looked a little tired and had been struggling less than before, began to work furiously on the net harder again. “Or not. Okay, I got the next shot lined up.” Cal shook his head and aimed the NASH.

  Tony could see the action from the periphery of the f-light view, which could be set to show as much as a one hundred and eighty degree angle. It looked like O’Toole and her twin—her twin, she couldn’t get over that—were sitting down, and O’Toole still had an arm around her. At least her sister was there, whatever she called herself. Since Tony hadn’t had years to think of her as Adele, maybe Berry would be an easy change. Her poor mother was going to have the worst time of it. That reminded her of the much more difficult call to come, so she pulled herself back to the matter at hand.

  “I’ll call as soon as Lieutenant Azeem returns,” Tony told the sergeant.

  “That could be a few minutes or a few days.” Hubbard put a finger to her nose and tapped. “Joe and Jacques are the senior detectives, but they’re out on assignment and not expected back for a while. Michael is still sick, and Baz obviously can’t decide what to do about himself. That leaves you and Cal as the ones in charge.” Since they were the newest pair of detectives in the unit, having the chain of command fall to them was unusual to say the least.

  “Fabulous,” Tony said. “So, Calvin Kelly, what do we do?”

  “Gorgeous, I am wiped. And Phil and I have a date tomorrow with the crew who may be behind all the Changeling trade. You decide.”

  Berry looked up at Cal’s words, her face devoid of expression, but her body alert.

  In his excitement at Cal’s words, O’Toole didn’t notice Berry’s reaction. Eagerly he told Cal, “I can help you take them down. Those smugglers you plan to see tomorrow.”

  Cal turned to O’Toole. “Is that so, Gandalf?”

  “Stop calling me that,” Tooley ground through his teeth. “I can help you. That’s why I came in, but I want something in return.”

  “Imagine that. Color me surprised,” Calvin said. “What would that be?”

  “Safe passage to Mundania for my mother and brother.”

  His words did surprise Calvin, who was rendered speechless. He hadn’t expected a selfless request. He figured it’d be the usual: immunity and some kind of monetary payment. Their suspect had hidden depths.

  Tony was not at all surprised, having met what was apparently O’Toole’s family. “Done! I assume you’re talking about the witch I met and the young giant, Bogey?”

  “Yes, my mother Pernella Packlead and my brother.” Almost shyly O’Toole added, “His real name is Bogart. Mum named him after her favorite actor. He, uhm, likes a lot of Mundane things, and I’m hoping I’ll get to expose him to some of them.”

  “Yeah, like Kiss?” She grinned at Tooley. “I haven’t gotten the guitar yet, but I have a call out to the guy. Hopefully, we’ll hear from him soon.”

  Tooley stared at the viz of Tony from the desk sergeant’s view screen, astounded that she had cared enough to do that for someone whom she probably was meant to arrest. Then he looked at Berry’s pink hair next to him and felt the connection of simple kindness between the two women. Perhaps this SCIB officer could help them.

  “I may need something else,” he added, a little ashamed to ask for more.

  Cal snorted, but then returned his attention to Baz, whose effort had been lessening, until the mention yet another witch. He flexed his hand on the NASH. It was cramping something awful. Holding a gun, even a NASH, on a fellow officer sucked.

  “What do you want?” Tony said.

  “I didn’t mean to help smuggle in a Being.” He paused and looked at Berry, then looked steadily back at the sergeant’s f-light viz. “The buyer is evil. She has put a command-compulsion spell on me. I can feel her pulling me back to her, even now. I am having trouble resisting her.”


  Berry’s head, which had again been drooping against his shoulder, came up and she stared at him. “You didn’t tell me the spell was still pulling you,” she whispered.

  “I was too ashamed to tell you,” he said, pushing some hair back from her eyes. “I have been fighting it constantly from the moment I got up to leave her bedroom.”

  Tony read the subtext in that. Not good. Command-compulsions built around sex never ended well for anyone. In Mundania, they sometimes got the Beings involved killed, even the victims, especially the victims, who suicided or attempted to kill their rapists. That O’Toole had attached to Berry said volumes about his own power. It took some serious mpsi levels to withstand such a spell. He shouldn’t have an attraction to anyone except the bitch who had put the spell on him, so this guy wasn’t just a magic-holder by any means. Maybe he was more powerful than the spell caster. From what he said, the buyer must be connected to the Willow and Sammeal, and that meant those two were up to their vicious little asses in something very ugly. Command-compulsion spells took away free will, and that shit didn’t go down well in any Realm, Fairie or Mundane.

  “Okay, O’Toole. I’ll contact the department’s magical practitioner and see if he can come in and remove the command-compulsion from you.”

  Berry’s eyes got big at that. If only there was a way to remove the spell she was under. She reminded herself that her command-compulsion, decades old, twined so deeply within her, it would take a miracle to remove it. She leaned into O’Toole, who misinterpreted her reaction.

  “I’ll be okay, Berry,” he told her. “And if there are any issues, then you can stay with Mama and Bogart.” He didn’t look her in the eye because he hated to lie to her. He had a feeling no government employee would be powerful enough to remove this spell. In all probability, this nice officer who looked so much like Berry going to have to kill him in the near future. But at least he could get his mother and brother safely away from Fairie first and give Berry an option other than her Mundane relatives.