“You guys getting paid for this?”
“We’re just thankful for the opportunity to serve the Lord,” Messina said.
“Their check had still better cash though,” LoPresto muttered under his breath.
“All you need to know is that these men have been briefed on the basic mission of the Secret Guard, so they will do. It is rare for us to utilize outsiders, and then they only work under Secret Guard supervision.”
“Like how you supervised Sonya?” I asked.
Gutterres sighed. “It’s a new program. We’re still working the bugs out . . . So how is our tire-slashing delinquent?”
“She’s alive, but only because MHI rescued her from a lich who was about to eat her.”
“And the stone?” Because of course Gutterres wasn’t offering their services out of the kindness of his heart.
“Well, that’s complicated. She’s got it. Only it’s been somehow magically fused to her body and our smartest people can’t figure out how that happened or how to undo it.”
The Catholics shared an incredulous look between them.
“You’re screwing with us,” said LoPresto.
“Nope. You can go see for yourselves. Last time I talked to her it was floating around inside her chest but somehow miraculously not stopping her heart. Your Order happen to have any rites for that sort of thing?”
“I can check the handbook,” Gutterres said.
“We get a handbook?” Messina asked.
“I was being facetious.”
Then I heard an incoming helicopter. It wasn’t ours. The Hind was parked in its hangar while Skippy and crew bolted on a bunch of illegal weaponry for the night’s festivities. Because what was the point of having an attack helicopter if you couldn’t bust out the good stuff for special occasions? I listened to the distinct sound for a moment.
Warrington identified it first, I was guessing because he’d ridden in one a lot working for Uncle Sam. “Sounds like a Blackhawk.”
Gutterres frowned. “Unless MHI called up the National Guard, it appears your Monster Control Bureau is on the way. From your pained expression I’m assuming you weren’t expecting them?”
“Nope.” After Coslow had told me he’d called off STFU, I’d gotten my hopes up that we could complete this job without the government sticking their nose into our business. Optimism is for suckers.
A pitch-black helicopter with no numbers stenciled on it came into view over the trees. Only the MCB leaned that hard into conspiracy theory stereotypes. I was disappointed they were here, but not surprised. The government could always be counted on to make life complicated.
“Our debate over which of our organizations needs the Ward more becomes moot if the MCB simply seizes it for themselves,” Gutterres said.
“Tell me something I don’t know.” The MCB’s arrival could screw up everything. Plus I’d need to call Skippy and warn him to stop committing felonies. “I’ll deal with them. Head inside the main building, ask for Julie or Earl, they’ll figure out the best place to use you. I’m going to go see what these douchebags want.” I started walking toward the runway. Since the parking lot was full, that was the only place that made sense for the MCB to land.
The noise drew a bunch of other curious Hunters out. I saw Milo standing in the doorway of his workshop, but as soon as he saw who it was, he ran off, probably to hide the evidence of whatever anti-Drekavac projects he’d been working on. MHI paid a lot of taxes and did a lot of paperwork for our regularly purchased explosives, but that didn’t cover some of our off-the-books exotic weapons we’d gotten out of storage, or any of the homebrew stuff of questionable legality Milo was currently mixing together. At least Milo would have the sense to conceal Sonya and the rock and to warn Skippy to hide the missiles.
It was doubtful that this was a random yet unfortunately timed inspection by our governmental overseers. Somebody must have tipped them off about what was going on tonight. Regardless, I couldn’t let them know about the Ward Stone because they’d seize it. And considering how heartless the Feds could be they wouldn’t even care if it was currently stuck to some kid.
I had to shield my eyes from the stinging dust particles as the helicopter got closer. Before it had even touched down all the way, Agent Franks had already hopped out and started walking my way. They’d sent the big man himself, which was a bad sign. Franks had ditched the suit and was geared up for battle, wearing a suit of the MCB’s sleek new body armor that looked like something out of a sci-fi movie. Another armored Fed got out after Franks, but he was a lot slower because poor Grant Jefferson was having to serve as Franks’ gun caddy, laboring under the weight of several rifle and gear bags.
The helicopter immediately lifted off and soared away. Which was an even worse sign because it meant Franks was planning on staying for a while.
The really loud helicopter was still pretty close, so they probably didn’t hear me say, “What the hell are you dorks doing here?”
Franks’ ugly mug curled into a scowl, which meant his stolen ears had heard that just fine. Grant hadn’t heard me and shouted back, “What?”
The helicopter was farther away now so I could speak normally. “I asked what can MHI do for you upstanding gentlemen today?”
“Where’s Stricken?” Franks demanded.
It took me a moment to process that, because of the many things I expected from Franks right then, that question had not been among them. “What? I don’t know.”
“Where’s Lana?”
“Who?”
“The succubus who broke Stricken out of our interrogation room.” Grant had caught up with his much more intimidating partner. The look on the junior G-man’s face warned me that Franks wasn’t fucking around. Franks was legit angrier than usual. “This is serious, Pitt. Have you seen any indication that either of them has been here at the MHI compound since the escape?”
I was honestly baffled by this turn, but I could also tell that this was not the time to be a smartass to Franks, because he appeared even shorter tempered than usual. “No. We’ve not seen them.”
“Are you absolutely certain?” Grant asked.
“Yeah. The weird-looking creep who everyone here despises and wants to murder and a smoking hot chick with bat wings would probably stick out a bit. We’re not that unobservant.” I looked to Franks. “Just because we helped you when you were a fugitive doesn’t mean that MHI takes in every stray asshole on the run from the law. What’s going on?”
“We got intel,” Franks said in his usual terse way that explained absolutely nothing.
“What kind of intel?”
“Classified.”
“Come on, Franks.”
“It’s a reliable tip,” Grant interjected.
“MCB already shot their wad on that whole informant inside MHI thing with you last time, Grant. Even if you’ve managed to sneak another rat into our ranks to tattle to mommy whenever we break the rules, I can guarantee they’re full of shit on this one, because if Stricken had shown up here I’d have already capped him myself. Never mind what Earl Harbinger would do to him. I can guarantee that if we saw Stricken, it would be shoot, shovel, and shut-up time. There’s a track hoe in the garage and we’ve got a lot of acreage.” Though come to think of it, if we simply fed Stricken’s body to the wargs there would be even less evidence. The idea of Stricken ending up as warg poop made me smile.
“It’s not an informant, it’s . . . something else.”
“Coslow?”
The two Feds exchanged a knowing glance, which meant I was probably right.
“I can’t say. But the information is good. I can’t tell you how, but it looks like Stricken is really interested in whatever it is MHI is prepping for tonight. He’s up to something. He’ll be close, or it’ll at least be one of his trusted allies.”
“Like the succubus,” I said. Franks’ reaction after the prison break had seemed a little off to me. “Do you two know each other?”
“No.”
“Too bad. She was strangely attractive for a lady with horns. But don’t worry. If this obvious demon woman shows up in a compound full of extremely well-armed Monster Hunters and we don’t just immediately cap her to collect the PUFF for some baffling reason, we’ll be sure to call the MCB.”
“She’s not always obvious,” Franks corrected me. “Lana can alter her form.”
Great. Another shapeshifter. Just what I needed complicating my life. “You sure you don’t know her? Because I’m kind of getting the vibe that you know her.”
“No.” Franks’ denial was perfectly flat.
A little too flat maybe. And the fact I could tell that was a testament to how much quality time I’d gotten to spend with Franks over the years. “Sure . . . We’ll be on the lookout then. Thanks for the warning. You can go now.”
“If it’s all the same to you, we’re going to stick around here and observe for ourselves,” Grant said. “And by ‘all the same to you,’ I mean we’re going to do whatever we want anyway because we’re the law and can make your life miserable until you cave, so you might as well get over it and cooperate.”
Franks simply grunted in agreement.
“Wow, Grant, you’re remarkably good at throwing your weight around and being a total dick. Government work suits you.”
“My high school guidance counselor told me I’d be good at public service, but I decided to waste a few years being a dumbass MHI employee first.” Grant gestured toward the main building. “After you.”
“Fine.” I started walking toward headquarters. They followed me. Earl was going to hate this, but Grant wasn’t bluffing. If we fought the MCB over this, they’d just hit us over the head with a big legal hammer. And instead of just these two we’d be up to our eyeballs in meddlesome Feds. At least I knew Grant was good in a fight, and Franks was a virtual wrecking ball of monster-killing destruction. We could use the help. “But I’ll warn you, we’ve got something really nasty incoming. It’s the contract-enforcing monster Stricken warned me about during our meeting. So if you did your observing while shooting back, that would be handy.”
“We’re here to watch for Stricken,” Grant said. “As for this other business, our orders are to not interfere.”
“We’re gonna interfere,” Franks told his subordinate.
“Never mind then.” Grant passed his boss one of the heavy gun bags. “I guess we’re interfering.”
* * *
There were so many people at the compound that Julie moved the ops meeting from the conference room to the cafeteria. As the new official CEO since the death of her grandpa, Julie was in charge. Earl was there—with his nearly a century of practical experience—to gently correct her if she got anything wrong, but he mostly sat there looking tired. Earl didn’t need to say much because Julie knew what she was doing and transforming into a werewolf off the calendar always left Earl exhausted and gaunt. Normally he spent a month gaining weight just to lose it all at the full moon, and he’d burned even more calories than usual because Phipps had really worked him over.
The compound’s defenses were already solid, and a bunch of Hunters had spent the day making sure everything was ready. Julie handed out assignments to everyone else where they could join in as soon as we were done here. The plan had already been presented, and she was trying to make the rest of this quick. The more we could accomplish before the Drekavac arrived, the better off we’d be.
The assembled Hunters gave Franks and Grant a wide berth. No matter how many times MHI worked with the MCB, that general feeling of animosity between our organizations would probably never change. Half of their job seemed to be making our lives miserable. The other half was keeping monsters secret, which made our lives complicated. To the MCB we were the messy cowboys who kept blowing shit up in public making it harder for them to keep monsters secret.
Speaking of secret, the guys who were so secret that they literally had secret in their name were there too. Gutterres hadn’t even introduced himself yet, but all the Hunters already knew what he was. It turns out that in a business where most of us work for money or glory, mystical warrior monks develop something of a rep. The soldiers he’d brought looked a lot more like regular Hunters, but the exorcist was an oddity. I caught Gutterres looking at Sonya a few times, probably annoyed that she hadn’t just delivered the rock like they’d hired her to do.
Sonya struck me as somebody who normally enjoyed being the center of attention, but not today, not like this. All of the big-brain Hunters had taken a look at the Ward stuck to her, and they were treating her almost like an afterthought. I don’t think they were being dicks on purpose. It’s just that a good bedside manner wasn’t normally that important to what we do.
Cody was watching her like a hawk. After the mentally and physically grueling siege, he had been happy to retire. After decades of leading MHI’s team that handled all of our mad-science contracts with various research labs, he’d been happy to buy a fishing boat and a little place on the beach in Gulf Shores to live out the rest of his days in peace and quiet. Except as soon as Julie had told him another Ward Stone, he’d probably broken a whole lot of speed limits to get back here. He’d been baffled at how Newton’s weapon was interacting with Sonya.
Our young shapeshifter was probably pretty good at hiding her emotions behind various faces, but it was obvious that she was really bothered when Tanya—who she had been promised would surely know how to fix this—had been confused too. It turned out there wasn’t a lot of overlap between elf magic and Newton’s alchemy.
Unfortunately, one thing Cody and Tanya had both agreed on was that it couldn’t be good for Sonya’s long-term health to have an artifact crackling with magical energy embedded in her body. Too bad she was basically shit out of luck until they could figure out how to fix it.
“Some of you may have noticed that we’ve got a few guests who will be helping us tonight,” Julie told the cafeteria full of Hunters. “Most of you know Agent Franks and Agent Jefferson of the MCB.”
I was impressed. Nobody booed. But that wasn’t out of respect so much as fear of Franks.
“Do you have anything you want to say to everyone, Agent Franks?” Julie asked.
Franks slowly looked around the room, surely trying to decide if he wanted to regale us mere mortal Hunters with his copious wisdom. “No.”
Julie wasn’t surprised or disappointed by that answer. “Great. Moving on—”
“I’d like to say a few words,” Grant interjected.
“Of course you do.” Julie sighed. “Agent Jefferson.”
Grant stood up to address his former coworkers. MHI is a pretty tight bunch. When one of our own ditches us, joins the hated MCB, and then comes back to spy on us, it leaves some hard feelings. So of course there was some muttering from the crowd. Among that I picked out the words, traitor, Judas, backstabber, and dickhead . . . Okay, I’ll admit, that last one might have been from me. But I was sitting in back so not too many people heard it . . . probably.
“I just want everyone to know that the MCB will in no way hinder MHI’s operations tonight. We are merely acting as observers. I’m fully aware of everyone’s feelings about the Bureau and about me personally. However, we’re going to set that aside because we all have more important things to worry about. Officially, all I can say is that if you have any knowledge pertaining to the whereabouts of the man known as Stricken, the MCB is offering a reward for any information leading to his capture. Thank you.”
That was a remarkably non-dickish message by Grant standards. Holly golf-clapped for him.
“Thank you, Agent Jefferson,” Julie said, a little surprised that Grant had managed to keep it that professional. He must have been bucking for a promotion. “And over here, we’ve got some representatives from the Blessed Order of Saint Hubert the Protector, who have agreed to share their intel about tonight’s threat.”
“In exchange for access to the Ward Stone,” Gutterres specified. “We have a rather pressing
need for it.”
“After we figure out how to get it unstuck from our other guest, sure,” Julie said. “But please, continue, Mr. Gutterres.”
The combat exorcist stood up. “The creature you will be facing tonight is known as a Drekavac. It is a rare power bestowed by the devil himself to only the vilest of human beings to have ever lived. Men and women willing to sacrifice their souls in exchange for immortality and terrible abilities. This offer is only made to the most unrepentant mortals who have become the living personification of some terrible sin. This creature in particular is the embodiment of unrighteous judgment. His mortal name was Silas Carver. He was once trusted to protect the innocent, a killer of monsters, burner of witches, but who, in his search to punish sinners, became everything he hated and more.”
“Sounds like a real asshole,” Earl said.
“Grade A,” Gutterres agreed. “He was so focused on destroying evil that he embraced it.”
“One of yours?”
“Protestant, thankfully. But if you want to throw stones about our organizations’ various embarrassments—”
Earl held up one hand before Gutterres could bring up someone like Julie’s dad or Martin Hood. “No need. I didn’t intend any offense. You can’t do what we do without having some bad apples once in a while.”
“Of course,” Gutterres nodded politely. “Silas Carver was relentless in life, and that hasn’t changed in undeath. Each Drekavac is a unique being with differing abilities. We have not dealt directly with Carver before, so I can’t tell you how his abilities will manifest the more he dies. However, I can assure you of one thing: He will become increasingly dangerous until his thirteenth form is defeated.”
Albert Lee was sitting near the front, taking notes so that he could update MHI’s files. “How has mankind beaten these things before?”
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