Battle Hill Bolero

by Daniel José Older

  But then young Damian calls everyone to order. He’s unnervingly deadpan for a kid, even a dead kid, and the room shuts up quick. “Thank you for coming. Cyrus would like to say a few words before we get into the nitty-gritty.”

  I hadn’t even noticed Cyrus. He sits on a bright red plastic chair beneath posters of cartoon animals and a big banner that says FELIZ CUMPLEAÑOS JESUS in balloony letters. I’m wondering which of the little guys playing in the other room is Jesus when I realize it’s fucking Christmas. “Thank you, Damian.” The old ghost stands, strolls into the middle of the circle of foldout tables we set up. “I feel your frustration, friends and comrades. It’s been a difficult two weeks.” He pauses so long, I wonder if he may take a nap. “For all of us.”

  Mutters of agreement.

  “And I know the general sentiment is toward action, attack. And I have asked for restraint, and you, for the most part, have heard and respected my call.” He looks up, locks his eyes with various ghosts around the room, then me. “And I am thankful.” I suppress a twinge of guilt about starting shit yesterday over the book, but I know it had to happen. Cyrus would understand. “For me, it’s been the most difficult two weeks since I’ve risen from that Burial Grounds. Mama Esther’s murder hit me harder than I ever could’ve imagined it would.” Another excruciating pause. Only Cyrus could command this undivided attention amidst such silences. “And I admit, I didn’t know which path was right, so clouded was my mind with grief. I believe that now the time has come for action.”

  A burst of nausea rises up in me as sighs of relief erupt around the room. So much hinges on what happens in the next few moments. But then, so much will hinge on the moments after that too, and the ones after that. All there is to do is get used to the new norm. Across the room, Riley catches my gaze, nods. Good.

  “I’ve divided up command responsibilities,” Cyrus says. “It’s very unfortunate that both Krys and Big Cane are still MIA.”

  Shit. With Krys already being so erratic, it’s impossible to tell whether her absence is more of that or something far worse.

  “Each soul in this room has a role to play,” Cyrus continues. “You are what they call the inner circle now. The battle begins and ends with us.”

  This was unexpected. Sasha shifts in her seat beside me. She’d come to pledge her support to the cause, not get caught up in any leadership role.

  “Damian, who as you all know is my only known descendent and the carrier of this family’s spiritual legacy, will be running logistics and supplies. I’ll let him speak to you.” He looks around once more, lands his warm, wrinkled gaze on each of us, then returns to his seat beneath the festive posters and steeples his fingers.

  “Each of you commands a battalion of spirits,” Damian says, launching into the air as a flickering collection of tiny images comes into view around him. They’re the Remote District forces, I realize; numbers appear beside the shimmering ghost clusters. “In the past two weeks, five Remote Districts have gone rebel, swelling our ranks to well over a thousand. We estimate the Council forces have bolstered too, to at least fifteen hundred. They are currently holed up inside Sunset, trying to wait out this revolutionary fervor they’ve stoked. The newly joined Rebel Districts, because we’re not calling them ‘remote’ anymore, are RDs 8, 9, 10, 14, and 16. The first three are in Harlem; the last rep parts of Queens and, shockingly, Staten Island.”

  “Ay,” a burly ghost in the corner grumbles. Everyone laughs.

  “Plus we have Vincent Jackson’s Black Hoodie Squad, Cyrus’s African Burial Ground Crew, the Ghost Riders, a full battalion of dead construction workers, and about three dozen homeless ghosts, repped by the esteemed Mr. Trant.” An older ghost nods with a genial smile. “And Sergeant Milford will head up the squad of veteran ghosts.” A young man stands at attention, snaps a salute, sits. “Everyone in this room right now,” Damian continues, “will be functioning as captains in the field.”

  “Even half-dead guy?” the Staten Island ghost says. “He ain’t even rea—”

  Cyrus and about two-thirds of the room stand, cutting him off midword. “Delacruz has done more for this movement and risked more than most of the spirits in this room,” Cyrus says. “He is an excellent tactician and a skilled fighter. We need him.”

  “And he didn’t wait till it was cool to join up, like some people, Talbot,” Riley adds.

  Talbot mumbles something and shrugs.

  I wonder if it’s true, though, what Cyrus said about me risking more than most of the spirits in the room. Folks here have lost loved ones already; my own loss feels so far away, literally another life. Sasha places a hand on my leg, brings me back with a smile and a whispered “You okay?”

  I nod. Things are happening fast, though. Already, little Damian is handing the floor over to Riley and explaining that he’ll be the lead commander of the allied revolutionary forces in the field.

  “Sweet,” I whisper as the room explodes with cheers.

  “Thank you, thank you,” Riley says. His grin is subdued, though, by Riley standards. He knows there’s only Hell ahead. “Talbot, any wiseass comments?”

  Talbot waves him off. “I’m good, Commander.”

  “That remains to be seen.” Everyone laughs, even Talbot. Then Riley signals to the far side of the room, where a squad of ghosts is rapidly emerging into view.

  “My friends,” Riley says, “I present to you the much-rumored and sought-after Squad 9, formerly of the Council of the Dead, here to pledge to the Revolutionary Dead.”

  Sylvia Bell steps forward at the head of her squad and says, “Greetings.” She’s a squat, middle-aged white woman, who also happens to be one of the most ruthless soulcatchers the Council ever trained. She went renegade after the Blattodeon wars, took her whole team with her, and they’ve been underground ever since. And now they’re here, and ready to fight.

  “Welcome back, Captain Bell,” Riley says, but his smile says, Hello, beautiful woman of my life. I never quite got the full rundown on what all went down between them—Riley was uncharacteristically quiet about it—but it seemed serious.

  Sylvia nods, salutes, and walks up and plants a kiss right on his shocked face. The whole room says “Whoa!” at the same time.

  “Missed ya, babyboy,” she says, walking back to her squad.

  “I . . . missed you too . . . ,” Riley says.

  “So,” little Damian says, floating up into the center of the room. “If you’re quite finished, Commander Babyboy?”

  Riley fake sneezes an Ahh, fuck off and then says, “The floor is yours.”

  “I have another special . . . er . . . surprise guest.” I’ve known Damian for a few months now, and it still unnerves me how old and young he is at the same time. His little translucent child’s body turns a slow circle, staring each of us down with those big haunted eyes. “You will not like this one. It doesn’t matter. It’s a piece of the puzzle. This is where shit, as Carlos says, gets real.”

  “We sure we trust everyone in this room, D?” Riley says, glaring at Talbot.

  “You have something to say, Commander,” Talbot rumbles, “then say it.”

  “I just did.”

  “Everyone,” Damian says, “in this room has my trust. We’ve done our homework, Commander. There are no leaks, no rats here. We don’t have to like each other, but if you trust me, and you better, then you trust everyone here. You have my word.”

  “And mine,” Cyrus croaks from the back. Then he says again, quietly, as if to himself: “And mine.”

  Riley nods curtly. “Alright. I’m with it. Talbot, you good by me.”

  Talbot allows a slight smile.

  “Ya borough trash though.”

  Damian sighs and holds a hand up to preempt Talbot’s clapback. “Gentlemen, I’d like to continue. Time is short. Now, many of you received what we’ve come to call farewell gifts from Mama Est
her. Commander Riley alerted us last night that the Garvey Park spirits believe Mama Esther was working on some kind of plan of attack, a way to take out the Council, when she was killed, and that she passed on the pieces of what she was working on to each of us, with the hope that’d we’d assemble them into a full picture—one that may or may not be complete—and make our move.”

  “What’d she give you?” Saeen asks. Then someone coughs, and someone else grunts, and a general murmur of discomfort rises. I look around, but nothing has changed in the room; no one has walked in, although the walls seem somehow drab now. The FELIZ CUMPLEAÑOS sign glares off the wall, a suddenly vicious shade of red. I shake my head. Sasha’s hand wraps around my wrist, and I see from her face she feels it too, this deep-down wrenching of soul.

  “I believe our guest has arrived,” Damian says through gritted teeth. He’s diminished—all the spirits are. Their shrouds flicker and fade as they rub their eyes and scowl. “Let the telemon through.”

  “Oh hell fuckin’ no!” Riley yells. And then I remember when I’ve felt this way before and why it would upset Riley. The door opens, and an immense figure walks in. His solemn, pale face peers out evenly from beneath a hood. He carries a large duffel bag to the table, places it with the utmost care, and then retreats to the corner of the room.

  The first time I saw an ngk, it was posted up in a house near Mama Esther’s, puffing away on its fucked-up little stationary bike, as they do, and chuckling to itself like a maniac, as they do, and making the air utterly unbearable all around it. As they fucking do. They’re tiny, come a little higher than my ankle, and absurdly powerful—basically a rat-sized chemical grenade for spirits. On a stationary bike. And if you kill one, which everyone always wants to do because they’re so horrible, all the rest materialize with a quickness and eat your entire essence. Like, they will feast on your body, mind, and soul. I’ve never seen a feeding frenzy like when the ngks swarmed Dro, and then Sarco. I still have nightmares.

  The one that emerges from the duffel bag has brought its stationary bike along, but it isn’t riding it—which I presume is why all the spirits in the room haven’t run out screaming yet. The ngk rests one creepy little hand on the handlebar as it passes an eager gaze around the room. It has little tufts of hair sprouting along its wrinkled body and row after row of perfectly aligned, razor-sharp teeth, all the better to shred your entire fucking soul with.

  “I . . . This is a bad idea,” Riley says. “With all due respect. Whatever the idea is, it’s bad.”

  The ngk bows its head slightly at Riley, turns to Damian.

  “Hold on,” Damian says. “First off, Baba Eddie, you there?”

  Baba Eddie and Rohan enter, each carrying a huge bowl of blueberries and shaking their heads with distaste at the wretchedness pulsing through the room in brutal waves.

  “Thank you,” Damian says.

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Baba Eddie grumbles, leaving quickly with Rohan.

  “We’ve discovered that blueberries contain certain properties that counteract the effect of that special . . . ngk sensation we’re all . . . feeling.”

  Everyone dives for the blueberries at once, and for a few seconds a rabid feast ensues.

  “Still say whatever it is is a bad idea,” Riley says through mouthfuls of blueberries. “I only feel slightly better.”

  “It is,” Damian says. “But it’s the only one we got. We can’t assault Sunset head-on. The Council forces won’t leave. So we have to give them a reason to leave. We’ve smuggled out their evacuation plans—they can’t mass such a huge army in the crowded Sunset Park streets, so the route leads directly up the hill to Green-Wood Cemetery.”

  “Where we’ll be waiting for them,” Cyrus says through a strained grin.

  “And Riley,” Damian continues, “you of all people, who was nearly killed by the ngks and lost a partner to them, has cause to enter into this with trepidation.”

  “I’m not entering it with trepidation,” Riley says, shoving another handful of blueberries into his mouth. “I’m just not entering it. You shoulda let me in on it before you put me in charge, so I could let you know. This is fucked up to the nth degree.” He looks at the ngk. “No offense.”

  “Hear me out,” Damian says. “Hear the play, Commander. We have no other options.”

  And then something clicks in my head. And I can see it. I can see it all.

  I stand. “I’ll do it.”

  “The hell you will,” Riley says. “Do what?”

  I rustle through my bag, retrieve the book of floor plans Mama Esther gave me, drop it on the table. Grab some berries while I’m up. The ngk regards me with an unnerving grin, then nods sagely. The vile fuck.

  “What is it?” Damian asks. He’s better at hiding it than everyone else, but I see the way he squints through the discomfort.

  “The Sunset floor plans. Which will help me place the ngk in Council headquarters and get out quickly—here.” I flap some pages forward and point to the entrada we found.

  “They got an entrada at Council HQ?” Riley says.

  “Why don’t we just bring the army in through there?” Talbot says. “No ngks necessary.”

  Riley shakes his head. “We’d bottleneck and be slaughtered. They’d hem us in and come cutting from both sides. No room to maneuver. Anyway, you’re gonna do what, Carlos?”

  “I’m going with you,” Sasha says, standing and stepping beside me.

  I start to object. My whole body is a volcano of objections, about to overflow, but somehow I cap it. We just found each other again, finally, and we just started making sense, and somehow, still, our bodies fit together just right, our minds just right. And now she’s going to run into Hell at my side? Truth is, I’d rather go alone, die alone, keep shit simple. What if they take her? What if they make me watch her die? What if—I shudder, then look her in the eye and nod.

  She’s right: everything she would say if I tried to object would be right anyway. If I go down, who will get it done? A ghost wouldn’t be able to hold the ngk long enough to make it inside even with a mountain of blueberries. Rohan hasn’t been inside HQ, and he’s still kind of fresh in the whole chopping-spirits department. Sasha’s the best warrior I know. There’s no one I’d rather have my back. There’s no one I’d like less to have my back.

  I turn and look her full in the face, catch my breath. Try not to think about how her eyes get wide when I enter, the contour of her naked back; it’s all I think about, though, all I see. Her whole, exquisite form lies painted across the inside of my eyes, and I’m helpless.

  Sasha narrows her eyes. It was only a flicker, a momentary lapse, all those thoughts, but she caught it—saw my gaze drift back to the hotel room, the night on fire around us, her thighs embracing me. “C, it’s decided.”

  I close my eyes. Accept it. Turn to the group.

  “We’re gonna bust up in there,” I say, “drop the ngk off, and then be out, through the entrada, into Hell, and up to the surface again.”

  “Sssssssssssss.” The hiss comes from the center of the table, and everyone takes a wary step back. The ngk is smiling that unacceptable smile, gazing at us sublimely.

  “¿Qué, motherfucker?” Riley growls.

  “Easy, Riley,” Damian says. “He’s our ally now.”

  “I don’t—” Riley starts, but he’s cut off by another appalling hiss from the ngk.

  “Ngk,” it croaks. “Sssssssssssss.”

  “Oh,” I say, squinching my face. “Plural. Ngks.”

  “Fuckin’ great,” Riley sighs.

  Sasha

  “Why don’t they just bust down to Hell through the Prospect Park entrada,” the Staten Island ghost they call Talbot says. “And then get in through the secret Sunset Park entrada in HQ?”

  “No dice,” Riley says.

  “Why not?”

  “It’ll be
heavily guarded, for one thing,” I say. “Especially right now. Probably both sides of it.”

  We’re standing on the highest point of Green-Wood Cemetery, a tombstone-speckled hill: Riley, Talbot, Sylvia Bell, Vincent of the Black Hoodies, Damian the child ghost, and Carlos and I. Spread out behind us, the combined forces of the Revolutionary Dead gathers and waits amidst the trees and graves, their sullen, glistening faces turned toward us. Ghostlings run messages back and forth between Riley and Cyrus, who sits at the cemetery entrance taking account of every new battalion that joins.

  From this hill, we gaze out across the rising and falling row houses and church steeples of Sunset Park. The Brooklyn-Queens Expressway cuts like an unruly metal worm through the neighborhood; just beyond it the warehouses loom in their industrial wasteland; beyond that is the bay.

  “Plus,” Riley points out, “it’s called a secret entrada for a reason. Just ’cause we know it exists don’t mean it’ll be easy to find. And we don’t have time for C and Sasha here to waste rooting around the back corners and weed holes of the Hell looking for an entrada that may or may not even be visible to the naked eye.”

  “All while fending off attacks from who knows how many ’catchers,” Carlos adds.

  “And then however many more show up when they sound the alarm,” I put in. “No thanks.”

  “Okay, fair point,” Talbot mutters.

  “Y’all could go in under the guise of a diplomatic mission,” Riley says. “I’m pretty sure Botus is aching to have a meeting with you at this point, find out what’s what and feel out the mood for our surrender.”

  Carlos and I exchange dubious glances. I shake my head. “Not my style,” he says.

  “Is getting skewered by a hundred ’catcher blades while the entire rebellion collapses in on itself more your style?” Talbot sneers. “Cuz that’s what’s—”

  My outstretched arm slows Carlos’s lunge. “Fall back,” I say just to him. “Not worth it.”