ANGEL ™: avatar

by John Passarella

  Standing up so abruptly that his chair fell over, Elliot backed away from the computer as if it had bitten him. “Oh, man,” he said faintly, “that double-crossing bastard!” He’d been a fool, a blind fool! The deformities weren’t temporary, as Yunk’sh had assured him. As the cycle had progressed, Elliot’s own body was transforming—to become the demon’s re-spawned body! Elliot would be the twelfth and final victim and then the demon would somehow take over Elliot’s altered body. It made sickening sense.

  “I am so totally screwed,” he said, panicked. I gotta get the hell out of here! He dressed quickly in a sweatshirt and fleece sweatpants, cursing vehemently while he taped his sliced sneaker over his wide left foot. He took a Dodgers baseball cap from the closet and a cheap pair of sunglasses from the kitchen junk drawer.

  As he reached the door to his apartment, he stopped and banged his head against the wood panel. There’s nowhere to go, he told himself. I’m linked to him. No matter how far I run, eventually he’ll catch me.

  All his dreams evaporated in the few seconds he stood with his head bowed against the door. The demon had lied to Elliot about everything because he needed a human intermediary to gain the temporary physical form needed to kill his victims. He’d needed Elliot to find victims. All but one. The twelfth victim Yunk’sh had found all on his own. And baited the trap with an irresistible morsel. Without the dreams, all Elliot had left was his life.

  And tonight he’ll kill me.

  Elliot began to pace the living room, banging his deformed left fist into the side of his head as if he could jar loose an idea. “Options, I need options.” He sighed. “Okay. Find the cult. Let them have the demon. Right? No, no, no! They’ll just hold you down while Yunk’sh kills you, completes his cycle, and falls into their hands. What, then? What—No, not what . . . who!”

  Elliot returned to his bedroom and his computer desk. Opening his Web browser’s window, he muttered, “The enemy of my enemy,” as he brought up a search engine and entered several key words, starting with “Angel.”

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  When the telephone at Angel Investigations rang, Cordelia picked up the handset and gave her usual greeting: “Angel Investigations. We help the helpless. How can we help you?” She listened briefly. “Oh, hi!” Then her eyes went wide. “Oh, no! No, wait a— He’s here.” Cordelia looked up at Angel, who had come out of his office after the phone rang. “Okay, okay. I’ll tell him.” She hung up the phone, then scribbled some notes.

  “Tell me that wasn’t Kate,” Angel said. He’d spent several hours yesterday—actually much earlier that morning—telling and retelling Detective Lockley everything they’d done to set the trap for the demon. But that hadn’t been good enough, so Kate had had Cordelia and Doyle come down at nine o’clock and explain it all again, separately. By noon she’d finally been satisfied they were telling the truth—which they were, right up to the point where they substituted the word “stalker” or “killer” for “demon.”

  Doyle stood up, dropping the newspaper account of the murders on the chair behind him. “Anyone but Detective Lockley.”

  Cordelia shook her head. “No. It was Chelsea Monroe, from L.A. After Dark. She sounded nervous, said it was urgent. She needs your help, Angel. At this address.”

  Angel took the note paper and checked the address.

  “Go,” Doyle said. “Don’t worry. I’ll keep looking for the spell or ritual that locates the demon while it’s in its borrowed form. And Cordelia here will continue to do the chat room mambo.”

  “Except this time,” Cordelia added, “Doyle’s the bait.”

  “Fine,” Angel said. “But, Doyle, don’t forget your other sources. We need to approach this from all directions.”

  Doyle nodded. “If anything develops, we’ll call your cell.”

  The address Chelsea Monroe had given Cordelia led Angel to Armand’s on La Cienega in Beverly Hills. He found her one floor up, in the Crescent Lounge, a piano bar. With quick, wary glances, Angel checked his surroundings, attempting to locate the apparent menace.

  While the inner curve of the lounge overlooked the wide expanse of the restaurant below, the outer curve faced a wall of floor-to-ceiling glass with a stunning view of the immaculate boulevard, modern buildings separated by orderly rows of palm trees. A stunning modern view, as if someone had just removed the shrink-wrap. Some sections of the city can fool you into thinking almost anything is possible, Angel thought.

  Chelsea Monroe had been sitting at one of the small tables, a long-stemmed wineglass in front of her. She rose when she saw him, smiled with uncharacteristic hesitation. She wore a shimmering bronze blouse with a plunging neckline, a calf-length burgundy skirt, and matching leather boots. Without one of her expensively tailored suits she seemed unusually casual. She stared at him with her rich green eyes, as if memorizing his every feature. “Angel, I’m so glad you came.”

  Several other couples had come up to the lounge, to better hear the piano player at the white baby grand and perhaps to distance themselves from the clinking of crockery and stemware in the restaurant below. As if by unspoken agreement, all the couples were evenly dispersed, keeping conversations intimate and, Angel hoped, private.

  With one last darting glance around the lounge, Angel stepped forward and whispered, “Cordelia said it was urgent.”

  “I urgently needed you away from that office,” Chelsea said. “I’m starting to suspect you hide behind your isolation. Now please, join me at my table.”

  Angel frowned but accompanied her back to the table to keep their conversation private. “I thought you were in danger.”

  “I am,” she said. “We are.”

  “I don’t follow you.”

  “I only wanted to give us a chance.”

  “There is no us,” Angel said adding more firmly, “And you lied to me.”

  “Forgive my little deception.” Chelsea reached out and touched the back of his hand. For a moment, Angel didn’t pull away. And, if only for that moment, he entertained a possibility of his own, one that could never really exist, one that faded with only a tinge of regret, best forgotten. “This isn’t about my show and hasn’t been for a while, although I thought I could use the show as a pretext to spend some time with you.”

  “Failing that,” Angel said, “you pretended to be in danger.”

  A couple walked hand in hand to the small parquet dance floor and began to sway slowly to a Cole Porter tune tinkling from the piano.

  Chelsea quirked a wry smile. “I’ve got you under my skin.”

  “Excuse me?”

  She nodded toward the piano player. “He’s playing the Cole Porter song.” Canting her head, she said, “I don’t suppose you’d care to dance.”

  For some reason, he found it difficult to stay mad at her and wondered at his own resolve. He sighed. Looking out the grand windows gave the illusion that anything was possible, but that was all it was—an illusion. The reality of life was a series of hard decisions, sacrifices, and responsibilities. “Chelsea, I’m sorry but this just isn’t possible.”

  “Shouldn’t anything be possible?” Chelsea asked him. “If we want it badly enough?”

  His cell phone chirped.

  Angel pulled the phone from his jacket. “I’m expecting an important call,” he explained. With a resigned nod, Chelsea sat down at the table and took a sip of wine. Angel turned away and lowered his voice to answer the call. “Cordelia. Did you find something?”

  Cordelia twisted the telephone cord excitedly between her fingers. “No, but something found us. You’ll never guess. Okay, then don’t guess. We were hungry, so Doyle went for takeout and then the phone rang and it was him. The human servant, that’s who! He found our phone number on the Web page. I won’t say I told you so, but I told you the Web site was a good idea.”

  Listening, Cordelia sat in her chair but stood up again in a moment. She reached for a pen in the round desktop holder and knocked the whole thing over, spilling pens,
pencils, and paper clips. “He wants to come over to our side, help us kill this Vishrak demon before it’s too late. I believed him because he sounded totally terrified.”

  Doyle backed through the door balancing a large white bag and a couple of cartons of Chinese takeout.

  Cordelia cleared a spot on her desk. “He thinks the demon wants to kill him next. Oh, well, I got his name, address, and phone number. No, I told him to wait there, that I’d call you and send you right over.”

  Doyle mouthed, “Angel?” And Cordelia nodded. “Okay, okay, Mr. Twenty-twenty-hindsight. I’ll call him back and tell him. Here it is.” She read the name, address, and phone number to Angel. “I think that’s near Culver City. Oh—don’t hang up! How’s Chelsea? What? A misunderstanding? Well, if you say so.”

  When she hung up the telephone, Doyle asked, “What’d I miss?”

  “The human servant just called. He wants to change teams.”

  “Because the demon wants to kill him next.”

  “Oh, you heard that part. Anyway, I told him to wait there for Angel.”

  “You told him to wait for Angel right where the demon can find him?” Doyle asked.

  “Now you sound like Angel,” Cordelia said, picking up the telephone handset again. “I’m supposed to call this Grundy guy back and tell him to come here instead.” She dialed the number, shaking her head as the phone on the other end of the line continued to ring. “Jeez! Everybody with the twenty-twenty hindsight. Besides, there’s a demon after this guy. You really think he’s safe anywhere?”

  As soon as Elliot hung up the telephone in his apartment he felt the cold knot of dread in his stomach expanding, nearly paralyzing him. The woman in Angel’s office had told him to sit tight, that she’d call Angel and have him drive immediately to Elliot’s apartment. But as the minutes ticked by, Elliot felt a tide of panic rising within him. The demon would reappear any second and this Angel guy might take an hour to show. Less than five minutes had passed when he decided to run. Anywhere is better than here. I know Angel’s office address. Why not wait there?

  Another minute or so passed while he tugged on his canvas gloves, pulled down the bill of his cap, and slipped into an overcoat. With the taped-up sneaker and the odd assortment of baggy clothing to hide his deformities, he appeared no more unusual than a homeless person. His bowlegged gait and prominent limp would be seen as nothing more than a disability.

  He slipped quietly out of his third-floor apartment and hurried, as much as he was able, down the stairs, confident that he could still drive his battered old Chevy Cavalier. Since it was an automatic transmission, he only needed his right leg to accelerate and break, his right hand to change gears.

  He heard the telephone ringing. No way in hell I’m going back now!

  Elliot climbed awkwardly into his car, worked the ignition until the car sputtered to life, then swung out into traffic, trembling with relief. Rush hour was past, and the light traffic gave him time to consider his predicament. Yunk’sh would find the apartment abandoned. Elliot wondered how long the demon would hang around before beginning the search for his human servant—hell, human vessel! That delay was Elliot’s only hope of reaching Angel in time. Would Yunk’sh grow weary of waiting for Elliot’s return and simply hunt down another random victim as he had the previous night, to complete his ritual cycle? Even if Yunk’sh found a twelfth victim, Elliot had a sick feeling the demon would want to settle accounts.

  Moments after the telephone stopped ringing, Yunk’sh swirled into existence in Elliot’s bedroom and immediately sensed that his human servant and vessel was gone. In light of the demon’s impending triumph, Elliot’s absence seemed, at first, a minor inconvenience. But as the minutes ticked by, the demon began to wonder if he’d underestimated Elliot Grundy.

  Elliot never strayed far from home. Since he had no social life, he spent most of his time eating, sleeping, watching television, or working at his computer. Uninteresting, unnoticed and most of all, unlikely to be missed, Elliot Grundy was an angry young man with little talent but a lot of envy and absolutely no ambition, at least not in the industrious sense of the word—all of which made him a perfect servant, victim, and vessel.

  Yunk’sh walked through the apartment, looking for a note, some indication of where Elliot had gone or when he would return. Nothing. “Where is my greedy little vessel?” Yunk’sh rumbled. He knew the cult now had his remnant corpse in Los Angeles. It was agonizing for him to sense his prior physical remains, yet be blind to its location. While his borrowed human form had its magical limitations, his re-spawned demonic body would allow him to rip aside the magical veil and destroy the cult and his own remnant corpse. But first he needed to complete the cycle. And for that he needed Elliot.

  A few more minutes passed and Yunk’sh started to worry that Elliot, somehow realizing his fate, had fled. Returning to the bedroom, Yunk’sh perused the contents of Elliot’s desk. He found the list of the victims and details about their personal lives and began to tear all the documents into tiny scraps. Next he found a list of all the signs of the zodiac with all but one crossed off. The last one was circled several times in red ink. “So the mortal fool does know what I intend for him.” Yunk’sh slammed his hand down on the computer keyboard.

  Instantly the animated screen saver blinked off, revealing a dark screen, a Web site for a detective agency. Then he glimpsed the name and shouted it in anger, “Angel!” Yunk’sh slammed his fist through the computer screen. The monitor made a loud pop, followed by a flurry of sparks. Lifting the monitor off the desk, Yunk’sh ripped it free of its connections and hurled it across the bedroom, where it took a large chunk out of the wall, then dropped to the floor with a heavy thud. The stale scent of ozone filled the air.

  So he runs to my nonhuman enemy. Angel cannot save you, Elliot. We are linked, you and I. You can run, but you will not escape. Wherever you go, I will find you.

  Each time Yunk’sh assumed physical form, he had to tug on the bond between them. Always the link had led back to this place, but Yunk’sh had the ability to follow the link wherever it led, and it would lead back to Elliot.

  Somebody knocked on the outer door.

  Only one person visits Elliot on a regular basis. Yunk’sh walked out of the bedroom and approached the door, listening but not speaking. His glamour reached out, tendrils of power seeking the human mind on the other side.

  “Elliot, open up. It’s me, Shirley! I heard a crash from downstairs.”

  Yunk’sh peered through the peephole. Its fish-bowl lens distorted the frizzle-haired young woman beyond. But she was alone. Maybe if he waited long enough, the meddlesome girl would go away.

  “Elliot? C’mon, open up! You and me have to take care of each other, you know. It’s fate, right?”

  Fate?

  “Elliot! C’mon, I’m worried. Open up or I’ll call 911.”

  As he remembered Elliot’s varied complaints about this Shirley Blodgett, a smile began to form on Yunk’sh’s generic human face. Elliot could never seem to escape her attentions. Not only had they worked together, but she lived right below him and she always made a big fuss about how they had the exact same birth date.

  The glamour complete, the demon’s smile appeared now on Elliot’s face. “I’m fine, Shirley,” Yunk’sh said in Elliot’s nasal voice and opened the door.

  In a green pullover, blue jeans, and black running shoes, Shirley stood with her hands clasped together before her, worry etched on her face until his ready smile put her at ease. “Guess that was pretty dumb, about calling 911,” she said. “I mean, you look fine. Even your burn is healed.” She reached a hand out toward his. “Can I touch it?”

  “See for yourself.”

  She did a double-take, before nodding with a pleased grin. When she took his bare hand, he could feel a slight tremor in hers. “So, um, what was that loud crash?”

  “Nothing. I was cleaning out a closet and some stuff fell.”

  “Well, the doctor did a gr
eat job,” she said, releasing his hand.

  As she walked into the room, he closed and locked the door behind her. “I’ve been meaning to tell you, that lasagna was terrific.”

  She stared at him and frowned. “You were?” She laughed nervously. “I mean, of course you were. Well, you’re certainly welcome.”

  “Next time we should, you know, eat together. It’s not fair. I’ve really taken you for granted all these months. But that’s gonna change.”

  “You sure you’re feeling okay?”

  “Terrific . . . now that you’re here.”

  “You look a little pale.”

  With a mischievous grin, Yunk’sh said, “That’s easily fixed.”

  His fingers twitched in anticipation.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Angel swerved the convertible into the nearest parking space, almost jumping the curb in his haste, and ran to Elliot’s apartment building. The old three-story building had been converted from a single-family home into three separate units. A small foyer featured a security panel and a locked inner door. Angel pressed the buzzer for Elliot’s apartment. After a moment a hushed male voice spoke through the speaker, “Yes?”

  “Elliot,” Angel said. “It’s Angel. You okay?”

  “Yeah. But I’m scared. I was just about to leave. Come on up.”

  The lock release buzzed. Angel opened the inner door and took the steps three at a time, though his footfalls were silent, inhumanly silent. One of the perks of being a vampire, he thought. Stealthy approaches. Knowing the demon could return for Elliot at any moment, Angel listened at the door, but heard only silence.

  Angel knocked on the door. “Elliot?” Silence. “Elliot, open up.”

  Soft footfalls approached the door. Calm measured strides that seemed fainter as they neared the door. Caution? A hand fell on the doorknob. But that was all. The knob didn’t turn. If Elliot was on the other side, he was waiting for something. Maybe he wasn’t alone. “Elliot?”