Cold Hearted: A Yancy Lazarus Novel (Episode Two)

by James Hunter

  Just not good enough to keep Wolfie from colliding into me and ramming black-tipped claws into my exposed gut. I went to the ground, hard, the metus on top of me, gaping mouth a foot or two from my neck, my face. The scent of its reeking breath, like old dead meat, filled my nostrils. My guts filled with liquid fire—the beasts nails gouging into me like a set of hot steak knives passing through butter.

  The bark of gunfire, and the creature fell away, tumbling into the conference table behind it. Angry purple wounds dotted its face and neck. It looked on for a few seconds more before finally pitching over to the side, its body swollen and still at last. A handful of seconds later, the body started to melt: fur, claw, tooth, clown costume dissolving down into a puddle of green Jell-O, not that you’d want to eat what was left of the metus. In another hour or two, even the goo would be gone, leaving behind nothing by way of physical evidence that the metus had ever been here. Save, of course, for the carnage and corpses.

  Boy were Ferraro and the officers gonna have a helluva time writing this up in a report. Even if they had video footage—doubtful considering the blackout—it’d still be a tough sell. No police chief in their right mind would sign off on the “shape shifter did it” explanation. Talk about career suicide.

  Hopefully I wouldn’t end up taking the fall, though it had been an especially unlucky couple of days for me, so I wouldn’t hold my breath. Shit, I couldn’t hold my breath even if I wanted to; my guts hurt too much for it.

  Ferraro rushed over to me, holstered her weapon, and took a knee by my side. “Bet you’re glad I decided to hang around after all,” she said with a tight smile as she began to peel my shirt up to check the gut wounds.

  “I’d have figured something out.” I said, wincing as her finger probed four messy wounds. “Besides, who needs their guts anyway?” I coughed, which hurt like a bitch. “I hear there’s like thirty feet of intestine in there—seems a little excessive, I could probably live without a couple of feet, give or take.”

  “Shut up, idiot,” she said. More probing. I tried not to groan and give away how much her doctoring hurt. Plus—as I’ve previously mentioned—she was pretty good looking, and generally, squealing like a piglet isn’t the manliest way to impress a woman. So I just tried to clamp my teeth closed and endure it. But boy did I want to squeal. Stupid, manly pride.

  “I’ll need to stitch these up, but I don’t think the injuries are life threatening. The punctures are messy, but not very deep—I don’t think the creature managed to perforate the abdomen wall.”

  “Thank you, Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman, for your highly professional assessment, but it seems like a hospital would probably be a safer route.”

  “No hospital,” she said. “You are escaping.”

  “Come again now?” I asked, thinking I’d surely misheard her.

  “I said, you’re escaping. And I’m coming with you.” She took a long pause, looking down as though she wasn’t sure she could meet my eyes. Finally she looked up. “Maybe I was wrong about you—after tonight … well, maybe I was wrong. But that doesn’t mean there’s not a killer out there. You said someone sent this thing—the same someone who killed Kozlov. That means I have a murderer responsible for at least three deaths, two of them cops. I want to make sure this guy gets justice. And I need you to do that … so, you’re going to escape. And I’m going to follow you.”

  Damn, I hadn’t seen that one coming. Normally, the idea of taking some almost-Rube on a hunt for a dark mage, channeling a semi-immortal Lich, wouldn’t seem like a great idea. But Ferraro was pretty badass and seemed handy as hell in a tight corner. And without my powers? I needed all the help I could get.

  “Alright.” I smiled. “Let’s go nab us a bad guy—but you better buckle up lady, ‘cause you’re in for one bumpy ride. Before we can get this perp, I’m gonna have to track down the gen-u-ine Holy Grail, and I got a bad feeling that we’re gonna have to go into the backwaters of Outworld to get it. So get your game face on.”

  She grinned; it was not a nice smile. Check, game face on. Time to get the show on the road.

  EIGHTEEN:

  Train to Outworld

  “I can’t believe this place—can’t believe this has been right under my nose for so long, and I never saw. Never knew,” Ferraro said from the train seat across from mine. The FBI agent, and my former enemy, was on sabbatical leave after the crazy-ass goings-on that had taken place in a police station a few days back. The two-week sabbatical hadn’t entirely been her idea, but she’d seemed happy enough since it allowed her to help me track down the actual shithead responsible for the whole fiasco.

  To be honest, I was happy too—I had someone to help me out in a tight spot and that someone also happened to be a good-looking, highly competent woman. So win-win for me.

  I watched her for a moment—at just shy of six foot, she was a tall woman with short black hair, strong features, and darkly tanned skin. She looked scruffier now than before: dirty rumpled cargo pants, white undershirt with a red plaid shirt over the top. She glanced at me before looking back out the window—watching the Hub trickle past, rubbing at the bridge of her nose with one hand.

  The muddy brown sky peeked down on a strange city filled with jagged buildings of every shape and size, made from almost every imaginable material. Blood-red brick places with lurid women dancing in the windows. Towering apartment complexes of pitted concrete painted in shades both too loud and too strange—glowing-yellow here, sewer-shit-green there.

  Thick swathes of power lines snaked overhead, frantic things running from everywhere to everywhere with no sense of order or even purpose. And above those, the Royal Helicutter ran on a massive set of tracks—larger than the roadway proper—hanging high in the air, supported by huge metal columns jutting at intervals from the sidewalk. The whole scene looked dirty, sleazy—garbage everywhere, grime coating every surface, gaudy neon lighting advertising everything. Women, men, sex, pain, drugs, secret knowledge. Everything could be had here.

  We were on the ground train, chugging along for the Hinterlands.

  Outside our train window a Victorian-era carriage—pulled along by a zombified horse with greenish flesh, a wispy mane, and gobs of meat missing—trotted by in the opposite direction. The driver, a rail-thin man in black wearing a top hat, flashed us a grin and a wink, as though he were privy to some inside secret. Shit, here he might’ve been.

  On the left sprawled a strangely lopsided building of lime-green stone sporting thick power cables, towering antennas, and high-tech steel-shuttered windows and doors. “What the hell is that?” She jabbed her finger.

  “The Cult of Akroid,” I said, wanting the ride to be over, and knowing it wouldn’t be for a good long while yet. She was new to all this, so her curiosity, excitement even, was entirely understandable, completely justifiable, but utterly exhausting. “One of their operation facilities, anyways. Technomancers and plastic surgeons. Offer people high-tech body upgrades, mechanical retrofits, that kind of thing.”

  Once we passed the edge of the Hub, metal curtains would close over the train’s windows, affording me a break from her intense questioning. She was an intense kind of woman, which was fine in small doses.

  “Unbelievable.” She shook her head. “And those things?” She gestured to a pair of men, each with fat, bulbous bodies, no legs, and disproportionately large arms and hands, which they used for walking.

  “I dunno.” I shrugged. “Don’t look like pure-blood anythings—so probably just halfies of one variety or another?”

  “Halfies?” She arched an eyebrow at me.

  “Yeah, halfies. Sometimes things from the Hub will go to Earth—Inworld—and reproduce. The babies that come out are different—not entire one or the other. Halfies. Look, there are a gajillion things here … just try to enjoy the ride, huh?”

  “I can’t.” She was practically bouncing in her seat with pent-up energy. “This is too much. It’s crazy—how is it possible that this has remained hidden
?”

  I shrugged again. “People see what they want to see, and ignore everything else, I guess. In the West, we believe in science, we believe in the rational—and this”—I flashed a hand across the window—“is not rational, this is not science. So people make excuses not to believe. But yeah, you’re right, shit’s crazier than a friggin’ psych ward.”

  And it was. I’ve been living as a mage for years, but I started out as a dumb Rube, and sometimes I still found it hard to believe and I’d had years to adjust. But Nicole? Why, a mere two days ago, she’d been holding me in custody on a series of grisly murder charges, completely oblivious to the supernatural world. And today? Today she was sitting across from me in a private train compartment, zipping through the sprawling supernatural city called the Hub, en route to one of the most dangerous parts of Outworld.

  The fact that she was accompanying me as an ally instead of as an arresting agent was almost as crazy in its own way. Personally, I just never would’ve seen that one happening. Guess it all goes to show that sometimes life has a way of getting complicated, getting away from you, and leading you in some very unexpected directions.

  “Tell me more about where we’re going, again. I want to be ready.” She ran a hand over the Glock at her hip, the motion one of instinct, maybe comfort.

  “Fine, then a little quiet, okay?”

  “You are a wanted fugitive,” she said, her tone saying no nonsense would be tolerated. “You’re free because I’m allowing it, so I expect full cooperation, Mr. Lazarus.”

  I ground my teeth in frustration. Even though I did my time with the Marines, I’ve never been great with authority. “Fine. Cooperation. The Hinterlands is outside the Hub, but not technically a true part of Outworld. It’s kind of a wasteland, sort of a crazy version of the Old West—except with monsters, demons, post-apocalyptic cities, and nuclear fallout. It’s bad, dangerous, yada, yada, yada. Keep your head on a swivel, so on and so forth, and all that jazz. We’ll meet my contact in a bar called the Hog’s Head. Happy?”

  “Not even remotely,” she said, staring back out the window, but saying nothing more.

  I don’t know if she slept or not—if I were in her shoes, I’m not sure I could’ve—but I dozed on and off for the next couple of hours.

  When I woke, Ferraro was awake, alert, nursing one of those tasteless energy bars health nuts go for. She’d ask me a question or two, I’d respond with all the enthusiasm of a dental patient about to receive a root canal, and then I’d drift back off again. One lesson I’ve learned in my days on the road is this: take sleep when you can get it, especially if there’s a pile of shit and a fan close by. You just never know when you’ll get another chance, and being well rested can make the difference between life and death.

  We traveled that way for maybe seven hours, give or take; time can be a little wonky in Outworld—trains will often pass through drifting time pockets, which could either slow things down or speed ‘em up. I didn’t give it much mind. I was still worn out from my scrap with the metus and, because of no-good Randy, I didn’t have access to the normal strength and fortitude the Vis leant me.

  So yeah, I slept. As well and deeply as I could, considering I only had a hard little bench to curl up on.

  After a good couple of hours, Ferraro nudged me awake with the toe of her boot. I cracked an eye from my place on the bench, and stifled a yawn. Outside the window, a dusty town—made of equal parts wood, concrete, and steel—stretched away into the distance. Gusts of dirty wind swept through the town, revealing buildings for a moment and then swallowing them in a cloud of brown. Men and women, human-looking and not, trudged about the street—heads down, eyes often hidden behind brass and leather-trimmed goggles, while sleek ventilation masks covered noses and mouths. The sun hung low over the horizon—maybe an hour or two until the sun set for the night—casting lurid red light along the streets.

  Bradshaw Landing: one of only a few thriving, semi-civilized cities in all of the Hinterlands.

  “This us?” Ferraro asked, simultaneously slipping on a tan, military-grade backpack. She rooted around in her cargo pocket for a minute, not waiting for my reply, and fished out a pair of goggles and a mask of her own, which she promptly donned.

  “Yeah, this is our stop. Hurray.” I sat up and stretched out cramped back muscles—should’ve paid for the upgrade; first-class had genuine beds to sleep on. It wouldn’t have fit with our cover story, though: just a couple of world-weary, and mostly human—definitely not mage—travelers. Still, my back was not happy about our cover story.

  I reluctantly stood, pulled on my own bag, followed by goggles and respirator, and then snatched up my guitar case. That was part of the cover story, too—I was keeping my head down by going around as a bona fide Song-Slinger, which was true even if not exactly the whole truth.

  With bags and gear in hand, I pushed past Ferraro and led us down a narrow interior hallway running alongside the train rooms—especially tight considering my guitar—to a set of stairs that took us to the platform. Well, there wasn’t actually any platform, not like you might be thinking. The “platform” consisted of the dusty ground in front of the rusted tracks, a row of cheap wooden benches, and a single tall post with an old clock affixed to the front.

  Hot air, dry and dusty, washed over me. “God, I hate this place. Even with this damn ventilator on I can still smell the reek. Shit and garbage …” I took another long pull of air. “Burnt garbage.”

  Ferraro dropped down from the train, carefully brushing her hands along the front of her shirt.

  “I hate the Hub,” I said, “but I hate the Hinterlands even more.”

  “Aren’t you a ray of sunshine.” Her voice was slightly muffled by the respirator. “We’ve got a job to do, so let’s get it over with, and then we can leave this place behind.”

  “Yeah, yeah, I got it.” We trudged into town, the buildings sprawled along the hard packed boulevard like drunk and disorderly bar goers: staggered, lopsided, leaning drunkenly every which way. A boardwalk ran in front of shops and homes on both sides—we took to one, mostly to avoid the traffic meandering up and down the street. Old rusted-out cars, a few horses, a malformed water buffalo, a host of Tri-skiffs—three wheel taxis in a riot of hues—and mopeds. Heaps and heaps of zippy little mopeds.

  The Hog’s Head wasn’t far and was easy enough to find—right on the main boulevard with a giant, rotating, mechanical hog’s head held high in the air, protruding from the end of a thick metal pole.

  “Alright Ferraro,” I said as we trotted up to the batwing bar doors—damn place was like the cover for a bad Meatloaf album—“we need to keep our heads down here. Don’t talk to anyone if you can help it. Don’t stare anyone down, pick fights, or generally do any of the things your alpha-female brain compels you to do. Kay?” I glanced back at her over my shoulder. She nodded.

  I peeled off my ventilator and goggles—Ferraro followed my lead—and pushed my way into the bar interior. Nice digs, these. The wood floor was covered in straw, wet beer stains, and, in a couple of places, blood in varying colors. Round card tables dotted the room with a variety of players, most of them definitely not human, drinking from dirty mugs and talking too loudly. A large chandelier of bone, fashioned from antlers, deer skulls, and human bones interspersed throughout, hung over the whole lot of tables. Against the left wall, and near the back, a narrow set of stairs ascended to a second floor, which probably served as guest rooms or a brothel. Along the back of the room ran a long hardwood bar, complete with a horizontal mirror spanning the length of the wall.

  This was the spot, this was where Fortuna—Lady Luck, my temporary boss—had told me to find her. But there wasn’t hide nor hair of her. Dammit. Why would I have expected it to be that easy? Idiot. Well, I couldn’t just stand around in the doorway until she showed—I was aiming for inconspicuous. So instead I sauntered up to the bar, trying to appear casual and unruffled. Ferraro clung to me like a shadow. She might’ve been tougher than old
boot leather, but she knew when subterfuge was the best policy, so she kept her head down too.

  The bartender wasn’t even close to human: gnarled old goat’s face with blunt teeth, curling horns, amber eyes, and giant, cancerous growths protruding from his face, neck, and arms. A halfie and a mutie … the Hinterlands were contaminated, so longtime residents often ended up like the barman. “What’ve we got here?” he said, his voice raspy. “You a real, legitimate Song-Slinger?” he asked me, eyeing the guitar on my back.

  “Yessir,” I said, bobbing my head. “Name’s Bobby, Bobby Haskell.” Then I held out an arm and drew back my sleeve, revealing a tattoo in shifting gold and silver, just below the crook of my elbow on my forearm. An intricately wrought harp in gold, bordered by a ring of silver.

  “Hot damn,” the barman whispered. “Union certified, huh?” The tattoo was fake. Ben had done it up right before smuggling Ferraro and me into the Hub. A Union-certified Song-Slinger was a great cover for me since I could play—not to mention that Song-Slingers were rarely hustled, even out in the Hinterlands. After all, everyone likes to listen to a good tune and out here in the Hinterlands, where advanced technology was often unreliable, entertainment could be hard to come by.

  “Well …” He paused, scratching at his wispy goatee (Ha … goat-ee). “We already got us a Song-Slinger, of sorts.” He waved a deformed limb—part cloven hoof, part human hand—toward a balding, fat man in a bowler hat pounding away at an upright piano in the corner. The piano was a real beaut: an upright Emerson, 1880s, beautiful dark wood, carved front panel and fallboard, real ivory keys. Made my fingers itch to play it, bet the action was great.