by C L Walker
She paid our bill and we crossed the street. I followed her up the stairs and stood aside when she pointed out a camera watching the entrance. She rang the bell and waited. When the door opened the man on the other side wasn’t what I’d been expecting.
He was well dressed, to a degree that seemed ridiculous. His suit was severe and crisp, as though he’d only put it on moments before coming to greet us. He had a piece of technology lodged behind his ear, and he held up his hand while he listened to what it had to say.
“You’re on, buddy. I’m all about it. We’ll be ready when you hit the strip. Alright, see you in a minute.”
He pressed a button on the thing behind his ear and turned his attention to me, looking up at me with an odd half-smile on his face.
“Hello,” I said. I couldn’t think of anything better and Bec hadn’t told me to kill him yet.
“You’re a big SOB, aren’t you?” He stepped back as though he needed the perspective to take all of me in. “What do you bench?”
“I am very large, yes.”
I was at a loss how to deal with him. His business might have been the same as Roman’s had been but the similarity ended there. Roman had been a hermit in a dingy apartment with mystic trinkets in every corner and an odd smell in the air, while this guy was…something I hadn’t run into before.
“I’m Bobby,” he said as he put his hand out toward me. I took it and shook carefully. “And you are?”
I began to answer but Bec beat me to it. “Dave. He’s a friend of mine.”
“Dave. Yeah, I can see it. Alright Dave, what can I do you for?”
I chose not to answer for fear of saying the wrong thing. Thankfully Bec took control.
“I’m here to get some more stuff, Bobby. Dave is cool.”
“If you say he’s cool then he’s cool.” He stepped inside and waved us in. He continued as we entered the dim, cool interior. “Did you hear what happened to Tsepes?”
“No, I haven’t seen him in a while,” Bec replied. “He was supposed to bring me something.”
Bobby the hedge-mage moved past us and led us to a large room that had once been the house’s living room. It now housed four desks with computers on them. The reason for the darkness within the house was revealed in the other three occupants sitting before the glow of their monitors, their hands on keyboard and mouse and the sound of gunfire blaring from their headphones.
“Don’t mind them, big guy,” Bobby said as he led us through and into a kitchen that had better lighting and some chairs we could use. “They’re practicing for a tournament.”
“They’re trying to make their names in a pro-gaming league,” Bec said unhelpfully. I had no idea what that was and didn’t really care.
Bobby pulled sliding doors across the entrance and turned a dial on the wall that made it brighter. I wondered why he didn’t open the curtains, but it didn’t really matter. I’d seen all I needed to see: they weren’t responsible for the assassin. I’d be surprised if they were able to stand in the face of a real fight, let alone plot a murder.
“So, Tsepes,” Bobby said. He leaned in conspiratorially. “Dude got his head torn off. They found his body out in the river this morning, all burning in the sun and shit.”
“What happened to the toy he was bringing me?” Bec said. She showed no emotion in response to the story, but Bobby didn’t seem to notice.
“He wasn’t bringing you anything. Sorry, Becky, babe, but we’ve got to cut you off for a bit. Something dark is going down and we need to be all ghost-like for a while.”
Bec frowned. I wondered how much of her emotion was a façade and how much she actually felt. If I was right about her then I suspected most of it was false.
“You know I need my side gig, Bobby. This isn’t for me. It’s for the greater good.”
“Yeah, yeah, helping the less fortunate find a way to fill your pocket.” He took her hand. “I deeply, seriously, in a bad way love you. You know that? But I can’t help you.”
She pulled her hand back. “I deeply and seriously don’t care as long as you deliver. We have a deal.”
“We have an arrangement.” Bobby’s own façade was dropping now; his perpetual, irritating smile was slipping. “It’s on hold for a bit.”
I didn’t need them escalating this into a fight that wasn’t going to end in someone dying. I interrupted before they could take it further.
“What dark thing is going down?” I said.
“There’s vampires moving in all over the city,” Bobby replied. “And not the nice ones like Tsepes. The witches are getting territorial too, which is to be expected in this city, I guess, but they’re being all violence-focused about it.”
“How does that affect you and me?” Bec said.
“We had a little visit yesterday from some cops. They didn’t find anything but they were super aggressive about looking. We figure someone sent them, a check out the competition thing. So we’re going to lie low for a bit and see if it blows over.”
“That guy is outside again,” one of the men playing on their computers called from the next room. “He’s just standing there. Again.”
“That’s the other little problem we have.”
He stood and we followed him back into the dark room. He went to the empty desk and typed something on his keyboard, then waved us over to take a look.
A video of a hollow man filled the screen. He stood before the bar we’d just been in and watched the house. He wore a long dark coat, despite the warmth of the midday sun, and he didn’t move a muscle. He could have been a sculpture. He didn’t budge as pedestrians walked around him and bumped into him.
“This dude has been hanging around for a bit,” Bobby said. “Don’t know who he belongs to but so far the wards are keeping him out.”
If the house was warded I hadn’t felt it on the way in, which meant their defenses weren’t going to stop the hollow man if he wanted in. Whatever he actually wanted I doubted it had anything to do with a house full of people who could barely weave magic.
“Creepy,” Bec said. She stared at the screen, glancing at me when Bobby wasn’t looking.
“How long does he stand there?” I asked. I had an idea what our next move should be. “Is there another way out of the house?”
“Don’t worry about it big guy. Tall, dark and pasty only ever stops for a few minutes. Then he’s gone, off to be weird around other people.”
We waited in silence, intently watching the strange figure on the screen. Five minutes later he turned and started down the street.
“We are leaving now,” I said. I turned and moved to the front door without waiting for Bec.
“This conversation isn’t over,” she said to Bobby. She followed me out the front door and grabbed my arm. “What are we doing?”
“That being is like the one who attacked your father. It is clear to me the men in the house have nothing to do with your plight, but the hollow man does. We should follow him and try to ascertain what they are doing in the city.”
“Former angels, right?”
“They are presently angels. A hollow man can never change.”
“Then you want us to chase down a celestial being with godlike powers, someone neither of us is up to tackling.”
“That is my suggestion, yes.”
She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. The hollow man stepped around a corner and out of sight while she thought it over. I barely restrained myself from grabbing her and carrying her where we needed to be.
“Sounds like a party. Let’s do this.”
Following the hollow man had two advantages: they were clearly involved in the plot against Bec and her father, but more importantly they were powerful enough that any slip from me would lead to Bec’s death. There was a good chance I could escape for long enough to have Roman put me back in the locket, at which point they could do whatever they wanted.
It was a good plan. Bec followed as quick as she could as I strode after the ange
l.
Chapter 14
The hollow man seemed in no rush to get where he was going. He stopped regularly to observe the people around him, occasionally taking out a notebook to record his observations.
“What’s he doing?” Bec said.
I had no idea so I ignored her. We were standing in a small park a short way down the street, trying to look inconspicuous. Children ran and laughed around us as their parents watched from benches near the path.
“They’re kind of creepy looking, aren’t they?”
I was learning how to block out the sound of her voice. She was like an annoying dog, yapping constantly until it became part of the background.
“How long are we going to follow him for?”
The hollow man put his notebook away and continued making his way slowly up the street. I left the shade of the trees and pushed into the pedestrian traffic on the sidewalk.
“I wonder why an angel would want to kill me.”
The hollow man stopped again almost immediately and turned to look in our direction. Bec ducked her head but I continued walking, trusting to the crowd to hide us from view. If he knew we were there he’d see us, but if he already knew we were in for a fight anyway.
When the hollow man turned away and continued walking Bec tapped me on the arm.
“You don’t like me very much, do you?”
“I don’t have any feelings toward you, one way or the other. I will be happy to see you dead, but that is true of most living things.”
That shut her up for a bit. She didn’t know it but it wasn’t completely true; I liked many living things, as long as they didn’t get in my way. Trees were nice, as were cats. I wouldn’t miss much else.
“You can’t kill me,” she said at last. “It’s in the rules. You’re bluffing.”
“I don’t have to kill you. Your own stupidity will see to it for me.”
The hollow man approached a black sedan parked on the side of the road. I checked the street for a taxi in case he got in, but he had stopped to speak to the man in the driver’s seat. I couldn’t be sure but I didn’t think the driver was a hollow man.
“You have to be nicer to me,” Bec said. “I order you to be nicer to me.”
“That’s not how it works.”
I was answering her without thinking, focusing all of my attention on the exchange. The hollow man remained calm and measured while the man he was talking to twitched in his seat, occasionally raising his hand or opening his mouth only to fall silent as the hollow man continued regardless.
When the exchange completed the hollow man turned and left. The man behind the wheel waited a few seconds before revving his engine and pushing into the road, his tires squealing.
“What do I have to do to win you over?” Bec said, still fixated on the same thing. “What will make you like me?”
“I’ve already told you what to do, but you are not interested.”
“I’m not putting you back until I know I can summon you again.”
“Then I hope you get hit by a car while I’m not looking.”
This wasn’t entirely true either: if she was hit by a car and didn’t die immediately I could be in for a long wait at the hospital.
“You’re supposed to be…I don’t know. Better. What is the point of you if you’re going to be like this?”
I was done. I turned on her, towering over her and forcing her back into the people walking around us.
“You think I am a thing,” I said, not caring who overheard me. “A weapon to turn on your enemies. You think there is a purpose to my being in your possession. You are wrong. That locket is a leash around my neck but it doesn’t make me a trained dog. I’m not your slave.”
I turned away from her and continued following the hollow man. He didn’t appear to have noticed my outburst and was writing in his notepad as he walked.
“We can do things together, if you’ll just help me.” She was out of breath, having trouble keeping pace with me. “Think what we could do together.”
I needed her to be quiet. I grabbed her arm and pulled her out of the flow of traffic and onto a small path leading to a walkway between two buildings.
“I am older than you. I am older than anyone or anything you’ve ever heard of. I have seen civilizations rise and fall, and the one constant is that everyone thinks their time is special. Everyone thinks they can make a difference, but they can’t. You can’t. Whatever you do, with or without my assistance, will be forgotten faster than you expect. You are all ultimately pointless.
“You tell me to consider what we could do together. Will it change the fate of your doomed civilization? Will it stop the end of your futile striving toward greatness? Because if it doesn’t do that, then it doesn’t matter. The end of days will come and all this will mean nothing.”
“The end of days came,” she said without hesitation. “It happened, Agmundr, and things are the same. Your philosophy is bullshit and you can keep it to yourself.”
I wanted to strike out. Not necessarily at her, but it would have felt good to do so. I had been waiting for the end of days my entire existence; it hadn’t sunk in yet that things had changed, that there was no longer a defined end date for the farce of humanity.
“Fine, little girl. The end of days isn’t coming, but you are still going to die and so is everything else. And I will be here, waiting for whatever comes next. Why do you think I’d care about your petty little problems in the face of that?”
This time she took a moment to consider her answer. When it came it was almost sweet, if horribly misguided.
“Because this world is worth all the fighting.”
I opened my mouth to respond but found I had no words ready. She was so horribly naïve, and she hadn’t been listening. She saw the entire world from the vantage of a few score years, like a man with a torch lost in a cave, unable to see beyond his tiny circle of light to the awe-inspiring magnitude of the chamber surrounding him.
“Find a more noble pursuit,” I replied at last. “Discover something that will make a difference over the long term, and I will follow you. Until then, put me back and let me see if my wife still lives.”
“I’m not putting you back.”
I turned from her and continued on the sidewalk.
We’d been walking away from the downtown area for an hour and were now beginning to hit the more built-up suburbs. The hollow man had stopped before an empty lot and appeared to be waiting. The lot still had the remains of the building that had recently been destroyed, piled up around the edges.
Another hollow man appeared around the corner and made his way to the first, and then another, and another. Two cars came to a stop and more hollow men emerged to join the group.
I would have been excited – whatever was happening, it must have been important to bring so many of them together – but instead I was distracted. Something was bugging me and I couldn’t shake it. I felt like someone was watching me.
I leaned against the wall beside the entrance to a store and checked my surroundings, trying not to be obvious about it.
Bec was coming my way and she was sulking. Other than that I could see nothing of concern.
The feeling persisted. I’d been in too many bad situations because I’d ignored such feelings and I wasn’t going to start now. The hollow men could wait, however enticing their meeting was.
“What’s up?” Bec said.
“Shut up.”
“You can’t talk to me like that.”
“Please, then. Shut up.”
She held her tongue and let me continue my search. I scanned the street, checking the windows and rooftops as well.
I found it, someone atop a far roof, the sun glinting off the spyglass held to his face.
We had been spotted. The hollow men could know we were coming, or the observer could be unrelated. There was no way to tell. I turned back to the hollow men to find they’d been joined someone I didn’t know, a normal man by the look of him.<
br />
“I know that guy,” Bec said. “I’ve seen him on TV.”
The hollow men followed the new arrival into the lot and out of sight behind a pile of rubble.
“You should remain here,” I said, knowing she wouldn’t listen. “This will be dangerous.”
“Oh no, not a chance. If you get iced I’m dead anyway. I might as well learn everything I can on the way.”
We continued down the street. The back of my neck itched and I knew it was the lookout with the spyglass, tracking our every move.
If they knew we were coming then I could practically guarantee my freedom from Bec, though I couldn’t guarantee my own survival. When I had been sent to close the gates to the thousand heavens, I had been powered by the blood of an elder god, and the hollow men had been no match. Now I hoped I could run fast enough if they saw me.
We paused when we reached the empty lot, and I listened for anything that might tell me how far in they were, or if they’d posted guards. The only sound that reached my ears was mundane, cars driving by and a couple yelling from a parallel street.
“Stay behind me,” I said.
I stepped onto the sidewalk before the lot and found the view of the interior obstructed by a pile of rubble. It wasn’t a coincidence that it perfectly blocked whatever was going on within from the street.
“If you were to decide to stay safe,” I tried again, “now would be the time to stop.”
“Lead the way, Agmundr.”
I shook my head but there was no arguing with her, and I couldn’t stop her from joining me. I had done my duty; if my master chose to walk toward death then it was her fault.
The building that had stood on the lot had been destroyed but they hadn’t finished clearing it yet. When we walked around the first pile of debris there was only one open area our quarry could have been in.
The hollow men and their guest weren’t there, but there was someone waiting.
“Hello, again.” The assassin from ACDCs stood in the center of the cleared area, his hands at his sides and a smile on his face. He wore the same jeans and t-shirt he’d been wearing the last time I saw him, now accompanied by a black leather jacket despite the warmth of the day.
