by R. E. Vance
A large, gaseous, off-white humanoid creature lumbered towards us. It looked more like the Michelin Man than anything I’d ever seen. White puffs of smoke bellowed out of pinprick-sized holes all over its body. It ran—or rather, bounced—toward us. As it got closer, the Others that had been following it turned to run back downstairs.
“Out the front?” I said.
“Yeah, out the front,” agreed the angel. We both turned on our heels toward the front entrance.
“What the hell is that?” I cried out.
“A fugu-monster.”
“What’s that?” We slammed against the door, pushing it. We were almost outside.
“Think of it like the puffer fish of the demon world. It blows itself up to—”
POP!
The explosion blew out the door and sent us flying. Lucky for me, The BisMark’s excessive amounts of ceremonial balloons broke my fall like rapidly popping bubble wrap.
The balloons lay limp beneath me, never to inflate again. Unfortunately, rubber balloons and fugu-monsters weren’t made of the same kind of rubber. The fugu-monster, now deflated, stood above me with a wicked smile on its face. It started sucking in air again, puffing itself up.
Chapter 6
A Lot of Hot Air
While the fugu-monster inflated to a critical mass, my hands ran along the gravel feeling for a sharp stone. As much as I enjoyed being blasted out of my own hotel, I wasn’t going to let this fugu-monster blow itself up all over me again. I slashed its stomach, and from the thin cut I made, the fugu-monster started to hiss as it slowly deflated.
It looked down at the gash, embarrassed. Then, placing its pointer finger and thumb together, it pinched closed the hole with its two fingers and started reinflating itself.
“Cheater!” I yelled, as I ran down the hill.
Astarte and EightBall were already halfway there, running toward the fence that bordered the highway. Penemue and I followed. Ever try to run downhill? I don’t mean walk downhill, or even hop. I mean a full-on run. After a while momentum takes over, and the strides that on a flat surface would have you running full-on begin to slow you down. You need to either keep up the momentum, fall or jump. I jumped. I must have cleared eight feet, and I landed with all the grace of a cat. But then gravity took over, and I tumbled down until I hit the mesh of the fence. I hate gravity. I really, really hate gravity.
Astarte was right in front of me. She pulled out her knife and slashed at the chicken wire, prying it open. EightBall, with his nimble and agile eighteen-year-old body, crawled through, careful to look both ways before popping out onto the highway. Astarte followed, but I couldn’t leave Penemue to fend off the gargoyles.
I turned to see Penemue halfway down the hill. He was trying to take to the sky but couldn’t, because he was being wrestled down by two stone gargoyles—and one of them was ScarFace. Every time he pulled one off, the other jumped on him. One he could handle, but two were proving too much for the angel.
“Go on,” I said to Astarte. I rushed up the hill and threw a billiard-ball-sized rock at ScarFace. It hit him without effect, but he did look over at me. “Your mamma is a sun-baked mud,” I cried out. A bit lame, but it worked. ScarFace let go of Penemue and flew at me. Rather, he shot over to me, far faster than five hundred pounds of rock should be able to. He was burning time, a lot of it. Judging by how fast he was coming at me, he didn’t know what he was doing or didn’t care. The Doberman-sized gargoyle didn’t have an inch of soft flesh. At the speed he was moving, I was more likely to survive being hit by a bus.
I backed away to the fence hole, and just as ScarFace was about to squash me, I let myself fall. He zipped by, crashing through the fence and onto the highway. At this time of night there were few cars on the road, but there were trucks—large, Optimus-Prime-sized, long-haul vehicles going forty miles an hour. The gargoyle hit a front grille, and with the screeching of steel on stone, he skidded across the asphalt, shooting up sparks and losing one foot on the way. At first I thought I’d killed him. Well, not me, but the truck that so conveniently met his trajectory. A pang of remorse rushed through me. There had been enough death in the fourteen years since the Others arrived, and I didn’t want to see any more of these unique creatures go down, not even one that was trying to kill me.
I breathed a sigh of relief when the gargoyle stood up. Relief quickly turned to dread as he hobbled toward me. He encountered his foot along the way, and stepped into it. I could hear the grating of stone on stone as the smell of charcoal rose in the air. His ankle glowed red, and I realized that he was welding himself together. Great—I was fighting the gargoyle version of the T-1000.
↔
I started across the four-lane highway, hoping to put some distance between me and ScarFace before he healed himself, when Penemue fell on the road, grabbed me and took to the sky. “Human Jean-Luc,” he said, “I fear that we’re—what’s the expression? Screwed.”
“Yeah,” I said. “That’s it.”
“We can’t outrun all of them and we can’t fight them.”
“There must be a way out.”
“We must hide, but in order to hide, we first have to get out of their line of sight.”
“Thanks,” I said. “I know how the game is played.” Flying would be no use—we were exposed up here—so I scanned the ground looking for somewhere we could duck into. “Oh, crap! Look!” I pointed to the ground.
Astarte and EightBall stood in front of the Being Human Salon with their hands in the air. Miss Sally Webb stood in front of them, holding a gun that was pointed at Astarte’s head.
Hellelujah!
↔
“What the heck is going on?” Sally shrieked at me as Penemue lowered us down. She was wearing silk pajamas and big fluffy pink sandals, a purse slung over her shoulder. “It was not enough that your guests ruined my flyers—now you show up at … at … midnight! Were you going to sneak up on me like thieves in the night and turn me into a frog? Stars above, if it wasn’t for my alarm system—”
“Miss Webb,” I said, getting out of Penemue’s arms. I put up my palms in an “I come in peace” gesture. “There’s been a situation at my hotel, and we could really, really use your help.”
“Help? If you think that you’re going to win me over by coming here at this ungodly hour and—” Sally looked behind us. From her vantage point she could see an angry mob of Others clambering down the hill toward us. Some of them literally had pitchforks and torches, and I suddenly knew exactly how Frankenstein’s monster felt.
“Oh, heck,” Sally muttered.
“Ahhh, Miss Webb,” I started. “I don’t know what—”
“Oh hush,” she said in a stern schoolteacher voice. “Get inside.” She eyed Penemue and Astarte, then added, “All of you.”
Hellelujah!
Chapter 7
Hairdresser’s Got a Gun
Miss Webb held open the door, and the four of us ran inside the Being Human Salon and into a large waiting room. It was filled with all the stuff Miss Webb thought made us human. Mannequins with scarves and long press-on nails. Lipstick tubes and row after row of moisturizers. Wigs of all colors and sizes fitted on plastic heads. And on the walls, posters that said things like “Non-invasive teeth filing: Get rid of those fangs!” and “Turn your wings into a fashionable cape!” and “Extreme waxing for all your furry needs!”
A stone flew through her front window, shattering the glass. “If you don’t mind, please take a step away from the front door. I’m told this can be quite dramatic,” she said, almost offhandedly.
She pulled out what looked like a box with several buttons on each side, a big red button sitting under a plastic lid right on top. She flipped up the lid and pushed down on the button. What happened next wasn’t dramatic, per se. It was downright shocking, thrilling and terrifying. Metal shutters fell over the windows as steel bars appeared from the floor, locking the front door. Emergency lights turned on, and we were no longer standing in the foy
er of a beauty salon. We were in a cell, with no way in or out that I could see.
“What was that?” I asked.
“Panic button,” she said, turning on a monitor behind the reception desk.
She walked behind her desk and tapped the screen of her iPad. Images from her security cameras popped up. “Ah, Mr. Angel … I’d cover your ears.” Just as she finished saying it, a siren sounded, shooting out a piercing screech that made me cry out in pain. Astarte and EightBall winced, but what it did to Penemue … The angel fell to his knees, pressing the palms of his hands hard against his ears. He growled in agony, and I think he would have screamed if he could. His body went into near shutdown. Whatever the frequency of the siren, it was devastating to angels.
I rushed Sally and grabbed for the box. But the woman, who must have been well into her fifties, moved away with a dancer’s grace and countered my lunge with a move that would have made the most skilled aikido masters green with envy. “Oh, Mr. Matthias, please. The noise will pass. Don’t worry. It is not fatal. Just give it a moment.” She looked over at Penemue. “He is, after all, quite a big boy.”
Sally was true to her word—the noise did stop, and Penemue, dripping sweat, stood with a growl. Sally fished around in her purse and threw him a pack of wet wipes. “There,” she told us with a smile, “that should hold them. For a while, at least.” We all looked at the unassuming Sally Webb standing nonchalantly in her pajamas and big slippers. “What?” she asked. “It’s my security system. Don’t you have one, Mr. Matthias?”
“Nothing like that.”
She shrugged. “If you wish to install one, I can get you a deal.”
“Thanks,” I said, “but no thanks. I don’t need it.”
She pushed a button, and one of the slats on her window opened. “Really?”
I looked out at the angry mob of minotaurs, centaurs, giants, ogres and trolls outside, and shrugged. “Well, maybe.”
EightBall and Penemue, their bodies tense, scanned the room for escape routes. Astarte, on the other hand, wore a confused expression as she looked around like someone tracking a buzzing bee. “What?” she said. “How?”
“How what?” I asked.
She lifted a finger, gesturing for me to hold on, and continued to look around the room. “Brian? What is this? Some form of telepathy? Are you a wizard?” She paused. “Uh-huh … I’ve never heard of Bluetooth magic before …”
Bluetooth? I looked at Astarte. She was wearing a little wireless earpiece. Brian, that smart bastard—he’d given her a direct line to him. I pulled out the earpiece and put it on.
“Hey,” Astarte said, “you stole his voice.”
“You’ve been mortal all these years and you don’t know Bluetooth? I’m a Luddite, and even I know what it is.” I put my finger on the earpiece. “Brian, where are you?”
I heard the shuffling of flesh against leather as his voice crackled in. “I’m hiding in Astarte’s closet,” he whispered.
“And where is everyone?”
There was a pause. “Most of them are outside. Some are still in the banquet hall.”
“How do you know that? You’re in Astarte’s closet.”
“The cameras,” he said. “I’m jacked in.”
“Brian,” I murmured, “you geeky genius!”
“I’m … I’m not in trouble?” he whispered.
“No … Well, yes. Maybe,” I said. “I guess yesterday’s mischief is today’s savior. OK—look, I’m going to hand you over to …” I scanned the room and decided on EightBall. I figured he had the best chance to deal with technology, being young and human. “Let him know if anything changes,” I said, and threw the earpiece to EightBall.
“That’s mine,” Astarte said.
“And you’ll get it back,” I said, peering out the window. “If we survive this.” There was an electric buzzing sound coming from the window that reminded me of one of those bug zappers.
“Good. Now that that’s done, Mr. Matthias,” Sally said, folding her arms, “I believe you owe me an explanation.”
↔
Something, or rather some Other, slammed hard against the front door of the Being Human Salon with a thud that was followed by the unmistakable buzz of an electric current and a doglike yelp. Its cry was so loud that I covered my ears and cringed in sympathy. If Sally felt any sympathy, her expression didn’t betray it. She just stared across at me, her eyes stone-cold. She reminded me of Stewart.
“Well,” Sally said.
“Well …” I started. “I don’t want to get overly complicated, but it seems that someone …”—I looked over at Astarte—“accidentally started an apocalypse.”
“Calamity,” said Astarte. “It is not an apocalypse—yet. And don’t look at me, human. Despite being mortal, I happen to love my life and would do nothing to jeopardize it. If I wanted to hurt my sister, I could do it many other ways, none of which would involve my home being consumed by my rampaging niece. If anything, I tried to stop the whole damn thing.”
“The thing coming is Astarte’s niece?” Sally raised an eyebrow in my direction.
“Hey,” I said, lifting my hands up, “I’m just as surprised as you are.”
“And what a fish tale it will be,” Penemue mused, picking at his wings and pulling out a bottle of Drambuie. “Good—I knew I had one on me.”
Sally took two decisive strides toward the angel. “So long as you’re a guest on my premises, you will not consume that poison.” She held out a hand.
“But …” Penemue protested.
Sally stood with hand on hip, waiting. The angel groaned and gave her the bottle. I was impressed … I’d tried the stern “Hand it over” routine with Penemue dozens of times and it never worked, but Sally only had to yell at the angel and he was already compliant. I thought to ask her for some pointers—if she didn’t kill me first, that was.
“Very well, then. I believe Mr. Matthias was discussing the upcoming calamity?” Sally spoke with the clarity of understanding that was far more than any layperson should have.
I shook my head. “You say ‘poe-tay-toe,’ I say ‘apocalypse.’ And regardless, this … this Beast-thingie that’s coming to Paradise Lot to destroy everything … If we don’t find a way to stop it, we’re all going to—”
Another Other, having learned from the first Other, slammed something large and wooden against the entrance. The steel door took the blow with a reverberating clang.
Sally rolled her eyes with impatience. “Die?” she offered.
I nodded.
“So,” Miss Webb said, turning to Astarte. “You were once a goddess of Mesopotamia, Assyria … Babylon—you must know a way to stop this?”
Astarte shrugged. “All those who caused the calamity can be offered up in appeasement. Sadly, we don’t know who is responsible.”
“And even if we did … We can’t send them to their execution without a trial first,” I said.
Astarte rolled her eyes. “Then there is divine intervention, but there’s not a lot of divine lying about. Of course, we could try to derail it, end the calamity before it grows into something bigger.”
“Like what?” I asked.
“Like a full-blown, world-ending apocalypse. And before you ask, I have no idea how to stop it. In theory, if we stop the last signs from happening, the apocalypse won’t happen.”
“Signs?” Sally asked. “What do you mean, signs?”
“So far,” I said, “we’ve had an earthquake, the sky fell, we’ve drunk sour wine … Oh, and matricide. Let’s not forget matricide. There will be three more signs before Tiamat shows up.”
Sally tilted her head. “Tiamat?”
“Kraken,” I said. “They’ve unleashed the kraken.”
“OK,” Sally said with far less expression than one facing a raging monster should show.
“If the signs occur before dawn, then Tiamat will appear,” Astarte said.
“And if they don’t?” I asked.
“She will
return to the deep.”
EightBall sighed in relief before looking over at Penemue, who wore the same expression of dread on his face. Taking his cue from the angel, EightBall’s face resumed its look of fear.
“And these other signs,” Sally said. “What are they?”
“Only three signs remain. The Blood Moon, the Rising of the Beast and the Rain of Frogs.”
“Frogs? As in Kermit?” I asked.
“If this Kermit is as fierce as a lion and as graceful as a gazelle and as merciless as all-consuming fire.”
“He mostly likes to sing.”
“Then, no … not like Kermit.” Astarte looked down, and all guile, all seduction, drained from her face. She nodded and pressed her hands against her thigh, and for a moment I didn’t see the demigoddess of lust or the queen of desire. I saw Astarte as who she really was—just a person doing her best to survive in a world without answers or meaning. She was scared. Very, very scared. “Back when the Assyrian pantheon ruled the Fertile Crescent, before humans learned the secrets of language—back then, you were brutes, not to be guided, but dominated. We gave you knowledge. Civilization, culture, technology. We gave you enough so that you could understand the rules we imposed upon you. They were mostly arbitrary rules put there to simultaneously tempt you and remind you we were there … and if any mortal broke them, the results would be catastrophic. What can I say? In those early days, we were petty gods.”
“What kind of rules?” I asked.
“Things like, ‘Anyone who drinks from this sacred pool will go blind,’ or, ‘A curse on he who spills blood on the temple floor, a curse that shall pass from child to child for a thousand generations.’ When these rules were broken, we came down upon you with great plagues, terrible afflictions. The promise of death and destruction were our tools … and we always repaid human disobedience in kind,” Astarte said. “And still, humans tested us. Like children testing boundaries, they drank from where they should not, ate from what was forbidden. Desecrated what was sacred. It didn’t matter how many of them suffered boils or went blind or were cursed. Mortals always tested us. That was when my sister came up with the Pool of Urfa—”
