“This time is different. If it happens, all the fiefdoms that ever were or will ever be are right down the toilet.”
He cocks his head.
“Well, that’s different.”
“A little bit.”
“Thanks for the warning. We’ll see about making our way in the world a wee bit faster.”
He starts away and I call after him, “Have you heard of a ghost people call the old Roman?”
Arawn stops.
“Remember when you asked if we dislike vampires?”
“Yes.”
“We like ghosts even less.”
His men get up and stand around him.
“Do you know how to get there?”
“Not a clue. Thanks again for the knife. Ta.”
He starts up the stairs and his men follow. The Grays don’t make a sound as they go. They march into the dark and in a few seconds it’s like they were never there.
“I think I found something,” says Delon.
He’s squatting, leaning against the wall and drinking water from a bottle that’s three quarters empty. How long have we been in Kill City? It seems like a couple of days, but it can’t be more than a few hours.
“We turn right at the end of the hall, past a collapsed ceiling, and there’s a door that leads down.”
Vidocq stands and hefts his pack onto his shoulder.
“One of the Gray men told me about a door nearby. That must be it,” he says.
“Saddle up, everyone. The sooner we get downstairs, the sooner we’re out of Tombstone,” I say. Big talker. I try to stand up and it feels like my head is spinning around like Linda Blair’s. Candy comes over and helps me to my feet.
Everyone gathers up their gear and heads out. Traven takes a minute to change the batteries in his flashlight, then starts up the stairs with the rest of us. Good-bye, Shoggot country. Good riddance. If Hattie doesn’t poison your water supply, I’ll be very surprised.
The floor at the end of the hall is buckled like someone squeezed it from both ends like an accordion. Delon is back in the lead. Vidocq follows with Brigitte and Candy right behind. I’m at the back with Traven, stumbling along like a toddler just learning to walk.
“Are you in much pain?” he says.
“Just enough, thanks. Sorry I dragged you into this mess, Father.”
“I’m sorry I haven’t been more use along the way. Maybe I should have learned to use a gun.”
I have to lean my arm against the wall to get over the places where the folds in the floor rise above my knees.
“You might have noticed that we have a lot of shooters and it hasn’t kept us out of trouble. You’ll get to show your stuff when we find the Qomrama. You know anything more about it? Where it came from? Who made it?”
Staying back with me, Father Traven has fallen behind the others. I don’t like being the gimp in the group.
“Who made it is an interesting question. Most texts say it was the Angra, as a way to destroy our God. But there was speculation among a group of Byzantine scholars that God himself made it. That it’s not a weapon against the Angra but against himself.”
“God was going to take a bullet for the team?”
“Even that’s disputed. Maybe God intended to sacrifice himself in hopes that it would appease the Angra.”
“That doesn’t make sense. If our God made it, and Ruach let Aelita have it, she’d know how to use it, only she doesn’t. She got lucky killing Neshamah, but she can’t count on getting all the brothers on luck.”
“There’s one more theory. A minority theory, but an interesting one. It says that a high priestess is the only one that can bring the Qomrama into this universe from where the Angra are exiled.”
“How?”
“No one knows, but the theory continues that the reason the Qomrama is hard to control is that it’s not just an inanimate weapon. That it’s a kind of Qliphoth.”
“A demon? Then it’s a piece of one of the old gods. That means it’s alive.”
Traven shrugs. I can breathe again, so we start walking.
“As I said, it’s a minority opinion, but with the Qomrama, I wouldn’t put anything out of the realm of possibility.”
“Neither would I. Ever notice that we live in a very strange universe?”
Traven brushes dust out of his eyes and off his deeply lined face.
“What’s left to believe in? The God in Heaven isn’t to be trusted, and a piece of that very same God is also Lucifer in Hell? How are we supposed to go on knowing these things?”
“Cheer up, Father. It could have been ten.”
He gives me a look.
I say, “It’s a Hellion joke. When God threw the rebel angels out of Heaven, they fell for nine days.”
Traven nods and says, “I get it. Things could always be worse. I suppose that’s true.”
“I won’t tell you any other Hellion jokes. Most sound like the Three Stooges riffing on farts and vivisection.”
“I appreciate that.”
This part of the corridor is all raw drywall with Spackle smeared along the edges where the panels join. I feel woozy. I stop to lean against a section. And I’m falling. Not onto the floor but right through the wall.
I land flat on my back, knocking the wind out of me. It takes me a minute to get my senses back. My stitches hurt from the impact. Faintly, like he’s talking through water, I can hear Traven calling my name. But I’m in no shape to answer.
I came down on a pile of mall trash and building materials. Broken drywall panels, a layer of old cups and napkins, moldy clothes, and broken beanbag chairs. A million gnat-size Styrofoam pellets float to the floor, like I’m lying in a blizzard in a garbage dump. Thin, airy laughs come from the edges of the room. They sound like the wind from the other side of a hill.
“Who’s there?”
The laughter tapers off but no one answers. Looking up, I can see the hole where I fell through. It’s not that far. Shadows move across it. Someone is looking for me.
I shout, “Traven. Down here. Hey!”
“He can’t hear you.”
Another voice says, “None of them can.”
“Who is that?”
More laughs. A bunch of people down here think I’m fucking hilarious.
It’s warm and damp, with the same tropical feel as the mall’s atrium. My eyes slowly adjust to the room. Furred fungus on the walls glows faintly. Eidolon Whiskers. We had something like it Downtown. I look back at the opening in the wall where I fell through. It’s not real. It’s a phantom. A ghost wall like the one hiding the room in Hell where I first found the 8 Ball.
In a few minutes I can almost see my hand in front of my face. Then shapes in the room. I’m in the middle of a maze of improvised graves and tombs built from debris that landed here during the collapse. Someone has cobbled together a cemetery for whoever was trapped here. If this is a boneyard, I have a bad feeling about who’s been laughing at me this whole time.
“Hey, dead guys. Come out, come out, wherever you are.”
Gray wisps circle me. Faces resolve themselves for a second or two, then break apart into smoke.
“There you are. Why did you grab me? What did I ever do to you?”
“It was fun.”
“We were bored.”
“You were clumsy.”
“You’re alive. That’s offense enough.”
I shake my head.
“Is this one of those ‘we’re-dead-and-that-makes-the-living-our-enemy’ situations, ’cause seriously . . . ? That’s the best you could come up with?”
“It’s not smart to mock us.”
“I’m not mocking you. Hell, I’m on your side. I’ve been dead too. A couple of times. I know how much it sucks. Come on. We’re on the same team here.”
“We will be soon.”
More chuckles from the peanut gallery.
“You will never leave here.”
“You know you’re not the first dead assholes to threaten me, right?”
“No. We’re the last.”
“I see why you were bored before. You’re boring. You’re boring ghosts and that’s just sad. You have all day to figure out spooky stuff and all you’ve come up with is ‘boohoo we’re dead and everyone with TiVo has to die.’ ”