Paradise Lost Boxed Set

by R. E. Vance

  Mr. Cain clapped his hands and grinned. I guess a businessman such as himself interpreted I’ll think about it as an enthusiastic Yes. Given what he was offering me, he might just be right.

  The brother of Abel stuck out his hand. “Great. I look forward to hearing from you.”

  I looked at the extended hand that, once-upon-a-time, was guilty of the first murder and wondered if there was enough time in the world to wash it clean. Then I looked at my own stained hands and knew that there wasn’t.

  I took his hand and shook it.

  ↔

  After we shook hands, Mr. Cain paid the bill and he and BisMark left me alone to finish my apple martini.

  I stared at the napkin for what felt like forty days and forty nights, mulling over the offer. This was money. Real money. And despite owning the only functioning hotel in Paradise Lot, I was broke, broke, broke.

  Others were amazing at many things, but finances was not one of them. Hell, for most of them, money was worthless. You couldn’t eat it, you couldn’t plant it and it didn’t do anything magical like turn into a flying carpet or light things up or cure any ailments you might have. It was paper. Of course, money could buy bus tickets, which could be interpreted as a substitute for a flying carpet. Money paid your electricity bills, which kept the lights on, as well as your doctor bills, which kept you healthy.

  Money wasn’t magic. But it was a way to buy all the things magic used to do for you.

  Not that Others understood that. They still placed value in things that were inherently magical … like actual flying carpets, magic lamps and vials of health. I once had an ifrit try to pay for a room with—well, ahem, what succubi prefer to pay with. When I refused, she looked dejected and pulled out a spoon. Once-upon-a-time, whenever that spoon went into an empty bowl, it always came up with whatever food you desired. But with the gods gone, it was just a spoon.

  In the end, I let her keep the spoon and have the room for the night.

  The ifrit stayed for three months.

  I’m a sucker, I know, but you should have seen how she cradled that spoon in her hand—like it was the most precious thing she owned. And maybe it was. She was so lost, I couldn’t turn her away. Besides, that particular transaction had a happy ending—eventually the ifrit found work and a place to live. When she left my hotel, she was independent, happy and looking forward to her new career as a grocer’s assistant. The day she moved out she handed me an envelop which contained the spoon and a note that read: Maybe one day the spoon will work again. And when it does, you’ll see why I loved it so much.

  Best feeling in the world to have helped her on her way.

  And, in a world where being OnceImmortal made you a refugee, there was no shortage of Others in need. Best feeling in the world was hardly the appropriate prize for helping one creature.

  There was one more thing to take into account: good feelings don’t pay the bills.

  Mr. Cain’s offer could.

  As I ruminated over good feelings, something that elicited the exact opposite of good feelings happened: my phone buzzed. I flipped open to a text message that read:

  Looking forward to seeing you later tonight. We got quite the showing. Let’s meet at dusk—and don’t forget the cookies!

  –George

  “That’s today,” I muttered to myself, less of a question than an admonishment that I let it slip through my mind. George was a new friend. Our bond was formed over mutual experience: he, too, lost a friend during the almost-apocalypse. His loss was a myarid—a sea-jinni—of considerable power, Azzah. She sacrificed her life to save George’s.

  I considered not texting back, but then I thought about how much the ceremony meant to George. He deserved more than depressed-me, so I mustered my best give-a-damn attitude and texted back:

  OK, I’ll be there, but my cookies will not.

  Not much, I know. But at least I fought off the urge to drown my phone in drink.

  The message was whisked away with a zoop! sound—which I’m pretty sure was the noise Internet pixies made when they delivered messages through cyberspace—and waited for a reply.

  Not ten seconds later I received:

  We invited you for your cookies. ;)

  I chuckled to myself and wrote:

  Then you’ve obviously never had them.

  LOL … cookies or not, looking forward to seeing you later my friend.

  ↔

  I put away my phone and called Milton over. I considered my next words carefully before realizing the temptation was too great. I sighed, giving in: “Mr. Cain was right, wasn’t he? You did know they were leaving?” He might have clammed up with Mr. Cain, but I was the guy who stopped two apocalypses, and was considered a champion to Others … maybe, just maybe, he’d answer me.

  Milton’s eyelids snapped shut. They opened three seconds later, his large green iris glaring down at me.

  Champion or not, I wasn’t going to get an answer.

  “OK, OK,” I said, hand up in mock surrender, “can’t blame me for trying. On another note, since you can read my mind, what drink do I want now?” I held a finger up to my forehead. I wanted to get drunk and forget. I knew it was only a temporary reprieve, but it was something.

  He didn’t move. Or blink.

  “Come on. You’re not sore I asked you about the gods, are you?”

  He shook his head.

  “So … drink?” I held the image of a whisky in my mind’s eye, presumably in the same spot as Milton’s real eye.

  He didn’t move.

  I dropped my finger. “What’s the problem? I’d like a drink.”

  He shook his head.

  “I … don’t want a drink?” I asked, suddenly unsure of what I wanted.

  He blinked.

  “Because … it won’t help how I’m feeling.”

  Another blink.

  “I should leave.”

  Yet again, he blinked. I swear—this cyclops was a one-note creature.

  I thought about it. He was right. I did want to leave. Go for a long walk home to clear my head and think about things. Things like how if I was honest with myself, I mean really honest, then there was only one real reason I wanted Mr. Cain’s money.

  It was my ticket out of Paradise Lot.

  ↔

  I left the Other Place and headed home—if you could call a seven-storey hotel in the center of town “home.” I lived (and worked) in the Millennium Hotel, a once-upon-a-time boutique hotel that stood on a hill. It was cylindrically shaped, and from a distance looked like the rook from a chess board. The Millennium Hotel, and its residence, was my world.

  And right now I hated it.

  Ever since the near-apocalypse, I just couldn’t bring myself to really care.

  Seeing Medusa die nearly killed me. Figuratively speaking, of course. She was the second person I loved and watched die because of the Others and this new GoneGod world—and, frankly, I felt cursed.

  Don’t get me wrong. I never blamed the Others for what happened to Medusa and Bella—Bella, my wife who died six years after the gods left.

  I blame the gods.

  They shouldn’t have left. And if they had to, if for some GoneGodDamn reason they had no choice, then they should have done it without so much hurt or confusion. They were friggin’ gods, after all. They could have done something, anything to make the transition smoother. But they didn’t—and because of their careless departure, Others and people died.

  Others and people whom I loved.

  It’s been three weeks since Medusa’s death. Three weeks in which I have learned to empathize with zombies. Move, eat, groan—and don’t feel.

  I was numb. And I didn’t think there was anything that could be done to reanimate myself. I wanted out. Add to the equation that my former Army commander was blackmailing me, and I desperately wanted out.

  As I walked up the hill toward the Millennium Hotel, I was conflicted; an internal battle raged with no clear winner in sight. I needed to d
o what I always did when faced with questions that didn’t have answers: I needed to get up to my room and stage a battle between my 1980s vintage toys. And since the dilemma I faced was a big one, the battle I would stage would need to be between … who? Voltron and WWF stars. Maybe Transformers and GI Joe versus Smurfs and He-Man?

  I was already planning the battle as I pushed on the turnstile front door of the hotel. A little bell chimed with each hit of one of the door-flaps. The bell was magical in nature and attuned to my ear, telling me what kind of species rang it. Given I was walking through my own door, I heard the word ‘human’ after each chime. Chime, ‘human’ then two ‘human’—and with three ‘humans’, I was in.

  What waited for me in the lobby of my hotel made me wish to the high heavens that I had taken Mr. Cain’s offer and left with him then and there.

  Despite Popular Belief—Sinbad’s a Girl

  “Sinbad! My name is Sinbad. Sinbad. Sinbad!”

  Ah crap, not today, I thought as I walked through the turnstile into the lobby of the Millienium Hotel. As each door-flap rang the bell that hung above the entrance, the thought “For whom the bells toll!” sang in my head.

  The hotel lobby was a grand, expansive cylinder that soared all the way up the seven stories of the hotel. Each floor looked out into the middle, with only a brass railing to stop someone from falling down its center. The space was sparsely furnished: only a few couches near the glass walls and a large, circular oak desk in the center of the room.

  Usually my hotel was empty, with the occasional (unpaying) guest meandering about. Today, however, an eight-foot-tall angel lay flat on the ground as what looked like a six-year-old dressed in a Halloween pirate costume bounced up and down on his chest. Her face was surprisingly menacing as she screamed the name Sinbad down at her angelic prey. They were both covered in sudsy water, like someone had dumped a bubble bath on their heads and—judging from the angel’s own scowl and the little girl who was going tantrum-nuclear on his chest—neither of them were happy.

  The angel—Penemue—was sprawled out on his back, wings spread out like some poorly laid feather carpet. Penemue was one of my longstanding, unpaying guests. He was a drunk and an arrogant bastard, but that tweed-vest-wearing angel was my best friend, which meant I knew him well enough to know that he deserved any beat-down he was getting. Still, by all practical reasoning, Penemue should have been able to easily lift a six-year-old off of him, pirate or no—she was, after all, literally a third his size and an eighth his weight. But amazingly enough, from the strain on his face, I could see that Penemue was helpless against this girl. That meant she was either burning time to keep him down, or she was much, much, much stronger than she looked.

  Behind them stood EightBall—a former HuMan gang member and now my assistant—laughing hysterically.

  I’ll be honest, I considered just stepping over them and leaving; but, sighing heavily, I decided against it. This scene was unusual—even for Penemue.

  “What the hell is going on here?” I growled.

  Without hesitation, the girl pointed at Penemue and said, “He started it.”

  “I did not,” Penemue protested.

  “Yes, you did!” She looked at me with pleading, desperate eyes, like she needed me to believe it was Penemue who started it and not her. “Cross my heart, mister. Just ask the guy with the eight on his head.” She pointed another accusatory finger to the tattoo on EightBall’s forehead.

  Despite his name, it wasn’t a tattoo of an eight. It was a vertical infinity sign that, because of EightBall’s perfectly round head and dark complexion, made his head look like an eight-ball.

  Why EightBall even had a tattoo on his forehead was a long story. The short of it: HuMan gang members liked to shave their heads and cover them with tattoos of religious symbols that—since the gods left—few, if any, still worshipped. Crosses, crescents, the Wheel of the Dharma, Yin and Yang … you get the picture. And since EightBall was once-upon-a-time Paradise Lot’s local chapter leader, his head was covered with more symbols than most.

  But these days the teenager wore his hair short and neat—his past buried under tight black curls that covered most of the tattoos. Only the eight remained visible.

  “OK,” I said, leaning in close. “But will you get off the angel’s chest so we can discuss this in a civil manner?”

  “Not until he apologizes,” the girl sniffed. “It’s only proper.”

  Despite Penemue’s predicament, his face was defiant. Getting an apology out of him would be damn near impossible, I could tell. “I merely asked what kind of Other you are,” the pinned angel said. “I’ve never encountered your kind before.”

  “Other what?” she said—as if the term didn’t mean anything to her.

  Penemue sighed in exasperation. “What kind of mythical creature are you?”

  “I’m a girl.”

  “No, you’re not,” Penemue said.

  “I’m Sinbad.”

  “Again … no, you are not.”

  “Yes, I am. I am Sinbad the sailor.”

  “Sinbad is a fictitious character that never lived.”

  “I! AM! SINBAD!” the little creature screamed. She punctuated every word with a stomp, hard on his chest, knocking the breath out of him.

  I just stared. This was what the fight was about?

  Penemue coughed. “OK, if you are Sinbad, where is your ship?”

  “In the water.”

  “And where is the water?”

  “Out there,” she said, waving in the general direction of outside.

  “Port? Starboard? Where?”

  “ ‘Starboard,’ ” the little girl giggled, “Mr. Angel, you talk funny.”

  “I do not,” Penemue protested.

  “You do, too.”

  “I do not—”

  Sinbad stomped down hard on his chest again. “YOU! DO! TOO!”

  “OK, OK, I talk funny,” the flattened angel said. “Ha. Ha. There, happy?”

  Sinbad giggled.

  As I tried desperately to see the humor in the situation, three tiny chimes sounded behind me, announcing a possible new arrival. I turned to see a poltergeist pushing through the turnstile door.

  The bell rang out the word, ‘Ghost’, but what it should have said was ‘the Devil’.

  Oh, crap … Judith, I thought, as the ghost of my mother-in-law, back from her all-too-short holiday in Australia (I wish that was a joke, but it’s not) entered the lobby.

  Judith took in the scene before her with one glance and glared at me. “Really, Jean,” she said with her usual scorn. “I don’t know why I expected things to be different when clearly nothing will ever change around here.”

  I forced a smile. “Welcome back.”

  “Humph. ‘Welcome back,’ indeed.”

  The five-foot-nothing poltergeist floated over to me. From the waist up, Judith looked like a woman on her way to church: a nicely pressed Sunday dress with a pretty floral pattern; a respectable hat with all the appropriate bobby pins holding any potentially loose strands of hair at bay; the ensemble even included a petite yet elegant purse, strapped around her shoulder, which matched her yellow cardigan.

  The waist down, however, was another story. Judith had no legs, instead floating, well, exactly as you’d expect a ghost to float. Judith died before the gods left, but instead of going into the proverbial light, she decided to stick around and haunt the poor soul who married her daughter—me. Things would go missing all the time, I’d feel cold or anxious for no reason and, on more than one occasion, I’d wake up in a cold sweat.

  Then the gods left, taking most of the world’s magic with them. The result? Judith could no longer remain invisible and, manifesting in that same gaudy dress we buried her in, she came back to life. Problem was, we thought she was dead, so we sold her house. Having nowhere else to live, she moved in with her daughter Bella and her son-in-law moi.

  That was fourteen years ago; now, with Bella dead and forever gone, I wa
s the one stuck taking care of dear ol’ Mother-in-law.

  But not just my mother-in-law. There was also the alcoholic angel, Penemue; the teenage ex-gangbanger, EightBall; and a whole host of other Others that needed my special brand of care.

  I’d like to say that dealing with the two fighting Others (or one Other and an actual pirate, if this girl was to be believed) and a judgmental ghost of a mother-in-law while being late for a meeting was unusual—but if I was being honest, this was a fairly typical day.

  I knew I should ask about her holiday, try some sort of small talk, but honestly I didn’t care. I was so overwhelmed, on sensory overload, that Welcome back was just about all I could manage. Her being back was just one more thing to make my already miserable life more … well, miserable. So instead I stood there like some kind of breathing rock.

  She ignored me and floated toward Penemue and the girl. “And what is going on here?”

  Finally my brain’s gridlock thawed. I spun around and said to Judith’s back, “Good to see you’ve returned refreshed and relaxed.”

  Judith took a moment to look at me over her shoulder and scowl before pointing at Penemue and saying, “Seems the angel is misbehaving. Again. Not that I would expect anything else from an angel from Hell.”

  The girl’s cheeks turned bright red when Judith said Hell. Her eyes grew large and she whispered to no one in particular, “She said a bad word.”

  EightBall nodded, suppressing a giggle.

  “Young lady, it is only a swear word when used as blasphemy. The angel you are currently standing on did indeed reside in Hell.”

  Cheeks burning brighter, the girl giggled at the word.

  “I repeat: what is going on here?”

  “Judith,” I said. “I’m handling it.”

  “I can see that. Now if you don’t mind”—she floated close to the three of them—“what is going on?”

  “Well, as you can see—” Penemue said.