Ballistic Kiss

by Richard Kadrey

“Even a crazy one?”

  “All angels.”

  I think about the offer for a minute.

  “If I let you go, will you promise not to make any more Chris Steins?”

  “You have my word.”

  I look at her. I wish I could read angels better. But I can’t.

  I say, “Okay. I’ll take the deal.”

  Zadkiel closes her eyes for a few seconds. Opens them.

  “It’s done.”

  “Wait. That’s it?”

  She cocks her head at me.

  “Did you expect that there was a giant key I’ve carried with me all of these years?”

  “I was kind of hoping.”

  “I’m sorry to disappoint you. However, the gates are open.”

  “Wait here. I need to check something.”

  I go through the Room and emerge in Hell, where the refugees have been huddled against the gates of Heaven. Sure enough, they’re open and souls are pouring through and up the celestial stairs.

  After all this time. All this blood. In the end it was so simple.

  I go back to the flying saucer house.

  “I’ve got to give it to you. You told the truth. The deal is done.”

  Zadkiel gives me a funny look . . . and kicks me hard enough that I leave a dent in the wall on the far side of the room.

  “There’s one more point to the bargain.”

  “Wait. I agreed to what you wanted.”

  “But you remain an Abomination. How can I trust you?”

  I hold up my hands.

  “Seriously. We’re done here. Go be psycho in Kansas. Become a Republican. Run for governor. I don’t care. Just get out of L.A.”

  “I will, but you must go too.”

  “You mean you want to kill me like Chris. I don’t think so.”

  “It’s the only way.”

  “I knew it. Never trust an angel.”

  She manifests her Gladius. There’s nothing else I can do. I manifest mine.

  Zadkiel is fast and strong and I’m still not a hundred percent. She doesn’t even bother trying to kill me at first. She has a good old time punching and kicking me around the flying saucer house. Furniture splinters. She knocks the TV off the wall. Pushes me back into the kitchen and kills the microwave, so I can’t heat up leftovers.

  That’s when I lose my temper.

  I swing my Gladius at her belly, but she sees the blow coming and smashes her sword into mine. The shock wave from the two divine weapons’ meeting blows the kitchen to pieces. I manage to work my way around her and back into the open space of the living room.

  Zadkiel bares her teeth at me.

  “When I’m done with you, I’ll close the gates again. That’s your punishment for being a fool, Abomination.”

  I do the only thing I can think of. I bark some Hellion hoodoo and set fire to her wings.

  Zadkiel shrieks in pain and outrage. She spins around, bouncing off the walls, waving her wings, trying to put out the flames. Her screams are like sonic booms, and I have to put my hands over my ears before my skull explodes. The stink of burning feathers is even worse than the Malediction. She falls to the floor. Her wings are nothing but cartilage and gristle hanging from her back.

  While she’s distracted, I shoot in with my Gladius over my head and slash her from her throat to her waist.

  Her sword flickers out. She looks at me, wild eyed, and grabs my arm. Even dying, she’s strong. Zadkiel pulls me on top of her. She closes her eyes and when she opens them she gives me a last sad smile. We both lie there, beaten and aching.

  “You should have murdered me before,” she says.

  “I was going to let you live.”

  She puts a bloody hand to my cheek.

  “I want you to know that this is all your fault.”

  “What is?”

  She grimaces in pain. Tears run down her face.

  “I’ve done something awful. Just awful. You’ll see.”

  “Did you close the gates?”

  She shakes her head.

  “Something much worse.”

  Before I can say another word she dies and fades from existence.

  I fall onto my back.

  What the hell could Zadkiel have done while she was lying there half-dead?

  I look around. Once again, the poor flying saucer house looks like it was hit by a hurricane. A few more times like this and I’m going to get annoyed.

  When I can move again, I hunt through the wreckage by the sofa until I find the asphodel seed. With it tight in my fist I shadow walk—well, shadow stumble—and come out across town.

  Right in front of Max Overdrive. Candy and Alessa are still partying at Bamboo House, so I’m alone with Kasabian.

  I knock on his door.

  “Go away.”

  “It’s me, Kas.”

  “Then go far away and fuck off.”

  I go inside and sit down.

  “Thanks for the invitation.”

  He’s still just a pile of wreckage on his bed. He holds up his one good arm and gives me the finger.

  “Make yourself at home since I’m in no condition to throw you out.”

  I look around and find a couple of dirty glasses.

  “You have any of that Suntory left? I thought we could have a drink.”

  “To what?”

  “Vidocq, you asshole.”

  He stops whining and looks serious.

  “Yeah. I heard about that. I know you two were close. Sorry.”

  “What? No shots at me for being sentimental or a death trap? You really must be feeling low.”

  “Don’t worry, I still think you’re a prick. It’s just that, unlike you, I don’t kick a man when he’s down.”

  “You’re saying you’re a better person than me?”

  Kasabian thinks about it.

  “Yeah. That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

  “Then let’s drink to that. Where’s the bottle?”

  “On the floor.”

  He’s done a good job on it. The bottle is about three-quarters empty. Still, there’s plenty left for what I need to do.

  I pour one drink and set it on the floor by my foot. Then pour a second glass, drop in the asphodel seed, and give it to Kasabian.

  I hold up my drink in a toast.

  “To Vidocq. Like you and me: one of a fucked-up kind.”

  “I’ll drink to that,” he says.

  We both down our drinks. Mine is smooth, with that slightly hot fruit-flavored aftertaste.

  Kasabian downs his. Only his face looks funny. He chokes and coughs. Keeps coughing. Finally, he spits something into his hand. It’s the asphodel seed.

  “What’s this?” he says.

  “Nothing. It’s medicine. Eat it.”

  He leans back on the bed and looks at me.

  “After all this time, you’re finally trying to kill me. What’s the matter? Killing the old French guy wasn’t enough for you? What’s the plan? You kill me, move in here, and win Candy back? It ain’t gonna work, asshole. I told you. She’s gone. You’re nothing to her now but a sad old mutt she’s too sentimental to put down.”

  “Just eat the goddamn seed, Kas.”

  “No. I’m not going to be another notch on your belt. You want to kill me, put your gun to my head so I can look you in the eye.”

  I set down my glass and put my hands together.

  “I promise you. I’m not trying to poison you or hurt you in any way whatsoever.”

  “Your existence hurts me. You walking the streets, getting drunk at a bar I can’t get to, eating donuts at a shop I can’t walk to. Everything about you is a pain in my nonexistent ass.”

  My blood pressure is going up, but I take a breath.

  “You want donuts? I’ll bring you some tomorrow. How many do you want? What kind? I’ll fucking fill this place with donuts.”

  Kasabian holds out the seed.

  “You think I want food from you when you try to poison me? I might be pathetic,
but I’m not dumb. Get out of here,” he says. “And take your poison with you.”

  He throws the asphodel seed at me. It bounces off my coat and under his bed.

  “Shit.”

  I get on my hands and knees and crawl underneath. It’s not pretty.

  “Fuck, Kas. Have you swept under here once? It’s like the goddamn Amazon rain forest. Tumbleweeds everywhere.”

  He flails his one good arm at me.

  “There aren’t any tumbleweeds in the Amazon rain forest, you moron.”

  He manages to tag me a couple of times with his damn metal hand. On top of my other injuries, it really hurts.

  Then my hand lands on something.

  “Got it.”

  I come out from under the bed and blow the last of the dust off the seed.

  Kasabian looks genuinely scared now.

  “I’m not swallowing your fucking poison.”

  “I’m telling you, it’s not poison.”

  “Then you eat it.”

  “I can’t. There’s only one and it’s for you.”

  He looks at the seed.

  “Is that from your buddy Vidocq? I bet he had all kinds of poisons around. Did he give you that to get me out of here?”

  Then he does a kind of clumsy crab walk away from me on the bed.

  “Or did you give that to him? Did you kill the Frenchman? You’re psycho, Stark. You know that? You’re a goddamn psycho.”

  I sit back down in the chair.

  “Kas. You’re eating this seed. It’s not going to kill you and you’re going to thank me when it’s over.”

  “You’re going to have to kill me to make me eat that thing.”

  “That doesn’t even make sense.”

  He cowers in the corner where his bed meets the wall.

  “Get out of here or I’ll tell Alessa and she’ll never let you back in here.”

  I consider that possibility for a minute. Then I consider another one. Candy’s advice not to kidnap people. Respect their boundaries. Listen to them. But then I think of Janet. And what she said after we got back from her being the main event at a sacrifice. What comes to mind is this: Like me, Kasabian isn’t exactly people. And sometimes you have to make a kid cry because they need a shot.

  I grab him.

  “Open your mouth, Kas.”

  “No.”

  “Open it.”

  “No.”

  This time he says it with his teeth clamped shut.

  I say, “You need your flu shot.”

  He frowns.

  “Before I just called you a psycho, but you really are one. You’ve gone around the fucking bend.”

  I lunge at him; get hold of his fat, stupid face; and start prying his jaws apart. He squirms and screams and grunts. Also, he’s pounding me in the balls with his one good hand.

  But, in the end, I’m stronger than him. I finally get his teeth enough apart to shove in the seed. Then I push them back together so he can’t spit it out.

  “Swallow,” I yell. “Swallow.”

  He shakes his head frantically.

  Finally, when I can’t think of anything else to do, I grab the side of his head and bang it into the wall. When he’s a little dazed, I pour whiskey down his throat. He thrashes around, and whiskey goes all over him, all over me, and all over the bed. But he finally swallows the damn seed.

  Horrified, he looks at me with tears running down his face. Or maybe it’s whiskey. I took some in my eye and I can’t see really well right now.

  “Well, that’s it,” he says. “The end of the line. Hell, maybe I deserve this. Killed by the monster I helped make. Yeah, that’s it. You finally got the last of us. The people you crawled out of Hell to murder. I hope it feels good. You know what? I don’t even hate you anymore. You’re doing me a favor. Fuck this life. Even when Manimal Mike made his goddamn Tin Woodsman body for me, I’ve been miserable. This is good. I’m ready to go. Thank you, Stark. You’re a real pal. A pile of festering puke, but a real pal.”

  He closes his eyes and lies back on the bed.

  “Kas, just shut up and let it happen.”

  He opens one and says, “You’re going to stay and watch, aren’t you, you ghoul? I take back every nice thing I said. I don’t deserve this.”

  “No,” I say. “You probably don’t.”

  He twists around on the bed, like he’s rolling around with stomach cramps.

  “Shit,” he yells. “What is this stuff? Oh god. It hurts.”

  “Hang on. It’ll be over soon.”

  I grab Kasabian’s head as the metal armature of his body falls away. I kick it onto the floor and set him back down. He’s moaning now. I can’t tell if he’s awake or having some kind of seizure. It goes on for a few minutes.

  Eventually, he opens his eyes. He gets one look at me and puts his hands to his face.

  “You prick. You followed me to Hell. Leave me alone. Why don’t you go kick Mason in the ass for a while? I hurt all over.”

  “You’re not in Hell, Kas. You’re still in your filthy fucking room. And if you want to kick my ass, why don’t you get up and do it?”

  He pulls his hands from his face and looks at them. Then his pudgy body. He wiggles his weirdly long toes.

  I point to his foot.

  “What’s going on down there?”

  “My toes? They’re a family trait, you jerk. They’re from my mother. And why are you staring at my feet?”

  “Because you have them.”

  “Yeah. I noticed.”

  He looks at me, still a little suspicious.

  “That’s what the seed was for? To give me my body back?”

  “It was a wish charm. It gives you whatever you want. Good thing you weren’t hungry. You could have ended up a three-hundred-pound fritter.”

  He makes a face at me.

  “I don’t like fritters, you mook. Those are your things. I like people food. Now get out and let me get dressed.”

  I wipe some of the whiskey off my coat and limp for the door.

  “What’s with your leg?” he says.

  “An angel kicked my ass tonight.”

  “Good.”

  Just before the door closes, I hear the absolute smallest “Thanks, man” ever uttered on Earth.

  “Anytime, Kas.”

  I head back to the flying saucer house.

  At least no one has cleaned it when I get there. I knock some rubble off the bed, get under the covers fully dressed, and pop a PTSD pill and a lorazepam.

  I dream about somewhere far away and a different life I could have had. Should I have taken the asphodel seed and changed time to stay with Alice? A part of me wants to think that it could have worked out. Us dumb and happy together until we got old. But my whole body hurts, and my side is bleeding, and Kasabian bit my finger. When I rub it, I feel my scars.

  Changing time, going back to Alice, and starting over is a pipe dream. I am what I am. A Nephilim. An Abomination. A natural born killer. Playing house a little longer wouldn’t change that. I was always going to end up here. The last of my kind in the universe. At least now there are people who care about me. If I’d stayed like I was twelve years ago, I’d still be a smart-ass and a drunk and useless. Alice would have died anyway, and that version of me would have ended up alone. And he’d have deserved it.

  In some ways I’ll always be alone. But there are people who’ll miss me when I go. Maybe they’ll drag me onto a mountain and burn me so a crow can carry me back to—does it really even matter anymore? Heaven is open and Hell is obsolete. Except for the doom twins. While the other damned get to bum-rush the celestial stairs to the pearly gates, I’m keeping them in the House of Knives. It’ll be chaos Downtown for a while. No one will notice they’re missing.

  Finally, I drop into a deep, dark sleep.

  After all that’s happened, I’m afraid of nightmares, but if I dream at all, in the morning, I don’t remember a single one.

  I wake up to a great smell. When I sit up I find
Samael sitting on the end of the bed sipping from a china cup.

  He says, “Good morning, sunshine.”

  “Is that coffee I smell?”

  “Did you want a cup?”

  “In fact, I do.”

  “Sorry. This is the last of it.”

  I throw the covers off me and try to get up but fall back over.

  “Ow.”

  “I take it you and Zadkiel had some fun last night.”

  “She beat me like I stole her car.”

  “Statistically, there’s a good chance you did at some point.”

  “Please tell me that she wasn’t lying. The gates of Heaven are still open?”

  He takes a sip of coffee and says, “They are indeed. Damned souls are flooding in while rebel angels are flooding out. It’s quite comical really. A sort of rerun of what I did with my pack of rebels all those years ago.”

  “Bunch of copycats.”

  “Unimaginative dross.”

  I try sitting up and this time it works. Stumbling through the wreckage, I make it to the kitchen and open a cabinet. There’s a whole unopened pound of French roast on the shelf.

  “You said there wasn’t any coffee.”

  “You found some? Why don’t you make us a fresh pot?”

  I find a filter, shove it into the blessedly intact coffeemaker, and pour in half the damn bag of French roast.

  “I hope you like yours strong.”

  “Like the Rock of Gibraltar,” Samael says. And looks around. “A bit of a step up for you.”

  “Yeah. It’s not bad.”

  “No. I meant the debris. You usually get beaten up in much worse places. You’re on your way to the big time, Jimmy.”

  The coffeemaker burbles like it’s laughing at one of us, and I’m the only one covered in bruises.

  I say, “Do you know how much blood I’ve lost over just the last few days? I could freeze it and carve you a new suit from it.”

  Samael makes a face.

  “Despite all the art, red really isn’t my color.”

  “Are you here to congratulate me or just drink the last of my coffee?”

  “All of the above. Well done with everything.”

  I look at him.

  “I always get nervous when you’re nice.”

  He looks at me in mock horror.

  “I’m the sincerest being in the entire universe.”

  “What about Mr. Muninn?”

  “The second-sincerest being in the universe, then.”