“Who knew that you could make a whole engine out of duct tape?” Dean said, waving a hand in front of his face to clear the smoke. He shook his head and closed the hood like it was a coffin lid. “This thing isn’t going anywhere.”
Xochi got out and fished around in her pockets.
“Let me call Alejandro,” she said, unfolding a crumpled bar napkin.
“Who?” Dean asked.
“The guy with the El Camino,” Xochi said, pulling out her phone and dialing the number off the napkin.
“He gave you his phone number?” Dean asked.
“Of course,” she replied.
She switched to Spanish and turned away from Dean, voice taking on a flirtatious tone.
Dean looked down at his hands. The backs of his hands and forearms were scratched up from the broken glass. Nothing serious.
Xochi ended the call.
“Alejandro is at work right now,” she said. “But he’s sending his cousin Oscar. He can give us a ride to Santiago de Querétaro. We can get another car there, or, if we find no other choice, we can take the bus into El D.F.”
“The bus?” Claudia made a sour face. “I’m not taking the bus. Aren’t Mexican busses, like, full of chickens and babies with TB and ten smelly guys mashed up against you?”
“You’ve been watching too many American movies,” Xochi said. “The bus is just a bus. Just normal people, going to work or to visit relatives. No chickens allowed.”
“Yeah,” Sam said. “But we don’t have time to wait for a bus. We’re bleeding time here. Every lost minute is an extra mile Teo has on us. At this rate, there’s no way we are gonna make it in time to stop her. We still don’t have any idea exactly where she’s going. Now I’ve never been to Mexico City, but I understand it’s pretty big. ”
“You’re right,” Xochi said. She paused a moment in thought. “Claudia, have you ever tried consciously to link minds with your mother?”
Claudia shook her head.
“It just kinda happens,” she said.
“I will teach you,” Xochi said. “Once we get on the road. This may be our only chance.”
They waited for over an hour in the dusty swelter before a guy pulled up in a ridiculously tricked-out white mid-eighties Monte Carlo SS. He looked about twelve years old, but with way too much hard living around the eyes. Dressed in a shiny, sharkskin suit and a screamingly loud fuchsia-silk dress shirt. He was so short, Dean was surprised he was able to drive without sitting on a phone book. This guy had to be Oscar.
Xochi greeting him in Spanish and made introductions. Dean just nodded and smiled. Xochi sat up front while Dean and Sam had to cram themselves into the back seat with Claudia between them.
As they crept through the snarled and snail-like traffic, the prepaid phone Xochi had given Dean back in Nogales rang in Sam’s pocket.
Sam took out the phone, glanced at the screen. He took the call.
“Bobby?” he said. “What have you got?”
Sam listened in silence for several minutes.
“Right,” Sam said. “Okay.”
He ended the call.
“What did he say?” Dean asked.
Sam kept his voice low, even though it seemed pretty clear that Alejandro’s cousin didn’t speak English.
“Not much on the possibility of curing Elvia using the Alpha’s blood,” Sam said. “He says he can’t find any info whatsoever on the Borderwalkers, only the most vague allegorical references to the Coyote’s Kiss in some old recordings of Native American oral history. We’re on our own there. But he had some interesting things to say about the Star Demons.”
“Great, let’s hear it,” Dean said.
“Those soul-chewing teeth,” Sam said. “They’re a weakness as well as a strength. Probably the Star Demon’s only weakness.”
“How?” Dean asked. “I don’t get it.”
“The teeth are made of obsidian. Obsidian is a type of naturally occurring volcanic glass, razor sharp but also brittle and easy to shatter. A couple of good cracks in the mouth with a blunt weapon would essentially defang the demon. The only problem would be getting cut by the flying shards.”
“Not to mention getting close enough to score a hit like that,” Dean said.
“Right now,” Sam said. “That’s pretty much all we’ve got.”
The ride to Santiago de Querétaro was agonizingly slow. Xochi tried to make polite conversation with Oscar, but she could feel every passing second cranking the tension inside her higher and higher.
Once they finally got into town, Oscar dropped them off in front of the bus station. Unfortunately, massive lines snaking out the main door made it clear that the bus wasn’t going to be an option.
Dean managed to boost a halfway-decent Caddy El Dorado that didn’t look like it would fall apart on them, but getting the car out of the city was a whole other challenge. Xochi could tell that dealing with improvisational Mexican driving was making Dean homicidal. He was leaning out the open window, shouting hilariously creative American profanities and shaking his fist at the motorbikes and taxicabs, but there was nothing she could do about that now. She needed to be in the back seat with Claudia.
“Now I want you to listen very carefully to me,” Xochi told the girl. “What I am teaching you is not easy. Normally you would need to learn how to link with someone who is right next to you before you would be able to link with people who are far away, but we have no time. You must learn to run before walking, but your natural ability and your bond with your mother are both so strong that I believe you can do it.”
“I hope you’re right,” Claudia said.
“First you must clear your mind,” Xochi said. “I know this is hard with so much happening, but it is a critical step. Imagine that you are a glass pitcher and all your thoughts and worries are pouring out of you like water, until you are empty.”
Claudia took Xochi’s hand and closed her eyes.
“Slow your breathing,” Xochi said. “Shut out all the noise around us.”
Claudia did as she was told.
“Now,” Xochi said. “Say these words after me.”
Xochi slowly spoke the ancient words of the mind-linking spell, carefully and clearly enunciating the complicated string of syllables. Claudia stumbled on some of the pronunciation, and Xochi had to struggle to keep her own mind calm and breath even.
“Start again,” Xochi said.
She spoke the spell again, even more slowly this time. Claudia followed along, but before she could finish she sucked in a sharp gasp, clutching Xochi’s hand tight.
“I see her,” Claudia said.
“What do you see?” Xochi asked.
“A huge swap meet,” Claudia said. “With all these different color tarps. Hundreds of stalls selling all kinds of weird, cheap stuff. I see the Nagual taking Elvia into an empty storefront. A green building.”
“Show me,” Xochi said, pressing her hand to Claudia’s forehead.
A stream of images flooded Xochi’s mind. She recognized the place at once.
“Tepito,” Xochi said. “El Barrio Bravo. This is a rough neighborhood in the Cuauhtémoc section of Mexico City.”
Claudia’s eyes opened, looking into Xochi’s with a kind of stunned wonder.
“I did it,” she said.
“Yes,” Xochi said. “You did.”
“Tell me about the area,” Sam said. “How rough are we talking here?”
“We will have dangers there,” Xochi said. “Human and inhuman. But I know the area well. It is full of good people as well as bad. Many of my closest friends are Tepiteños.”
“Okay then,” Dean said to Xochi. “Now that we got that cleared up, I think it’s time for you to drive, before I add a dozen counts of intentional vehicular homicide to my rap sheet.”
FORTY-SIX
They made Mexico City by sundown. The area of Tepito was easy to find. The flapping, colorful blue-and-yellow tarps were just like Claudia had described them. Tall wire rac
ks of merchandise. Knock-off perfumes. Fake designer watches and purses. Pirated DVDs. Piles of second-hand clothing and small appliances. Paper flowers and cheap nylon panties. Dean had never seen anything quite like it.
Xochi parked the stolen El Dorado on a side street. They all got out of the car, gathering and checking their weapons, but Xochi seemed distracted, staring up into the night sky. She turned to Dean with real fear in her eyes.
“Dean,” she said. “The Tianquiztli cluster, can you see it?”
“The what?”
“That’s a constellation.” Sam said. “The Pleiades, right?”
“You call it ‘the seven sisters,’” Xochi said. “We call it ‘the marketplace.’”
“I don’t see it,” Sam said. “Maybe it’s just too smoggy. Or the bright city lights are hiding it.”
“Can’t you feel that breeze?” Xochi said. “The night is clear. All the other neighboring stars are clear. This is a terrible omen.”
“What kind of omen?” Dean asked. “What does it mean?”
“It means the end of the world,” she said. “It means demons will devour the earth. It means the Tzitzimimeh are coming.”
“Are coming?” Sam asked. “Or are here already?”
“Don’t you see?” Xochi said. “It’s all connected. This place, Tepito, it is the ancient second marketplace. In the time of my Aztec ancestors, this place was a ghetto market for disreputable, lower-class merchants who were not allowed in the main marketplace. Stolen goods have been sold here for hundreds of years. It is now and has always been a place of much illegal activity, and it is the perfect place for Teo and Itzapapalotl to conduct their illicit business. Now the celestial marketplace is gone from the sky. It has already begun. The Star Demons are on their way, if they are not here already.”
“What’s that music?” Claudia asked.
“Sounds like mariachis,” Xochi said.
They turned the corner and found the street choked with people. There was some kind of parade or street fair in progress. Every tenth person seemed to be holding a large doll, each one wearing a different frilly, elaborate outfit. It took Dean a second to realize that all the dolls had skull faces.
“What is this?” Sam asked.
“No,” Xochi said, her voice full of dread. “No, this is terrible. We need to get these poor people out of here!”
“It’s a Santa Muerte festival, isn’t it?” Claudia asked.
“Yes,” Xochi said. “And all these people will be meeting the Skinny Lady much sooner than they expect if they stay here tonight.”
“Saint Death?” Sam asked. “They worship Death?”
“They think they are Catholics,” Xochi explained. “But really they are worshiping the Aztec death goddess Mictecacihuatl. Death is neither good or evil. She comes for all of us. We are all equal to her.”
“My Tia, Izzy, has an altar to Santa Muerte in her backyard,” Claudia said. “She put it up after her son got shot. My mom always said she was nuts.” Claudia looked down at her hands. “I mean, my adopted mom...”
“Come on,” Dean said. “We need to find Elvia.”
There was a group of Aztec dancers in full traditional dress gathering up their drums and equipment at the edge of the crowd. A man in a huge, elaborate skull and feather headdress spotted Xochi and raised a hand.
“Javi!” she called to him.
He came running over to where they stood and swept Xochi up in his arms, lifting her off her booted feet and laughing. He was broad-chested and ripped within an inch of his life, wearing nothing but an elaborately embroidered loin cloth. She spoke to him in Spanish, kissing him on the mouth and getting his black-and-white skull make-up on her lips. He set her down, cupping her the curve of her ass with one hand and speaking close to her ear in a low, intimate tone.
“This is my friend Javi,” Xochi said. “Dean, Sam, and Claudia.”
Dean nodded in silent greeting, biting back on an involuntary and ridiculously powerful surge of competitive, testosterone-fueled dislike for the buff dancer.
Xochi spoke to Javi in rapid-fire Spanish, pointing down the street. Javi nodded and took off in that direction.
“Wow,” Claudia said. “Is that your boyfriend?”
“Sometimes,” Xochi replied.
“If that was my boyfriend,” Claudia said, staring after Javi, “it would definitely be all the time. We’d never leave the house.”
Dean looked over at Sam, who was suppressing a smirk.
“Looks like you’re not the center of the female universe after all, dude,” Sam said.
“Come on,” Dean said. “I’d look good in a loincloth too, wouldn’t I?”
“I don’t ever want to know the answer to that question,” Sam replied.
Xochi came over to Dean.
“I told Javi to spread the word that one of the gangs is planning a drive-by,” she said. “If we’re lucky, that will get some of these people out of the street. Meanwhile, we need to start searching these storefronts to see if we can find the empty green one from Claudia’s vision. This is where Elvia will be opening the gate.”
There was a low rumble under their feet, like the subway or a passing truck. Xochi gripped Dean’s arm.
“They’re here,” Xochi said. “Can’t you feel it?”
“I don’t feel anything,” Sam said.
But Dean did. It was horrible, a pulsating, unnatural resonance that felt like a more subtle version of the work that Xochi’s grandmother had done on his wounded soul. The healing scar on his hand was throbbing like a second heart.
“Look!” Claudia said, pointing to a small skirmish going on about a half a block away. It resembled a chaotic bar fight, except more than half of the participants had large, gaping wounds on their arms and faces. Mortal wounds that didn’t seem to be slowing them down or affecting them in any way. The fight was swiftly spreading through the gathered celebrants. People were screaming and frantically trying to get away, but it was too crowded and there was nowhere for them to go.
Then, the plate-glass front of one of the shops exploded outwards and Dean got his first look at a Star Demon.
The creature was so big that it had to crouch down to fit through the shattered plate-glass storefront. The first thing Dean saw was long, black machete-clawed fingers clinging to the edges of the broken window. Then a massive head the size of a La-Z-Boy. Corpse-white skin, tiny matte-black eyes, and a wide, under-slung jaw like a lantern fish. Its crooked, obsidian teeth were slick with blood. In place of hair was a crown of gory, bone-white horns and glossy black quills. As it crawled free of the pale-green storefront, Dean could see its emaciated torso was distinctly female. A necklace of severed human hands and impossibly beating hearts swung between the grayish flaps of its crone-like breasts. Bloodshot human eyes studded the long white arms and legs, blinking and rolling as it stood to its full height of nine feet or more.
“Run!” Xochi said.
The four of them tore down the street with a riot on their heels. The soulless zombie victims were spreading through the crowd as swiftly as the mounting panic, and both ends of the street were blocked by competing taco trucks set up to serve the festival crowd.
“In here,” Sam said, pushing open the door to a small shoe store and waving them inside.
As soon they were through the door, Sam and Dean worked together to pull down the security gate while Xochi shoved Claudia behind a rack of high-heeled boots and drew her .45. Seconds later, the glass shattered and a dozen bloody, reaching arms were shoved through the spaces in the gate, rattling it on its hinges.
“Headshots?” Dean asked, raising the shotgun.
“Yes,” Xochi said, demonstrating by putting a bullet into the forehead of a screeching, middle-aged woman with a bad perm, wearing a sparkly red tube-top.
The moment the zombie fell, three more took her place.
“Come on,” Sam said, gesturing to an open door that revealed a flight of stairs on the other side.
&nbs
p; Xochi sent Claudia up the steps first and Sam followed close behind.
“Go,” Dean said, letting an old guy in a Raiders cap have it with the shotgun.
The security gate was starting to give, peeling loose from its moorings in one corner. The zombies would be in the shop in under a minute.
Dean shot a skinny young man trying to push through the gap and then ran backwards toward the stairs, reloading as he went.
He got to the door just as the zombies busted through the gate. He slammed the door, shoved a large metal garbage can up under the doorknob, then followed Xochi up the stairs.
The second floor was just a bunch of empty offices so they continued up to the roof. The roof access door was reinforced steel, locked with a key lock. Another damn Medeco.
“Dean?” Sam asked.
“On it,” Dean said, stepping up to the door and pulling out his lock picks.
His hands were shaking with adrenaline. He took in a long deep breath and struggled to focus, shutting out everything but the feel of the tumbler.
“Dean,” Xochi said urgently. “They’re in the stairwell.”
“Come on, baby,” Dean whispered between clenched teeth. “Come on, come on, come on.”
Sam and Xochi were firing down the stairs, but Dean ignored it. Focusing.
The lock gave, and popped open.
Dean let out his breath in a shaky laugh and pushed the door open.
“Claudia!” he yelled, pushing the girl through the door and out onto the roof.
Sam followed Claudia and then Xochi. Dean was about to go through the door himself when he felt clutching hands grab the back of his shirt.
FORTY-SEVEN
Dean twisted his body around to face Xochi’s friend Javi. His chin was slick with gore, skull make-up smeared and ruined. He’d lost the feathered headdress at some point and there were giant teeth-marks in his shaved scalp. He screamed, blood-webbed teeth snapping inches from Dean’s face. Dean fought to shove Javi back far enough to raise the sawed-off for a headshot but the dancer was incredibly strong. Several more zombies were barreling up the stairs behind Javi. Dean had only seconds before they would be on him.
Supernatural: Coyote's Kiss Page 23