Poison City

by Paul Crilley

  ‘Ah. Then—’

  Parker raises an eyebrow. I close my mouth, mime zipping it shut and throwing away the key.

  Parker turns her back on me. She holds the parchment up, clears her throat, and starts speaking in a language I’ve never heard before.

  I always thought this kind of thing was done in Latin, but this . . . this is . . . alien. One minute it sounds like Parker is gargling on glass, then it’s like liquid hypnosis, her voice a warm, wet touch, a lover’s embrace that slides into my being, fills my mind with entwined limbs and silky caresses. Only thing is, the entwined limbs and silky caresses are not human. They’re shared between demons, all twisted limbs and scaled hides.

  I can’t escape the sound, the images. Her voice grows louder, throbbing in my ears, between my legs. This is ancient magic. Primeval spirits talking directly to the amygdala, bypassing society, modern man, communicating with the primitive caveman huddling in his cave, terrified of the storm outside. I can no more escape the feelings than I can chase away a lightning bolt.

  Not that I want to escape. Parker’s magic reverberates through my being. Her voice is everything. I know that if it stops my heart will stop as well. My brain will just switch off. I want it to go on forever. I want to wrap her words around me, let them seep into my skin.

  My heart is beating rapidly. I groan, and I’m not sure if it’s pleasure, or fear, or pain. Maybe all three. Her words grow louder. The heat in the room grows. I’m sweating now. I realise my eyes are closed. I force them open. The lights have dimmed. Black smoke whirls through the air, twining above Armitage’s body. The silhouette of Parker pulses. She is taller, more powerful, a towering mage astride ancient worlds.

  Her voice rises, growing even louder. Shouting. Now it’s like the very first wave crashing against the very first shoreline. Powerful, dominating, irresistible. I need to obey it, but I don’t know what it wants me to do. Purple-white flashes of gristle and bone and horned gods bestriding ancient heaths.

  The horned god comes for me, a powerful presence that smells of musk and sweat. It seems to know who I am. I feel a connection, that somehow I have met this being. Or am going to meet it. It points a clawed finger at me and smiles. And I’m suddenly hanging above London, watching the city crumble and fall, creatures rampaging through the streets, slaughtering any who get in their way.

  Then it’s not just London. The creatures of the past come back and move through England, then Scotland, ancient, primeval creatures from the dawn of consciousness re-emerging into the world.

  I grimace, struggling to find myself, fighting to keep my mind from fragmenting into a million pieces.

  Then Parker shouts a single word. Three times.

  ‘Dolm-aata. Dolm-aata. Dolm-aata!’

  The smoke rears back like a snake about to strike. It hovers, then rushes downward, disappearing into the little bump on Armitage’s forehead.

  An incredible implosion of air. My ears pop. I smell ozone, smoke. Blood and fear.

  An invisible wind rushes in to fill the void of reality. It batters me to my knees, rushes through my ears, a roar of fury.

  Then nothing.

  I blink. Stare at the tiles, condensation droplets glinting in the light. My head pounds. My body feels like it’s run the Comrades Marathon. Twice.

  I haul myself heavily to my feet. Parker is leaning back against the desk, watching me, breathing heavily, a triumphant gleam to her eyes, a wicked grin on her face.

  ‘Was it good for you?’ she asks.

  ‘Fuck me, woman,’ I say, steadying myself against the wall. ‘You could have warned me.’

  ‘You wanted to stay.’

  ‘Yeah. I did that.’

  A noise from the operating table brings us both around. Armitage is sitting up, pulling a cigarette from the creased box we left on her throat. She flicks it into her mouth and lights it. Inhales deeply.

  Smoke trickles out from the between the stitches Jaeger made to the wound in her chest.

  We all stare at this for a while. Then she looks slowly up. First at Parker. Then at me.

  I’d like to say it was like the end of a Saturday morning cartoon. That we all burst out laughing and Armitage gives us a sly wink. ‘You guys.’

  I’d like to say that. But it would be a lie.

  She goes bat shit insane.

  Throwing the desk over, screaming in anger, bending the metal tables in half. (Seriously. Great strength upgrade, being a revenant.)

  Parker and I flee outside and pull the door closed, listening to the destruction unfolding not five feet away.

  ‘Jaeger is going to be pissed,’ says Parker.

  The dog wanders into the corridor. -What’s that noise?-

  -Armitage.-

  -Oh.- He turns and walks away again, utterly unconcerned.

  The noise goes on for about five minutes before an uneasy silence falls.

  Parker looks at me expectantly.

  ‘I’ll just check if the coast is clear, shall I?’

  ‘Off you go then,’ says Parker.

  I cautiously open the door. A scene of chaos greets me. Nothing has survived unscathed. Jaeger’s desk is in pieces. Tiles smashed. Shards littering the floor. Twisted metal surrounding Armitage, who’s sitting amidst the wreckage, head bowed.

  ‘Armitage?’ Hesitant.

  She looks at me with such anger and fury in her face that I take step back.

  ‘You know what you are? An absolute cock-tonsil. A selfish, fucking jizzcock. That’s what.’

  Right. Well. I’ve been called worse for less.

  An hour later and Parker, Armitage and I are standing awkwardly around in her office.

  Armitage is slumped in her comfy chair, a lit cigarette dangling from her fingers. She doesn’t look too bad for a member of the undead. Pale, sure. But that’s what comes from having no blood circulating around your body. But it still looks like her. She even sounds the same. A bit raspy, but again, that’s to be expected seeing as her vocal cords have been in deep freeze for the past day.

  I look at Parker. She shrugs and makes shoo-ing gestures at me.

  I clear my throat. ‘Armitage?’

  She stirs, looks at the cigarette, then turns her sad eyes onto Parker. ‘How could you let them do this to me?’

  Parker stiffens. ‘Hey – I was against this. I told them not to do it.’

  ‘So what am I? A zombie? Am I going to start craving human flesh?’

  I give her a forced smile. ‘Ah, no. Parker was very clear on this. You’re a revenant. All the benefits of being a zombie without that desire to eat brains.’

  She glares at me. I sigh. ‘Look, I’m sorry, all right? If we had any other choice we would have taken it. But this case . . . it’s serious, Armitage. Big.’

  I tell Armitage about what’s happened since her death. About Lilith’s serious hard-on for the ramanga’s soul, wanting to start some kind of war.

  ‘Only problem is, I have no idea why she wants it. I was hoping we could . . . wake you up and you’d tell us where it is. I mean, I’m assuming you used the token? Picked it up from Tiurakh?’

  Armitage nods. ‘I picked it up all right. When I looked inside the box Jengo had left with Tiurakh I realized what he’d done. I thought it was a pretty bloody good idea too. You know why?’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I was being followed. I’d lost them by that time, obviously. I wouldn’t lead them to Tiurakh. But still, I was feeling a bit paranoid. So I did the same as Jengo. Called in a couple of favours from an old sangoma I know, extracted my soul, and left it with Tiurakh – after making sure my tail hadn’t found me again.’ She shudders. ‘It’s . . . not a great feeling, let me tell you. The emptiness . . . Like you’re hollowed out. Utterly devoid of life, of everything. Kind of what I feel like now, actually.’ She trails off, then shrugs. ‘But still, I’m kind of glad I did it. When I got home I realised why they weren’t following me anymore. They’d decided to just wait for me in my house.’


  ‘So what did you do with Jengo’s soul? Where is it now?’

  ‘Now? It’s in the evidence room.’

  I look at her in surprise. ‘Here?’

  ‘Of course here. Where the hell else would it be safe?’

  ‘So can we communicate with it?’ I ask. ‘Try find out what happened?’

  ‘I have no idea,’ says Armitage. ‘I suppose we can ask Eshu. He’s supposed to be the expert in this kind of thing.’

  ‘This is bullshit,’ says Parker.

  We’re sitting around a foldout table in Eshu’s room. There’s a Ouija board sitting on the table, and resting on the board is Jengo’s soul. It’s similar to Armitage’s, although there is more red and purple in Jengo’s.

  Parker looks at Armitage, then me. ‘We’re really going to do this?’

  ‘It will work,’ says Eshu. ‘Trust me.’

  ‘What makes you so sure?’ asks Armitage.

  ‘Because I’ve used my aether generators to boost our psychic powers.’ He flicks the light switch. The fluorescent strips wink out. Then he goes around the room, switching his monitors off one by one.

  He leaves his LCD television on. It’s showing the space battle at the end of Return of the Jedi, the dim room lit up by red and green laser blasts.

  Eshu sits down next to me and holds his hand out. I stare at him.

  ‘Come on. Link up.’

  I sigh and take his hand. It’s warm and dry. Parker is on my right and she grabs mine and grips it tight. She takes Armitage’s on the other side and Armitage completes the circle with Eshu.

  ‘So . . . what do we do?’ I ask.

  ‘Close your eyes,’ says Eshu.

  We do as we’re told. I can still sense the TV, light flashing and strobing through my eyelids.

  ‘Jengo Dhlamini. Are you there, Jengo?’

  Silence.

  ‘Jengo. Talk to us, Jengo.’

  More silence. Then the temperature in the room drops by a few degrees. Parker squeezes my hand tighter.

  ‘Who wakes me?’

  My eyes snap open. There’s a pale shape hovering before us. I recognize the features as Jengo’s from the decapitated head.

  Armitage looks at Eshu and he nods.

  ‘Why were you killed, Jengo?’ asks Armitage.

  The ghost looks around. He seems lost.

  ‘Jengo?’

  Jengo turns slightly, focuses on Armitage.

  ‘Why were you killed?’ she repeats.

  ‘Ul Khu tavu.’ The voice is faint, like a whisper.

  ‘Ul what?’ Armitage looks at me. I shrug.

  ‘Ul Khu tavu.’

  ‘What does that mean, Jengo?’

  Eshu pulls his hand away and gets up from the table. He disappears into the darkness and fiddles around with something at one of his computers. Jengo’s ghost brightens suddenly. He blinks, focuses on us all sitting at the table. Eshu rejoins us.

  ‘Better be quick. I’ve upped the amps but he’ll burn out soon.’

  ‘Where am I?’ whispers Jengo.

  ‘Dude,’ says Eshu, ‘you’re dead.’

  I punch Eshu in the shoulder. He winces. ‘What? Best to be upfront with these ghosts. Get it out the way.’

  ‘Dead?’ says Jengo.

  ‘That’s right,’ says Armitage. ‘You were murdered. Your heart scooped out. And you were um . . . decapitated. Sorry.’

  ‘Oh.’ Jengo frowns suddenly. ‘Yes. Yes, I remember. He was a big man.’

  ‘What did he want?’

  ‘He wanted my sins.’

  I frown. ‘Your sins? You got a lot of them?’

  He frowns at me. ‘You do not understand. They were not my sins.’

  ‘You’re right. I don’t understand.’

  ‘I took them from people. I helped them. I took them inside of me.’ He holds his hands against his chest. ‘I was their sin-eater.’

  Armitage and I exchange looks. A sin-eater? What the hell? I’ve never come across a sin-eater before. To be honest, I didn’t even think they were real.

  The stories I’d heard were mostly from England and Wales, and put them as these sad, lonely old men who went round to a house when someone had died and took on the sins of the deceased, absolving the soul of all wrong doing.

  ‘Do you know who your murderer was?’ asks Parker.

  ‘I have never seen him before.’ Jengo looks around, frowning. ‘I do not like it here. It’s cold.’

  ‘Just a few more questions,’ says Armitage.

  ‘No. I am done now. I am tired.’

  He starts to fade away.

  ‘Wait,’ says Armitage. ‘We want to help you.’

  He looks sadly at Armitage. ‘I am beyond help.’

  The ghost winks out of existence. Eshu gets up and flicks on the lights again.

  ‘Can you bring him back?’ asks Armitage.

  ‘No. Not for a while. His soul is drained. It will take a while for him to recharge.’

  ‘What good are your bloody generators then?’ snaps Armitage.

  ‘You think that was a normal séance? You think in Victorian times they had their ghosts actually turn up and chat to them like that? You should be thanking me. Now come on. Get out. I need to catch up on my feeds.’

  We head back to her office. Sin-eaters? Is that why Lilith wanted the ramanga – no, the sin-eater? So he would take her sin? She didn’t really seem like the repentant type, to be honest. Besides, Jengo’s dead. He can’t take any more sins.

  So why did she need his soul?

  Armitage sits on her desk. ‘Do some research into these sin-eaters,’ she says. ‘See if we have a list of names or something. And look up those words. Ul Khu tavu? Try as many different spellings as you can.’

  ‘What are you going to do?’ I ask.

  ‘I am going to sit in my dark office for a while. I need some alone time. To come to terms with my death and resurrection.’

  Parker and I leave her office and head down to our desks. I yawn. It’s after three now, and I’ve had what could only be termed as a busy day. I plan on putting my head down in the accommodation block, but I log in to GHOST and do a quick search on sin-eaters. Just to satisfy my curiosity.

  Nothing.

  And by that I mean all we have is a link to a Wikipedia article. I frown. That’s not right. Every single orisha on the planet is supposed to be listed in the database. Why not sin-eaters?

  In fact, there’s more info on the public internet than we have in our own files. That’s really not right.

  I try to find a reference to Ul Khu tavu, but likewise come up with a blank. Parker has no luck either.

  I stare at the monitor, but I can’t think straight. My brain is too scrambled. I think I’ll have to pay a visit to one of my contacts in the morning. A guy who goes by the name of Harold Grimes. If anyone knows anything about these sin-eaters it will be him.

  I log out. Parker is already asleep, folded over her keyboard like a dropped marionette. I prod her but she just gives a little snort and carries on sleeping.

  I take the elevator up to the accommodation block on the tenth floor and open the closest door. The room on the other side is like every generic hotel room you’ve ever stayed in. I half expect to find a Gideon bible in the drawer.

  I open it to check. No bible. Just a business card for ‘Sexy Solange, mistress of the night’.

  I close the drawer with a tired grin. I wonder who used this room last? Bet it was Russells. Dirty bugger.

  I fall onto the bed and am asleep within a minute.

  Chapter 11

  I wake up to the sounds of shouting.

  I stare at the ceiling, blinking, trying to make sense of the world.

  Trying to shake off the dreams.

  They weren’t so bad last night. Still there, but I slept through. Didn’t wake up every hour in a cold sweat.

  The shouting is getting louder. I think I hear Armitage’s voice.

  Armitage.

  Shit.

  I s
cramble out of bed and pull on my shirt. Head through the door and lean over the balcony. It’s Armitage and Ranson. Ranson is standing behind a desk in the office below, looking terrified and furious while Armitage tries her best to pummel him into submission with her rage. The rest of our co-workers are watching this with wide eyes. Most of them are staring at Armitage in wonder.

  ‘Do I look dead to you?’ she screams. ‘Do I? Because I don’t feel dead, you odious piece of shit.’

  Anger transforms the fear in Ranson’s face. ‘You can’t talk to me like that! I’ll have you up on charges.’

  I grab the elevator and ride it down to the bottom floor.

  ‘What’s going on?’ I ask, hurrying to Armitage’s side.

  Armitage waves at Ranson in disgust. ‘Mr Hopeless-Case here doesn’t want to accept I’m alive.’

  ‘Oh. Well . . . you’re not. Not exactly.’

  ‘No. But it doesn’t interfere with my ability to run this unit.’

  Ah. Now I understood. If Ranson couldn’t even admit to magic being real, he’s not going to be happy working with a revenant.

  ‘It’s a clear conflict of interest,’ he says, appealing to me in an incredibly misguided belief that I was on his side.

  ‘How so?’

  ‘She’s one of them now. An orisha.’

  ‘I bloody well am not.’

  ‘Actually, she’s not.’

  We turn around to find Parker approaching with a file stuffed full of printouts. She hands it to Ranson. ‘All the details about the procedure I undertook, background details on revenants etc. She is not an orisha. If anything, you would call her physically challenged.’

  ‘I am not physically challenged,’ protests Armitage.

  ‘Fine. Not physically challenged,’ says Parker. ‘Spiritually-challenged? Life-challenged?’

  Ranson winces. Something-challenged. The word strikes fear into any office manager’s heart. Especially if we’re talking about discrimination.

  ‘I don’t know about challenged,’ says Armitage. ‘But if you try and fire me because I’m a revenant, I’m pretty sure that’s racist, species-ist, dead-ist, and any other amount of -ists I can think of. I might need to have a word with the National Intelligence Co-ordination Committee.’