by G A Chase
That’s where you’re wrong. Fisher is in a lot more danger than you know, she thought. But anything she told Polly would inevitably get back to the professor, and Sere wasn’t ready to trust the old man with information that sensitive. “Just trust me and do it.”
Polly picked up one of the pellets from the desk. “Tell me you didn’t try something stupid. If he has one of these things inside him, the bandage could pull it through his body, creating all sorts of damage.”
Thanks for the vote of confidence. I’m not that stupid. But arguing with Polly wasn’t going to help the CPA at their feet, so Sere got right to the point. “It wasn’t me. Fisher forced one of those little pebbles down Thomas’s throat. That’s how he went all demonic.”
Polly turned the small pellet between her fingers. “Interesting.”
“Look, I’ll tell you all the fun little tricks I’ve learned to do with these shiny rocks another time. We don’t have time for curiosity right now.”
Polly was still staring at the shotgun pellet while Sere started ransacking the medical bag.
“The technological bandage will work. I’m well acquainted with the spiritual mechanics. Lord knows, I’ve gotten into Jennifer’s mind often enough. The professor said that even if she died, he had enough information on her in his memory banks to resurrect me no matter what mischief I got into.” She pulled out what seemed like a mile of cloth bandage. “If he’s got any information at all on Montgomery Fisher, the connection should work to remind this sweet man of who he is. I don’t need to repair his body. I need to fix his soul. Once we’re sure he is still the kindly CPA, we can call in the paramedics.”
Polly finally got her ass in gear and started wrapping the cloth around Fisher’s head. “If he’s unconscious, how do you expect to know who’s in charge?”
“Because you’re going to hardwire him to me.”
“What?” all three yelled at once.
Sere uncoiled the connecting cable. “The professor’s equipment is geared toward me, and I am a doppelgänger living in reality. Think of me as a power converter.”
Polly handed Sere a role of bandage. “This is wildly dangerous. I’m only agreeing to it because I don’t see another option.”
“I can see about a dozen options,” Kendell said. “Like take him to the hospital first and deal with what comes out of him later. Hooking you up to a person just seems like a disaster waiting to happen.”
Like it hasn’t already happened? Sere ripped at the end of the second bandage to expose the wires, resisting the urge to waste more time arguing with Kendell. She held the bare ends in one hand and the computer cord in the other. Now what?
“Give it to me.” Polly fished around in her backpack and came up with a handful of connections that looked like computer intestines.
“Is no one listening to me?” Kendell asked. “This is a bad idea. I’m calling the paramedics.”
Good luck. Sere stared at her, waiting to witness the loss-of-signal irritation that anyone who tried to use a wireless device around Sere suffered. “This isn’t a democracy. When it comes to the mechanics of hell or dealings with the devil, you’re the expert. But we’re talking about battles of the soul now, and that’s not something you understand.” She didn’t mean to be harsh, but wasting time was one of Kendell’s weaknesses, whether she knew it or not, and this simply wasn’t the moment for it.
Myles put his hand on Kendell’s back. “I’m sorry, my love, but Sere is right.”
Kendell seemed about to argue her case until she looked into his eyes. “I sometimes forget you’ve been there too. Baron Malveaux’s possession of your body seems like a lifetime ago.”
Sere wrapped the jerry-rigged bandage around her head like a bandana. “What is with you people and reliving history?”
Polly finished preparing Fisher, connected the two bandages with the spaghetti-noodle computer intestines, and plugged Sere’s bandage into the phone cord. Then she looked over at Kendell and Myles. “There should be just enough line to run this out the front door. From there, one of you should be able to call into the professor’s equipment.” She held up the med kit’s phone. “There’s only one application. All you need to do is tap the icon. I need to stay here and keep an eye on our patients.”
Kendell got up from Fisher’s side. “Since my ideas are apparently not of any use, I might as well do something productive.”
Myles went with her like an attentive bodyguard.
“You might want to lie down,” Polly said. “This has never been done before, and I don’t have a way of keeping tabs on what’s going to happen. As this is your idea, have you got any suggestions?”
Wow, we really must be in uncharted territory for you to ask me for advice. Sere took off her analog military wristwatch and set it on the concrete floor next to her ear. “I suck at time, but I should be able to hear the ticking even if I’m inside Fisher’s head.” She thought back to her connections with Jennifer. “Give me five minutes.”
Polly sat close enough to see the watch. “I’ll give you three, then I’m pulling the plug.”
The worst part about being in someone else’s head was identifying which were her own thoughts, which theirs, and which were the oddly new collaborative ideas. Usually, she could rely on her level of cursing as a good measure of who was doing the thinking. If “fuck” wasn’t used in every other sentence, she could be reasonably sure it was the host brain doing the processing. Jennifer, after all, was a mom trying to set a good example in thoughts as well as deeds for her young son. When dealing with a partially demon-possessed consciousness, however, all bets were off.
“I’m going to take over and fucking burn this godforsaken reality to the ground. Hell keeps sending minions like damned moths to the flame. How shitty does a leader have to be to keep sacrificing his warriors in pursuit of a lone little girl? I’ll stand at the gate to hell and welcome my brothers and sisters to their rightful place. Fucking see if I don’t.”
Okay, not me. I’d never refer to myself like that. “Badass demon killer” maybe, but never “little girl.”
“You are truly a fool. Even at my most negative and desperate, I never considered destroying the world. Emotional pain is the result of separation from people, and furthering that divide only makes things worse. You’d turn that suffering into a permanent condition.”
The argument between the two masculine spirits that were nearly identical in energy signature made Sere dizzy. Images began fluttering around her awareness like flowers falling off a magnolia tree. Pretty, she thought. She focused on the closest one, which expanded into a memory.
Annabelle Campbell’s perfectly piercing green eyes cut through the smoky nightclub on Bourbon Street like a high-intensity strobe light. But instead of lighting up the customers crammed onto the noisy dance floor, they penetrated straight into Montgomery Fisher’s heart. He was certain all the men in the club instantly fell for her the moment the singer’s eyes passed over their faces. Her gaze finally settled on him, and she smiled. At that very moment, he knew he would marry her. He’d have asked her then and there—in front of all the dancing, sweating, drunk partiers—if he hadn’t feared scaring her off.
At thirty-one, he was just leaving the painfully shy stage of his life. His parents attributed his lack of a wife to his being a late bloomer. The seersucker suit and purple bow tie had been his attempt at crafting a cover identity to hide his insecurities. The image meshed well with his pursuit of an advanced degree in mathematics, though the combination had resulted in even his closest friends labeling him a nerd. With nothing to lose, he chose to embrace the title and hoped he would one day find a mousy little undergrad willing to be swept away by his intelligence and genteel nature.
Never in all his years had he expected to attract a woman with a beauty approaching that of Annabelle. Twenty years, ten months, and fourteen days later, he still couldn’t believe that first premonition had come to pass.
Sere let the flower-petal memory drift
back on the wind of consciousness. “Gummy, I think my water just broke.” The next fragrant petal that covered Sere’s awareness was so powerful she felt her heart rush as she ran into the downstairs bedroom. Sweet, lovely, radiant Ann—she’d insisted on the shortened name when she’d accepted Fisher as her last name—lay sweating and panting on the guest bed.
“What do I do?” Being cool in a crisis was one thing, but seeing his wife in distress blew away any male reserve Montgomery could muster. Her anguish was his kryptonite.
And her smile was his salvation. “Come here and help me up. Thank goodness you had the foresight to move me to the guest bedroom. Can you imagine trying to get me down those stairs with this humongous belly?” She was trying to calm him, and he knew it. It worked.
“I’ve got you.”
The bright-red flower was sucked away from Sere as if by a hurricane. In its place, a young girl in petticoats ran through a field of wildflowers. Wait. That’s me.
Sere felt as if her eyes were being ripped out of her face. “Fucking ouch!”
“That’s three minutes,” Polly said. Her voice was like fingernails on a chalkboard.
Sere rubbed her temples, fearful of pressing any closer to her eyes. “You simply have to modify that app so I don’t feel like my insides are being torn apart each time you turn off the connection.”
“Weren’t you listening to the watch?”
“I forgot.” More like I was distracted by being in someone else’s memories. Now that she was back in her own doppelgänger body, she knew that the final memory she’d witnessed wasn’t from Montgomery Fisher. It wasn’t from Jennifer Cranston either. The memory belonged to Serephine Malveaux, and there was no way the professor could have had that version of her on file. Someone—either an entity from hell or the loas of the dead—was too close. Please let it be an entity from hell.
Kendell came back into the warehouse while Myles stood outside the door, cell phone in hand. “Now can we call the paramedics?”
“Gummy—I mean Montgomery—is spiritually fine. He’s got a lot more of an emotional foundation than I’d suspected.” She looked down at the unresponsive CPA. “Time to get him fixed up so he can get back to those who love him.”
Sere huddled next to Kendell in the early-morning light as the ambulance pulled out of the crumbling parking lot. “Take me back to my motorcycle. I need to get to the hospital.”
“We’ll go with you,” Kendell said. “You can use the van to stash your shotgun and snakes.” She looked Sere over like a mother analyzing her child’s back-to-school wardrobe. “A change of clothing wouldn’t be the worst idea either. I only wore that steampunk getup during Halloween gigs. You do realize it’s supposed to have a dress with it? Only Polly wore costumes that revealing. We could swing by the condo on the way.”
Not happening. One time wearing a sundress was enough. “Just trying to fit in.” Sere didn’t want to cap off a night of fighting with an argument about her attire.
Polly threw the paranormal med kit into the back of the VW bus. “A lead singer needs to stand out. Besides, we were making a statement about taking back our sexual identities. Don’t get all conservative on me now, Olympia Stain. Sere looks fine. We need to get to the hospital right now, no detours. I don’t trust that the medical professionals won’t mess up our emergency soul treatment. Between the anesthesia, antibiotics, and lord knows what else, Fisher might end up weak enough that his evil twin reasserts himself.”
Though the prospect of having everyone sitting around the waiting room in case a demon started tearing through the hospital wasn’t ideal, Sere knew she was outnumbered. “Fine. I just want to get there before his family does. They shouldn’t have to sit around wondering what happened to him. Since he didn’t come home last night, they’re probably already in a state of panic.” The pang in her heart—left over from her psychic bond with Gummy—made her accept leaving her motorcycle behind.
Myles cranked the grumpy VW engine to life. “I’ll run you all to the hospital first. As soon as we find out Fisher’s condition, Kendell and I will start to work on damage control. We’re going to need Joe to intercept any police report that might have gotten filed regarding last night’s activities, and we can retrieve your motorcycle.”
Kendell’s tensed muscles and increased breathing betrayed her excitement. “You don’t mind me driving it again, do you?”
Do you have any idea how much you sound like a teenager bouncing for joy at getting the keys to the family car? Sere pulled the key with attached alligator-tooth fob out of her leather bustier. “Just don’t go hot-rodding around town.”
The old bus never was particularly fast, but hearing the poor little engine strain to push the big metal box up onto the freeway made Sere wonder if she wouldn’t have been better off walking. Why aren’t we there yet?
For distraction, she turned to Polly, who was sitting next to her. “Why were you so interested in the shotgun pellet?”
The woman had a similar lost-in-thought expression to the professor’s when something was vexing her. “The only thing that material is supposed to do is cut a doppelgänger off from its real’s projection. Since Thomas no longer has a double—in hell or otherwise—the pebble shouldn’t have had any effect, but even Fisher must have known something would happen, or he wouldn’t have made Thomas swallow it.”
She decided to share what she knew about the pellets, even if Polly did end up telling Sere’s secrets to the professor. Some problems needed smarter brains to solve. “The swamp creatures come running when I toss a paranormal shell in the water. And though a boat isn’t animal in nature, I was able to coax an unresponsive motor back to life by dropping pellets in the gas tank.”
Polly nodded as if an idea was forming and she was attempting to tap it into place. “They must be working as some kind of feedback loop. Whatever is currently being picked up by the professor’s equipment—instead of being sent into hell—is being projected back into the original model.”
Sere never could follow Polly when she started talking science. “Stop being my teacher, and tell me what’s going on.”
“Sorry, I’m just talking the idea out, not lecturing. If animals, human or otherwise, had their own energy fed back to them, it would make them more present in the moment. Like, seeing what’s happening not just with their eyes but with their spirits as well.”
Sere struggled to keep up. “You mean like déjà vu?”
“Not quite. They wouldn’t experience a time change in what they saw. More like omnipresence.”
Myles turned his head sideways to butt into the conversation from the driver's seat. “Sounds like dipping a toe in the deep waters.”
“That wouldn’t explain Thomas’s reaction, though,” Polly yelled over the engine noise. “If he is possessed by the spirit of his doppelgänger, those evil intentions might be what was being manifested.”
Sere settled back on the seat, wondering what would have happened to Fisher if he’d taken one of the pellets. Would the physical damage become worse? Could he have focused on his family and pulled himself out of his connection to his demon? Once again, it appeared that the professor had made something he had no control over.
The nurse came out of the emergency room and told the group that it would be a while before they knew anything.
“That’s my cue to leave,” Kendell said before heading back out to join Myles in the bus.
Just as well, Sere thought. The last thing I need is a mother figure thinking I need emotional support. The waiting room made no sense at all to her. “Why won’t they let us in?” she asked Polly.
“Doesn’t work that way. Doctors like to work in private. Someone will come out when they know something.”
Convenient. If something goes wrong, there’s no one to see. “But why is it taking so long? Can’t they just hook up a monitor and figure out what’s wrong with him?”
Polly had the irritating smile of a mother who simultaneously wanted to tell her child to
shut up and sympathized with her impatience. “It’s the way things work.”
That’s a bullshit answer if there ever was one. Sere stopped pacing in front of the painting of a forest in fall and sat on the orange fabric bench. Her heart caught in her throat when she saw the three women push their way through the wood-paneled swinging doors.
“Sit here, you two. I’ll go find out what’s happening.”
Sere’s legs were wobbly as she stood. “Annabelle?” Fuck, she goes by Ann now!
“I’m Ann Fisher.”
Fisher was wrong about one thing: it isn’t just men who fall for her eyes when she locks her gaze on them. “I’m Sere Mal-Laurette. I work with your husband.”
The strained lines around the woman’s eyes and mouth quivered as if she were about to break down. “Can you tell me what happened?”
Sere wondered how much Ann Fisher could handle. “It’s a long story, but it ends with me being too slow to stop the asshole from pushing Mr. Fisher backward onto the concrete floor.” Sere caught the look of the two late-teenage girls behind their mother. “Sorry about my language.”
“It’s okay,” Ann said. “I’d have used a lot worse. What was he doing in an abandoned warehouse?”
So she knew about the warehouse already. The paramedics must have called in a report. Damn people and their rapid communications.
“That’s the long part of the story. Your husband is very brave but a little overly chivalrous.” Sere hoped she had read Fisher’s insight correctly. Part of what had swept Ann into Montgomery’s arms was his old-fashioned ideas about looking after the woman he loved.
Ann’s eyes closed only partially as they swept Sere from head to toe. “What is your relationship to Montgomery?”
I saved his life but am responsible for him being possessed by a demon. Yeah, that should go over well. “He helped me with a particularly vexing life-or-death problem,” Sere said.