“Phase two?” I asked. “I don’t even know what phase one was.”
He laughed. It was a loud, mocking chuckle.
“Still buying time?” he said, wagging his finger at me. “You, Mr. Vedis…you have been fun.”
If there was any one thing I’d learned over the last couple of days, it was attack first, and do so preferably when your opponent isn’t expecting it.
I jumped up in Superman style and launched a sizzling fireball at him, hoping to get it past his shield.
It burned out, harmlessly.
My mojo dwindled.
I was getting a bad sense of déjà vu.
“Now, now,” he admonished, “let’s have none of that.” He drew in breath through his nose. “Besides, it’s my turn, Mr. Vedis, and unlike others you may have met, I quite love explaining how I did it.”
He strolled over to one of the bodies and sat down on it.
“Phase one started with getting inside the PPD,” he spoke in full voice. “Having Jonah find Chief Rakenchan and putting her under his control was easy. A djinn’s power of persuasion is wildly underused, you know.” He looked up thoughtfully. “It was nothing to make her think she had an addictive personality. We turned her into an alcoholic, a gambler, and all kinds of other things.”
Granger/Bubbles picked at his fingernails theatrically.
“She thought we were exploiting her weakness, and we were. What she didn’t know was that they were weaknesses we had planted.” He sniffed proudly. “With that in place, I could take advantage of that to get what I needed. Jonah put me in her department, convincing her I was a member of the PPD. Sure, he needed to stop by periodically to renew her enchantment and keep her under his power, but it all played into the story of her being crooked.”
He let out another giggle.
“The funny thing is that Rakenchan actually used to be a good cop, and a decent chief,” he added. Then, he looked up at me. “Not that you’d know it now, of course. But before all of this, she didn’t even drink.”
I started pulling power from inside. Not shaping it, but having it ready. I decided to keep him talking as long as I could.
“So, why put on the act?” I asked.
“Mr. Vedis,” he said, sounding disappointed, “one doesn’t simply conquer one of the five branches of the Umbra without allies.”
I blinked. “What?”
“Oh, yes,” he said. “You see, as soon as that mafioso bitch Samantha killed the previous boss, Franco, I knew I had a chance. Jonah was happy to be my second-in-command and to play the role of my superior while I worked at the PPD. I learned all sorts of wonderful information about special species and targets and whatnot.” He leaned in. “A little visit to my Shaper friends made Jonah powerful enough to ink anyone I wanted.”
“Shaper friends?” I asked, feeling interested despite of myself.
“Yes. Let’s call them phase one-point-five.” He gave me a knowing grin. “Now, I wanted to take out Samantha, but there was no way to do it alone. Luckily, one of the Shapers reached out to me and proposed a deal. As long as I provided them with as many of my people and resources as they asked, I could have The Third. Hell, I could have the whole Umbra Pentarchy.”
Bubbles/Granger pursed his lips, like he was thinking. Actually, seeing as there really was nothing remaining of Granger, I decided to just stick with Bubbles.
“A good deal, no?” He looked over himself. “All it cost me was my body, which was no treat to begin with, so I figured why not?”
Then, he glanced around the area.
“Where is Jonah, by the way?” he asked. “Did you kill him?
“Yeah, kind of,” I replied with a shrug. “He tried to attack us earlier, but I don’t take kindly to people who are seeking to kill me.”
Bubbles frowned. “He was just supposed to slow you down.” There was a small sigh. “I’m glad you killed him, then. I’d anticipated a double-cross, of course, but not this quickly. If you’d died before I could absorb you, it would have been problematic.”
The hairs on my neck stood up.
“You keep saying stuff like that,” I said. “I thought you wanted me dead, for a test.”
“Well, to be fair, I did need to see if a demon relationship was worth all the bother,” Bubbles admitted. “You know, before I used them to conquer the world.” He clapped his hands together in triumph. “That’s phase two, by the way.”
“That was your plan?” I asked with a laugh. “That’s the ‘big thing’ you were leading up to?”
“Clearly,” he said, looking offended. “Phase two was take over The Third using a demon army.” He gently cleared his throat. “Then I’d see how it went after that. I’d planned just to use wizard power to summon demons, but Bonding will ensure nobody is strong enough to challenge me while I do it.”
I laughed darkly, shaking my head.
“That wouldn’t even have worked, you idiot.”
He jolted. “Excuse me?”
“The power of a warlock isn’t enough to Bond with a demon, you scrotal skin tag. You have to have a contract.”
“Ew,” he said, and then added, “Seriously?”
“Yep,” I answered, crossing my arms, “and as long as Queen Für is in charge, she’s not going to agree to anything like that with you.”
He opened and closed his mouth several times, until finally saying, “Oh, well. Bonding with a demon would have been nice, but I suppose I’ll have to settle for enslaving them instead.” He looked at me, then wiped an imaginary tear from his eye. “I’m so sorry, but I guess I don’t need you, after all.”
He stood up, dusted himself off then clapped his hands.
“Slaves,” he called, “to me.”
An instant later, every stripper, bartender, and employee of the almost thirty clubs swarmed outside, charging to join Bubbles with blank eyes and hungry expressions.
“Funny how easily distracted people can get,” Bubbles chuckled. “Jonah had you so focused on a few missing people, that you didn’t notice how many were truly gone. Disappeared one day, returned the next. You all really shouldn’t underestimate the power of a djinn.” He was very proud of himself. “A few years of planning was all it took. Jonah inked them and put them under my command. Then, I sent them to the Shapers to be altered. They were allowed to live their lives as sleeper agents, reporting in for periodic reconditioning, until I needed them. The djinn ink makes them little more than zombies.”
Bubbles turned away.
I threw a wave of ice at him, just in case. It coated his energy shield, but didn’t stop him.
“Where are you going, you coward?” I yelled at his back.
“Oh, don’t worry, Mr. Vedis,” he said, waving, “I’ll be here. I need to make sure that my friends have killed you. Do try to make it exciting, if you please?”
With that, he spun again on his heel and snapped his fingers in the air.
“Slaves,” he commanded, “kill them.”
Chapter 37
I charged the energy shield again, bouncing off it as the group of Shaped charged. I gave up on getting to Bubbles for the moment and focused on survival. I wish I could say I tried spared some of them, but I took out as many as possible, as quickly as possible.
There was no choice.
Lana and Mira were with me, as well as the officers they’d managed to free between attacks, but it was a losing game.
Eventually, even I got tired.
I’d taken the brunt of the attacks and the sheer numbers were forcing me to use magic almost constantly. I barely had time to heal as I covered everyone else.
One Shaped finally got in a lucky shot.
I’d just pulled another off of Lana when I felt a knife penetrate my torso, nicking my heart. Demon-beast or no, that shit would take anyone out of a fight.
I dropped as I heard someone shout, “Finally, he’s out of the way. Light the fuckers up!”
A thousand flashes appeared in the night as countless
machine guns shredded all of the Shaped.
Troops swarmed in, cleaning up any survivors.
Then, a hand reached down and helped me up.
“Are you okay, Vedis?” a familiar voice asked.
“Chief Rakenchan?” I asked, glancing up at her tiredly, feeling confused. “But…how?”
“I’d already turned myself in,” she replied. She didn’t lift her visor, but I could hear the amusement in her voice. “Might as well take advantage of my mafia connections while I have them, right?”
I pulled in some painful breaths as Bert’s energy repaired my heart. I started to feel a hunger as it did. Not for food, but for energy. The repairs must have been tapping him out.
After another wince, I refocused on Rakenchan.
“Huh?”
“I called Samatha Cho and told her what’d been going on with Jonah,” Rakenchan explained. “Let’s just say she had suspicions he wasn’t exactly loyal to the family.”
I spied Bubbles holding off the mafia’s troops. Their gunfire was not penetrating his shield, but even his power couldn’t last forever. From time to time, he let off an energy blast and killed a few of them. That had to drain his reserves pretty fast. Still, I had a feeling that he had one hell of a tank to pull from.
That’s when I got an idea.
A bad one, but what choice did I have? I couldn’t let myself get killed because of someone named ‘Ronald.’
“Call off the troops and pull them out of here,” I stated as my strength began to return. “They can’t do anything against Bubbles while he’s shielded.”
“Bubbles?” Rakenchan asked with a tilt of her head. “Who is that?”
“Sorry, I mean Granger,” I corrected. I’d forgotten she wouldn’t know they were the same person. “I’m going to have to take him out,” I continued, “but it’s going to get messy.”
I pulled the last rune bead from my bracelet, energized it, and then started counting.
“Hey, asshole,” I called over to Bubbles, leaving Rakenchan behind as I charged to meet him. “I’ve got a present to give you.”
He turned to look at me, then sighed dramatically.
“Could you not?” he pleaded. “This is getting tiring.”
I reached out to the shield as the troops got the memo and ran away.
Instead of trying to push through it, I wrapped an energy net around myself and used it to absorb the energy-field around me. This allowed me to step through it.
Then, I tossed him the rune at around the count of nine, hoping I’d have the full ten seconds that Oscar’d promised.
He blinked as the explosion went off.
Acting on instinct, I formed my own shield, covering myself from the blast.
I’d kind of expected Oscar’s last bead to be something clever or scary, but…no.
It was just a giant bomb.
Waves of wizard energy hit the shield, bouncing between the shield Bubbles was managing and my own.
I held it off, giving my shield every bit of energy Bert and I had left.
Fortunately, it was enough.
Barely.
Mira ran up to me as soon as the decimation was complete. She held me up as the energy left my body. Good thing, too, as I was about to collapse.
The ground inside the explosion area was pulverized, and dust was everywhere, but I could see something glowing in the middle.
No.
No fucking way.
Bubbles smiled.
“Sorry pal,” he gloated. “I’m made of Shaper energy. I can reform as fast as I’m torn apart.” He was slowly shaking his head in a mocking sort of way. “You, on the other hand, aren’t looking so good. Poor little warlock.”
He put his hand to his mouth, as though ashamed.
“Oh, sorry. I forgot you prefer to be called ‘spirit mage,’ right?”
A snarl escaped my lips as the hunger I’d felt earlier tore through my body, creating a powerful craving like nothing I’d every felt.
I wanted energy.
No, I needed it.
My eyes twitched as the hunger consumed me.
I took a step towards Bubbles.
He looked instantly confused.
“Don’t make this so easy, Mr. Vedis,” he implored me. “You know how much I love a real challenge.”
“Your eyes…” Mira said, stepping back. “They’ve turned black.”
I didn’t look at her.
I was too focused on my prey.
“You know,” I growled, “‘spirit mage’ seems kind of wimpy, the more I think of it.”
I took another step, an energy web forming in my hands.
Bubbles opened his mouth, no doubt ready to pull some trick out of his hat.
I didn’t let him.
With a flick of my wrists, my energy net expanded, forcing its way down his throat and through his body. It expanded and latched on to every one of his energy cores.
He twitched, real fear showing for the first time.
His cores grew brighter as he attempted to form energy for a return attack.
My web surrounded those too.
Then, I did something he never would have anticipated. I pulled all his energy into me, relishing his screams as the power was torn from his body and absorbed by mine.
His face contorted in a look of utter anguish. Considering what his cousin Jonah had gone through, I felt what I was doing to him was more than kind.
“I’ve been told that ‘spirit leech’ is more appropriate.”
The dried husk that remained of his body crumbled to dust.
“Compared to that,” I whispered as the rush of stolen power filled me, “I’ve decided I’m pretty comfortable with the term ‘warlock’.”
I took a deep, cleansing breath, seeing the world in an entirely new way.
A deadly way.
“And anyone who doesn’t like my being a warlock can suck it.”
Chapter 38
The next few days were busy. Everyone at the station was taken down to the Netherworld and put through reintegration. They didn’t find any other spies, but I’d doubted the Shaped would have been dumb enough to leave anyone around who could expose their plans.
Rakenchan had been taken into custody by a Retriever almost immediately after I’d taken care of Bubbles. I felt responsible, since she’d put her ass on the line for me with The Third, so I helped her successor get acclimated while I waited for the call from the Directors to come.
“I don’t want any of this,” Tranq said, shifting in the booster seat on top of the chief’s chair. He’d been less than enthusiastic when he’d turned out to be the ranking officer. “Can’t they get some other penguin fu…erm person to take over instead?”
“Not my call,” I replied with a shrug. “For what it’s worth, though, I think you’re a caring and competent guy. Not wanting to be chief seems like a good indicator that you’ll do a decent job. The power-hungry ones make me nervous.”
“Jade said almost the exact same thing when she was here,” he grunted.
“Jade?”
“I mean Agent Brice,” he clarified.
“Oh, I didn’t know her first name. Did you know her?”
“Not as well as I would have liked,” he admitted, “but she took an interest in me when she learned I was attempting to control my pixie urges, and she helped me a great deal before she died.”
Tranq smiled sadly.
“She was one of the only other pixies I knew that didn’t wallow in insults.”
He looked down at his desk, gathering his thoughts I suppose.
“The whole situation reminds me of a joke she told me, actually,” he said, finally.
“Huh?”
He looked up at me and smiled. “It’s a terrible joke, but I’ll share it anyway. What do you get when a lemon eats a cucumber?”
I was spared the punchline by Lana’s arrival.
“Sir, the Directors request a moment of your time.”
I’d know
n this was coming and was ready to get it over with. Hopefully I’d be able to help Rakenchan. She’d helped me when she didn’t have to. Compared to most people I knew, she was worth a second chance.
“Okay, fine,” I said. “How do I meet with them?”
She frowned. “You haven’t gone over the features for your connector and tattoo, have you?”
There hadn’t been time.
“Not in detail, no.”
I hadn’t looked at all, but she didn’t need to know that.
She sighed. It sounded fake, but maybe that took practice.
“I’ll help you,” she said, “but please take some time to read up on the features. They may prove to be useful.”
“Okay,” I said. “I’ll try to find some time.”
She smiled. “Thank you. I’ll guide you through the physical process, though the manual will show you where to find it from the digital interface.”
“I promise I’ll read it.”
She nodded and took my arm.
“Please press the activation node here, then the communication line here…”
Yeah, the physical process was a pain in the ass. I guessed they didn’t want people to trigger something by accident. After around ten more steps, a robotic voice—properly robotic, not an AI—spoke through my connector.
“Joining session in ten, nine... “
“You might want to sit down,” Lana said.
“Why is that?”
“Really, sir. Please sit down.”
The countdown concluded “six, five,… all movement has been disabled to prevent injury to the physical host.”
I dropped to the floor as the countdown reached zero. The last thing I heard before everything went black was the voice saying, “Now entering the southeast Asia Director’s virtual chambers.”
The lights switched on in my brain and I found myself sitting in a courtroom, next to Rakenchan. Five people, presumably the Directors sat behind judges benches. I couldn’t quite make out their faces, though. It was like they were wisps of formed air. One instant, they were solid, but the next they’d turned to smoke. I couldn’t commit any of their faces to memory…except the one on the far right. To be fair, I wasn’t really looking at her face. She was in full view, and what a view it was.
Bangkok Warlock: A Mark Vedis Supernatural Thriller Book 1 (Southeast Asia Paranormal Police Department) Page 20