Look, I’m Foul Mouth again.
Twenty-eight or maybe twenty-seven hours until my fight.
Afternoon.
Had to get through a night, some sleep without any Meteyos anal probeage hopefully, and a nice, peaceful morning. Then it would be the Day of Elementalism. Get backstage, watch the events go down. Relax. Then my moment to top it all off. Main event. Death match. Conan Sapa.
Not as absurd as dragons and blood gods, but it’s up there.
So close.
So much finished and decided already.
Vega ain’t gonna kill me.
JoJo is pregnant.
Pocket is partly out of the closet.
My closest friends are clued in to what I know about the secrets of the world.
Eternal Order is a thing.
Isabel is out of the Pit and on the loose.
Some good. Some bad.
Val still ain’t by your side.
Yeah . . . I’d have to work on that one in the future.
Least thinking about her don’t make me want to kill myself any longer.
All that done . . .
Seemed like the whole Crazy came down to Conan Sapa.
Face down the Curator’s monster.
One last ‘fuck you’ before I go away for awhile, Big Boy, I heard Fate whisper in my ear. Don’t let Conan Sapa kill you and I have even more in store for your future. So many questions to be answered! So many worlds to explore! So many to die! We’re gonna have some fun, you and me!
My phone rang.
Eva.
I smiled over the name, motioning for everyone to be quiet as they chatted about whatever random dumb shit they were talking about. Probably lunch given the way T-Bone was licking his lips. Or . . . yeah, hopefully lunch. “Everyone hold on to your butts, Eva’s on the line.”
I clicked the phone, put it up to my ear. “Hey,” I kept going, “if you’re about to tell me you killed Conan Sapa a day before I get to do the job myself, I’m gonna be sorely disappointed about it. So disappointed you’ll have to make it up to me by going on a date.”
Silence.
“Eva?”
The voice that came over the phone wasn’t Eva’s. It was male, polished, and calculating, but not inconsiderate of the situation. “Please don’t be alarmed, Mr. Price. Or, rather . . . don’t be alarmed about me being the one using her phone. I’ve stabilized her, she’s alive, for now. Though I have made studies of your kind, I am not anima-infused myself and can only guess at what was done to her. It was . . . not natural.”
“Who the fuck are you?” I hissed into the receiver with full on fury of the earth type shit ringing behind me.
“My arrival followed hers. She’s learning quickly . . . if she survives this I will look forward to her next attempt at meeting me. Her sacrifice gives you that honor very soon. I have sent you the current address we inhabit. Please hurry, despite my efforts she will need to be taken to a proper hospital.”
“If you hurt her I’ll fucking rip you apart,” I kept on hissing, the geo-anima inside of me almost bubbling.
“Are you listening, Mr. Price? I’m the man who saved her life.”
“You ain’t a man if you’re calling me anima-infused,” I said, recalling all the oldest Vamps doing the same.
“No,” the voice agreed. “But thanks to you I am now Divine. Hurry, Mr. Price. Also, don’t forget to come in peace. I would hate to be forced to rip you into pieces.”
Click.
If my phone wasn’t the only thing in the world with Eva’s current address on it, I would’ve smashed the thing in my hand out of anger.
The vampire Inanina wanted to replace Eresha with, what was his name? Pwent called him the monster in the attic, she was worried.
I was worried.
I was . . .
Eva . . . what did you stumble into?
“Dude, what’s going on? You okay?” Pocket asked for the group. Everyone stared at me, faces concerned. I realized that while I’d refrained from breaking the phone, I had smashed my fist into a plaster wall without even noticing I’d done so. Without an iron fist or a glove to protect it, my knuckles ached. Wall didn’t look too hot either.
“Eva’s hurt,” I whispered. “Maybe really hurt.”
Vicky gasped.
“Could be a trap, but still got to go.”
“Who was on the phone?” T-Bone asked. “I doubt you’d talk to Eva like that. Was it . . . whoever hurt her? Is she a prisoner? Is she—”
“Iscariot,” I remembered out loud. “That was his name. The new Divine that Inanina voted in.”
“A vampire Divine has Eva?” T-Bone squawked.
“Said he saved her life, but . . .” I found the address Iscariot sent me on the phone. “Trap or not, I’m going.”
Everyone started arguing about who would go and who shouldn’t go and all that shit. I just stood there frowning, stuck in my own head. How the shit, Eva? You have to be alive . . . if you’re not . . . if I have to go into that cage with you dead too . . . won’t be no Ouroboros left after I’m through, much less a piece of meat you can call Conan Sapa.
Welf of all people put his hand on my shoulder, gave me a little shake. “If I understand correctly then Eva is hurt and this vampire claims he saved her, yes?”
“Yeah, something like that.”
Welf nodded. “Price and Bonnie will come with me to collect her,” he told everyone else. “Sister, you, Landry, and Valencia need to return to our hotel suite—”
“Brother, don’t you dare ‘little girl’ me—”
Welf raised his voice to speak over the interruption, “Once you are there I need you to call the Learning Council. You need to speak with either the Lady or Fines Samson, do not take ‘no’ for an answer. You are a Welf, I know you don’t like to use our family connections, but this time, for Eva, you need to use whatever is required. Inform the Lady or Samson what we have learned, little though it may be. Then contact the Rejuvenation Society and arrange for a healer to be ready to arrive at whatever hospital we transport Eva to. After that, keep the phone clear for my call.”
We all took in those orders.
From Welf.
Week just keeps getting weirder . . . no matter how much of my list I cross off.
“That idea didn’t actually suck,” Pocket spoke for all of us.
“Let them have the Rolls. We’ll take Tyson’s rent-a-car,” I decided, “and I’m driving this time.”
“God have mercy on all the stray animals, hobos, and stop signs we might cross paths with,” T-Bone mumbled under his breath.
What the hell does that mean?
[CLICK]
The address was for a rundown, closed dentist office that had seen better days even by dilapidated standards.
In its prime it was one of those big building, multi-dentist types that cram in and screw over as many poor people as possible. But now its parking lot was empty, the neighborhood didn’t look too hot, and the Strip might as well have been on another planet.
I hooked a turn into the parking lot with the rent-a-car and slammed on the brakes, barely even skidding out as we came to a stop. GPS navigator said it would take sixteen minutes, I did it in ten. Shows what the fucking computers know. Maybe I went through someone’s yard a couple times to cut some street signs . . . it was an emergency!
Ain’t quite a motorcycle with two uzis and a chick in an American flag bikini on my lap, but at least I got to drive for once. Rented car with a nerdy black guy, a patrician with a stick up his ass, and a dead woman . . . I’ll take it!
As the car came to a stop, T-Bone gave a little scream—not for the first time—unbuckled himself hurriedly, and rolled his way out of the car as quickly as he could.
Welf followed, swaying to his feet and steadying himself with his stupid ass cane.
Only the dead woman seemed to be in the game, exiting like a perfect lady despite the man’s suit she wore.
I unclawed my fingers from the steerin
g wheel, twisting the keys to turn off the hybrid engine. Didn’t use any electric cruising on that drive, no we did not! I kicked open my door and stepped outside.
There was a new dent in the fender.
Wonder what I hit?
“We’re still alive,” T-bone wheezed to himself. “Thank God we’re still alive.”
I ignored him, surveying the dentist office. Where the windows weren’t boarded up with wood they were shaded heavily with blinds. Old graffiti on the walls, but not exactly the sign of life I hoped for. Would be back offices, a surgery suite maybe, some type of storage room. “Got a pool up, T-Bone?”
“Ten minutes. You?”
“Plenty.”
“How are you doing this without artifacts exactly?”
“Gonna make things go boom if that’s what I have to do.”
“Let us hope it doesn’t come to that,” Welf said. “The vampire might have been speaking the truth.”
“Are they allowed to do that?” I quipped despite the pressure of the moment.
“I believe so,” Welf said, “but you’re the one who made love to one. I suppose I will bow before your expertise on these matters.”
“Are you allowed to bow before my expertise, Welf?” I quipped again. Just like the first time it didn’t relieve any pressure.
“Only this once, Foul Mouth,” Welf told me. He turned to the neighborhood itself. “Do people live in this squalor? It’s disgusting . . .”
Working hard not to roll my eyes at him, I pulled out my phone and hit the return call button. It rang twice before the other end picked up. “We’re here, Iscariot,” I said into it without greeting.
The vampire hummed a discordant note. “An old name. One I dislike, but one Inanina forces on me for the religious connection, even if it is a falsehood of your shattered history.”
If you went into history bullshit with vampires, you’ll never get anywhere. It’s always some other mindfuck, one after another. Brutus was a vampire! Richard the Lionheart was a vampire! Blah, blah, fuck your bullshit. I didn’t jump down the rabbit hole this time. “Where’s Eva? Where are you? Place looks deserted. I’ll only warn you once: you better not be playing me.”
“I deduce from you using that specific name that the rumors are true about you hijacking Nii-Vah’s spying feeds. How very interesting. As for now, we’ll honor Mr. Welf’s presence and you may call me Falschein.”
Whatever you want, asshole. As long as my friend is alive “Okay, Falschein, how about you give me a reason not to level that building you’re hiding in?
“Miss Reti is inside of it with me for one. For two, as I pointed out earlier, I have no ill intentions towards you or the woman. She has been quite the sight these last few days trying to keep on my trail, not as good as your Miss Soto has been at dodging me however. It’s a pity that Eva decided to change up her tactics and beat me to my prey . . . perhaps if she hadn’t she would be conscious. But where are my manners? Do come inside. The door was unlocked when I arrived and hasn’t been barred since. Try not to step on any evidence, it’s quite a mess.”
I did break the phone this time.
“Front door is open,” I barely contained my rage.
Autumn started out towards it. “Safety first,” Welf said.
“Especially after King Henry’s driving,” T-Bone whispered under his breath.
I glanced back at the dent in the fender. There wasn’t any blood and it was a rental . . . who cared?
The Construct pulled a small gun out of somewhere. I think out of her own body. Or her vagina. Her again. Despite the fact it had never looked more like a corpse than it did in the Las Vegas sunshine. “How’s it work exactly? You pull a string to make it walk or it got some kind of command code set up? I assume you see what it sees too . . . somehow.”
Freaky ass Bonegrinders.
Welf smirked as Autumn prepared to open one of the boarded up doors. “All of the above. You figured out about extended pooling, didn’t you? That’s what you and Tyson were talking about. Ten minutes . . . not very strong.”
T-Bone gave me the Welf-is-such-a-dick expression, but his manners kept his mouth shut.
“One area where I’m bigger than T-Bone,” I bragged. “Wasn’t just extension neither. Splitting and holding a pool outside of yourself too. Asked Vick about it and she said your mom was teaching you all of it. Must be nice getting everything handed to you on a silver platter thanks to some Richie Rich loophole.”
Welf’s jaw went hard. Wonder the guy has molars given the way he grinds them together around me. “How industrious of you to strive to better yourself.”
“Bit of a waste on a necromancer knowing all the tricks, ain’t it? How’s it help when all you can do is control bodies and dead shit?”
“It helps in crafting them and in reestablishing control,” Welf informed me tightly, “like when Soto broke my necro-strings with that sword of hers. Which will not be happening again.”
T-Bone tried to give us some pep in our steps. “Do you think we’ll be lucky enough for this Falschein to have killed her and Sapa while saving Eva? Would be nice to find a surprising ally instead of yet another enemy for once.”
Welf sneered a little bit. “Falschein himself is telling you to be wary of him. His name is a rather direct translation of ‘False One’ in German.”
“Why ain’t you sending it in, Welf?” I complained about the Construct’s lack of movement.
“I’m checking thoroughly for explosive traps on the door.”
“Just a Construct, right?”
“My mother’s Construct.”
“She has three more.”
“If Autumn was sold at auction she would be worth nine figures, Foul Mouth.”
“Didn’t you make a little speech about not caring about money when we met a few days back?”
“The two of you need to focus,” T-Bone scolded us. “Eva’s in there. She’s at least tied up and we need to save her. Not stand here and bicker.”
“First time I’ve ever had to save a woman, usually they save me,” I pointed out. “Guess I won’t owe her one after this. Of course, you’re right and if Welf has his way she’ll be dying of old age . . .”
Autumn flung open the door and threw herself inside, rolling across the boundary. After that she disappeared, though you could see lights were on inside the building now that the door was open. There were no explosions or gun shots to follow.
Welf frowned a little bit. “Average white male, taking pictures of the room. No sign of Eva. The man just said to step inside and isn’t flinching at all about the gun I have on him. It’s safe to assume he’s our vampire, but nothing more.”
Enough for me.
I crossed the parking lot, T-Bone at my back. Welf took up the rear. “Could stay outside if you want,” I told him, but the tone of my voice said I’d judge him as a coward if he did.
“She’s my classmate too, Foul Mouth. I’ve lost enough of them for a lifetime already. Besides, the closer I am to Autumn the faster she fights.”
Good to know.
If I ever have to fight a Bonegrinder.
Good thing none of them want to kill me, right?
I wanted to ask him more questions. How many can you use? How far can you send them away? Do they absolutely require necro-strings or can you have some sort of robot mode set into them where they act like a drone? But wasn’t the time or the place.
I opened the door and stepped inside.
Falschein had been speaking the truth about the floor being a mess. The carpet had been removed and metal had been bolted down into the concrete itself. It made a large circle with thirteen smaller circles surrounding it, much smaller. It reminded me of the Ultra symbol, only with circles instead of stars. There was some type of holding system in each of those smaller circles that I would need to study, but it seemed oddly familiar, if customized. At the very center of it all was a metal structure, almost mishmash, but the way those lines and the pieces curved . . .
Like the inside of an anima vial.
Except . . . I was pretty sure it was a Were Totem.
So the cult gains its iconography . . . what’s next? A symbol just for the Curator? Etched into murder scenes? Spray-painted on brick walls?
Another metal line in the floor bisected the largest circle into that Totem. On either side of the Totem were repurposed dentist chairs. Kind that are padded as all fuck, but still uncomfortable since you associate them with loud buzzing and holes in your teeth. Both the chairs were empty now, but . . . I had a feeling Conan Sapa had laid down in one of them a week or so back.
Falschein took pictures of it all, as Welf had said. He made no more notice of me or T-Bone or Welf than he had the gun Autumn pointed directly at his head. “Intriguing, isn’t it, Mr. Price?”
“Where’s Eva?” was the only question I had for him, no matter how fucked up the room.
Falschein took another picture of one of the holding machines. “She’s stable, no reason to rush.”
“You said she needed a hospital.”
“She will need more than a hospital I imagine, but there’s no rush.” Falschein pointed at the circles and the chairs. “Study it please. Consider it a consultation. Your payment is Miss Reti alive and well. It was no easy task saving her. In shock and low on blood when I found her. I had to enter her body just to stabilize her vitals, then give my shell’s own blood to supplement her supply long enough for my corrections to take place.”
.
.
.
“I hate vampires,” T-Bone muttered.
He looked about ready to zap the fucker into nothing but ashes.
Welf played it cool, or . . . maybe not cool since he was Heinrich Welf, but uncaring and cold at the very least. He surveyed the room as Falschein had asked of me.
I still wasn’t ready to be a bitch. “Where is she?”
“In the surgery suite with an IV drip,” Falschein said. He was as average and forgettable as Welf had claimed. Not what you expect out of a monster in the attic. “If it will hurry this arrangement along, Mr. Price, then please go check on her to see I speak the truth. Stay out of the freezer in the breakroom, however, there are three bodies in it I still need to identify.”
The Foul Mouth and the Mancy Martial Artist (The King Henry Tapes Book 5) Page 53