The Foul Mouth and the Cat Killing Coyotes (The King Henry Tapes)

by Richard Raley

  She used to help me with my homework when I was still young enough to care about homework . . . wonder if she’d help me with the statistics now?

  “Why you end up a Coyote, JoJo?”

  Maybe the Prices are cursed. Me a mancer, JoJo a Were, and Susan disappeared. I hadn’t thought about my family much since I started dealing with my shop . . . but seeing JoJo, getting shot over her . . . I thought on it again.

  I looked up into that windy March sky and I asked, “What we do to piss you off, you bastard?”

  [CLICK]

  I walked up to T-Bone’s car the moment he pulled it into a parking space near the Sheriff’s Department building. Being that it’s downtown the only reason there even was a parking space was thanks to the time . . . 4AM. No one around but law enforcement, homeless, and crazy ass mancers plotting a game at unseemly hours.

  “This is a bad idea,” T-Bone told me without even leaving the car.

  I leaned over, talking to him through the window. We didn’t look like drug-dealers or nothing . . . promise. “It’s the best idea I got.”

  “Attacking one of the scariest men I’ve ever met is your best idea?” T-Bone’s hands never left the steering wheel. If he’d had muscle to equal his size the whole thing probably would have been ripped off. “We should calm down . . . hide out at my place. I have a spare room you can use. I’ll have to move some computers off the bed, but . . . you can spend a few days with me.”

  “Now there’s a sitcom everyone would watch . . .”

  “Stop being so calm!”

  “Who you think we could get to play the cute next-door neighbor? Blond chick from The Big Bang Theory reruns is a cutie . . . maybe we can borrow her?”

  “Stop making jokes!”

  “Probably getting old by now though . . . tits starting to sag and the like . . .”

  “Stop making sexist jokes!”

  T-Bone freaked out like any normal person. Like I should have been. Bullets really didn’t scare me . . . it was kind of a revelation. Dad’s belt growing up, waking up to see Mom wasn’t home in that body of hers . . . yes to both. Bullets . . . not a bit. “Ceinwyn is coming, right?”

  The thought of Auntie Badass getting nearer lightened up the grip on the steering wheel. “Yes, she is.”

  “She at the Asylum for once?”

  “It’s March . . .”

  It took me a second. “Second Evaluations?”

  “Yeah, that and Winter War, the only times Miss Dale is guaranteed to be around.”

  “So you just want us to hang out at your place playing your Playstation 4 while Ceinwyn comes and fixes everything for us?” I asked, my tone letting him know I thought this was about as stupid as going raw-dog with a Thai hooker.

  “She fixed everything for you the first time around.”

  I shook my head. “And we still ended up here. We need to handle this. We are Fresno’s Ultras. The Coyote Nation just tried to kill us.”

  “You don’t know that,” T-Bone decided. His eyes had trouble looking at anything. He didn’t want to look at me and he really didn’t want to look at the Sheriff’s Department. “I actually think if they were trying to kill us we’d probably be dead. It was just a warning or something else we’re not aware of.”

  Ethos. T-Bone worked on what’s right, assumed the world would work on what’s right. Which is a pity . . . I don’t got a bit of ethos in me. “Say Ceinwyn does handle it . . . what’s to keep them from doing this again?”

  “Fear of retaliation from the Asylum, fear of breaking the treaty that keeps Fresno from exploding.”

  “Now you’re talking: fear.”

  “That wasn’t what I meant, King Henry!”

  “We need to hit back, beat up some of his boys, make him know we’re something to fear too. Add that with all the rest Vega is worrying about and maybe we find some space to survive.”

  T-Bone finally met my eyes, his face was surprised. “You mean . . . you aren’t planning on killing him?”

  “Of course not,” I lied.

  “Oh.”

  I faked some anger . . . not hard in my present mindset. “You see me killing a lot of people, do you?”

  “We both know you have a temper . . .”

  “I do . . . damn fucking right I do. They thrashed my shop so I need to thrash something of theirs.” I leaned down further, glanced all the way in the car. Electric just like my bike and brand new too. You didn’t see many new cars that weren’t at least hybrids nowadays. American Muscle had faded in place of American Intelligence. Lesson in that. Of course, the car was a Japanese piece of shit . . . but . . . lesson in that.

  “I just want to find his house or some property and crack a gate or some pipes, let the Coyotes know we can get to them,” I lied some more. I want to bash his fucking face in until his skull cracks against my knuckles. I want to grab the Shaky Stick and level his whole house. Some downright biblical Sodom and Gomorrah epicness. I want . . .

  Vega tried to kill me. Vega was grunting and humping my sister . . . turned her into some creature . . . kept her under guard like a good little prisoner. Prices are a variety of screwed up . . . but the one thing we always crave is freedom. What the hell had Vega done to JoJo to get her to walk back into her golden cage?

  And why is Horatio Vega interested in JoJo Price? Granted if I thought about it fairly my sister was cute in that pixy, small frame kind of way . . . but . . . had herself an attitude, body had seen some wear; tattoos, piercings, drugs, drink. Why JoJo Price and not some supermodel imported for the job?

  I wanted revenge . . . and I wanted answers.

  “No killing?” T-Bone asked. “No more guns?”

  I smiled at him. “Not if I can help it.”

  Fists, I want to use my fists . . .

  [CLICK]

  T-Bone took to the plan of cracking a gate or some pipes or whatever inanimate object of Vega’s we could find before Ceinwyn came to town and forced a peace. I let him believe the fiction. He was helping, that’s all that matter.

  I wasn’t proud about using him, but I told myself it was the only way: fucking necessity. Besides, I’m partly right about things playing out his way. Ceinwyn makes a peace with Vega, what’s to protect us from him? Vega already proved he’s more than happy to flaunt the gentleman’s agreement already there to try to kill us, already proved he’d give the biggest show of violence Fresno had ever seen just to kill us too . . . and Fresno’s had itself some serious violence in its years.

  I loved me some Ceinwyn, she’s family. I could count on her to protect me . . . but when it came to Horatio Vega or even what had happened with Annie B . . . Ceinwyn’s a veil of clouds, not a steel curtain. I had to settle this . . . now. Vega and I needed to meet . . . needed to have us a talk . . . then . . . if I’m lucky and he’s as big of a prick as expect . . . I get to kill him too.

  The hope lightens my heart.

  Be a prick . . . please be a prick.

  “Why are we still sitting in your car?” I asked.

  T-Bone brought my artifacts along with him. My static ring—still labeled with the good ol’ KHP—had never left my finger through lead cop or Ribera. It was charged up, ready for use again. My SEM-DEW went into my right coat pocket, on account of it needing to be thrown and on account of me being a righty.

  The aero-fan went to my left pocket, though it didn’t much matter since it wasn’t charged. I flapped it a few times, frowning. It had taken the better part of a week of random couple minute fannings to build up that burst of air.

  It wasn’t a good design. Wasn’t an efficient design as Plutarch would have scolded me. Every anima type has its weight, if you will. Geo, necro, hydro . . . those are heavy and dense, stop you cold. Don’t take much to get them to be useful. Aero . . . that’s right near the bottom.

  Of course . . . the fan didn’t actually use anima. Just like the static ring didn’t. The anima only stored the physical equivalent . . . electricity or air. But aero-anima makes for a crap co
ntainer, which means lots of flapping and flinging my arm to get this thing to work again.

  There were other artifacts in the boxes. My two working pairs of cold cuffs . . . those I stuck in a pocket. Covered in pink fluff or not, I might need to restrain myself a Coyote or maybe even a coyote or two before the night was over. All the bullets and punches so far, I think I deserved seeing at least one Shift in person. Then I’d run through a door and lock the dumbass up when it followed.

  Thumbs, motherfuckers, they’re awesome.

  Then more SDRs . . . I’d never tried to wear more than one at a time. No time like the present, I thought before I slipped one labeled PL on my left hand to mirror KHP. Pocket could just wait on his birthday present until after I survived the next twenty-four hours. There were more than his . . . RM, JV, RQ, and even a CD. One extra . . . try more and you’ll burst into flames, Price.

  I fumbled through the rest, all of the experimental and unproven items far away from usable in most cases. But in a pinch . . . no time like the present.

  Anti-Vamp Hot Cuffs or AVHCs: no use for humans or Weres. They kept going too hot and were likely to burn a normal person alive. Would probably burn a vampire alive too . . . not that I’m against it in the general principle, but it hadn’t been my design intention.

  Fake Laser Sword Attempt Two: instead of pyro-anima I’d tried spectro-anima, but on account of how spectro is lighter than even aero I couldn’t get the artifact hot enough to burn anything but unsuspecting gingers. Looked awesome and realistic though . . . I’d have sold it to some uber nerd but then George Lucas would have sued my ass. He’s from Modesto and that’s even worse than being from Visalia . . . you don’t want to fuck with people that have been bearing that kind of stigma around all their life . . . trust me.

  Another metal ball, same casing as the SEM-DEW: now that . . . might be useful. Tell you about it? Spoil the surprise? Where’s the fun in that?

  “T-Bone? Earth to T-Bone . . .” I said to try to get his attention again.

  He waved at his shoulder; that ‘don’t bug me’ sign everyone recognizes but no one ever actually listens to.

  I was in the backseat with my artifacts; he was in the front with a laptop leaning again his steering wheel and some kind of tablet-computer in the passenger seat that he picked up occasionally to check something on. There wasn’t even music . . . just typing keys or thudding touch-screens.

  Considering how we’re on a timetable . . . I was not best pleased.

  “Going to repeat myself I think, with my favorite word added for effect: why are we still sitting in your fucking car?”

  More tapping and typing. For such a big man he sure did have deft fingers. “We need an excuse.”

  “To go in?”

  “Exactly.”

  “I thought you had some card or skeleton key or shit?”

  “I have a consultant’s security badge and my face isn’t unknown in the building . . . but, it’s almost 5AM and I’ve never been to this building at this ungodly hour. In fact, for me to be at this building at 5AM would require an emergency with their computer network.”

  My phone rang again, I ignored it again too. “So you’re creating your own emergency.”

  “Exactly.”

  “Won’t you showing up a few minutes after the emergency starts be suspicious?”

  “No . . . every system I set up flags intrusions and emails them to me. So . . . I backlog everything for an hour ago when I’m messing around.”

  I shook my head. “Making this more difficult than it has to be.”

  The typing stopped for a second. His head turned to study me. “One of us already has the cops after him; I don’t wish to be added to the list.”

  “But it’s so fun . . . there was coffee and next time might have doughnuts.”

  “Just let me finish this, please.”

  I went through my artifacts one more time. I flapped the aero-fan for a minute before I gave up. Tried to rip off the pink fur from around the cold cuffs . . . gave up on that too. Checked another experimental design in my box but eventually put it back. It was awesome . . . geo-anima like the SEM-DEW, but completely untested. If I set it off it might start running around the room killing people.

  That would be bad . . .

  Plus, I figured there would be more guns before this was over and I wasn’t planning on doing product reviews while under fire.

  Too bad I didn’t grab the Shaky Stick.

  In the moment it had seemed too dangerous. Now, after the worry of being arrested had faded, a little bit of too dangerous seemed ideal. It wasn’t the same artifact it had been when I’d first used it. Hundreds of years on the shelf had been replaced by weekly siphonings into anima-vials. It kept the Shaky Stick contained . . . calm. Instead of an earthquake waiting to happen it was . . . a free pool, maybe an hour in size.

  Large. Powerful. But something I had managed before.

  An hour pool.

  I’d been experimenting with that too since Ceinwyn’s hints. Never an hour though. Ten minutes, fifteen minutes, occasionally a half hour. Just how much had the Asylum lied? Just what was the benefit of pooling to that size? Power for one, but it seemed like the more I pooled the more of the pool would slip away when I let it go.

  Next I’d tried only releasing part of the pool. Which is a lot like blowing up a dam and trying to hold the pieces together at the same time. Impossible and . . . painful. I almost shit my pants the first time. Like all my muscles had instantly liquefied. I managed to hold in the brown flow but my ass crumbled to the floor, all the anima escaping at once. With anima it’s apparently all or nothing.

  So far.

  What I had accomplished was splitting the pool into pieces . . . using it towards multiples instead of at one target. That—

  “Done,” T-Bone announced, closing up his laptop. “Let’s get this over with.”

  [CLICK]

  The walk across the parking lot and into the building seemed to take forever. Most of this had to do with it being across a parking lot. Is there anything more full of shit, more human than a parking lot? All that asphalt, all those white lines and arrows ordering you around. Go this way, you stupid idiot, this way.

  Some of forever . . . came down to time. Time was a ticking. Geomancer I might be, but this wasn’t sand I could turn around. While we’d goofed off in the car the March sun had woken itself up and put on a pot of coffee. Quick little session of spooning-sex with a wife to finish off the morning-boner, a shower and a shave, then it would be off to work.

  Sunrise is never a thing of beauty in Fresno, like it is some other places. The Asylum, I’m actually a fan of those sunrises . . . all the crisp mountain air and clear sight right out into eternity . . . but Fresno, the sunrise sucked ass like it did with everything else. In summer it woke up to brown smog. In winter it woke to gray and the Fog. March was probably sunrise at its best . . . and it still looked hung over after too much time at the titty bar.

  T-Bone and I crossed the parking lot in pink light and heavy shadows. I wore my usual . . . same from the day before. Guess I should be thanking the Mancy I hadn’t gotten bloodied in my shop from all the glass flying around or this would have never went down. Instead I just looked grungy. Jeans dirty. Geomancer’s coat dirty. The March wind cut at my face and hands, but the rest wasn’t so bad.

  Beside me, T-Bone was so clean he squeaked. Six-and-a-half-foot-tall black guy in black cords and a white polo shirt that went to his wrists, covered up with a woven sweat-vest. The vest even had an Ultra pin on it. He looked so damned respectable . . . it’s sickening. There are country clubs in this world that would have giggled at him. Tyson Bonnie: Security Consultant. I’d have given the guy my computer passwords in a second . . . even the ones to my porn accounts . . .

  . . . What?

  “You should wear a coat,” I said to make the parking lot go by quicker.

  He frowned down at me. I didn’t look so good in the reverse apparently. “Mancer coat?”


  “Yeah. They’re warm, you know. Plus . . . lots of pockets.”

  T-Bone chuckled at that, lifting his computer bag. “Plenty in here. Besides, you know what electromancer colors look like.”

  Blue and yellow. Right up there with spectromancers and corpusmancers on the ‘holy shit, what’re they thinking?’ list. “Could always pass for a Chargers fan.”

  “A what?”

  “Chargers, going to make me do the Rivers face?”

  “Huh?”

  “Football . . . you know, those little guys you play with on Madden.”

  “Oh . . . I’m not a sports guy.”

  I gave him another look over, sneering at the vest. “Bet that brings every football coach you meet to tears.”

  “Besides, you’re the only one I’ve ever seen who wears his colors around all the time. Unless someone is heading to the Institution for a reunion or have been called in by the Learning Council they usually sit in the closet collecting dust.”

  “Can’t beat the pockets, man . . . can’t beat them then join ‘em.”

  It was his turn to give me a second look over, noticing my added static ring most likely. “How many weapons do you have on you right now?”

  “Not enough. You can never have too many artifacts.”

  There was a sheriff deputy at the front desk.

  We’ve already covered that the important thing to know about the Fresno Police Department is that they are very happy to shoot you and very good when it comes down to it. The Fresno County Sheriff’s Department, on the other hand, has a reputation passed down from the days before camera phones as being very happy to beat your asshole in. If you give them any crap at all . . . at all . . . they are likely to start smashing face.

  Which . . . is kind of right up my alley.

  In an alternate reality world, King Henry Price is probably a sheriff’s deputy.

  Yeah, that’s the scary thought, ain’t it?

  This deputy was as un-King Henry Price as you get. Tall, skinny, old, balding, and frankly . . . pleasant. We’ll call him . . . Deputy.