Zero Sum: An Alexi Sokolsky Supernatural Thriller (Alexi Sokolsky: Hound of Eden Book 3)

by James Osiris Baldwin

  Zane banged the tall iron bar on the floor and ducked outside. “Okay, we’re good. Bring the van up! Let’s haul out!”

  All up, there were twenty cases of eight guns each—and at five thousand dollars per gun, we were looking at close to a million dollars of hardware. It boggled me to think they’d only put two guards on it. The other unspoken question, of course, was ‘What the hell was the Organizatsiya doing moving eight hundred thousand dollars’ worth of witch-hunting equipment?’ In all my years of working for them, I’d never seen anything like it.

  I caught up with Jenner as she and Talya carried one of the cumbersome crates to the back of the panel van. Angkor was holding the door for them, a cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth.

  “Jenner, I’m going to head out from here on.” I looked between them, arms crossed. “I’ll meet you back at the clubhouse late tomorrow. Yegor was high-profile: I need to go to ground for a night.”

  “No worries.” She grunted as she swung the case up to Ron, who hauled it into the depths of the van. “We got this. We’ll figure out something to do with the Russian boys over there. Any suggestions?”

  “Lock them in an empty gun crate together,” I said. “Naked. The only reason this much hardware would have so such low-profile protection is because it’s not here for very long. I suspect it was moved in as recently as yesterday and could be scheduled for pickup tonight.”

  Jenner nodded. “Right. That settles that then. By the by, next meeting is on Sunday night.”

  And I had a date tomorrow. “I’ll be there.”

  “You better.”

  I nodded, and crooked my fingers to Angkor before I left, motioning him to follow me. He arched his eyebrows inquiringly as I walked off and put a bit of space between us and the others. When we had relative privacy, I turned back.

  “Club 21,” I said. “The address is on your nightstand.”

  Somehow, Angkor had ended up close to me, close enough that I could see the lines of pewter and cornflower blue shot through his eyes. Angkor had very dark violet-gray eyes, an unusual color in an Asian face. From a distance, they looked black. It was only when he was here, like this, that I could discern their true color. “I guess I’ll be seeing you there, then. You know... That was a really hot piece of Phitometry you did back there. I’m envious.”

  This close, the synesthetic feedback of his voice rippled through the skin of my scalp like a caress. I glanced past him to the others. They were oblivious to our intimacy, and the thundering of my pulse lifted enough that it nearly drowned out the sound of their chatter. “It was just Inotropy. I… uhh…”

  “‘Just’ Inotropy, he says.” Angkor rolled his bottom lip under his top teeth in a way I found very distracting. “So, Club 21, nineteen hundred hours. I’ll meet you there. Be careful… I know Jenner’s excited about these weapons, but they make me nervous.”

  “Me too. And I will.” The urge to kiss him was more powerful than I’d expected. His eyes hooded to dark crescents, and he lingered, maybe waiting to see if I’d take it further. But how could I?

  We parted without saying anything else. I watched him retreat into his cheerful mask, laughing and teasing Talya as they got ready to pack up. Binah was waiting for me on the motorcycle, and she purred and arched against my hand as I took the saddle and opened my jacket for her. “GOD help me, Kutkha. What the hell am I thinking? What the hell am I doing?”

  “Learning to live a little, finally,” Kutkha sounded distinctly amused.

  “I mean that this is… ugh.” I shook my head, annoyed. “Forget I said anything.”

  “As you say, my Ruach.”

  Chapter 5

  It was a hundred and fifty miles to Albany, a journey made fresh by the concentration needed to ride instead of drive. I pulled into a motel I’d never stayed at before, the romantically named 'Budget Motel'. It was a U-shaped clutter of clapboard buildings with peeling paint and a grimy office window entirely obscured by creeping kudzu—on the inside of the window. They offered cheap beds, thin walls, an old T.V., and a don't-ask-don't-tell policy of conduct. I paid cash for a twenty-five-dollar room, ordered some Mexican food at the payphone in the office, took a shower, and ate tacos with only Binah and silence for company.

  Budget Motel wasn't exactly a luxury resort, but I hadn't gone here with luxury in mind. To the contrary. The first hour after a public job – the kind where you left the body out intending for it to be found – was the hot zone, the time you were most likely to screw something up and incriminate yourself. The next twelve to twenty-four were hotter than hot. By this time, the body’s been found, cops are crawling over it like maggots, reporters are busting through the yellow tape, and a very tired detective and their lab team are doing their very best to find you. Meanwhile, the earnest wetworker is also tired and strung out, and if they got money for the job, very likely to spend their ill-gotten gains in an attempt to relax. I needed the ritual self-abnegation to remind myself that I wasn’t rich, that I wasn’t shit hot, and I was in fact one of the bottom-feeders, a ‘thug with a couple of magic tricks’, as Yegor put it. The reason I’d never been arrested was because I’d never put myself in a position to get caught.

  I turned the T.V. on to catch the news while I brushed my teeth and got ready for an early night, listening from the bathroom sink.

  “Five people were killed and thirty-two injured, seven critically, when a rain of human body parts fell over the Financial District today.” The news anchor—a woman with big blonde hair and a pink power suit, her voice laden with dry disbelief—sat beside a cutout reel showing the scenes of carnage as the red rain swept across Wall Street. People running for shelter at the Exchange; crowds huddling in the mouth of an underground car park. "Our sources can confirm that this bizarre event occurred almost entirely in and around Wall Street. Viewers, if any of you were caught in the rain today, the CDC is urging you to please report to the nearest hospital to be tested for blood borne diseases. At least two people have already tested positive for the Hepatitis B virus. Citizens are to be advised that HBV can survive in dried blood for over seven days. and while clean-up crews have been dispatched, HBV transmission remains a major concern for employees such as custodians, laundry personnel and anyone else who may come in contact with the blood or any other potentially infectious materials.”

  Looking at the images, there was no denying where the meat had come from. Some shots of the street were almost completely blurred out to conceal smashed human heads, limbs, other recognizable body parts. The cameras had caught videos of people in HAZMAT gear helping screaming, hysterical men and women into chemical showers, as well as firefighters in gas masks sluicing the streets with high pressure hoses. The triangular zone between Broadway, Wall Street, William Street and Beaver Street was closed off by the National Guard.

  “Bozye moy[3].” What a mess. I shook my head, turned to the sink and spat.

  "...Some people are even suggesting that this event has religious significance. The CDC has refused to make a statement on the nature or consequences of the Wall Street Meat Storm, saying only that they are currently looking into the matter. Let's go live to our special guests for tonight. We have Professor Phillip Lawson, Head of Atmospheric and Meteorological Sciences at Oswego University, and Pastor Zachariah Goswin, the founder and lead minister of the Church of the Voice of the Lord."

  I frowned, looking back out to watch as the two talking heads came up on screen. They were filming the pastor in Chicago, judging by his photo backdrop. Zachariah Goswin was a stocky, plum-faced man with an Ivy League haircut and a look of studied concern. He was in a black shirt with a purple stole, and I unconsciously searched his features to see if they matched The Deacon while they worked through the introductions.

  "What do you have to say about this, Professor?" I tuned back in as the newscaster spoke.

  "There have been numerous instances in history when meat and-or blood has fallen out of the sky as part of a weather event." The professo
r, a gaunt, clean-shaven man with neat hair the color of slate, regarded the camera steadily. "Firstly, there's a phenomenon called 'red rain' or 'blood rain' that results from dried algae being picked up by the wind. When it mixes with water, it forms meat-like clumps of jelly that are easily mistaken for beef or human fl... human biomatter."

  "This event clearly involved human parts, Professor. We’ve got footage of legs, hands, heads-"

  "Well, it’s quite possible that a number of very unfortunate people were swept up from the ocean, or possibly an air transportation accident. I think as we get news from around the world, the mystery will begin to resolve itself. And, oh, as the lady said—if you were in contact with any of this bio-waste, please self-report to your local hospital or even just your doctor as soon as you can."

  The news anchor nodded. "I'm sure the religious perspective is quite different, Pastor Goswin."

  "Yes. I really think this event is a very serious wake-up call." Goswin's voice was strong and resonant, a little raspy at the edges, but he exuded patrician confidence. His eyes were very blue, but he didn't sound or hold himself like The Deacon, the strange Temporalist who had nearly killed me the month before. "I think we have experienced a remarkable event, truly remarkable in that the epicenter of the storm was the Financial District and specifically the Wall Street Stock Exchange. There is a strong religious ground to take that as a sign being given to us all. It's a very bad sign."

  He sounded very reasonable, but my eyes narrowed all the same. Admittedly, I was biased. The ringleaders of the child-trafficking racket we had busted up in September were both Voicers, adherents to his megachurch. The Church of the Voice of the Lord was half Calvinist church, half self-improvement program. They believed that people had to work for the right to be considered ‘real’ Christians, and it wasn't enough to simply declare Jesus your savior and repent on your deathbed. An interesting sentiment, in theory... in practice, it boiled down to: 'if you're not rich or successful, God doesn't love you and you're going to hell’. For this reason, it had become a bit of a thing among religiously inclined celebrities... and apparently, shapeshifting child molesters.

  "What kind of sign do you believe this represents?" the woman asked.

  "I don't care to speculate. That's up to the Lord," Goswin replied. "But I think that we should be alert, and I think we should be afraid."

  “Well, that’s a very interesting perspective from two very different people. We’ll be right back with further updates…”

  After the ads, Yegor’s death only got a passing mention from an anxious news reporter in a white filter mask—not even a Crimestoppers composite. They moved on quickly. “In other news: Professor Lee Harrison, the famous anthropologist, explorer and diver who filmed the award-winning documentary ‘The Blue Holes of the May: Gateways to The Underworld’ has been reported missing shortly after her arrival in New York. Anyone with information on her whereabouts is encouraged to contact the New York Police Department. We now head back to Wall Street for the latest.”

  I sighed. My luck. A famous missing person and The Wall Street Meat Storm had provided an incredible layer of obfuscation I hadn’t counted on. Not a bad thing, but I’d been hoping for a headline. With nothing left to do, I turned the T.V. and lights off, got into bed, and stared at the map of light and shadow on the grimy ceiling for the half-hour or so it took me to pass out.

  When I woke up, it was snowing over Albany. Stripped to the waist, I watched the silent white blanket lay itself over the highway while Binah wound around my legs, butting at me for attention. My nose was stuffy, and my jaws ached from grinding my teeth all night. The quiet drabness of the motel that had been so comfortable the night before now made the back of my neck crawl.

  I moved restlessly to the little bar fridge and opened it to look inside. Besides my leftovers, there was an overpriced can of Coke and two bottles of Corona. Without thinking, I reached for a beer and cracked the lid, stopping only when the yeasty, yellowish smell of it hit my sinuses and made my stomach lurch.

  What the hell? I hate that shit. I recoiled from the odor and put the bottle back in, jamming the cap back down. Maybe it was a carbohydrates thing. Beer was high in carbs, and I’d had a physically intense day without much food. Shuddering, I got the bag with the rest of my takeout and slammed the door.

  After a cold breakfast of leftover tacos, Binah and I were back on the road. It was icy, the air swirling with snow. The conditions necessitated a leisurely pace that gave me ample time to become increasingly restless... and fixated. I’d already lost the glow of satisfaction from dealing with Yegor, and now I had my sights on Celso Manelli and the Manelli’s pet spook, Carmine. The plan was to make it appear to be a hit by the Organizatsiya, drawing the full weight of the city’s largest Italian Mafia family down on Nicolai’s head. I could hardly wait.

  “My Ruach,” Kutkha said, his voice stirring up out of the blue. “Do you recall what Angkor said about the nature of Yen?”

  “Vaguely.” While riding, I didn’t care about replying to Kutkha’s telepathic voice aloud. The only one to hear me talk to myself was the cat, and she was too busy watching the world go by from her nest inside my jacket.

  “Do you remember that the Yen infection causes compulsions, harmful behaviors?”

  “Yes.”

  “Like blood-thirst, perhaps?” He suggested, delicately.

  “Then this Yen can help me hunt these motherfuckers down,” I replied. “I’ve been wanting to do this since before I got Yenned.”

  “Yes, but you are burning the candle at both ends again, to borrow your own preferred expression. You should consider at least giving yourself a month to cool down.”

  The ghostly odor of the open beer stirred in the back of my mouth. I ground my teeth until the crowns locked. “We don’t have a month.”

  “Look at yourself in the mirror.”

  Haltingly, I obeyed. He had a point, because to put it frankly, I looked like shit. Even behind a visor, my eyes were sunken, my face sharp and hungry. I needed a shave. My scalp and face were thick with dark blond stubble that stood out on my blueish-white skin.

  The last time I hadn’t listened to Kutkha when he’d advised restraint, I’d ended up homeless, pumped full of toxic vampire blood, and stripped of my magic. While I had many faults, the inability to learn from my mistakes was not one of them. I’d eaten one too many dead raccoons to willfully ignore my Neshamah’s advice ever again.

  “Fine,” I said. “I’ll give a rest for a while. But we can pick up the file from Doctor Leventhal today and fix a plan. Do you have any objection?”

  “I have no objection at this stage. The time for escape is now long passed, and the Morphorde in our locale remain a threat,” Kutkha replied. “In theory, we had a brief window of opportunity for freedom which rushed by and has now receded into the past. But as you learn, my Ruach, so do I.”

  “Oh?” I glanced at my mirrors, instinctively checking for tails. “About what?”

  “The decision you made to stay here.” In my mind’s eye, I could see him. Kutkha used the diminutive form of a name possessed by a very ancient Siberian god, and in the spirit of that god, he assumed the visual form of a raven made of black, filamentary smoke. His eyes were solid, blazing white, spitting and burning like tiny stars. “It may not have been a decision at all.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Free will is illusory,” he replied. “Not in the sense of augury or fate, my Ruach, but in the purely mechanical sense. You are one mote of mitochondria in a body so large as to beggar comprehension. Do you think that mitochondria has free will?”

  “No. Of course not. Genes control it. It acts according to a pattern.”

  “As do we,” Kutkha said. I could feel him smiling—a sensation that creeped and prickled across my skin, like goosebumps. “And I now wonder if you merely acted in accordance with the code, which I assure you is far more complex than any mere Neshamah could ever know.”


  “So ending up destitute and on the street was my destiny, then?” I snorted.

  “I don’t know what your destiny is, my Ruach. But you have made our bed. Now, we will lie in it.”

  ***

  I drove us back into the city on good time, stopped for coffee to try and get rid of the weird beer craving, and regretted it from the first sip onward. It tasted like the water in the bottom of a dumpster smelled. I drank it anyway, with an urgency I rarely felt. I needed the caffeine, or I wasn’t going to be sharp enough to make the most of my next stopover: The Doctor’s office.

  Doctor Yusef Levental lived in a white brick rowhouse in Crown Heights, which was slowly returning to its old, sedate, upper-middle class neighborhood feel after the Crown Riots in August. Because of that, I was surprised to see three police cars parked outside the gate and down the street. The NYPD had put more force on the ground here to head off violence between the Chassidic Jews and Caribbean Blacks who coexisted uneasily in this part of the city, but the way they were all lined up in the gutter made my gut twinge with warning.

  I looked for signs of the blood rain here, but if it had fallen anywhere outside of Manhattan, the sweeping rain had washed away the evidence. There was no blood or shredded tissue clinging to the short, sharp spikes of his fence, or on the tiny juniper seedlings that flanked the concrete pillars beside the front door. I buzzed the doorbell, withdrawing under the shallow balcony to stay out of the rain, and waited.

  After a few seconds, the intercom hummed to life. “‘Allo?”

  The voice was young and male. One of the doctor’s sons, no doubt. “Levi? It’s Alexi Sokolsky. I’m here to see your father.”

  The intercom dropped out, but the door didn’t buzz and open. Frowning, I waited with my hands jammed in the pockets of my coat. I was about to hit the doorbell again when the door creaked open. It was Levi, Doctor Levental’s oldest son, a shy and darkly handsome Chassidic man only five years my junior. He was in his usual black suit and yarmulke, but he looked like he’d been gutshot.