Tales of the Scarlet Knight Collection: The Wrath of Isis

by P. T. Dilloway

  “I should enjoy being a kid while it lasts, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Aggie told me that too—your Aggie.” Renee wiped at her eyes, which smeared her mascara. “It’s not so fun right now.”

  “No, it’s not. It’ll get better, though. I promise.” He took her hand and helped her up to her feet. “Who knows, maybe I’ll come back someday and you’ll be the world’s first doctor/lawyer/jazz trio player.”

  “I can do operations in the courtroom and lull patients to sleep with my cello.”

  “There you go. Now come on, there are still a few things we need to do.”

  Renee was little, but she could help him by operating a hydraulic pulley so he could get the breastplate on. She also helped him with some of the lighter pieces and to double-check that everything was hooked up properly. “Are you sure you don’t want to let me come? You could use someone to help with the suit—”

  “I’m sure Akako can help with that,” Tim said.

  “It was worth a shot,” she said with a shrug. Then she fetched the scroll for him from off a worktable. “What do you do with this thing?”

  “Just throw it. But make sure you hold on to something. Otherwise you’ll get pulled in.”

  “And we wouldn’t want that to happen,” Renee said.

  “Renee—”

  “I know. I know.” She pressed the scroll into his hands, but then her eyes widened. “Mr. Snuggles!”

  “What about him?”

  “I don’t want him getting sucked into your universe.” She dove into her little fort and called for him in her overly sweet babyish voice. “Come out and I’ll give you a tweat.”

  “Maybe he went out,” Tim said. He wouldn’t blame the cat if it wanted to escape Renee’s smothering. “He might be out catching some mice or something.”

  “I can’t take that chance,” Renee said. Her voice bordered on panic. Tim could only watch as Renee raced around the work area and called for the cat. It seemed silly, but given that she’d already lost her mother, Renee didn’t want to lose something else close to her, which was also why it was so hard for her to accept that he had to go without her.

  He finally heard her shriek with joy; she held up the cat. “I found him!”

  “That’s great,” Tim said. “Now stay back and try to hold on to something.”

  He cocked his right arm slightly and then tossed the scroll to the floor. The purple gateway sprang to life as it had back in his world. Just as he was about to step into it, he felt something hit the back of the suit.

  He turned and saw Sylvia racing towards him, her pistol raised.

  ***

  When she talked with some of the other officers on the scene, they had all decided not to mention the weird robot thing they’d seen. Sylvia had seen it closer than the others, but she didn’t elaborate on the identity of the person inside the suit. Collectively they reached the same conclusion that to mention the robot thing would only lead to a lot more paperwork, briefings, and psychiatric evaluations.

  Sylvia went along with all of this, as well as the idea that she had done it alone. She knew better than to mention an eleven-year-old had tipped her off by translating Swedish gangsters in a chat room. Renee had already been in enough trouble with her father; Sylvia didn’t want to add to it by hauling her down to the station to question her about anything else she might know.

  She hadn’t gotten a wink of sleep. There had been the process to bring in Tallander and the others. Then the reports to file. Then the interviews, which for her were the worst part of all. Charlotte had warned her about the reporters during their brief time as partners. “Don’t try making friends with them,” she had said while smoking in the car. “Today they like you but tomorrow they’ll make you out to be Satan if it will sell a few papers.”

  After all of these reports and interviews, Sylvia finally got a chance to slip away from the station to take care of the most important business. Tim had left plenty of weapons to implicate the Bolivians and Swedes, but that didn’t mean she’d let him get away with it. She had no idea what he might do with so many guns, especially with that goofy robot suit of his.

  They had foolishly left the door from the loading dock open. Sylvia heard someone banging around. The factory was large enough that she could easily slip into the shadows where they wouldn’t be able to see her easily. She took out her pistol, just in case he wanted to use some of those weapons he’d acquired on her.

  She heard a girlish squeal followed by Renee shouting, “I found him!” Sylvia saw Renee hold up an obviously stray cat. The way she coddled the thing, you would have thought it was a purebred.

  “That’s great,” Tim said. “Now stay back and try to hold on to something.”

  Sylvia saw Tim had gathered up the crates into a net and he was still in that robot thing of his. There was something in his hand—a weapon? He threw it to the ground and to Sylvia’s amazement, a bright purple portal opened. What the hell was that thing?

  When Tim took a step towards it, she knew that it had to be some kind of weird gateway to beam him somewhere. That would explain how he’d managed to escape with those weapons so easily. But he hadn’t escaped yet.

  She burst out of cover and charged towards him with her pistol out. Renee shouted at her to stop, but she ignored the kid. She wasn’t about to let this bastard get away scot-free. She aimed for Tim’s back, but since she was moving the shot pulled wide to hit him in the shoulder. He turned around and shouted, “Sylvia, no!”

  “Get away from whatever that is and take off that damned suit!” she shouted back.

  “I can’t. I have to go.” He dragged the net with its case of weapons into the gateway as if they were pillows. She fired another shot, but it only grazed his other shoulder. “I’m sorry!” he called to her. Then he stepped into the gateway and disappeared.

  She wasn’t about to let him get away that easily. Wherever he ended up, she would still arrest him and drag his ass back here. Even if it turned out to be the other side of the world or Mars or a spaceship full of little green men.

  She holstered her pistol and then dove into the gateway. With a flash of purple light she was gone.

  Chapter 16

  In her dreams she swam in an ocean of blood. At first she flailed in the sticky, salty fluid to try to escape. When her muscles tired from this, she sank slowly beneath the waves. Her lungs burned, hungry for oxygen. Finally she opened her mouth and blood flowed into it.

  Her body came back to life. Her tired muscles were reinvigorated so that she could propel herself back to the surface. Her head broke through the waves of the red ocean. She let out a triumphant scream, her fangs bared.

  Then she heard the shadow woman’s laughter. Above her, like a pair of twin red moons, she saw the evil woman’s eyes. “You’re mine now,” she hissed.

  Emma awoke with a scream that echoed the one in her dream. She flailed around only to realize she was not in an ocean of blood, but her own bed. Her bedroom appeared no different than it had last night before she left to meet Jim.

  The memory of that date rushed back. Jim had drawn her naked. Instead of appreciating his gift, she’d freaked out on him. When he’d tried to stop her from leaving, she’d slapped him. Then she’d gone into an alley and trapped a rat. As much as she wanted to devour the creature, she couldn’t. She couldn’t take an innocent life, not even an animal one.

  She winced as pain lanced through her stomach. She was hungry. She needed to feed. She remembered what that horrible woman had said to her, that eventually she would have to give in. “No,” she whispered. “I won’t.”

  She took two showers to try to get the stink of the alley off her. It didn’t help. The putrid sewer stench continued to linger. She grimaced at her reflection in the mirror. Her hair hung lank, greasy despite two washings. There were dark circles around her eyes as if she had painted them with mascara. Her skin had turned even paler, tinged now with green as if she were nauseous. She looked and
smelled like a corpse.

  She scurried back across the hall to get dressed and tried to leave the apartment before Becky saw her. She had just grabbed her purse and was about to climb out the window to use the fire escape when the door opened. “Oh, you’re up—holy shit,” Becky said. “Did you take a shower in the sewers?”

  “No.”

  “You smell terrible.”

  “I know. I’ve showered twice already. It doesn’t seem to help.”

  “What the hell were you doing last night?”

  Emma looked down at her feet and tried not to cry. “Jim and I had an argument. I ran away and I went to an alley to think about things.” She didn’t mention what else she had done in the alley; she knew Becky wouldn’t believe it.

  “I told you he wasn’t any good, didn’t I?”

  “Yes. You were right.”

  Becky grabbed her arm; this time she didn’t seem to look for track marks. “Come on, maybe we can fix you up a little.”

  Becky applied some foundation and blush to Emma’s face, but this just made her look like a corpse made up for a funeral. The perfume Becky liberally sprayed on her still couldn’t penetrate the stench of putrefaction about her, as Emma knew it wouldn’t. The only thing that could stop this rotting was a dose of blood. To do that, she would have to kill someone.

  “I’d better go,” Emma said.

  “Aren’t you going to eat anything?”

  “I’ll get something at the cafeteria.” She forced a smile to her face. “Thanks for worrying about me.”

  “It’s my job, kid.”

  Emma would have liked to hug her friend but she didn’t want her stink to rub off on Becky. That and she worried if she were so close to Becky’s neck, she might be tempted to sink her fangs into it. She settled for a little wave instead and then hurried out of the apartment.

  She should have known Leslie would notice her smell. “Did you sleep in the dump?” she asked as she met Emma downstairs.

  “No, ma’am.”

  “And what’s with the makeup? Are you one of those Goth kids now?”

  “No, ma’am. I’m just a little tired.”

  “I hope you don’t scare the customers too much. Tomorrow you come in looking and smelling halfway normal or you’re fired. Got it?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Now go count in.”

  Emma trudged back to the stockroom to punch in. Jim was already there to flip through inventory reports. “Hey,” he said coolly, as if they’d just met.

  “Hi. I’m sorry about last night.”

  “Whatever.”

  She could tell he wouldn’t forgive her easily, not this time. “I guess I better go count my drawer.”

  He only grunted at this, seemingly absorbed in his work. Then his pointed nose sniffed the air to give him a rat-like appearance that reminded her of the striped rat in the alley she’d nearly killed. “Did you cut one?”

  “No. It’s just a new perfume.”

  “It smells like something died.” His eyes finally turned to her and she saw them widen for a moment. The warmth returned to his voice as he asked, “What happened to you?”

  “I don’t feel very good.”

  “Maybe you should go home.”

  “No, I’ll be fine.”

  “Well, look, I can do the register today—”

  “I can handle it,” she snapped. She stomped out to the cash register to count in. She paused for a moment and put a hand to her stomach. The pain nearly doubled her over. She waited until it passed before she continued.

  ***

  There was one benefit to looking like a corpse: the children who came through the store minded what she said. The kids gaped at her; their eyes widened when their teachers shepherded them into the store. “Play nice, kids.” That was all the warning they needed to behave themselves.

  The adult customers approached her cautiously; their nostrils twitched as they picked up on her smell. They refused to make eye contact with her and mumbled in response when she read the script about the membership program. When she handed their bags to them, they took these at arm’s length, as if afraid they could catch whatever she had by touch.

  One well-meaning old woman smiled at her and said, “You’re such a brave girl. When my niece was going through chemo, she could hardly stand for three weeks.”

  “Oh, thanks,” Emma said. “Is your niece feeling better?”

  “She passed on a number of years ago.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s not your fault. You were hardly even born I imagine.” The woman took her bag with another smile. “God bless you, dear.”

  “You too,” Emma said. God had certainly not blessed her; He seemed to have abandoned her. Maybe she should go to a church and try to pray for her immortal soul, but weren’t vampires repulsed by crucifixes?

  Jim remained in the stockroom for most of the morning. He finally came out at noon. “How are you feeling?”

  “I’m all right,” she said. She resisted the urge to put her hand to her stomach as she felt another cramp. Her nose twitched as he took a step towards her; she could smell the blood inside of him.

  “You want to take lunch now?”

  “I can wait.”

  “Emma—”

  “I’m not a child. I don’t need you taking care of me.”

  “I’m sorry about last night. About that drawing. I didn’t mean to give you the wrong idea.” He reached out to put a hand on her arm, but she backed away. She couldn’t stand to have him close to her right now, afraid of what she might do. “I don’t want to do anything with you that you’re not ready for.”

  “Please, just leave me alone. I’ll take my lunch in a half-hour.”

  “Fine.” Jim returned to the stockroom, which left Emma to sag against the wall and try not to whimper in pain.

  She was hunched over when a familiar voice snarled, “You need a Midol or something?”

  She looked up to see Dr. Dreyfus glare at her as he had on the elevator. “Can I help you with something?” she asked. She tried in vain to make her voice sound chipper.

  “My niece is having this birthday party tonight. I need some gifts.”

  “Oh, well, how old is she?”

  “I don’t know. Six or seven maybe.” He rubbed the back of his neck as he thought. “Maybe ten.”

  “We have a lot of toys and games for young children.” She tried not to groan as she walked around the counter. “Did you have something in mind?”

  “I don’t know, what do little girls like? You’re a girl, you tell me.”

  Emma looked around the store and tried to think of what she might have wanted when she was six to ten. Her attention was immediately drawn to the fossils and chemistry sets. She doubted Dr. Dreyfus’s niece would want anything like that. Over by a display of African spirit dolls, she saw a music box of an antique carousel. “Well, this music box is very nice.”

  “Great I’ll take it. And give me that big giraffe over in the corner,” he said. He pointed to a giraffe that was as tall as her and would certainly be taller than his niece.

  She set the music box on the counter and then went to retrieve the giraffe. The price tag indicated it cost four hundred dollars. The music box was another seventy-five. “That’s going to be five hundred thirteen dollars,” she said. She rang it into the register.

  “Just put them on the damaged goods log. I’ll sign for it.”

  “I don’t think I could do that. I’d get in trouble.”

  “Listen, kid, I’m the assistant director of this museum. I snap my fingers and you’re out on your pasty ass. Get it?”

  “Yes,” she said. She looked down at her feet and reminded herself she needed this job.

  “Gift wrap the carousel for me, sweetheart. I’m not going to have time to do that later.”

  “I’ll see what I can do.” She looked beneath the counter for any wrapping paper but found only tissue paper and gift bags. “There might be some in the ba
ck.”

  “Never mind,” he snapped. As he tried to snatch the carousel box away from her, the sharp corner raked across his thumb. “Shit, look what you did now? Go find me a Band—”

  Emma no longer listened to him; her eyes stared at the blood that oozed from the cut on his thumb. Her eyes widened and her body trembled at the smell of it. Blood. Pure, red blood.

  Before she knew it, she had leaped across the counter to pounce on Dr. Dreyfus the way she had the rat in the alley. He tried to swat at her, but her muscles had become like steel, driven by the smell of fresh blood. She pinned his arms down with her hands and his chest with her knees. He shook his head as he screamed for help. It wouldn’t matter. Soon she would feast.

  Her mouth opened and the fangs extended. With a feral hiss she snapped at him. He turned his head just in time so she only grazed his ear. “Get off me you crazy bitch!”

  “Shut up and stay still!”

  Before she could snap at him again, she felt someone pull at her. “Emma, what the hell are you doing?” Jim screamed at her.

  His voice cut through the red haze to reach down to her soul. She blinked back to full awareness and let Dr. Dreyfus go. In a daze she stood up and turned to Jim. She put a hand to her mouth to cover her fangs. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m so sorry.”

  As she ran for the stairs she heard Dr. Dreyfus scream, “You’re fired, you crazy bitch! You hear me? You’re never setting foot in this museum again!”

  ***

  She ran along the crowded sidewalks, her vision blinded by the tears in her eyes. With one hand ahead of her like a cowcatcher and the other over her mouth, she plowed through the crowds. People shouted after her, but she paid them no mind.

  She ran until she reached the diner where Becky worked. She burst through the door and wiped at her eyes enough to see Becky beside a booth, an order pad in hand. Becky’s face turned pale; the order pad slipped out of her hand as Emma threw herself at her friend. “Emma, what the hell’s wrong with you?”

  “You’ve got to help me. I don’t know what to do.”