by J. R. Mabry
“So much for the calming effects of morphine,” Casey said, pouring a glass of water from the pink plastic pitcher near the bed. “Here you go.”
Terry slurped at it greedily and when he had drained it, he held it out again. “More, please.”
She smiled and filled the cup again.
This time he was sated and he set the cup on the movable table to his right. “Okay. So what happened?”
“You don’t remember getting shot?”
“Is that why my shoulder hurts?”
“Yup. You were in surgery until about two in the morning.”
“Wow. Where’s Susan?”
“I don’t know. They’re—” she stopped, as if she had said something she shouldn’t have.
“They?” Terry picked up on it. “They who?”
“Susan and Chicken went after Dylan. I don’t know what happened.”
She didn’t look him in the eye as she said this. Terry’s suspicion was aroused.
“Terry, I have a favor to ask you. It’s a big one.”
“Okay.”
“Okay you’ll do it?”
“Okay, I’m listening.” He lowered one eyebrow. He didn’t like this already.
“The mayor was going to ask Dylan if he would do magick to help protect the island.”
“Ha!” Terry burst out. He hastily covered his mouth with the hand attached to the arm that didn’t hurt. “Sorry. I couldn’t help myself.”
“Why is that funny?” Casey asked, sitting back down on the edge of his bed. “We don’t have a lot of weapons here. We need all the help we can get. I haven’t heard from the mayor but I was wondering if maybe you—”
Terry ran his good hand through his hair and looked out the window. “Okay, let me make a list of everything that’s wrong with that. First, you don’t summon demons to protect people. That’s like using rat poison to cure a chest cold. Second, neither Dylan nor any other Blackfriar would agree to that, because it’s in direct violation of our vows. Third, demon magick is not my area of speciality.”
Casey leaned back and blinked at all this information. “What is your area of speciality?”
“Angel magick.”
“Is it against your vows to do angel magick?”
“No…not as such.”
“Why is it different?”
“Because demon magick is telling—it’s coercive. Angel magick is asking—it’s petitionary. It’s like praying. Nothing wrong with praying.”
“So why did you say ‘as such’?”
“You can be pretty sure angels will respond to you, but you can’t control how they’ll respond,” Terry said. “Not unlike God, now that I think about it.”
“But you’ll do it?”
Terry scowled at her. “Okay, I’ll do it. But I’ll need some supplies.”
“Like what?”
“I’ll need an Enochian table. You can’t just get one of those at the Neiman Marcus. I’ll have to make it. Please bring me a round table with a light finish, about two-and-a-half feet across—tall, like a standing table at a bar—and a black permanent marker. I can do the sigils from memory.”
“I didn’t understand much of that.”
“Bar table. Blond wood. Thick black magic marker.”
“I can do that,” Casey said.
“Then what are you waiting for?” Terry asked.
“Can you do it right here?”
“Why not? There are angels everywhere.”
She stood up and gave him a curt nod. “On my way, then.” She darted out of the room.
“Holy Christ, how do I get myself into these situations?” Terry asked himself out loud. He needed one thing and one thing only—to get the hell out of this room before she returned with a table. He knew it would do no good trying to impress upon her how volatile angel magick really was. His shoulder hurt, but it wasn’t unbearable. He groaned and leaned forward. It was almost unbearable, he decided. He swung his legs out of bed and was about to hop the short distance to the floor when a round cheery face appeared at the door.
“Hi there. I’m Chaplain Fran. How’re you doin’?” Chaplain Fran was a young woman in her mid-thirties. Her face was as red as an apple and she had yellow hair that looked like her perm was well past its shelf life. She wore a striped green shirt with a clerical band collar. She was stocky, but not overweight, and about Terry’s height.
“I’m…I’ve got a bullet hole in my shoulder that feels like someone just shoved a red-hot poker into my chest. But other than that I’m fine.”
“Well, you’re alive, and that’s something to give thanks for.”
Terry cocked his head. “Yes,” he answered. “Yes it is. Thank you for pointing that out.”
“Would you like to talk?” she asked, sitting down in the only chair in the room.
“Well, actually, I really need to get—”
She was looking at his chart. “Would you call yourself a religious person…Mr. Milne?” She looked straight into his eyes. “Can I call you Terry?”
Terry sighed. Okay, she’s too adorable to turn away, Terry thought. And it’s going to take Casey a while to find a table anyway. And I might get another dose of morphine if I time it right. “Terry is fine,” he answered. “And I am religious. I’m a friar.”
“Are you really?” Chaplain Fran’s eyes got wide and her face broke out into a look of unfeigned delight.
“And for true,” Terry answered.
“What order?”
“The Order of Saint Raphael.”
She jerked upright. “No.”
“Yes,” Terry nodded, a little uncertain.
“You’re a Blackfriar. From Berkeley.”
It was Terry’s turn to grin. “Yes, that’s us. You’ve heard of us, then?”
“Are you kidding? I played that scene from the Republican Convention on a loop for—” She stopped and her eyes grew wide again. “Oh. My. God. You’re the guy…you were standing right next to him when he die—when he was killed.”
“The Bishop? Yes, that was me.”
“Oh. My. God!” she repeated. She reached out to hug him then jerked back, remembering herself. “I am such a fangirl, it’s embarrassing.”
Terry couldn’t help but match her smile.
“You’re my heroes,” she said.
“You do some pretty heroic work here yourself,” Terry said, taking her hand.
She blushed.
“You know, when this is all over,” Terry started, “why don’t you—and your partner, if you have one—why don’t you come over to the friary for dinner one night? Brian—” He was about to praise Brian’s cooking, but he couldn’t get the words out. The whole recent history with Brian came rushing back to him in that moment and he felt crippled by the grief of it.
“What…is something wrong?” Chaplain Fran asked.
“I just…well, I just woke up from surgery a few minutes ago, and my memory is just coming back. And there’s a lot…it was easier when I wasn’t remembering it.”
Chaplain Fran nodded and squeezed his hand encouragingly.
“In fact, there’s a lot I need to do. There are…dark forces afoot.” He watched her eyes widen. “Fran, I need your help…”
A few minutes later, he was out of bed, dressed in his own trousers and Fran’s clerical shirt, walking right out of the hospital with no one questioning him or stopping him or even paying him the slightest bit of attention. “Gotta love a collar,” he said to himself as the door to the main hospital exit slid open for him.
102
Marco held out his bowl and the young blonde guard spooned a ladle full of hot cereal into it. “Have a nice day!” she said, her ponytail bobbing behind her head. “Please come again.”
Marco walked over to an empty spot in the yard near the barbed wire fence and pulled his designated spoon out of his underwear. He sniffed at the cereal, uncertain as to what it might actually be. It’s too fine to be oatmeal, he thought. It’s too dark to be Cream of Wheat.
Madison sidled up to him, spoon already poised. “I am hungry as a motherfucker,” he said, scooping up a spoonful.
Encouraged, Marco tried it. It was brown and course and kind of nutty. “It’s not bad,” he said, his eyebrows shooting up. He ate more.
Madison made a face. “I’d trade my incisors for a pound of sugar.”
Cain joined them. “It’s animal feed.”
“What?” Marco asked.
“We used to feed this exact stuff to our goats on my grandfather’s farm in Nebraska.”
“No shit,” Marco said between mouthfuls.
“May I?” Cain reached for Marco’s bowl. Marco reluctantly allowed him to take it. “Gotta watch out for these fellers though.” Cain held up a tiny curled worm. “This stuff is rife with them.”
Madison spit his mouthful back into his bowl. “Motherfuckers,” he said.
Marco eyed his grain suspiciously. “They can’t hurt you, right?”
“It’s a protein source,” Cain said. He sniffed at the cereal and his grin faded.
“What?” Madison asked.
Cain sniffed again. Then he raised his hand. “Don’t eat another bite.”
Madison froze in mid-spoon.
“It’s spiked.” He sniffed some more. “It’s faint, but…I think it’s scopolamine.”
“What’s that?” Marco asked.
“It was used by the government as an early truth serum,” Cain said. “It’s easy to synthesize, and it’s been used in a rash of burglaries in Europe. We busted a guy at one the UC Berkeley labs who was making it. It’s supposed to be undetectable, but…”
“But you’re the fucking Bloodhound.” Madison punched him in the arm.
“Why would they be giving that to us?” Marco asked.
“It makes people compliant. Those cases in Europe? The perps used a powder form, they’d blow it in people’s faces, then tell them to empty their pockets, give them their ATM cards and codes, empty their safe deposit boxes. People just did what they were told—no argument, no fuss.”
“That explains a lot,” Marco said, looking around.
“It’s a low dose, but you get a steady supply of that?” Cain shook his head. “You got a pretty reliable zombie workforce.”
“Shit,” Madison swore.
“I’m glad you were able to smell that,” Marco said, “but I’m not sure what we’re going to do for food.”
“It certainly gives us a timeline for escape,” Cain said gravely.
Just then someone nearby cried out. There was a flurry of motion, and Marco instinctively backed up until his shoulders touched the barbed wire fence.
“He took my food!” Marco recognized one of the other new arrivals. The man was calling out to the guards, pointing to another new “guest” who was scarfing up cereal as quickly as possible, completely ignoring everything not contained in his bowl.
A tall, neatly dressed guard stopped serving and wordlessly walked around the table. He pulled a taser from his belt and, without warning, punched the man in the neck with it. Marco heard electricity crackle, smelled the unmistakable odor of ozone, and watched the man plummet to the dirt.
Without emotion the young man grabbed the fallen man’s collar and pulled. The fallen man moved a few inches, then the paper jumpsuit tore away from his body, leaving him exposed in his regulation briefs.
Another guard crossed the yard, and together they dragged the man to a gate. They inserted a key card and opened it. Then they dragged him out of the yard.
Marco leaned over to another “guest” who seemed to be taking little notice of the drama. “Where are they taking him?”
“Manners readjustment,” the man said without looking at them.
“Manners readjustment,” Marco repeated to Madison and Cain.
“I heard,” Madison whispered. “Shit. Gotta hold my pinky out when tea-time comes.”
Marco laughed. In spite of everything, it felt good.
“Any minute now, they’re gonna let you go,” Madison said, looking at Cain.
“Why do you say that?”
“Because you’re one of them.”
“What the fuck do you mean by that, Madison?”
“I mean you’re white, and you’re not Jewish, and you’re not poor. They’re probably going to give you a job.”
Cain chewed on that for a moment. Marco could see that Cain followed the logic. “I won’t take it.”
“If you don’t, you don’t have any chance of helping us,” Marco said.
Cain looked down. “Maybe…maybe I could go and get help.”
“Have you forgotten what it’s like out there?” Madison said. “This might be an internment camp, or concentration camp, or whatever, but is still safer than out there.”
“If you want to be drugged into zombiedom,” Marco objected.
“So we’ll be safe and we’ll be in no pain,” Madison said. “It don’t seem like too bad a deal.”
“Except for the shit we don’t know yet,” Marco said. “Like what they ultimately are gonna do with us folk that aren’t like them.”
“I can’t leave,” Cain said, turning away from them.
“Why the fuck not?” Madison asked.
Cain didn’t answer at first. When he did speak, Marco could hear the emotion in his voice. “I can’t leave because…if my son were here, he’d be in here, too—for good.”
Marco could see that the revelation was hard for him, but he didn’t understand. “How so?”
Cain pointed with his chin to two men asleep on the ground, slumped on each other’s shoulders. Marco didn’t get it at first, then he saw that they were holding hands. “Cain, is your son gay?” Marco asked.
Cain looked down, then away. “Bi,” he said, not as a shorthand, but because his voice closed halfway through the word.
“Your son is bisexual? Which means the straight world doesn’t understand him, and he's rejected by the gay community to boot,” Marco said.
“What?”
“It’s a thing,” Marco said. “Look…never mind.”
“No, I want to know. I might never have the chance to hear it from him.”
Marco’s eyes softened. He sighed. “A lot of gays discriminate against bisexuals because if they wind up with an opposite sex partner, they can pass as straight. It’s just a cluster of sour grapes.”
Cain’s brows furrowed as he took that in.
“And then a lot of gays also say that bisexuals don’t exist—that they’re just not being honest with themselves.”
“What do you think?” Cain was looking at him now.
“I think people get to say what they are, and no one else’s opinion counts for shit.” Marco placed a hand on Cain’s shoulder. “Look for what it’s worth, I have close friends who are bisexual. You’ve met both of them. Remember Susan? She got married to a great guy, Dylan, and it’s true—life is easier for her. And then there’s Richard—”
“The leader of your Order—”
“Not my Order. I’m not that crazy. I’m just friends with them. Anyway, Richard…he plays the field. And he gets his heart broke on a pretty regular basis. He’s the shit when it comes to Christian stuff and he knows his magick…but in love he’s just about the unluckiest son of a bitch I’ve ever met.” He squeezed Cain’s shoulder. “So, you know? You never know.”
“Cain,” a guard’s voice called out across the yard.
“See there? That’s a job offer right there,” Madison said. “Get your ass over there. Make your boy proud by doing something useful with your one miserable life.”
“Not gonna happen,” Cain said. “It’s white privilege.”
“Are you delusional?” Madison asked. “This is the one time I officially give you permission to use it if you got it.”
“Do it, Cain,” Marco said. “You can do more good out there than in here.”
103
Just as Brian knocked back the last of his coffee, the lights came back on.
; Maggie stood up. “Well, that’s our cue to leave the green room. It’s show time, dear.”
Brian felt a wave of dread wash through him. The fact that the lights were on meant that whatever Larch was preparing to do, he was going to do it soon. Maggie turned on the radio, and a news station filled the air with a staticky stream of commentary. “…are gathering now at the Hostess Ho Ho’s Stadium, where Commander Larch is preparing to address the nation.”
“And we know where we’re going,” Maggie said. “Although I might have guessed it.”
“How far is that?” Brian asked.
“As the crow flies, maybe three miles. But on surface streets, and with things as they are…maybe five?”
“And we’re walking?”
“Maybe we can catch the seventy-nine bus, if it’s running. We have to go by that stop anyway. Let’s give it a go.”
Her style was disarmingly free-wheeling, and it made Brian nervous. But he didn’t balk. Instead, he visited the rest room and put his gray-green jacket on. “Ready,” he announced.
They weren’t the only ones on the move. It seemed like the whole neighborhood was slowly migrating in the same direction, some in small groups, some in grim solitude. No one was terribly chatty.
They’d walked about three blocks when they heard the roar of a motor behind them. At first, Brian took no notice—it was a city, after all. But when it screeched to a stop right behind them, he turned.
A white government SUV with darkened windows brooded over them menacingly. Maggie smiled, but that didn’t mean anything. Brian was half-sure she was crazy. He froze as the door opened. He was relieved to see that the driver was a large, fleshy, hairy man that he recognized.
“Hello, Moshe,” Maggie said.
“Morning, Serah.” He looked at Brian, and although it seemed as if he might choke on the words, he managed a weak, “Morning…Brian.”
Brian smiled a warm return greeting at him.
He continued. “I thought you might like a ride. To the Stadium, that is.”
Maggie wagged her finger at him. “You just want to make sure we get there.”
“Of course I do. That’s not exactly an ulterior motive. If he ascends—”