by Paul Neuhaus
Yellen nodded and flicked on the slide projector. For a moment, the image couldn’t be discerned because it was projected onto the man rather than the screen. The Israeli stepped out of the way and Henaghan saw the slide. It was a symbol. Like a “Y” with a vertical upstroke between the two diagonal ones. “You guys brought me here to market-test your logo?” Henaghan said. “It needs work.”
The bald man grinned. Quinn could tell he liked her. Hooray for her. “We are selling a product,” he said. “A world without magic.” He pointed at the projected image. “This is the sign of the Hexenjäger. As a group we’ve existed since the uprising against the Asura. Hexenjäger is a German word from, God, who knows when? Most of us like the sound of it so it’s survived into modern times. It rolls right off the tongue. I like it myself, despite it’s Teutonic origins.”
“‘Witch Hunter’,” the redhead said, translating the term.
Uriah nodded. “I don’t know how much history you know. Most modern Tilted and Resolute consider the Hexenjäger little more than a footnote. They’ve been able to do that with impunity for centuries—we have not been as effective as we would like to have been. But that is about to change.”
Based on the fancy handcuffs, Quinn realized Yellen might not be wrong. His was a significant threat. “I’d like to say I’m impressed,” she said, her voice more or less back to normal. “You know what’s hanging me up, though?”
Yellen shook his head.
“It’s the slide projector. What’re you guys doing, a tour of the local high schools? ‘The Hexenjäger and You’.”
The Israeli glared at her for a moment. “No, we’re not doing that, but it is an idea worth considering. A community outreach program might help our cause.”
Next to Quinn, Matt Abrigo laughed. She could at last turn her head to look at him. She wished his good looks didn’t obscure the fact that he was a dick.
The disfigured man pushed the slide projector closer to the screen so that it made an enormous Hexenjäger symbol on the white surface. Matt stood up and walked away to Quinn’s right. From near the side wall, he pushed what looked like a dentist’s chair so that it sat in front of the screen. Meanwhile, the man Yellen had called Zvi grabbed a cart of instruments from where it had stood by the chair. He wheeled this over so that it was between the chair and Uriah. The sight of the cart with its multitude of sharp, shiny objects caused a momentary panic attack in Quinn. Barry Faber had had a similar cart in his basement.
“Alright, gentlemen,” the Israeli said. “Get her up.”
As they’d done in the parking lot at Celestial Pictures, the three men lifted Henaghan up and carried her. She’d gotten back enough control of her body to wriggle but little else. They put her in the chair without incident. Turns out what the girl had taken to be a dentist’s chair was, in fact, a dentist chair. Quinn recognized many of the instruments on Yellen’s cart. After she was down, Giulio rolled another chair over. This one was for Uriah to sit in.
“Have you ever seen the movie Marathon Man?” Yellen said, taking a seat.
Of course Henaghan had seen Marathon Man. For years, films were her stock in trade. 1976. Dustin Hoffman. Laurence Olivier. Roy Schneider. Directed by John Schlesinger. Obviously, the Israeli man was referring to the famous “Is it safe?” scene. In that scene, Olivier, playing a Nazi war criminal, tortures Hoffman with creative dentistry.
Uriah pushed closer to the girl’s chair then stopped to glare at his assistants. “Put her in the chair correctly, please.”
Abrigo and the others worked quickly. They unsnapped one of her bracelets and left it to dangle. Then they fastened her wrists to the dentist chairs armrests with leather straps. They forced down her head and affixed a harness that kept her locked in place and able to look only forward. Again, shades of Faber. But this restraint had a new wrinkle, it also forced her mouth open.
The trio of men backed away and Yellen closed the distance between himself and Quinn. “I am aware, of course, of your recent history,” he said. “I’m thinking of your imprisonment and near-death experience at the hands of the so-called ‘Woman’s Agent’.” Faber’s nickname. “I suspect you survived that encounter by entering into your captor’s mind and destroying it. Can you do that with me?”
Henaghan tried to reach out with her consciousness, but even the single handcuff around her right wrist was enough to inhibit her Channeling. She shook her head no as much as she could within the constraints of her restricted head movement.
“Good,” Yellen said. “Let’s begin.” He was meticulous. He looked over his instruments before beginning the task at hand. “I was an oral surgeon in Tel Aviv before I acquired this injury,” he said. “I was wealthy, I was respected, and I attracted the attention of many women. I know that surprises you given my current Quasimodo-esque appearance, but it’s true.” He leaned over her and she could see that, in his hand was a mirror on a handle and another tool which ended in a small fang-like hook. The man stopped short when he looked into the girl’s mouth. “Oh,” he said. “Your oral health is exemplary. Good show.” He leaned in further still and jammed his instruments into her. He poked at her gums for a moment and Quinn squirmed, but, so far it was no worse than a regular cleaning. “Okay,” the former surgeon said. “I’m going to poke you here, slowly. When it begins to hurt, I want you to raise your left hand.” With that, he followed through, sticking the hook between two of her lower front teeth and pushing down. Very quickly, the girl raised her left hand. “Really? There?” Yellen said. Then he jammed the hook in quickly so that it was completely inside of her gum. Quinn cried out—which was hard to do with two large hands in her mouth. She would’ve bitten down if the harness around her head had not prevented it. In any case, her limited range of movement was not enough to dislodge the Israeli’s tool. As quickly as he’d jammed it in, Uriah yanked the hook out. “Where is the key?” he said, and Henaghan knew that he was mimicking Laurence Olivier’s cadence when the actor had said, “Is it safe?”
Tears were already streaming down the sides of Quinn’s face. She took a sharp breath, but said nothing.
Yellen put down his hook and picked up another instrument. The girl could no longer see the rolling table and the not knowing made things worse. He stopped with both hands suspended over her chest. He looked up. “Would you like to be excused, Matthew?”
“Yes, please,” Abrigo said.
Uriah nodded, sending the younger man off. “Isn’t that funny?” he said. “Matthew is squeamish.” Without further comment, he jammed something between the tooth he’d just been working on and the one next to it. For Quinn, it was like having a hot wire shoved through her gum and quickly fed downward through the rest of her body. Again, she bucked but to little avail. “I’m concentrating on this specific area,” her tormentor said. “As you Americans say, It’s a glass is half-empty scenario. The injury site will bother you for days and days but the rest of your mouth will be fine.” He pulled the tool out quickly and jammed it back in again. He was very practiced at his art. He took the mirror out of her mouth and turned his upper body so that he faced the tray—all without removing the little blade from between her teeth. He picked something up off of the tray and turned again to face her. He placed whatever it was he’d acquired into her open jaw and squeezed it. A warm liquid flowed onto the place where he had his instrument inserted. The pain nearly made Henaghan lose consciousness. “Simple rubbing alcohol,” Yellen said. “It hurts like hell and it tastes terrible but, in moderation, there will be no ill effects.” He pulled the blade out again and said, “Where is the key?”
Quinn gasped several times before she found her voice. When she did, she said, “I gave it to your mother last night. When I fucked her in the asshole.”
The ex-surgeon grinned with genuine mirth. “Ah, yes. I forgot that you made your home on the Isle of Lesbos. How was she? My mother I mean. Israeli women are known for their vigor and stamina. I suspect my mother enjoyed your… anal conquest.” One of the
men still in attendance—either Zvi or Giulio—laughed. Uriah picked up more tools. He moved toward her again and paused. “Where is the key?” he said.
Before Henaghan could answer, she was cut off by a cultured voice out of sight and in the direction of the van. “You’re starting to sound rather like a broken record,” it said.
Then chaos erupted. Quinn could not see most of what took place but she heard a great deal. The scrambling of feet. The instrument cart falling. The sound of fire burning the air. It was all over in moments. The girl felt a searing heat at her wrists, head and feet. Fire consumed her restraints. After a moment, she got to a seated position. She looked around. There were two bodies on the floor, badly damaged. Zvi and Giulio. Scorch marks shot out in many directions, marking both the walls and floor.
Floating in front of her, a golden sun painted on his forehead, was David Bowie. “Owed you that,” he said with a smile.
“Holy shit,” Quinn said. Still short of breath.
“There were two other men here, your dentist and another. I’m afraid they got away.”
“That’s okay,” Henaghan said, rubbing her wrists. “Right now, you’re my absolute favorite person in the world.”
Bowie descended and said, “Here.” With a flick of his wrist, he shot a curvy tendril of flame. It wrapped itself around Quinn’s remaining handcuff bracelet and snapped it open. The device was meant to inhibit her access to maya but it couldn’t do diddly to other Channelers. She stopped and picked up the two halves. “Are you okay?” the pop star said. Apart from the sun on his forehead, he looked very normal. His hair was blonde rather than orange and he wore a suit—a dated suit, but a suit nonetheless.
“I will be,” Henaghan said, moving around the back of the white van and reclaiming her purse. She dropped the pieces of her handcuffs into it and turned to face the Brit.
“You got away by the skin of your teeth,” Bowie said. The girl groaned but smiled. “I’ll remain here until you’re away.”
Quinn went over and hugged Bowie. Like many Englishman, he seemed embarrassed by unexpected bodily contact and obvious gratitude. “Really,” she said to him. “You’re a prince.” She dropped her arms and took two steps back. She could still see him as the light of her portal enveloped her.
Quinn reappeared next to her Prius in the lot near Celestial Pictures. The door was still open, and she was relieved to find that nothing was gone. Her teeth hurt and she was bone-tired. All she wanted to do was go home, take a Tylenol and get into bed. As she got out her key and bent to enter the vehicle, a voice from behind her said, “Please put your hands up, Miss Henaghan.”
The redhead turned and saw Pietro Laskov pointing a gun at her. He still had two black eyes from their last encounter. He looked small and desperate. “Aren’t you a Channeler?” she said.
Laskov ignored the question. “If the locker key is on your person, you will give it to me. If it’s not on your person, you will drive me to where it is, and you will give it to me.”
“Really though? A gun? Isn’t that a little crude?”
Again, he ignored her. He made a jabbing movement with the pistol, indicating she should get on with it.
“Alright,” she said. “Get in.” She allowed the European to get into the car first then she followed suit. When she was seated, she looked over and saw him pointing his gun at her and looking sullen. “Put your seatbelt on.”
“That won’t be necessary,” he replied.
“Maybe not in whatever backwater hole you come from, but here in the U S of A we wear fucking seatbelts.” Henaghan was very nearly at the end of her rope.
“I’m from Crimea,” Laskov replied. “It’s a lovely country.” But he put on his seatbelt.
Quinn pulled out of the parking lot and took a left on Cahuenga Drive toward Hollywood proper. “What do you think?” she said. “Should I get on the 101 or should I take surface streets?”
“I’m certain I don’t care,” the little man said.
“Mmm. 101. It’s early still. Not much traffic. So… I have a question. You’re a Channeler, I can feel it. Any reason why I’ve never seen you Channel? Lack of confidence? Feelings of inadequacy? Like maybe you won’t measure up.”
“I studied psychoanalytics at university,” he said, his tone flat. “If you want to ask about the size of my penis, do it directly.”
“Mr. Laskov,” Henaghan said. “How big is your penis?”
Pietro was stopped short by the question as well as the incongruous way his gun was disassembling itself in mid-air. Each one of the pieces moved to the the side as it came away until the whole looked like an exploded view from a textbook on small arms. Soon, the only part left that Laskov could lay claim to was the grip still in his right hand. He gasped but didn’t have time to frame a question or take action. As before, he was enveloped in light and taken elsewhere. That elsewhere was a spot in the road about thirty yards behind the Prius. Quinn looked in her rearview mirror to see the little man scrambling to get out of the middle of the Hollywood Freeway. As she’d said, traffic was light and Pietro would make it to the median. She wasn’t sure how she felt about that. She got off at the next exit and the pieces of Laskov’s gun all fell into the passenger seat.
Quinn’s mouth hurt like hell.
Quinn pulled into the parking lot of her apartment complex and got out of the Prius, her oversized bag in tow. From her right, she heard two voices.
“Damn girl!” Ferley said.
“You look like warmed-over dog shit,” Nate said.
Henaghan wanted to get inside and sleep but this was an opportunity. She walked over to the Tilted man and the Resolute man (though she still wasn’t sure which was which), and took the broken handcuffs out of her purse. She could feel the object’s dampening powers through the metal. “Either of you guys know what this is?” she said.
Nate and Ferley looked at one another and then back at Quinn. “Those’re handcuffs,” Ferley said.
“Is that how you got yourself looking like this?” Nate asked with a wink.
“I hope you had a safety word.”
“‘Banana’,” Ferley said, and Nate nodded.
Henaghan smiled in spite of her fatigue. “Here,” she said. She handed the cuffs to Nate.
After a moment, Nate said, “What’m I supposed to be— Waitaminute. What the fuck?” His expression grew more serious and he handed the broken bracelets to Ferley.
Ferley held the cuffs for a moment and said, “This thing’s a dampener.”
The girl pointed at her nose then at Ferley.
“Where’d you get these?” Nate said.
“I had them slapped on me by some Hexenjägers.”
Again, the two men looked at one another then back at Quinn. “Shut the fuck up,” Ferley said.
“It’s true. They wanted to know where I put the locker key?”
“You tell ‘em?” Nate said.
Henaghan rolled her eyes. “No, I didn’t fucking tell them.”
Ferley leaned in a little. “This is some next-level shit. This could be a serious problem.”
“True,” Nate added. “The Hexenjägers ain’t been nothing for—well, forever. This marks a change.”
“Do you mind if we send these back to headquarters?”
“I do,” Quinn said, holding out her hand. “At least for now.”
Ferley returned the broken cuffs and the redhead put them back into her purse. “Sorry we don’t know more,” he said.
Henaghan nodded and turned to go to her apartment. Nate called after her, “Hey, if you had those on you, who burned ‘em off?”
“David Bowie.”
“Isn’t he dead?”
“It’s a long story.”
When Quinn got to the top of the second flight of stairs, Simone Gros was coming out of her apartment. After she finished locking the door, the heavyset woman turned and gave a small cry. “Oh,” Simone said. “I didn’t see you there. You startled me. I didn’t—” She stopped and too
k a closer look at Quinn. “Oh my, what happened?!”
Henaghan hadn’t seen herself in the mirror, but she figured she must, indeed, look like warmed-over dog shit. “It’s been a rough morning,” she replied.
Gros pivoted and unlocked her door again. She popped it open and grabbed Quinn by her bicep. “Come in. Come in at once.”
The younger woman started to protest but decided she didn’t have the strength. She allowed Simone to usher her into the apartment and place her on the couch.
Gros shut the door and called out, “Arnold!”
The door to the kitchen opened a crack and Ristich’s head appeared.
“Our friend here has had a trying time. Put on some tea.” She looked down at Quinn. “Are you hungry?”
Henaghan thought for a moment. Actually, she was hungry but the idea of biting down on anything with her teeth made her shiver. “If you have some pudding…” she said, half joking.
“Of course we have pudding,” Simone replied. “I am fat.”
“Tea and pudding for two?” Ristich said.
“Please.”
Gros sat down opposite Quinn. “Is there anything else you need?” she said.
Quinn shook her head.
“Alright then. You must tell me about your morning.”
The redhead breathed in and held it. She wasn’t sure how much she should say to Simone. The woman seemed innocuous but she was, after all, an Asura. “I— An article recently came into my possession that… many people seem to want. I’ve been… inundated with requests for it.”
“Mmm. Does this have anything to do with the strange men surveilling our parking lot?”
Henaghan nodded.
“Does it have anything to do with the man in the coat and his strange friends carrying a body down our stairwell a few days ago?”
“You saw them?”
“Yes. The circumstance was much as it was today. I came out of my apartment and there were three odd fellows carrying an older man down the stairs. They frightened me half to death. When I asked them what was going on, the good-looking one (the other two were nondescript and rather thuggish) said that his father had gotten himself drunk again and that he and his friends were doing the old geezer a good turn. Something about that didn’t seem right to me.”