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IT’S AS HOT as a dragon’s balls. I have my coat off and thrown over my shoulder before I’ve gone fifty yards. I don’t do outdoors. I’ll take the arena any day over this Miami damnation tanning contest.
Bava showing up and sticking her bony fingers in my skull really threw me at the end. If something has gone wrong and I’m stuck in an afterlife cow town somewhere between Nowhere and Fuck All it could be my fault.
Alice was a mole feeding the Sub Rosa intel about my life and me? I don’t buy it. That’s exactly the kind of psyops party trick Mason would come up with. Then he’d get Aelita to tell Bava because she’s security and security believes anything a superior or a halo tells them.
I don’t believe it, but the angel won’t shut up about it. I think the Black Dahlia might have shaken something loose in its head. I’m the unreasonable one in this Laurel and Hardy act, but it’s jabbering away in a frantic stream of What if? Could it be? And that explains everything.
Maybe the angel can’t deal with being on this side of death or whatever this is. Have I blown its tiny feathered brain? This treasure hunt was going to be hard enough with Little Mary Sunshine whispering to me, but it’s going to be a whole lot worse if I end up with a crazy person trying to claw his way out of my skull.
The simple truth of it is that Alice couldn’t be a mole. I would have felt it if she was Sub Rosa. Alice is the only person I never bullshitted or lied to. She’s the only person I ever really trusted. That means if she was what Bava says and I missed it, everything I’ve ever believed about my life or myself is wrong.
My human father, the one stuck with the lousy job of raising me after a certain angel called Kinski knocked up my mom, hated me. He even took a shot at me once when we were deer hunting. So much for the father-son three-leg race at the church picnic.
My mother loved me, but was lost at sea most of the time when I was growing up. The drinking and pills didn’t help. I don’t remember a single moment when she didn’t seem lonely. She jumped at every sound in the yard or at the door like she was expecting someone who was never there.
There’s Vidocq, who’s been more of a fatherend of a f to me than my civilian father or Kinski. He’s the only other person I trust as much as Alice. Trusted.
I don’t see how Bava’s bullshit could be true, but Alice did hold out on me at least once. One night she told me that she was rich and that she came from heavy money. She never said much else about her family, but I always took that to mean she was as far from hers as I was from mine. Was she about to confess that all that filthy lucre came from Daddy’s late-night infomercial magic-wand business or youth potions from Elizabeth Báthory’s blood?
Goddammit. How could I let Bava get to me like this? Was she throwing some hoodoo at me when we talked? No. I would have felt it, and if I didn’t, the angel in my head would. It has to be a mind game and I’m ashamed that it’s worked. Or maybe the bitch was telling me the truth.
And where in the goddamn middle of for fuck’s sake am I? Is Mustang Sally in on Mason’s cosmic scam? If there even is a scam.
Calm down. Deep breaths. Go to your happy place. Oh, wait. I don’t have one. Slow down and think, but thinking is supposed to be the angel’s job. Nice time to stop taking your pills, Saint Acid Test.
Fuck me, it’s hot here.
There isn’t even a decent enough shadow so I can slink into the Room and go home.
Maybe I’ll get lucky and there will be a postcard stand somewhere. “Dear Everyone. Hope you don’t mind being doomed. Xoxo Stark.”
The road disappears ahead. A dune has blown across it like the wall of a sand fortress. If the desert has eaten the rest of the road, things are about to get really interesting.
The dune is soft and loose. I can’t walk. I have to crawl up it. It’s slow and hot with the coat draped over my shoulder. I move one hand. One foot. The other hand. The other foot. If this is a joke and Sisyphus is waiting at the top to hand me his boulder, he can kiss my ass.
Halfway up and I’m getting very pissed off. The angel is freaking out and the clock is ticking. Even if Mason is lying about having Alice and just wants me chasing my tail all over Hell, I need to know. It means that he’s ready to make his move on Heaven.
If I ever get out of here, I’m going to find whichever angel invented sand and make it eat this fucking desert while getting a Tabasco enema.
I reach up and get a handful of air. I’m at the top of the dune. I was right. The road is gone. But it doesn’t matter.
Holy shit.
I think I just found the Garden of Eden. There’s probably a soda machine and I left all my cash in L.A.
I stumble down the side of the he side ofmonster dune toward the acres of cool green grass and sparkling waterfalls.
The gates in front are dazzling in the desert sun. I don’t know what they’re made of, but they shine brighter than anything I’ve ever seen on earth, but the reflection doesn’t hurt my eyes. It’s like the gates have an internal glow that evens out the sun. Even the chains holding them shut are glowing.
There’s a lone angel to one side of the gate. He’s like one of those Buckingham Palace guards. He stands like an idiot statue staring straight ahead at attention, like a filthy, sweating madman didn’t just stumble in off the Mojave. I wonder how long he’s been there. I put my coat back on to cover up some of the dirt and walk over to him.
“My GPS is out, but the AAA guide said there was a Denny’s around here. Is this it?”
The angel doesn’t move. I get in front of him and stick my face right into his. Close enough that our noses touch. Nothing. If I wasn’t trying to stop the destruction of the universe, I could waste some time giving this guy a hotfoot or starting a tickle contest, but duty and getting out of this sun calls.
Mom always told me that God helps those who help themselves, so I head for the gates. I grab hold of the chains holding them closed and take out the black blade. Before I can swing it, the angel turns into a speeding blur and slams his shoulder into me like a supersonic linebacker. I go flying back to the dune.
He looks a little surprised when I get to my feet, but manages to stay in character, spreading his wings and pointing at me in that superior my-shit-smells-like-blueberry-muffins way angels have. His armor glows with the same light as the gates. His voice is low, louder than the cop bullhorn, and echoing. I wonder if heaven issues every angel its own reverb unit.
