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Alice comes over to me.
“Are you all right?”
“Yeah. I think so. I don’t know.”
I give Vehuel a look. She’s enjoying tormenting me just a little too much for my taste.
“Why are you telling me all this? What does it matter if I remember Henoch Breach or not?”
“I think they need you,” says Traven. “You can’t get the Light Killer, can you?”
Vehuel nods.
“It’s not for angels of the Lord to retrieve the Lux Occisor. It’s Lucifer’s job.”
“I’m not Lucifer anymore,” I say.
“I was being polite. It’s a job for an Abomination.”
There it is. A dirty job for a dirty guy. She had a good time saying it, too. “What if I don’t do it? What if I tell you all to fuck off, and find a way back to Pandemonium myself?”
“Jim,” says Alice. “Please.”
Vehuel says, “That’s an option, of course. And you’re right, but remember this. Without the sword, the war will go on. And God—Mr. Muninn, as you like to call him—will lose. The loss of Heaven, and the final and irrevocable damnation of all mortal souls, fallen, and loyal angels will lie squarely on your shoulders.”
I look around at everyone. Daja is confused and scared. The Magistrate is practically licking his lips he’s so excited. Traven looks overwhelmed seeing an obscure story in his obscure books coming true. Hell isn’t Hell. The Devil isn’t the Devil. Next you’ll tell me that Mickey Mouse is just a guy in a costume.
The looks on the angels’ faces range from bemused to angry and, in the case of Alice, worried.
“I told you this was a real-estate scam. You’re a hard-sell bastard.”
“It was necessary.”
“You enjoyed it.”
“A bit.”
“I was right. All you angels are assholes.”
“By your definition, yes,” she says.
I look around, trying to figure an angle, but I can’t find it any more than I can find a way home. It hits me hard that I’m probably really stuck here, that maybe my whole life has been manipulated to put me here at this moment.
“Fuck. Okay. I hate you celestials, you know.”
Vehuel cocks an eyebrow.
“Even Alice?”
I look away for a minute. Rub a knot at the back of my neck.
“Talk to me like that again and I’ll let Heaven and all the rest of it fall just to watch you burn.”
“Jim, please,” says Alice.
When I turn back Vehuel tries to stare me down. It doesn’t work. She needs me.
“Very well,” she says reluctantly. “Please accept my apology.”
