War-N-Wit, Inc. – MeanStreet, LLC (11 page)

“
Go Jim Dandy…squawk!
Oh, yeah, they jumped straight in that magic box with ‘em right ‘afore it slammed shut.”

“First good news I’ve heard all day.”

“Micah?” Spike cut in. “The
cat
?”

“
That cat’s not an ordinary cat. Pretty sure Ari knows more about that than she’s been ready to tell me yet. Personally, I got a suspicion he’s not always a cat.”

“Everybody needs to stop talking over there and give me a minute to
think
!”

“
Too bad. I’ve already
thought
, G. Demon boy’s gonna send us through before he finishes sliming to death. Now you know where we’ll be so some back-up would be nice if you think you can handle that!”

“Magic Man,
wait just a damn min—
” The phone clicked off.

“Well,” Gabriel said as he pocketed the phone. “That coulda gone a lot better.”

Rafael’s voice cut through the darkness. “Gabe! Mike! Found a way in! Move your damn wings and let’s go have a talk with brother Lucy!”

* * *

“Okay, Demon Boy. How’d you send ‘em through?”

“The box! The box on stage!”

Bob Anson finally broke out of his shock.

“
Wait just a damn minute here! You two mean to tell me Ari’s book is
real
? That magic shit? She’s a
witch?
And so is Stacy? And from that call, the two of you are—
warlocks?
”

“Yes, sir. Sorry to break it to you like this.”

“Well, damn. That explains a lot. Especially about Grace.”

“Sir?”

“Explains why every time she gets really pissed at me, all the pictures fall off the wall. All the picture frames have that plastic stuff. None of ‘em have glass. We damn near went broke replacin’ picture frames the first couple of years we were married.”

“Glad we cleared that up for you, Bob.
Now, before we head to that box I need some answers. Why’d you send ‘em through? And how many have you sent? What does your kind do with humans?”

“They—”

“Human slaves power our world,” Irene spat out. “And if you go through, you’ll
die
!”

“I wouldn’t make any bets on that, sweetheart. Power your world? How? What do you do with them?”

“The weak-minded work the mines, good for nothing else. That’s most of them. The stronger ones—”

“Irene,
shut up!
”

“You shut up or I’ll shoot you in what passes for your balls. Might not be the right spot but I’ll keep trying till I hit it.
Keep talking, Irene.”

“Irene! Don’t be more of a damn idiot than you usually are!”

“My name’s
not
Irene! It’s Raxchanxchn! Your name’s
not
Damien! It’s Xanchoxn! And don’t tell me what to do!”

“You two
really are the love story of the century, aren’t you? I’m waiting, Irene. What do you use the stronger ones for?”

Irene shot a sideways glance at Damien
and shut down the information pipeline. “For something else.”

“What?”

“To work some other power source, I don’t know the details! I’m not one of the techno-geeks!”

“How many? Over how many years?”

“Do I look like a history professor? I don’t know how long. Forever. Back to the beginning. How many? No idea. A lot, I guess, I mean, it’s been going on forever. We don’t take many at a time, not even enough for anybody to notice. I don’t know what the big deal is. Humans are so selfish.”

Chad’s jaw muscles twitched. So did the muscles in the hand holding the gun.
He reached into an inside pocket of his jacket and pulled out two rolls of duct tape. “Spike, I got both of ‘em covered. Hand your gun to Bob and do the honors on Demon Girl. We don’t need her out there with us, he’ll be enough to handle. Besides, I think she’s more dangerous than he is.”

“
Coulda’ used that back in the day.” Harold peered down from Chad’s shoulder. “Travel-size duct tape!”"

“They make travel-size
everything these days. Much easier to carry than cuffs.”

“
You know, mate,” Harold observed while Spike secured Irene. “She’s got those same slimy wavy tentacles he does. Only seen ‘em sort of unzip themselves and hang the skins up, but wouldn’t surprise me much if they could just bust straight out of it, you twig? Don’t quite think even duct tape’d hold her then.”

“Voila! Done!” Spike stepped back and checked his handiwork.

Chad motioned for Damien to walk in front of him. “Okay, move it. Wouldn’t surprise me either, Harold. And that’s why she’s taking a little nap while we’re conducting business. Goodnight, Irene.” The gun butt connected with the back of Irene’s head and she went out like a light.

“Wait a minute! He’s dripping slime. Cover me.” Spike stripped a couple of pillowcases off the pillow
s on the dressing room’s day bed, slipped them over the smelly mass of shredded tentacles and duct-taped them to the magician’s forearms. “Okay. What if a cleaning crew’s already in the club?”

“Won’t be, mate.
Besides, curtains’ll be closed.”

“Harold, you’re a good man to have around. Let’s move.”

Chapter Fifteen

Stacy and I stared at our mother. Some damn.

“So
that’s
where we came from!” Stacy exclaimed.

“Yeah, well, while the octopodes are over there untang
ling themselves, we might oughta move our asses somewhere else!” I pointed over to the tangled mound of tentacles, tugging and pulling on each other as they tried to unknot.

Meooowwww!!

Micah wound rapidly around my legs and then shot straight out into that bluish swirl of smoky fog that seemed to stretch for miles, the smaller cat hard on his tail.

“Okay!” I called after him. “But you’ve
still
got a lot of explainin’ to do!”

“But Ari, dear, what do we do now?” Mom asked.

“What I do best, Mom.
Follow that cat!
”

* * *

Bob Anson measured the magic box with his eyes. “Well, it’ll be tight, but I think all three of us can fit in.”

“Bob, you can’t go through with us,” Chad said.

“What the hell you mean I can’t go through? My girls and my
wife
went through! You think I’m too old to be any use over there?”

Spike put a hand on Bob’s shoulder.
“You’re too pissed to think straight, man. Use your head. Somebody’s got to watch him while we’re going through. Afterwards, too, and the other one’s not gonna stay out all that long. You might not have noticed but Harold over there can’t exactly hold a gun on ‘em. No hands.”

Harold flew off Chad’s shoulder and landed on Bob’s.
“’E’s right, mate. ‘E also serves who only stands and waits and all that rot. That’s you and me, mate. Guard duty.”

“One of you can—”

“Bob. I’ve done this sort of thing my whole life. We need you and Harold to take care of this side and each other. Harold, you understand what I’m saying?”

“
Squawk!
You can count on me, mate! Bob’s in good hands. Wings. Whatever.
Squawk!
”

“I need Spike with me,
Bob, he’s not your ordinary doctor, he had a whole ’nother career before and during med school.”

“
And I was trained by the best for this stuff. By my brother. You gotta let us go, Bob. And you gotta stay here.”

“Shit. Yeah, okay.”

Chad reached down to his ankle and pulled his back-up gun. “Here. You know how to use it?”

“Damn, how many of those things you got? Yeah, don’t travel in your circles, but I know how to use a gun. Pretty good shot, actually.”

“Good. Use it if you need to. So let’s get this show on the road.” Chad and Spike got in the box. “Demon Boy?”

“Enter the box and take a magical carpet ride—”

“Can the crap and just
do
it!”

“Okay, okay!”

Damien moved close and hit a button on the side of the box with his elbow. His hands weren’t much use at the moment. The box just sat there.

“I still got the gun, Demon Boy!”

He raised his elbow again and jabbed at the button. “I’m trying! Maybe my elbow’s too big to push it in right!”

“Show it to Bob!”

Bob moved over, gun carefully aimed.

“There! Right there!”

Bob reached out and felt the side. “Yeah, it’s a button. You’d never know it was there if you just didn’t know it.”

“Just push it! Like an elevator button!
That’s all there is to it. This is just an
elevator
between the worlds.”

Bob pushed. Again. And again.

“I can feel it going in. It’s just not doing anything.”

“Demon Boy!”

“I don’t know anything else to do! It’s not
moving!
The door must still be open on the other side.”

“Why would it still be open?”

“
I don’t know!
They unload the cargo, they close the door, it’s ready for next time. That’s all I can tell you, I’m not a freakin’
scientist
, for crying out loud, I don’t know how the damn thing works!”

“Shit, damn,
hell!
Okay, out!” Chad and Spike got out. “So if the door’s not closed—”

“It means the girls are out of the damn thing on the other side,” said Spike. “But the
locals haven’t closed the door. Probably because they can’t.”

“
Because the girls didn’t work out quite like they planned.”

“
Hell, no. They don’t play well with others.”

Spike laughed. “And that’s just Ari and Stacy. If something happened to trigger Grace, and she’s as powerful as your man Gabriel claims—”

“Furniture’s flown across the room a few times,” Bob volunteered. “But she’s got to be really pissed for that to happen. And usually hungry, too, come to think of it.”

“A pissed, hungry witch is not a good combination. That was Ari’s trigger for the mind control thing the first time.”

Bob smiled. “Tell you what, guys. They tried to lay a hand on one of
Grace’s girls—I’d say those demons are getting a new definition of Hell.”

“Okay, back to the dressing room. Move it!”

“Let me!” Bob stepped forward and motioned Damien forward with his gun. “Start walkin’, bud.”

Spike leaned closer to Chad’s ear as Bob moved in front of them. “
Lot to leave Bob with, watching both of them, don’t you think?”

“
You know damn well I was gonna blow Damien’s head off before that door closed and Harold was gonna get Bob out and away from here. Wanted to blow Irene’s off back in the dressing room but I didn’t want to freak Demon Boy out of his mind.”

“
He’d of probably thanked you. But nice to know you haven’t gone soft on me. I was beginning to wonder. What now?”

“Damned if I know.
Let’s get back to the dressing room and see if we can get Demon Boy to tell us something about the other side before we try again.”

* * *

I grabbed Mom’s right hand, Stacy grabbed her left, and we charged out into that swirling blue fog like Olympian runners. Demons weren’t yapping at our heels at the moment, but they would be soon enough. Flashes of black raced in front of us, setting the course. The fog began to lighten, and I saw we were running on stark and barren ground, like the backdrops on old episodes of
The Twilight Zone,
the sci-fi ones set on alien planets. Outcroppings of bare boulders decorated the landscape and hills loomed in the distance. So this was a flat plateau, surrounded by hills. Not mountains exactly, but not small, either. Foothills. Good battle terrain, if we could get to the top. And how the hell did I know that and where did such crazy thoughts come from when one was running for their life? Of course. Livia, one of my past lives. It’d been Livia’s subconscious memories who’d made me stop at that display of faux-jeweled sandals, styled after the old Roman sandals, that now shod our feet, I’d bet Pine Whisper Plantation on it. I shuddered to think of this run in spike heels or backless shoes.

The flashes of black veered to the right. We followed and the ground began to incline,
not much at first, then increasing at a steep angle, winding into the rocks. A natural stairway into the hills. The hills we needed for tactical advantage. I wasn’t in bad shape, Mom jogged every morning and Stacy was a natural athlete, but even she was beginning to pant by the time we gained the sheltered circle of rock at the top of this foothill. A natural clearing opened out of the rock, sheltered from view but affording a vantage point over the plateau and the surrounding foothills.