Tim Marquitz - Echoes of the Past

Once I made it to the spot I’d spied from down the road, I sounded the debarkation chuckle and dumped Venai on her fabric-stuffed ass. She hit the ground with a meaty thud that had to hurt. She pretty much confirmed it when she jumped to her feet-conveniently keeping me out of the crosshairs of her fellow agents-and took a swing at me. I ducked the first and let my fingers do the walking one more time; into the holes of the manhole cover I’d stopped over. I popped up as she swung again, her puffy cheeks crimson.

I raised the steel cover and braced. Her fist crashed into it and I heard what sounded like popcorn. All the bones in her hand and wrist, and quite possibly her forearm, snapped on impact. She shrieked and set my ears to ringing. I raised the manhole cover over my head and booted her square in the twins. She flew back a good fifty feet. I figured that would be far enough. It was.

The asshole with the RPG, who’d been waiting for Venai to move, let loose with another round. I stood still until it was close and tossed a magical shield up. It wasn’t anywhere near enough to stop it, but it was solid enough to trigger the warhead. As soon as it blew up, I dropped into the sewers and pulled the steel lid down behind me. It latched into place with a metallic thunk and I fell into the wet muck below.

The grenade thundered above and shook the ground, causing bubbles of stink-water to jump up and douse me good. I suddenly regretted losing my hoodie. It was by far the better scent. It probably tasted better, too. Something gritty and pungent crunched between my teeth and I wished I’d have thought to keep my mouth shut when I jumped in.

No time to worry about the consistency of peoples’ lunches or whether I’d find corn in my teeth later, I hurried through the tunnels, randomly taking right and lefts to throw off any pursuit. It’d probably take the DSI a little while to figure out where I went, my departure hidden behind the explosion, but at some point they’d be after me. However, if I was lost in the sewers, it was a pretty good bet they wouldn’t be able to find me.

Now all I had to worry about was the smell killing me.

~

It’s a good thing my expectations are low. I set out to lose myself in the sewers and that was exactly what I did. Mission accomplished. You’d think I’d know the place better as often as my mind visits.

After about an hour and a half, I stumbled across some sewer folk who kindly pointed the way out for a mere fifty bucks. I don’t know what I felt more violated by: the nasty grit that invaded my ass crack or the cackling old men who’d raped my wallet. It was a tossup. At least they’d stuck to their part of the deal and didn’t send me off to die in the dank, smelly deeps. Following their directions, I found a ladder that led to another manhole cover. I just hoped I hadn’t circled around to the same one I’d come in through. That would really suck.

Just as I latched onto the rung to climb out, the static of a telepathic connection sprung alive inside my head.

“Frank?” Katon’s voice sounded loud and clear.

Never comfortable carrying on these kinds of conversations in my mind, too many disturbingly errant topics popping up, I moved away from the ladder and down the tunnel a bit to make sure no one lurking above could hear me.

“Go ahead.” I felt a strange sense of serendipity that I belonged under the earth, talking to myself.

“I’ve been searching everywhere for Scarlett, but I haven’t found her. Raguel said he hasn’t either, not since shortly after you met with them. He has the angels on it, but he can’t spare too many to hunt her down with all the drama in Heaven.”

“Damn it.” I was gonna kick that angel’s ass if Scarlett turned up hurt. “We’ve got to find her. Mihheer might not be the toughest guy she’s faced, but he’s sneaky. She doesn’t deal with sneaky well.”

I heard Katon huff. “I won’t stop searching.”

“Good.” Katon was on it. “I need to stop in Hell real quick, so I’ll set some dread fiends on the hunt. Maybe that’ll help. I figure the big alien is still somewhere down there.”

“In Hell?” Katon’s voice sharpened.

It hit me right then that I hadn’t told Katon what I’d suspected when I ran down to warn Baalth. “Yeah, what’s up?”

“Rachelle told me she’d detected a new dimensional portal opening down there a short while ago. I didn’t think much about it because it started near Lucifer’s old chambers and looped back into Hell all of a sudden, as if somebody had split the wall just to travel to the other side.”

That was Mihheer. The alien’s magic must have short circuited the wards that kept Baalth’s portal from being detected. Rachelle must have picked it up right before it closed. “Was she able to track it?”

“I didn’t ask for specifics, but she seemed to know the location.”

“Find out. If Gorath and Mihheer have Scarlett, that’s where we’ll find them.

“I’ll get the location and meet you in Hell.”

“Come to Lucifer’s chambers…and bring me some bullets.”

I heard him mutter a quick affirmative and the connection was severed. My breath cold in my lungs, it looked like we were closing in. No clue what to expect with Gorath, I couldn’t help but wonder if we were marching off to die. How would Lucifer deal with someone invading his turf? I thought back to the story I’d been told about when Gorath first arrived. Lucifer kicked his ass and locked him up for a thousand, mind-numbing years. That was how the old Satan dealt with it.

It was time to show Gorath how the new Satan rolled. I just needed to find some wheels.

Once I was back in Hell, I went to the God-proof room to take care of a couple things-like find some clothes-before I headed out with Katon. Chatterbox greeted me at the door with a rousing rendition of “For Whom the Bell Tolls” that sent shivers down my spine. I seriously needed to ask Karra if he’d been a psychic medium or a conman before he died. He always managed to sound off with something prophetic, or just vague enough to be deemed prophetic, when I was running off on a mission.

It was creepy.

No time to worry about CB’s choice of soundtrack, I dropped off the flesh tablet and gathered the last of Lucifer’s blood, all two vials of it, and stashed them carefully into the pocket of a pair of absconded slacks. While I cherished the gift, I hadn’t been bothered by consuming the blood of my uncle before, but now, knowing Lucifer was my father, it seemed strange to be drinking the same blood that ran in my veins already. It made me wonder if only I were able to feel the effects beyond the healing. Would anyone else turn into Mongo-Frank if they consumed more than a few sips? Guess it didn’t matter since I only had a little bit left. No one would be drinking it but me.

As I paced and waited for Katon to arrive, I asked Chatterbox to send Karra a message and tell her I was okay. The zombie’s eyes rolled back in his head and fluttered there for a few minutes while I wore a hole in the carpet. Just when I was starting to get annoyed with him, CB’s eyes thumped back into place and he stared at me, his gray cheeks quivering.

“ Ccannn’ttt fffiiinnndd,” he said in a voice that sounded as distraught as a zombie voice could possibly sound.

“What do you mean you can’t find her? You’re connected, right?”

He did his best to shake his head. “ Ggggonneee. Nnooottt ttthhheeerreee.” His teeth clacked together, over and over. “ Nnoottt tthheererre.”

My throat constricted as I thought about what that meant. “Can you take me to her?”

Again, he shook his head, his eyes lolling in their sockets. “ Ggoonne.”