Richard Kadrey - The Perdition Score

He’s pale. Thin. Unshaven. Three days or more. He doesn’t smell that great either. He leans against the side of the door where his face falls into line with the blinking sign in front of a bodega. There he is, yellow one second, then swallowed in black the next.

“How long did you know?” he says.

I hear it in his voice. Now that I’m looking for it, I can smell it under his stink. “Fuck me. You’re an angel.”

He purses his lips, half smiling and half embarrassed.

“Guilty as charged.”

“Get out.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“I’m a nephilim, pal. Half angel and half pissed off. I knew you were there the whole time, but I was waiting for you to do something interesting.”

“Why not attack when you saw me?”

“I was bored.”

“You wanted me to attack you.”

“That would have been more fun than this.”

The angel shakes his head.

“You’re not what I was expecting.”

“How’s that?”

“I came looking for an Abomination. A monster that acts violently on instinct.”

“You came looking for Sandman Slim.”

“Does he still exist?”

I take a pack of Maledictions from my pocket, tap one out, light it, and blow toxic smoke rings in his direction.

“If you came looking for Jack the Ripper, you came a couple of months too late. I’m a solid citizen now. Got a job. Eat my vegetables. Hell, I didn’t even steal this car.”

“I came here for … would you mind rolling down a window?” he says.

“Sure. How rude of me.”

I roll down the driver’s side, letting the fogbank drift away to kill the weeds in the parking lot. Whoever he is in the back seems harmless enough, but I keep my knife ready.

“What was it you were saying?”

He coughs a couple of times. Winces. Drops his weight back against the seat and looks at his hand. There’s blood there.

“If you’re going to bleed to death, please don’t get it on the upholstery. I just had it cleaned.”

He points a bloody finger at me.

“That’s more who I came looking for.”

“For what?”

He’s wearing a dirty trench coat. It looks new, but also like it’s been dragged behind a car. Sort of like the angel himself.

“Who are you?” I ask him.

“Karael. I came a long way to find you.”

“Why?”

He reaches into his dirty coat and I get the black blade ready. From an inside pocket, he pulls out a small ornate box. He leans forward to hand it to me, then falls back against the seat.

“Have you ever seen one of these before?” he says.

I glance at the box.

“It’s very pretty. If it’s a hope chest, you’re one depressed fuck.”

“Look closer.”

I hold it up to the light coming in from the parking lot lights. The box is lacquered black wood rimmed with gold and ornate flourishes that I recognize instantly.

“It was made in Hell. That doesn’t mean I know what it is.”

“Open it.”

I set the box on the passenger seat, well away from me. Pop the latch and push the top back with the tip of my knife. Nothing explodes. No poison gas or hungry ghosts. Inside the box is a padded compartment holding a glass vial full of a watery black substance.

“Okay. I found it. What is it?”

He leans forward again, groaning.

“They need it.”

“Who?”

“The rebel angels.”

I put the vial back in the box and look at him.

“That makes you one of the good guys. How do I know you’re not gaslighting me?”

“Listen,” he says. “I’m dying. There are many of us loyal angels left, but I’m not sure enough. If we fall, the rebel angels will bar all human souls from entering Heaven.”

“What about the ones already there?”

“I doubt they’ll last long.”

“And this black ink is supposed to mean something to me?”

“Black milk, it’s called. No human will enter Heaven as long as they have it.”

The angel looks at his hands. They’re shiny with blood.

“We’re near a friend’s clinic. You should let me take you.”

“It’s too late for that.”

I’m not going to argue. Angels don’t take it well. “What am I supposed to do with this stuff?”

The angel shakes his head.

“I was hoping you’d recognize it. Find out what it is. Find out how to destroy it.”

“How am I supposed to do that? I can’t get to Hell anymore. I’ve lost the Room. I’m as landlocked as any of these other mortal assholes.”

He frowns at me.

“You can’t travel to Hell. You can’t find the secret of the black milk.” He drops his head. “We were so afraid of you once. Abomination, we called you. Now look at you. When you were a monster at least you were good for something. What good are you now?”

I ask myself that every night I get into bed with Candy. But I’m not going to tell this halo polisher about it. When I look at him, he’s staring straight at me.

“Where are you going tonight?”

“None of your business.”

“You used to be an honest monster. Now you keep secrets from your friends. Your lover. Probably from yourself.”

“If you know me so well you know I don’t take advice from angels.”

“Not advice. Merely an observation. Before I came here, Father—Mr. Muninn—wanted me to tell you to follow your instincts. But do you have any left I wonder.”

The clown is getting to me. I want to kick him out, but I remember being bloody and ready to die in the arena. And I can’t kick an angel out in the street, especially not near a church. For all their God talk, the last people alive who want to meet an angel are church types. Show them that Heaven isn’t all gossamer robes and harp recitals and they’ll hallelujah their lunch right into the toilet.

“Look. I’ll get this stuff checked out, but I don’t know what you or Muninn expect me to do after that.”

But when I look up, Karael is gone. Angels do that when they die. Blip out of existence like they were never there. I look at the box, close it, and put it in my pocket. Asshole angel that he was, he died to bring me this sludge. Black milk . I’ll show it to Vidocq tomorrow. Right now I have to get across town. I’m late and I can’t afford to miss tonight. It’s funny, though. Arguing with an angel, my headache disappeared. Now that he’s gone, I can feel it crawling back behind my eyes.

I need the cure and I need it soon.

For a second, I wonder about Alessa waiting for her cab. Could she be in on this? Was she there to distract me from Karael in the backseat? If there’s something more going on with her—more than playing guitar with Candy—I’m going to find out what. Until then, it’s time to get on the road. I start the car and head back into traffic, hoping that whatever kind of ectoplasm Karael leaked onto my seats will come off with soap. Heaven might be at war, but that doesn’t mean angels get to fuck up my car.

HE COMES AT me low, puts his weight behind the punch, and slams it in under my ribs. I let him do it. I like the feel of the blow, my muscles screaming, the breath rushing from my lungs. I relax into the pain. It’s something real and tangible, and unlike the headaches, these punches, elbows, and kicks deliver a completely different kind of pain. The headaches make me weak at the knees. This Hulk Hogan stuff, I can grab on to and choke the life out of.

The guy coming at me is built like a battleship welded together from fat and blind fury. Whatever he does for a living, he needs a new job. Whoever he’s married to needs to get a ticket back home to Mom because the SS Shithead here is not fit for human company. I guess that’s why he was the only one who wanted to fight me tonight. There are a couple of dozen other guys in the abandoned high school, but none stepped up. I’ve beaten most of the others down here in the fight pit. No one knows who I am down here, but I’ve laid out enough of them that it’s mostly the new guys and the crazy ones who want to go at me. I’m not exactly a big guy—people call me Slim for a reason—but most of the weekend gladiators down here are scared off by my scars. But the ones who step up—the crazy ones—they’re the cure for a sane life. My best friends and the only elixir for a Trotsky headache.