Richard Kadrey - Hollywood Dead

She probes a shattered bit of bowling pin with the toe of her designer pump, clearly biting down what I’m sure is a clever retort.

“If you’re through playing the idiot, let’s go upstairs and talk business.”

“Sure. But remember. I might be an idiot, but you’re the idiot who hired me. You have to expect a certain amount of breakage.”

Sandoval looks me up and down and says, “And put a glove on that grotesque hand. It makes me sick.”

I flex my prosthetic left hand. I can’t argue with her on the ugly part. The hand was a present from a monster. Really, my whole left arm looks like something that belongs on a mechanical insect. It’s still good at giving the finger, but I restrain myself now.

While I slip on my glove, she leaves with her entouragein tow. I give them a few seconds before leaving the bowling alley. I might be an idiot, but I know they need time to cool down. Just like I know I have to keep pushing them. If they get pissed or flustered enough, they might drop some useful piece of information. But I can’t go too far too fast. Sandoval could have their necromancer pull the plug on me and I’d be right back in Hell with no body and a pack of new enemies. I’ve got to play this right. Dance around the edges of being a complete asshole.

The problem is, I’m not the best dancer.

On my way out, I flick off the bowling alley lights. Too bad they found me. I kind of like it down here. Especially the soundproofing. It would be a good place to play the monster and slap the shit out of one of them until they told me what’s really going on.

I MEET UP with them in Sandoval’s office, where I woke up yesterday. It’s a nice room. Nice furniture covered in pretty silks and leather. A nice pool table. A nice TV the size of Kansas. It’s all so fucking nice it’s like a museum. I halfway expect a stuffed grizzly bear and maybe some wax Neanderthals in the corner. No such luck. It’s the same six assholes I’ve been staring at since I got back.

Sandoval is the boss, that much is clear. Black hair, a deep tan, and a dress cut low enough that you could autopsy her and never touch the edges. She’s pretty, she knows it, and she isn’t above using it. It’s tedious just looking at her.

“I take it that you’re feeling better today,” says Sandoval.

I glance at the other idiots in the room.

“Better is a relative thing. I feel better than dead, so, yeah, I guess I’m feeling swell.”

“It looks like your motor functions are coming back, too. That’s good. You’re going to need them,” says Barron Sinclair. He’s the only other one who talks much. He’s heavyset. Long gray hair and perfect little beard. He’s one of those guys born with an old face. He could be fifty or seventy. He’s also sick. I can smell the drugs in his system. Metallic and bitter as lemons. Sinclair tries to look calm, but he’s scared. Whatever he has, it must be bad if he can’t find any magicians who can cure it. He’s worried about what’s waiting for him in Hell, especially since I wiped out Wormwood down there. Good. That’s more incentive for him to want me alive.

“Eva keeps telling me that, but she won’t say what I’ll need them for.”

“That’s what this meeting is about. I think you’re coherent enough to discuss your mission,” she says.

I look at her.

“My mission? That sounds so noble. Am I going to rescue your kitten from a tree?”

“Not quite,” she says, shooting me a feral smile. “You’re going to kill someone.”

“Probably a lot of people,” says Sinclair.

“That’s what I figured. Who’s the lucky guy or gal?”

She points to one of the other cockroaches that follow her around. A young, cocky guy with a face built for punching.

“Roger here can give you the details . Roger?” says Sandoval.

I hold up a hand as Roger opens his mean little mouth. He closes it again.

“Is Roger going to be giving me orders? Are any of these other idiots?”

Sandoval crosses her arms.

“I suppose not.”

“Can any of them help me stay in my body?”

“No.”

“Then fuck ’em.”

Roger and the other roaches’ heartbeats spike. I smell sweat. Roger starts to open his mouth again. I raise the Colt and point it at his stupid face.

“Hush, Roger. Grown-ups are talking.”

He clamps his mouth shut. I put the Colt in my waistband at my back. Okay. Enough of that stuff for now. Everyone is nice and rattled. Let’s see if someone says something interesting.

Sandoval stares at me, wondering if she made a huge mistake. When she doesn’t say anything, Sinclair steps forward.

“It’s not exactly a hit,” he says. “Though I suspect there will be a considerable number of casualties. What we need you to do is stop an event.”

He coughs wetly and wipes his mouth with a monogrammed hankie. When he’s done I say, “What kind of event?”

“Stupendous,” says Sandoval. “Cataclysmic.”

“Can you narrow that down a little?”

“No. All you need to know is that something awful will happen on Sunday unless you stop it.”

“And if I do I get put back in my body for good, completely alive?”

She raises her eyebrows a fraction of an inch, even as she says, “That’s the deal.”

The silk slippers they gave me are absurdly comfortable. I wiggle my toes in them, telling myself that this pack of jackals is going to keep its end of the bargain.

“I’d still like to know what kind of event.”

“I told you. No.”

“You see, it would help to know what I’m walking into. Am I knocking over a quinceañera or stopping a nuke launch? You get my meaning? It’s about preparations, appropriate tools, and my general attitude.”

“Maybe we should tell him,” says Sinclair.

“No,” says Sandoval. “It’s a trick.”

I look at Sinclair, then back at Sandoval.

“I know it has to do with the Wormwood bunch that broke away and opened their own lemonade stand without you.”

“No,” says Sandoval. “You do what we say and you get your body back. That’s all you need to know.”

I don’t say anything long enough for the room to get uncomfortable. Sandoval gives me the stink eye and I give it right back.

“I think we should tell him,” says Sinclair.

Eva shakes her head.

“No.”

I wait, wiggling my toes. Not saying a word.

Finally, Sinclair blurts, “It’s a ritual. A magic ritual.”

Sandoval whirls around and slaps him hard enough to leave a mark on his cheek.

I say, “What kind of ritual?”

Sandoval stares at Sinclair, breathing hard. Sinclair touches his face where she hit him. Despite things, he says, “When you joked about a nuclear launch you were closer than you realize.”

“The other Wormwood has a bomb?”

“They might as well have,” says Sandoval. She turns from Sinclair and looks at me. “The splinter faction are in possession of a ritual that will utterly destroy Los Angeles.”

Sinclair says, “It will trigger similar destruction all over the world. Berlin. Tokyo. Sydney. Anywhere we, the true Wormwood, are concentrated.”

“They hope to wipe us out in one massive action,” Sandoval says.

I listen to their hearts. Check the microtremors on their faces. They’re telling the truth.

Well … fuck.

I say, “With all due respect to Berlin, Tokyo, and wherever the fuck else, I don’t care. Let’s talk about L.A.”

“They’re out to destroy our entire infrastructure,” says Sinclair.

Sandoval says, “Then they can pick off the stragglers one by one.”

I look over at the roaches.

“Any of you have a cigarette?”

“There’s no smoking in the house,” says Sandoval.