Christopher Moore - Secondhand Souls

He looked at Charlie. “You need to figure out if your little girl still has her powers, because if she doesn’t, her history with them is probably all that’s protecting her, and without her hellhounds, that’s about it. So even if we can’t kill them, we can at least weaken them, slow them down.”

Minty Fresh rubbed his shaved head, as if polishing an idea in there, then looked at Charlie. “How did you find them last time?”

“Bummer found them,” Charlie said. “I sort of wandered around in the sewers with the Squirrel People until we ran into Bummer. He led us to them.”

“They’re definitely going to be out of the light,” Lily said.

“We heard one, the Inspector and I, in a sewer in the Sunset,” said Baptiste.

“That’s my neighborhood,” said Lily. “I’m officially pro -fuck-up-the-sewer-harpies’-shit. Now you just have to find them.”

The Emperor held up a hand. “I know where they are.”

“Okay, well, that was easy,” said Lily. “You don’t know where the thousands of souls listed in your book are, do you?”

The old man shook his head dolefully. “I’m sorry.”

Baptiste thought it was perhaps the strangest meeting he had ever attended, and even when it was over, and they were all leaving, he looked to Minty Fresh and said, “Mr. Fresh, can you tell me please, what happened just now?”

“You know in a horror movie, when the scientist comes in and explains that there’s a zombie virus or there are vampires in the city?”

“Yes.”

“That’s what this was, but instead of a scientist, we had a crazy old man who thinks he’s the Emperor of San Francisco.”

“Oh, I see,” said Baptiste, who really didn’t see.

He stood on the porch of the big Victorian, gathering his thoughts, searching in his messenger bag for his car keys as the others made their way to the street.

“Pssst!”

A noise at his feet, no, below his feet. It was coming from beside the stairs.

“ Monsieur Baptiste !” An urgent, small whisper.

Baptiste went to the rail and looked over. Below, on the walk, stood a creature about fourteen inches tall with a rotund little body, small hands that looked like those of a raccoon, and the head of a calico cat, wearing what looked like miniature pink hospital scrubs and doll shoes.

“ Monsieur Baptiste, comment allez-vous ?” it said in perfect French.

“Not so good,” said Baptiste.

Wiggly Charlie lived in a big house with his friends Audrey and Big Charlie. He liked mozzarella cheese sticks, chasing his tennis ball, and putting his purple wizard hat on his willy and pretending they were friends.

One day, he was playing with his ball in the butler’s pantry (which was a small room where rich people used to keep their prisoners until they needed them to bring them a beverage). When Big Charlie reached in the door, took the ball, and threw it for Wiggly Charlie, it bounced into a vent behind the wastebasket and disappeared.

Wiggly Charlie didn’t even take time to be sad or think how throwing his ball down a vent was kind of a dick move, but instead jumped right into the vent after it. He slid down and down and plopped out on his bottom in the dirt. All around him were little lights in many colors. He stood up and turned all around, looking up at all the pretty colors. He saw that there was a little doorway, just his size, and on the other side he could see his ball.

He went through the doorway and found himself in a passageway made of green glass, so he could still see the colored lights attached to the floor joists of the big house, as well as others that were strung through the glass hallway. He threw his ball and chased it down the hallway, catching it in his mouth just as it was about to roll down some stairs. Then he saw something wonderful.

In front of him was a big round room, like a hole, only nicer, and all around it were little people just like him. He dripped drool on his toes as he looked around in wonder at all the little people, all with different heads and feet, different hands and different clothes, all just about his size. They gathered around a stage in the center of the round room as one of them talked at the others.

“Bring the head for Theeb,” said the little person on the stage. He was wearing a red uniform, had a face that looked like a cat skull, and a very nice black-and-red hat. When he talked, he waved around a spoon that was a fork, or a fork that was a spoon—whatever it was, Wiggly Charlie thought it was very clever.

The little people parted and two of them carried a tray with the head of an animal Wiggley Charlie didn’t recognize down an aisle. (It was the head of an opossum, but the o was silent, as often happens with the decapitated.) The red suit guy took the head and put it on a table on the stage.

“Bring the body for Theeb.”

“Bring the body for Theeb,” everyone chanted, and two more little people brought a big piece of meat on a tray and fitted it on the table with the head.

“Bring the legs for Theeb!”

And the legs were brought.

“Bring the voice!”

As each pair of little people brought their pieces, they took tools out of little pouches and sewed the pieces on the body. When the arms were attached, a person with a lizard face wearing a pretty pink dress brought some clothes, and the new body on the stage was dressed. Wiggly Charlie had seen Audrey making clothes just like the ones they fitted onto the body. These must be Audrey’s secret friends, thought Wiggly Charlie.

“Bring the soul, so Theeb the Wise may give it life,” said the special fork-spoon guy.

“Bring the soul. Bring the soul. Bring the soul.”

There were many, many little people in the round room now. More than a hundred, but Wiggly Charlie didn’t count very well, so he just thought there were many, many. Each of them had a red light in his or her chest, glowing even through their clothes. Now they opened two doors in the side of the round room, and behind it were many different kinds of objects: shoes, trophies, boxes, tools, bowls, rings, clocks, radios—there were many, many things, and each of them glowed a dull red, just like the little lights each of the little people had in his chest.

“ Bonjour ,” said a voice right next to Wiggly Charlie, and he was so surprised that he dropped his ball. It bounced down the steps and into the crowd of little people. He looked to where the voice had come from and he saw the very pretty face of a calico cat.

“ Soyez la bienvenue ,” she said. She had a pink ribbon around her neck and wore a pink outfit like the ones Audrey made. In the center of her chest a red light glowed very brightly and Wiggly Charlie jumped and clicked his talons because he liked it so much.

“Shhhhh,” said the cat person. She held a finger to her mouth, which Wiggle Charlie knew meant he should be quiet because Audrey and Big Charlie did it all the time. She pointed to the middle of the big room, then patted a spot next to her on the stairs for him to sit next to her. He did, and watched.

“ Je m’appelle Helen ,” said the cat person.

Wiggly Charlie didn’t know what kind of nonsense she was talking about, but she was nice, so he sat down and watched the show going on in the middle of the big round room. “Ball,” he said, pointing to the spot in the crowd where he thought his ball might have rolled.