Christopher Moore - Secondhand Souls

The same sort of stealth fire drill happened when they were bringing Sophie back to the apartment. Jane let Audrey into Charlie’s new apartment and Cassie carried the sleeping Sophie into their apartment, leaving Mrs. Ling to fend for herself. When the elevator cleared, Mrs. Ling looked into her cart to see the cat carrier. She wheeled it to her apartment on the third floor, then unzipped the cat carrier just far enough to peek inside, and smiled for the first time since her friend had fallen down.

She had cooked a creature almost exactly like this one before, when one of the early Squirrel People who fancied himself an assassin broke into the building, only to find himself in Mrs. Ling’s soup pot. Duck in Pants, she had called the dish. This one would make a nice soup that she could take to Mrs. Korjev at the hospital. She went to the kitchen and filled her blackened soup pot with water and turned on the flame.

“Need a cheez,” said Wiggly Charlie from his carrier.

Rivera slammed two five-hour energy drinks as an act of faith. Not the faith of his father, which he now looked upon as quaint ritual, but faith in his own anger, because if he looked at the situation rationally, five hours was probably about four and a half hours longer than his current life expectancy. He was exhausted, having driven all over town through most of the night doing what he had come to think of as the “To-Do List of the Dead,” but now dawn was breaking and he and Minty Fresh were pulling into the concrete channel where the old train tracks cut into the knoll at Fort Mason.

“Back in,” said Minty Fresh.

Rivera flipped a Y-turn and backed the brown Ford into the channel until they were about twenty-five yards from the big steel doors that led into the tunnel, then stopped, popped the trunk, and got out. Minty Fresh unfolded out of his side of the car and met Rivera at the back; Minty in green leather trousers and black trainers, Rivera in his oversized sport coat, jeans, and black nylon tactical boots.

Rivera pulled two folding “Men Working” barricades out of the trunk and handed one to Minty Fresh. They set them up in front of the car and turned on the flashers.

“I told dispatch that animal control was going to be using some charges to chase rats and ground squirrels out of the tunnel, so if they get any calls for people hearing gunfire, they have an explanation.”

“They believed that?”

“They love having an answer.”

They walked back to the trunk.

“You got bolt cutters?” asked Minty Fresh, shooting a glance over his shoulder toward the steel doors.

“Yeah, but I think we can probably climb over. They’re what, eight feet tall? I’m not that old.”

“I ain’t worried about getting in, but if shit go sideways, I sure don’t want to have to get over those motherfuckers in a hurry getting out.”

Rivera ticked off a point well-made in the air, pulled the bolt cutters from the trunk, and leaned them against the bumper. He handed Minty Fresh a light flak vest. “Blade-resistant,” he said. “Prison guards wear them. Should fit, just may not cover you all the way down.”

Minty Fresh shrugged off his leather coat and the double shoulder holsters with the massive Desert Eagle pistols. He put on the vest.

“Turn,” Rivera said. “Lift your arms.” The Mint One did as instructed and Rivera cinched the vest up tight on him. Minty put on his shoulder holsters, buckled them down, then his coat. Rivera held up a riot helmet. “I guessed at the size.”

Minty Fresh looked at the helmet like it was a foul dead thing. “Yeah, I ain’t wearing that.”

“It’s Kevlar. Lights and goggles. You said one of them flings venom from her claws.”

Minty Fresh pulled a pair of wraparound sunglasses from the breast pocket of his coat, flicked them open, and put them on.

“Going to be dark in there.”

“I have excellent night vision.”

“Suit yourself,” said Rivera. He put on his own helmet and pulled down the goggles.

Rivera handed Minty some orange foam earplugs. “You’re going to want these.”

“I’ll be all right.”

Rivera grinned, looking—in all the tactical gear—like a victorious soldier in the tooth-whitening wars. He reached into the trunk and pulled back the flap on a nylon satchel, revealing a row of grenades clipped into elastic straps. “Flash bangs. Trust me, you’re going to want earplugs.”

Minty smiled. “We going to throw grenades in the park and 911 going to tell people we’re animal control?”

“Aren’t we?”

Minty held out his palm and Rivera dropped the earplugs. Rivera handed him a riot shotgun with a pistol grip, a laser sight on the top, and a flashlight slung under the barrel. “You ever use one of these?”

“I have.”

“Semiautomatic, just click off the safety and pull the trigger. I have double-ought buckshot in them. They’ll tear the hell out of whatever they hit, but they’re not Magnum loads, so they’ll kick less, and if you have to shoot quickly you’ll still be able to aim. You have nine shots with one in the chamber, five each extra on the elastic on the stock, four on the forestock.” He pulled a box of shells from the trunk. “You want some extras for your jacket pocket?”

Minty Fresh laughed. “No, Inspector, I think eighteen shots and our handguns are either going to do the trick or we gonna get done.”

Rivera nodded and shrugged off his sport coat, revealing the Beretta slung in a shoulder holster under his left arm, two extra clips under his right. He was checking for the tenth time that each was loaded when he heard gravel crunching and a silver-blue Honda pulled up in front of his Ford. He checked his watch.

“I thought you told him seven, it’s barely six-fifteen.”

“I did,” said Fresh.

Charlie Asher climbed out of Audrey’s Honda and stood by the door. “You guys are ready already?” He wore a leather jacket and was carrying a black cane with a silver handle, but otherwise he looked like Mike Sullivan out to buy a paper.

“How’s the old lady?” asked Rivera.

“She’s stable. Heart attack. Her son is there.”

“But alive,” said Rivera. He looked at Minty Fresh.

“That’s good,” said Minty, meaning more than it was good that she was alive, it was good that Lemon had attacked her and she’d managed to survive it. It meant Lemon was vulnerable.

“Where’s the Emperor?” Charlie asked.

“Jail,” said Rivera.

“Really?”

“Just until this is over. Actually I had them lock him in a cage at the animal shelter so his men could stay with him. They owed me a favor.”

Charlie joined them at the back of the Ford. “My motocross leathers got all cut up when I—when Mike jumped off the bridge, so I only have this jacket. Should be okay, right?”

“Yeah, you ain’t going to need them,” said Minty Fresh.

“Go home to your daughter, Charlie,” Rivera said.

“What are you talking about? This is my battle. I’m not a afraid of them. I’ve done this before.”

“We know,” said Rivera. “That’s not even the issue. You have to go back to Audrey and your daughter and your sister because you have them to go back to.”

“We don’t,” said Minty Fresh.

“I have guns now. Look at these bad boys,” Charlie said, flexing his biceps. “I didn’t have these before.”

“Have you ever been to the animal shelter, Charlie?” Rivera said. “I could show you around.”

“Go home, Charlie,” said Minty Fresh. “I didn’t go to all that trouble to bring you back to life so you could get killed again. If something happen to me, you look out for Lily, you hear?”

“You know I will.” Charlie slumped, knowing he was defeated. They had decided this long before now. If he hadn’t shown up early, it would all be over by now. And they had a point. He had charged into battle against the Morrigan once before, and Sophie had lost her daddy for a year. He couldn’t do that to her again.