From: Nine
Subject: Help us
This is Alfred Kropp. Op Nine very hurt. 2 days to give them Vessel. Don’t have Vessel. Don’t have Hyena. Where is devil’s door? Please send help.
AK
I held my breath, my index finger hovering over the touch pad. I clicked, waited, and then a box popped up.
Message Undeliverable: Unknown Recipients
I gave a yell of frustration and pushed back from the table. From the bedroom Op Nine moaned loudly, as if in answer.
His body jerked on the bed and his head lolled back and forth on the pillow. His color, never very healthy looking, now looked even worse, a kind of burnt orange, and spit rolled from his open mouth. I went into the bathroom for a fresh washcloth and caught my reflection in the mirror.
I froze. Red spots with white centers the size of nickels had appeared all over my face and neck. I touched one on my cheek. It was like pressing the head of a hot match against my skin, and I yanked my finger away. What now? What the hell were they doing to me now? I pulled the sweater off and lifted the shirt underneath. The marks were there too, and on my back. I was covered in boils.
“Okay,” I muttered, dropping my shirt and ducking my head over the sink as I wet the washcloth. “Okay. Pustulating boils. That’s fine. You wanna play hardball. I can take it.”
I returned to the bed and wiped Op Nine’s face.
“I can’t get through,” I told him. “I don’t know, maybe headquarter’s been destroyed or something. We’re on our own and since I can’t get through to you either, I guess that means I’m on my own. Not a happy development in terms of MISSCOMP.” He moaned, eyes jerking behind fluttering lashes.
“You guys did lie to me,” I went on. “I’m the carrier. My blood is the active agent in the 3XD ammo. You must have taken a couple pints from me on the ship to put in your guns, and that’s really low. That borders on the despicable. You could have just asked. But I guess being a SPA means you never have to ask. No wonder Ashley told you to take a hike. You’re gonna have to answer for that, but you’re not going to have a chance to answer because they’ve scooped you out too, and you can’t help me find Mike or the devil’s door and so everything’s screwed. Game over.”
His arms began to pull against the knotted towel, his fingers clawing in the air. I didn’t have much time before he went for his eyes. I went back into the bathroom and smashed one of the drinking glasses in the sink, picked up the longest shard, and without even a second of hesitation cut my left palm open and walked back to the bed, my hand raised over the level of my heart, palm upward, cupping the blood.
I sat on the edge of the bed, dipped two fingers into the blood pooling in my palm, and smeared the blood over his eyelids, saying the whole time, “Now in the name of Saint Michael, I order you to be whole—though I oughtta . . .” Then I stopped, because a healing was no place for bitterness. “So be healed, Operative Nine, be healed.”
I traced a cross on his forehead with my blood and then took my hand away. The moaning stopped, the eyes went still, and the hands relaxed. I gave his shoulder a little poke, but he didn’t wake up. Something had happened, though.
I wrapped a hand towel around my left hand, dragged myself into the main room, collapsed on the sofa, and lay there for a few minutes before I got back up, went into the bathroom, and trimmed my toenails.
Then I went back to the sofa, threw an arm over my eyes, and fell asleep. It would be the last sleep I got for a very long time.
42
I don’t remember what I dreamed during that last bit of sleep before my final showdown with the demon king. But when I woke up I knew my next move.
Op Nine was still flat on his back, but his eyes were open, staring at the ceiling. The towel must have come loose at some point while I slept, because his arms were crossed over his chest, the way they arrange dead people in caskets, and that unnerved me, like a portent of things to come.
“Op Nine?” I said softly.
His eyes rolled in my direction, but his head didn’t move. The dried blood on his eyelids and forehead had turned a rusty red.
“What,” he croaked, “is an ‘Op Nine’?”
“That’s complicated,” I said. “But don’t worry, your memory will come back. Mine did, so I don’t see any reason why yours wouldn’t. Here’s the deal: we’re in Chicago right now, but we won’t be for very long. We’ve lost contact with HQ and so we’re going solo. You’ve been attacked by demons, only you don’t like that word, but sometimes you gotta call a spade a spade. My name is Alfred Kropp.”
“Alfred Kropp!” His eyes widened. “I know that name!”
“I’m going to order some room service because I haven’t had anything except a Snickers and a Coke—not counting the dead cat, which I’d rather not.”
“Dead cat?”
“You want anything?”
He swallowed. “Perhaps some water.”