The Weirdness(77)

Something occurs to Billy. “What about the others?” he says, helpfully. “They went to the Right-Hand Path headquarters. It’ll be harder to get them. They’re defended against you.”

“Billy,” Lucifer says. “When the Right-Hand Path catches me by surprise, they may be able to momentarily deter me. But when I come for them? In my full splendor? That is a moment when they stand revealed as the rank novices that they are. You worry about my ability to get the others?”

They emerge from the alley into the slanting sunlight of a late November afternoon.

“I got them first.”

And Billy sees, before him, gleaming golden in the light, double-parked on the sidewalk, hazards blinking, attended by a Traffic Enforcement Agent who is already printing a ticket for it, Jørgen’s Trusty Econoline Van.

Lucifer pushes the parking agent gently aside with the back of his hand. The agent turns, looking pissed, mouth already forming the first phoneme of what would surely be an impressive string of abuse, but Lucifer fixes him with a stare, a soul-accounting stare, and he is harrowed, shaken into silence. He moves back. He is maybe beginning to cry a little.

Through the windshield Billy can see Jørgen and Elisa. He can see that somehow Lucifer has gotten them to swear fealty as well. Their faces are expressionless, calm. They have a job to do, and that is all.

Lucifer slides open the van’s side door. “I will return to you in two hours,” he says, placing both hands on Billy’s shoulders. “In that time, I task you with retrieving the Neko from Ollard’s tower.”

“I can do that,” Billy says, although he’s not actually sure that he can. But he knows this: He will go into the tower. He will fight Ollard. Maybe he will be tortured. Maybe he will be killed. Maybe he will win. The important thing is that he serve Lucifer, as best as he can.

“I believe in you, Billy,” Lucifer says. “Now. Go. Jørgen knows the way.”

Okay, then, Billy thinks, as he climbs in the van and fastens his seat belt. Back to work.





CHAPTER THIRTEEN


KILLING MACHINES


ROOKIE MISTAKES • HOT HITS • A GOOD CALF • GERMAN PUNK REISSUES • SKEEVED OUT • OPENING A DOOR WITH YOUR EYES • IGNORING THE NUANCE • NOT KNOWING SHIT ABOUT SHIT • FORENSICS • ONE LAST THING




Traffic is bad, so it takes a while. Everybody and their sister is trying to get to the tunnel. Jørgen sits behind the wheel, plays with the radio, occasionally lets out a judgmental grunt, as though they don’t have traffic in Europe and the very manifestation of it is some kind of New World cultural failing.

Elisa joggles the rickety lever that controls the heat.

“Please do not touch that,” Jørgen says, tersely.

“I’m cold,” Elisa says.

Jørgen works himself out of his heavy leather coat and passes it over to her. She arranges it behind herself, slouches down into it, her head half disappearing into its depths. She sticks one leg out, plants her slippered foot on the windshield. Even from here in the back Billy can see Jørgen kind of tense up with the effort it requires to prevent himself from telling her to sit normally.

“We should have taken the subway,” Billy says.

No one answers him.

“The fate of the world hangs in the balance and we decided the best way to spring into action was to crawl across town at five miles an hour?” he says. “Fucking rookie mistake.”

“It was Lucifer’s idea to drive,” Jørgen says.

“Yeah, well, he’s not exactly a local, is he,” Billy says.

Jørgen sighs and stabs at the radio, going back to Z100 for maybe the fifth time.

Billy slumps back down in his seat, looks out the window at the West Manhattan buildings. He looks at the slate-gray sky, wondering whether it’s about to ignite. Everything looks pretty much normal; no ominous portents. So maybe they have time. They’ll get there when they get there. He fiddles with a puncture wound in the vinyl of his seat, tries to see if he can fit his finger into it. He may have sworn fealty to the Devil, but the act seems to have left much of his personality more or less untouched, which means that he seems to be as free as ever to be distractible, fidgety, restless. He looks up at Elisa’s foot, at her ankle, at her calf. It’s a good calf. He finds himself kind of turned on.

Wow, he thinks, as if realizing it for the first time. I had sex with her. He goes up a notch in his own estimation of himself. He knows he shouldn’t really feel good about it, given the fact that he’s technically still involved with Denver, sort of, maybe, maybe not—but, fuck it, after the day he’s had he feels like he wants just one moment to bask in the sensation of pure self-congratulation. The way things are going, it may be the last time he ever has the experience.