The Kill Society (Sandman Slim)(104)

“Is that true?” Geryon asks.

“I don’t know. I never tried. And maybe it’s the way to get to the center and not out.”

Geryon slumps. Puts his head in his hands. None of the soldiers have weapons anymore. They’re ripped and bitten and bloody, and they’re all staring at me like lost kids at the zoo. I say the first thing that pops into my head.

“Try the doors. Maybe there’s a window or a place to hide and figure a way out.”

That gets them moving. We head in different directions down all four corridors from the crossroads, rattling and kicking at doorknobs. They’re all locked but there’s nothing else to do. We keep trying one door after another. Finally one opens.

“Here,” I shout. “I found one.”

I push open the door with the glow stick held high. The room is empty. On the far wall is a barred window. I head for it. Three steps in I hear a crack and the floor gives way beneath me. The last thing I see is Geryon’s shocked, scared, stupid face as I fall.



Martin Denny wakes me up. It’s “Quiet Village,” all birdcalls and tropical piano chords. Someone is pulling me from the floor and setting me on a bar stool. Carlos the bartender is the first thing I can make out clearly. Then plastic hula girl. Palm trees. I’m in the Bamboo House of Dolls.

“Maybe you’ve had enough for tonight?” Carlos says and turns to someone on my right.

“What do you think? Too much or just enough to take advantage of?” comes a female voice.

I turn and Candy is right beside. She kisses me. My head hurts and I’m as dizzy as the Teacup Ride at Disneyland.

Candy does a mock frown.

“Uh-oh. Too much, it looks like. Maybe we need to get you home.”

“Home?” is all I can get out.

Vidocq comes over. Puts an arm around my shoulder.

“You remember home. The lovely Chateau Marmont. It’s just a few steps away. Come. We’ll take you from all this, le merdier. You’ll never have to see it again.”

“Never again.”

They pull me to my feet. Candy, Vidocq, Allegra, and Kasabian. Kasabian has arms and legs. A complete body. He wags his finger in my face.

“You never did know when enough was enough.”

I look at Candy and my heart breaks all over again, just like it did when I lost Alice.

“I’m sorry to say but I know exactly when enough is enough.”

I pull the black blade from the waistband at my back and slice Kasabian’s head off. It rolls across the floor like a sweaty basketball. I whirl and stab Vidocq in the eye. Pull out the blade and shank him in the heart. Then I do the same to Allegra and Carlos.

“Stark. What are you doing?”

They’re screaming and they don’t stop until they’re in pieces on the floor.

I turn and look at Candy. She backs away, her hand held up to me. Bumps into the jukebox and freezes.

“It’s me, baby. What are you doing?”

I’m dizzy and nauseated.

“Doing just what you said. Getting myself away from le merdier.”

I flick out the na’at but I can’t go for her. I lunge and put the blade into the jukebox. Denny sputters and dies. I turn and hack the bar in half. Swing again and slice through the bar stools. Vault the bar and start in on the bottles. I take out a row of booze with each swipe of the na’at until I’m ankle deep in the stuff. Back over the bar, I push a candle over. The booze goes up in one big whoosh.

I’m feeling it now. That old arena feeling, where nothing feels better than something breaking under the na’at or my hands. Candy backs against the far wall. I stab it over her head, pulling out big chunks of plaster. I hack at the windows and floor. I slice apart the pillars by the door and the whole thing collapses. The decorations over the bar are burning and patches of the ceiling glow cherry red. Once it catches we all go down together.

“Right, Henoch?” I yell.

I hack at the beams in the walls. They start to sag. I hack at the floor until it starts to buckle beneath us. The ceiling catches. The air is sucked out of my lungs as all the oxygen in the room cooks off. I look at Candy. I pull out the black blade to throw through a window. She knows a flashover is coming.

“Enough.”

She screams it over the sounds of the flames. I don’t have to throw the knife. The window cracks. The air explodes, enveloping us in flames as thick as molasses. Then stops. The room goes black.

“Enough.”

It’s not Candy’s voice. It’s a man’s.

“What in Lucifer’s name is wrong with you?”

Light slowly comes up. I’m standing in a dimly lit stone room with an old man. Splintered pillars and support columns lean haphazardly against the walls and across the floor.

“You mean my name, don’t you, Grandpa? I’m Lucifer.”

Henoch Breach has wet rheumy eyes set in a sagging face. Scraggly white whiskers that might be the remains of a dead beard. His teeth are black and crooked, like fallen dominoes. He’s dressed in robes that probably looked regal about a thousand years ago. Now they look like a gaudy bath mat in a Tijuana flophouse. He looks around the room.

“Look what you’ve done to my home.”

“What was I supposed to do? No one told me there was a ring inside the house. Only this one wasn’t suffering. Did you really think the ‘it’s all been a dream’ gaff was going to work? Does anyone ever fall for it?”