Oh no, thought Meg. First I get saddled with him on Earth, now I have to put up with him for all eternity!
“Meg! Help me.”
Belch was giving her the puppy eyes. Pathetic.
“Get lost, Belch! You tried to kill me!”
She blinked. Belch had killed her! He’d killed them all!
“Murderer!” shouted Meg.
The old Belch would have retaliated. But not the new thing. He just—it just—whined pathetically.
“This is all your fault, Belch!” screamed Meg. “I told you not to shoot! I told you!”
They hurtled around a bend. Up ahead the tunnel split in two. That didn’t take a whole lot of figuring. Up and down. Good and bad. Heaven and hell. Meg swallowed. This was it. Payback for all the cruelty she’d inflicted on the people of Newford.
The currents bore them along at a terrific speed. There was no friction. No winds whipping at their clothes or ballooning their cheeks. Just an increasing heat blast from the lower branch of the tunnel. As they drew closer, Meg could make out cinder-blackened figures with pitchforks dislodging stragglers clinging to the wall. Hurrying them along on their way to hell.
This wasn’t real. It couldn’t be happening to her. Fourteen-year-olds didn’t die; they went through a troublesome phase and grew out of it.
Meg could see details now. The red demon-eye glow of the tunnel creatures. The silvery glint of their prongs. The job satisfaction in their grins.
Belch whined in dumb terror, pinwheeling his arms in the heavy air, as if that could save him. Meg steeled herself.
The gate to hell loomed before them. It seemed as large as the sun, and almost as hot. Meg balled her fists. She wasn’t going down easy.
Then her course changed. Just a nudge to starboard, but enough to steer her away from the lower passage. A relieved sigh exploded from her lungs. Purgatory, limbo, reincarnation—she didn’t care. Anything was better than whatever waited at the end of the red tunnel.
The Belch-Raptor combo wasn’t so lucky. In a second the fiery current had him and he was gone, spinning into the inferno.
Meg had no time to worry about the fate of her associate. Whatever power had been guiding her suddenly vanished, leaving her careering with the force of her own momentum. The tunnel wall reared before her. It looked soft. Soft and blue. Please let it be soft. . . .
No such luck. Meg smashed into an unforgiving surface at an Earth speed of four hundred miles per hour. Not that speed makes any actual difference on the spiritual plane, where kinetics are out the window. That’s not to say that it didn’t hurt.
THE DEVIL WAS NOT HAPPY.
“Two,” he said, drumming filed nails on the desktop. “I was expecting two today.”
Beelzebub shuffled nervously. “There are two, Master, sort of. I have them . . . it . . . whatever . . . in pit nineteen.”
“Two humans!” hissed Satan, tiny lightning bolts sparking between his horns. “Not one youth and his dog! How did a dog get in here, anyway?”
“They were . . . blended together. One heaven of an accident,” stammered his aide-de-camp, consulting a clipboard. “The boy is a true disciple. Very impressive human cycle. Bullying, torturing animals, theft, murder. A rap sheet as long as your tail. And the dog, a real hound of Satan. Tetanus injection sales have risen by fifteen percent in the first quarter.”
The Lord of Darkness was not impressed. “He’s a cretin.”
“The dog?”
“No, you halfwit! The boy! Unimaginative, brutal.”
Beelzebub shrugged. “Evil is evil, Master.”
Satan wagged a fine-boned finger. “No, you see, that’s where you’re wrong. That’s why you’re a minion, and I am the undisputed Lord of the Underworld. You have no vision, Bub, no flair.”
Beelzebub’s fangs quivered in his mouth. He hated being called Bub. There wasn’t another being in the universe who would dare to use that condescending abbreviation . . . well, perhaps just one—a certain saint named Peter.
“These impulse sinners have no staying power. Their life expectancy is too short for them to wreak any real havoc. One major sin and they’re gone. No planning, you see. No thought of getting away with it.”
Beelzebub nodded dutifully, as though he didn’t get treated to this lecture at least a dozen times a millennium.
“But you give me one creative sinner and he’ll be spreading the gospel of misery for decades before anyone catches him. If ever.”
“True, Master. Very true.”
Satan’s eyes narrowed. “You wouldn’t be patronizing me, would you, Bub?”
“No,” croaked a very nervous senior demon. “Of course not, Master.”
“Glad to hear it. Because if I thought for one second that I didn’t have your undivided attention, I might move you from that apartment overlooking the Plain of Fire, and into the Dung Pit.”
Beelzebub flicked a forked tongue over suddenly dry lips. Dung was all very well at work, but you had to switch off sometime.
“Honestly, Master. The new boy is exceptional. Especially in his new . . . state. A bit rough around the edges, certainly. But I’m sure he’ll make a fine spit turner.”
“Spit turner! We’re up to our wings in spit turners. I need an arch demon, someone with a sense of humor.” The Devil smoothed his jet-black goatee. “The other one. That girl I was planning to greet personally. Where is she?”
Beelzebub flicked a page on his clipboard. “Actually . . .”
“Don’t tell me.”
“We had her all the way through the tunnel . . .”
“You lost her.”
Beelzebub nodded miserably.
“The one soul I tell you to look out for and you lose her. I think you’re getting a bit old for the job, Bub.”
“No, Master, no,” stammered hell’s Number Two, well aware what happened to demons past their prime. “The closed-circuit cameras are down and we have to rely on tunnel mites for information. You know how unreliable they are, especially if they’ve been chewing soul residue.”
Satan sighed. “Excuses, Bub. That’s all I’m hearing. Excuses. We have all the technology. Limbo surveillance, the ectonet. And here we are relying on the gibberings of some inebriated tunnel mites.”
“Myishi assures me the system will be back online shortly.”
Satan scowled. “Do you know how much that technophile’s soul cost me? A fortune. And he can’t even fix a few monitors.”
“Soon, Master—”
“Now! I want that errant soul found. It could just be snagged on a stalactite in the tunnel. If it’s up for grabs, I want it grabbed.”
“But, Master,” protested Beelzebub. “A lawyers’ convention bus goes over the edge of the Grand Canyon this afternoon. We’re expecting a bit of a glut.”
Satan rose to his hooves. The tailored pinstripe he wore burst into in blue flames, exposing the red muscles and sinew beneath.
Always the theatrics, thought Beelzebub.
“I don’t care about lawyers. Who’s going to sue me? No one. I want that girl! Have you read her file? Did you see what she did to that stepfather of hers? Brilliant. Totally original.”
The Devil’s tone became silky smooth. His most seductive. And dangerous.
“Find her for me, Bub. Find her and bring her here. I don’t care if you have to send a retrieval squad into the tunnel. Get her . . .”
Beelzebub waited for the inevitable threat.
“Because if you don’t, I’ll be holding interviews for a recently vacated position.” He paused pointedly. “Yours.”
Satan loped into a corner. The meeting was over.
Beelzebub barreled down the pulsating corridor, vaporizing drone souls indiscriminately with his trident. Their final squealing sizzle didn’t cheer him up the way it used to. He hated it when the Master got in one of his obsessive moods. He had to have exactly that soul, and no other would do. And God help . . . Beelzebub blinked nervously . . . Lucifer help the demon who disappointed
him. He quickened his pace. You shouldn’t even think the G-word in this building. Somehow the Master always knew.
What was so special about this particular soul anyway? Some Irish girl. Admittedly it had always been a bit special when you nabbed someone from the “Land of Saints and Scholars,” but that golden age was long gone. These days there were as many Irish down here as there were in America.
Beelzebub hopped into a gloomy alcove, pulling a black mobile phone from the folds of his silk kaftan. Lovely little thing. All shiny and impressive. Myishi had run him up a pair. Top secret. Not even the boss knew about them. Devious admittedly. But he was, after all, a demon.
There were no numbers on the phone pad. Just some function buttons. This was a private line. There was only one person he’d ever call. His warty finger hovered over the pad for a moment, then pressed. He had no option. The apartment was at stake. And getting good accommodations in this neighborhood was sheer hell.
Saint Peter was not happy. If he was such a big-shot holy saint, how come he had to sit outside the gates all the time while the rest of them enjoyed the fruits of heaven? Why couldn’t James ever take a turn? Or John? Or Judas, for that matter. If there was anyone who owed him a favor, it was Judas. There was a strong contingent of the opinion that the tax collector shouldn’t be up here at all. And if it hadn’t been for yours truly putting in a good word for him, he’d still be floating around purgatory with the rest of the don’t-knows.
Peter heaved open the cover of his ledger. What he wouldn’t give for a good mainframe. A powerful server with plenty of workstations. But you rarely got any computer buffs up at the Pearlies. Most of them came out at the other end of the tunnel, especially since Lucifer had begun offering his “own your own soul after a century” deal. So he was still stuck with balancing the accounts manually.
The points system was complicated, developed over thousands of years. And, of course, new transgressions were added every year. Members of boy bands and mime artists were two recent categories with heavy representation.
The system was straightforward enough. Even if you had enough plus points on your sheet to keep you out of hell, that didn’t mean you were a shoo-in to heaven. There was purgatory, limbo, or reincarnation as a lower life form. If it was a close call, you got an interview with the chief apostle. Everyone said he was a bit quick with the reject button. A million souls on the lower levels prayed for the day Peter got his marching orders.
High above Peter’s head, the tunnel’s mouth pulsated in an azure sky. It was a fantastic sight if you cared to look, but Peter barely spared it a glance.
A soul floated from the mouth and ascended gently to the floor of Peter’s office. The saint ran his finger down the lists. Luigi Fabrizzi. Eighty-two. Natural causes.
“Mi scusi,” said the Italian.
“Behind the line, please,” muttered Peter automatically, jabbing his pen at the floor.
Signore Fabrizzi glanced downward. Brass trapdoor hinges protruded from the marble tiling.
“You’re cutting it pretty fine, Fabrizzi,” commented Peter, in flawless Italian. The gift of tongues, another little bonus from the boss. “Good early life, but you’ve been a real jerk for a long time.”
The Italian shrugged. “I am old. It’s my prerogative.”
Peter leaned back. He loved Italians. “Oh really. And where exactly does it say that in the Bible?”
“It’s not in the good book. I feel it in my heart.”
Peter ground his back teeth. Who except an Italian would argue at the gates of heaven?
He totted up the points quickly. You’d be surprised how all the little misdemeanors add up.
“I don’t know, Luigi. The whole Mafioso thing in the fifties. I’m afraid it’s put you over the limit.”
Fabrizzi paled. “You don’t mean . . . ?”
“I’m afraid I do,” said Peter, reaching covertly beneath the rim of his desk for the limbo button.
The Italian clasped his hands in prayer . . . and the phone rang.
Peter rolled his eyes. Beelzebub again. Couldn’t that demon do anything on his own? He pressed the receive button.
“Yes.”
“It’s me. Beelzebub,” came the hushed reply.
“You don’t say.”
“A bit of a problem down here, compadre.”
“I thought you liked problems.”
“Not this kind. My job is on the line.”
“Oh,” said Peter. “That is a problem.”
Even though the archangel and the demon came from different ends of the spectrum, theologically speaking, they had, over the past few centuries, established something of a rapport. Nothing major. No exchanging of trade secrets or anything like that. But both men realized the similarities between their jobs. They also realized the mutual benefits of keeping the earthbound spirits from destroying the planet. After all, what would be the point of spirits without bodies? So they kept in touch. So far their little communiqués had averted several presidential assassinations and a world war. If Beelzebub were to be replaced, the new Number Two might not be as accommodating.
“Ah . . . mi scusi, Santo Pietro?” said the suddenly polite Luigi.
Peter waved at him irritably. “Oh, go on in. And no more gangster stuff.”
“Sì. Sì. No more gangster stuff.”
Luigi skipped toward paradise, his youth miraculously restoring itself with every step. Peter returned to his conversation.
“So, what’s the problem, Bub?” He grinned down the phone line. His opposite number would be spitting fire, but he’d have to swallow it if he wanted a favor.
“The Master is looking for a soul.”
“What about that lawyers’ convention?”
“No. A specific soul. I thought if you had her at the Pearlies, we might trade.”
“Out of the question. An innocent in Hades. Can’t be done.”
“This is no innocent. We were expecting her down here today. I don’t know how she escaped.”
“Hmm.” Peter finger-combed his white beard. “Gimme the stats.”
“Aah. Meg Finn. Fourteen. Irish. Gas explosion.” Peter flicked to the Fs. “Finn. Finn. Here we are. Meg Finn. Nice little line in misdemeanors. Not a whole lot on the plus side. Just the one big deposit right here at the end. Hold on, I’ll do a count.”
Peter ran his finger down the good and bad columns, totting up in his head. A frown creased his brow.
“Hmm. That can’t be right.”
“What’s the problem?”
“Hang on there a second, Bub. I’m going to e-mail this to your handset.”
Myishi had equipped the phones with a scanner, fax, and e-mail. Peter ran the receiver over the relevant page and hit SEND. A few seconds later he heard his counterpart draw a sharp breath. “Well, I’ll be damned.”
Peter nearly laughed. “You getting the same count as I am?”
“Yes. Dead even. A balanced account. She saved herself at the last minute. I haven’t seen one of these since . . .”
“Since that rock-n-roll singer with the hair.”
“Exactly. And look at all the trouble he caused when he went back.”
Peter was silent for a moment. “This is a touchy one, Bub. Wars get started over this kind of thing.”
“I know. A single soul becomes very important all of a sudden.”
“We have to leave it alone, Beelzebub. One loose cannon on the mortal plane is enough.”
“Of course,” said Beelzebub soothingly. “It’s out of our hands now. Just let the girl seal her own fate. No one is worth sending in a Soul Man for.”
“Hmm,” said Peter, entirely unhappy with Beelzebub’s acquiescence. “Just as long as we understand each other.”
“Perfectly,” hissed the demon, pressing the Terminate button.
Peter stuffed the cell phone into his pocket. This wasn’t over. That sneaky tone had crept into Bub’s voice. He intended to send a demon to Earth, to reclaim the lost soul. A Soul M
an. Peter was certain of it. Beelzebub was going to risk untold repercussions on the mortal plane for the sake of one Irish girl. Who was this Finn person? And why was she suddenly the most popular spirit in the cosmos?
Beelzebub stuck his nose out of the shadows. All clear. So, Finn got to go back. Well, it wouldn’t be for long. He would make sure of that. Just long enough to add a few more points to her negative column. Then Lucifer would have his precious soul. And Beelzebub would hold on to his job until the next crisis.
So he had lied to Peter. Big deal. He was a demon, wasn’t he? What did that white-suited goody-two-shoes expect?
MEG DIDN’T WANT TO OPEN HER EYES. SO LONG AS SHE lay here hiding behind her lids, she could invent her own little story to explain recent events. That was it. She’d just lie here forever, and never even peek at what lay outside her head.
So: the pains all over her body were not the result of smashing into the walls of a celestial blue tunnel, but into the gas tank. That explained why she was lying down too. Doubtless she was in hospital, grievously injured. But alive. And the hallucinations, they were probably brought on by the painkillers. She would have laughed, if her sides weren’t wracked with shooting pains. Obvious, really. And it made a lot more sense than the other version of the story. I mean, dog-boys and giant tunnels?
Meg was so confident in her new theory that she decided to risk cracking open her eyelids. Her initial impression was blue. A lot of blue. Still, don’t panic. You get blue in hospitals. A soothing color.
Then a pair of disembodied, bloodshot eyes blinked in the azure panorama, bringing her hopes for a happy ending crashing down around her ears.
A set of sooty teeth appeared beneath the eyes.
“Never seen nothing like that,” said a phantom mouth.
Faced with something like that, lying-down-with-your-eyes-closed tactics suddenly seemed dubious at best. Meg scrambled to her feet, backpedaling until she was flattened against the tunnel wall. Yep, that tunnel again. Looked like the hospital theory wouldn’t fly.
“Spectral trail,” continued the mouth, oblivious to Meg’s discomfort. “Blue, red, purple. Wow-wow-weee.”