Green Simon. Agents of Light and Darkness

   I felt like whistling loudly, impressed, but I didn't. I had a reputation to maintain. "No wonder there are angels in the Nightside."
   "Already?" Jude leaned forward sharply. His eyes didn't look kind any more. "Are you sure?"
   "No," I said calmly. "So far it's only talk. But the word is, we have visitors from Above and Below."
   "Shit," said Jude, startling me just a bit. You don't expect language like that from a priest and librarian.
   "Mr. Taylor, it's imperative you locate the Unholy Grail for us, before agents of the Lord or the Enemy become directly involved. Make no mistake, if agents of the Principalities go to war here, they could level the Nightside."
   "If the Unholy Grail is here, I can find it," I said, giving Jude my best confident smile. He didn't seem impressed or reassured.
   "It won't be easy, Mr. Taylor. Even with your famous talent. A lot of people are going to be searching for the Unholy Grail, for all manner of good and bad reasons. And in the wrong hands, its power could conceivably upset the balance between Above and Below. The Last Days could come early, and we're not nearly ready yet."
   "So if the angels don't destroy the Nightside, whoever gets to the Unholy Grail first could do the job too? Wonderful. I just love working under pressure."
   "But you'll take the commission?"
   "I can find anything. It's what I do. That is why you came to me, isn't it?"
   "You came highly recommended," said Jude. "Though for the sake of your ego, I don't think I'll say by whom. Now, the Unholy Grail was being kept in the House of Blue Lights, one of the hidden complexes deep under the Pentagon. But a guard somehow got past all the defenses and protections, and smuggled it out. He couldn't hang on to it, of course, the poor fool. It had just used him to escape."
   I remembered the man in black at St. Jude's, and what had happened to him. The awful voice(s) had mentioned a Grail. But I didn't say anything. I had no reason to keep things from Jude, but I still wasn't ready to trust him entirely either. I was pretty sure he was keeping things from me.
   "If it's here, I can find it," I said flatly. "But I'm not so sure I should turn it over to the Vatican. Your reputation's taken a series of knocks recently. Everything from banking to the Ratlines."
   "The Unholy Grail would go straight from me to the Holy Father," Jude said earnestly. "And he would ensure it would be locked away and properly contained. Until the End of Time, if necessary. If you can't trust the Pope to do the right thing, Mr. Taylor, whom can you trust?"
   "Good question," I said. I wasn't convinced, and he could tell. He thought for a moment.
   "We only want to preserve the status quo, Mr. Taylor. Because Humanity isn't ready yet for any of the alternatives. I have been authorized to offer you a quarter of a million pounds. In cash. Fifty thousand in advance."
   He placed a stuffed envelope on the table between us. I didn't touch it, though my fingers were itching to. A quarter of a bloody million?
   "Danger money?"
   "Quite," said Jude. "You'll get the rest when you place the Unholy Grail in my hands."
   "Sounds good to me," I said. I picked up the envelope and tucked it away, giving Jude my best confident smile. "You've got yourself a deal, Jude."
   And then we both looked up as three large gentlemen loomed over us. They took up positions standing as close as they could get without actually joining us in the booth. I'd heard them coming, but hadn't said anything because I didn't want Jude distracted while he was talking about money. The three gentlemen glared at us both impartially. They were the best-dressed thugs I'd seen in some time, but the attitude gave them away. They might as well have been wearing I am a mafioso hit manT-shirts. They looked slick and heavy and dangerous, and each of them had a gun. All three were professionally calm, forming a semicircle to cover both me and Jude, while efficiently blocking us off from the rest of the bar. No-one could see what was happening, and we wouldn't be allowed to shout for help. Not that I had any intention of doing so. The largest of the three gunmen flashed me a humorless smile.
   "Forget the pew-polisher, Taylor. From now on, you're working for us."
   I considered the matter. "And if I prefer not to?"
   The gunman shrugged. "You can find the Unholy Grail for us, or you can die. Right here, right now. Your choice."
   I smiled nastily at him, and to his credit he didn't flinch. "Your guns aren't loaded," I said.
   The three gunmen looked at each other, confused. I held up my closed hands, opened them, and let a stream of bullets fall out to clatter loudly on the table-top. They pulled the triggers on their guns, and looked very upset when nothing happened.
   "I think you should leave now," I said. "Before I decide to do something similar with your internal organs."
   They put away their guns and left, not quite running. I smiled apologetically at Jude. "Boys will be boys. You leave the matter with me, and I'll see what I can turn up."
   "Soon, please, Mr. Taylor," said Jude. He fixed me with his deep brown eyes, positively radiating sincerity and earnestness. On anyone else, it would probably have worked. "We're all running out of time."
   He rose to his feet, and I got up too. "How will I find you, when I have something to report?"
   "You won't," he said calmly. "I'll find you."
   He walked off through the bar, not looking back. Interestingly enough, people moved to get out of his way without even seeming to notice they were doing it. There was more to Jude than met the eye. Mind you, there would have to be. The Vatican wouldn't send just anybody into the Nightside. I went back to Alex, who was refilling the hand in the top hat's glass. Frankenstein's creature was moodily tightening the stitches in his left wrist. Alex nodded to me.
   "Got yourself a new client?"
   "Looks like it."
   "Interesting case?"
   "Well, different, anyway. I think I'm going to need Suzie's help for this one."
   "Ah," said Alex. "One of thosecases."
   There was a crack of thunder, a flash of lightning, a billowing of dark sulphurous smoke, and a sorcerer appeared at the bar right next to me. He wore dark purple robes and the traditional pointy hat. He was tall, dark, and imposing, with long black fingernails, a neat goatee, and piercing eyes. He gestured dramatically at me, while fixing me with a ferocious glare.
   'Taylor! Find the Unholy Grail for me, or suffer an eternity of my wrath!"
   While the sorcerer's attention was fixed on me, Alex calmly produced a heavy bung-starter from behind the bar. He plucked off the sorcerer's tall pointy hat and hit him over the head with the bung-starter. The sorcerer yelped once, and collapsed. Alex raised his voice.
   "Lucy! Betty! Time to take out the trash!"
   Lucy and Betty Coltrane, Alex's body-building bouncers, arrived and cheerfully hauled away the unconscious sorcerer. Alex glared at me.
   "Unholy Grail?"
   'Trust me, Alex. You really don't want to know."
   He sighed. 'Taylor, get out of here. You're bad for business."

Three - Meetings in Dark Place

   The long and narrow alleyway outside Strangefellows was as dark, gloomy, and filthy dirty as always. The heavy blue light from the huge moon hanging overhead gave the cobbled alley a bleak, sinister air, like the uneasy streets we walk in our dreams, and never to anywhere good. Business as usual, in the Nightside. I headed for the bright city lights at the end of the alley, picking my way carefully through the rubbish littering the way. There were severed hands everywhere, and not a few feet, all hard as ice and dusted with hoarfrost. The Little Sisters of the Immaculate Chainsaw had been busy tonight. The Christmas season must be starting early this year.
   A figure appeared suddenly at the far end of the alley, standing silhouetted against the glaring neon, and I stopped dead in my tracks. For a moment my heart slammed painfully against my chest, and I forgot how to breathe. The last time I'd walked down this alley, I'd been ambushed by my enemies. The faceless horrors of the Harrowing had come for me, and I'd only escaped with the help of my old friend Razor Eddie. Of course, he'd been the one who set me up for the ambush; but that's friends for you, in the Nightside.
   But this time there was only the one figure, with a distinctly female silhouette, and as she started down the dark alleyway towards me, a soft golden glow appeared around her, lighting her way. She was exceedingly blonde and pretty, and almost overpoweringly voluptuous, moving with easy grace in her own pool of light. Marilyn Monroe, in her glorious prime, in her iconic white halter dress. Not a look-alike or a double, but indisputably the real thing, wrapped in glamour, bursting with life and laughter, just like in her films. Sweet and sexy Marilyn, walking in her own spotlight.
   She came to a halt before me, and smiled dazzlingly. She smelted of sex and sweat and sandal-wood, of roses and rot, and though her smile was a inviting as ever, there was no matching warmth in her eyes.
   "Hello, sugar," she said, in a voice like a caress. "I'm so glad I found you. I've got a message for you."
   "That's nice," I said, carefully non-committal.
   She laughed her famous laugh, wrinkled her nose at me, and handed me a long white envelope with the tips of her fingers. "This is for you, sweetie. Inside the envelope, there's a blank check! Signed by Mr. Hughes himself. He wants the Unholy Grail for his collection. All you have to do is find it for him, and you can fill in the check for whatever amount you like. Isn't that generous of him?"
   "Pardon me for asking?" I said. "But aren't you dead?"
   She laughed huskily and tossed her head. Her wavy hair moved in slow sensuous waves. Being bathed in the glow of her open sexuality was like staring into a blast furnace.
   "Oh, that wasn't me. Howard looks after his friends."
   "I rather thought he was dead too."
   "Men that rich don't die, sugar. Not if they don't want to. They just move to another plane, for tax reasons. He's mixing with some really powerful people these days."
   "People?"
   "Loosely speaking."
   I weighed the envelope in my hands thoughtfully. I'd never been offered a blank check before. I was tempted. But... I smiled regretfully at Marilyn.
   "Sorry, dear. I already have a client. I'm spoken for."
   "I'm sure Mr. Hughes can match any offer..."
   "It isn't the money. I gave my word."
   "Oh. Are you sure ... I couldn't do anything to persuade you?"
   She took a deep breath, and her breasts seemed to surge towards me. I was finding it hard to breath "I'm probably going to hate myself in the morning," I said finally, "but I have to say no. My services are for sale, but I'm not."
   She pouted at me with her luscious mouth. "Everyone has their price, darling. We just haven't found yours yet."
   "I'm always loyal to my client," I said. "It's all the honor I have left."
   "Honor," said Marilyn, wrinkling her nose again. "See how far that gets you, in the Nightside. See you again, sugar. Boop boop de boop."
   She blew me a kiss, turned elegantly on her left high heel, and strode off down the alley. Her shoes made no sound on the cobbles. She walked in glamour, still in her own spotlight, like the star she was. I watched her disappear back into the neon noir of the city streets, and only then looked down at the envelope in my hand. My first impulse was to tear it up, but wiser thoughts prevailed, and I put it carefully in my inside coat pocket. You never knew when a check with Howard Hughes's signature on it might come in handy.
   I looked around for a dark doorway. They tended to come and go, but you could always rely on a few, this close to Strangefellows. I walked over to the nearest, kicked a few hands aside, and sat down cross-legged. No-one would disturb me here, and I had work to do. If one major player already knew I was on the trail of the Unholy Grail, then it was a safe bet everyone knew. Or at least, everyone that mattered. They'd all be looking for me, and the people they'd send wouldn't all be as pleasant and polite as Marilyn. This was the kind of treasure hunt that started serious turf wars. And the last thing I needed was the Authorities getting involved. No, I needed to get my hands on the Unholy Grail as quickly as possible, and that meant using my gift. I'm always reluctant to do that, because when I use my special talent, my mind blazes like a beacon in the darkness of the Nightside, signaling to all my enemies exactly where I am. But it's my gift that makes me what I am, that enables me to be so very good at what I do.
   My gift. I can find anything, or anyone. No matter how well hidden they are.
   So I sat there in the deep dark shadows, my back pressed against the wall, breathed deeply, and close my eyes, concentrating. And opened the eye deep in my mind; my third eye, my private eye. Energies swirled within me, rough and roaring, then flowed out of me, rushing off in all directions, lighting up the night so I could See everything. The thunder of a million voices descended upon me, not all of them in any way human, and I had to struggle to focus, to narrow my vision to the one thing I was searching for. The bedlam died away, and already I could begin to sense a direction, and the beginnings of distance. And then Something reached down out of the over-world, snatched my mind right out of my body, and bore it away. There was a sensation that might have been flying or falling, as the alley and the material world disappeared. And I was somewhere else.
   This time, it was my turn to stand in the spotlight. A light stabbed down from somewhere above me, brilliant and blinding, holding me in place like a bug transfixed on a pin. I felt horribly naked and exposed, as though the light showed up everything inside me, the good and the bad. All around me there was only darkness, a deep concealing darkness, and somehow I could tell it was there to protect me, because I was not worthy or strong enough to see what lay beyond my small pool of light. But I could sense that I was not alone, that to either side of me there were vast and powerful presences, two great armies assembled on an endless unseen plain. There was a feeling of restless movement, and what might have been the fluttering and flapping of wings. My mind, or more likely my soul, had been hijacked. Brought into the over-world, the boundaries of the immaterial. The over-world wasn't Heaven or Hell, but it was said you could see them both from there.
   A voice spoke to me from one side, and it was a harmony of many voices, like a crowd chanting in syncopation, a choir that sang only in descants. My skin crawled at the sound of it. I'd heard such a voice before, in St. Jude's. It was a powerful, imperious voice, steeped in ancient, unanswerable authority.
   "The dark chalice is loose once more, traveling in the world of mortal men. This cannot be permitted. It is too powerful a thing to be abandoned to merely human hands, and so it has been decided that we shall descend from the glory plains and walk in the material world again."
   A second harmonied voice spoke from the other side, rich and complex and full of discords. 'Too long has the Unholy Grail wandered at random in the world of mortal men. The somber chalice, the great corrupter. It must be placed in the right hands and allowed to fulfill its purpose. Its time has come round at last. And so it has been decided that we shall ascend from the infernal plains and walk in the material world again."
   All I could think was Oh shit...
   'Tell us what you know of the Unholy Grail," said the first voice, and the second echoed, 'Tell us, tell us..."
   "I don't really know anything yet," I said. It didn't even occur to me to lie. "I've only just started looking."
   "Find it for us," said the first voice, implacable as fate, as an iceberg seeking out a ship.
   "Find it for us," said the second voice, relentless as cancer, as torture.
   Both their voices were very loud now, beating about me in the darkness, but I refused to allow myself to flinch or quail. Show weakness before overbearing bastards like these, and they'd walk all over me. I was scared, but I couldn't afford to show it. Both sides could destroy me in a moment, for any reason or none. But they wouldn't, as long as they thought I could be of use to them. I glared out into the dark, showing impartial contempt. Angels or devils, they both spoke with the arrogance of anyone who speaks from a position of strength. But I felt pretty sure I had a question that would reveal their true position.
   "If you're so powerful," I said, "why can't you find the Unholy Grail for yourselves? I thought nothing was hidden from you, or your bosses?"
   "We cannot see it," said the first voice. "Its nature hides it."
   "We cannot see it," said the second voice. "Its power hides it."
   "But you can See what is hidden."
   "So See for us."
   "I don't work for free," I said flatly. "And if either of you could compel me, you'd have done it by now. So stop trying to bully me, and make me a proper offer."
   There was a long pause, and the voices said together, "What would you want?"
   "Information," I said. 'Tell me about my mother. My missing, mysterious mother. Tell me who and what and where she is."
   "We cannot tell you that," said the first voice. "We only know what it is given to us to know, and some things are forbidden, even to us."
   "We cannot tell you that," said the second voice. "We know only what is said in darkness, and some things are too awful, even for us."
   "So essentially," I said, "you're really nothing more than glorified messenger boys, working on a need-to-know basis. Send me back. I've got work to do."
   "You do not speak to us that way," said the first voice, its harmonies rising and falling. "Defy us, and there will be punishment."
   I looked across at the other presences. "Are you going to let them get away with that? If I'm hurt or damaged, you risk losing the one person who can definitely find the Unholy Grail for you."
   "Do not touch the mortal," the second voice said immediately.
   "You do not speak to us that way!"
   "We speak how we will! We always have!" There was a stirring and a disturbance in the darkness, as of two great armies readying themselves for war. There were angry voices, with vicious threats and vows, and ominous intent. And it was the easiest thing in the world for me to quietly slip away from them, and drop back into my body, which waited in the doorway in the alley outside Strangefellows. It had grown cold and stiff in my brief absence, and I groaned aloud as I made myself stretch reluctant muscles and pounded my hands together to get the circulation moving again. I closed my mind down tightly, pulling all my strongest mental shields into place. You don't last long in the Nightside if you don't learn a few useful tricks to guard your mind and soul from outside attack or influence. Walk around here with an open mind, and your head will end up more crowded than the underground during rush hour.
   But it did mean I wouldn't be able to use my gift again. Anytime I let down my defenses long enough to See, you could bet agents from Above and Below would be waiting for a chance to grab me again. And make me an offer I wouldn't be allowed to refuse. So it looked like I was going to have to solve this case the hard way: lots of legwork, asking impertinent questions, and the occasional twisting of arms.
   Which meant I was going to need Suzie Shooter even more than I'd thought.
   Shotgun Suzie lived in one of the sleazier areas of the Nightside, up one of those narrow side streets that lurk furtively in the shadows of the more traveled ways. Lit starkly by glaring neon signs advertising nasty little shops and studios, offering access to all the viler and more suspect pleasures and goods, at extortionate prices, of course, it was the kind of place where even the air tastes foul. The neon flickered with almost stroboscopic intensity, and painted men and women and others who were both and neither smiled coldly from backlit windows. Somewhere music was playing, harsh and tempting, and somewhere else someone was screaming, and begging for the pain to never stop.
   I walked down the centre of the street, avoiding the greasy rain-slick garbage-strewn pavements. I didn't want anyone tugging at my arm or whispering coaxingly in my ear. I was careful not to catch anyone's eye, or even glance at the shop windows. It was safer that way. I didn't want to have to hurt anyone this early in the case. Suzie's place was set right in the middle of it all, between a flaying parlor and a long pig franchise. From the outside, her section of the old tenement building looked broken-down, decayed, almost abandoned. The brickwork had been blackened by countless years of pollution and neglect, covered over with layers of peeling posters, and the occasional obscene graffiti. All the windows had been boarded up. But I knew that the single paint-peeling door had a thick core of solid steel, protected by state-of-the-art locks and defenses, both high-tech and magical. Suzie took her security very seriously.
   I was one of the very few people she'd ever trusted with the correct entry codes. I looked around to make sure no-one was too close, or showing too much interest, then I bent over the hidden keypad and grille. (No point in knocking or shouting; she wouldn't respond. She never did.) I punched in the right numbers, and spoke my name into the grille. I waited, and a face rose slowly up out of the door, forming its details from the splintered wood. It wasn't a human face. The eyes opened, one after another after another, and studied my face, then the ugly shape sank back into the wood again and was gone. It looked disappointed that it wasn't going to get to do something nasty to me after all. The door swung open, and I walked in. I was barely out of its way before it slammed shut very firmly behind me.
   The empty hallway was lit by a single naked light bulb, hanging forlornly from the low ceiling. Someone had nailed a dead wolf to the wall with a rivet gun. The blood on the floor still looked sticky. A mouse was struggling feebly in a spider's web. Suzie never was much of a one for housekeeping. I strode down the hall and started up the rickety stairs to the next floor. The air was damp and fusty. The light was so dim it was like walking underwater. My feet sounded loudly on the bare wooden steps, which was, of course, the point.
   The next floor held the only two furnished rooms in the house. Suzie had a room to sleep in, and a room to crash, and that was all that mattered to her. The bedroom door was open, and I looked in. There was a rumpled pile of blankets in the middle of the bare wooden floor, churned up like a nest. A filthy toilet stood in one corner, next to a battered mini-bar she'd looted from some hotel. A wardrobe and a dressing table and a shotgun rack holding a dozen different weapons. No Suzie. The room smelled ripe, heavy, female, feverish.
   At least she was up. That was something.
   I walked down the landing. The plastered walls were cracked, and pocked here and there with old bullet holes. Telephone numbers, hexes, and obscure mnemonic reminders had been scrawled everywhere in lipstick and eyebrow pencil, in Suzie's thick blocky handwriting. The door to the next room was closed. I pushed it open and looked in.
   The blinds were drawn, as always, blocking out the lights and sounds of the street outside, and for that matter, the rest of the world as well. Suzie valued her privacy. Another naked light bulb provided the main illumination. Its pull chain was held together by a knot in the middle. Takeaway food cartons littered the bare floor, along with discarded gun magazines, empty gin bottles, and crumpled cigarette packets. Video and DVD cases were stacked in tottering piles all along one wall. Another wall held a huge, life-size poster of Diana Rigg as Mrs. Emma Peel, from the old AvengersTV show. Underneath the poster, Suzie had scrawled My Idolin what looked like dried blood. Suzie Shooter was lying sprawled across a scuffed and faded green leather couch, a bottle of gin in one hand, a cigarette in one corner of her down-turned mouth. She was watching a film on a great big fuck-off wide-screen television set. I strolled into the room, and into Suzie's line of view, giving her plenty of time to get used to my presence. There was a shotgun propped up against the couch, ready to hand, and a small pile of grenades on the floor by her feet. Suzie liked to be prepared for anyone who might just feel like dropping in unannounced. She didn't look round as I came to a halt beside the couch and looked at the film she was watching. It was a Jackie Chan fight fest; that scene towards the end of Amour Of Godwhere four big busty black women in leather gang up on Jackie and kick the crap out of him. Good scene. The sound track seemed to consist entirely of screams and exaggerated blows. I glanced around me, but nothing had changed since my last visit. There was still no other furniture, just a bog standard computer set up on the floor. Suzie didn't even have a phone any more. She wasn't sociable. If anyone needed t contact her, there was e-mail, and that was it. Which she might not get round to reading for several days, if she didn't feel like it.
   As always when she wasn't working, Suzie had let herself go. She was wearing a grubby Cleopatra Jones T-shirt, and a pair of jeans that had been laundered almost to the point of no return. No shoes, no make-up. From the look of her, it had been some time since her last gig. She was overweight, her belly bulging out over her jeans, her long blonde hair was a mess, and she smelled bad. Without taking her eyes off the mayhem on the screen, she took a long pull from her gin bottle, not bothering to take the cigarette out of her mouth first, then offered me the bottle. I took it away from her and put it on the floor, carefully out of her reach.
   "Almost six years since I was last here, Suze," I said, just loud enough to be heard over the television. "Six years, and the old place hasn't changed a bit. Still utterly appalling, with a side order of downright disgusting. Garbage from all across the country probably comes here to die. I'll bet the only reason this building isn't overrun with rats is that you probably eat them."
   "They're good with fries, and a few onions," said Suzie, not looking round.
   "How can you live like this, Suze?"
   "Practice. And don't call me Suze. Now sit down and shut up. You're interrupting a good bit."
   "God, you're a slob, Suzie." I didn't sit down on the couch. I'd just had my coat cleaned. "Don't you ever clean up in here?"
   "No. That way I know where everything is. What do you want, Taylor?"
   "Well, apart from world peace, and Gillian Anderson dipped in melted chocolate, I'd like to see some evidence that you've been eating sensibly. You can't live on junk food. When was the last time you had some fresh fruit? What do you do for vitamin C?"
   "Pills, mostly. Isn't science wonderful? I hate fruit."
   "I seem to recall you're not too keen on vegetables either. It's a wonder to me you haven't come down with scurvy."
   Suzie sniggered. "My system would self-destruct if it encountered anything that healthy. I eat soup with vegetables in. Occasionally. That sneaks them past my defenses."
   I kicked an empty ice cream tub out of the way and sighed heavily. "I hate to see you like this, Suzie."
   "Then don't look."
   "Fat and lazy and smug with it. Don't you have any ambitions?"
   "To die gloriously." She took a deep drag on her cigarette and sighed luxuriously.
   I sat on the arm of the couch. "I don't know why I keep coming back here, Suze."
   "Because we monsters have to stick together." She finally turned her head to look at me, unsmiling. "Who else would have us?"
   I met her gaze squarely. "You deserve better than this."
   "Shows how much you know. What do you want, Taylor?"
   "How long have you been lounging around here? Days? Weeks?"
   She shrugged. "I am currently between cases. Bottom's dropped out of the bounty-hunting business lately."
   "Most people have a life apart from their work."
   "I'm not most people. Just as well, really, considering most people depress me unutterably. My work is my life."
   "Killing people is a life?"
   "Stick to what you're good at, that's what I always say. Hell! When I do it, it's an art form. I wonder if I could get a grant... Shut up and watch the film, Taylor. I hate it when people talk during the good bits."
   I sat with her and watched quietly for a while. As far as I knew, I was the closest thing Shotgun Suzie had to a friend. She wasn't much of a one for getting out and meeting people, unless it involved killing them later. She only really came alive when she was working. In between cases, she shut down and vegetated, waiting for her next chance to go out and do the only thing she did well, the thing she was born to do.
   "I worry about you, Suzie."
   "Don't."
   "You need to get out of this dump and get to know people. There aresome out there worth knowing."
   "Men have been known to walk into my life, from time to time."
   It was my turn to sniff loudly. "They usually leave running."
   "Not my fault if they can't keep up." She shifted her weight on the couch and farted unselfconsciously.
   I glared at her. "They usually leave because you made them watch Girl On A Motorcycleone time too many."
   "That film is a classic!" Suzie said automatically. "Marianne Faithful never looked better. That film is right up there with Easy Riderand Roger Corman's Hells Angels movies."
   "Why did you shoot me, six years ago?" I didn't know I was going to ask that until I said it.
   "I had paper on you," said Suzie. "Serious paper, backed by serious money."
   "You knew that paper was false. The whole thing was a setup. You had to know that... but you shot me anyway. Why?"
   "You were leaving," she said quietly. "How else could I stop you?"
   "Oh, Suze .,."
   "Why do you think you were only wounded? You know I never miss. If I'd wanted you dead, you'd be dead."
   "Why was it so important for you to stop me leaving?"
   She finally turned to look at me. "Because you belong here. Because . .. even monsters need to feel they're not alone. Look, what do you want here, Taylor? You're interrupting a classic."
   "Bruce Lee again?" I said, just to tease her. And because I knew I'd got as much honesty out of her as both of us could stand.
   "Don't show your ignorance. This is Jackie Chan."
   "There's a difference?"
   "Blasphemer. Jackie's got some great moves, but Bruce Lee is God."
   "Speaking of whom," I said casually, "I have a case I could use some help on."
   Suzie sat up and gave me her full attention for the first time. "You have a case involving Bruce Lee?"
   "No. God. There are angels in the Nightside."
   Suzie shrugged and gave her attention back to the television screen. "About time. Maybe they'll clean the place up."
   "Maybe. But there's a distinct possibility there might not be much left of the place by the time they'd finished with it. They're looking for the Unholy Grail. I've got a client who wants me to find it first. Thought you might like to help. The money really is extremely good."
   Suzie produced a remote control from somewhere underneath her and put the film on hold. Jackie froze in mid kick. Suzie looked at me. "How good?"
   "I'm offering fifty thousand, out of my fee. You get twenty-five up front, and the rest when the job's done."
   Suzie considered, her face impassive. "Is the job very dangerous? Will I have to kill lots of people?"
   "Odds are ... yes and yes."
   She smiled. "Then I'm in."
   And that was it. Suzie didn't really care about the money; she never did. She just went through the motions, so people wouldn't think they could take advantage of her. With her, it was always the job that mattered, the challenge. The only feelings of self-worth she had came from testing herself against forces that could destroy her. I took the money out of the envelope Jude had given me, peeled off half, and dropped it onto the couch beside her. She nodded, but made no move to pick it up. She didn't have a safe, or even a strongbox, on the unanswerable grounds that no-one was going to be stupid enough to steal from her. There were less painful ways to commit suicide. She turned off the television, stubbed out the last half inch of her cigarette on the leather couch, flicked it away, then fixed me with a steady stare.
   "You have my full attention. Angels ... and an Unholy Grail. Kinky. Bit out of our usual territory. Would silver work against angels?"
   "Not even if you loaded it into a bazooka. You could probably strap an angel to a backpack nuke and set it off, and he wouldn't even blink. Angels are major hard-core."
   Suzie looked at me for a long moment. It was always hard to tell what she was thinking, behind the cold mask she used for a face. "You religious, Taylor?"
   I shrugged. "Hard not to be, in the Nightside. If only because there are no atheists in foxholes. I'm pretty sure there is a God, a Creator. I just don't think he cares about us. I don't think we matter to him. You?"
   "I used to tell people I was a lapsed agnostic," she said easily. "Now I tell them I'm a born-again heretic. I hung out with this bunch of Kali worshippers for a while, but they said I was too hard-core, the wimps. Mostly ... I believe in guns, knives, and things that go bang. All of which we're probably going to need if we're going after the Unholy Grail. I take it there will be competition?"
   "Lots and lots. So you don't have any problems, about going up against angels or devils?"
   She smiled coldly. "Just give me something to aim at and leave the rest to me." She frowned thoughtfully. "There was a weapon I heard of once ... The Speaking Gun. Created specifically to kill angels. The Collector tried to bribe me with it one time, to get into my pants ..."
   "I think we'll save that for a last resort," I said, diplomatically.
   She shrugged. "So, where do we start?"
   "Well, I thought we'd go and have a word with the Demon Lordz."
   "Those gangsta wannabes? I have seen puppies in toilet paper commercials that were more threatening than that bunch of poseurs."
   "There's more to them than meets the eye."
   She sniffed. "There would have to be."
   I stood up. Time to get the show on the road. "Grab what you need, and let's get moving, Suzie. Above and Below have already tried to lean on me. I'm pretty sure we're working against the clock on this one."
   Suzie lurched ungracefully to her feet and stomped out of the room, heading for her bedroom. I waited patiently while she threw things about, looking for what she wanted. When she came back, she looked like Shotgun Suzie again. The grubby T-shirt and faded jeans were gone, replaced by gleaming black leather jacket, trousers and knee-high boots, generously adorned with steel chains and studs. She wore two bandoliers of bullets across her impressive chest, and the hilt of her favorite pump-action shotgun peered over her right shoulder from its holster on her back. A dozen assorted grenades hung from her belt. She'd even brushed her hair and slapped on some make-up. She looked sharp and deadly and very alive. Suzie Shooter was on the job, heading into deadly peril, and she couldn't have been any happier.
   "Damn," I said. "Clark Kent becomes Superman."
   "Big Boy Scout," she sneered. "Who's our client on this one, Taylor?"
   "The Vatican. So watch your language. You ready?"
   "Does the Pope shit in the woods? I was born ready."
   I made a mental note to keep her well away from Jude, and led the way out. It was a good day for someone else to die.

Four - Demons, Nazis, and Other Undesirables

   We went uptown. The nastiest, scariest, sleaziest joints are always uptown. Where the beautiful people go, to act out their inner ugliness in private places. Uptown, where the neon becomes more stylized and the come-ons are more subtle. Where the best food and the best wine and the best drugs, and all the very best music can be yours, for a price. Which is sometimes money and sometimes self-respect, and nearly always your soul, in the end. Uptown, you can see everybody on the way up, and everyone on the way down. Birds of a feather groom together. Walking the rain-slick streets under hot neon, with Suzie at my side like a barely restrained attack dog, it quickly became clear that there really were a lot fewer people about than usual. Just the thought of visiting angels, from Above or Below, had been enough to scare a lot of familiar faces into lying low for a while. But there were still crowds of people out and about, hurrying along temptation's rows, avoiding eye contact, lips wet with anticipation. On their way to business or pleasures they couldn't or wouldn't put off, even for the threat of Judgement Day.
   Now and again, certain individuals would spot Suzie Shooter coming down the street towards them, and they would quickly and quietly disappear, slipping into convenient side streets and alleyways. Others would hide in doorways or deep shadows, shoulders hunched, heads down, hoping not to be noticed. A few actually stepped off the pavement and out into the road, to be sure of giving her plenty of room. A dangerous act in itself. It was never wise to get too close to any of the endless traffic that roared through the Nightside. Not everything that looked like a car was a car. And some of them were hungry.
   When you go uptown, into neatly laid-out squares with tree-lined streets and ornate old-fashioned lampposts, passing increasingly expensive establishments with pretence to class and sophistication, you move among a much higher class of scumbag. There are restaurants where you have to book months in advance just to be sneered at by a waiter. Huge department stores, selling every bright and gaudy useless luxury the covetous heart could desire. Wine cellars, dispensing beverages older than civilization that madden and inflame and bestow terrible insights. Weapon shops and influence peddlers, and quiet parlors where destinies can be adjusted and reputations restored. And, of course, all the hottest brand names and the very latest fads. Love for sale, or at least for rent, and vengeance guaranteed.
   And nightclubs like you wouldn't believe.
   The Nightside has the best nightclubs, hot spots, and watering holes in the world. The doors never close, the music keeps on playing, and the excitement never ends. Nowhere is the scene more now, the girls more glamorous, the setting more decadent, or the shadows more dangerous. These are places where they eat the unwary alive, but that's always been part of the attraction. The Blue Parrot, The Hanging Man, Caliban's Cavern, and Pagan Place. Once past the ominous doormen and the reinforced doors, there's every kind of music on the menu, including some live acts you would have sworn were dead. Robert Johnson, still playing the blues with weary fingers, to pay off the lien on his soul. Glenn Miller and his big band sound, still calling Pennsylvania 6-500. (The Collector had Miller on ice for a long time, but was leasing him out now, in return for a consideration best not discussed in public.) Buddy Holly, hitting his guitar like it might fight back, headlining the Rock & Roll Sky-Diving All-Stars. And the Lizard King himself, on tour from Shadows Fall, that small town in the back of beyond where legends go to die when the world stops believing in them. Plus a whole bunch of Elvises, John Lennons, and Jimi Hendrixes, of varying authenticity. You paid your money and you took your choices.
   Suzie and I were on our way to The Pit. A relatively new concern, recommended for the seriously discerning pleasure-seeker. An extremely private place, for those in whom pleasure and pain combine to form a whole far greater than the sum of its parts. Where caressing hands had sharpened fingernails, and every kiss left a little blood in the mouth. The Pit, not surprisingly, was underground. From the street up, the place was just another restaurant, specializing in meals made from extinct animals. To get to The Pit, you had to go down a long set of dirty stone steps, to an alley well below street level. No flashing neon here, no dazzling come-ons. You either knew what you were looking for, and where to find it, or you weren't the kind of patron The Pit wanted to attract. It was the kind of place where if you had to ask the price of something, you couldn't afford it. I'd been there once before, to rescue a succubus who wanted out of her contract. It all got rather messy and unpleasant, but that's life for you. In the Nightside.
   Suzie and I walked down the alley, ignoring the long queue. A few of those we passed scowled an muttered, but no-one said anything. Suzie and I are well-known faces, and our reputations went before us. A few people produced camcorders, just in case there was trouble. The solid steel door that was the only entry into The Pit was guarded by two of the Demon Lordz, scowling menacingly at one and all, their muscular arms folded across their heavy chests.
   At first glance, the Lordz looked like just another street gang. Both wore dark, polished leathers, fashionably scruffy, and heavy with metal studs and hanging chains. They wore bright tribal colors on their faces, gaudy daubs on skin so black it glistened blue. They wore strap-on devil's horns on their foreheads, and when they smiled or scowled they showed teeth filed to sharp points. But there was something more about them, in their unnatural stillness, in the boiling air of menace they projected, that showed they were so much more than just another set of gangsta wannabes. Certainly none of the punters waiting patiently to get in even thought about trying to jump the queue. They were mostly rich kids, in all the latest fetish gear, whose parents could probably buy and sell The Pit out of petty cash, but none of that mattered here. It wasn't who you were, but who you knew, that got you in.
   Suzie studied the two Lordz standing guard before the firmly closed door and scowled ominously as they refused even to notice our presence. She tended to take such slights personally. She looked around the alley, then sneered impartially at the Lordz and the queue.
   "You know all the best places to bring a girl, Taylor. I just know I'm going to have to disinfect my boots later. Do we have anything resembling a plan?"
   "Oh, I thought we'd just barge our way in, insult all the right people, and kick the crap out of anyone who annoys us."
   Suzie smiled briefly. "My kind of party."
   I walked right up to the Lordz, radiating confidence. Suzie stuck close beside me, still scowling. Some of the queue decided that they'd try another club. The doormen finally deigned to acknowledge our existence. They were trying hard to look cool and aloof, and not quite bringing it off. The clenched fists gave it away. The one on the left looked down on me from his full six feet four.
   "Back of the queue," he growled out of one corner of his mouth. "No jumping. No bribes. No exceptions. Members only. And you two would be wasting your time anyway. We have a very strict dress code."
   "So piss off," said the one on the right, from his full six foot six. "Before we have to do something to you that might upset the nice ladies and gentlemen in the queue."
   "Let me kill them, Taylor," said Suzie. "It's been a slow night so far."
   "Keep your bitch under control, Taylor," said the one on the left. "Or we'll take her inside and teach her some manners. We might let you have her back, in a week or two, when we've broken her in properly."
   Suzie's shotgun all but whistled as it flew out of the holster on her back, and the Demon Lord shut up suddenly as she rammed both barrels up his nostrils.
   "I'd really like to see you try," she said, smiling her awful smile.
   "This," I explained to the Demon Lordz, "Is Suzie Shooter. Also known as Shotgun Suzie, also known as Oh Christ, it's her, run."