Dead Jack and the Old Gods, page 10
“How do we return?” Oswald asked.
“Just click your heels and say, ‘There’s no place like home.’”
“Really?” I said.
“No, dummy. That’s a movie. You need do nothing to return. As I said, you can only temporarily enter Tír na nÓg, and since you are not Tuatha Dé Danann—well, she may be partly—” she nodded at Zara “—you’ll be ejected from Tír na nÓg soon enough. So, make haste.”
Dana touched the side of the mound and a narrow section shimmered like a mirage and revealed an opening. “Hurry,” she said, and we rushed into the mound. “And don’t forget to follow the Yellow Brick Road.” Her laughter trailed away as we traveled in complete darkness.
“I had no idea the Queen was such a laugh riot,” I said.
By the time Zara touched her torchlight tattoo the other Other World had already filled with light, a ghostly pale glow.
When my eyes adjusted, I was able to make out blurry shapes. It looked like we were in a garden with flowers and trees and shrubs. Water tinkled softly.
“How much do you trust this leprechaun queen?” Zara asked.
“Not at all,” I said.
“So, she may have locked us up in here forever?”
“On the bright side, if she did, we’re probably safer in here than out there.”
As we traveled, the haze thinned out and the colors of the garden became clearer. We walked on grass. Flower beds abounded. In the distance was a large willow tree. We made our way there.
“So, what are we supposed to do?” Zara asked. “Call the IDBs’—I’m sorry—the angels’ names and hope they show up?”
We stopped under the shade of the tree, the shadows stretching far and wide.
“You know, I saved all those IDBs,” I said. “They owe me.”
“You saved them?” Oswald and Zara said in unison.
“We—I meant we saved them. Maybe they can say hello to us all.” I raised my voice: “Remember that time we saved your ungrateful asses? I never did get a thank you! We never did get a thank you.”
“Good strategy,” Zara said. “Piss off the angels.”
“How did the leprechauns catch them?” Oswald asked.
“I never asked them,” I said. “I only saw that little baby in a glass jar. I let him out, he gave me the finger, and flew away.”
“Maybe they’re attracted to glass,” Oswald said.
“What?”
“Maybe that’s how they captured them. Put out the glass bottle and they slipped in. Like a trap. Some supernaturals are attracted to certain metals and substances.”
“Zara, do you have a glass bottle inked on your body?” I asked.
“All I have is a shot glass.”
“If that’s all we’ve got... Let’s see it.”
Zara pulled up her shirt, exposing her belly. To the right of her belly button was a shot glass. She pulled it off her skin and held up the shot.
“You got any Devil Boy?” I said, and Zara gave me a dirty look. “Never mind. Just sit it against the tree.”
Zara placed the shot glass in front of the tree.
We hid on the other side of a hedgerow about fifty yards away and kept watch. We stayed quiet and I wondered how long we’d be allowed to stay in Tír na nÓg. The place was pretty nice. It reminded me of the Other World with its bright blue sky and colorful gardens. A few years under the blood-red sky of Pandemonium and you forget how beautiful the Other World was, how warm and normal. How much it differed from this horror show world. I suddenly craved hot dogs.
The leaves of the willow rustled, but there was no wind. We all held our breath as we watched a naked cherub descend from the tree, fluttering down on his little black wings. It was the bird-flipping bastard. He landed next to the shot glass. He eyed it wearily. I could see he was very interested in the glassware, but he was cautious.
The fat, round, pink creature circled the shot glass. He looked around, like he was about to get caught taking a whiz in public. The IDB leaned down and tapped the rim of the glass. Then he was running his finger along the edge, smiling. He put his hand inside, and before he knew it, he was somehow inside it. Trapped.
We hopped over the hedge like Olympic hurdlers and raced to the shot glass. What a sight that must have been: a zombie, a homunculus, and a six-foot pixie jumping over a hedge in an extra dimension running toward an angel in a shot glass.
I picked up the glass. “I guess this answers the question of how many angels can dance inside a shot glass, huh?”
I could see the little guy’s eyes blinking and watching me. “Remember me? I released you from Fine Flanagan’s bottle not too long ago, and for my troubles you gave me the finger.”
He didn’t show any form of recognition. “I’m going to help you out. Now don’t try to run off. We need to talk to you. I think you’ll want to listen. Remember, how I saved you and your pals on Skull Mountain before the Pandemonium Device sucked away your essence?”
With my thumb and forefinger, I reached into the shot glass, pinched the IDB by his wings, and gently pulled him out. There was a popping sound like a cork being removed from a champagne bottle. I dropped the glass on the ground.
When I held him up, he had returned to his original size without notice. I looked him in the face, his silver eyes stared blankly back at me. “Do you remember me?”
He continued his mime routine and didn’t acknowledge my existence.
“We’re not looking to capture you or anything. We have the Necronomicon. A very bad person who calls himself the Harbinger has entered Pandemonium and he’s looking for it. As far as we know, if he gets it he’s going to use it to summon the Old Gods and enslave or kill us all.”
“Balls,” the IDB said, fear and apprehension in his tiny voice.
“You spoke! Holy shit. I thought you were mute.”
“I speak when I have to.”
“Why did you say ‘balls’? You’re an angel, right? Angels shouldn’t say ‘balls.’”
The angel looked at me with infinite sadness and frustration. “First of all, let me go or I’m not saying another word.”
“You got it.” I immediately let go of the IDB’s wings and he hovered in the same exact place.
“That’s better,” he said. “Now when you say ‘Old Gods,’ what exactly do you mean?”
“Cthulhu,” Oswald said, “Nyarlathotep.”
“Do you have the book?” the IDB asked.
I reached into my inner pocket and hauled out the thick book.
“Whoa!” the IDB said. “Okay. Put that back.”
I did.
“Let me tell you a story so you’ll better understand,” he said. “You all should sit down. This is going to take a while. Move back.”
We all took a few steps back. The angel waved us farther back. “That’s enough. Sit down.”
We all got down on the soft grass, facing the tree. The IDB floated above us.
“Let me show it to you...”
Suddenly, darkness swallowed the top of the tree. It resembled a blank canvas or a movie screen.
“In the beginning,” he said, “there was the void and a really long time passed.”
The darkness grew until it took up the entire sky.
“In this void appeared some creepy ass things.” Dark shapes appeared, shadows against the dark. “And those creepy ass things evolved into gods, but at this time which was still a really, really long time ago they weren’t called old gods or elder gods, they were just gods, you see.”
The shapes took on more solid and defined forms, many with tentacles.
“And these gods didn’t have anyone to fook with, and what’s the point of being gods if everyone else is a god, right? Besides they were just spinning around in a damn void. So, they created seraphim, aka angels.”
Angels, humanoid beings with large wings, appeared and crowded the sky above the tree.
“And a bunch of shit happened that I won’t get into—a lot of political stuff that’ll bore you and pointless philosophical debates—but suffice it to say some of the angels took to not wanting to take shit from the so-called gods. There was a war...”
On one side of the sky, appeared dark tentacled forms. On the other, beautiful, naked angels with large feathered wings. They came together with a big bang. The sound exploded throughout the garden. More terrible sounds came. Wails and screeches and things breaking and tearing apart.
“The angels won and banished the Old Ones to the far reaches of the universe, but in doing so they nearly died. Do you know what a pyrrhic victory is? Are you folks literate? Familiar with the classics? I don’t want to talk above the crowd.”
“Please, continue,” Zara said. “We get it.”
The angels, now much fewer in number, appeared smaller, emaciated. Not as beautiful or powerful. Their wings were broken or missing altogether.
“Their powers were greatly diminished. Once they were mightier than the Elder Things, but no longer.”
The darkness above the tree vanished, and now we looked at a tree and blue sky once again.
The angel baby fluttered back into view, flapping his wings above us. “If we tried to destroy the Necronomicon, we’d likely destroy ourselves, and if we cease to exist so too does Pandemonium, for we created this world as a barrier between Earth and the Old Gods. Once that barrier vanishes, nothing could hold them back. We can’t destroy the book even if we tried, which we won’t.”
I took it all in. It was a hell of a story. But it didn’t help us. We were back to square one. “What do we do?” I asked.
The IDB looked at me, shrugged. “Fook I know. Figure it out.”
And with that, we were sucked back to the sub-sub-sub-basement of Finn MacCool’s.
When we came through the sídhe, Dana and her guards were still standing by the entrance.
“Any luck?” she asked.
“You’ve been here the whole time?” I said.
“You were gone only a few seconds. Time moves differently inside Tír na nÓg.”
“We found the stupid angels,” Zara said. “But they can’t destroy the book either.”
“I upheld my end of the bargain,” Dana said. “You owe me a tattoo.”
“We have more pressing matters, Ms. Queen,” I said. “Like a lunatic trying to get his hands on the Necronomicon.”
“A deal’s a deal. Unless you want to give me your head instead. Either works for me.”
“How fast can you tattoo, Zara?”
“To be honest, I’d feel better with a replacement tattoo,” Zara said. “My arm is feeling empty and I could use a weapon, because I’m sure I’m going to need it. Let’s discuss our options at the tattoo parlor.”
“You mean our lack of options,” I said.
27
Tattoo You, Tattoo Me
Oswald and Zara got in the Studebaker. The plan was to drive to a tattoo parlor on Bleak Street, where Zara knew the owner. Dana would meet us there.
When I was about to pull away, someone knocked on my window. It was Herb. I rolled down the window.
“Hey, were you gonna leave me?” he asked.
“I thought you took off.”
“Nah. I just needed to clear my head. After all I’ve been through, I didn’t like the idea of traveling to another dimension. Where are you going?”
“A tattoo parlor on Bleak Street.”
“Can I come with you guys?”
I thought about it. I watched him with that dejected look, his head down. The kid did know better than the rest of us what trouble we faced. “Get in,” I said.
Herb jumped in the back with Oswald. Zara rode shotgun. As she told me, Ms. Moonbeam doesn’t ride in the back. As I headed west, I wracked my brain looking for a solution. We couldn’t destroy the book, but could we destroy Harbinger? One of them had to go. And even if we did kill Harbinger, what was stopping anyone else from coming through that damn portal? How did things get so damn messed up?
Dana and her two henchmen waited outside the parlor, which was between a record shop and a haberdashery. A sign on the frosted glass door read: “Jimbo’s Tattoo Parlor.” There were no windows, only bricks.
Zara pressed a black doorbell embedded in the brick, and it wasn’t long before a tall fairy of indistinct gender opened the door. The fairy’s rolled-up shirt sleeves revealed full inked forearms.
“Is Jimbo here?” Zara asked.
The fairy turned and shouted, “Jimbo? It’s Zara.”
“Then let her the fook in,” someone shouted from inside.
Who I assumed was Jimbo sat in what looked like a dentist chair. He leaned back, smoking a fat cigar. He was a muscular, mean-looking fairy, a rarity. He had pointy ears and silvery eyes, but also a scowl and a granite face. He wore black denims without a shirt, his big, round hairless belly covered in dark tattoos that squirmed as he breathed in his stogie.
The other fairy sat in a chair at the back of the parlor and picked up a magazine.
“Zara, it’s been awhile,” Jimbo said.
“I’d love to catch up, Jimbo, but we’re pressed for time. I need to use your facilities to tattoo this fine lady and I need to give myself a replacement.” Zara turned and showed Jimbo the empty space on her arm.
“Holy Satan, you lost your hammer? What happened?”
“Long story short—it disintegrated. Can I use your place?”
“Sure, Zara, use whatever you need. Just make sure you send me tickets to Unicorn’s next show.”
“You got it. Thanks, Jimbo. Okay, Dana, sit in the middle chair and we’ll get started.”
Dana sat in one of those dentist chairs, opposite a station equipped with a tattoo gun and various ink pots. Her henchmen hung back, just far enough away to give Zara room to work. Drawings of dragons and skulls and hearts and snakes covered the walls.
Zara sat on a stool beside the station and inspected the tattoo gun.
“Who’s your friend?” Jimbo said.
Oswald sat next to the doorman and began writing in his diary.
“I’m Dana the Leprechaun Queen,” Dana said.
“Welcome to Jimbo’s, Dana the Leprechaun Queen. Leprechaun’s don’t usually get tattoos.”
“I’m not your typical leprechaun.”
“What makes the tattoos magical?” I asked. “Is it special ink?”
“I do,” Zara said. To Dana, she said, “Where do you want it?”
“On my back.”
“Then I need you to straddle the chair and pull up your shirt.”
Instead, Dana took off her shirt. Her breasts bounced out and Jimbo nearly choked on his cigar. Her henchman averted their eyes. I didn’t know where to look.
Dana stood up. “I hope these aren’t the first boobs you’ve all seen.” She straddled the chair and leaned forward.
Zara wiped Dana’s back with an alcohol pad. When she finished, she held up the tattoo gun. “This may hurt a little bit.” The gun whirred and then she began stippling Dana’s back. Dana whimpered a little at the first few jabs at her skin, and then remained silent.
“Can you give me a tattoo?” I asked. “Something I can use to fight these elderly gods?”
“It doesn’t work on dead flesh. In fact, it doesn’t work on non-fairies, either. Magical tattoos anyway. Regular tattoos are fine.”
“So, I’m on my own fighting these monsters?”
“What monsters?” Jimbo asked.
“Just some gods that want to invade Pandemonium,” I said.
“Oh, you mean like Cthulhu?”
“Wait. You know about this?”
“I used to be part of a Cthulhu cult, but waiting for the stars to be right is a slog, you know?”
“Well, I have some good news and some bad news. The stars are right.”
“You don’t say. I never thought I’d see it in my lifetime.”
“I hope you don’t see it,” I said. “We’re trying to stop it. What did you do in your cult?”
“Mostly sat around and read ancient texts we didn’t understand. We were supposed to prepare for the coming of the Elder Ones, but we never knew what exactly we were supposed to do.”
“Do you know Herb here? He was in a cult.”
“What? Me? I was never in a cult. I didn’t even know they existed. I told you I only read the Necronomicon for fun and stopped.”
“You read the Necronomicon?” Jimbo asked.
Herb got quiet. He looked at me and then quickly looked away. “Yeah. Only a few parts.”
“Our cult had been searching for it for years. I thought it was a myth.”
“Can we trust you, Jimbo?” I asked. “Are you still part of that cult?”
“No. I was young then. I know better now.”
“I can vouch for Jimbo,” Zara said. “You can trust him.”
“I have the Necronomicon and someone named Nyarlathotep is looking for it.”
Jimbo jumped out of his chair. “Nyarlathotep, the Crawling Chaos, is in the Five Cities? This is unreal. Can I call my buddies? They’ll get a real kick out of this.”
“We’d rather you didn’t,” Zara said.
“We tried getting some interdimensional beings to destroy the book,” I said, “but they couldn’t help us. Now we don’t know what to do.”
“Run,” Jimbo said. “Take the book and run as far away as possible.”
“He’s right,” Herb said. “We can’t destroy the book and we can’t defeat them. The only thing to do is leave the Five Cities. Go into the Outer Lands.”
“New Jersey,” I asked.
“New Jersey?” Zara asked. “What’s New Jersey?”
“That’s the state to the west of the Five Cities in the Other World,” I said. “It’s called New Jersey.”
“Was it nice?” Zara asked. “I was born in the Five Cities, and I never paid attention in history class.”
“New Jersey might have been the closest thing to the Five Cities as anything in the Other World. I imagine its Pandemonium version is an even more terrible place.”
“Herbert’s right, it could be the solution,” Zara said.
“Even if we wanted to go, it’s a difficult journey,” I said. “In the Other World, New Jersey was just over the Hudson River from New York City, but here the distances are stretched out. There are dozens of miles of the Undead Sea between the Five Cities and the Outer Lands. And I’ve heard there’s a barrier between the Five Cities and the rest of Pandemonium.”
