Toki was in mid-swing when something grabbed him around the middle and jerked him backwards. Before he knew what was up he was sailing through the air then splashing down in the ocean. Memories of his near-death-by-phorocyde flooded his mind and he screamed and flailed in the warm water.
"Chill," a female voice ordered. "I just need to talk to your fairy godfather."
Toki tried to look behind him, only managing to do so when he swung his head hard enough to flip his hair out of the way.
There was a woman floating in the water behind him, looking completely comfortable to be submerged even though she was fully clothed. Toki's eyes widened as he remembered the face of the eel-mermaid who had come to his rescue the previous day.
"Toki not supposed to dives or fly for another four days!" The young Norwegian blurted. Or at least tried to blurt. He got as far as 'Tuh' before water flooded into his mouth. Toki clamped his mouth shut.
"Oh, right! Sorry," the woman said. She gestured in an odd way and a bubble seemed to form around Toki, insulating him from the water and pressure. The guitarist spit a mouthful of salty water into the bottom of the bubble and took a deep, grateful breath. The strange woman was still studying the surface of the water as if waiting for something.
"Who ams you?" Toki asked.
The woman looked down at him with a benevolent smile.
"You don't recognize me?" She asked.
"Well, ums, I knowed you was dere yesterday with de fish people, but I don't know who you ams."
"I'm Ixchel," she said simply, using her newly acquired professional name.
"You de Boner Goddess?" Toki said in wonder.
The carefully crafted expression of cool, calm benevolence melted off of the young goddess's face.
" . . . the what Goddess?" she echoed.
"Oh, uh, I means . . . uh . . . Toki ain't got a fairy godfather! . . . . . . Does I?"
A tremendous splash distracted the both of them. A creature swam out of the foam; vaguely serpentine but horned with a blackish mane of hair. A few tentacles coiled angrily, then a long pair jetted forward and latched onto Toki's bubble. The young Norwegian screamed shrilly as he was dragged towards the monster. Ixchel clung to the other side of bubble and allowed herself to be towed along. The magic bubble seemed pretty tough, but Toki's shoulder blades still made a spirited attempt to dig through it as more long, tentacled arms latched onto the bubble, twisting it up until Ixchel was perched at the top, right before the monster's gaping maw.
"MINE." It growled in a voice more felt than heard.
"Hi, Phooka," Ixchel said cheerfully. "We need to talk."
"O – O – O – Okay," Charles slurred, spitting out a worn-out lime. "Here's . . . . here's what we're gonna do."
Matthias gathered up lime segments and went to slice some new ones. He had heard that sometimes Charles would spend a weekend drinking with the band. The assistant always pictured the prim manager sitting quietly in the corner nursing a white wine spritzer. He never expected to see Offdensen put away a whole bottle of tequila. Likewise, he never expected the manager to join the boys in their hot tub, especially not fully clothed.
Oh fine, Charles had taken off his shoes and he was wearing khakis and a polo shirt, not his normal suit, but it was still quite unexpected. Nathan and Pickles had stripped down to their underwear to soak and Skwisgaar was completely naked. Somehow Matthias had been drafted as a waiter and kept them all supplied with drinks.
"Tomorrow we'll have a . . . . have a . . . . thingie . . . and say Nathan was just giving – giving Toki a hard time. Toki's lousy English made Toki think – made Nathan think . . . y'know, something was going one when it wasn't. Biiiiiiig misunderstanding. It'll be just like the time Skiwsgaar got caught with that tranny."
The Swede's head jerked up sharply.
"She saidses she's was post-ops!"
Nathan and Pickles snickered drunkenly.
"Set up a . . . . a . . . thingie . . . press conference! That's it. Shet up a press conference, Conrad," Charles ordered.
"Um . . ." Conway began. "Are you sure you wouldn't like to dry out first, sir? Last time you ordered me to do something when you were drunk . . ."
"I am not drunk; I have been drinking. There's a difference," Charles said primly.
"Yeah, dood!"
"I really hate it when employees backtalk," Nathan growled.
"So do I," Charles agreed in a lethal tone of voice.
Matthias sighed and pulled out his iPhone.
"This is going to come back and nail me in the ass," he murmured to no one in particular. "And not in a good way."
"I – I need some gummy worms, too, Conrad," Charles cut in.
"Gummy worms? Right now?"
"Well, it's . . . it's not for me. My ladies. They need gummy worms. For after – after I'm done hanging out with the boys."
"Would gummy bears work or –"
"No! It has to be gummy worms!"
"Yes, sir, I'll –" Conway paused as it struck him why it had to be gummy worms. "I didn't know straight people knew that trick," he mused. "I'll find you some gummy worms, sir."
"What trick?" Nathan asked, eyeing his manager distrustfully.
Charles lolled his head to look at the front man.
"You . . . ah . . . you don't know the gummy worm trick?"
"Uh . . . of course I do!" Nathan blurted. "I – I just didn't think you would."
The lead singer cast a puzzled look at Pickles, who was far beyond noticing it. Skwisgaar had his head tilted back and was staring up at the sky; no help there. A massive bubble broke the surface of the water, bringing with it the faint smell of ponds and decay.
Charles opened his mouth to tell Murderface to at least say 'excuse me' but closed his mouth when he realized the bass player wasn't present. Where was William, anyway?
The water in the hot tub exploded upwards. An octopus tentacle as big around as a tree reached up into the night sky. A figure was clutched in the huge, ropy appendage; a very familiar figure.
"Toki's ready to go homes now!" the figure screamed.
"Toki?" Charles cried, scrambling out of the hot tub. Gears rushed into the area, guns at the ready. "Don't! You'll hit Toki!"
Nathan, Pickles, and Skwisgaar bolted behind their bodyguards, screaming: 'Kill it! Kill it!'
"You can't be fucking serious," came a long-suffering sigh.
Charles looked around at his assistant. Conway didn't look scared. He didn't even look concerned. His attitude said 'Everything else happened tonight and now this. I hate my job.'
"You! Get Toki!" Charles ordered. "I'll give you a corner office!"
"I already have a corner office," Matthias said, still unconcerned by Toki flailing around two stories above concrete.
"Then you'll get a company helicopter! Toki!"
"I don't need a heli-"
"We'll discuss the details later! Just get Toki!"
"All right, all right; I'm going," Conway sighed.
There was a soft 'whump!' and Offdensen's personal assistant was airborne.
"Oh holy shit, dood! I changed my mind, I don't want no more of this shit!" Pickles announced.
The drummer turned and ran off into the dark.
"Holy fuck . . . ." Nathan growled. "You . . . ah . . . . you have an angel for an assistant."
Matthias Conway soared over the heads of the assembled on white wings that seemed to glow from within. The only fact that he was still wearing the same rumpled suit he'd been wearing for the past eighteen hours detracted from the ethereal image, but only slightly.
"He's not an angel," Charles stated. "And he'll get pissed if you call him that."
Matthias alit on the gigantic tentacle next to Toki and grabbed him by the T-shirt. The tentacle bent backwards as though it were trying to grab Matthias and let Toki loose of it's suckered grip. The pair immediately plummeted towards the ground; Matthias stroking hard with his wings, but not able to actually carry the larger man.
Charles hadn't considered that; you didn't see sparrows carrying squirrels around. Toki was easily twice Matthias's weight. The wet T-shirt slid through the young deity's hands and Toki fell.
The tentacle coiled again as if searching for it's lost tidbit. Toki bounced off of the back of the giant arm and slid into the hot tub. He scrambled out a second later and bolted for the safety of the Gears.
Matthias fought to gain height now that the burden of Toki was gone. The wildly flailing tentacle crashed across his back, coiled around him and retreated back into the water of the hot tub, dragging the American Cupid with it. After a minute, the blackish water in the Jacuzzi turned to it's normal clarity.
The jets were even still on.
"So what's the plan now?" Dixie asked, her head pillowed on Ben's chest.
"Do you still have the money Javed stole from this oaf?"
"Mmm, he managed to get ten thousand before the account was shut down," the redhead said, fingering the yellow-orange stone on her ring.
"They didn't catch him on camera or any of that nonsense, did they?"
"No, he said he torched every location as soon as he had the money," Dixie said, leaning up on one elbow.
"Handy fellow with flame, that Arab," Ben observed.
"What about Plan B?" Dixie asked.
"I love Plan B," Ben announced. "J'adore Plan B. In fact, let's work on Plan B all night!"
Dixie couldn't help snorting.
"'J'adore'?"
"'Je t'aime?'" Ben offered.
"You ain't gonna convince nobody that you're William Murderface if you go bustin' into random French," she announced with a grin.
"German, then?"
Dixie snorted again and whapped him gently with a pillow.
"I'm serious!" she said, despite all evidence to the contrary. "William Murderface is a . . . . well, everything about him is 'poorly': poorly spoken, poorly educated, poorly dressed . . ."
"I'll have you know I've been practicing being an oaf. I can curse in front of a lady and everything."
"Oh yeah? Tell me to fuck off," Dixie ordered.
" . . . . I did say 'in front of', not 'at', titian."
"You can't call me 'titian' either! That's way too educated of a nickname! . . . even though it is really sweet," she conceded with a shy grin.
"I have been calling you 'titian' for more one hundred and fifty years and I don't intend to stop now," Ben said. "I'll say I'm having a mid-life crisis and I've been taking elocution lessons and whatnot."
" . . . we are doomed," Dixie observed.
"Oh no, titian. You see, in this time everything worth anything has to be measured; I'm sure the powers that be have dear William's fingerprints, hair samples, DNA, and those eye scan things as a matter of public record. Any attempt to prove that I'm not William Murderface will only prove that this is his body. I'd be more at risk of being convicted of body-snatching back in the Victorian era."
"Good point," Dixie sighed. She sat up and took another long look around the room. "I'd still like to know what happened to his soul."
Pickles sprinted through the night, heedless of where he was going. This night was turning into one bad trip and he didn't even remember dropping any acid! First there was that ghost that looked like Murderface, then the UnSeelie Court had taken up metal – which would be pretty badass as long as you weren't in immediate danger of being eaten – then a giant octopus possessed the Jacuzzi! No more, man, just no more!
Pickles was startled to see that Murderface was keeping up with him on his headlong flight. The bass player was the most out of shape member of the band but he stayed beside the sprinting ginger as though it were nothing. He didn't even look out of breath.
"What?" the drummer suddenly yelped. "We're runnin' from a fuckin' monster an' you wanna know if the guys are mad at you?"
Only the crackle of dried leaves and brush cracking underfoot broke the night silence.
"I don't know why everybody else was ignorin' you, okay? I – OOF!"
In his headlong dash, Pickles burst back into tame land; a dry dock for the hotel's many tour boats. It also seemed to be a hang-out for various night workers sneaking a smoke or surreptitious nip from a flask. The Dethklok drummer crashed into a woman smoking, knocking her down.
"Watch it, ye rat-arsed bastard!" She snapped. "That was me last fag, too."
On some level Pickles registered the Irish accent. His first thought was to get back on his feet and keep running. His second thought was to warn the chick he'd run into about the monsters. He grabbed her wrist and yanked her to her feet.
"Dood, we gotta get outta here! We . . . gotta . . . oh fuck me."
Any other time, he might have been preoccupied with the woman's gorgeous black curls or flashing green eyes and even now he wasn't above admiring the generous figure under her little black dress. But right now he couldn't help noticing the small, delicate horns curving up out of her skull.
"Oh Jesus," Pickles whimpered.
He tried to release her wrist, but found his fingers locked into place.
"What are ye starin' at?" the woman inquired in a low tone. "Ye can see 'em, can't ye?"
"W-w-what? Uh. Uuuuuuh, no. I can't see your horns. You look perfectly human t' me," Pickles stammered.
There was a long pause as the woman digested this.
"Right then so," she decided. "Ye're with me, ginger."
The woman started to walk back into the jungle, dragging Pickles along as though he were nothing more than a balloon tied around her wrist.
"No! Gahd! Help! Murderface! Murderface, go get help!"
The woman looked over her shoulder.
"Ye think a dead man'll be much help?" she asked.
"What? Fuck you, lady! Murderface! Run back and get help!"
The dark-haired woman shrugged and dragged the drummer into the jungle.
In yet another part of the jungle, swampy black water roiled, bubbled and discharged a ragged winged figure.
Matthias crawled up onto the bank with difficultly, pulling himself forcefully from the foul mud. He gagged from the stagnant smell of the swamp, but finally found a piece of ground that didn't threaten to swallow him and collapsed on it.
In the water behind him, a creature broke the surface. It had a long, serpentine head, crowned with horns – one of them broken off half-way, and a mane of black hair. It's long, column-like neck stretched up and up as it observed the American Cupid. A few enormous tentacles coiled around nearby trees, pulling the fell beast up onto shore.
Matthias stared up at the monster and shook dirty water from his wings.
"The explanation you are about to give me had better be fucking amazing!"