Devil Said Bang (Sandman Slim 4)

“Which means I get to live this little drama all over again.”

Ipos nods. Merihim picks up the gyroscope from the desk and spins it the wrong way. The ominous voice comes out high and weird. A demonic Alvin and the Chipmunks.

“Definitely,” says Ipos.

“And it will be both subtler and more serious. We have access to potion makings in the tabernacle. I’ll personally prepare some draughts to protect you from psychic attack.”

“What I want to know is why now?” say Ipos. “After all this time, why would someone attack you?”

I shrug.

“Maybe someone caught me counting cards.”

Merihim says, “Something has changed. They’ve discovered something or they’re afraid you will, and they need to kill you before you discover it too.”

I say, “It’s the possession key. Mason wasn’t exactly generous with information. He created the key and wouldn’t want anyone else using it, so it’s not like there’s going to be a user manual lying around. Maybe it’s taken this long for whoever has it to figure out how it works.”

Merihim waves off the comment.

“Perhaps. Speculation is pointless. We need to contact our operatives among the legions and the palace thaumaturgy staff to see what they can find.”

“Did anything interesting happen at the Council meeting?” says Ipos.

“Not really. Marchosias wanted to fuck me in her limo to annoy the others. I called Buer a Nazi and sent them all home to watch a silent movie about good architecture and a mad scientist.”

“It sounds charming,” says Merihim.

“There’s even a robot.”

“A masterpiece, then.”

Ipos says, “We should get to work.”

He sets his glass on the desk, holds it there, and pushes on it. The desk rocks a fraction of an inch up and down.

“I thought so. You wore down one of the legs dragging it over. I’ll fix that the next time we meet.”

“I can just stick a matchbook under it.”

He looks at me.

“No, you can’t. You might run the kingdom but I maintain the palace. This is my domain.”

“Whatever you say, Mr. Wizard.”

After they’re gone, I sit down at the desk and light a Malediction. Toss the Glock into the bottom drawer of the desk. I don’t like Glocks. They’re the gun equivalent of a middle-aged guy buying a Porsche.

From the top drawer I take out a shiny silver Veritas. The coin is a useful little pocket oracle. Another Veritas helped me survive my first few days when I first escaped back to L.A. The Veritas sees the present and the near future and never lies, though sometimes it’s a little shit about it.

I flip it and think, What now?

It comes down showing the image of a man pouring money into a woman’s hands. I’ve seen the symbol before. A hooker and her customer. Around the coin’s edge, in perfect Hellion script, it reads, Don’t make any long-term investments. Have a good time  now. That’s what I mean. The little prick could have just said, You’re doomed, but it likes showing off.

I toss the Veritas back in the desk, pick up a book, and lie down on the sofa. I’m reading a chapter about a Greek philosopher named Epicurus. The guy was a kind of depressed swinger. Imagine the Playboy Mansion run by Mr. Rogers. Epicurus was all about pleasure but in a stingy eat-your-vegetables-or-you-won’t-get-any-dessert kind of way.

A lot of this philosophy stuff puts me right to sleep, but Epicurus must have been able to see into the future when people like me can’t read more than a paragraph without checking our e-mail because he spit out the important stuff short and sweet. It’s called the Tetrapharmakos and it’s a kind of a PowerPoint list to fix whatever ails you. It goes:

Don’t fear God