Sunset Volume 2: High Noon

Sol’s LAHQ. Uranus Department.

Marek always beat everyone into the office. Not needing to trek through the halls played a huge role in that, but he also liked having that silent, alone time to get the office prepped for everyone else. Little things that someone in his position probably shouldn’t be doing, like ensuring the coffee was on, the creamer hadn’t gone bad, the bins of tea bags were properly filled in the break room, and the whiteboard schedule of where the top five would be needed that day was up to date. If there was time, and he generally made sure there was, he’d send out a good morning memo and his first “Baguette Update” of the day. Those were always great. Funny little pictures of his hamster with some caption or another. Today’s was especially good, he felt: Baguette in a hot pink doll convertible, accompanied by the caption: “Rev your engines for another great Wednesday!” Other departments didn’t care enough about morale, in his opinion.

But that morning, Becca had beaten him there. She worked an absurd number of hours like the rest of them but she tended to stay later into the night, so Marek paused, bag over his shoulder, when he saw her light on. He leaned in without knocking.

Becca was fine. He wanted badly to like her more than he did. Or rather, he liked her fine when she was interacting with others, but she truly did not like him, and that active ire set the tone for the entire relationship. She had big, light brown, curly hair and light hazel eyes that could match a glare from even the toughest of Neptune agents.

“Hey,” he called. “Early morning for you.”

She barely looked up. “I needed to run some numbers before you send Jupiter the final budget proposal.”

They’d had a painful number of meetings going over everything top to bottom. He knew she hadn’t forgotten that, because no one could forget the sheer bullheadedness with which Emmett argued his points. “Anything you want to run by me?”

“No.”

With that tone, Marek half expected her to shut her office door with her telekinesis. “Oh-kay. I’m sending it at nine, so just let me know if you’re not set by then.” When she didn’t reply, he made his way to his office. Whatever she was doing, Marek assumed he wasn’t going to like it. It wouldn’t be the first time she’d taken his suggestions or even directives and ignored them, at best. Torpedoed them, at worst. He dumped his stuff in his office and hit the breakroom. Grabbing a coffee mug, he dumped in two sugar packets and teleported to Emmett’s quarters, just inside the door.

“Emmett, good morning,” he called out. The entryway was still dark, so he guessed he hadn’t gotten up yet. “I brought you coffee.” He added quieter, “Sort of.”

“Marek?” Emmett’s voice said his name, but his tone said, ‘What the fuck?’

“The one and only. Probably.”

“Just a sec.”

Marek flipped on the light and walked, heel to toe, through his kitchen. He debated if he had time to brew a batch of coffee right then, but Emmett’s coffee maker was so fancy-looking he didn’t trust himself not to press all the wrong buttons and accidentally fax China or something.

“What’s going on?” Emmett came out into the kitchen in jeans and a soft looking sweater. He looked harried and there was still a slight pattern of pillow creases on one side of his face.

“I brought you a beverage,” he smiled.

Emmett just stared at him. “Why?”

Marek looked to one side. “It’s Tuesday?”

Emmett shook his head and grabbed the mug from his hands. He froze, mug halfway to his body, staring at the mug of sugar.

“Just add coffee,” he offered.

“What the fuck is wrong with you. This is weird, even for you.”

He opened his mouth, not sure if he wanted to defend himself or launch into the Becca thing, but just then, Penn emerged from the hallway leading to Emmett’s bedroom, working to properly knot his tie. Marek clicked his mouth shut and turned to Emmett, who was looking more annoyed than anything. Huh.

“Good morning, Marek.” Penn’s matter of fact voice was reassuring. He hadn’t intended to increase the awkwardness of his morning a thousand fold like this.

“Good morning,” he replied, casually standing back to observe as subtly as one can, when one has teleported into someone’s apartment uninvited.

Emmett tilted the cup in Penn’s direction. “He wanted to bring me a drink.”

He narrowed his eyes at the mug as he finished straightening his tie. “Okay.”

“It’s Beverage Tuesday,” Marek explained with conviction. “New initiative.”

“It’s not Tuesday.”

Marek pointed at him. “That explains why the coffee is late.” He smiled into the awkward abyss.

Penn exchanged a look and likely a telepathic message with Emmett, then nodded at Marek. “Always fun running into you, Marek.”

“You too, Pennsylvania.”

He left and Marek turned his thin smile to Emmett.

Market kept his comment to simply, “That’s new.”

Emmett let out a breath. “Yes, it is, but it’s early and you didn’t even bring me coffee.”

“Yeah, sorry about that.” Market scratched at the side of his head. “I wanted to catch you before you went in though.”

Emmett began whatever alchemical process was required to run his coffee maker. “What for?”

“Well,” he began, then began to wonder if this was a terrible plan. He’d come too far. “Becca beat me in today and she’s working some numbers on the budget.”

He saw Emmett’s nostrils flare. “The budget is set. Or it’s not set-set but it’s ready to go to war with Jupiter set.”

Marek broke out his most calming voice. “I was also under that impression.”

“So what the fuck is she doing?”

“I don’t know, but I wanted to prepare you so you didn’t spontaneously combust or murder her when I have to email out proposal changes for approval.”

Emmett grabbed his work bag and pulled out his laptop. “Well, let’s find out what Miss Rebecca is up to.”

They both skimmed the proposal document, though Marek had looked at the numbers so many times he was beginning to struggle to hold them in his head.

“There,” Emmett pointed, his voice was thoughtful instead of the torrent of rage he’d been expecting. “She shifted funds from your new Moon thing to infrastructure repairs.”

Marek squinted at the page. He’d floated a program to help Moons feel more connected to Uranus, team building stuff, care packages, organized meetups of teams in the same area as each other, more communication. That would technically fall under Becca to implement and, while she hadn’t jumped up in excitement, she hadn’t fought him on it either. Apparently she had decided it was easier to go around him. Again.

She and Marek had never seen eye to eye on Uranus’ relationship with the Moons. Marek had been on a Moon and understood the isolation and disconnect that could come with it. Becca not so much. She favored a hands off approach to let Moons do their own thing with as little interaction with Sol as possible.

He glanced at Emmett. “That’s clever of her,” he mused. “I’m guessing you’re not about to fight her over you getting more money.”

“It’s hard to do that, yes.” Emmett stood up and stretched his neck. “What do you think you’ll do? Are you going to fight her?”

“No,” he sighed. “The thing’s due in under three hours and it’s seemingly important to her. We’ll get it in the next round and I’ll talk to her then.”

Emmett raised an eyebrow. “You could always talk to her before then. Isn’t this communications?”

“Please, my job is hard enough as it is. I’m letting sleeping dogs lie. She knows what she’s doing.”

“Okay.” Emmett looked at him. “Can you maybe get out?” He said it kindly.

“Yeah.” He couldn’t hold in a smile. “So, was he good?”

“Get out.” Emmett poured his coffee, which smelled better than anything Marek had ever brewed. “And yes.”

---

Sanctuary. Flanders, Belgium.

Warren sat with his back to the window, smoking quietly. Reeve had been unconscious for almost a full day. They’d thrown half a dozen stitches into his side where the bite was deepest and packed his right ear with gauze. Warren had offered to sit up with him through the daylight hours to keep an eye on him while the others slept. It honestly wasn’t that bad of a mauling compared to what he’d seen. Most of them had clearly never seen someone get bitten before, and assumed that was why he was still out. Only the tall one had ever had a piece taken out of him, but he wasn’t offering anything up to the others about it. Anyway, they weren’t wrong in thinking that that particular brand of pain could do a thing to a man beyond what it did to the flesh, but being hit full force by a Howler was not something to be underestimated. They wouldn’t know if he had hearing damage until he woke up.

The blinds in the small upstairs bedroom were pulled shut against the sun, but that only did so much. Reeve was propped up in the bed, and Alex—the one with the sissy lilt to his voice—was asleep next to him, on top of the covers, a pillow shoved over his face to keep the light out. They had wanted to stay up with him too, but the Church knew from experience that it's always better to sleep off that kind of shock. Whether people liked it or not. They’d all been given something for the pain, a bit stronger than was admitted.

Warren felt Reeve come to before he opened his eyes. Even from an exterior position, Warren could sense the analytical, tense field that was Reeve’s mind pouring out like smoke, seeking all the corners of the room, then pushing past. It hit Warren’s mind like a gust of wind and he sealed his head off against entry.

Reeve, everyone is safe, he projected, hoping to calm him and prevent a more aggressive ingress into his head. The Sol telepath was uncomfortable; the flow of his mind was so regimented it almost felt as if it had corners.

What happened? His eyes opened in a tight squint.

You were bitten. And you got hit with Noah’s scream. “Can you hear me?”

Reeve closed his eyes. Yes. You’re muffled though.

How’s the pain?

Don’t ask.

He watched Reeve shift, peeking under the pillow to scan what he could see of Alex. Is anyone hurt? he asked.

You. The rest are fine. They’ll be waking soon. Warren snuffed out his cigarette. He has a sinful attachment to you.

What?

This one. He shaped an image in his mind of Alex from last night as he was falling asleep, one hand resting on Reeve’s arm.

Flinching, he felt Reeve’s mind increase its pressure in the room. He responded in kind, maintaining a firm boundary and pressing out. Reeve was exhausted, weaker than he knew, and his walls began to crumble. Reeve’s anger swelled like a heat searing across his skin, but he wasn't about to drop his pressure.

He’s family. Reeve’s response was densely packed and intended to sting.

Warren narrowed his eyes, hovering at the edge of Reeve’s mind. He would never break through, but he didn’t mind knowing he could. It’s ungodly.

“Reeve?”

They both looked over with a start. Alex was sitting up, hair a rat’s nest, eyes puffy in his pillow-wrinkled face.

Reeve breathed out. “Hey.”

“Jesus,” he groaned, setting Warren even more on edge, “you woke me up with your telepathy. Ease it up, huh? I guess you’re okay?”

“I’m okay,” he said, carefully putting an arm up to guard his bandaged side. Warren could feel the protective mental shell Reeve kept around the lot of them closing again. “Maybe just no sudden movements though.”

“You fucking scared me!”

Warren grit his jaw, standing abruptly. “I’m going to get some sleep.”

As he reached the door he felt Reeve send out, Thank you, but he let it slide off of him without responding.

---

As it turned out, The Children of God were categorically opposed to taking a night off. Hannah was bruised and battered; they all were, except for Gareth. Even Noah had a knot on one cheekbone that left the white of that eye tinged bloody. The Children did not take a night off to recover. Even the old man who’d shown up while they slept, arms covered in tattoos of pentacles, roses, and suns, looking tired and haggard from travel, was up and raring to go. No rest for the wicked. Or the holy. Whatever.

They had tried to leave one of their own at home to stay with Reeve, but Noah had made it very clear that any action that held members of their “team” above other Children would be taken very unkindly. So that was that. Michael, still bandaged but no longer shaken, was up on the rotation to stay home with Reeve and the sleeping Warren, while Noah and the old man (who’d ignored her question about what his name was and had a habit of spitting on the floor) brought the others out. Reeve looked wrecked lying in bed. There were bluish circles under his eyes that had nothing to do with sleep and he turned his head a little when they spoke, to hear them better. But when she and Noah checked his wound, it was a healthy red. She slathered it with an antiseptic anyway. Reeve was at least strong enough to fake being in good spirits--or as good of spirits as he’d had since they’d left Beatty.

It was a clearer night, and stars and moonlight made it easier to see out on the streets. She had grabbed heavier firepower this time and probably too much ammo, going by the look the old man gave her. They still looked out of place as an ominous group in long coats, but it seemed like the immediate locals had grown used to their strange presence—or at least no one called the cops. She walked close to Alex and Gareth, taking the shivers of their fear as a comfort for once—reassurance that she hadn’t lost her mind.

“You won’t always have a telepath to help with your hunt,” Noah said, leading them down a street running parallel to the main road. “You’ll need to learn to find dogs on your own. One way is to stick to areas with bars or nightclubs, places where predators could guide some sloshed stranger away without raising too many alarms.”

“Is that their preferred method of...choosing?” Alyosha asked.

“I don’t really have a damn clue about preference, but it’s the easiest to spot when you’re starting out. It’s certainly not the only way to isolate a victim. They’ll stalk tourists, people leaving work, break into homes, they’ll even try to pick you up sober if they’re young enough to remember how to flirt—”

“Homeless camps,” Gareth said flatly, making Hannah startle.

Noah held his tongue for a moment, but didn’t stop walking. “Yes,” he agreed, “anywhere people are vulnerable. Proverbs thirty-fourteen, ‘There are those whose teeth are swords, whose fangs are knives, to devour the poor from off the earth, the needy from among humanity.’”

Somewhere ahead of them a car horn honked jarringly into the night. “How?” Hannah started as he led them down the street, taking detours down each alley to check the back entrances to restaurants and bars. “How can you tell that it’s something that needs shooting and not just a couple of drunks?”

“First of all, shooting will get you nowhere. But there are subtle clues you’ll learn to pick up on as you go along. Until then, mostly you have to get up close, bump into them and test how solid they are. Pick a fight even. But with a group in coats like this, they’ll probably know what we are and react one way or another when they see us.”

“That all sounds like a terrible idea,” Alyosha muttered. Beside him, the old man spat on the concrete.

“S’keep moving,” Noah called.

The air was cold and smelled like dumpsters and piss. It did not make her feel particularly religious. They paused to watch a man hovering in one dark corridor, and Alex stopped beside her. In the streetlight, his eyes were red-rimmed like hers. She scrubbed the palms of her hands against the inner fabric of her coat sleeves to dry them. The man doubled over vomiting and they moved on.

“So did you break Reeve’s hearing for good?” Alex asked.

“Anything’s possible, but I doubt it,” Noah answered without looking back. “A ruptured eardrum will heal in a few weeks without permanent damage. Trust me, I’ve seen a fair bit of that.”

“Alright, not to be an ass,” Gareth started, waving a hand palm-up in the old man’s direction. “But is anyone going to tell us who this guy is and why he doesn’t talk?”

Hannah raised her eyebrows. The old man didn’t seem to react. “Is he deaf?” she asked quietly. (Then she felt silly for asking that in a whisper.)

“No,” Noah sighed, rushing them across an intersection and back into the maze of alleyways. “He’s taken some vow of silence. I’ve seen him lighting candles to Harpocrates, Hellenistic God of silence. He carries a picture of Him. I looked Him up once, to see what I could find out—I guess He’s a young Horus, and also represents the sun, which always comes back to overcome the dark. Makes sense, with the work we do. But the guy won’t even write, so I’ve never met anyone who knows his name. Everyone calls him Spits and from what I can tell, he doesn’t seem to give a damn.”

“Spits,” Alex repeated dryly.

“He spits,” Noah offered by way of explanation.

The rasp of a machete hissing past cloth startled them and curled Hannah’s stomach into a tight knot. The old man had his weapon out and had taken off at a steady run down the next alley. They hurried to follow. Hannah fought to maintain her disciplined deep breathing, but still found herself panting through her dry mouth while she readied her gun. In the middle of the alley, she could finally see them. A woman was bent over some prone form; her head was craned upward and frozen like an animal caught drinking at a pool of water.

Hannah weaved through the group, but as she found a clear shot, the dog and her bloody chin bolted. A loud metallic creaking jolted Hannah to the bone and she brought herself to a stumbling stop as a dumpster flew clear over their heads from behind, spattering her with grit and droplets of foul liquid. It came down on top of the dog with a sound Hannah never wanted to hear again, pinning the flattened thing to the pavement. She froze in shock before noticing that the old man was ahead of them, his free arm outstretched, controlling the dumpster.

“Holy shit,” she coughed, holstering her gun. “Spits, I love you!”

The steel of the dumpster groaned, lifting up one corner as the dog heaved herself up. Something in Hannah’s chest curdled and the old man leaned forward and the container shuttered, pressing down. Noah, Alex, and Alyosha had reached the dumpster, knives out. Nothing she could do there that they couldn’t. Shaking herself and wiping some muck off the bridge of her nose, she ran to the body on the ground.

He was thin, in his early twenties, and he was going to bleed out unless she stopped it. There was so much blood on his chest that Hannah couldn’t immediately tell where it was coming from until she tore his shirt. The energy coming off of him made the hairs on her arms stand on end. Gareth dropped down on his knees next to her, pulling off his jacket and balling it up. She took it from him and pressed it hard against the wound by his collar bone with as much weight as she could manage. The man didn’t cry out in pain and her heart sank. He was pale and there were clicks in his breathing as he moved his lips mechanically like a fish, but his eyes were clear and open. He was seeing her and she didn’t want to look. At the dumpster, she watched Alex bring his machete down on the thing’s neck as it was clawing its way out from under the dumpster. Noah picked up the head as Alex staggered backward.

“Hannah?” Gareth asked in a hushed tone.

She looked back down at the man on the pavement. His lips were blue and the pauses between his breaths were growing longer. She shook her head and handed off the compress to Gareth. She laid down next to him, close to his face.

“Hey,” she said quietly, then louder when his eyes started to roll. “Hey, help is coming. Try to...you need to save your strength. If you think you can sleep for a little bit, you should sleep. I’ll be right here. I’m not leaving you alone. It’s okay, you can sleep.” He blinked at her and she held his limp hand. She felt the icy edge of his fear ebb. He closed his eyes and stopped breathing shortly after.

Hannah sat up and collapsed backwards with her legs pulled halfway up her chest, wet hands hanging slack over her knees.

“That was good,” Gareth said softly, as he used the ruined coat to clean the man’s torso.

“No, it wasn’t,” she snapped. “Not anywhere close.”

“You know what I mean,” he replied calmly. “You saw him relax.”

She nodded.

Noah’s voice above them, hoarse in a low whisper, made them raise their heads. “My lord, Christ, please have mercy.” His face was frozen in fear. Hannah followed his eyeline and saw a second wound low on the man’s chest, streaked with blood, uncovered as Gareth tried to clean him up. Noah dropped down next to him and began to tear the rest of his shirt off.

“He’s gone,” Gareth protested, leaning back as Noah snatched the wadded up coat and finished toweling the young man off. The second reddened oval of a bite on his chest was raised and puckered. Hannah looked up to see Noah staring at her, waiting expectantly.

“This was healing,” she stammered, confused.

“Check his arms,” Noah told them. “Flip him over.”

“What?” Gareth put his hands up. “No.”

“Have mercy on his soul.” Noah spoke in a low monotone while he methodically ran his hands down the length of both the dead man’s arms. “Lead him safely to your holy dwelling. ‘For many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake, these to everlasting life, but others to disgrace and everlasting contempt.’ Book of Daniel, chapter Twelve verse—” He stopped, pausing to double back and run his thumb over a section of the man’s shoulder. Without warning, he grabbed Hannah’s hand by the wrist and yanked it forward. He set her hand where his had been.

“Here,” he said softly. “Feel that?”

There was a raised scar, crescent shaped. She rummaged through her pockets, pulling out a lighter to cast a little more light and fumbled the sparkwheel with slick thumbs until it caught. The skin was a fresh new pink, several weeks healed.

“Three bites?” Gareth asked, standing up and taking a step back.

Noah nodded. He took out a rag from one pocket to wipe his hands. “Fuck.”

Behind them the sudden flash and glare of Alyosha setting fire to the body trapped under the dumpster made them all squint and flinch away.

“Is it possible,” Hannah asked when her eyes had adjusted, “they aren’t from the same one?”

“Of course, but not likely.” Noah answered, handing her the partly soiled rag. “We can’t risk that.”

Gareth bounced his long knife in one hand. “I’ll do it.”

“No!” Noah shouted. “Sorry, that won’t work. We’ll have to hold a Vigil.”

“What does that mean?”

Noah spread out the stained coat to cover the man’s body. “We watch the body. A dog’s feral cycle is three days: for two, they're able to act something akin to human, and on the third, they become a frenzied beast. You must be bitten on three different nights, and then you must be dead for three nights before you wake. It’s a mockery of Christ. If he will rise, any damage done to the body will only be healed three nights from now.”

“Even if we burn him?”

“You can’t kill the demon because he’s still human right now. Normal bodies don’t burn to ash like a dog’s. We have to wait and if he turns, then we can destroy it.”

Alex came around the corner with Spits. His face was unreadable. She wanted to grab his hand, but hers were still bloody and, as he got closer, she saw his were smeared with darker ichor.

“Anyone hurt?” Gareth asked, once they were back into a tight huddle around the body. They all shook their heads.

“Good,” Noah said, standing up. “Now, let’s get the body home. We’re going to have to take the long way back to stay in the dark.”

“What?” Alex asked, his head shooting up. “No, whatever, tell me later.”

***