Grant just nodded, his expression inscrutable. It was no secret that he disliked me. "Just doing my job." Saving my life was a professional courtesy, nothing more. "I suppose that makes us even."

He was talking about me pulling him out of DeSoya Caverns. Technically I figured I was still ahead by one, but I had broken his nose for that incident. "Fair enough."

The fire was still burning in the distance. We were parked on the bridge between Buzzard Island and Montgomery. State police, by order of the Feds, had blocked the bridge into town. This area was now quarantined, certainly as part of what Myers had referred to on the radio as a Level 5 Containment Event. Agent Myers, trailed by Agents Torres, Herzog, and Archer, approached as Grant and I waited. The Goon Squad looked pretty beat up. Archer had a black eye and a Sig 229 dangling from one hand. Skippy, Gretchen, and Edward were nowhere to be seen, which was probably real smart right about now.

"Pitt...Jefferson," Myers addressed us, anger barely contained. I was waiting for him to explode. I was going to jail, if I was lucky.

"Myers," I said gravely. "Have you found Franks yet?"

"We will find him," Myers stated matter-of-factly, somehow talking while keeping his jaw clenched. "As for you..."

I waited patiently for my arrest.

Agent Myers hesitated, obviously waffling between having the cuffs put on or ordering his agents to just shoot me to get it over with. The look he gave me was a mixture of anger, frustration, and something else that I wasn't sure about. He turned from me, studied the surviving members of my protective detail one by one, and then scowled back at me, deep in thought. Finally he seemed to deflate. His teeth unclenched and then Myers just seemed like the tired, middle-aged, glorified bureaucrat that he was. "You, I'll deal with later. Go home..." He waved his hand. "Just...go home."

That was a surprise. "Seriously?"

"But, sir!" Herzog shouted. "He attacked us."

"I never touched you," I said, which was true. The orcs had beat the h.e.l.l out of them-not me.

"He pulled a gun on Agent Franks." Archer said. "That's-"

"Enough!" Myers cut his subordinate off. "Pitt, if I thought it would benefit my mission I'd have you locked up for eternity. Your actions jeopardized my men."

I had no idea why he was letting me go. A smarter man would have kept his mouth shut, but my temper tended to run faster than my brain. "You knew more about these oni than you let on. I had nothing to do with your trap failing. Did you expect me to just let them kill my brother?"

"You're a free man for one reason only. You're still our only in against this group," Myers spat. "Don't mistake my actions for mercy. I need all of my available men for this containment but I'll provide another protective detail shortly. We'll a.s.sess how tonight's setback affects our case against the Condition. Hopefully, the cultist your father shot will survive and we can get some information out of him."

"How are my parents?" I asked.

"Fine. They're on a flight now."

"Parents?" Mosh spoke up from behind Grant, concern evident in his voice. "What happened?"

Myers gestured into the back of the van. "One of your people?"

"That's my brother, the one you were going to leave to die," I said, pointing to Mosh, who looked really exasperated.

Myers sighed. "I meant the dead one."

"Driver of the tanker." Grant spoke for the first time.

"We tried to save him," Mosh said.

"I understand." The senior G-man nodded. "Men, carry this body to the chopper."

"What about Mom and Dad?" Mosh demanded.

"I'll explain later," I said. Mosh scowled in a manner that suggested he was giving serious thought about attempting to kick my a.s.s. I was bigger and had a lot more experience but I knew my brother was d.a.m.n tough when he got angry. "Chill out, dude. They're fine." Mosh punched the side of the van and stomped away. I waited until the Goon Squad had picked up the trucker before returning my full attention to Myers. It took all three of them to hoist the body up and shuffle away, each of them telegraphing their distaste for their superior's decision not to haul me off. "Any idea how many more dead?"

"Not as many as you would think," Myers replied. "We got lucky. Some civilians at the concert and I have four men dead and several more wounded." I didn't know if he was counting Franks in that quant.i.ty. "We got most of the cars stopped away from the tanker and the people stuck behind the crash were smart enough to run when they saw Force drop his invisibility. As far as we know, n.o.body else was caught in the explosion. In the meantime, I've got hundreds of witnesses and a slew of damage that I have to explain. Some idiot is going to talk about this and that means they'll have to be dealt with..." He trailed off, finding the idea distasteful.

"Wouldn't it be better if we just let the truth be known?" I suggested.

"Not my call, Pitt. I just enforce policy. I don't make it." He began to walk back to the waiting Blackhawk.

"You murder survivors and witnesses!" I shouted. "You destroy lives to keep up this illusion of safety! People should know what's really out there."

Myers paused, turned, and shook his head sadly. "Can you imagine what would happen if the world found out the truth? Chaos. Pandemonium. No. People need to be kept safe from themselves, and I'll do whatever I have to, lie, cheat...kill...anything, to keep my country safe." The professor was a dedicated man.

It was disgusting. "How do you sleep at night?"

Myers actually chuckled, his normally bureaucratic demeanor apparently damaged by his losses. "I don't. If you knew what was coming"-he resumed walking, the wind from the rotors snapping his cheap tie over his shoulder and making it difficult to hear-"you wouldn't sleep anymore either."

"What's that supposed to mean?" I shouted after him.

But he didn't answer. The chopper lifted off a minute later, leaving me to ponder what it was that Myers thought was coming. Clearly there was more to this cult than the Feds were letting on. Lee hobbled around the side of our van. He was in jeans and a Schlock Mercenary tee shirt. He had bailed out of the compound so fast he hadn't even had time to gear up. Grant must have gotten dressed on the road. The sight of Lee in normal attire made me especially thankful for my friends. They hadn't hesitated to go after me any more than I had for my own brother. "Z, I've got Harbinger on the phone. He's been trying to reach you."

I pulled out my cell phone. It had gotten cracked at some point during the evening's excitement. "Piece of c.r.a.p!" I c.o.c.ked my fist back and chucked it far out into the Alabama River. That small bit of random violence made me feel better.

Lee shook his head and grinned. "You know the company phones have a warranty on them, right? You could have got that replaced for free. Now you'll have to buy a new one."

I groaned. "What did he say?" I knew it had to be some variation of Pitt, you suck. Go hide at the compound Pitt, you suck. Go hide at the compound. Lee handed me his phone.

My boss actually sounded concerned. "How're y'all doing?"

"We're good. Only minor injuries." I hurried, knowing that he was going to rip me for disobeying his orders. "We got to my brother in time. Agent Franks is dead." Saying that sounded weird. Franks had always seemed so stoic, so invulnerable, that it was hard to imagine anything being able to end his life.

"He was a jacka.s.s but he was a pro," Earl said simply.

I turned away so the others wouldn't hear. Something that Bia said had been gnawing at me. "The creatures knew I was coming. Somebody told them I was on my way. There is is a spy at the compound." a spy at the compound."

There was a long silence at the other end while Earl mulled that over. "Either there or it could have been somebody who's with me right now. Julie got your message and told everybody else. We're on our way back. I've got an idea. I want you to meet me someplace. Can you ditch the Feds?"

"Already done."

"Okay, Lee's driving? Pa.s.s the phone back to him."

I walked back to the others and handed the phone to Lee. "What's going on?" Grant asked. Lee was listening to instructions and went forward to program an address into the onboard GPS.

"Earl wants us to meet him somewhere."

"I don't like it. Myers said we should go back to the compound," Grant said.

"Screw him," I said automatically. "When did you start caring what the Feds say?"

Grant snorted like that was absurd. "I don't."

"You're just worried that you're too pretty for prison." They'd have loved Grant in Tijira. Lee came back. "Where to, man?"

"Birmingham. Harbinger gave me an address for a house in a neighborhood called Hensley." Lee said.

"Never heard of it, but cool." So Harbinger had something up his sleeve after all. The whole "hide and wait for the bad guys to kill me" plan hadn't gone real well so far, so hopefully he had found a way to go on the offensive.

I like like being offensive. being offensive.

Chapter 8.

Birmingham was the next big city north of Montgomery. It took us awhile to drive the van through all of the various detours that popped up in the aftermath of the concert. It gave Gretchen a chance to bounce around between the seats, applying greasy, smelly ointments to all of our various injuries.

"Yes, d.a.m.n it, Tim. The tour bus exploded...Yeah, you heard me. Ex-Plode-Ed," Mosh said into Lee's borrowed cell phone with quite a bit of consternation. He had wanted to contact his band to let them know that he was still alive. "No, I don't know what's going on...Atlanta? h.e.l.l, I guess we're probably going to have to cancel it, don't you think? Since the bus exploded. exploded. " He shook his head sadly. "Okay, whatever, I'll call you back as soon as I can." My brother handed the borrowed phone back and then banged his forehead against the window. " He shook his head sadly. "Okay, whatever, I'll call you back as soon as I can." My brother handed the borrowed phone back and then banged his forehead against the window.

Yep, I've had nights like that before.

Mosh wasn't very responsive and appeared deep in thought. He hadn't even commented as Gretchen had applied a paste made out of old squirrels and herbs to the scratches on his face and arms. I had thought about taking him to a real hospital but I knew that he was a lot safer with me than floating around out there, alone and a target.

The worst injury to our contingent had been to Edward. Bia had clubbed him pretty good. He was resting in the back, and Gretchen informed us that he would be just fine. Orcs were built tough.

The broken windows made conversation difficult but at least the airflow made the evaporating gas stink from my soaked boots bearable. Grant rode shotgun, literally in this case, with a 12-gauge FN auto-loader sitting across his lap. It was still unknown just how much info the Condition had about us but we were a relatively small and vulnerable force out here on our own.

Lee had asked for details on the monsters while Gretchen pasted an inch-long cut on my scalp shut. I had lost a lot of scars because of the magical healing at DeSoya Caverns but I was having no problem picking up new ones. Lee had pumped his fist in the air when I had told him the details of Force and Violence's demise. "Yes!" our librarian shouted. "The clay, the explosions, the ghosts, that's textbook right there. They were giant, animated, soul containers. I was right. They were definitely oni, disembodied spirits living inside a created form. That's awesome." He turned to look at me over the seat. Apparently I gave him a stupid look. "Don't you get it?"

"Uh, no? And watch the road, I've already been in two car accidents tonight. Don't make me make a tacky comment about Asian drivers."

"Puh-leeze, like I've got a Camry with a giant spoiler on it."

Lee flipped back around. "PUFF on an ogre is only like twenty grand, depending on the breed. They're big but they aren't anything special. The PUFF bounty on an oni is in the hundreds of thousands."

Grant perked right up at that. "You all saw it. I got a confirmed on the purple one. So I'm the primary," he said smugly. At MHI, the entire company shared bounties, but the team, or in this case, the individual who did the most work, got the most pay. "And to think Earl left me behind to train stupid Newbies while he wasted his time on some wimpy trolls. How many hundreds are we talking about?"

"I'll have to look it up. It's not like anybody has killed one of these in a long time." Lee almost giggled. He was such a dork when it came to monster lore. "And the best part? The Feds smoked the big one, but the law says that government representatives can't collect PUFF."

"Really? Agents don't get PUFF?" Grant was incredulous. "That's...that's crazy. Well, good thing I'm not a Fed! We'll file the paperwork for an a.s.sist on the red one in the morning." He had been MHI's golden boy once, but had left in disgrace. Pulling off a great kill in his first few days back would probably help his reputation. "They couldn't have got him without our providing a distraction."

"Oh, that'll p.i.s.s off Myers, but good." Lee held out his fist for Grant to b.u.mp knuckles. Grant looked at him awkwardly for a moment and then did so.

"On a personal note, it sucks to be the number one target of a G.o.dlike interdimensional being, but it sure is good for business," I added.

"That's it." Mosh finally spoke up. "I've had about enough of this s.h.i.t. PUFF? Ogres? Oni? Who the h.e.l.l are you people?" He jerked his thumb to where the orcs were sitting quietly in back. "What the h.e.l.l are those people?" He turned toward me and stabbed one callused fingertip into my armored chest. "And the h.e.l.l are those people?" He turned toward me and stabbed one callused fingertip into my armored chest. "And you. you. You owe me an explanation or you can pull this thing over and let me out right now." You owe me an explanation or you can pull this thing over and let me out right now."

I glanced out the window. It was the middle of the night and we were in the country. "Not the best place to hitch a ride, bro."

"I swear I'm about to beat you like a tetherball," Mosh said.

"Well, it's a long story," I began.

"Give me the short version."

"Monsters are real. We make lots of money killing them," Lee piped in.

"I didn't ask you. I asked my stupid brother, who I'm guessing isn't really a CPA." He thumped me in the armor. "I want answers."

I laughed. "Short version?"

Mosh gave me a dangerous look. "Break it down for me."

Well, if he wanted to be that way..."Cool. Remember last year when my accounting supervisor turned out to be a serial killer? Nope. Werewolf. Remember last time we talked and I told you about my new finance job? Nope. Monster Hunter. These guys are some of my coworkers." I waved toward Grant and Lee, then I jerked my thumb to the rear. "Those folks back there are orcs, but it's all good, they're on our side. That muscle-bound guy who got killed back at the overpa.s.s? He was my bodyguard, a.s.signed by a shadow government agency that keeps monsters secret from the public. The things at the concert were mythical creatures hired by a death cult to sacrifice me to a giant s.p.a.ce mollusk because they think I poked it in the eye with a nuclear weapon last summer...Any questions?"

Mosh glared. "You always were a d.i.c.k."

"You ready for the long version now?"

I wrapped up as much of my story as possible by the time our GPS guided us to the location that Harbinger had given Lee. It was in an old, rundown, kind of scary area on the northwest side of Birmingham. We pulled onto a narrow street. To our immediate left was a series of fat, rectangular, red-brick buildings. Each identical building was aesthetically awful, with barred windows and knee-high brown weeds in the neglected yards. We were in the Projects.

"So, what do you think?" I asked my brother. "We cool?"

Mosh had been stroking his goatee and quietly looking out the window for the last little while. He turned back to face me. He was still incredulous, but taking it well. "Why didn't you tell me this before?"

Honestly, I had wanted to. I shrugged. "If you hadn't seen what you saw earlier, would you have believed me anyway?"

"No. I would have told you to put down the crack pipe. But now? Hard to argue with what I saw tonight." When I had first joined MHI, Harbinger had told me that Hunters' greatest weapons were the flexibility of their minds-their ability to take in situations, no matter how weird, and just deal with them. I had made a pretty good Hunter, and judging by my brother's reactions, flexible minds ran in the family.

Hensley had the look of a tough town. The streets were mostly deserted at this late hour, but there were still knots of rough young men standing under the streetlights on various corners. They glared at us suspiciously as we drove by, not recognizing us as part of their regular customer base. "Friendly place," Grant said, clutching the shotgun. Now this would certainly be the wrong vehicle to carjack.

"Come on, trust fund baby. You haven't been in the 'hood before?" I asked sarcastically. "This is the kind of place that me and Mosh grew up in. Right, bro?"

Mosh raised a single eyebrow. We had grown up in a middle-cla.s.s suburb, but he was quick enough to play along. "h.e.l.l yeah, straight up ghetto. Right out of Compton. Slinging...gats. Yeah."

"Word," I said.

"Pimpin' ain't easy," Mosh stated, dead serious.

Grant shook his head, having his negative opinion of me confirmed again. Lee stifled a laugh, realizing immediately how full of c.r.a.p we were.

The GPS computer voice told us to make a turn and head down under a railway into an even older neighborhood. Lee had to hit the brakes to keep from creaming a nasty-looking Chow dog that blundered stupidly in front of us. To the right was a street of small frame houses, each one with a tiny front yard. The indicated address was the only one with lights on. An MHI vehicle was parked in the driveway and another was in the street. We pulled in behind it and stepped out.

I heard deep barks coming from a dog in the fenced-in backyard. Other than that, this particular street seemed eerily dead. Trash and broken bottles were scattered in the other yards, and every single lawn was dead. There were a lot of smashed windows on this street. It looked like most of the surrounding houses were long since abandoned, leaving this one particular home isolated. It felt good to stretch my legs. There were a few random gunshots in the distance.

"Owen," Julie cried as she stepped out of the other MHI vehicle. She ran over and engulfed me in a hug. The Hunters from Esmeralda's team piled out behind her. I kissed her forehead as she held me tight, almost like she was afraid to let go of me again. "I'm glad you're okay."

"No biggie," I said modestly.