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Fallen Angels

Epilogue

The moment Crane fell to the floor, the door lock clicked open, and Quinn and I dashed headlong into the corridor without looking back.

"They're trashing the lab," panted Quinn. "They won't stop raging until the ARF wears off."

"Leave them," I said. "I put the MP3 player on repeat. The ARF wears off sooner than the batteries."

I shivered in the cold night air outside. Behind us, we heard the muffled sound of lab equipment and furniture being destroyed. At distance, it sounded innocent enough, like a building crew remodeling an office to the sound of a radio.

"There's not much point in hanging around, said Quinn. Leave it up to the MI-16 to sort out their own mess."

"And Frederic Samza?"

"He's MI-16 property too. This will become one of those cases that never happened. Loose ends get tied up, details are forgotten, people get paid off, paperwork gets filed. It's all standard procedure."

"Like in the Burris case? [*]"

Quinn shrugged. "They'll throw the blame on Crane. Probably decide he made Captagon for the black market, and a local gang busted his lab." Quinn patted my shoulder, "It's all standard government cover-up You'll get used to it." His hand came away bloodied.

"You're bleeding pretty bad," he said quietly. He reached into the patrol car and gave me a gray, police issue blanket. "This time I didn't bring any spare clothes with me."

"You know," I said. "If it hadn't been for your cheap-ass Sears shirt ripping on me, I'd have been dead in there."

"It wasn't the shirt," said Quinn. "You were about to shift in there."

"Bullshit!" I snapped. "There IS no demon; never was. You admitted as much yourself. Demons belong in folklore and scary stories. I'm a just a regular guy with a guitar and finely tuned senses. That's all."

Quinn's mobile rang. I bade him farewell and looked for my car in the dark parking space.

"Wait!" Quinn called, waving the phone over his head. "Get in the patrol car; I'll drive you to the hospital."

"Dude," I objected. "I'm alright. I'm torn up and exhausted, yes. But I'll be okay on my own."

"Not you, dummy." Laughed Quinn, "Irene's alive."

---

I sat by Irene's hospital bed until dawn, holding her hand and praying she would pull through. The bullet had grazed her heart and it took the surgeon hours to retrieve the slug of lead.

"There!" said the surgeon and handed Quinn a vial that contained a twisted lump of metal. "We were lucky to get it out."

Siobhan was a young Irish doctor who had taken up the vacancy after Dr. Gill.

"I don't get it," she said. "She was almost gone when they brought her in, but she kept going during the operation. Your friend must have an incredibly strong heart."

"The previous doc would probably say she was strong of will." Quinn winked at me, but I was too tired to laugh.

Siobhan shook her head. "I only know, I've never seen recovery like this before."

I was close to fainting from exhaustion and hallucinated rat like creatures scurrying around on the floor and in the wastebasket. An invisible hand painted verses in blood on the wall that made no sense, and could have been dirty limericks for all I cared.

Bring it on, I said defiantly. I'm not impressed.

"Good job!" said the male voice in my head. The one I call t_he General_.

"Thanks, that's a rare compliment, coming from you."

"You've done us a great service." It was the female voice of Karen. "Now is the time to return the favor."

In that moment, Irene opened her eyes.

---

The doors to_The Phantom Cat_ were boarded over, and a sign outside read

"under reconstruction". Through a crack in the fence Irene and I watched construction workers painting the walls and moving furniture around. Once they were finished, every trace of Frederic Samza having set foot in that place would have vanished. If the MI-16 even allowed him to have existed in the first place.

"Quinn asked me to give you these." I had the keys to the nightclub in my pocket.

Irene flashed a timid smile. "I guess I'm the manager of The Cat now?"

"That's the way Jesse would have wanted it."

"I'm gonna put a new band together," she said. "Maybe you'd care to join in on guitar?"

"You could probably sing me into it."

"I'll also need someone to help me run the place." She took my hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. "Someone trustworthy."

"Listen," I said. "Did you... see me back then? When I shifted."

"I've seen you for what you really are," she replied.

"And?"

"I think The Phantom Cat will be run by two beautiful freaks."

THE END

[*] In "My Guardian Demons"