Heaven can Wait Read online

  “I know that,” Selene spoke up now. “But we don’t have time to wait.”

  “Just because they are dead it doesn’t mean these people no longer have any feelings.”

  “The longer we take to get this information the more dead people with feelings there will be on their way to join them. I know that you have this protectiveness towards the dead, now we need to extend that towards the living. Try to help prevent people meeting the same violent end as these folks. Surely even the dead will be willing to forgive a little intrusion for that?”

  “You’d be surprised,” I said wryly. “Some people want to help, and then there are others are so bitter, because nobody was able to help them, that they don’t give a shit what happens to those of us who are still alive.”

  “I guess death doesn’t automatically turn everyone into good people then. Dead people can be assholes too, what a surprise.”

  With a little effort I ignored Selene’s sarcasm. “People are just people, dead or alive doesn’t do anything to change that.”

  Selene had none of my reluctance about disturbing the ashes, she was marching around leaving a trail of footprints like a child in the snow. “So will you do it?”

  Selene hadn’t really needed to ask, it was obvious that I was going to at least try to get the information the bounty hunter needed. If it could help to save more innocents from this fate my conscience wouldn’t allow me not to try. Whether the result turned out to be anything helpful or not would be a different matter, and one that was out of my control.

  I had brought my rolled up loony tunes blanket with me into the warehouse. It was intended to keep my body from going numb against whatever surface I might happen to end up resting on. Despite that it hadn’t helped in that regard at all so far, still I had brought it and at that moment I was very grateful that I had. Walking about in the ashes was one thing but if I had had to lie down on them directly . . . Well I didn’t have to so there was no reason to dwell on where that thought was taking me.

  The warehouse was a wide and open space but neither of us had moved very far inside. Selene’s wandering had taken her a short way further than myself but we were both still close to the door we had entered through.

  By way of an answer to Selene’s question, I moved to a part of the warehouse where the carpet of ash thinned so that parts of the actual floor were visible through it. I still wasn’t very far inside, unlike Selene I simply couldn’t be so blasé about walking through the scene of such slaughter. The blood and bodies might have been blasted into their component molecules by tongues of unforgiving flame but I could not forget what the carpet of ash represented.

  I spread the blanket out on the floor. Sylvester was chasing Tweety almost off the rug and into the bleak grey ash.

  “Here.” I said slipping out of my jacket and holding it out for Selene.

  I settled down onto the blanket, taking as much care as possible not to disturb the ashes that I was pretty much resting amongst. This wasn’t a pleasant experience for me, no, not in the least.

  There was nothing magical about what I did. There were no rituals to be performed. There were no chants or incantations. Definitely no sacrifices, be they animal, human or whatever. Sometimes I wished there were, a number of my clients seemed to expect me to have to go through more in the way of preparation and their scepticism increased when all I did was put a blanket on the floor and get down on it. I had once considered investing in some basic candles so that I could at least turn the lights down and light some of them to set the mood. I almost immediately discarded the idea. Manipulating moods with staged scenery and a whole bunch of mumbo jumbo were the tricks of the fakes and the charlatans. Why should I bother with them? I was the genuine article and my clients, however sceptical, all soon found that to be the truth, whether they accepted it or not. I didn’t need their belief in me to do what I did.

  Selene backed away and left me to it. She had seen me do this before and was aware that there was little she could do that would interfere with the process, there was also nothing she could do to help it.

  It was not a prerequisite for me to be near the body in order to contact specific individuals. As it had with Gregory Chimes the soul could wander until it found somewhere where it was comfortable and my astral form would journey there. But often being near the body enhanced my ability to make that initial contact. In a situation of this kind, where I didn’t have the name of any individual to guide me it was definitely going to help make the process easier. The fact that I could stretch out and put my hand inside bits of the bodies was an unpleasant thought but if I hadn’t worried about it it could make for a closer link than I was used to.

  I had shielded myself automatically against the strong emotions that lingered inside the warehouse but now I had to open myself to them again. I had to invite all of those feelings in, however much I might want to keep them away.

  It came to me as naturally as drawing breath. I lay back on the blanket and closed my eyes. The lingering emotions flooded into me. I kept them to manageable levels, not allowing myself to be swamped under by the tide. The despair and the pain cut at me, dragged at me and weighed me down, but I refused to let them take me under. These were only remnants. Residual reminders with no power in them.

  I settled myself. I put my soul in tune with my surroundings and forgot about my physical body. I couldn’t feel my chest rising and falling, gradually the movement becoming smaller as my breathing became shallow. I ignored the blood flowing in my veins until it no longer did. My still heart was cold and dead in the centre of my chest.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  I blinked and my vision swam. Some disorientation was usual, if I waited for a moment it would soon pass. When my vision was clear I regarded the warehouse with my astral eyes. My physical body was exactly where I had left it, laying on a blanket on a carpet of ashes. I ‘stepped’ around myself trying not to pay too much attention to my form. If I did I might notice that my chest didn’t rise or fall. I might become focused on the deathly pallor of my already pale skin. I might have to deal with the reality of what I was doing. The reality that when I performed astral projection, when I removed my soul from my body, that I was for all intents and purposes dead. I wasn’t an imposing woman by any stretch and I had none of the abilities or skills that made Selene so formidable, but it was rare for me to feel particularly vulnerable. I got those twinges, probably every woman did, when I was out alone after dark. I knew what could be lurking in the shadows along with the muggers and rapists, and frankly muggers and rapists would be quite bad enough thank you. But the vulnerability of being outside your body with no way to control it or affect the physical world was something else entirely.

  But it is better not to dwell on such things, so I turned my gaze away from my body. Selene stood where I had last seen her. She was shuffling her feet impatiently, kicking at the ash with her toes, flicking glances at the physical me. I moved my astral body around so that I was standing directly in front of her.

  Moving in this form was simply a matter of willing myself to move. I found this the easiest to do when I had my astral body perform the actions that my physical body would to walk or run. When I had to travel far distances in my astral form was when I would simply will myself to be there. Then it was like I had my own personal Star-Trek transporter and the world seemed to fade in and out around me, without me moving at all. But for short distances it was less of a strain just to ‘walk’ there. Besides however much it might seem like the world was shifting around me I knew better. When I jumped from place to place I was using the space between realms as a short-cut. Quite apart from the fact that such journeys could bring the elders’ ire down on me again, there was the risk that my activities would come to somebody or something else’s attention. When I was between realms I was between all of the realms.

  Standing there, with Selene looking right through me, gave me a voyeuristic thrill that seemed to start at the base of my spine and run up to my skull, chasi
ng static into my long blond hair. It seemed to because it couldn’t possible actually do it since I really had no skull, or spine, or hair, in my astral form. I waved my hand back and forth in front of Selene’s face. It had been the bounty hunter’s idea to do something like that. Of course Selene had said that if she could do what I could do she would be tempted to wave some more intimate astral ‘body’ parts around. She had also mentioned a few locations where certain intimate activities would take place that she might like to check out while nobody could see her. It was probably a good thing for the privacy of the population at large that it was I who had this ability.

  I pushed my astral arm through Selene’s leather clad body, wiggling the fingers where they emerged through the bounty-hunter’s back with no visible effect on the other woman. It was my one concession to childishness, Selene would be proud to know I still had it in me.

  I couldn’t long forget that I had come here with a serious purpose though. The all pervading atmosphere saw to that. The impression of an inky black cloud was worse now. When I closed down my defences the darkness seeped back into my vision. It leaked out of the walls like filthy dry-ice and gathered in a knee-high mist across the floor. It disturbed me to notice that Selene’s movements had no effect on the mist but movement of my astral body sent it swirling and rolling temporarily clearing a patch so that I could once again glimpse the ash cloaked floor. Then the black mist rolled back in and lapped against my legs. I stepped away from Selene and mentally centered myself. I had no names so I couldn’t call out and try to make contact with any specific individual.

  “Is there anybody here?” I cringed even as I ‘spoke’. If anybody had been able to hear me I would have sounded exactly like the fakes I continually had to distance myself from. But it was only the dead who could hear me now and how else should I address them. A cheery ‘Anybody home?’ didn’t really fit the mood.

  It might have been that the atmosphere in the warehouse changed or maybe it was just my perception of it. The despair, pain and violent emotions were still there but muted somehow. There was a sense of anticipation, like the whole world was holding its breath. Some of the mist seemed to soak away through the floor, it came to just above my ankles now and was thinning so that it became less opaque, I suppose it counts as an improvement that I could make out my body through the mist now. Although looking at myself lying there in the midst of it I wasn’t so sure.

  I really didn’t want to break the mood, but I had to.

  “I’m here to help you. My friend killed the thing that did this to you. I just need you to give me some information so that we can stop things like this happening to others.”

  The bubble of anticipation was burst and suddenly I was at the centre of a howling gale. The thinning mist was whipped up by the wind and dispersed throughout the warehouse becoming so diluted that it vanished.

  There were voices in the wind. Screaming, angry voices. The voices of those who had been murdered here and who my presence had disturbed. The wind tugged at my astral clothes. It whipped my astral hair into my face and battered against my astral body.

  I let it continue, largely because there was nothing I could do to stop it.

  I had to blink my eyes to keep them open against the wind. Just out of arms reach from me Selene stood oblivious. The wind didn’t touch her. Her leather coat hung motionless from her shoulders, her hair was fixed in place. My physical body showed no sign of the wind. Likewise the blanket of ash on the warehouse floor remained undisturbed.

  These spirits were angry but they lacked the power to affect the physical world. They were not poltergeists, although if they kept hold of their anger and their pain they might one day have the power to become them.

  The voices on the wind became more distinct. Amongst the confused gibbering mass I could identify perhaps half a dozen distinct voices that were stronger than the rest. These would be the most recent dead with the strongest memory of their individuality and ties to the physical plane.

  “I am sorry for disturbing your rest,” I shouted so that I could hear myself over the storm. It was largely wasted effort, my voice seemed to disappear in the wind as soon as it left my lips. But the dead would hear me.

  “I-“

  And just like that the gale was over. I stopped yelling and continued in a normal tone.

  “I am here to ask for your help.”

  “Our help, our help.” The dead voices jabbered in unison. No single presence distinct enough for me to latch onto.

  “We couldn’t help ourselves so we can’t help you. Leave us alone. Let us rest in pieces.”

  The dead voices cackled madly at their morbid jest.

  I had to talk with them. To engage them in conversation and make them remember who they were, or had been. But without a name, a single voice or personality to focus on, to isolate and engage with, my task was a difficult one.

  “Your deaths have been avenged, but we need your help to prevent the need for more vengeance.”

  “Avenged, avenged. What good does that do us? Does it make us any less dead? No it does not!”

  Now why couldn’t one of these folks have been more like Gregory Chimes? I knew why. Even though some of these people would have known they were going to die, the method of their passing would have been so hard so . . . I couldn’t finish my thought.

  “Go away. We can’t help you. Just leave us alone.”

  Was it my imagination or had the clamour of voices grown softer, as though some of the crowd had stopped speaking against me with the others?

  “What’s in it for us?” This was from the smaller group.

  “What?” I spoke before I really thought, otherwise I would have phrased my question more politely. The dead didn’t seem to have been offended by my lack of manners.

  “If we help you what do we get out of it?”

  For a long moment I was at a loss. These people were dead, their murderers had already been killed and I had already told them that Selene and I were here to prevent more similar atrocities. What more could I offer them?

  If it had been Selene talking with them then she probably would have been stumped. Revenge and violence sometimes seemed to be her responses to every situation. But I was used to helping people in different ways.

  “I can talk to the living on your behalf. You were torn away from your loved ones but I can give you a chance to say goodbye.”

  There was another collective pause. I realised that I was holding my breathe. I took a moment to wonder whether it would hurt me not to breathe since I wasn’t technically breathing anyway.

  “I’ll help you, if I can.” The voice was unsure, hesitant.

  “Thank you,” I said softly.

  “My name is Alec Nest. I’ll help you if you will pass on a message to my mother.”

  I was about to assure him that I would pass on a message to anyone he wanted when;

  “You are wasting your time here, girl. None of these mortals can help you or your half-breed friend.”

  The acrid stench of sulphur forced it’s way into my nostrils, I had never smelled anything in my astral form before and this was a less than pleasing way to start. The black mist seemed to have seeped back into the air because everything had gone a little dim. The voice clawed at my soul. It was tainted and evil. This was a voice that didn’t belong in this realm in life or in death. Although technically neither did I.

  I knew my ‘half-breed’ friend would have a comeback for the demonic voice. Maybe to remind it that supposedly being something other than mortal didn’t make it anything other than dead right now. I on the other hand was too concerned with the unexpectedness of having a dead demon talking to me to offer up a snappy retort. I had spoken to more living vampires and half-demons than most people but it wasn’t really a common place occurrence. I had spoken to dead people, normal dead people on a regular basis. I had never spoken to a dead demon.

  Did this mean that they had souls as well? Or was this thing reaching out to contact me
from somewhere else?

  I wasn’t prepared for this. I turned back to regard my physical body and prepared to re-enter it.

  “That’s it, girl.” The demon made my gender into an insult. “There is nothing for you here.”

  “Please wait.” This was from Alec. “I’ll help you, if I can.”

  I hesitated mid-motion. I helped the dead. That was what I did, my method of atonement. Helping Selene was only an aside to my true calling. Could I really forsake a poor deceased innocent just because the remnant of a dead demon had unnerved me?

  “I’ll stay.”

  “You are wasting your time.”

  “We’ll see, but if that’s so why are you trying so hard to make me leave without talking to him?”

  “You think talking is the only tool I have at my disposal for dealing with you?”

  The demon seemed arrogant, but that would be just so much bluster. The demon may have been powerful when it was alive but now it was just dead. I shouldn’t be afraid of it if I just kept reminding myself that. Pity it wasn’t working out quite that way for me. Never mind, I had a job to do.

  I addressed Alec, “Why don’t you tell me as much as you can?”

  I had been afraid that the demon would interrupt again. Perhaps try to drown Alec out or bully him out of talking to me. Perhaps the demon recognised the futility of that latter course, what could it threaten him with now? What could be worse than what it had already done to him in life?

  “Where do I start? I was on my way out of an interview when I was grabbed. I’m a law student,” he paused and corrected himself. “I was a law student. I had an interview with Delco, Diablo and Caine to see if they would take me on after I finished at University next summer. It was my Mum that got me the interview, it’s her I want you to talk to Anne Nest, Dr Anne Nest. She knew someone from the firm because they had been working together on some research project or another, the lawyer was there to file patents for whatever it was she was working on. I didn’t get the job, I guess that doesn’t matter now though. I was pretty bummed and I’d just decided to find myself somewhere quiet where I could get a couple of drinks before I went home to tell my mother. I hadn’t got far when they jumped me. I guess it was some of those creatures, that thing,” I sensed his shudder. “I never saw them, they were on me too fast. When I came around I was here. The last place I’ll ever see.”