"I've never seen something like that before," Eddie said."I've seen stuff that's just as bad.But never quite like… that."
There was a shifting in the air, and a scrabble from my pants; Nagi had wrapped a robe around himself again, and there was a clink as his manicured nails placed a number of glass vials into an ornate box.A soothing green glow beamed up at him from where he'd opened it.
"What is that?"I asked.
"A chemical stabilization unit," Nagi said.The green glow cast a bizarre shade on his face, and he slowly closed and sealed the box."I would suggest you not touch, look, smell, or taste this fluid.I had a bit land on a talon.Singed straight through to the bone.I was able to stop the dissolution process by twisting and isolating that part of my DNA, but as you can see…"
He held up his finger to us.A white, gnarled piece of bone stuck from where the skin had blackened and charred.
"Is it acid?"I asked.
"Doubtful," Nagi said."Acid leaves a different smell, and the chemical components of the biological effluvia has a different puddle pattern to it."
"You seem to know an awful lot about how a human body decomposes."
"Before 3P, one had to be handy in order to remain undetected," Nagi said, his voice carefully measured.
Something snagged and bobbed in my stomach.I wondered how many people Nagi had murdered, really, when it came down to it…
"Where to next?"I asked.
"We take this to be analyzed," Nagi said.
"Like a forensics place?"
"Something like that," Eddie said.
"Yara.Please take us to Master DeFoe's," Nagi said.
"Right away, sir," she said.
"Who is Master DeFoe?"I asked.
Eddie and Nagi said nothing, and the car slipped away into the morning.
We werein a dark back alley beneath a hospital.Yara had parked a few blocks over, and Nagi, Eddie, and I hoofed it; Nagi holding the stabilization unit like it was made of dynamite.We slipped inside of an old iron door that Eddie prized open with his fingertips and then walked into what looked like a long, bent, curved hallway, with moss on the water-stained bricks and the smell of mildew heavy in the air.
Low floodlights, almost hospital-style incandescents, buzzed overhead.Our shadows grew large and awkward, bizarre in places.There was a door with a slot in the top and a buzzer on the side at the far end of one hallway.There was a lizard crawling its way along one of the gutterings on the floor.
"Whatever you do, don't berate him," Nagi said.
"Don't call attention to his appearance," Eddie said.
"I would ensure you reply to him promptly," Nagi said.
"But don't let him mess with your head, and don't respond to him being inappropriate with you," Eddie said.
"Jesus guys," I said."How bad is this going to be?"
"There's a reason you haven't met Gurg yet," Eddie said."He's useful, in his own way, but I wouldn't trust him as far as I could throw him."
"As strong as Eddie is, neither of the two of us could toss Gurg very far," Nagi said.
"What is he?"I asked.
"Well, he's not human," Eddie said.
"No shit.What, is he a vampire, a werewolf, a zombie?"
