“These fuckers are somethin’ else,” Candy Vargo grunted.
“Let your actions be free of ego,” Tim said. “Solutions without ego leave no blood in its wake.”
“Who said that?” Gideon asked.
Tim gave him a small smile. “I did, friend.”
“Gotta say, that’s a good one, Timmy,” Candy Vargo told him. “And fuckin’ true.”
“It’s time to go,” I told the group. “We don’t need a run in with Chamuel.”
“Chamuel?” Jennifer asked.
I paused and realized we knew a whole heck of a lot more than she did. It was worth spending a few minutes to get her as up to speed as we could. Knowledge could be more powerful than magic. It had been proved to us over and over again. She’d be in more danger without it.
“Chamuel is the real name of Cheese Dick,” I told her, glancing over my shoulder. The coast was still clear. “Names have power. Chamuel represents, or rather used to represent compassion. You’re Chamuel’s counterpart. The twin who took Alana Catherine is Uriel. It, at one time, represented logic. Alana Catherine’s gift is logic. Shitty Ritchie is vengeance. Hemah, or rather Fake Tom Hanks, also known as Goober is Shitty Ritchie’s counterpart as vengeance. All three are needed for balance.”
Tim took over. “The balance has never existed since Hamah caged Chamuel and Uriel in the beginning. Vengeance has ruled the Immortal world for eons. It’s why everything has gone haywire.”
Shitty Ritchie took a turn. “And that’s why the Universe blessed you, Alana Catherine and me with the gifts to take over and bring balance back to our world as the true Higher Power.”
Jennifer was nodding. “Got it,” she said. “But what in the heck are we supposed to do with Chamuel and Uriel? I mean, Fake Tom Hanks aka Goober aka Hemah got eaten. Right? Its gone.”
“Umm… kind of,” I replied, trying to truncate the explanation. “Hemah is inside Shitty Ritchie. It might be dead and It might not be. We won’t know until Shitty Ritchie poops It out.”
“Like Candy Vargo did the Angels?” Jennifer asked with a wince.
“Yessssssss,” Candy said with an eye roll. “We ain’t sure how much Shitty Ritchie chewed the motherfucker. But to answer your question, each of you has to end your counterpart.”
“End?” Jennifer questioned, confused and alarmed. “As in end-end?”
“Bingo, motherhumper,” Candy Vargo replied.
Jennifer didn’t look happy about that. It worried me and I wondered if it would break the rules if we gave her a hand in ending Chamuel.
“Shitty Ritchie did chew,” he announced. “But not a lot of chewing. Five chews!”
“That would track,” I told the little turd. “Part of Hemah was transparent. It leads me to believe Its dead but not completely gone.”
“He’s a ghost?” Tim asked.
“Possibly,” I said. “If I dive back into Shitty Ritchie’s mind, there might be more clues.”
“No time for that right now,” Gideon said, picking up Jennifer and securing her still weak body in his arms. “We need to get out of here.”
And of course, that’s when Chamuel came back…
CHAPTER TEN
Chamuel looked deranged.Dried pasty white foam and blood lined Its lips. Its eyes were dilated and darting around wildly, but Its limbs were fully formed. The abomination had obviously gone away to heal after the battle with Uriel. It paused and stared hard at Jennifer for a long moment. It seemed surprised and a little confused that she was alive.
With a flick of Its fingers, the door of the cage slammed shut with all of us inside. Then, It smiled.
“How lovely of you to pay a visit to my humble abode,” Chamuel purred, waving Its arms in welcome as It eyed us with crazed delight. “Saves me the trouble of hunting you down and killing you. Travelling can be so tiresome. This is wonderful!”
It was not wonderful. Not even a little bit. As powerful as we all were, opening a cage that had been magically enchanted by Hemah millions of years ago would be next to impossible. It didn’t matter how much we believed. I knew that in my gut. Apparently, so did Candy Vargo.
“We’re fucked,” Candy muttered under her breath.
