1. What a way to start the day. #3
I would regret my decision when it came time to pay my rent.
Then again, maybe I wouldn’t. My certification opened doors, and everyone wanted someone who could handle dangerous substances without a hazmat suit.
If I didn’t mind a life as a high-class janitor, I’d be set.
There weren’t a lot of people who could fall into a vat of gorgon bile and live to tell the tale.
I was one of three in New York City, and the other two were gorgons, powerful ones who didn’t need to petrify me before crushing me to teeny tiny Bailey bits.
A little after one in the morning, I trudged home.
Thanks to the late hour, it took four buses, and I staggered to my door in Queens at a little after three.
All in all, I couldn’t complain. It could’ve been worse—a lot worse.
I had run into only one drunk, and he’d been more interested in a leggy blond, who had enjoyed shocking the shit out of him with her Taser a little too much.
In the relative safety of my apartment, I flopped on my battered, flea-market couch and dug out Magnus McGee’s phone. “Who could you possibly want that you’d pay me so much to hunt him down for you?”
To add a bit of extra icing on my day, the asshole had locked the phone. I glared at the prompt. “Seriously?”
Blocking the info behind a passcode meant he either wanted a little revenge or meant for me to earn my keep.
Fine. Two could play at his game, and a four-digit passcode wouldn’t take too long to hack, especially if I pulled out all the stops.
First, I’d try random bullshit luck. I’d save the hocus pocus for later, when I was frustrated enough I wouldn’t care if I broke the phone.
I took a few minutes to test the device to make sure it was the real deal.
A few swipes of the screen brought up the expected menus, and I even turned on the flash out of curiosity.
Maybe after I got paid for the work, I’d buy my very own cell phone.
I was probably one of ten people in the entire city without one.
It took me until five after six to brute force my way in.
The device clicked, the screen flashed, and it displayed a list of icons showing one missed call.
It also clicked and gave an electronic buzz.
Before I could do more than suck in a startled breath at the unexpected sound, the device detonated.
A cloud of vapor, dust, and glass shards burst in my face.
The sharp bite of shrapnel tore into my skin, and my eyes burned with the fires of hell.
With tears streaming down my cheeks and blinding me, I staggered to my bathroom to flush my eyes.
I cursed every painful moment I spent splashing my face with water.
When I could finally see again, reddish droplets stained my white sink and had splattered on my mirror.
I squinted to make out my reflection. The whites of my eyes had turned an angry red, but by some miracle I refused to question, none of the shards had cut me anywhere important.
Being blinded would’ve really put a damper on my day.
I picked out the fragments with tweezers. It was a good thing I hadn’t started life all that pretty, as my new collections of scars would ensure no man looked my way twice. At least I didn’t think I needed any stitches.
Who the hell turned a phone into a miniature bomb? Magnus McGee, apparently. The dust gave my skin and clothes a greenish cast, and after a few exploratory sniffs of my shirt, I picked up a faint trace of wet earth.
Gorgon dust.
No one in their right mind made the stuff, not even gorgons.
Not only could it turn its victims into stone, they ran a chance of becoming a gorgon, too.
The authorities refused to give a percentage on how many were turned, but I suspected it was high, as handling the stuff required a top-level permit, one I possessed thanks to my immunity.
The truly insane dosed themselves with it on purpose. McGee hadn’t just tried to kill me. He had meant to make me a monster—one who’d never be able to look anyone in the eyes ever again.
“That son of a bitch!” Had I been anyone else, I would have been transformed into a statue, easy pickings for anyone who came into my apartment.
Petrifying someone was a great way to get rid of them—or cart them off before reversing the petrification with neutralizer.
Spitting mad, I went to work purifying my apartment, tears pricking my eyes.
It hadn’t been my fault McGee’s sister had cheated on her husband.
What kind of idiot left someone like Chief Quinn for a college kid?
Audrey McGee, apparently.
At least I had everything I needed to neutralize the gorgon dust thanks to working with the police.
They provided me with a new batch of neutralizer every call, and I kept every last pinch of it.
After mixing the powder with some water, I’d be able to spritz everything and vacuum the pale residue when it was dry.
Two hours and one thoroughly cleaned apartment later, I collapsed into bed and dreamed of wringing Magnus McGee’s scrawny little neck.