Malphas grunted something barely perceptible.

"I'm sorry?"

"I said, 'the hard way.'"

"Excellent. Now why don't you hand me your little housewarming present and step outside. There are some cherubim in the hallway who will escort you outside the M.E.F. so that you can phone up Lucifer and tell him that the conditions for a surprise attack are sunny with a chance of catastrophic success. Once his demonic horde begins showing up at the planeport, you'll be escorted somewhere comfortable where you can be debriefed on the details of Lucifer's plan."

Malphas, not feeling as if he had much of a choice, complied.

As a result, only seconds later a very surprised horde of demons bearing ornamental gla.s.s apples began pouring into the Temporary Portal Arrivals area at the angelic planeport. They were met by two dozen security officers bearing flaming swords and one diminutive cherub who buzzed annoyingly over their heads.

"The sting of a b.u.mble bee will help ease the pain of arthritis for thirty days," offered the cherub.

FORTY-FOUR.

Christine, Mercury and Karl crept as stealthily as they could through the corridors of the planeport. Mercury had managed to convince Uzziel to create one more temporary portal ostensibly so that Mercury could return to the Courts of the Most High and turn himself in. Mercury, however, had other plans. Amid the chaos surrounding the apprehension of the apple-toting horde, they managed to smuggle Karl unseen to the Infernal Plane.

"So," said Christine, as they walked up the steps toward Lucifer's pink stucco house, "You made a deal with Lucifer to return Karl to him?"

"Yeah, but don't worry," replied Mercury. "He'll be perfectly safe. And comfortable. Hey Karl, that's your house over there."

Karl looked in the direction of the cozy faux Tudor that Mercury was pointing out.

"Looks okay, I guess," said Karl. "My mom won't be there, right?"

"No, Karl. Your mom, along with almost everyone else in the Universe, has absolutely no idea where you are. That was part of the deal."

"And I can work on my music?"

"Absolutely," said Mercury. "I wrote a state-of-the-art sound mixing system into our contract with Lucifer. Plus a T1 Internet connection and full access to Lucifer's library of illegal recordings. That's like eighty million songs. And I'm not just talking about illegally downloaded recordings. I'm talking about illegal recordings illegal recordings. He's got a recording of Richard Nixon singing 'Tiny Bubbles' in the shower."

"Huh," said Karl, obviously thrilled to have a place where he could work undisturbed. "That's pretty cool, I guess."

"Yeah," said Mercury. "Also, I think I may have insisted on a crystal duck."

"Okay," said Karl, as if he had expected as much.

"And he's not allowed to hara.s.s you in any way. I mean, I can't guarantee he's going to show up at neighborhood barbecues or anything, but he shouldn't give you any trouble."

"Will he do my laundry?"

"Er, you want Lucifer to do your laundry laundry? I didn't actually think to ask, but that might have been a deal breaker."

"Whatever. I just don't want to do it."

"I think we can work something out. Just keep in mind that Lucifer might be a little on edge when he finds out that "

The front door of Lucifer's house swung open. "You!" howled the lanky blonde demon, wearing only a pair of Rocky and Bullwinkle boxer shorts and a navy blue terrycloth bathrobe. "You!"

"It's okay," said Mercury. "I'm no good with names either. It's MER-kyer-ee MER-kyer-ee. Like the planet. And you're Lou... Lou... Lou something, am I right?"

"You told Heaven about my plan!"

"True," said Mercury. "Christine here and I told the Arbitration Panel of the Subcommittee for Adjudication of Matters of Alleged Violations of the Apocalypse Accord."

"That's a violation of our contract! Don't you realize what you have done? You will suffer torments unheard of, even on this Infernal Plane!"

"Sadly, no," said Mercury. "We told Heaven about your plan before before we signed the contract. The contract, as I recall, has no provisions requiring that we go back in time and un-tell people that we had already told. It's your bad luck that we figured out your scheme, like, hours ago. The important thing is, I've told no one about your plan since the contract was signed. And as you can see, I've also delivered Karl Grissom, Antichrist we signed the contract. The contract, as I recall, has no provisions requiring that we go back in time and un-tell people that we had already told. It's your bad luck that we figured out your scheme, like, hours ago. The important thing is, I've told no one about your plan since the contract was signed. And as you can see, I've also delivered Karl Grissom, Antichrist par excellence par excellence. No one knows that he's alive except for me and Christine, who is the one who saved his life in the first place. I have held precisely to the letter of our contract. Now I believe Karl has some questions regarding late night recording sessions. Are you the acting president of the homeowners' a.s.sociation here, or should he address his questions to another demon?"

"The Antichrist is no good to me now," growled Lucifer. "My demonic horde is stranded at the planeport, thanks to your meddling. You knew my plan would fail! You acted in bad faith!"

"Hang on," said Mercury. "I thought it was the good kind of faith that you didn't care for. I was under the impression that bad faith was okay in these parts."

"I will rain down fire upon you!"

"Again, no. Our contract guarantees my safety, as well as that of Karl and anyone else rescued from Tiamat as a part of his extraction."

"Tiamat," hissed Lucifer. "So she's the one behind all of this. She abducted the Antichrist to use him against me. I should have known you were in league with her."

"I'm not 'in league' with her. Well, it's true that I was once in a a league with her, but it was a bowling league, and in any case, that was years ago. These days I'm a free agent. I work autonomously." league with her, but it was a bowling league, and in any case, that was years ago. These days I'm a free agent. I work autonomously."

Christine cleared her throat.

"Sorry," said Mercury. "I'm working with Christine. We work together, autonomously. And you can't touch either of us. It's all right there in the contract. If you try raining fire down upon us, you're going to be in a h.e.l.l storm of trouble yourself."

Lucifer fumed silently.

Mercury turned to Karl. "Karl, it's been fun. Sorry I called you a d.i.c.kweed. Lucifer here will get you your keys. And Lucifer, I know you're fond of Karl, but no sneaking out to toss pebbles at Karl's bedroom window. I remember what it was like to be young and in love."

Mercury wheeled about and offered his arm to Christine. "Shall we?"

Christine nodded. "Let's get the h.e.l.l out of here."

FORTY-FIVE.

Christine stood once again on the verge of Armageddon.

Having returned to the planeport, she and Mercury had taken the only available portal back to the Mundane Plane the one that opened to Megiddo.

"So despite all of our efforts," said Christine, "the Apocalypse goes on as planned."

"Presumably," said Mercury. "We can only hope, as you say, that the good guys end up being good guys and don't make things any worse than they need to be. Lucifer bet everything on his sneak attack; he's going to be woefully unprepared when the Heavenly host starts showing up here, ready to give him a beat-down. Not only that, but the downside of pulling out of the Apocalypse Accord, from Lucifer's point of view, is that it frees up Heaven to attack him anywhere, anytime. Michael will presumably seize upon the current situation as an opportunity to wipe out Lucifer once and for all."

"And the Four Attache Cases of the Apocalypse are still out there somewhere?"

"I had to agree to give the Case of War back to Uzziel to get him to go along with my plan without asking too many questions. Lucifer still has the Case of Death, but he'll probably get rid of it once he starts trying to build a case for plausible deniability of this whole mess. That mutant strain of corn is still wreaking havoc in South Africa, thanks to the Case of Famine, and I think the World Health Organization has the Case of Pestilence."

"That can't be good," said Christine.

"No. I'd expect that to go horribly wrong sometime in the next few days."

"And I a.s.sume that the situation in the Middle East has only gotten worse."

"A safe a.s.sumption. It usually has."

"So there's really nothing we can do to stop it?"

Mercury shrugged. "These impromptu diabolical schemes are one thing. Stopping the Apocalypse is a whole different deal."

Christine nodded grimly. "So what happened to Izbazel anyway? You said he got hit by that pillar of fire near Tiamat's hideout. Is he dead?"

"Angels don't die. Izbazel is probably in the hands of the Heavenly authorities. Pillars of fire, in addition to being fantastically destructive and really cool to watch, act as temporary portals. Whatever was left of his corporeal form was sucked back to a special area of the planeport, where he could be collected by agents a.s.signed to apprehending renegade angels."

"What about Tiamat and Gamaliel and the rest of her minions?"

"They're on the run. I wouldn't be surprised if Heaven picks them up, too. They will need to lay low for a while to avoid the wrath of both Heaven and h.e.l.l."

"And Harry?"

"Harry's dead."

"Right, but what does that mean? Is he in Heaven?"

"Beats me," said Mercury. "What happens to you mortals when you die is one of the great mysteries of the Universe."

"So we don't go to be with the angels in Heaven?"

"Not that I know of. I hope not, for your sake. Most angels are w.a.n.kers."

"Yeah, I noticed that."

"And what's going to happen to you?"

"Well, I did foil Tiamat's plan to subjugate all of humanity and thwart Lucifer's plot to double-cross Heaven and bring about untold destruction, so at the very least I can look forward to spending the next five hundred years filling out paperwork."

Christine nodded, thinking about everything that had happened over the past few days. After some time, she spoke. "Why did you do it?"

"Well," Mercury said. "In all honesty, I was going to just make regular Rice Krispy bars, but I was out of marshmallows. I saw that we had some of those Peeps, and I thought "

"Seriously, Mercury. I thought you didn't care about anything. Why did you get involved?"

Mercury waved a hand, dismissively. "Oh, you know. The whole business with the linoleum portal... And trying to kill Karl. I mean, what did he ever do to anyone? It's like that book, you know..."

"To Kill a Mockingbird."

"No, the one with the kids on the island."

"Lord of the Flies."

"No, you know. They have a raft, and they're sailing down the river."

"Huck Finn."

"And then they get attacked by those flying monkeys."

"Flying monkeys? Are you talking about The Wizard of Oz The Wizard of Oz? There was no island in the "

"Charlie Nyx and the Terrible Flying Monkeys! That's it! Book Four. It's like that. At the end, where Charlie Nyx has to choose between saving his sweetheart Madeline or killing all the flying monkeys so that they can no longer terrorize the good people of Anaheim."

Christine's eyes narrowed. "How in the h.e.l.l is this anything like that?"

Mercury thought for a moment. "Well, I suppose it isn't, exactly exactly. Still, the whole business seemed unsportsmanlike."

While they talked, a young girl in her early teens was dawdling nearby. She was making a not very convincing show of being interested in a collection of pebbles at her feet.

"Can we help you with something?" Christine said to the girl.

"Uh, sorry, I couldn't help overhearing," she said. "Were you talking about the Apoc... the end of the world?"

"Yeah," Christine said wearily. "We just thwarted two demonic plans for world domination only to have the Apocalypse proceed as planned. It's been one of those kinds of weeks."

"I know what you mean," said the girl. "My dad makes me clean up after my little brothers sometimes. I get so sick of it. It's so unfair. Day after day after day. Sometimes I just want to end it all end it all, you know?"

Christine instinctively moved closer to the girl, worried that she might have been planning to throw herself over the railing to the rocky ravine below.

"You're a little young to be so defeated," said Christine.

"Am I?" asked the girl. "How old do you have to be before you're allowed to be defeated?"

Mercury peered curiously at the girl, as if noticing something a little funny about her.

"Well," said Christine. "You know, that's a good point. There's never really a good age to be defeated. I guess we all just have to keep going, the best we can."

"Yeah," said the girl, smiling weakly. "I guess. You're kind of a nice person, you know that?"