The Night Beat

foolishness.”
    “He’s not my father, and you’re not my mother.”
    She shook her head. “You know that’s not true.”
    The Adversary patted her hand. “Now, dear, you know how stubborn our little girl is.”
    I managed not to gag. “I am stubborn, but I’m not your little girl. Get out of here, before we destroy you.” Hey, I was good with the false bravado.
    He laughed. “You and all your personnel are trapped. Easily, I might add.” The Adversary leaned closer to me, and I managed to hold my ground. “Did you really think we’d make it this easy for you?”
    “Well, you’re all none-too-bright, so, yeah, I did.” Right now, none-too-bright was running in the family but I figured any stalling I could do would be a help.
    I jumped down from the podium and went to human form, during which process I took a quick look around. We had a lot of Enforcement personnel in here, but not all. The injured members of my team weren’t around, as far as I could tell. Whether that meant they’d been held at the hospital or if it meant we had more than one mole, I couldn’t guess.
    Our angels were down from the ceiling and behind me, creating a barrier between the minions and the rest of our troops. Angels were also into the self-sacrifice thing, if it was the only option. I didn’t like that it appeared to be the only option.
    “So, just what are you hoping to accomplish here?” I figured questions might get answers and any extra time was going to benefit our side more than theirs.
    “Extermination of most of Necropolis Enforcement,” the Adversary replied like it was obvious. Well, it was, but it never hurt to see if there was more going on.
    “That’s it? All the pretty pre-Armageddon displays were just to lure us? You’re not really bringing about the Apocalypse?”
    “Oh, we are.” The Adversary let go of my mother’s hand and stepped closer to me. “But there are certain…things we…need first.” He put his hand out toward me. “Certain beings we wish to…protect.”
    In human form Big and Little Harp had murdered every sibling I’d had, so I was quite clear that they didn’t have a truly paternal bone in their horribly creepy shared body. Ergo, they wanted me for another reason. But I had no clue what that reason might be.
    “I’m good here, thanks.” I backed up a step, keeping the distance between us so the Adversary couldn’t just reach out and grab me. “I chose my side a couple of hundred years ago, remember?”
    He shook his head. “It was chosen for you. By that creature .” He spat the last word.
    “Black Wolf wasn’t a creature. He was a hero.”
    “You gave him your fealty, your love. A werewolf! The lowest of all the undead creatures. You became one of them, for no reason other than childish pique.”
    I heard someone snort behind me. “Werewolves aren’t the lowest,” I heard Merc say, presumably to Sexy Cindy and Freddie. “Far from it. Wonder what his game is.”
    Merc had spoken loudly enough to carry, so I knew he’d wanted me to hear it. And he had a good point. Werewolves weren’t up to angelic standards, but then, neither were vampires. But we were by far the most adaptable and versatile of all the undeads.
    Black Wolf’s pack had slowed the Adversary down long enough for me to become a werewolf. There were several of them, yes, but I tried to think -- had any other undeads actually engaged the Adversary in hand-to-hand battle? And even if they had, did it matter? The Adversary could be killed, and had been killed, over and over again. Each Adversary was different, based on the being who took over the position. So, each one had different weaknesses.
    Hoping he was listening, I spoke low and without moving my mouth. “Sic him, boy.”
    Ralph leaped, fangs bared, as I did the same, changing in midair back to werewolf form -- might as well test whether wolf or werewolf did the most damage, after all. We hit at the same time. There was a boiling of evil undead ick and werewolf fur and fangs. But I could tell -- we were hurting the Adversary.
    I heard someone who sounded like Jack shouting orders to attack. There was a lot of activity around us, but Ralph and I were pretty busy. I felt someone slamming something against my back.
    “Bad girl! Get off your father!” Great, my darling mother was adding in.
    “Yo, bitch, get off our girl.” I heard a thwack and no one was hitting me any more. As we rolled around I caught a glimpse of Sexy Cindy and my