Page 95 of Legacy of Chaos

Her stomach growled at the aroma of hot roast beef and frites, and she had to stop herself from snatching the bags and ripping into them with her teeth. “Parker, you’re my hero.”

He gave her a sheepish grin. “You’ve been gone for a week, and I got stuck on the project. Figured I’d run it by you really quick while we eat.”

A week? There was no way. A couple of days at most.

She checked her wrist comms, and, sure enough, seven days had passed. Time must have worked differently inside the anomaly. Interesting. She’d have to study that when she had a chance.

“You okay?” he asked, watching her with concern. “We didn’t get the whole story, but what we did hear sounded bad.”

She really wasn’t in the mood to talk, despite her loneliness, but she was starving, and Parker had brought her food, so she figured she could manage a few minutes of conversation.

“I’m fine, thank you.” She gestured to the kitchen table. “I have beer and seltzer. I think I might have a bottle of wine somewhere…”

“Seltzer is fine,” he said, putting down the bags. “And don’t worry, I won’t stay long. You gotta be tired.”

That was putting it mildly. “What have you heard?” she asked as she opened the fridge door.

“That there was some sort of doorway to Hell beneath an oil rig.” He spoke while he pulled food containers from the bags. “Most people at the company didn’t know what was going on with the platform, so hearing that it was engulfed by a leak from Hell was big news.” He dumped condiments onto the table and set aside the bags. “So…what happened?”

Cyan gave him the basics as she opened a couple of bottles of sparkling water and fetched dishes.

“Damn,” Parker said, sounding a little stunned as they took seats at the table. “That’s some insane shit. Dakarai said a DARTspecial ops team picked up a couple of prototypes to take out there, but he really didn’t know the full situation.”

“It was…an experience.” She took the sandwich he offered and nearly moaned at the first bite of the roast beef and cheddar on a warm roll.

“So, is the portal destroyed?” he asked. “Or just sealed?”

She nearly choked. “What?”

“You said you and the angel stopped the leak. You didn’t say how.” He washed down a big bite of his sandwich with a swig of seltzer. When he was done, he shook his head and swore. “I can’t believe you worked with anangel. And not just any angel. AnArchangel. Holy shit, Cyan! Were you freaked out? I mean, angels aren’t known to leave demons alive.”

She dragged a frite through one of the sides of mayo. “Yeah, well, Gabriel did tell us the other angel wanted to kill us.” She shrugged. “He was pretty cool. The other guy was a douche.”

She was glad Gabriel had killed him.Ifthat was what’d happened. It was entirely possible the demon really had managed to take the guy’s head off with a super clean cut.

Superclean.

“So…how did you solve the problem with the breach?” Parker repeated.

Dammit. She hadn’t prepared for an interrogation. And Parker wasn’t stupid. He wouldn’t buy a lame story or another evasion.

She dabbed her mouth with a napkin, buying time. “First, I repaired the glyphs that kept the breach sealed. But just before I repaired the last one, he sent some sort of angel-powered bomb down the pipe and into the breach.”

Parker nodded idly, considering her answer as he chose a fat, well-done frite. “Why didn’t he do that to begin with? Why did you need to repair the glyphs first?”

Damn him and his curious mind. “Because if the breach was mostly sealed, the explosive energy would be contained rather than losing some of the power to the sea.”

“Ah. Makes sense.” He popped the frite into his mouth and chewed. “How did you confirm it was destroyed?”

“Why are you so interested in this?”

“You kidding?” he said, picking up his sandwich. “Who wouldn’t be? The Gehennaportal’s existence has been the subject of debate since, well, always.”

“Really? I’d never even heard of it until a few days ago.”

“Eh, I go down some rabbit holes of knowledge sometimes.” He took a bite of his sandwich, chewed, and swallowed. “So, here’s the thing. According to what I’ve read, when it comes to Heaven and Hell, there has to be a certain symmetry. That’s why there are evil people and good demons. It’s why Heaven has a Radiant Angel and Sheoul has a Shadow Angel. When they made the Gaiaportal as an angelic gateway between Heaven and Earth, they created the Gehennaportal as a demonic gateway between Sheoul and Earth—back before there were hellmouths and Harrowgates.”

“Yeah, I know all that already.”

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