Intertwining Destinies

Chapter 21

Hellboy lay among his pillows with half a dozen of his pet cats rubbing their heads and swishing their tails against him, and others nestled on his broad red chest. He was trying hard to cool his temper and anxiety over his inability to find Em. It had been almost four days since she had gone missing. On top of that, he was irked that there had been no more incidents since their last encounter with the tree god. He was sure that the prince could be up to no good; was almost sure that the BPRD should invade the troll market and capture that kill-crazy pile of pus, and finish off this Golden Army business once and for all.

And Tom Manning and Krauss seemed to have become steadily more agreeable to Princess Nuala's suggestions. It was she who had persuaded them all that attacking the troll market would only incense the fae population and make them side with Prince Nuada for protection. Hellboy had then suggested an ambush strategy to flush the prince out of his hiding hole, but Abraham Sapien had vehemently protested against it, saying that the prince was too cunning to fall into a trap, and it would only be a waste of their resources.

Abraham: he was on HB's growing list of irks, too. The blue merman was so completely smitten with Princess Nuala that it was comical to watch him prancing and preening to catch her attention. He had tried on various pairs of his eye lenses, hoping for the best attractive effect and gone around asking the agents their opinions; but they saw no difference. He had asked Liz to loan him some of her face creams to smooth and shine his scales. And he had just suggested to HB that maybe, if he wore the same style of duster coat, he might look more 'dashing'. HB desperately hoped that he hadn't appeared this ridiculous when he was first trying to date Liz.

When his door was suddenly opened wide by that very friend, HB remained as he was, not disturbing the scene.

"Brother Red!" Abe cried. "Dr. Bruttenholm has returned!"

HB sat up so quickly that his cats took fright and jumped away. "What?! Where is she?" He hustled to meet the merman who was recovering his breath, having run all the way to deliver the news.

"With Tom Manning."

They rushed down to the director's office, and as they neared the room, they heard his raised voice through the open door.

"It was very irresponsible of you to leave your issued firearm discarded on the pavement like that. It was a serious breach of security!"

"Manning," HB warned from the doorway.

"I was just telling Dr. Bruttenholm -"

"And nobody cares about that right now." He looked Emerald over and let out a sigh of relief. She was alright, after all.

Emerald smiled brightly at HB and came forward to hug him. It was then that he felt her awkward movement, and suspected that she was hurt.

"I'm so glad to see you, Hellboy!" She buried her head in his shoulder while he gently patted her back.

"Em! You're back! We've been so worried," came the voice of Liz from behind them.

She let go of him and turned to get a hug from Liz; but couldn't stop herself from wincing. "Ouch!"

"Oh, sorry...what's wrong?" Liz asked, concerned.

"Uhh...it's my arm...nothing serious," Em dismissed. But Hellboy had heard her attempt to brush it off.

He growled the question. "Did that Prince Nuada hurt you?"

Emerald hoped her response would soften his mood. "No, he didn't do this, but there's something I need to tell you. Can I talk to you? And Liz, too?"