I strolled up to the checkpoint and smiled at the guard there.

“Agent Black,” he said carefully. He had one hand in the air, and the other hand was creeping toward the gun at his hip. Where did all the guns come from? Why had I never really noticed them before?

“You don’t want to do that, Agent Hill,” I said. “Because I am in a really bad mood, and I don’t want anyone else to get hurt today.”

“Our orders are to take you into custody,” he said, his fingers brushing the holster.

“Do you have kids, Agent Hill?” I asked conversationally.

He looked confused. “Yeah.”

I leaned close to him, and my smile became a baring of teeth. “Do you want to see them again?”

His hand dropped to his side and he took a step back. “Let her through.”

“Smart man,” I said, and walked through the metal detector. The alarm was set off by the sword on my back.

“What are you doing?” one of the other guards shouted, running toward us.

Nathaniel, who was following closely behind me, turned around and stunned the guard who had shouted. The man fell to the ground, the gun in his hand spinning away on the shiny marble floor.

“Any other takers?” I asked to the room at large.

The secretary, the other two guards and the few Agents who were in the lobby all stood very still.

“That’s what I thought,” I said, and went to the elevators.

“They’re going to have every Agent in the building come down on your head in a minute,” Beezle said.

“I don’t care,” I said. “In a minute I’m going to have J.B. and Samiel and Jude with me.”

“And then what?” Beezle said. “Fight your way out of another impossible situation?”

“No,” I said. “They’re going to give me the other three, and then we’re going to walk out of here.”

“What insanity do you have planned this time?” Beezle asked as we stepped into the empty elevator.

I pressed the button for the basement level one. “Don’t worry. It doesn’t involve anyone bleeding. Probably.”

The doors opened. The hallway seemed suspiciously quiet.

“The rooms where the lost souls were kept are this way,” I said, going left.

We walked past the Hall of Records. The door was closed. No one moved up and down the corridor.

At the end of the hallway was a set of double doors. Behind the doors was a conference room that had been modified into a padded cell for the people I’d found in the warehouse with their memories stolen.

No one stood outside the doors. I kicked them open.

Sokolov sat at the head of a table like a preening little king. On one side of the table, lying on the floor, were Jude and Samiel, bound and gagged.

J.B. was on top of the table, shirtless, and two Agents held him down while a third sliced a knife across his chest.

Everything stopped when we entered the room.

“Maddy,” J.B. said, and his voice was full of despair.

“Let them go,” I said to Sokolov.

“Agent Black,” he said, coming to his feet. “I am surprised you would dare show your face here after what you have done today.”

“Let them go,” I repeated.

“I don’t think so,” Sokolov said, indicating to the Agents that they should come after me. “I think you’ll be joining your friends.”

“Where do you get your dialogue?” I said. “Cheesy Villains R Us?”

The three Agents approached Nathaniel and me.

“I don’t have time for this,” I said, and I blasted all three of them in the face with nightfire.

They fell to the ground, clawing at their faces and screaming. I would have felt bad about the fact that I’d set their eyeballs on fire, but I’d seen them cutting up J.B.

“Cut the other two loose,” I said to Nathaniel. I went to J.B., who was trying to sit up, and put my arm around him.

Sokolov narrowed his eyes at me. “What is it you think you will accomplish by this act, Agent Black? You have repeatedly defied the express wishes of the Agency. You have harmed other Agents. You have demonstrated that you have no respect or care for your office or your sacred duty. You have become a rogue, Agent Black, and as such you will be given into the custody of the Retrievers.”

Nathaniel finished loosing Samiel and Jude, and the three of them came around to help J.B. to his feet. I walked toward Sokolov, who stood impassively as I approached him, secure in his belief that he would defeat me.

“You know what?” I said. “I’ve had a long day, and I’m really sick and tired of listening to threats from little creatures who think they’re more powerful than me. I killed Antares today. I wiped out Azazel’s army, the army he’d intended to use to gain dominion over the world. And I killed Azazel.”

Sokolov’s eyes widened slightly. So he hadn’t known about that yet. Good.

“I killed one of the oldest Grigori, the angel that had sat at the right hand of Lucifer since time unknown. And right now, what I really want is to go home with my friends, take a nap, and eat Chinese food until I feel sick.”

“Pork dumplings!” Beezle said from the inside of my coat.

“So here’s what I am telling you, and believe me, this is no empty threat. If you don’t let us walk out of here unharmed, I will burn this building and everyone in it to the ground. And I will start with you.”