by Jadie Jang
“Where did you find her? Here, or in the water?”
“Oh, no, here, not in the water. Nothing could kill her in the water. She only came on land for the workday. She shared my boat, you know, and those of a couple of others: just for storage space and the shower. She slept in the water. We all have dinner together, you see.”
I recognized the disjointed logic of shock and decided to let him be. If I remembered correctly, Gareth and the rest of the supernats in the houseboat community were poly. I’d met one of his partners before, and chances were that Maral—sharing his houseboat and dinners—was another partner. Poor Gareth!
Her nakedness meant she’d probably been in animal form right before she was killed. I could easily imagine Shady getting her attention the same way it had gotten mine—and probably Chucha’s, and Aahil’s—luring her ashore so it could pin her down and suck her essence out.
Ayo arrived soon after. Her examination of the body was quick.
“Yes,” she said to my unasked question. “Completely gone.”
“What is?” Gareth asked.
“Her essence,” she told Gareth gently. “She was killed by the same creature that’s been killing shapeshifters the past couple of weeks. Maral makes the sixth such killing.”
“Gareth,” I said, with a renewed thrill of horror. “Gareth, you have to be careful, you and all the others. I think this thing is … collecting.”
Tez protested, but Ayo said, over him, “Do you really think so?”
“Every victim so far has been a different kind of shapeshifter. A harimau jadian—”
“Weretiger,” Ayo put in, for Gareth’s benefit. He nodded.
“And then a werewolf, a bajang, a vanara, a nagual dog, and now a nhang.”
“Soooo …” Ayo said, “You don’t think it has anything to do with the—”
“Ayo,” Tez broke in, hurriedly. “Maybe we should talk about this in private.”
Ayo looked startled for a moment, then nodded. Wow, how out of it did she have to be to almost out Tez in front of Gareth? I looked closer and saw faint shadows under her eyes, and remembered that Maral had been a friend of hers, too. Shock all around, then.
I watched as she negotiated with Gareth over the disposal of Maral’s body, Ayo convincing him that Maral wanted her body returned to Armenia in time for an elaborate funeral three days after her death. She warned Gareth again about the shadow creature and elicited a promise from him to pass the warning on. Then Gareth took his leave of us, picked up Maral, and headed back to his houseboat.
Tez and I looked at each other, and then at Ayo, who plunked herself down at a picnic table overlooking Mission Creek, or the empty lot/construction site behind us, depending on which side you sat on.
“So,” Ayo said, picking up our debate right where we left off, “Maya, you don’t think the killings have anything to do with the Huexotl?”
I sat down across from her. “I really don’t, now, no.”
“You think this shadow thing is collecting shapeshifter essences? What for?”
“Hang on,” Tez said, sitting down next to me, “I’m still not convinced that it has nothing to do with the Huexotl. It has attacked everyone holding It—”
“Except for the 70s’ werewolf—”
“Because he didn’t have it long enough; we took it from him—”
“And except for you,” Ayo put in.
We both stared at her, then looked at each other, frozen.
“We never got a chance to tell her,” I said.
“Last night was a bag of cats,” he said.
“Wait, are you saying that thing attacked you?” she almost shrieked. “Where? When?”
“Right outside Sanc-Ahh last night when we left.”
“Are you all right?” she cried. She scanned me with her magic night vision goggles or whatever but apparently couldn’t see any ozone depletion.
“You should check Tez out, actually,” I said. “He’s the one who got sucked on.” Monkey immediately gave me a more pleasant visual for that and my face got hot, but Ayo turned her gimlet eye on Tez and neither of them noticed.
“You look fine, Tez,” she said, calming down immediately. “But you’re right, all that does maybe put the kibosh on Maya’s collector theory, since he’d already taken a nagual.”
“Uh, actually …” Tez said, sounding cagey.
“What?” I asked.
“Well, I didn’t want to flip you out, which is why I didn’t say anything, but I think that thing was actually going after you. Or maybe somebody else in the cafe. But probably you.”
“What?” Ayo and I said at the same time.
“Well, I was waiting for you outside and it just came floating up, and it kind of … looked at me … I don’t know how I knew it was looking at me because it has no face,” he shuddered, “but it looked at me and then it looked through the window and—again, I don’t know how I know this—it was looking at you. Then you went behind the counter and it started to phase into the cafe, and I got the distinct impression that it was on your case.
“So I blocked it, and it tried to get around, but I started whaling on it, and it threw me down the street. It was about to go after you again, so I yelled to it that it had to deal with me first because I was just going to follow it inside. So … that’s what was happening when it came outside. It was dealing with me first. I wasn’t its target, though, Maya. I’m pretty sure you were.”
I felt my guts flip over. I’d shaken off the horror of the creature’s killing capabilities because there had simply been too much else to worry about, even after it attacked me last night. But the thought that it could come after me, could take away my life, my power, my essence … I shuddered down to my soul.
“So,” Ayo said, thinking, “the shadow did attack every holder of the Huexotl since it started killing shapeshifters, but apparently it wasn’t trying to collect you, Tez, so you don’t actually count.”
His eyebrows went up, but he didn’t protest.
“And it did kill the harimau jadian first,” she continued, “although he wasn’t holding the Huexotl and didn’t have anything to do with it, except for passing on the instructions. Then it killed the werewolf and then the bajang, both of whom were holding It. But then it diverged again and killed the vanara, who also had nothing to do with It. Then it killed your sister …” we both winced again “who was holding the stick. But then Maral had nothing to do with It, either. It’s too random, Tez. I have to agree with Maya. I don’t think this thing is after the Huexotl.”
“But it’s too much of a coincidence that it went after three stick-holders in a row,” Tez insisted.
“It doesn’t have to be a coincidence,” Ayo said. “All the supernats it went after who weren’t holding the Huexotl were prominent both in their supernatural communities and in their human ones. Wayland, the harimau jadian, was a prominent businessman and local political bagman, as well as the head of the Asian were-cat benevolent society. Aahil, the vanara, was the CEO of a very promising start-up, and the heir to the chieftainship of his clan.”
“I didn’t know that,” I said faintly.
“And Maral was the leader of the Mission Bay houseboat community and a rising local government official.”
“So, what’s your point?” Tez said.
“My point is, the shadow creature was drawn to power, to creatures who were at least somewhat in the public eye, and who had taken on leadership positions. Doing that, placing yourself in the center of a network of people, or creatures, and taking on responsibility for them, actually enhances your essence to a certain extent, makes it … brighter, more visible to those who can see. Aside from the direct power thing, it’s part of why people take on those roles; because it feels good and makes you a stronger soul.”
“What about Maya?” Tez asked.
Ayo looked at him, eyebrows raised. She looked genuinely offended. “Maya is one of the heads of the only national Asian American magazine our country has righ
t now; the leader of a direct action group working on a number of social justice issues in the Bay Area; and she’s my second-in-command at the only supernatural sanctuary in the region. Maya’s position is comparable to Maral’s or Aahil’s, albeit of a different kind. And compared to them, she’s very visible.”
Hunh, I thought. Monkey thought the same.
“Okay, so Chucha and Bu Bu and Justin weren’t these kinds of powerful people. And you’re trying to say that they were targeted because they held the Huexotl?” Tez asked.
“It clearly enhances your essence,” Ayo said. “I saw that when you came in with it last night. It makes it brighter and more visible, in a similar way. If the creature wanted to collect shapeshifter essences, like Maya suggests, it would want to go for the ones that are the strongest, the brightest. For Justin, a very young, lone wolf, with no connections, the enhancement of the Huexotl would have been his only appeal. But Maya tells me Bu Bu was previously a bit of a public figure, and with the magical enhancement, he would’ve been pretty tasty looking.”
“And Chucha was coming into something of a leadership position among the San Antonios even before she took on the stick, so she would’ve been even more attractive,” I said.
“I think the shadow creature found Justin by accident, and then stuck around to see what other creatures the Huexotl offered up to him. The fact that it didn’t follow the stick to the 70s’ werewolf, and didn’t attack you immediately, supports Maya’s theory that it’s trying to eat a different kind each time.”
“And it just tried to consume me because it needed a kill,” said Tez.
“No,” I said, thinking furiously. “It doesn’t sound like it needs to kill. It could easily have knocked you unconscious and been on its way. No, I think it wasn’t going after you, but you—a semi-active nagual holding the stick—were probably too tasty a dish to pass up, if you were going to lay yourself out on a platter the way you did.”
“Why don’t you think it needs to kill?” Ayo asked.
“Well, look at the timeline.” I said. “It got Wayland around October 10, then Justin on October 11, then Bu Bu on October 14, and Aahil, as far as we can tell, on October 15. Then it got Chucha on October 18. So far it didn’t go for more than three days without a kill. But then, it waited four days to go after me. Why? If the previous killings were a pattern, going four days without a kill would have meant that it was hungry as hell.
“Assuming it’s not from around here, by last night at the latest it must have had the lay of the land. And by last night at the latest it certainly knew where the sanctuary was—i.e. where the 31 Flavors of shapeshifters had its storefront—and could easily have lain in wait there for any shapeshifter it hadn’t had before to leave. Then it could have followed it to a dark, quiet spot.
“But, if I’m remembering correctly, there were no alphas among the shapeshifters at Sanc-Ahh last night. So it waited for me. And when it didn’t get me, instead of hiding nearby, it went all the way across the Bay and got Maral, another network-y leader type. It’s clearly being choosy; and hungry creatures in need are opportunistic, not choosy.” Suddenly I remembered: “Ayo,” I said, “What about Dalisay?”
Ayo’s eyebrows nearly hit her hairline. “Yes, you were thinking that maybe Dalisay was the first victim.”
“It would fit, wouldn’t it? She’s a leader. And she disappeared only two days before Wayland was killed. Did you talk to the Hung For people?”
She shook her head, and I explained Dalisay to a puzzled Tez. “But I’m prioritizing this now,” she promised. “I’ll go down there tomorrow, first thing.”
We were all quiet for a while after that. The logic was indisputable … and rather terrifying. If it was being choosy, that meant that it might not give up on me. I didn’t have the stick, but I started out more powerful than most … okay, let’s be honest, more powerful than all of the shapeshifters I’d ever met, including a pre-Huexotl Tez, if Chucha was anything to go by. And I apparently had that whole network-y leadership thing going, too. I was a yummy morsel.
Was that really how Ayo saw me? I had never looked at myself that way. Truth be told, it was Baby who led me into activism. I’d always thought of Baby as the leader, and myself as the follower. Hell, I was even managing editor to Baby’s editor-in-chief. But then, that did make me Baby’s second-in-command, and, as far as everyone else was concerned, they looked to me or Baby to take the initiative. And I had taken over the protest arm of the organization. I didn’t do it by myself … but I did all the organizing and … shit, I was a leader!
I didn’t know how to feel about this.
“What do you mean ‘semi-active’?” Tez said, with an aggrieved air. Oh, that’s what he’d been spinning out about? Huh. While I was tripping on being called a leader, he was tripping on being called not entirely a leader. What a man.
“Tez,” Ayo said in her “handling touchy men” voice, “we’ve talked about nagualism before. You know I’ve seen naguals at work, and they are completely embedded in their community life. You’re not. That’s all. No one’s accusing you. This isn’t exactly a village, and how you fulfill your responsibilities isn’t as clear cut.”
Tez didn’t look at her, and I carefully avoided looking at her, too.
“What?” she asked, looking back and forth between us. “What happened?”
I refused to speak.
“Maya,” Ayo said, “tell me. You two went to see Amo—Amoxtli—yesterday. I can tell you did. What did he tell you?”
“It’s not my story to tell,” I said.
Her eyes narrowed, but those were the rules. Hell, we were the ones who enforced them.
“Tez,” she said, but he got up and moved away. I got up, too.
“Tez,” Ayo said, “supernatural problems are human problems. We’re inextricably linked.” But Ayo’s philosophy wasn’t gonna do shit in this situation. Tez kept walking down the green.
“Tez—” I started, but he held up his hand.
“I’m sorry, Maya, but I need some time. It’s too—” he stopped. “I just need to clear my head. I’ll call you later.”
And he left, quickly, leaving me feeling cold all over, like a child who had fallen asleep in her mother’s arms, only to be put down into cold sheets and left alone.
“Maya,” Ayo said quietly, “You should come back to Sanc-Ahh and help me look for this shadow creature. I’m certain now that it’s not after the Huexotl, but you and I really need to figure out what it is and what it wants.” She paused, and continued gruffly, “And I’d like to get you behind some protective spells, too.”
My spine prickled at the reminder. She was 1000% right, and I needed to stop thinking, so I got up and led her out of the maze of cyclone fencing that would soon be a waterfront high-rise.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Sunday, October 23, 2011
Rosa Parks Lane; Maya’s Apartment, San Francisco
For once, my delight in Ayo’s library was dimmed, and hours of hard searching turned up nothing. Ayo even admitted to me that she had, after all, reached out to her communities yesterday, but nobody had heard of a shadow-monster-soul-sucker before now.
After an interminable BART ride home (I was afraid of running into Slim Shady on my own, and too tired to fly fast) I took a short cut through the Valencia Gardens Projects via Rosa Parks Lane, a short stretch of street that was always strangely deserted for this active part of the Mission, but especially so at this time of a Sunday night.
My bumpy reverie was interrupted when I was bowled ass over head from behind by what felt like a … a concentrated shockwave. I barely had time to notice the shadow gathering, a sentient cloud of smoke, over me, before Monkey took over and rolled me away and onto my feet. I distantly noted that I hadn’t changed form—good—and then Shady hit me again in the chest, throwing me across the lane onto the sidewalk beyond.
I turned to stone, instinctively, removing the pain from all the small bones he’d broken. That strike was def
initely harder than ever before. Was he getting stronger?
Shady was on me so fast I didn’t have time to think, and pinned me down with a pressure that just felt like the weight of the world on me. I turned to water, like I had done last time, but the shadow seemed to be prepared for this. It descended around me like a dome, and I had nothing to put between me and him. I couldn’t run out from underneath him, and the pressure continued to press me down.
And then, I felt it.
I rarely felt heavy or substantial, but suddenly, I felt like the shadow was sucking away my weight, my substance. My … importance. I felt myself growing light, and Monkey, panicking, took over. I shifted from a puddle of water to Monkey form, flailed my long arms and legs, but couldn’t otherwise move. I grew lighter, less substantial, less meaningful.
Something was calling to me, telling me to just let go, to just let myself disappear. My chagrin and shame for … for everything came to the fore … and then were sucked away. I felt that secret shame for not belonging—that was sucked away. I didn’t have to worry about Baby hating me because I was a violent freak—but that thought was sucked away, and I started to feel relief. I didn’t have to worry about my sexuality— sucked away; I didn’t have to feel disgust at my own violence—sucked away; I didn’t have to feel uncomfortable with Tez—
Tez! Tez needed me! An image of Tez’s dangerous, adorable face appeared before me. I still hadn’t kissed him. He needed me to be strong for him! The thought galvanized me and I gathered myself up and gave a great heave. It barely made a dent, but I distracted and displaced Shady for a moment, and I felt the sucking sensation stop.
But it wasn’t enough, and the shadow’s weight settled over me again. I heaved again, but it wasn’t enough. And again. Not enough.
And then, suddenly, it was. The weight was gone and I was lying in the clear air, gasping and feeling my body caving in around a hollow space in my center; part physical, part metaphysical.
Then I heard a grunt and a thud, and I sat up in terror.
A few yards away, in the middle of the empty street, Slim Shady was fighting some … thing.