“I never believed in a no-win scenario,” Fred replied. “Having said that, I stand with my initial assertion—it’s nothing compared to an aptgangr attack. Aptgangr don’t quit when you cut them to pieces. In addition, when we say ‘any dead,’ we mean anything that dies, not just demi-humans. You know how many insects die in a deep drift in a given year?”
“You mean like zombie cockroaches?” Patrick asked in an awed voice.
“Zombie cockroaches are easy,” Billy-Bob said, “but the blind crickets are a pain in the ass.”
* * * * *
Chapter Twenty-Seven
“Later the same evening, our heroes rested,” I said, stepping out of the shower.
“You know, I was told to marry you,” Diindiisi said as I walked out into the main room of our apartment.
“But?” I asked, standing there with a towel wrapped around me.
“But I’m glad you have a sense of humor,” she replied with a wry grin.
“Well, yeah. You have to laugh at yourself in this business. Otherwise, you go bark-at-the-moon mad,” I replied, stepping toward her and grabbing for the towel, which had slipped and was heading for the floor.
I kissed her on the head and re-wrapped the towel around my waist.
“Whatcha reading?” I asked, looking at the pile stacked in front of her.
She’d never really gotten into computers for research, preferring hard copy.
“Oh, I was looking into historical cases that might be tied to the Oeillet cult,” she replied. “There’s nothing here.”
I looked at the papers. Diindiisi wasn’t one to scatter papers on the table—ok, that was my style—she kept things neat and organized. The top pages were a précis of the Leopold and Loeb case.
“Those two,” I said, shaking my head. “Smart. Convinced they were smarter than everyone else.”
“Ubermenschen,” she said, placing the papers in a folder. “And like the rest of Nietzsche’s fantasies, they failed, as well.”
“If there’s a hell, Nietzsche is probably enjoying the deepest pit,” I said with a shrug.
“After all we’ve been through, you still question the existence of hell?” she asked with a skeptical lilt to her voice.
“I have it on good authority that hell is other people,” I replied with a small smile.
“You’ve been reading Sartre again, haven’t you?” she replied as someone knocked on the door.
“One minute,” I shouted, ducking into the back of our quarters for my emergency pants.
Okay, they were emergency coveralls, but you get the picture.
I walked back into the main room, zipping the coveralls up. Fred was sitting at the table with Diindiisi.
“Emergency…coveralls?” Fred asked, handing me a glass of amber-colored fluid.
“Yeah. Ask Diindiisi about my toga sometime,” I said, taking a sip from the glass.
It was smooth and smoky, with a bit of a bite.
“Good whisky,” I said, setting it on the table. “What’s the occasion?”
“Magic,” Fred replied enigmatically. “Magic and Medicine. Herself sent it and said everyone on my team needed protection against what’s coming. So drink up.”
“Oh, I just love magic medicine,” I said snarkily.
“Marine, this is the best I got,” Fred said, a serious look on his face. “I don’t have a six-daemon bag full of wind and fire or shit like that. Just what Herself sent. Which, admittedly, started life as a damn good blended whisky.”
“When you put it that way,” I said, leaning back and drinking the glass in one gulp. “Pahhhh! You’re right, that is damn good whisky.”
“And a hell of a way to abuse it, drinking it like that,” Fred said, eyes twinkling.
“I didn’t have to drink it all at once?” I asked.
“Nope. Instructions say you have an hour to finish it,” he replied.
“Pay up,” Diindiisi said, holding a hand out to Fred.
“Gold or paper money?” Fred asked, grumbling and reaching into a pocket.
“Gold,” Diindiisi replied. “None of those ‘gold’ dollars, though. The real stuff.”
I watched as he dropped five twenty-dollar gold pieces in her palm.
“Are those even legal currencies?” I asked.
“In Chisos they are,” Fred replied. “Out here, they’re worth specie weight.”
“Which is?”
“Oh, same as the old US coin—0.9675 Troy ounces of gold,” he replied casually. “Your wife did specify dwarven coin. I should have known.”
I looked it up, and then turned back to them.
“You bet him six thousand dollars I’d drink it in one go?” I asked.
“No, I bet him a hundred dollars in ‘coin of the realm of my choice’ you’d do it,” she replied, “and picked dwarven coinage.”
“I love you,” I said with a laugh.
“How tied are you to him?” Fred asked.
“Hey, now,” I started.
“Sorry, Fred,” Diindiisi said with a great sigh, “but my marriage to Jesse was ordained by the gods of my people. The last thing I want to do is offend them.”
“Story of my life,” Fred said with a laugh.
“Other than betting on my medical practices, is there anything else I can help you with?” I asked.
“Not at the moment,” Fred said, rising. “I was supposed to stay and watch you drink it down, but you did that.”
“See you at work tomorrow then,” I said.
“There is one last thing,” Fred said, stopping at the door and digging into his bag. He drew out a huge folder. “This is everything we’ve got on werewolves and other bitey-bitey creatures. Our data disagrees with Miller’s—there hasn’t been any increase in attacks.”
“Why would Miller lie?” I asked, taking the file.
“That’s the six-thousand-dollar question, isn’t it?” Fred said, walking out the door.
* * * * *
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Something I learned as a young Marine—when you’re in over your head and can’t call in artillery, punt. After glancing at it, I turned Fred’s file over to the researchers and number crunchers, because that shit was way over my paygrade.
Things settled into a grind for a couple of weeks—we were back to being the ‘newbies,’ so we went back to shit detail. Literally, as the first callout we got where we were primary was the Dessau Wastewater Treatment Plant, which was, once again, overrun with akaname.
“My guys aren’t a hundred percent up to speed on all the surface monsters,” Fred said over the radio as we drove to the plant.
“Oh, you’re going to love akaname,” I replied. “Basic breakdown—they’re a chimp-sized yōkai with cropped heads and clawed feet.”
“Pan Troglodytes or Pan Paniscus?” Fred asked.
“Common chimp,” I replied, sighing.
“What’s a yōkai?” another dwarf asked.
“Japanese daemon,” Diindiisi replied. “Reddish green overall with a red face, black hair, and a tongue like a frog.”
“Doesn’t sound too bad,” Fred replied.
“Yeah, if you like being licked by a three-foot-long tongue covered in shit,” Padgett broke in. “Get licked, take many, many shots.”
“Ah. So, what’s the plan?” Fred asked.
“We’ve tried capturing them. That got people infected, fast. Pistol shot should take them down just fine,” I said. “Oh, and try not to shoot the tank up. The director of Public Works gets upset when we damage the settling tank.”
“You’re kidding, right?”
“No,” I replied as we pulled into the parking lot of the stop and rob on the corner next to the wastewater treatment facility, “I’m not. Look, why don’t you and your guys take the perimeter. We can handle the akaname.”
Sure enough, one of the little bastards was sitting on top of the settling tank, licking the hardware. Usually that’s why Austin Water called—half the time, trying to eat,
an akaname would insert its tongue in the moving parts and gum up the works. We were cheaper than hiring divers certified to work in blackwater. I could hear three or four more hooting somewhere on the property.
“You sure?” Fred asked, walking over.
“Yeah,” I replied, pulling on a Tyvek suit. “Besides, we don’t have Tyvek suits in ‘short and squatty.’”
“Very funny, human,” Fred replied, stoking up a cigar. “Dwarves! Perimeter, pistols only. Don’t shoot the humans in their plastic finery unless you have to.”
Have I ever mentioned I’d like to find the bastard who’s breeding akaname and spreading them throughout town? Wastewater treatment facilities aren’t on most people’s bucket lists for good reason, and I’d spent more than enough time in the ones around town.
“Diindiisi, Singh, Dalma, grab the shotguns, twelve gauge,” I said, pulling the bright yellow Tyvek suit on.
Suit, booties, and rubber gloves. At least it was a ‘winter’ day in Austin—so I’d only sweat out about a gallon of water in the suit.
“Right, let’s go get ’em,” I said, flipping down a plastic face shield.
Apparently whoever was breeding the little stinkers had raised this bunch for intelligence, because the one on top of the tank hooted twice and started flinging poo at us.
“The hell? Someone been crossing akaname with monkeys?” Padgett asked as a well-aimed bit of partially-digested—the process of wastewater treatment involves a step called digestion—shit knocked the pistol from his hand.
“Go hot,” I said, shooting the akaname off the top of the tank.
As gravity and Murphy demanded, it fell into the tank, hooting the entire time. Three more came around the tank at ground level and lined up.
“Oh, that’s not good,” I said as they reached for gravel from the driveway.
Akaname displaying territoriality was new. A decent professor at UT could have gotten a hell of a grant from the government to study the behavior. None of that means a damn thing when chimp-sized daemons are flinging gravel at you as fast as they can. Yōkai bombarding you with shit is embarrassing; gravel fucking hurts.
It didn’t help that I could hear the dwarves roaring with laughter at our situation.
Padgett had dropped his slimed pistol and gone to his hobby—tossing knives at things. Generally, this would just piss off most supernatural creatures. In this one case, it worked. He didn’t have the range or angle for the last one—it was running for the trees on the back side of the lot—so Dalma shot it, dropping it like…well, like a sack of shit.
“Clear!”
“Let’s see if we can fish the leader out of the shit tank before the city calls Goodhart,” I said, climbing the steps on the side of the tank to the catwalk.
The remaining akaname, hanging from the bottom of the support rod for the stirrers in the tank, chose that moment to hit me in the face shield with a handful of waste product. I went ass over teakettle, and the akaname swung up onto the catwalk. My only thoughts were of not rolling into the tank. Many, many shots doesn’t begin to describe what would happen to me if I went swimming.
Hooting, the akaname charged, I think. I couldn’t see a damn thing; I’d dropped my pistol somewhere, and all I could feel was the vibration of the catwalk above the tank. The smell was unbearable. I think my nasal passages actually overloaded at some point.
Best part? At least four people were trying to shoot the akaname, from the sounds of gunfire.
“Cease fucking fire!” I shouted, rolling to my knees.
Two things happened at once—I flipped the befouled face shield up, and the akaname slammed into me, knocking us both off the catwalk, to the ground, thank God. Oh, and I broke the akaname’s fall, what with being on the bottom of the pile and all. The akaname sat on my chest, all hundred-plus pounds, licking the filth from the face shield, and hooting softly to itself.
“Oh, isn’t that a scene of domesticity, a man and his filth-licker,” Fred said.
“Anyone got any ideas?” Diindiisi asked.
“I could get my rifle,” Dalma offered.
“No…” I croaked.
The akaname thumped me on the chest, knocking my breath out, again. I figured it was a good time to practice laying there in pain.
“Problem is, at this range, I’d shoot through the bastard longways, let alone the way its sitting, and Jesse said not to damage the tank of shit,” Dalma said.
“I’ve got a Taser,” Fred said, as if that meant something.
“And?” several voices asked.
“The akaname in question is exhibiting unusual behavior, based on your description. We should be able to tase it as a, call it a gift, for Sola Stellus,” Fred said.
I tried to reply, and the akaname thumped me again.
“What about Jesse?” Diindiisi asked.
“He should be insulated by the Tyvek suit,” Fred replied.
“Do it.”
I’ve been tased before. It hurts. Apparently the power source for Fred’s Taser was a nuclear power plant, a small captive sun, or a pocket galaxy, because I heard the POP of the Taser firing, followed by a spluttering bang, and I passed right the fuck out.
I came to lying on my back in the stop and rob parking lot. I was out of the Tyvek suit, and my shirt was open. There were leads running from my chest to machines that were beeping, stage left.
“He’s conscious!” Dalma said.
“How you feeling?” Ozzy asked.
Someone had started an IV on top of everything else.
“Cold,” I replied.
“Cold, how? Your hands? Feet?” Ozzy asked.
“Cold. As in I’m shirtless, laying-on-concrete-in-a-drizzle cold,” I replied, trying to sit up.
“Yeah, that would do it,” Ozzy said, raising my torso so someone could slide a folded blanket under me. “You were out for ten minutes.”
“Where’s the akaname?” I asked.
“Spread over the side of the tank,” Fred said, walking over. “It exploded when the current hit it.”
“Yeah, they do that,” I replied, shivering. “Methane builds up in their tissue, and they conduct electricity well. Ask me how I know.”
“How many have you blown up that way?” Fred asked instead.
“Remember I said capturing them alive didn’t work?”
“Oh. Yeah, that makes sense,” he replied.
Alfie and Dalma came into my field of view, both holding syringes. I hate shots. I took them anyway, and then took a little nap while we rolled back to the compound, where various doctors and at least one Elven magic graduate student poked and prodded me further. At least there, I was in a nice, warm room on a thin mattress. In addition, for once I wasn’t the one filling out the after-incident reports.
Diindiisi and Fred came in about two hours later. I was dozing.
“He looks asleep,” Fred said in a whisper that could crush stone.
“Not anymore,” I replied, reaching for the remote to reposition the bed.
“Sorry,” Fred said, dragging over a pair of chairs.
“So what was the damage, other than me?” I asked once he and Diindiisi sat down.
“Some goo to wash off the tank; that’s about it,” Fred replied with a shrug. “Oh, and a windshield on one of the trucks. The head caught some air when the akaname exploded and came down hard.”
“Figures,” I said. “That’s covered in the contract. How’s the team?”
“They’re good,” Diindiisi replied. “Laughing at you, but that’s to be expected.”
“Nothing quite like seeing your boss covered in shit to bring a group together,” I said. “When are they going to let me out of here?”
“Tomorrow at the earliest,” a figure in scrubs said, walking into the room. “We’ve got to make sure you didn’t pick anything up from the tank.”
“I didn’t go swimming, Doc,” I replied.
“No, but you inhaled, right?”
* * * * *
Ch
apter Twenty-Nine
One day in the infirmary turned into three—there was a shadow on a slide, or a bad X-ray of a germ, or something. Diindiisi slipped in with some of her magic salve, so the bruises from playing backstop for an akaname disappeared, and I spent the time sleeping, soaking up some adequate chow, and doing, you guessed it, paperwork. There are days I swear QMG will resurrect my corpse if the paperwork isn’t finished when I die.
“How you feeling?” Jed asked as I walked into the main building after the medics turned me loose.
“Not moderately unwell,” I replied.
“Good. The research team finished going through the data you handed them,” he said. “It’s interesting, and shows some correlation with the stuff we got from the Catholics.”
“So, even though the dwarves don’t think there’s been enhancements to the werewolves, there’s been enhancements to the werewolves?” I asked, confused.
“Yes and no,” Jed replied. “It’s complicated.”
“No shit, Gunny?”
He stopped, turned, and led me out to the smoke pit. There was a technician sitting there puffing on a vape when we walked out. Jed reached into a cargo pocket and pulled out a cigar case, selected an evil-looking, dark brown cigar, and offered me the case. I grabbed one and punched the end with a handcuff key on my key chain.
“These some of Fred’s stock?” I asked as the tech fled the smoke.
“Yeah. Ain’t they great?” he replied, blowing a smoke ring. “Back to what we were discussing. The dwarves don’t see a rise in the power of werewolves because their database is deeper.”
“You lost me,” I said.
“Look, the Church has records going back to the fall of Rome, right?” he asked.
I nodded.
“The dwarf records go back before that, and they’ve got things from the sagas that the Church either ignores or passes off as myth,” Jed said.
“Like what?”
“The dwarves knew Sigmund from the Saga of the Volsungs,” he said, as if the name was significant to me.
“Who’s Sigmund of the Volsungs?” I asked.
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