**
It took us fifteen minutes and Google to find there were only two Comfort Inns close enough to both my house and the theater that someone could have cursed me from both, then two phone calls and Connie's knowledge of her sister's membership number to determine which of them Michelle was staying in.
Now that is magic. And I am not using a “k.”
Half an hour's drive later, we knocked on room 137, and had Lydia yell, “Room service!”. A few seconds later, a girl that looked like a slightly older, slightly more evil version of Connie (and yes, someone can look “more evil”; it's an eye thing) opened the door. She was even wearing the same black outfit and the same pendant; honestly, the main difference, physically speaking, was that she had gone the extra distance by dyeing her hair black too.
Her reaction to seeing me outside her hotel room door was... unique.
First, she said, “I didn't order any room service... oh, Hell.”
Then she tried to slam the door shut, which I prevented by catching it on my boot.
Her eyes filled with venom, and she raised her hands. “In the name of the black goddess, I call forth—” she began. She stopped when I punched her in the face.
“Yeah, I'm a bit too close for you to be pulling that shit,” I said, drawing my sidearm and pointing it at her face. “Now, you wanna go inside and we'll talk, or do I need to hit you a few more times? Because as it happens, I have absolutely zero problem with doing that.”
“He is not a gentleman at all,” Lydia confirmed.
“It's true, I'm not,” I agreed.
“Um... hi, Michelle!” Connie said. “How are things?”
Michelle's eyes narrowed. “I should have known that you would turn against me. You were always too weak to do what must be done, to truly master the art of magick.”
I rolled my eyes. “Again with the 'k.' Just go inside and sit on the bed, hands behind your head, before I get annoyed, punkin. And if I see a black cat in this room I will shoot you. Just throwing that out there.”
There was no cat (the hotel charged extra for pets), but there was pretty much everything else you'd see in the Stereotype's Guide to Witchcraft. A big red pentagram drawn on the floor, a ring of black candles, a skull that I was preeeeetty sure was plastic, a wooden staff with intricate runes carved into it, a big leather-bound book marked with a crescent moon... it wasn't a bad collection for someone who couldn't afford a hotel room without the discount membership card.
“Well?” Michelle spat. “We both know you're here to kill me, so you might as well get to it.”
“No, my sister! We are here to save you! Turn you once again to the light!” Connie implored.
“HA! To think that I would turn from true power? Would give up my ultimate revenge? My sister, you were always too weak for the path of magick, too soft for what my master taught me. To step beyond good and evil, and claim ultimate power.”
I sighed. “Lydia, can I?”
“You have my permission,” Lydia said demurely.
In one smooth motion, I swatted Connie upside the head and looped around to smack her sister squarely in the face. “Both of you, stop that! Connie, you are not a grand servant of the light, and Michelle, you are not a dark mistress of the unknown! Neither of you is actually any good at this at all! I literally had more difficulty fighting a creature that tried to kill me with weaponized popcorn than I did subduing you!”
“I... I did my best...” Connie muttered.
“I am a bit dark and unknown...” Michelle grumbled.
“Connie, you think 'boning' means 'using magic with bones'! Michelle, I defeated you with a Google search and a phone call!” I snapped, and both of them winced. “Both of you are no longer allowed to pretend to be impressive from this moment onward, because let me make this as clear as I can: It really is pretend.”
“Normally I try to stop him when he gets like this,” Lydia said. “But in this case, I fear the outburst is a bit merited. Miss Michelle, your curses were quite visually impressive, but I fear that repelling them took almost no effort whatsoever. Perhaps a few more years of practice is in order.”
After a few minutes of silence, Connie finally said, “You two are jerks.”
“Do you want me to smack you again? I will, and I won't even feel guilty about it,” I said.
She didn't say anything else.
Michelle, however, did not get the hint. “You think I care about your opinions? You think I'll stop just because you hunted me down?”
“No, I think you'll stop because you can't hurt me in any way, and if you don't stop trying I'll eventually just get fed up and shoot you,” I said mildly.
“Ha! Then you don't understand the depths of my dedication, murderer,” she said, and I resisted the urge to roll my eyes because she wasn't using her 'mistress of the dark' voice. She sounded legitimately furious. “You killed my master... my love. The only man who has ever seen the true potential in me and brought it out. Do you think I would ever stop seeking my revenge on the madman who murdered my beloved Malvolioth?”
“Mal... who?” I asked.
“Your attempts to enrage me further will not avail you, monster. You struck down my master, cost the world his wisdom and grace, and I have cast my soul deep into the shadows of Hell in order to gain the power to avenge h—”
“No, seriously, that name is not ringing a bell. Do you have any other details?” I asked.
Michelle's eyes grew misty. “His eyes were dark and piercing, filled with the knowledge of the ages. Strong were his features, and firm was his spirit. Proud, he was, but justly so, yet not too proud to share his wisdom and love with me.”
“I really meant more, like... where did he live.”
“Oh. Um. We met online, but I know he lived in Texas...”
I blinked. “You 'know' he lived in Texas? Wait, you never met him?”
“Our spirits were united in...”
“Yeah, yeah, but you never physically met him.”
“Not in the... strictest sense, no.”
“But you said he was your teacher!”
“Well, it was mostly an online studies thing. That's becoming more popular these days, you know,” Michelle said. She didn't even have the good grace to look embarrassed.
“You've been trying to kill me over someone you never even met?” I snarled. The urge to slap her was gone, replaced in full by the urge to just shoot her right in the face. “Over some chump who taught you bargain-bin sorcery over the internet?”
She narrowed her eyes at me, still full to the brim of righteous fury. “I knew his soul and it was a thing of beauty. Until you murdered him without reason. Took his brilliance from my life forever. But you left your trail, fool. People who walk among the darkness know the signs of your involvement well, and you went too far when you sent your hordes of the undead into my master's home!”
“Wait. Wait. Wait,” I said, holding up a hand. “Hordes of the undead?”
“It was all over the net, if you know how to look for it,” Michelle snapped. “Nobody in the media recognized it. They reported earthquakes and gas leaks, as always, but those of us who know the dark recognized the signs of a zombie outbreak, and more than one person confirmed that you had been in the area. I put two and two together, hunter.”
Hordes of the undead... and he lived in Texas? Malvolioth...
Images leaped into my mind, unbidden. A small town in Texas overrun with flesh-eating zombies, and at the source of it all, possibly the least intimidating dark sorcerer I'd ever met until I'd met Michelle. Roughly fifty pounds above the healthy weight for a guy his height, a little goatee that looked like he'd missed a spot shaving, accessories from the Disney Guide to Villainy. Had he said his name was...
Oh, God. He had.
I started laughing. I couldn't help it, it was all just too much. “Oh! Oh, God! That guy! You're talking about that guy!
Hahahahahaha, oh, this is too wonderful! He couldn't magic his way out of a brown paper bag but he had apprentices! Online dark magic correspondence courses for the aspiring failure! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!”
“He was my master and my love, you heartless monster!”
“You never even met him!” I said, still giggling helplessly. “Did he send you a picture? I bet he sent you a picture. Come on, lemme see, come on.”
Michelle dug around in her pocket, before bringing out a small, somewhat crinkled printout that had a photo.
I looked at it, and gave the only sane response.
“HAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!” I laughed, unable to contain the rolling waves of mirth. “Oh, God! That's Brad Pitt, you moron! That's a picture of Brad Pitt that someone altered to have black hair! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!”
Michelle blinked. “I... what do you...” she looked at the photo in her own hands, turned it right, then left. After several seconds of examination, she winced. “Oh, God dammit.”
Oh, God, I'd needed this. I hadn't laughed so hard my ribs hurt since... well, since I'd killed her “master.” I wiped a tear of mirth from my eyes, tried to suppress the chuckles, and said, “Oh. Oh, honey. You put two and two together, all right, but somehow you made it add up to seventeen! Here, let meheheheeeeeehehehee! L-let me fill you in, cupcake. Those weren't my zombies, they were all on your boyfriend. Or should I say your fake boyfriend? He was getting up to some dollar-store necromancy, and the locals hired me to stop him. Which I did with about forty bullets, a spool of piano wire, and a bucket of salt water. So... y'know. He did better than you. But not by a lot.”
Michelle blinked. “What?”
Connie raised a hand almost timidly. “I... um... knew that. I mean, it was logical, right? There was necromancy, and, well, Michelle, I mean, you knew he was into spells...”
“... I... that...” Michelle looked at the picture in her hands. “He... didn't really look like this?”
“Nope. Oh, and Malvolioth wasn't his real name. I think it ended up being Lester,” I said. “Not that I looked through his wallet after he died or anything.”
“And he... really... killed all those people?”
“According to the news, the total death toll from his rampage was over eight-hundred. I was not there, sadly, but I'm told it was an impressive display for someone who was otherwise quite unimpressive,” Lydia said helpfully.
“I am an idiot,” Michelle said, covering her face with her hands in abject shame.
Connie patted her sister on the shoulder. “There, there. We all screw up sometimes.”
“That's true!” I said. “Of course, you should still feel bad, because of just how horribly you screwed up this time. It was really bad. You tried to kill someone you've never met on behalf of a psychotic murderer who you also never met and who didn't even like you enough to trust you with a real picture of himself. That's one of the stupidest things I've heard in like, the last year, at least.”
“Gee. Thank you for your sympathy,” Connie said somewhat coldly as Michelle started to cry.
“Look on the bright side,” I said cheerfully. “If this was Europe, your sis would probably already be dead. They take the practice of black magic very seriously over there, and she isn't good enough to get away with it. The Knights Templar, the Inquisition, the Ordo Solis, you wouldn't be able to shake a stick without hitting half-a-dozen ancient orders dedicated to setting evil stuff on fire. Whereas over here, I'm pretty okay with just humiliating her and making sure you keep an eye on her. God Bless America.”
“I guess that is an upside,” Michelle said, sniffling a little.
“There ya go! Dry those tears,” I said. “You know, I learned something today. The internet can be a powerful tool for bringing people together and teaching them black magic, but it can also make it easy for people to lie to us without getting caught! We should always remember that sometimes, it's best to just turn off the computer, go out, and spend some time in the real world with real people.”
“But Eric, when we tried to do that earlier, we were assaulted by that small lizard-monkey creature,” Lydia pointed out.
“Damn, good point,” I admitted. “Okay, I learned something else today. We dwell in a cold, amoral universe where 99% of horror stories are based on truth, and horrifying monsters could dwell around every corner. But that thing I said about the internet is also true. So frankly, you're not going to be truly safe anywhere, and might as well do whatever makes you happy.”
“Ninety-nine percent?” Connie asked. “Um... which one is false?”
“As far as I know, the one about the the woman who lives in mirrors and kills you if you say 'Bloody Mary' too many times has no basis in fact,” I said. I knew because my brother and I had tested it when we were kids. He had done the talking while I stood next to him with a chainsaw, just in case. Good times. “Other than that, pretty much every myth, legend, scary story, or old wives' tale is true. Cool, right?”
“Actually, I find it mildly depressing,” Lydia sighed.
“Hey, at least that means ghost stories are true too, so you can hang around. That's a bright side,” I said.
“I am not a ghost, I am a guardian spirit,” Lydia snapped.
“Oh, you know what I mean,” I said, waving off her concerns. Lydia got weird about these things, probably because being dead meant she didn't have much else to do with her time. “Besides, now that we defeated the evil witch... sorta... I think we have time to catch that movie if we start driving now...”
Lydia's eyes lit up, and she squealed, “Ooooooooo, I had nearly forgotten! We shall finally get to see the ending to Love Amongst the Autumn Leaves!”
I winced. “Must we call it that...?”
“Oh, I've been wanting to see that!” Connie said.
“I... I wouldn't mind going out,” Michelle said, wiping a tear from her eye.
Both of them stared at me for several seconds, and Lydia joined them shortly. They didn't say anything, didn't do anything. They just stared, and let the meaningfulness of the silence say their intentions for them.
“No. No, I don't want to see this movie in the first place, I'm not going to pay extra for a bunch of wannabe witches to come too. There is absolutely no way.”
Forty minutes later...
“Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!” the three women sobbed as we sat in the ten o' clock showing of That Leaf Movie.
“T-Thomas! Whyyyyy?” Connie wailed. “Why did you choose Theresa's love over your cancer medication?”
“H-he could have had boooooooooth!” Michelle sobbed.
“Curse your fatal flaw of being unable to trust, Thomas! Curse it, for it kept you from recognizing Theresa would love you no matter what!” Lydia moaned.
I winced. “Wow, they... they really spared no expense on making that actor look like he had cancer. Wow, that... how did this movie get to be PG-13...?”
The woman in front of us turned around and shushed us loudly, as her apparent husband covered his eyes so he wouldn't have to see the frankly horrifying content of the film.
Yeah...
I was definitely not telling people about this case.
###
Afterword
This is another one of those kinda weird stories I just wrote because it was in my head, it made me laugh, and I had to get it on paper. I've been known to write those; and in all honesty, enjoy them more than serious work. Oh, I promise I'll write something serious at some point; I have possibly way too many ideas. But God, this was just fun to do. I can only hope it's fun to read, too.
As always, thanks to my darling Izzy; I'd be lost without you, dear. Thanks to Jen for her editing work. I wouldn't be lost without you, but I would have much worse grammar. And, as usual, thank you to everyone who reads. You guys? You rock. Just sayin'.
About the Author
Andrew E. Moczulski is almost kind of a writer,
now. He has a Masters degree in business that he has never really used for anything, and which has nothing to do with anything seen here. He is a dog person.
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