by Adam Dark
Is the thing still here? he asked Ian. He felt his friend halfway leave his head for a second, then return.
‘Oh, yeah. Straight ahead.’
“Chase, keep moving that light,” Ben said, leading them farther into the alley. Yeah, okay. The light was a good idea. The beam swept back and forth across the ground as they moved, then it fell across a mangled heap of torn fur—black and gray this time, matted with blood that definitely hadn’t dried yet—cracked-open bones, and something that looked very much like intestines trailing from the heap toward the wall of the alley to their left. All four of them let out a shout of surprise, and Chase stopped moving the light.
“Oh, that’s sick,” April muttered.
The puff of Peter’s inhaler sounded behind them, and only then did Ben realize that the wheezing he heard now was coming from this ripped-up thing in the alley in front of them.
“Damn, it really is still alive,” Chase said.
Then one half of the furry, bloody mass moved a little across the other half. “Uh, that’s two different animals,” Ben said.
Peter gagged behind him and lurched toward the wall, but it didn’t sound like he was losing his dinner. Which had probably only been DayQuil and tea, anyway. Ben wanted to tell him to suck it up; at least these guys had had some warning about what they’d find here. But yeah, this was still super gross and messed up.
“Okay, so… what are we looking for, here?” Chase asked.
“You’re not looking for anything,” Ben said, unable to pull his eyes away from the ridiculously morbid mess in front of them. “Just keep the light where it is.” He felt awful that they were actually using these clearly suffering animals for what they were about to try. But if it worked, this would hopefully not happen again.
‘It’s here,’ Ian reaffirmed.
Okay. I don’t need to see it again.
But he did have to do something. His hand slipped back into the pocket of his jacket, and he wrapped his fingers around the figurine. For their cat problem.
The minute the weird little totem was out in the open, a huge, creaking groan rose from in front of them. It sounded more like a massive wooden ship than any noise a cat or two could make. Probably not even five.
‘It’s not the cats,’ Ian said.
“What… was that?” Chase asked.
“Think that’s our ghost?” April offered.
Ben looked at her and lifted the wooden figurine a little. “Think so.”
“Maybe we should stick to demons,” Peter said.
“We got this.” Ben extended the weird totem in his hand toward the cats, and the seemingly sourceless groan came again, only louder. Something whipped across the beam of Chase’s light and splattered with a wet smack against the opposite wall of the alley. Ben had no clue what it was, but he could probably take a few good guesses.
‘Hey, Mr. Spirit really doesn’t like that thing,’ Ian said. He sounded genuinely surprised and a little amused. ‘Get closer.’
Ben took one step. The black mass of fur that hadn’t moved yet burst in a spray of guts and fur clumps, like some giant claw had swiped at it. Ben felt the still warm bits of it thump against the legs of his jeans. Jesus Christ.
“Uh… are we totally sure it can’t do that to us?” Peter asked.
‘Nope.’
“Nope,” Ben replied. Before he had the chance to think of something halfway decent, the figurine was ripped out of his hands. Not by the spirit, though, but by April.
Just like that, she took three massive steps forward, even when a hot wind reeking of—yeah—blood blasted her hair back from her face and made Ben seriously envy Peter’s inability to use his nose right now. She dropped to one knee in front of the gray, wheezing cat and muttered, “Oh… god, I’m so sorry.” The spirit groaned again, sounding very much like a roaring bear, and April stuck the wooden figurine right down into the disgusting, gaping hole that was almost the animal’s entire body. Ben didn’t know if he actually heard the squelching sound or just imagined it.
Something cracked—maybe more splintering bones—and then the poor creature lying in the alley in front of April was suddenly the poor creature exploding all over her. The spirit’s weird noises stopped short, and the only sound now was the sickening, wet smack as pieces of splattered feline fell from April’s jacket onto the asphalt.
Ben thought he might hurl. It sounded like Peter actually did behind him. April just let out a long breath and slowly drew a hand across the front of her jacket. She flicked off a lot more of it than Ben thought he could handle. Then she stood, leaving the figurine where it was, and slowly turned around.
Right on cue, Chase aimed his light right at her, and really, the whole exploding-cat mess had only covered her from the neck down. Considerate. Ben shuddered just at the thought of being in her shoes but not as lucky with keeping the guts off his face.
‘Pretty sure that did it,’ Ian said.
Yep.
“Woah,” Chase said.
April shrugged a little. “So, level-one. Lowest threat.” Man, she looked like she hadn’t ever made that terrified phone call or almost cried in Ben’s arms. She started to unzip her jacket.
“Hey, do you want mine?” Ben asked, finally rousing himself from the shock of having just watched her do what he’d been about to do with that figurine anyway.
‘Come on,’ Ian said. ‘You didn’t even think about sticking it inside the cat.’
No, but—oh. ‘Apply before death.’ April had been right. Definitely before the cat’s death.
“No,” she replied, peeling the jacket away and holding it out by her side. “I’m actually feeling kind of warm anyway.” But it was freezing outside.
“Okay.”
“That was nuts,” Chase said, and the light on his phone bobbed away from April as he walked past Peter and Ben and made his way toward the slightly more desecrate cat corpses.
“Not really,” Peter said. “Just disgusting.”
True. This hadn’t been nearly as crazy as any of the demons they’d faced. Or dangerous, probably. Just a lot more blood and guts. From small animals.
“So I don’t know about that little doll thing,” April said. “Like if it’s got a ghost trapped inside it now like the crystals.”
“I can stick it in the box,” Peter offered.
Ben shrugged. “Yeah, couldn’t hurt.”
Peter opened his metal box, removed the unused stone from the setting there, and stuck it in his pocket. Then he joined Chase and April kind of circling the mangled bodies at their feet. He looked a little hesitant, but he seemed fully aware that April had just taken a blast of cat guts and that he couldn’t really wimp out over touching a wooden figurine inside said cat guts. Ben thought that was a good call.
With one arm around the box, Peter squatted and reached out for the figurine that was really only set inside the carcass. The minute his fingers touched it, though, he jerked them back again. “Holy crap, that thing’s still alive.”
“What?” Ben said. How was that even possible?
“Okay. Hold this.” Chase held his phone out to April, who shined the light down on the cat bodies and looked like she was grimacing. Then Chase squatted beside Peter and tilted his head for a second before he reached into the bloody mass of fur and insides and grabbed something. Some kind of strangled sound came from the animal—Ben didn’t ever want to think about it again, even just a few seconds later—and he realized Chase had grabbed the poor thing’s head in both hands. Then he twisted quickly, there was a little snap, and he let go.
“What?” Peter shrieked.
“What?” Chase stood and stared down at Peter. “You think it was a better idea to just leave it here like that? Breathing and everything?”
Peter scowled and looked down at his shoes. “No…”
“Well, okay.” Chase wiped his hands on his pants, which Ben would not have done with all that blood flying around. Then Peter reached out again for the wooden totem and this t
ime managed to pluck it with a wet little slurp from the fury body. He dropped it into the metal box and slid the top panel closed again until it clicked. Then he seemed to recognize the blood on his own fingers now too, and Ben knew the guy was about to freak out because he had nothing to wipe them clean.
“You can use my pants if you want,” Chase said. It was half genuine and half totally making fun of Peter’s dilemma.
Peter stared at Ben, who imagined the guy was thinking something along the lines of, ‘I’m not touching this jerkoff’s pants.’ Instead, he reached down and wiped his fingers on the very bottom of his sweatpants, which were dark blue anyway. Then he stood and headed back out of the alley. April followed him, and Chase aimed the light toward the street as well.
Ben walked with him out of the alley, and Chase asked, “That went pretty well, right?”
“Sure.”
“Okay. One down.” The guy’s grin flashed in the streetlights as they emerged. “I can’t wait for the next one.”
21
They went immediately back to Peter’s apartment after that. It wasn’t like the last time, after snatching up the demon at Buckley Playground and taking that boy Kevin home. They’d gone out to dinner—Ben, April, and Peter. None of them had anything remotely resembling an appetite after dealing with the spirit in the alley. And Ben wondered if he’d ever get the smell of blood and guts out of his car.
Peter stepped out of Ben’s car and said, “I’m gonna take like five showers. We can figure out what’s happening with the next one later.”
“You good with that thing?” Ben asked from the driver’s seat, nodding at the metal box in Peter’s arms and the wooden figurine inside.
“Yeah. Dump it in the cabinet, and I guess we’re good to go.”
“Okay. If it starts to do anything—”
“I got it. I’ll let you know. Later.” Peter had already started for his apartment building, apparently pretty eager to call it a night. Ben wondered if the guy had a bottle of NyQuil now to balance out the other stuff; Peter didn’t look much better for any of it.
Then Chase climbed out of the back seat too. “You let me know when we’re doing round two,” he said, grinning into Ben’s window.
“Okay,” Ben replied, really slapping on the false enthusiasm. Chase looked at April for a minute, nodded, then left them to go find his own car. “So.” Ben turned to April and raised his eyebrows. “Where to next?”
She closed her eyes for a minute. “Honestly, I’d rather go anywhere than back to my place right now.” When she opened her eyes and looked up into his, he thought she might be about to apologize. Again.
“What about my place?” Her eyes widened a little, and Ben had to backtrack all over again. “I mean, like if you just want to be somewhere else tonight. I sleep on the couch half the time anyway.”
April sighed out a small, tired laugh. “Okay. That actually sounds… okay. Thanks.”
“No problem.” He put the car into drive and headed back home. With April.
He did make her wait, though, while he went into his room first and shoved everything that even looked remotely messy into his closet. Mostly it was dirty clothes. He stacked a few scattered papers for school in the corner and considered cracking a window for a bit, but it was way too cold outside to make that one subtle. By the time he’d put the sheets back on the bed—like a real adult who cleaned stuff—and walked back out into the living room, April was sitting on the couch, hunched over her lap and staring at the floor between her feet. At least she hadn’t waited for an invitation to kick off her shoes. And she’d already chucked her jacket in the apartment dumpster on their way in.
“You okay?” he asked.
She lifted her head, then turned and blinked at him, like she’d either been about to pass out right there sitting like that or she’d been really, really thinking hard about something. “Yeah.” Her attempt to smile didn’t seem to agree with her. “Just a lot of stuff going on.”
Ben chuckled. “I think you’ve mentioned that once or twice.” He stepped across the living room to sit next to her on the couch. Not too close, but he definitely didn’t put the entire center cushion between them.
She lifted her forearms from her knees and sat up against the back of the couch. “So the little bit I talked about earlier,” she said, “about Isaac and, well, pretty much everything before I came to Boston… I know I have a little more explaining to do with that.”
Ben’s gut twisted. “You really don’t have to,” he said, trying to sound casual about it. Part of him didn’t really want to hear about some guy she’d dated out of high school who was now stalking her across state lines, even if she wanted absolutely nothing to do with the guy. At least, not until he could get a better handle on what was going on between him and April first. The bigger part of him, though, knew that if she opened up to him now about all of it, he’d only be able to focus on his crushing guilt over not having told her a single thing about Ian.
“I want to, though,” she said, lifting her feet to cross her legs in front of her on the couch. “I’m pretty sure I owe you that much. Especially after asking you to come over the way I did.” She pressed her lips together like she was trying not to laugh. “When I opened my door, you looked like you were ready to break something.”
Ben closed his eyes for a second and let himself laugh at it, too. “I think I was.”
“I didn’t mean to drag you into it like that.”
Shaking his head, Ben held her gaze and said, “I’m sure you’re pretty strong and all, but I think I’m too heavy for you to drag around.”
When April laughed, it sounded real this time—a little less exhausted—and she slapped the back of her hand against his shoulder. “Don’t be so sure.”
“Seriously, though,” he added. “We’ve both had crazy things in our lives. I brought you into mine when we went back to Oakwood Valley.”
“Yeah, but you told me exactly what I was getting into before I decided to come help.” She raised an eyebrow, like she was trying to one-up him in reverse and score him as many points as she could above her own.
“Don’t give me too much credit,” he said. April frowned a little at that, like what he’d said had just reminded her of something else she didn’t understand. “Doesn’t matter what it is, April,” Ben told her with a shrug. “Or how much I know. I’ll always help you.” The last thing in the world he expected was for the smallest blush to rise high on her cheekbones, just enough that it really couldn’t be mistaken. He’d thought that confession might have sounded a little desperate, but apparently, he’d said exactly the right thing. “You can still tell me whatever you want to explain. Doesn’t have to be right now.”
April stared at him, then lifted herself on the couch and scooted closer. Ben’s arm went up and over the back of the couch, as if they’d done this a hundred times, just before she settled back against him and curled her legs under her again. Her knees rested on his thigh. Then she dropped her head back against his chest and sighed. “Okay.”
“Okay.” He couldn’t see her face, but he didn’t really have to because he had his arm around her and she’d practically put it there herself. Ben couldn’t have been more grateful for the fact that Ian, with his infuriating tendency to ruin almost every moment, was as quiet as if he’d never been inside Ben’s head at all.
They sat there for a while—Ben could never have been able to guess how long—then April took a deep breath. “I think I just really need to get some sleep.”
“Yeah, sure.” Ben pulled his arm away as she sat up on the couch and smoothed her hair back from around her face. “Bed’s all yours.”
Her eyelids drooped heavily when she turned to smile at him. “This is the first time I’ve actually been able to relax in… well, it feels like forever.”
Hey, that was a point for Team Ben, wasn’t it? “Good. Hope you sleep well.”
“Thanks.” She stood from the couch and headed toward his bedroom. When sh
e turned back over her shoulder to look at him, he thought his heart might explode. “Goodnight, Ben.”
“‘Night.” When she closed the door behind her, he deflated. But not all the way. He was sleeping on the couch tonight while she took his bed, but things had gotten a lot better now than they were a week ago.
Except, maybe, for the fact that he really had to tell April about Ian.
Ben surprised himself the next morning by waking up before 9:00. And he couldn’t go back to sleep. He was even more surprised to find April’s shoes still inside the front door; he’d expected her to be one of those early-rising, up-and-at-‘em kind of people. Maybe she was, and maybe she needed to sleep in on a Saturday morning in someone else’s bed. Alone.
He made a pot of coffee and toasted some waffles, and even after he’d finished all that and eaten his fill, April still wasn’t awake. TV was just about as good an option as anything else. He kept the volume down and realized after only a few minutes that this wasn’t really what he wanted; he’d been staring the whole time at Chase’s list on his coffee table instead.
That second item they’d picked for the next project jumped out at him—the level two, which was hopefully a demon this time so they’d know how to handle it better. Ben couldn’t believe he was actually hoping for demons. Then it occurred to him that they actually might have had a better resource than they realized all along. Only it came with a serious attitude and obnoxious hair.
Ben picked up his phone and stared at it a minute before pulling up the text history with Chase. Any help was better than flailing around with practically nothing at this point.
—You said you’re good at finding information.—
That was about as far as he was willing to go when it came to asking Chase for something. If the guy tried to play him into asking nicely and saying please, he could forget it.
But the text Chase sent in reply was oddly intuitive.
—Yeah. Drop by whenever.—
Then he sent an address, which Ben had to look up because he had absolutely no idea where it was. And then he had to re-type it into his GPS just to make sure he’d done it correctly the first time. Because the idea of Chase hanging out in a neighborhood like this made absolutely no sense at all.