Black Frost

by John Conroe

  The initial section of my parents basement is finished into a theatre room, but if you travel through that, you come to a regular-looking door set in the wall. Only when you open it do you realize it’s steel and equipped with a Medeco deadbolt. The door to my Father’s combination den and workshop was open and I could see it was fully lit by the overhead fluorescents. Dad looked up from his workbench when I came in, started to turn back to his project but did a double take when he saw me close the door behind me.

  He raised both eyebrows and waited. “I’ve had two visits from the man in black,” I said as casually as I could. His eyes widened and he put down the tube of epoxy he held and straightened from the bench. He had been gluing the open ends of hollowpoint cartridges that sat in a tray. They looked like .45’s and there were at least three stacked trays behind the one he was currently working on. Maybe two hundred cartridges althogether.

  Distracted from my story I bent over and looked carefully. Each gaping hollowpoint cavity was filled with iron filings and Dad had been epoxying the open ends. “Clever,” I said. He was creating rounds that would spray iron particles throughout the bodies of anything they hit. I nodded in appreciation, but when I noticed the vein bulging on his forehead I realized I had better get on with my story telling or he would kill me himself.

  I filled him in on Greer’s two visits, the politics of his world as I understood them, and the feeding incident with the pucks.

  “Sooo, that’s about all I know, although remind me when I leave that I have to stop by the meat market on the way home. They should have some of those beef bones they keep for dogs that I can use,” I finished.

  He had listened to the whole thing in silence and now sat twiddling with his mustache, trying to deal with the load of incredible information I had dumped in his lap, staring at the concrete block wall behind the workbench. While he thought it through I looked around his man cave for anything new. As always it was neatly organized, everything in its place. A twenty-gun fireproof safe squatted in the corner of the room, taking pride of place. Two stuffed chairs and a loveseat were arrayed in the opposite corner around a forty-two inch flatscreen. That was football central. The other two corners of the room were filled with the opposite ends of the workbench that ran the full length of the wall. This bench was solely dedicated to gun related work, as the garage held his wood working tools. A big Dillon reloading machine took up space on half of the bench, bracketed by a Lee single stage reloader and a big vibrating brass case cleaner. That side was the reloading center, the other half of the bench set up for gun smithing and cleaning. The only thing new that I could see was a heavy duty steel cabinet with a push button electronic lock on the door. It was obviously a gun cabinet but that seemed rather redundant with the fire safe.

  “What’s that?” I asked, pointing at the cabinet. Dad looked up and grunted. “Ready rig, I’ll show you later. Combination is the last two numbers of your birth year and Ashley’s…in that order.”

  I studied him from the corner of my eye while pretending to still look at the metal cabinet. He was off…way off his normal pattern. His eyes were looking everywhere but at me and he was fiddling with his mustache in a nervous way. This was not my father. Then it hit me…he couldn’t wrap himself around this situation. It was too weird, too science fiction-come-to-life.

  I had never seen this before, my father, the federal agent, unable to cope with a situation. This was the man who had been in running gunfights with hardened drug lords, the man who had single handedly stopped a convenience store robbery with a can of beans and a display rack of potato chips.

  “Ah Dad? Do you believe me?” I asked, first checking his faith in me. He looked up and nodded, but the fear in his eyes threw me. “It’s the whole elf, goblin and fairy part, isn’t it?”

  His lack of answer was answer enough. I had another flash of empathy. I had felt much the same way when the pickup truck with the arrow headed plow blade had slid through a stop sign and crushed my wife to death right next to me. Waking up from the walking nightmare that followed had taken weeks. Trying to figure out what to do and being at a loss for answers. Dad and mom had helped me through that by breaking it down into small pieces, small decisions.

  “Dad, stop thinking about this as elves and think about it as illegal aliens from rival gangs or intelligence agents from China and Russia. They think Ashley has the plans to a secret new weapon and will stop at nothing to get it. No one will believe us if we try to warn people. So it’s up to us, although we have a double agent on our side and have turned one of their biological weapons against them,” I said, trying to use terms he was comfortable with.

  “Now I plan to stay at home with Ashley for tonight. The house is sealed in steel mesh, the pucks are there and Greer will be back in six hours or so. I also think the Summer elves, er agents are already in town, poking around. But I need more plans and I need your help securing Grandpa’s house,” I said, meeting his now firm gaze. “I’m thinking booby traps or something.”

  His expression had changed during my little speech and I could almost tell you the moment when his brain reengaged the problem and started to plan.

  “Booby traps? Actually, I’ve already got some ideas on that, Ian,’ he said, moving toward the workbench. He picked up a seven inch section of two-by-four that had things attached to it.

  “Here, see I screwed one of these new mouse traps to the two-by-four, drilled a one inch hole through the wood and fitted this little section of steel pipe in it. Then I fastened a little strip of steel to the jaws of the trap and put a nail out on the end of the metal. You just slide a twelve gauge shell into the pipe and its primer is all lined up with the nail. Set the trap by pushing down on this lever and when this string gets yanked the shell goes off.”

  It was deadly simple. He had used those new type plastic mouse traps, the kind that are much easier to set than the old wooden ones. He showed me how he would set one up by using a drill to screw it solidly into position, the tube of the pipe aimed at a doorway or some other narrow space.

  Pausing, my father looked over at me. “Chinese and Russian agents?” he questioned, eyes glinting in the overhead light.

  “Listen, don’t let the sci-fi part throw you. A lot of science fiction ends up coming true and in this case us human types built the Large Hadron Collider, which started all this,” I said.

  “That big accelerator thingy in Switzerland?”

  “Yeah, it wore away whatever separates our worlds naturally. So now we have illegal aliens within our borders, intent on child kidnapping. They have advanced biological weapons and can hide among the local population. And they’ve done this all before when the stars were right or the astrological alignments were in order or something,” I said.

  His mouth had thinned to a flat line of anger at the words ‘child kidnapping’ and he gave a sharp nod of agreement.

  “In fact, I find it hard to believe that some obscure government agency doesn’t already have some knowledge of them, like the guys at Area 51 or something,” I wondered.

  His head snapped up. “I’ll check into it,” he said, his tone determined.

  There probably wasn’t any such group, but it would give my dad something to do. He had contacts in almost every part of the federal law enforcement establishment. I doubted it would help our situation or stop the storm I could just about feel approaching Groton Falls, but what the hell, it was better than seeing my father not knowing what to do.

  He showed me how to put the shotgun shell traps together and we made four more, placing them into a cardboard box.

  “Here, take these as well,” Dad said, handing me an electronics box.

  “Cameras?” I asked.

  “Yeah, it’s a two camera security system I picked up at Walmart. Each camera on a remote control and wirelessly connected to the monitor. It was on sale and I thought I’d try it out. Put one camera under the eaves of the shop so it looks at the whole outside of the house and one on the ceiling of the p
orch. Should give you pretty good coverage and the cameras have infrared ability.”

  The setup seemed pretty simple to use. The cameras either plugged into a socket or ran on batteries. I could think of two easy places to plug them in. The base monitor also had dual power sources so you could move it room to room.

  “Now what did you do to your ammo?” he asked, his mind fully engaged in the problem at hand.

  I pulled up my sweat shirt and grabbed the spare magazine of ammo I carry in front. It slipped out of its kydex carrier and I showed him the round of .40 S&W that was visible at the top.

  “You sectioned rod?” he asked. At my nod, he went on. “How did you hold it in?”

  “It’s actually a pretty tight fit, but there’s a drop of super glue in there to make sure.”

  “Hmm, it’ll be a deep penetrating mother won’t it?” he mused.

  “Yeah, those goblins were pretty densely built. But your filing design will spread the iron quicker. I’m not sure which is more effective,” I said.

  “Generally, I prefer penetration over expansion, but we’ll just have to see, won’t we? What did you do for the cowboy assault weapon?”

  Dad nicknamed my deer rifle when I first got it. I only ever hunted deer on Grandpa’s land, which is thickly wooded with no real open shots beyond a hundred yards. So when I bought my first rifle it was a Winchester Trapper .44 magnum. With a sixteen inch barrel it’s a short, light handy little gun, perfect for our land. Dad had laughed at it at first, but after seeing me shoot ten fast shots of heavy .44 rounds he had gotten a thoughtful look on his face. The short barrel is still longer than a revolver’s so the bullet picks up speed, bringing up the kinetic energy of the round. At anything under 125 to 150 yards it’s deadly. My father had promptly borrowed it and when I got it back it had custom peep sights, a smoothed and tuned action and a buttstock ammo carrier that held ten more rounds. It also had a mount for a flashlight for investigating bumps in the night.

  “Same thing, but bigger diameter rod,” I answered.

  “Alright then….what’s your plan,” he asked.

  “Well for the next day, we stay at the house, you know, shelter in place. Grandpa did a good job securing it and I have some help out there, especially when Greer gets back,” I said. “After I talk to him, I want to see what my options are for getting out of the area, what might be a safe spot to go to till this gathering or whatever it is ends.”

  “What about staying here? Two of us are more capable than one!” he said.

  “Yeah, well I don’t want to drag you into it,” I said.

  “Bullshit! Bullshit!” he spat out. “Your mother and I were ‘in it’ the moment you were born. In it a second time when Ashley was born! Maybe sheltering at home is okay for the moment, but at the first sign of trouble you get your asses here! Got it!”

  “Dad, I don’t want Mom getting hurt!” I objected.

  “Listen to me, mister! Your mother has dealt with death threats, drug gangs and PTA. We already talked about it and she knows all about this, so you just get that line of crap outta your head. We’re your parents….would you let Ashley deal with this all on her own even if she was grown up? I don’t think so!”

  I hadn’t thought about it that way. If Ashley was grown and in danger I would do everything in my power, spend everything I had including my life, to help protect her. Mom and Dad felt the same way about me. I suddenly felt like Sarah was looking over my shoulder. It happens pretty regularly, at least weekly since she died. I’m facing a problem or decision and suddenly feel like she’s there, watching. Then I immediately try to think how she would handle it or what her input would be. The answers come quickly, not from anything supernatural, but just from my own knowledge of my wife.

  The answer came just as quickly this time. To protect my daughter I should use everything and everyone I had to.

  Chapter 10

  Ashley poked her head into the man space about then and informed us that lunch was ready, giving us each a questioning look. My daughter is observant and I could tell she had picked up on my behavior as well as our body language. The look in her eyes told me that we would be having a conversation in the car on the way home and I had better come clean. Ashley and I have a policy, one we created while rebuilding our lives after Sarah died. We don’t keep important things from each other, no secrets.

  Lunch was chicken salad sandwiches, chips, pickles and homemade vegetable soup. Mom kept up a steady chatter as we ate, while I mostly thought about what I would say in the car.

  “Ian, Ash tells me you met a young lady today?” Mom suddenly threw my way.

  I almost spit my diet soda all over the table.

  “Eirwen?” I looked at Ashley who was grinning.

  “Come on Dad, she’s gorgeous!”

  “Yes, Ash, she’s a gorgeous twenty-something year old. Way, way too young for me,” I answered, giving her a WTF look.

  “Well, it’s just that I got a serious vibe off her, you know, that’s she was very interested in you,” she replied.

  That absolutely couldn’t be right, we were worlds apart in age and background. I was dumbfounded that Ashley had even thought that way at all. I had my hands full with raising her and trying to eke out a living, save something for her college and rebuild our lives. Women were nowhere on my horizon.

  “Yeah, not so much. She might like some of the younger guys at the MMA dojo, but I’m afraid your radar is off this time.”

  My mom looked at me speculatively for a moment then changed the subject, asking Ashley about her final soccer game, which my parents had missed.

  The rest of lunch dragged a little, slowed by the invisible tension of the crazy, ridiculous danger hanging over our heads. My father and I exchanged numerous glances, some of which mom noticed, although Ashley didn’t appear to see any of it. My brain kept slipping gears, leaving the conversation to think about piranha toothed fairies, killer goblins and homicidal elves, always returning to the central question….what was there about Ashley that could draw them?

  We finally finished up and got ready to leave, a process made more difficult by my mother’s suddenly obvious anxiety and overly affectionate hugging.

  My father came up to me while I was putting the box of booby traps and cameras in the back of the Toyota, his arms full of butcher paper.

  “Here, this is a bunch of meat from the bottom of the chest freezer, stuff we just haven’t gotten to in the last year or so. It should be fine to feed to the…the…you know,” he said, suddenly at a loss for what to call them.

  “Pucks, Dad. Greer calls them pucks.”

  “Yeah, pucks. Listen, at the first sign of trouble you get back here. Leave your car facing the road. Is the gas tank full? Maybe you should take an extra gun?” he babbled, uncharacteristically nervous.

  “Dad, we’ll be okay. Got plenty of gas, I always park facing the road, don’t need any more guns, and, yes..we’ll come right here if needed.” I could see Ashley inside the SUV craning around to watch my father and I, her expression curious.

  “Right, well, call me when you get home and let me know everything is okay,” he ordered, his normal attitude reasserting itself.

  “I will,” I answered.

  We had no sooner turned onto the main road when Ashley turned to me, a determined set to her face, and demanded, “Spill!”

  I had known we would be having this conversation; my daughter was just too sensitive to any changes in our fragile lives. Despite that foreknowledge I still didn’t know quite how to broach the subject. How do you tell your thirteen year old daughter that the fairy tale monsters that lived under every kid’s bed were real and that they did, in fact, want to steal her away in the night?

  “Ash, I’m gonna tell you some things – things that might make you doubt your Father’s sanity. But I promise you that it’s all real, that your grandfather knows all about it and even he believes it,” I began.

  “Then, when we get home, I’ll show you proof. Alrigh
t?”

  “Dad you’re starting to scare me,” she said.

  “Well, I’m not going to lie to you, although I’m really, really tempted to,” I said, glancing away from the road to her face. Her wide eyes told me that she understood how serious it was if I was tempted to lie to her.

  Taking a deep breath, I started my story, right at the beginning, with the possum carcass, Grandpa’s journal, slowly working my way to Greer and the goblins in the forest.

  “Dad, you’re serious?” she asked, when I got done recounting the fight in the forest.

  Instead of a verbal answer, I just pulled up my sweatshirt on my right side, letting her see my holstered Sig. I virtually never wore my gun anywhere, so the sight of it was as uncharacteristic of me as my father being without a sidearm would be.

  She took a sharp breath in at the sight of my handgun, but didn’t say anything else, so I continued on with the tale. I told her how Greer had come back last evening, when she and Lindsey had seen me talking with him at the point of a shotgun. And again this morning in the barn. I told her what he told me – about the world of Fairie, the two Courts, the Hunters and Guardians, and the struggle for control of their world. How they had taken children of Talent for untold centuries from this world and how our own technology had created the opportunity for an even greater invasion.

  “Dad, if that was true, you would be calling the police or the FBI or someone!”

  “And tell them what? That elves, fairies and goblins were coming to steal our children? How long would it take for Social Services to arrive to cart you off?” I asked, ruthlessly applying one of our greatest fears. My glance at her found un-spilled tears in her eyes, her lip trembling. I pulled over immediately, set the hazard lights flashing and hugged her hard.

  “Listen, Ash, just because I can’t call in the troops without sounding like a loony doesn’t mean we aren’t working on it,” I said.