by K Helms
Before she exited the vehicle she slid the blocks from her feet and dragged her pack and carbine closer to her from the passenger side. Shelter was her first priority. Where there was shelter there was probably a vehicle. Shelter was always the first priority whether it was mobile or not.
She exited the vehicle and left the door open. She threw the pack over her shoulders and slipped her arms through the straps, cinching them tight. She pulled the bolt back on the carbine, chambering a round, and held it in both hands crossing the front of her. There was a blind corner ahead and as luck would have it a small wooded area kept her from seeing the other side. Juanita walked slowly, ever vigilant for the songs of the dead, she knew that tune and wasn’t a big fan.
As Juanita rounded the curve a form came into view. It was a man hunkered down and he seemed to be waiting for someone or something. For what, she wasn’t sure, but she guessed that it was her. He had probably been a local that knew the roads and had figured her route and cut her off. Juanita raised the rifle defensively, but continued forward. There was no way she could outrun him but she didn’t want to let him think that she was scared of him either; that showed weakness and she wasn’t weak, regardless of her diminutive size. As she neared him Juanita saw that he was holding a lever action rifle like John Wayne used to carry. He held it to his side where he squatted like a staff to balance himself. He was wearing a dingy wife-beater tank top, a pair of faded blue jeans and appeared to have only one hand. The other arm ended in a metallic hook, but it was unlike any hook she had ever seen before. This hook curled and uncurled around the barrel of the rifle like a prehensile tail. Juanita noted that the man was in good shape with a slender, athletic build but saw that his exposed flesh was covered in clots and masses of blue, black, green and red.
Juanita tensed when she saw those masses of swirling colors and held the barrel pointed in his direction thinking that the colors were signs of infection.
“Whoa…easy little lady,” he said holding a hand up in front of him, his ever present Ranger para-cord bracelet looping around his wrist as he stood to his feet. Juanita took a few more aggressive steps forward and she saw that the colors were actually just tattoos. The ink was a mangled mess that she thought no one deserved and she hoped he had shot whoever had given him those first grade finger paintings. Juanita got a better look at his face and noted that his head was just shy of being shaved, and light glistened on the sporadic stubble on his cheeks and chin. He wasn’t what she would call handsome, but the look suited him.
She held the rifle pointed at center mass. “Are you looking to get killed, Mister?” she said and saw him smile a crooked grin. He would never be confused with any Hollywood pretty boy that was for sure. “Something funny?” she asked, raising an eyebrow.
He still rested the butt stock of the Winchester on the pavement and he still wore that crooked grin. “You know, you look like a mini...” he said.
She cut him off with a glare “I don't think you want to get into what we look like, do we?” she said, nodding to his hand.
His smile twitched, almost disappeared, and then reemerged.
“Are you retarded or something?” she asked, anger beginning to spark within her. Juanita did not like being mocked.
“No,” he said as he hunkered back down, “I’m Arlington.” He nodded in her direction, “and that is Laptu.”
“Damn,” Juanita muttered, knowing that the hook handed bandit meant there was someone behind her. Juanita felt the carbine snatched from her hands from above her. She looked up and saw the great primate looming above her, his eyes were round. He appeared to be grinning too. She thought that maybe everyone had gone retarded, it was Kentucky after all. She felt a wave of surrealism wash over her and she felt dizzy as her mind scrambled for reason. A trained ape, maybe escaped from the zoo? She began to swoon, but the ape steadied her, gently resting his enormous hands on her shoulders. She noticed that he smelled like fresh cut grass.
Arlington could tell by Laptu’s expression that it took every last shred of restraint for the yeti not to pick her up and squeeze her. The Bigfoot’s eyes were round and dilated. “Baby! Laptu likes babies.”
Arlington stood again and walked the remaining few feet that separated them. “She’s not a baby, big guy. She’s a midget.”
Juanita snapped her head back to face the man, anger replacing the earlier lapse of reason. “I have hypochondroplasia, you idiot,” she hissed.
“Doesn’t that mean you just think you’re sick but nothing’s really wrong?”
“That’s hypochondria. Hypochondroplasia means that I have a type of dwarfism, numbnuts,” she answered in a scathing tone.
“Sorry…” he said, then grinned that stupid grin of his and added to Laptu, “I shall call her Mini Salma,” in his best Dr. Evil impression that really wasn’t all that good.
Juanita wasn’t accustomed to a having a complete stranger freely poking fun at her. “Do it and see what happens to your balls,” she challenged him angrily.
Arlington studied her for a moment and his expression changed to one of awkward embarrassment. “Listen, I was just kiddin’…” then he brightened, and again she thought that there was a very real possibility that he might actually be mildly retarded. “Let’s start over. I’m Arlington Neff and you are…”
Juanita snorted in disdain then reconsidered. If she gave him her name maybe then he wouldn’t call her any other stupid nicknames.
“Mendoza, Juanita Maria Mendoza,” she said and grudgingly took his proffered hand.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you Ms. Mendoza,” Arlington said politely.
She examined his face and decided that he was not patronizing her or playing her for a fool. “My car broke down and I need some shelter. Can you help me or not?”
“I think that can be arranged,” he said. “Can’t it, Laptu?”
“Baby…”
“She’s not a baby.”
“Baby!” insisted Laptu and Arlington shook his head.
Arlington looked down at Juanita “Don’t take offense. Laptu’s a good guy, but he’s a little slow sometimes.”
Juanita doubted that Laptu was the only one in this dynamic duo that was a little slow on the up take. “I want to warn you…warn both of you…if either of you try anything funny I won’t hesitate to shoot you in the balls when I get the chance.”
“What is it with you and balls?” asked Arlington with a wink, and immediately saw the dark storm clouds brewing in her eyes and changed his tone. “Sorry. We get the point. Balls are bad, gotcha.” He spun smartly on his boot heel, and said over his shoulder, “Come on. I think you’ll like the ship.”
She wondered why he called his car a ship. More than likely it was primer gray ’78 Ford Flatbed complete with fenders that flapped like wings as it beat the back roads. There weren’t any inland seas that she knew of for him to be sailing.
She followed them further around the blind curve and abruptly stopped dead in her tracks and nearly caused the Bigfoot to trip over her. She had been proud of how she had handled the appearance of a crypto-zoological beast, but this was getting to be too much. She wondered if this all had been some crazy dream and secretly hoped it had been. Maybe she would awaken with her legs and arms long and willowy, maybe they would end with graceful and nimble fingers and toes, and maybe she would wipe the sleep from her eyes and find herself on clean, starched sheets with the morning sun welcoming her to her usual life of millionaire ease.
Arlington turned to her. “Well, whadaya think? Is this good enough shelter for ya, Ms. Mendoza?”
“I might as well enjoy the dream,” she mumbled and now understood why the cat had been killed by its curiosity. Sometimes the draw of that adventure was too much to resist. She examined the silver disk. It reflected the landscape like one of those convex highway mirrors. She wasn’t sure if any of this was real and she needed to know. She took small shuffling steps toward it and stopped abruptly as she looked at her reflection. In the re
flective silver sheen her legs were long and thin and she felt her heart nearly stop before she realized that it was presenting her the way a funhouse mirror might.
A black man with a dog mask appeared at the top of the ramp and she almost laughed. Is it Halloween already?
The Anubis peered at them with one red orb and Juanita saw that maybe there was a price for knowing those mysteries that all animals wanted to know. “There is a large troop of the dead approaching from the woods,” the Anubis reported in a distinctly British accent. Having given his report the Anubis turned abruptly and with long graceful strides disappeared into the shadows.
“That’s Basil. He’s an Anubis,” Arlington explained in his usual astute manner.
“No shit,” Juanita replied rolling her eyes.
Arlington shrugged sheepishly. “Are you comin’?”
There was really no doubt in her mind. “I will as long as you remember the rules.”
“Rules?” Arlington asked puzzled.
She nodded and her eyes narrowed coolly. “No touching. No midget jokes and I would like a ride to Mexico.”
Arlington pursed his lips considering as he let the rules sink in. “OK, why not?” He walked up the ramp and he looked over his shoulder to see that she was following him, and that Laptu was following closely, there-after. The primate was hot on the little Latina’s heels and looking lovingly at her. Arlington thought that Laptu might burst if he didn’t get to play with the ‘baby’ soon. “I don’t s’pose you know of any other survivor’s d’ya?”
Juanita paused for a moment, considering Hito and Shere, and then said, “No, just me.” Again she noticed the metal hook and was fascinated by it. The metal looked like the color of pools of oil in parking lots with its swirls of color in its makeup. She felt a huge hand petting her long straight brown hair and she glanced back at the grinning Bigfoot.
“Baby,” he whispered happily
She smiled up at the giant and he beamed back. She wrapped her hand around one of Laptu’s thick leathery fingers and led him up the ramp. With his free hand he kept reaching his long fingers out to touch her hair, then yanking them harmlessly back, laughing like a little kid.
Chapter 65 – La Ciudad de los Muerto
Juarez, Mexico
“And I thought the wrestling circuit was a freak show,” she said, as Arlington raised a bunk from the floor for her. It was adjusted perfectly for her height. Laptu nearly sat on her lap and stared down at her, entranced.
“He thinks you’re a baby,” Arlington said. “He likes babies.”
“Yeah…” she said dryly. “I didn’t figure he kept calling me ‘baby’ because he was hitting on me.”
Arlington’s face reddened and she saw how uncomfortable he was. He stammered “Uh…well…we are going to Easter Island…There are six others there if you’d like to go.”
“Mexico, remember?”
“Yeah, I know…but if you don’t find what you’re looking for…”
“Then I’ll think about it.”
Basil called for Arlington and he welcomed the diversion as he walked to where the Anubis sat perched in the pilots’ chair. “What’s up buddy?”
“Don’t call me ‘buddy’ I’m not a dog.”
Arlington exhaled out his mouth. He felt like he was taking a royal beating today and really didn’t understand why. “Sorry, que pasa, amigo?”
“That means the same thing in Spanish,” chided the Anubis as it peered up at him then looked back to the console. “I want to keep this between us.”
“OK.”
“I am serious, Arlington. Just us,” reiterated the Anubis.
“Just between us, I promise.”
The Anubis took another minute before speaking, looked at the others to make sure they couldn’t hear him, and then said with a sigh, “I have been seeing things.”
“What kind of things?”
“It’s difficult to explain…but I feel as if I have a mental link to someone…something… I’m not sure, but it isn’t anything good and I have been getting headaches from them.”
“That’s a pretty vague description.”
“There is a skull…like it is made of red glass…and there is my eye; my missing eye. I think that is the link. It feels right.” The Anubis was obviously troubled by this and Arlington scratched the Anubis behind the ears.
“I’m getting tired, Arlington; very, very tired.”
“If you need to take a break, just say the word and you can take as long as you need.”
“It’s not that. I rarely sleep, I don’t need to as long as I remain in the ship,” said Basil, with a distinct weariness in his voice. “I am very old Arlington. I don’t think you recognize just how old I am and I just want this to be finished.”
Arlington had never considered that living as long as Basil had could be a bad thing. He studied the Anubis with concern. “You’re right; I can’t understand that, ol’ buddy. Even though there were days when I felt old, in comparison forty years is pretty fleeting compared to yours.”
Basil closed his eye and sighed, “I just feel like I deserve the right to die.” His eye snapped open and he added “when this is over…that’s what I plan to do.”
Arlington felt a lump in his throat and petted the Anubis. “Whatever you decide, I’ll back you.”
“Thank you, Hillbilly,” Basil said, and Arlington saw that the gleam was back in his friend’s eye.
“No problem fleabag.”
Juarez, Mexico looked as if it had been part of the movie set for ‘The Day After’. Every building had some damage. Some had been gutted by fires, some lay in piles of rubble, while others were riddled with holes of all sizes in them. Cars were overturned in the street, burnt hulks of metal sat on brake drums with a layer of melted rubber coating the pavement beneath them. The stench of the rotting dead was so intense that they could almost taste it. Bodies lay in the streets and vultures had picked the organs from their open torsos. Others still lounged in burnt up vehicles, their flesh cooked and charred with mouths agape. Of the one million plus inhabitants of Juarez the scan had picked up no heat signatures of the living.
Immediately, upon lowering the ramp, the dead emerged from alleys and demolished structures. They moved with more surety and coordination than Arlington had seen before. Their steps were faster and Arlington shivered. “Basil said that there was no one left alive.”
“How can he know that?” she snapped at him.
“It’s too sophisticated for me. I only know that the scans are always right.”
Juanita wasn’t mad at the inked up man beside her, but she often used that forced hostility to cover up the raw emotions beneath. Her whole family had lived in Juarez and although the town was notorious for being a horrible place to raise a family it was still home. At least the gangs, drug dealers and dirty cops no longer inhabited the city. Had it been the wrath of God or had God simply abandoned those who had abandoned Him? She rubbed her cross pendant absently. She jumped when Arlington laid a hand gently on her shoulder. “Ms. Mendoza?”
She watched the dead striving toward them. “Easter Island, huh?”
“Yeah.”
“Is it safe?”
“It will be.”
“I guess I could give it a shot.” She glanced over her shoulder and thought of Lot’s wife, but she didn’t turn into a pillar of salt. God had already left town.
As she walked back up the ramp she asked Arlington “Is there any way I could get cleaned up? I feel disgusting.”
He looked down at her “Yeah, sure, but you don’t look disgusting to me.”
The way he said that, not the words themselves, but the inflection made her feel something she hadn’t for a long time and she found that she was smiling. “Easy cowboy and remember the rules.”
“I remember Ms. Mendoza.”
“You might as well call me Juanita.”
Chapter 66 - The Gemini
Grove of the Gemini,
Plane of the Ark<
br />
The Grove was a small circular clearing that lay surrounded by dense woods. A single trail led to it and in the center of the clearing was a large stack of flat rocks that Regeliel called a cairn. Around the perimeter of the clearing stood large monoliths, each monolith was formed by two long rectangles standing on end supporting another that bridged their span. The same pattern repeated every ten or fifteen feet and Bodie saw the resemblance between it and the photos he had seen of Stonehenge in England.
Regeliel carried the grief-stricken Mia to the center and laid her body upon the cairn. Bodie watched as he leaned against his double-bladed war axe. He had no idea what to expect, only that some dude named ‘the Gemini’ was supposed to help her.
As Bodie watched, he saw two ghostly apparitions appear at the edge of the forest. Remembering how the skull had seemed to dissolve before their eyes he instantly grabbed his axe and ran forward. Regeliel held him back with one outstretched arm. “It is alright, my friend. It is the Gemini.”
The twin spectral bodies hovered near where Mia lay and Bodie could better see the detail of their faces. They were just children, probably eight years old at the most. The Gemini was a boy and what Bodie assumed to be a twin sister. Their faces were round and innocent and kind. There was none of the earthly greed or selfish defiance that graced most of the kids he had known.
The little girl laid a hand on Mia’s chest and visibly cringed. “Oh,” she said, with much pain inflected in her tone.
“She’s an empath,” whispered Regeliel.
“I have no idea what that is,” Bodie admitted.
“She can take your pain. She feels it so that you don’t have to.”
Bodie narrowed his eyes and stroked his beard “What’s in it for her?”
“Nothing,” answered the knight, “but she will only take it if the boy approves.”
“And what does the boy do, other than boss around his sister?” Bodie asked grumbling.