Carnival of Cryptids (Anthology to Raise Funds for the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children) (Kindle All-Stars Book 2)

by Bernard Schaffer

  Catarina said, "So he's got a thing against the squids?"

  "He's got a thing against everyone," Menard said.

  "I'm a little lost," Jack said. "Let's go one-two-three here?"

  Menard said, "For the past ten years, the people of Resilient have lived with the threat of attack by pseudo-humanoid creatures that dwell in our coastal waters. Colloquially, we call them Squidmen. For one reason or another – some folks think it was tied to industrial pollution or fishing – the Squidmen began to murder humans here.

  "It started with disappearances. Then bodies were discovered. Mutilated. Ripped apart. We would often find suckers – lined with razor sharp teeth – stuck inside the corpses. These were obviously animal attacks, but we had never seen anything like it.

  "As the murders ramped up, people started reporting strangers on their property. Slender, pale figures dressed in rags with strips of cloth wrapped around their heads."

  "Squidmen," Catarina said.

  Menard said, "Yes, though we didn't know it at the time. We assumed they were vagrants from the mainland. And for the most part, we ignored them."

  "I smell an 'until one dark and stormy night' coming on," Jack said.

  Menard smirked. "Actually it was the middle of the day. Last week, a police officer was sent after one of the 'vagrants' – " Menard made little air quotes " – when a woman reported a stranger menacing her daughter. The description of the man matched rumors we'd heard. But something we didn't know before was that they stank to hell. Like rotten food and urine. But, again, that's not unusual for a vagrant."

  Jack said to Catarina, "This guy would love the Port Authority."

  Catarina chuckled.

  Menard said, "The what?"

  "Nothing," Catarina said. "Joke about our home town. Go on."

  "Right," Menard said. "The Resilient officer approached this man, and as he did, the man's headdress fell apart. Then the man's face split open. A writhing mass of tentacles 'burst out,' to use the officer's words in his report."

  "What did the cop do?" Jack asked.

  "He opened fire with the standard-issue pneumatic pistols all officers carry. They fire iron darts. It tore the thing apart. He hit it three times in the head – though I use that term loosely – and twice in the chest. After an autopsy, it wasn't hard to discern, from the ringed suckers affixed to each tentacle, they were responsible for the disappearances and the murders."

  "And you responded to this information how?" Catarina asked.

  Menard said, "We increased our police presence a hundred-fold. We put up warning signs. Anyone who wore a wrapped headdress was stopped. Often shot."

  "And you guys don't have any religions that require their people to wear headdresses?"

  "Not as far as I'm aware."

  "That's convenient," Jack muttered. "All right, so you start plugging anyone who comes into town with a turban. Then what? Did the Squidmen wander ashore and ask for a truce?"

  "In effect," Menard said. "An emissary flanked by two others appeared one day. I guess we'd finally killed enough of them to make the leaders pay attention. Anyway, these three, pale, ugly things came ashore. And you've got to understand ... These things are ugly. Imagine an emaciated, white-as-paper frame with bulging air or ink sacs where the chest should be; and above the neck it's all tentacles. With a snapping beak at the center." Menard shivered. "But they came with their hands up and out. They asked for a meeting with me. I obliged and, with their weird, watery voices, they said they wanted peace."

  "Did you ask them about the attacks?"

  "Of course. They said that the murders are acts of a rogue faction that wants to destabilize any attempt at peace."

  "Terrorists?"

  "That was the word they used, actually."

  Jack rubbed his forehead and took another drink. "Fuckin hell."

  Menard said, "The emissary told me that the majority of his kind is content to live below the water while we hold this island. He told me they don't want outright war."

  Catarina said, "Well that makes sense. Wiping them out probably wouldn't be too hard. Just pollute the waters enough. Or send in a submersible to find their colony and torpedo it."

  "Right."

  Jack laughed. "We've got Squid-Qaeda."

  Catarina cut him a nasty look.

  Jack kept cackling. "Better watch out for Osama bin Squiden."

  Catarina shouted, "JACK."

  Jack chuckled into his hand. "Yeah, sorry." He coughed once to clear his throat. "So are you dedicated to brokering a truce then?"

  Menard said, "Absolutely. Neither war nor peace is easy. But my people will sleep better if there's one less boogeyman."

  Catarina said, "All right. We need to meet with the Squidmen."

  Menard said, "Talk to Burnet – David Burnet – down at the docks. He's got a good sense of where the Squidmen are. He'll get you on your way."

  Jack put his glass down. "Thanks for the drink."

  ***

  Jack kicked the side of the copper, brass, and wood submersible that bobbed before them. "We're gonna die in this thing."

  "She will get you where you need to go, my friend. She's solid." Burnet said. "And my man William Moody will take you. He's an expert. He's spent more time under the waves of Resilient than any other man on the island."

  "Yeah," Jack said. "Any other man. We're dealing with squidfuck monsters." He looked to Catarina. "Thoughts, Cowgirl?"

  She said, "My thoughts are: I'm glad knives don't need oxygen to operate." She nodded in the direction of Jack's Colt. "Water hazards ahoy."

  "Hey, hey, respect the gun. It's saved your sweet ass plenty of times."

  "Yeah. On land."

  Burnet watched them like he was watching an old, married couple argue. He smiled, thinking the exchange cute. "Moody is already below decks so unless you two have any more jabs ...?"

  ***

  Moody never stopped talking.

  "The thing most people don't understand is the craftsmanship that goes into building a vehicle like this. Oh, sure, it seems nuts – even though we heat our homes with steam and power our airships with balloons the size of city blocks – but going under water? Four hundred feet? They laugh and roll their eyes. 'Impossible,' they say." He spread his arms out. "Yet here we are."

  "It certainly is something," Catarina said.

  "I mean, the pounds of pressure per square inch constantly pushing at our hull! On the wood and glass viewports ... People just don't appreciate it."

  "No, I suppose they don't."

  The submersible was cramped. Each wooden wall was lined with pumping brass tubes and delicate glass instruments. The windows along the ship's sides showed nothing but inky darkness.

  Jack found himself fidgeting in the back. He kept cleaning his gun. He shouted up to the cockpit, "Where are we going, anyway?"

  Moody said, "Devil's Reef."

  "Oh, Devil's Reef. Of course. Goddamn Devil's Reef. Fuckin' wonderful."

  "That's where the Squidmen live, Mr. Jack."

  "You got any torpedoes on this thing?"

  "No, sir. It's an exploratory vessel."

  "Would be."

  Catarina said, "I don't think it would send the right message if we came guns blazing, Cowboy." She added acid to her words and let them hang. "We're on a diplomatic mission, remember? We're here to give these people – both people – peace."

  Moody said, "Well, if you don't mind me asking ... Then why are you two armed so heavily?" He nodded to Catarina's knives in their holsters. "And your man is carrying a gun whose barrel you could fit an eye into."

  Catarina tapped the hilts of her blades. "We're cautious, Moody. Just cautious."

  Below them, starfish sat and crabs sifted through sand. Eels churned, just shadows in the submersible's lights. A squid – a normal squid – flashed its bioluminescence and ducked out of sight.

  "We're here," Moody said.

  "Holy shit," Catarina said.

  "What is it?" Jack as
ked. "Wait don't tell me never mind I don't want to know."

  "Get the hell up here."

  Jack grunted and obeyed. He was struck dumb by the view out the front porthole.

  The 'Reef' in Devil's Reef was wholly inappropriate. 'Reef' conjured images of delicate, brightly colored flora and fauna. Pleasant. Maybe a cheerful narrator was around the corner. No, not here.

  'Devil' was spot-on, however.

  "Goddamn thing should be called the Devil's Monolith," Jack muttered.

  The Squidmen capital stood as a horrible, silent sentinel under the waves. A bone-yellow obelisk with strange, ribbed tentacular growths that pulsed and curled. Something biomechanical. Like H.R. Giger would design. A structure with cold purpose, but alive.

  From dim red-lit alcoves along the structure, figures emerged. Pseudopods like thick ropes twirled. They glanced around, then shot off into the darkness.

  "We dock there," Moody pointed to an opening halfway up the obelisk. It looked like a bloody mouth ringed by teeth. "That's what they told us when they met with the mayor. Their dock is set so that we go under the lip of the outside wall and come up into air. The place is pressurized, somehow."

  They ascended to the waterline inside the Squid capital.

  "Let's see who's home," Catarina said.

  She and Jack went to the vehicle's hatch, popped the top, and crawled out. The interior of the obelisk was frightening and alien. The walls and floor were the same bone-yellow. Thick, aged calcium deposits. And more of the ribbed tentacles. The whole place seemed alive. Teeming with squirming, aquatic life.

  Jack's right hand hovered over the Colt.

  From a wet corridor, three Squidmen appeared.

  "Just gets better and better," Jack said.

  The slender men – one tall and regal with golden rings wrapped around its extremities, flanked by two burlier body guard-looking types – were naked. They looked like stick figures with rubbery arms and legs. And then topped by that wretched writhing mass of a head.

  In a gurgling voice, the regal one said, "Welcome, humans."

  Jack nodded. "Yeah. Hi." He turned to Catarina and tapped his nose. No bad smell.

  Catarina nodded. The mayor had said the attackers stank like rotted meat and urine.

  She introduced herself and Jack. "We're here from The Collective. On behalf of the Resilients. We want to help you broker a truce."

  The regal squid said, "I am Plesioteuthididae of the Teuthapiens." He held out a tentacle arm.

  Jack took the Teuthapien's arm tip in his hand and shook. It was slick with mucus and the suckers on its underside stuck to his palm. "Nice to meet you, Plesio." Jack put on his best, pleasant grin. "Do you have a, uh, an office or a chamber you'd like to speak in?"

  "Yes," Plesio said. "Please be following."

  ***

  The meeting room was something Plesio called the Bone House. Like everything else on the monolith, it had been carved into the reef.

  Jack said, "Can I smoke?"

  Catarina glared at him. "Don't be an asshole. We're underwater. The fire will eat up whatever little oxygen they've got."

  "It's an addiction. And the nicotine loves me."

  Catarina slapped Jack's thigh.

  Plesio said, "Please no fire. Fire bad. Consume breathing air. This not our habitat. We prefer water. Only have ..." Plesio looked for the words. "Only able to stay in air short time. And you die in water."

  "Fair enough," Jack said.

  "Having humans here is great risk."

  "Why?"

  "Why should we trust? It could be trick. Then you harm my people. Maybe you light your fire after all."

  "We're dealing with the same thing. This could be a trap. Me and my Cowgirl wander in here and you got yourselves a couple of human prisoners."

  Plesio studied Jack for a moment. He said, "Yes. Trust. We must both trust one another."

  "Yes. And Plesio, I can understand why you'd be hesitant."

  "What do you know about the attacks on Resilient?" Catarina asked.

  Pleasio said, "We know who is behind it. And we will help you be fighting the terror makers. We want peace."

  Catarina nodded. "If you don't mind my asking, why now?"

  "Because the terrorists want to destroy my people. They evil. Many of my people have died.

  "This is why I did not trust you. I could not. We thought that we were being attacked by man."

  Jack held his hands out. "... We're listening."

  Plesio waited a heartbeat. The two enormous black eyes on the sides of his neck flicked away from the conversation. His writhing mass of tentacles shuddered. "They are hybrids. They are combination of your kind and mine. They appear to be man. Have your faces. Your bodies. But from top of their heads, it is Teuthapien. They hateful. Despise both our kinds.

  "They want island, coast, and waters for themselves."

  Catarina said, "Is this a mutation? A freak of nature?"

  "No. Natural. It did not come from a laboratory, but they being bred. On purpose."

  Jack held up a finger, "Wait. You mean someone is ... A human is porking your females? Making goddamn Were-Squid?"

  Plesio cocked his head. "I do not understand the 'porking.'"

  "Mating. There's a human mating with your kind – is that what you're saying?"

  "Yes."

  "Holy dicks. That's disgusting." Jack grimaced. "No offense."

  Catarina said, "Who's doing this? We need a name. We need to know who to go after."

  Plesio said, "Man named Lafitte."

  Jack let out a short laugh. "Figures." He rubbed his forehead. "I'm going to enjoy killing the shit out of him. Him and his weird mutant spawn."

  ***

  They told Plesio to focus on defending the monolith. They promised that no humans would attack. Then they rejoined Moody and headed for Resilient. By the time they got there the city slept. On each corner shined a brilliant gas light that floated and sparkled like a small star.

  Jack and Catarina needed rest as well. And time to come up with a plan. Or at least time to wrap their heads around what had happened.

  "Seems pretty straight-forward to me," Jack said. "Nab Lafitte. Round up his little nightmare kids. Put 'em down like dogs. Make sure the mayor and Plesio kiss and make up. Then we boogie."

  Catarina nodded. "Maybe. But things never go that smoothly for us, do they?"

  "Counterpoint."

  "Let's just get to our room."

  Their hotel was gorgeous. They celebrated its beauty by getting a little drunk.

  Jack looked down toward the feet of the love of his life – they'd been together thirteen years, both were fresh out of their twenties – and he said, "Nice shoes. Wanna fuck?"

  Catarina slapped him. Then smiled.

  They jumped into bed and tore each other's clothes off.

  ***

  Mayor Menard said, "I knew Lafitte was an obnoxious troublemaker. But I never thought he'd – God – I never thought he'd try to breed an army of monsters to destroy Resilient."

  "Resilient and the Teuthapien monolith," Catarina corrected. "Don't forget that. The Teuthapiens are victims here as well."

  Menard nodded, "Right. Of course." He poured drinks and set them in front of Catarina and Jack. "So to achieve peace, we need to go to war."

  Jack said, "Works that way more often than you'd think." He drank and then lit a cigarette. "We want you to track down Lafitte. Lock his ass up. My Cowgirl–" he nodded to Catarina, who smiled " – will do some knife-work and then we'll figure out where his base or nest or whatever is. Then it's clean up time. You and Plesio shake hands and tentacles and we get to go home." He took a pull from his smoke.

  Menard shook his head. "We might be able to get Lafitte, but any further action will have to wait. There's a hurricane coming. The biggest one we've seen in decades." He chuckled. "In fact, it might do the job for those damned hybrids."

  "You're kidding," Catarina said.

  "Wish I was," Menard said.
"In six hours, Resilient will be locked down."

  Jack shrugged. "When it rains –"

  "Yeah," Catarina said. "Yeah." She drank. "Shit."

  ***

  Resilient police couldn't find Lafitte. Maybe he was in hiding. Maybe he'd found out about Jack and Catarina meeting with the Teuthapiens and got spooked.

  It didn't matter.

  He was a ghost.

  ***

  Clouds blanketed the city. Rain began to fall. The wind tore at trees and people. Citizens of Resilient fought against it. Or tried. They boarded their windows and battened down the hatches.

  The storm roared.

  "Our luck is almost impressively bad," Jack said.

  Catarina grunted.

  They were back at their hotel. They looked out the room's big, barred windows as the hurricane pounded the city. Those foolish enough to wander into the streets were knocked around like small toys.

  It sounded like a titanic beast was tearing up Resilient. Each clap of thunder was a monstrous footfall. Each burst of blue lightning was a flash that cast weird, haunting shadows.

  An uprooted palm tree skittered down the street below. It slammed into a glass storefront, shattering the windows and spilling precious merchandise.

  The clay roof of another building farther away was coming undone tile by tile. Blacks square specks shot off and tumbled into the darkness. It looked like it was disintegrating.

  Jack said, "If I was Lafitte, and I wanted to wage a guerrilla war, now would be the time to do it."

  "I was thinking the same," Catarina said. "The streets are empty. Cops aren't on the hunt right now. Any noise you make is covered by the din of the storm. And every goddamn person here is holed up. Not watching anything but the weather."

  "Easy pickin's."

  They ran for their weapons.

  A woman's piercing scream filled the air.

  "That's goddamn next door," Jack said as he and Catarina jumped into the hallway. He tried the doorknob for the screamer's room. It wouldn't budge. He pounded. The shrieking continued. Then transformed into pleas. A woman yelling "Stop, God, just stop. Please, no."