The Woman on the Beast_A Season for Horror

by Macie Holloway

  “I don’t think it’s likely our underground cities could house billions of poor kids and orphans, if that’s what you’re proposing Haiku.”

  “I’m not. I’m requesting that in exchange for my weapons, you grant me three of NASA’s nuclear tunneling machines and let me start carving out fallout shelters beneath cities and neighborhoods worldwide containing the highest concentrations of children who are victims of poverty, sexual slavery and orphanages. Since clearly I can’t lower a Nuclear Tunneling Machine into the ground in Mogadishu, I need to use your underground tunnels as a starting place and keep all my efforts safely hidden underground.”

  President Matthews let out a hearty southern bellow, “Save the orphans? Haiku, you should have tried out for Ms. America.”

  “Ms. America wants to save the orphans, but sadly, is too stupid. Help me make her dreams come true, Mr. President.”

  “Won’t drug lords and gang members follow your innocent children into the entrances, Haiku?”

  “The entrances will be built in highly rural areas with zero population density many miles outside the impoverished neighborhoods. Twenty miles, thirty … however many miles away it takes to keep our entrances secret and completely out of sight.”

  “So, you want me to train military teams to go in, rescue the orphans, and safely escort them to the entrances.”

  Now Haiku was laughing.

  “Now that was a Ms. America idea. HELL NO! Two words, Mr. President – Blackhawk Down.”

  “Don’t hate me because I’m beautiful, Haiku. I’m sure you have another genius idea that will keep making me sound as dumb as a Georgia pageant queen, as usual. I’m used to it now. So, what’s the plan, Einstein?”

  “I want the children rescued by ninjas that I will train at a top secret school in Japan.”

  The President was imagining a large group of masked men in black suits throwing ninja stars and doing aerials with kids riding piggy back on their shoulders. It sounded ridiculous but if anyone could do it, it was Haiku.

  Mr. President’s assumption had missed the mark as usual.

  “The ninjas will be females, like the kunoichi. They were female ninjas that lived during medieval times in Japan. They were pretty girls dressed up like maids or dancers, but most of those fans they kept popping out had blades along the edges.”

  “I thought that was only in the movies.”

  “No, they were real. In fact, ninjas were mostly females. There were a few male ninjas also dressed as monks or workers carrying baskets, but the black suit thing was Hollywood’s imagination. Once the female ninja assassinated the ruler, the men were the ones trained to fight in the large armies of 100,000 or more soldiers that were coming to take down the village. They were still bad ass stealthy fighters, but they were not the ninjas. The definition of a ninja is basically someone who steals away things while invisible and to endure uncomfortable situations for the greater good. By invisible it doesn’t mean twenty guys in black suits tiptoeing around a castle; it means twenty beautiful dancers commissioned by a Samurai to give him a private dance. That is the real history. Ninjas were mostly women. Not only were they trained to fight, they had special weapons. The blades on the fan were just the tip of the iceberg. They had daggers stashed in their kimonos and even leather finger sheaths called Neko-te that the women could quickly pull out the sleeve of her kimono and slip her fingers into for a quick set of tiger claws. It’s the same concept as brass knuckles, except these claws were often covered in poison to make for quiet assassinations that she could quickly dance away from before anyone noticed. The only way the ruling Samurai could have stopped these women would have been to never come into contact with any woman ever again, and for a lot of men, that is just too drastic of a measure. Who wants to rule the nation if he can never have sex again?”

  “Not me.”

  “Exactly. Me neither. The movies make it all look like corny fantasy shit because they over exaggerate, giving the women real superpowers like invisibility, walking on water, or controlling nature. But, believe it or not, my ninjas will actually have at least two of those powers.”

  “I believe it.”

  “My top secret ninja school will train 25,000 smokin’ hot babes. They will be dressed to appear homeless, escaped sex slaves, hookers … whatever fashion choice best matches the location where they are to be stationed. They will be armed with secret weapons, trained in the local language of the area, and shipped out like cargo to precise locations via my stealth drones.”

  “Drones, huh? So it’s like getting a package from Amazon, except a Japanese hooker pops out and slits your throat?”

  “Very funny, Mr. President.”

  “Mason.”

  “Very funny, Mason. You’re getting warmer …”

  “So, Haiku, do you think you could set me up with one of these Japanese ninja hookers? I’ve always had a thing for Asian women.”

  President Matthews lost his wife to breast cancer two years ago and had never remarried. His advisors criticized him, saying he was hurting his chances of winning the election, but instead the public respected that the bachelor from Georgia loved his wife enough to not remarry for political reasons. Mason Matthews was a moderate Democrat from Atlanta who still had common sense. He didn’t want to ban guns, and neither did he want to take Social Security and Medicaid money to buy a yacht full of golden goose eggs. His sense of humor was merely a bonus.

  He’d been adored by the public from the day he played The Devil Went Down to Georgia on his fiddle during the Ellen show. It was no different than when Bill Clinton’s saxophone performance on the Arsenio Hall sealed his victory in 1992.

  “Are you sure you wanna hop in bed with one of these gals, Mason?” Haiku enjoyed talking country to the President.

  “It’s been two years since I’ve had sex, Haiku. I’m ready to take that risk now.”

  Haiku let out a humorous sigh.

  “I’ll keep my eye out for one, but just because some are dressed like hookers doesn’t mean they are, so you might have to win her over with your southern accent and not your money.”

  “I’ll take anything, but if you get me one with boobs that would really be a bonus.”

  Now they were both laughing.

  “Stay focused, Mason. We’re facing world war here.”

  “My bad, Haiku. So, how the Hell will one of these broads protect herself against a gang of armed Somali warlords riding by in a pick-up truck?”

  “Advanced weapons. I’ve come a long way since their tiger claws.”

  “I don’t doubt it.”

  “Even one of my ninjas can take down an entire truck of armed Somali warlords with a clear plastic fork or a tube of lipstick.”

  President Matthews would have ordinarily thought Haiku was kidding, but it was clear by his tone that he was not.

  “Now you lost me. You know you have to dumb things down for the rest of us humans. Weapons of mass destruction contained in a plastic fork?”

  “A clear plastic fork. Have you ever been driving over a hill at sunrise, and been so completely blinded by the sun that you could not tell if the traffic light was red or green?”

  “Every day.”

  “Have you ever accidentally been blinded by the sun only to see colorful blinking spots for fifteen more minutes?”

  “Yup. It’s called playing baseball at sunset.”

  “Are you aware that if the light rays from the sun hit a magnifying glass at the right angle they can burn a hole through a leaf?”

  “My sixth grade science project.”

  “Now imagine those blinding rays enhanced by super magnifiers that can literally burn out the retinas of an army from miles away, yet still be contained in a device as small as a clear plastic fork or a clear plastic headband with a tiny dial attached to it, keeping it hidden behind her ear. Transparency is key. The device will have a tiny dial I can set, meaning if I am attacked by one person, but do not want to permanently blind the fifty people standing ar
ound him, I can produce one deadly light ray as small as a laser that can a burn a hole in his head, just like that leaf. If I am a woman about to be the victim of an honor raping in Pakistan, I can roll the dial to produce a sun-like sphere of light around me, permanently blinding all those who approach. Again, with a mere dial I can set the radius of the sun sphere around me to blind only those twenty men. Rolling the dial chooses the lights intensity, while pushing the dial in or pulling it out like a drawer knob sets the size of the sphere around me. If attacked from all sides by 100,000 armed soldiers I can produce a sphere around me large enough to permanently blind the entire army or anyone up to 20,000 ft away. Light can travel far, and fast. This also means if an enemy aircraft is flying over my head, I can pull out my fork or my clear plastic cup and completely blind the pilot in only a fraction of a second. The technology behind it is rather elementary. It’s just lenses using the sun. It’s just a tiny lens ball composed of layers of super thin lenses that provide hundreds of settings depending on how strong you need the light to be. On the mildest setting, enemies are only temporarily blinded as if they stared into the sun. On the highest setting, the device has the power to burn a hole through a thousand heads of enemies who are encircling you. You are not walking on sunshine, you are walking in sunshine. I call it the sun dial. A tiny button in the center of the dial can be pressed to channel the light like a laser instead of using the sphere effect. That way, she can blind one man without damaging the eyes of surrounding orphans if necessary.

  The ninjas will only use their weapon as a last resort. She more than likely won’t have to because these little lens balls give her the power to control exactly how invisible she wants to be by emitting light rays to block the vision of those around her.”

  “So I get putting a tiny lens ball in a clear plastic fork, but where the Hell is this dial?”

  “It’s attached to the bottom of the fork. She pulls out the fork, looking ridiculous, but she is holding the fork by the dial attached to its bottom. The dial is covered by her hand, and of course it is on the left side of the fork’s stem, so she can easily roll the dial with her thumb as she’s waving the fork in the air and looking crazy. Dials can be positioned for south paws, too. We can’t leave out the girls that are left-handed.”

  “No let’s not leave any out please. Those left-handed ones could be the ones with the boobs. We need them all to stay alive just in case.”

  “They will all stay alive, and they will easily usher the children safely to the entrances by creating a sunshine ball around them to provide the necessary amount of invisibility. It’s not likely she’ll even be attacked in the first place if the entire neighborhood is seeing colorful moving spots. The ninja and the child are looking out from the sun. Everyone else is looking into it. Are you following?”

  “Believe it or not, I am.”

  “When you are driving and you pull your sun visor down, it blocks the entire sun. The visor has a 100% opacity, meaning you can’t see any light through it. When a woman is wearing a sheer white dress made of very thin cotton, you can see her underwear, but not the pattern on them. That makes her dress … maybe 20% see-through, or as scientists and Photoshop artists say, it’s at 20% opacity. It is pretty transparent, but not completely. If the dress is so thick you can only see the outline of the panties, then that dress is probably at 60% opacity. 0% opacity is like a window. You can see straight through it. It is invisible. That’s why poor birds never see a windshield coming. The dial on the weapon controls the level of opacity of the lens. Pushing the dial in or pulling it out sets the radius of light around you by choosing which layer of lens, just like when you change gears on a bicycle. Lenses are weapons. Think of how a pair of glasses can compress or expand light coming into your retina to completely perfect your vision by changing the light rays coming out of your eyes.”

  “I like the see-through dress example better than the old man glasses.”

  Haiku smiled. He appreciated the President’s down-to-earth sense of humor.

  “Yeah, I knew you’d get that one. So even a large-scale air strike could not take down even one of my ninjas.”

  “Genius, Haiku. You don’t have to drink invisible potion if can blind everyone around you. You really will make them invisible.”

  “And they are controlling the power of the sun to do it. That’s why I said my ninjas really will be invisible and control the forces of nature. I haven’t had time to make them walk on water, but if need be, I’d think of something.”

  “But what of the threat of biological and chemical warfare?”

  “Typically terrorists target densely populated cities and not people who are so poor that news stations don’t bother to report their deaths. And, there’s always the idea of drone dropping a ninja near the stockpiles of chemical weapons and letting her permanently blind the scientists from far away. I’ve met a blind piano player, but not a blind scientist.”

  Mason Matthews let out a hearty laugh.

  “Just like blind mice. All they can do is run when you’re through with them.”

  “Yup.”

  “So how do we retaliate when they start crop dusting anthrax over our cities?”

  “Mainly, stealth drones that drop baby atoms. They can target precise areas and while still nuclear, they are no Hiroshima. I’m not interested in killing a million women and kids and so I’ve down-sized the blast and emitting radiation considerably. There’s no way to avoid not killing a civilian or two, and so I can only hope it’s a last resort. I have 5,000 hidden in a secured facility, and I created other ways for us to communicate without him watching. I am still just as invisible as him, and he can’t read my mind either. So, maybe we will all survive and you can finally charm that hot left-handed ninja with the boobs.”

  “You can start on your plans immediately. Let me know if you need funding.”

  “I have my own funds, but thank you.”

  “And how will you keep me updated on your progress with Skeleton Key security breach?”

  “For now, by your rotary phone, but I’m amping up some old-school walkie-talkies. We’ll feel just it’s 1952. I’d be willing to bet my life that whoever this terrorist is, he won’t have a clue how to tap a landline, and he probably thinks Watergate is a theme park with water slides.”

  “Wouldn’t surprise me at all. So how much time do you have to start training these hot ninja hookers?”

  “Some will just look like homeless chicks, remember?”

  “So how much time do we have to train these hot homeless ninja hookers?”

  Haiku knew the President was coarsely joking as usual.

  “No clue. Any changes the hacker makes in any government intelligence is now invisible to us, but I’ll go as fast as I can.”

  Haiku’s mind was racing with ways to enhance old technologies such as radio waves, Morse code, telegraphs… He couldn’t wait to start tinkering with the vintage military walkie talkies he bought off eBay.

  He was determined to outwit the other hacker. After all, there were two Ghosts in the Darkness.

  KUDZU CAVE HEADQUARTERS

  When Atticus and Destiny returned home he ordered her to move in with her psychic friend Madame Misty right away, just to be safe. And, because she was getting on his last nerve.

  He had to set up headquarters somewhere Destiny could never find him since he knew she was the type to crack under torture.

  He didn’t know exactly what he had to work with right away, but a manual entitled Operation Skeleton Key from someone in charge of protecting top secret government intelligence sounded like she’d finally hit the jackpot on something for once. It was hard to believe, but those white-trash witches ended up knowing way more than he could have ever imagined.

  “But why?” she had whined as he shoved her out of the car door.

  “Because they may come after you. What good are great boobs if you’re dead?”

  “Good point. But where are YOU going? I need you.”

 
“I can’t tell you, but you have my word, I’ll contact you, and you have my word as soon as I pop this treasure chest open, I’ll buy you ten boobs and a beach house if you want.”

  She wanted to argue, but she couldn’t think of anything.

  “I’m the smart one, remember? I know what I’m doing. We have to separate. I have to go somewhere no one can find me now.”

  “Weren’t you supposed to return that rental car?”

  “On my way to return it now,” he lied.

  “Good. You put it in my name.”

  Exactly, and that’s why he had yanked out the GPS system with no plans of returning it. It wasn’t in HIS name. Now he had a car.

  Atticus had already found the perfect place for his headquarters and it was only ten miles from Applewood - Sterling Heights, Mississippi.

  Rich white people only noticed people that could be of use to them or who could provide an opportunity. Anyone who couldn’t was invisible. A thirteen-year-old fat kid was the definition of wall flower in that pompous town full of privileged white-collar douche bags and gossiping soccer moms.

  The northern part of Sterling Heights had a neighborhood of old Victorian houses the city had a ten-year plan to restore but hadn’t gotten around to it. That’s where everyone left their elderly parents until they were sick enough to imprison in a nursing home. Meanwhile they built luxurious new homes in communities with names like Sterling Brook and Riverside Place. That way, no one had to look at the ugly old people, and no one had to worry about helping them mow their yards. Since it was north of the bridge it was out of sight, out of mind. The town called it the historical zone. All the houses were even older than the people. It was perfect.

  There Atticus found an old vacant Victorian house so covered in Kudzu he called it the Kudzu cave. It was barely even visible from the road and anyone would pass it without seeing a house if they were not specifically looking for one.

  As an added bonus, there was a garage to hide his stolen rental car.