Nightmare Stalkers

by Michael La Ronn

  “We don't know the whole story yet,” I said. “I can't take her money in good conscience if we let her go now.”

  Darius shook his head.

  “Wizard tech basics,” he said. “Never mess with the physics of the human body. My teachers taught me a lot about this. We’re messing around with something we don't understand. We need to have her go to Kemiston Memorial Hospital. The FBI Magical Crimes Unit can take her case if the doctors call.”

  Typical Darius, chickening out on me.

  Had to sweet talk him. Make it worth his while.

  “You sound like a chicken,” I said. “Scared of a challenge?”

  “Ain't scared of nothin’,” he said. “But all of this ain't worth the price we agreed on, I can tell you that.”

  “We help people,” I said. “Sure, we need the money. We’ll get the money. But it's not good for business if we half-do the jobs that come in the door.”

  Darius turned and started packing the EEG sensors in a plastic bag.

  “Darius,” I said.

  “I'm cool,” he said.

  “No, you're not,” I said.

  “We gonna continue,” he said. “It don't matter what I say. It's a’ight, cuz. It's a’ight.”

  “D, quit being like that,” Destiny said.

  “Like what?” Darius asked. “I'm all in, sis. Sounds like I don't have much of a fucking choice anyway.”

  I sighed.

  “D, if you don't wanna be part of this, don't be part of it,” I said. “But I thought we were a team. You were all kinds of ready to help her last night when she walked through the door.”

  Darius jammed the EEG into the closet.

  “Got it,” he said. “I'm a team player.”

  “Allegra’s gotta sleep,” I said. “After a lucid dream like this one, she should be pretty dreamless.”

  Allegra had no place else to go. I told her she could sleep on our couch in the basement.

  “That reminds me,” Destiny said. “I need to take her some blankets.”

  We exited our dream room, a bedroom on the second floor of our brownstone.

  Allegra exited the bathroom at the same time, wearing a white towel. Her black hair hung down on her shoulders, and steam rose from her skin. She was definitely beautiful in a Brazilian model kind of way. She looked far more relaxed now.

  “Sorry,” she said, sidestepping.

  “We’re sorry,” I said. “Had a good shower?”

  “Nice and warm,” she said.

  Damn. That probably meant there wouldn't be any warm water left for the rest of us.

  “Good to hear,” I said.

  I glanced back at Darius, who was staring with his jaw open.

  “Yeah, we uh, you need anything, I mean, uh, yeah, that's g-g-g-good, yep—”

  I smacked him upside his head.

  “We’ll leave you alone,” I said, dragging Darius down the stairs. “Come and see us in the kitchen when you're dressed.”

  Allegra smiled shyly.

  Darius tripped on the bottom step and fell on his knees.

  “Just can't get a good look, can ya?” Destiny asked.

  “Shut up,” Darius said. “Shut. Up.”

  “You like that Brazilian ass,” Destiny said, “and the breasts. And the legs. And the face. And the hair. You were lookin’ at her like she was the last woman on Earth.”

  “Thought I told you to shut up,” Darius said.

  “You probably imagined all kinds of thangs,” Destiny said. “You sooo predictable.”

  “So are you,” Darius said. “Look: she's a good-looking lady. Nothing wrong with that. Can't get mad at a brother for admiring, can you?”

  I chuckled as we started to clean the shop. I tossed Darius a broom.

  “For the record,” I said, “you've only spoken one coherent phrase to her.”

  “One day, when you're in the presence of true beauty, you'll understand,” Darius said.

  Destiny beat him with a mop.

  “You was supposed to say you in the presence of true beauty every day,” she said. “You live with two women, you know.”

  Darius shielded his face.

  “Damn, stop!” he said.

  Destiny paused, raising her mop.

  “True beauty,” she said. “You live with true beauty.”

  “Yeah, Aisha,” Darius said, tilting his head at me. “Teach her a thing or two about true beauty.”

  Destiny hit him again.

  “Well, your dream girl is going to be wearing some of my clothes, so picture that when you undress her…” Destiny said.

  “That's cold,” Darius said. “You done messed up my mental imagery.”

  Destiny laughed. “Can't you just hear his dick shriveling up now?”

  Darius pursed his lips as he swept the floor.

  I wiped down the front counter and slid on my snow boots and my blue peacoat.

  Through the shop window, the snowy street outside looked cold.

  “I need some time to think,” I said. “Thinking I might do a bit of shoveling.”

  “Remember what happened the last time you did that,” Darius warned.

  It was true.

  The last time I shoveled the sidewalk in front of the shop, evil demons showed up and derailed my entire night.

  But life had been pretty quiet lately.

  “I'll be fine,” I said. “Besides, I'm tired of listening to you two bicker.”

  “It's not bickering,” Destiny said. “I'm just trying to stop my dear brother here from making a total and utter ass of himself. Sister’s love.”

  “So that's what they call it,” Darius said.

  I grabbed the shovel and slipped out the back door, into the night.

  3

  I dug my shovel into the snow. My street, a long, long row of brownstones, was quiet. The moon shone bright, thinly blanketed by clouds colored orange by the streetlights.

  Three o’clock in the morning was the perfect time for thinking.

  A subzero chill cut through me.

  I heaped a bucket full of snow into our tiny yard, a twenty by twenty plot of land that was dirt most of the year because we never took care of it.

  After a while, I built a nice little snow mound that had twigs, weeds, and dirt clods sticking out at odd angles.

  Here I was, knee-deep in snow and knee-deep in another client’s problems…

  And Allegra da Silva was a mystery.

  She came, as all our clients did, out of nowhere.

  Either she just happened to dream a lot about trains and death, and it was a coincidence, or something was going to go down at the Kemiston Central Station.

  I remembered the vivacity of the dream, how real it felt. Hell, if I didn’t know better, I would have mistaken it for reality.

  Real dreams usually had something wrong with them. Details were missing. Sometimes there were too many details, other places mixed in. That was the brain’s way of telling you that you were sleeping.

  But she had dreamed of the Kemiston Central Station as if she were actually there. Almost everything looked like a true representation.

  And that was a problem.

  I thought of the train hurtling through the tunnel, the platform collapsing, and I shivered.

  I remembered the first event that Allegra told us about.

  We didn't believe her when she said she dreamed about the Star Street Station incident, about a subway car traveling so fast it threw up sparks that gave people such severe burns that they died in the hospital.

  Seemed like too much of a coincidence.

  And then she told us about the Transom Street Station, where several people, with no forewarning, jumped in front of the train as it entered the station.

  Allegra was heartbroken over the incidents, even though they weren't her fault.

  Totally understood that.

  And deep down, I knew where her emotions were coming from. If I dreamt of people dying and they actually did, I would feel responsibl
e too. But I wouldn't worry like she did…

  I dug my shovel in the snow again and hit a rock. I scooped under it and rolled it aside.

  The rock rolled away, into the street.

  A black boot stepped on it, stopping its trajectory.

  A woman enveloped in swirling shadows stood in the middle of the street. African-American, in her sixties, big pearl necklace, and a black floral blouse.

  She stood in the middle of the street, shadows swirling around her, as if no cars would even dare to hit her.

  “I always thought your Nana told you to stay inside after two o’clock in the morning,” the shadow woman said. “After all, nothing good happens in this city after then.”

  I staked my shovel in the snow.

  Shadow woman.

  The last time I saw her, she had meddled with my and my cousins’ lives, with no remorse about the consequences. And then above all, she had the nerve to say she was a friend of my grandmother’s.

  If there was one thing I learned recently, it was never to trust a shadow woman.

  Shadows saw and heard everything. They could transport themselves anywhere with just a thought. Nothing, nowhere, no one was private if a shadow wanted to penetrate it.

  “Did you come back to wreak more havoc?” I asked. “Play some more roulette with my life?”

  The shadow woman advanced. Her body blinked and she disappeared, then reappeared directly in front of me. The effect was jarring to my eyes.

  “No roulette,” the woman said. “And your life was never in danger last time.”

  “Bullshit,” I said.

  The woman held out her hands. “Aisha, a woman like you shouldn't be adrift.”

  “Adrift?”

  “There are better uses for a dream mage,” she said. “I applaud your entrepreneurialism. This little dream reading business you've got here is creative, but there's a nobler cause.”

  “You and your noble shit,” I said. “Who are you?”

  The woman folded her arms and frowned. The frown looked natural on her. She didn't seem like the smiling type.

  “Give me one reason not to turn around and ignore you,” I said.

  “The money and experience, for starters,” the woman said. “But you asked me two questions without giving me the chance to respond. My name is Harriet Shadow, and I am the leader of the Shadow Walkers. We investigate mysterious disturbances in the city, and we eliminate them.”

  “You're demon hunters, then,” I said. “Just like every other quote-unquote organization out there.”

  Everyone belonged to an organization of some kind. It was the hot, trendy thing, especially to flash your membership card to Demon Hunters International or Vampire Gold Club, or whatever.

  “Anyone can hunt demons,” Harriet said. “Even the most skilled demon hunter is pedestrian compared to us.”

  “Demon hunters make good money,” I said.

  “How many demon hunters do you see in political office?” Harriet asked.

  I paused.

  Shit.

  There were none.

  I was mad that I didn't have a witty reply.

  “How many demon hunters do you see with real decision-making power?” Harriet asked. “Didn't think so. You've lived in this city your whole life and have no clue about what goes on here, about who really runs it.”

  “And you're here to tell me that you, a black woman, are running the place?” I asked.

  “What if I did?”

  I puffed. “I don't know what your values are, but showing up on my doorstep and trying to shame me into action doesn't work,” I said.

  “It doesn't?” Harriet asked. “It doesn't shame you to realize that you had no idea what your Nana was doing when she left for work every night?”

  “She was a demon hunter, and low class, according to your definition,” I said.

  “Aisha, your mouth is your biggest liability,” Harriet said.

  “My mouth is my own business,” I said.

  “Your Nana worked for me,” Harriet said. “I knew her well. And I can assure you that very little of her time was spent demon hunting, though she was good at it.”

  I wasn't going to let anyone talk about my Nana. No one would take the dearest memories that I shared with her and distort them. No one.

  “If you knew another side to Nana, then prove it,” I said. “You better hope that you're right.”

  “We have a deal,” Harriet said. “Come with me for a few hours. See what I do. That will be all the proof you need.”

  “No,” I said. “I don't go on adventures with strangers.”

  “I doubt that,” Harriet said, “given all the misadventures you go on.”

  “I want photo evidence, documentation, or something,” I said.

  “We don't keep records,” Harriet said.

  “Then we don't have a deal,” I said.

  “Fine,” Harriet said, eyeing my brownstone. “For what it's worth, you’re in for trouble with Allegra da Silva. That's why I'm here. I came to offer my assistance.”

  “Let me guess: you’re behind this,” I said.

  “No,” Harriet said, “not this time. I have nothing to do with it. But I can help you solve it. It's really quite simple.”

  “No thanks,” I said.

  I grabbed my shovel and turned around.

  “Aisha, I can be a valuable mentor to you,” Harriet said. “I see your potential. Your Nana did too. But I won't help you if you don't ask for it.”

  I wheeled around to fire off an angry reply, but when I did, Harriet was gone.

  The cold wind blew, sending up a column of snow that danced down the street.

  4

  “Cuz, you look rattled,” Destiny said as I entered the kitchen in our basement.

  Darius, Destiny, and Allegra were at the kitchen table, nursing mugs of hot chocolate. It looked like they had been talking a while.

  “I'm fine,” I said, slipping out of my coat.

  “You don't look fine,” Destiny said.

  I poured myself a cup of hot chocolate from a pot on the stove, and I eased into the last empty chair at our tiny little table.

  Sipping the hot cocoa goodness made it easy for me to forget about Harriet.

  “What'd I miss?” I asked.

  Destiny’s gaze on me lingered.

  I knew she knew something was wrong. She was going to ask me about it later. I hoped she'd forget.

  “We were talking about Allegra’s dream,” Darius said. “By the way, Allegra, would you like some more hot chocolate?”

  Allegra nodded. She was wearing one of Destiny’s red sweaters, and it was too big for her, which was saying something because Destiny was TINY. Her hair was still wet from the shower.

  Allegra held out her mug, and Darius poured hot chocolate into her cup, giddy and smiling.

  Destiny rolled her eyes.

  “You're such a gentleman,” Allegra said.

  Darius giggled.

  “Naw, naw, I'm not a gentleman,” he said. “My grandmama always taught me to take care of guests, know what I'm sayin’?”

  “I sure do,” Destiny said.

  Allegra laughed and sipped from her mug.

  “You three are so hospitable,” she said. “You don't even know me, and you opened up your home to me. I'm so grateful.”

  “It's what you do,” I said, winking. “Besides, if you had bad intentions, our emotion charm would have picked it up.”

  “What are you anyway?” Darius asked.

  I kicked him under the table.

  “Ow!” he yelled.

  “Pardon his manners,” I said.

  “People ask me all the time,” Allegra said. “I grew up in Brazil. My family came here when I was ten.”

  “Ah,” Darius said. “Cool. But that's not what I meant.”

  “You mean what kind of magical being I am?” she asked. “I'm a…no one.”

  “Everybody in Kemiston is something,” I said.

  “I have no p
owers,” Allegra said. “Never have.”

  “You're just a regular chick?” Darius asked.

  “Yes,” Destiny said. “She just said that.”

  “I was always jealous of my friends growing up,” Allegra said. “I always wondered what it would be like to have magic.”

  “No offense,” Destiny said. “But if you don't have magic, why live here? It's just asking to be teased or bullied or whatever.”

  Allegra shrugged. “I never had to worry about it.”

  Probably true. A girl with looks as good as hers probably didn't have to worry about being teased.

  “That helps us, Allegra,” I said. “I've been thinking about your dreams. I'd like to go over what we know.”

  Destiny pulled a notebook out of her pocket.

  “I was thinkin’ the same thing,” she said. “Let's run through what we've found so far,” Destiny said.

  “She came over from Brazil,” Darius said. “She grew up without magic, and—”

  “You are lost,” Destiny said. “So lost it’s not even funny. Go take a shower.”

  “I'm trying to paint the facts we know,” Darius said. “Even if they aren't relevant, sis.”

  “You sure you haven't been charmed, Allegra?” I asked.

  “I don't think so,” she said. “I've taken self-defense classes.”

  I shrugged. “So let's take this a step further: you dreamt about the Star Street Station incident, and then it happened. Four people died.”

  “Five,” Allegra said, lowering her head. “It was on the late night news. Another in intensive care died.”

  “Five, then,” I said. “Then you dreamt about the Transom Street Station. Five people died there if I remember correctly.”

  Allegra pushed her mug aside.

  “And now you just dreamt about Kemiston Central Station,” I said. “And from what I could tell, a lot more than five people died.”

  “What did you see?” Darius asked.

  “We were there,” Allegra said. “It was busy. There were a lot of people. And then the train arrived, except—”

  “It wasn't a subway car,” I said. “It was a real locomotive.”

  “Damn,” Darius said.

  “It tore up the tracks and destroyed everything in its path,” I said. “The platform collapsed and a good number of people were thrown under the train.”