"- no, that's not what I mean, I mean -"
"- I mean, I'm not trying to say I know what you want -"
" - no, I'm not trying to say that you -"
"Hey, Mikkel, we got an emergency," said Szandor, interrupting our awkward flailing. He had come down the stairs and now stood with his hands in his jacket pockets. He looked at me when he spoke and then looked at the floor. I saw Lem hovering on the stairs but just out of earshot as if ready to ride in and avert catastrophe.
"An emergency?" I said.
"Yeah, there's a thing. It's complicated. I'll explain in the van."
We had left the van at home. And we never had any emergency that was so vague. I realized what he was doing. He was trying to be a good brother and make up an excuse to get me out of this situation. He was trying to play rescuing wingman. I appreciated that, but I didn't want it. I'm not sure why I didn't want it. Stubbornness, stupidity, masochism, who knows? Probably the perfume.
"It's fine, Szandor, I'll be fine."
"Seriously, it's important. We have to run," persisted my brother.
"Szandor, it's fine. I don't need a rescue," I said tersely.
My brother half blushed and looked uncomfortable. I think he thought he was being suave and like a secret agent, but I'm sure Carly recognized the failed rescue too.
"Hi Szandor, how are you doing?" said Carly with a smile.
"Uh, hi Carly, I'm doing fine," he said, nervously stretching his arms and scratching the back of his head. His glance ranged over the room, anywhere but on Carly. "I mean, I could be doing better. But I'm doing okay. I guess."
"Go," I said to Szandor. His mouth opened but I repeated myself. "Go. I'll be fine. I'll pick you up tomorrow for the thing. Tell Lem I'm sorry to bail."
Szandor closed his mouth and just nodded thoughtfully. He patted me on the shoulder than headed up to the stairs. I saw his conversation with Lem but didn't hear it. After some words from Szandor, Lem turned to look at me with concern, then he shook his head in resignation. The two headed up the stairs to the street. I turned back to Carly.
"I see you still inspire a lot of loyalty in your friends," said Carly.
"Sometimes they're all I have," I said. "And those two will always have my back, in their own ways."
"Did they have your back for this?" Her hand reached up before I realized it and gently touched the cut on my cheekbone, now poorly covered by medical tape. There was a lot of tenderness in her expression and it surprised me. Maybe that's wrong. Maybe I wasn't surprised by it. Maybe the truth was that I wasn't ready for it.
I nodded. "They did."
"Monsters?" she asked with some confusion. She knew Szandor and I hunted, but she knew Lem didn't.
I shook my head. "Drunken frat boys."
Carly cocked her head. "Has your life changed so much?"
I shook my head again. "Some guys from Avalon U trying to pick a fight in Twin Eagles. One came in and lured people outside to where his friends would jump them."
She smiled. "And you let yourself be baited."
"I thought I was just doing people a favor and taking the trash out. I didn't know he had friends. I'm lucky I had mine."
"And that's the Nowak ethic. Put yourself in the line of fire for the sake of others."
I sighed. "We've gotten back to this so quickly?" This was suddenly familiar territory. A battlefield.
Carly frowned and sighed, finally nodding. "Sorry. You're still doing it, though. Right?"
"Hunting? Yes."
She seemed about to say something, but then shook her head. "It's funny. Times are changing in this city. When you first told me about all you did, I didn't believe you. And it took seeing it to believe you - and how much I regretted saying that once I saw my first zombie. But I had the advantage of you being able to show me. Not everyone gets that, but views are changing. Now even my crazy sister believes there are monsters."
"No shit?"
"She says she saw some men with very sharp teeth and she didn't think they were human."
My eyes must have widened. That sounded like a revenant. For those of you playing the home game, think a vampire, but lots meaner. They were definitely high on the list of dangerous monsters. "Is she okay?" I wondered if Szandor and I really did have an emergency to ride off to. I couldn't let Carly's sister get killed.
"Oh, she's fine. She says a friend beat them up. I don't think she actually saw anything from your line of work, but she thinks she did. My point is, people around here seem like they're becoming more accepting of the idea of what you do. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing. Is society ready to believe in monsters again?"
"People get hurt," I said. "Someone needs to hunt the creatures that do it. I'm going to do this either way. But it'd be nice to get some acceptance. It would make my job easier."
"But why does it have to be you?" This was a sudden outburst, her eyes immediately wide and wet with tears that might not come. We had just crossed over to a hot button issue on the battlefield: risking my life to kill monsters. She didn't want me to do it because of the danger and I needed to do it because it was important to me, to save others before they ended up like my family. She shook her head and wiped her eye, her voice resuming its more measured tone. "I'm sorry. It's not fair. We can't see each other again and them immediately bring up all the old arguments. Things have changed, we don't need to go in the same old circles again."
"I made a lot of mistakes in the past..."
Carly squinted her eyes again, fighting off tears. She put her hand up to stop me. "I think... I think now's not a good time. Just give me a call or email me. We'll talk more. I want to talk more. But this is enough for now."
She turned and walked back to the table with her friends. Even in retreat, I looked at her longingly. One of her friends saw her tears as she sat down and glared at me, but Carly said something and the friend gave up the glare and turned back to her.
Three words fell silently from my lips. Best left unsaid, but they welled up in my heart, beating against the walls between us. The most common three words left unsaid, said too late, or said at the wrong time. I won't say them here. You know what they are. Guess. Then feel sorry for me.
In a blur I left the bar and walked home. It had started raining again. Had I been in better spirits, I might have marveled how the universe had changed to reflect my mood. Instead, it just added insult to injury. I walked briskly, adrenaline fueling my steps as I hurtled toward my apartment at the ever increasing pace of my own gravity. I did not dally at the entrance to my building, not on the stairs, not my front door. I walked with a rapid purpose, as if drawn by irresistible force. I needed to get to the kitchen. In a flurry of movement, the whiskey bottle came out and so did the shot glass. In the morning, the shot glass remained where it was on the counter, unused. It was a drinking from the bottle night.
I'm not sure how much I had drank when I got the call. I had put on Big Trouble In Little China, one of my favorite movies of all time, hoping for comfort in the familiar lines and action. But even that cinematic gem was doing nothing for me. No matter how much I quoted along with Jack Burton, Egg Chen, and others, there was no joy in it. I had a sucking chest wound that nobody could see. I was in full on heartbroken emo mode, waiting for the sweet oblivion of alcohol to overtake me.
You might ask why I even picked up the phone. I didn't know either. It was reflex. Maybe I hoped it was her. Maybe I was afraid it was her. Even if it was, I had no words to say, only the gasping words of a man drowning in whiskey. But the point is, I answered the phone. It wasn't her.
"How you doin'?" It was Szandor. He sounded like he had too much to drink, but unlike me, he sounded a happy drunk. There was loud music in the background.
"What do you want, Szandor?" I said, bringing the bottle to my lips for another drink.
"Ooo, testy tone. I'm guessin' things did not go well. Not that we're surprised. Are we Lem? Me and Lem are bonding and on the prowl. Dickie never showed up,
but that's fuckin' Dickie. However, we're out here at... where the fuck are we? Well, I don't fucking know either, that's why I asked! Fucking Lem. Anyway, brother, we wanted to see how you were doing. Maybe you want to come meet us - wherever this is. Dance away your troubles, find some girl with that famous Mikkel luck."
"I'm fine where I am. I don't want to go out to a club."
"Well, maybe we can come over," countered Szandor. "We come over, finish off the night shootin' the shit over there. Male bonding with whiskey and movies. The best way! We'll put on your favorite movie. What the fuck is that again? Once Upon a Time in China?"
"That's not my favorite movie."
"Well, who the fuck cares? We'll come fucking watch whatever! We'll find some laughably bad women in prison film and watch that. Cheer up your whole fuckin' night!"
"No, I'm fine. I don't want you guys to come over."
"Okay, so no bullshit now, Mikkel. We're super fucking worried about you. She's like your goddamn kryptonite and we're worried you're right there now drinking from the bottle and feeling sorry for yourself, but like in a totally bad way! Not in like the good way you would do if we came over."
I paused to look at the bottle in my hand half raised to my lips.
"I'm fine," I repeated.
"You keep saying that, and each time you say it I believe you less."
"Okay, let me rephrase," I said. "I want to be alone tonight. If one of you comes over, you're getting this bottle tossed at your face."
"That would technically get it out of your hands," said Szandor.
"Look, I'm fine. Fine. Fine!" I practically shouted. "If you're not going to believe me, then get the subtext that I want to be fucking alone tonight and will fight you tooth and fucking nail on that. Leave me the fuck alone, Sandy! Got it?" Szandor hates that nickname.
"Got it," said Szandor glumly. "Don't... ah, fucking forget it. I'll see you tomorrow." He hung up without waiting for my response.
You know what's great for your shitty, drunken, heartbroken mood? Fighting with the only other person that matters to you and then feeling like a regretful shit for everything you said after. And you know what's not the cure for that, a not-the-cure which I doubled down on? Alcohol. Lots of alcohol. Old friend whiskey, carry me home.
Despite my earlier predictions, it was Szandor who had to pull me out of bed in the morning. He half carried me to the van and slumped me in the passenger side. Lola Mandragora looked down on me disapprovingly and shook her hips for me begrudgingly. As my brother drove us to the hunter meetup, I was vaguely aware of his looks of concern at each stop sign, but he respectfully didn't say anything of note. Nothing I needed to respond to. He had seen this before. He had been with me during and after Hurricane Carly the first time around. He figured it was best to not mention things and let everything sort itself out. Whether this was the best idea, only time would tell.
Dead Promises
"We are here to slay a beast," said Jericho at the front of the room. "A murderous predator who is a blight upon the world. One who lurks in the depths of this city." This was the beginning of our briefing.
We had made the meeting on time, but my head was still killing me. My thinking was slow. I looked around the room. Chairs had been set out in the open space of the warehouse, but there were a few empty seats. Some hunters had elected to stand. Not me. My hangover was such that slouching in a folding chair was all I wanted to do... unless there was a couch I could take a nap on. My brother was in a chair next to me. Normally he wouldn't take this briefing seriously and would have his feet up, ready to interject with asinine comments whenever possible. But he sat up straight and attentively. Because he knew I was out of it, his concern for getting the details for both of us for once outweighed his general resistance to authority and school-like settings. If you asked him, he'd say he was doing it for me.
Jericho paced the front of the room as he continued his speech. "You all know you're here to kill Jabberwock Jack. Most of you have never even seen the beast. Few have survived such encounters. Know that this is a dangerous mission. Risk is high, but we do the world a great service."
"Can we get onto the practical details? We're hunters. We all know the risk, so let's save the doom and gloom speech for rookies." This hunter was leaning against the wall with his arms crossed. He was Hispanic and had a mustache and goatee. His dark hair had no gray, his face not overly lined, so I put him in his thirties, maybe early forties. He wore an Australian slouch hat, a brown leather jacket, jeans, and snakeskin boots, which made him seem more Crocodile Dundee than sea serpent hunter. His name was Diego.
Jericho narrowed his eyes in a glare, but then nodded in agreement. Judging from the small group assembled, Szandor and I were the closest things to rookies, so the speech was unnecessary.
"The subject of this hunt is Jabberwock Jack," continued Jericho. "As you all know, Jack is a gigantic beast, far larger than anything you may have encountered. We lack a good measurement for him, but we've guessed Jack may be about fifty to a hundred feet from head to tail. His body is long and snake-like. He may have small fins or legs, but unfortunately, between those of us who have seen him, accounts differ. Here are the facts we all agree on. Jack is white and scaly. His head is like that of a snake or reptile. He has one large red eye, the other was... damaged. His jaws are massive. Jack can swallow a human being in one gulp without chewing. His teeth are several feet long. That's Jack's primary means of attack. Unfortunately, we have no defense other than getting out of the way. So be on your guard."
"It seems so unlikely that such a huge creature would still exist in this day and age," said Diego. "I've hunted far and wide but never seen evidence of something that big actually existing. Nessie has never been proven, nor any of the others. Do we have any pictures of Jack? Video?"
"No video exists of Jack," said Paulie, a cigarette dangling from his mouth. He was lounging in a cushy desk chair in front of one of the computer desks. "Hard to frame him in a shot when you're running for your life or getting eaten. The photos that exist are pretty much worthless. They're bad Loch Ness Monster shots. White blurs, the impression of long bodies. Trash."
"So do we even know this creature exists?" said Diego. "I only track confirmed creatures. I'm not chasing someone urban legend."
"I have survived an encounter with the beast. It was me who took Jack's eye." Jericho's words ended in an icy tone.
"Mikkel and Szandor also saw Jack. In the past few weeks," said Meat, gesturing to my brother and I. "Their description matches up with known details. Either that was Jack or we have another similar gargantuan beast."
Diego looked at my brother and I incredulously. "What, those kids? They saw and survived this monster that supposedly leaves few of his victims alive?"
I could feel Szandor coil and tense in the seat next to me. I'm sure a dozen biting retorts surged to his lips, ready to be flung at Diego like the most venomous of primate poo.
But Meat spoke first. "Whether the two of them saw it is not at issue. They did."
"And that's a fact you'll have to accept as part of this briefing. Understood?" said Jericho.
Diego paused, taking a look at my brother and I, then back at Jericho. He nodded.
"Jack is a predator and make no mistake he is very lethal," continued Jericho. "While he prefers to swallow men whole, those teeth can easily rip flesh. But he is a cunning foe. He prefers to lurk in the water, but he can move easily upon land as well. He will use the terrain to his favor, striking from a stealth you would not expect of so great a creature. He's easily as smart as a man and has a strong survival instinct. Jack has lived for centuries and none have killed him yet."
"Centuries?" said Szandor. "No shit?"
"No shit, kid," said Paulie. "There are stories of a creature like Jack for as long as people have been in the Avalon area, but the first real account of anything with a solid description of Jack pops up in 1832. A man named Daniel Wexler was on the river, almost at Lake Avalon. His dog start
ed barking and then jumped into the river. A gigantic white creature came to the surface for a moment, then disappeared. The dog was never seen again."
"That could be anything," said Szandor. "Maybe the dog just drowned and there was... I don't know, a dead cow in the river."
"It wasn't a dead cow, kid. 1868. Vitaly Ivanovich was on a boat on Lake Avalon with his wife and two children. He sees a massive dark shape in the water. The lake swirled, like a whirlpool. Ivanovich saw a white flash and long teeth. He was found on the shore later that day, barely communicative. The boat was in broken pieces all over the shore. Ivanovich's right arm was missing and so was his family. He raved about the white demon until he died two days later."
"That's just a boating accident," said Szandor, but his protests were becoming weaker.
"Do you know who Ellis Husker is, kid?" said Paulie. "Founder of Huskerville. In his memoirs, he claimed to have seen a huge white snake swimming through Lake Avalon on a spring day with a strange red sky. That's widely believed to be cause for one of his eccentricities. After that day, he refused to step foot on a boat and was known to panic when he crossed bridges. Outwardly, people just thought he preferred to stay in the community he created. But he said it was the snake."
"But that's just -" started Szandor.
"Kid, I got a huge dossier of disappearances near the lake and river over the history of Avalon. They're not quite as explicit, but there are a bunch of people who have gone missing. No new zombies, no ghoul remains. People just gone from the banks of the river or gone from the lake. It's gotta be Jack. Either way, I don't advise swimming in Lake Avalon. Ever. Not in anything but the shallows, at least." Paulie ended with a long drag from his cigarette.
There was an awkward silence. I broke it, since there had been something I had been wondering and there never was a good time to ask it.
"Why is he called Jabberwock Jack?" I said.
"That's from 19th century Avalon historian and sometime explorer Clayton Heath," said Paulie.
"Heath?" I said, "isn't that...?" I looked over to Meat. Everyone called him Meat, but his name was technically Benthem Heath. That name hadn't suited Meat at any point in his life, so his marine nickname was all anyone ever used.
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