Rescue From Planet Pleasure

by Mario Acevedo

  Crows circled overhead and cawed softly.

  Jolie and I climbed up the porch and stooped through the door into the doublewide. It looked like … well … a bomb had gone off inside. Pictures, knickknacks, the remnants of furniture, broken dishes and bottles had tossed all over. Vinyl paneling curled from the interior walls like peeling skin. Scabs of burned, melted polyester spotted the carpet. Pockets of smoke lingered in the nooks and crannies. I found the Marlin carbine and my backpack in what was left of the living room, buried under the smoldering couch.

  We gathered back outside. Jolie carried a cooler filled with bags of blood she had salvaged from the refrigerator. Rainelle stoically hefted a couple of Pullman suitcases and made a beeline to the barn. Her flip-flops slapped the bottoms of her feet.

  We watched Marina climb out a window of the master bedroom and float to the ground. She wore a denim barn coat and carried a cigar box. She set the box on top of a fence post and lovingly plucked items from the box and dropped them into a coat pocket. I was curious about what she was doing but could tell she wanted to be left alone. I guessed that the items were mementoes of Coyote.

  I levered the carbine and made sure it was fully loaded. Jolie racked her pistols. The mechanical sounds comforted us. We might have been vampires but cold steel and high-velocity ammo was as soothing to us as warm human necks. And right now we needed plenty of soothing.

  Marlin in hand, I walked past Rainelle’s pickup and the blackened fence posts where the fight had gone down. I halted at the rim of the canyon and gazed down the slope of the mesa. The smoke from the suicide-bomber had vanished and I was sure nothing remained of him but shredded clothing. The minced parts of his flesh would’ve been incinerated by the sun.

  With my contacts in, the supernatural dimension of our world was invisible. I wondered how much of this battle would’ve been seen by humans. As an enforcer for the Araneum, my job had been to keep the existence of the supernatural world—and us vampires specifically—secret from humans. But Phaedra was reckless in her tactics—or worse—letting humans know about us might be part of her agenda.

  Carmen sat on a stack of cinder blocks. Eyes closed, she massaged her side.

  “Are you going to be okay?” I asked.

  She kept her eyes closed and gave her head a tiny, pained shake. “Phaedra did to me what she did to Coyote. It feels like a hole has been punched through me and my life force is draining out.”

  Jolie knelt behind her. She draped her arms across Carmen’s shoulders and pulled her tight. She kissed Carmen’s cheek. As close as I was to both of these women, I could never match their sisterly bond.

  “Maybe Marina can help you,” I said, grasping for ideas. When I looked up, she was gone. I asked Yellowhair-Chavez if he’d seen her. He panned to the left and to the right, then shook his head once. I wasn’t surprised she’d ditched us.

  “Maybe she went to look for Coyote,” Jolie said.

  Maybe. She could access the portals but I suspected traveling across the psychic world involved a lot of voodoo rigmarole so getting to Coyote might not be a straightforward process. And I suspected she was up to something else.

  Crows fluttered about and landed in the yard. They pecked at the feet and tail feathers of their fallen comrades and began to tug them into the middle of the yard. Other crows pushed the remaining dead off the barn roof and the gutters of the doublewide and then glided to the ground. They joined the others in dragging the bodies into a pile.

  I reached for a dead crow with the intention of tossing it into the heap. The crows and I never got along but they could’ve used my help.

  A pair of crows lunged between the dead one and me. They spread their wings and cawed angrily. The rest of the crows joined their pissed-off chorus.

  I backed away. The two crows that had instigated the protest became quiet and eyed me warily. All the birds became silent and returned to their funereal labors. I guessed fifty dead. About twenty surviving crows arranged the feathered corpses into a heap five deep in the center. Once they were done, the live crows hopped into a circle around the pile and faced the center.

  A yellow flame flickered inside the heap. The flame licked around the bodies, growing into a fire. Each dead bird burst to flame, the wings and body writhing into a gnarled piece of glowing coal. A sheet of fire beat the air. One by one, the burning crows crumpled into ash. The heap collapsed, and the fire shrank into a trembling flame and then went out. The remaining crows kept their silent vigil around the smoking pile of ash.

  A small dust devil whisked through the yard. Dust blasted me, and I shielded my face. The mini-tornado brushed over the crows and churned the air with the smoke and gray soot of their dead compatriots. The ash twisted into a column that corkscrewed upward and blossomed into a smudge that faded away.

  The crows ruffled their feathers and shook ash from their bodies. In ones and twos, they sprang from the ground and flew over the mesa, soaring and cawing.

  What brought the crows in the first place? Yesterday they had pointed the way here to Coyote’s home. But what was their purpose today? Did the skin-walker’s magic summon them? What was the point of them showing up only to have Phaedra kill them in droves?

  The last of the crows disappeared. For a moment, the yard and the mesa grew so eerily quiet that I could hear my watch tick. The rooster emerged from the shadow inside the barn. He strutted to where the crows’ funeral pyre had been. Tipping his head side-to-side, he scratched at the dirt and cinders. He crowed what had to be the all-clear because the hens meandered out of the barn. Their clucking brought a semblance of peace and normalcy.

  Rainelle emerged from the barn, wearing hiking boots, a tattered straw hat, and an army fatigue shirt over her sundress. She and Yellowhair-Chavez stood side-by-side and appeared ready to leave.

  I asked, “Where are you going?”

  The skin-walker rattled the ammo can. “You’re going to need more help than this.”

  “Against Phaedra?”

  “You got more enemies I don’t know about?”

  Plenty, and fortunately they’re not here.

  He and Rainelle started walking down the road and off the mesa. Her truck was wrecked and the nearest anything was miles away. I had to repeat. “Where are you going?”

  Yellowhair-Chavez gestured with the ammo box and grunted. That way. Which from my vantage was hundreds of square miles of empty desert. He and Rainelle hiked down the road, over the crest, and disappeared out of sight.

  Jolie said to Carmen, “Better get you out of the sun.”

  Carmen raised her arms. Jolie and I grasped a wrist and yanked her upright. We were heading to the barn when a drumming noise echoed up the canyon. The chickens clucked raucously and scattered for cover. A loud whine blared across the mesa.

  I knew the sound. A helicopter. A big one. We cringed, waiting for Cress Tech to arrive.

  The helicopter lifted above the rim of the mesa. I was right, it was a big one. The bus-sized CH-53 we had seen days before. Lattice outriggers reached from both sides of the broad fuselage. Psychotronic diviners rotated at the ends of the outriggers. The giant helicopter roared toward us.

  Our battle with Phaedra had surely blasted out gobs of psychic energy, and now Cress Tech had dispatched this airborne mechanical beast to pinpoint the source. The sensor turret below its nose twitched back-and-forth and fixed on us.

  ***

  Chapter Forty-six

  The gigantic CH-53 roared loud and low over the doublewide. The air and ground shook. The windows rattled. The chickens retreated to the barn in a panicked rush.

  I craned my neck to get a good look at the helicopter as it passed overhead. The sensor turret swiveled over Coyote’s ruined home like the eye of a flying cyclops. A crewman tipped his helmeted head out an open cabin window and panned the yard. Heat waves blurred the fuselage behind the massive engines. The rotor wash blasted an eddy of dust and debris across the backyard.

  The CH-53 flew between the sun
and me. For an instant the big machine became a black silhouette outlined by a dazzling lace of sunlight, then it dipped below the sun to continue its noisy trek down the canyon.

  Jolie squinted and raised a hand to drop a shadow over her eyes. “Are they on to us?”

  “You think it’s a coincidence that a helicopter flew over the house so soon after Phaedra was here?”

  “So what do we do?”

  I didn’t know how to answer. We couldn’t hide. Where would we? We had to find Phaedra. Our business here wasn’t done until we killed her.

  Carmen wasn’t paying attention. She pinched her eyes shut like she was in a lot of pain.

  I nodded toward the barn. “Let’s get her inside.”

  Jolie and I held Carmen upright and led her into the barn. Inside its gloomy interior, sunlight lanced through the cracks in the wall and ceiling. Dust motes swirled like tiny, agitated flies. The coffin Coyote had been lying in earlier was gone, but the table it was propped on remained. Before we let Carmen rest on top we had to find bedding so she’d rest comfortably.

  I stood my carbine against the table and rummaged through the shelves. I found cardboard boxes marked FEMA: Property of the United States Government. For Official Emergency Use Only!

  Well, this was an emergency. Our emergency, and I was declaring it official.

  I extended a talon and sliced open a box to discover several woolen blankets. Carmen leaned against a shelf while Jolie and I spread blankets over the table and folded one to serve as a pillow. We then tucked Carmen into this makeshift bed. I went back outside and retrieved the cooler with blood.

  Jolie rummaged through the suitcases Rainelle had dropped here earlier, finding clothes, some toiletries, a bag of mini-Snickers, and a large can of Folger’s coffee. She dumped the can on a bare shelf. Out rattled a small glass bottle with dark liquid, metal cups, plus small cloth and paper bags. She opened the bags and said, “Felix, see if you can find a camping stove, I need to boil water.”

  “What have you got?”

  “Something that might help Carmen.”

  None of the other FEMA boxes had a stove, Sterno, or heat tablets. I did find matches. From a box of discarded electric coffee urns and teapots, I pulled out a vintage one-burner portable stove. I gave it a shake and heard a slosh inside its sausage-shaped fuel tank. Five minutes later the barn was filled with the odor of burning kerosene. Blue flames danced around the burner until it glowed cherry red. In the murky darkness its warm radiant light shined like a humble beacon of hope.

  Jolie squatted beside the stove, set a cup on the burner, and emptied the bottle into it. She tapped the contents of the bags into the cup and stirred. I smelled elderberry wine, pumpkin and watermelon seeds, juniper berries, honeysuckle, clove, and crushed rose petals.

  “That some kind of a potion?” I asked.

  “It will be.” Steam curled from the cup. “But it needs fresh lamb’s blood.”

  I didn’t recall any sheep in the yard. “We have goats. Chickens.”

  Jolie shook her head. “Come here and stir this.” She let the spoon rest and started to roll back one of her sleeves.

  “No, you stir.” I crouched beside her and extended my arm. “Use my blood.”

  “Goddamn it, don’t argue. Do what I tell you before the potion boils over and gets ruined.”

  I stuck my arm in front of her and skinned back the sleeve. Lips pruning into a tight frown, she extended an index finger. Her talon sprang out like a switchblade. I rotated my wrist to give her a good angle. She sliced into my flesh and gave the claw a hearty, sadistic twist. Though pain whiplashed my nerves, I rewarded her with a smile. My blood seeping into the cup should’ve dried into flakes to form a crust, but the concoction kept it liquid.

  When Jolie had enough of my blood, she nudged my arm away. I clamped my free hand over the wound. Blood oozed around my fingers and dripped to the dirt floor where it spattered into reddish-brown dust.

  Carmen shifted. Her aura lit up a notch. At least she was still lucid enough to appreciate the aroma of fresh blood, even tainted ichor such as mine.

  Jolie stirred the cup for another minute, then grasped it with a rag to lift it off the burner. She stood and offered the cup to Carmen who strained to lift her head. Her nostrils quivered at the fragrance and her lips parted to accept the drink. The scintilla around Carmen’s aura quivered with a burst of fresh energy, then calmed as the rush passed. Sip by sip, she emptied the cup.

  “This helps for now,” Jolie set the cup aside, “but I’m afraid as long as Phaedra lives, she will continue to drain your kundalini noir.”

  Carmen rested her head and swallowed, her neck cording from the effort. She whispered, “Then we better hurry up and kill her.”

  Jolie laid a palm on her forehead. My wound had scabbed over and I smoothed my sleeve over my wrist. “Where did you learn about this potion? Vampire home ec?”

  “At least one of us knows what to do.”

  My nerves jittered from inaction. We … I had to do something. “How far is the skin-walker’s home from here?”

  “Why?” Jolie replied.

  “We can’t wait for Phaedra to show her cards. Maybe Yellowhair-Chavez knows a way to find her.”

  “We tried his magic once,” Jolie waved a hand over Carmen, “and look what it got us. Besides, it took us forty-five minutes each way, by truck.”

  “It’s what, four, five miles to the next paved road? I’m bound to find a set of wheels between here and there.”

  Carmen began to cough. She wiped her face and turned onto one side, pulling her body into a semi-fetal position. I smoothed the blanket over her form. If I had a heart, it would’ve sank against the bottom of my belly like a ball of cold mud. My kundalini noir creaked like a branch in a windstorm.

  She opened one eye and caught my look of pity. “The way you two are carrying on it’s like someone is dying.” Her hand emerged from under the blanket and reached for mine. We clasped fingers. She smiled and closed her eye. She was gravely wounded and it was me who drew strength from her. She managed a weak laugh that pumped life back into her expression. “What would Coyote say if he was here?” She patted my hand, her touch light as a cat’s. “I can’t believe the fate of us vampiros rests on your dumb ass, ese.”

  “Something like that, for sure,” I said.

  “Give me a bit to feel better. Then we’ll all go together.” Carmen gave another squeeze and withdrew her hand under the blanket.

  Jolie walked from the table toward the door. She turned an old metal bucket over, set it in the shadow away from any sunbeams, and sat on it. Pulling the cooler by her feet, she opened it and fished out a bag of blood. She fanged a hole in the foil wrapper, inserted a straw, and drained the bag.

  I stepped from the table and leaned against a shelf covered in dust and a jumbled assortment of tin cans and glass jars. Jolie tossed me a bag and I fed and thought.

  Phaedra was going to use Coyote as bait, that was obvious. Afterwards, she would kill Coyote as well. I wondered if Phaedra knew about Antoine and King Gullah. Surely she had to. Maybe that was where she was now—taking care of them. But she had double-crossed Marina, and who knew what Coyote’s mom plotted. The skin-walkers were another wild card that could spoil Phaedra’s plans.

  Outside, the rooster crowed, and we perked up. I glanced at my watch. It was late in the afternoon and it could be Rainelle coming back. About time. Carmen propped up on her elbows and considered what was outside. “The bird sounds pissed. He doesn’t like who’s here.”

  So it wasn’t Rainelle. Jolie stood and drew a pistol. I palmed the receiver of the carbine and rested my finger over the trigger guard. “Phaedra?”

  Carmen shook her head. She sat up and swung her legs to the floor.

  Jolie stood and opened the door. Brilliant light washed over her as she stepped outside. I hefted the Marlin and followed her across the yard to the fence by the wrecked doublewide.

  The hens clucked nervously. The ro
oster had flown to a corner fencepost, and feathers ruffled, stared down the eastern slope of the mesa. Jolie and I stopped against the fence. Below us, a plume of dust billowed behind a Humvee in desert tan camouflage. Cress Tech. The vehicle scrambled up the narrow, twisting road toward us. The helicopter must’ve relayed our location.

  Jolie followed the Humvee’s progress. “Like we need these idiots. Any ideas?”

  One came to mind. My kundalini noir tingled with anticipation. I handed the carbine to Jolie. “Get back inside the barn.”

  “What?”

  “Stay out of sight but keep tabs on me. I’m going to lure them close.” I put my contacts back in.

  “And …?”

  The road hugged the mesa and from my angle, the Humvee momentarily disappeared from view. “You’ll know when the time comes. Hurry, hide before they spot you.”

  Jolie jogged back into the barn. She closed the door but left it cracked a bit so she could watch.

  The Humvee grunted over the lip of the mesa. It crunched over the broken glass and debris and halted by the doublewide, next to the scorched remains of the front porch. Three men dismounted, one from the front passenger’s door, the other two from the rear. The driver stayed inside the Humvee and rolled his window down. Like the other Cress Tech vehicles, this one had no badges or lettering besides numbers stenciled on the bumper.

  The men were dressed in drab tactical overalls with matching helmets, vests, and magazine pouches. Plus sunglasses and matching frowns. They each carried an M4 carbine with a grenade launcher attached under the barrel. They halted and studied the blasted heap that had been Coyote’s home.

  I took a step toward them, my hands in plain sight, claws itching to spring free. “Have you come here to help us?”

  The three men traded looks and chuckled. One of them said, “Yeah, right, we’re here to help.”

  “We had an accident. A gas leak, I think.”

  “Or a meth lab gone boom,” another muttered.