"I didn't tell her nothing!" Skeeter said at the exact same time Agent Amy said "Skeeter called me."
"Okay, maybe I told her where you were. And maybe I told her you weren't exactly what we would call stable, even for you. And maybe I told her to give you an hour or so before she came rolling into town, because that would give you enough time to either take care of stuff or get deep enough in the poop to not run her off." Skeeter said without a trace of apology in his voice anywhere.
"You know, Skeeter, I could shoot you for this."
"Or you could just enjoy the scenery and shoot the goblins."
"That is the voice of a man that really hopes I run out of ammo in the mine." I said, and pushed the button on my headset. I pointed Bertha up the aisle at Agent Hall and watched her eyes go wide. Then I swung the barrel a few inches to her left and blew away the goblin that had been creeping up behind her.
"Thanks." She said, moving down the aisle quickly to stand uncomfortably close to me. "Now, where is the major infestation?"
"I think it's still in the cave."
"We have to seal it." She said, all business. For somebody who was all business, she smelled really good. And was that a little hint of lace I could see through her shirt? I shook my head to get focused back on the matter at hand. Or at least the unattractive matter at hand, since Agent Sweetbuns was pretty much right there at hand, too.
"We should make sure there's no civilians in the church first." I said, turning away to get my head together. A goblin twitched in the aisle ahead of me, and I put a round in its face. One more popped up a couple of rows ahead, and I sent it to meet its maker, too. I felt something press up against my lower back and realized that Agent Amy had turned around and was taking out the rest of the goblins in the balcony, pressing her back to mine to make sure nothing could sneak up on her. I didn't bother to tell her that she should be way more worried about me than a goblin sneaking up on her. A goblin just wanted to kill her, after all. I had much more nefarious, if pleasant, plans for the pretty agent from DEMON.
It didn't take us long to clear the rest of the goblins from the church, and about fifteen minutes later we sat on the front steps reloading our weapons and taking a quick breather before heading down into the mine. I took a deep breath, let it out, and said nothing. I breathed deep again, then let it out without saying a word. I drew a third breath and Amy spun around and pointed her Sig right at my balls.
"If you heave another gigantic sigh I swear to God I will shoot your nuts off and put you in a dress. Jesus Christ you sound like a housewife who just found out that the Twilight release was delayed! Now what's on your mind?"
"Thanks for coming." I said, not looking at her.
"Well, you seemed pretty upset when you got the news about your dad."
"That might put you in the running for Understatement of the Year." I pulled a bandanna out of my back pocket and began studiously cleaning goblin guts off of Bertha's barrel and grip.
"Do you want my help finding him?" She asked. "I do have the resources of the United States government at my disposal."
"I ain't worried about finding him. He'll find me when he wants this thing settled. And that's coming soon. That's why he let the Bigfoot tell me what he's up to."
"Let him? Are you saying the Bigfoot was a plant?"
"Yeah. I don't think Ol' Fuzzynuts even knew he was nothin' more than a message to me that the family feud is back on, but that's exactly what he was." I took another deep breath, thought about my balls and Agent Amy's threat, and plowed on ahead with what I had to say. "Now I need you to leave. And I need you to not be back below the Mason-Dixon Line until I let you know it's safe."
"Safe? Bubba, you might have missed the memo, but I am a fully sworn, trained and equipped Field Agent for the Department of ExtraDimensional, Mystical and Occult Nuisances. I think I can handle myself."
I turned to her then. I grabbed a shoulder and turned her to look me in the eyes. "You can't. You've got to understand something, Amy, and this is no bullshit. My father is the meanest, nastiest son of a bitch I've ever met. He was a monster hunter from the time he could walk, and now that he's a monster himself, he knows all the tricks. He's never going to be found until he wants to, and that's going to be bad for anybody around. I don't want to see you get hurt, so you need to not be around me for a little while."
She looked up at me and smiled. "Why Bubba, if I didn't know better I'd think you were getting a little sweet on me."
I just stared at her. I tried to think of something to say that would show her how bad this was going to get, but I had nothing. I couldn't think of anything to say, and I couldn't shoot her, so I pulled her close and kissed her instead. I wrapped one big hand around the back of her head and laid one on her. I kissed her long, and slow, and after a few seconds where she stiffened in my arms and I wasn't completely sure she wasn't going to shoot my balls off, she wrapped her arms around me and kissed me back. Her hands tangled in my ponytail and I let my big mitts play across her delicate shoulder blades.
After a long moment, I pulled back and looked her in the eyes again. "Amy, the last thing I want to do is deal with my father without you around, but he will kill you. He won't even care that it's you, he won't give a rat's ass that you're a government agent. He'll just figure out that I care about you, and he'll kill you just to get at me. And you won't be able to stop him. I won't be able to stop him, and all the government agents in the world won't be able to stop him. So please, just leave. For both our sakes. I promise, as soon as I take care of him, I'll call you and we'll pick up where we left off."
"You make it sound like he's unstoppable. He's just a werewolf."
"He's not just anything. He's an alpha were in the prime of his power, and he got that way by killing everything above him on the food chain. And he's still got all the skills and knowledge that three generations of monster-hunting gave him. He knows all the ways he can be killed, and how to avoid them. And he knows all the tricks in our book, because he wrote half the damn book! Do you get it?"
She looked me square in the face, and there was no blink or back down in her eyes. "I get it. You think he's going to kill you, and you think because of what happened to Jason and Miranda that you deserve it. And yeah, I know all about it. I've got your file, remember? Well, you don't deserve it. You can beat him, and I'm going to help you. But right now we've got more immediate problems, like a nest of goblins that are in bad need of killing. So can we please cut out the Harlequin novel deep eye-gazing bullshit and go shoot something? I'm really starting to need a drink and I can't start in on tequila shooters until we get done here."
"Why not?"
"Because the only damn bar in this pissant town in closed due to goblins. They even wrote that on the sign in the door. That was the first place I looked for you."
"Fine. We'll go shoot a shitload of goblins. But when we're done, we're gonna finish this conversation." I got up and started back towards the company store and the entrance to the mine.
"Sounds good. As long as we finish the conversation with a kiss like the one that started it, I'm good with that." Amy walked past me to her Suburban and smacked me on the ass as she passed.
"I like her." Skeeter's said into my ear.
"I do too, Skeet. That's what worries me."
"She's not Miranda. She knows the score."
"Jason knew the score. Didn't help him."
"Jason never knew shit, he just thought he knew everything. I love you like my own family, Bubba, but your brother was a dick."
"Your family hates you for being gay, Skeeter."
"Okay, I love you more than I love my own family. That doesn't change the fact that your brother was a dick."
I hate it when Skeeter's right. Of course he's almost always right, but I don't tell him that. He's enough of a pain in the ass as it is. I fell back to the standard response of the man who has no comeback. "Whatever. I'm probably gonna lose reception hen we get underground, so I'll call you back when
we get to the surface."
"Be careful."
"Like always." I replied.
"Try to be more careful than that." Skeeter shot back, then hung up on me.
Amy was waiting for me in the elevator, her thumb on the dead man's switch and her Sig in her hand. As soon as I stepped into the elevator she pressed the DOWN button. "How much ammo you got left for that thing?" She asked, pointing at the Saiga.
"About a dozen shells."
"That's a good start. I've got six mags for the Sig, plus four for the backup."
"Here." I handed her four magazine for my backup piece, a Ruger LCP that matched the one strapped to her right ankle.
"What'll you use for backup?"
"If Bertha runs dry I've got this." I pointed over my shoulder to Grandpappy's sword. "Never runs out of ammo." We checked the action on all our weapons and made sure we had rounds chambered in everything as the elevator carried us deeper and deeper into the earth. I'd never been in a mine before, and was happy to see they made the tunnels tall enough. I'm 6'5" or so, which makes confined spaces a challenge. The tunnel was wide enough for us to walk side-by-side, even taking into account the size of my sides. So it was wide enough for three normal people to walk abreast. I kept my shotgun pointed forward while Agent Amy flicked on the flashlight mounted to her Sig to give us a little light. My eyes adjusted to the dark pretty quickly, but I was never gonna have goblin-quality night vision; so any bit of light we could get was a big help.
We crept down the empty tunnels slowly, listening at every turn for the scritch of claws on stone. Finally we saw the opening that the miners had made into what looked like a much larger cavern. I could see the glow of fires from within, so I motioned for Amy to cut her flashlight. We stopped just outside the glow from the entrance and listened. I could hear the murmur of bunches of goblin voices and really started to regret not bringing some explosives.
I leaned down to Amy's ear and whispered "How many of them do you think are in there?"
"Our research shows that larger goblin nests can have upwards of five or six dozen of the creatures. How many have you killed?"
I thought back to the store and the church and counted on my fingers for a minute. "I dunno, math, math, math...maybe twenty-five, maybe thirty."
"So you could have taken out half the nest? That's good."
"Yeah, except that wasn't all at once. And I don't know if we can take thirty or forty goblins before they swarm us."
"Well, only one way to find out." She said, and stepped into the light. I made a grab for us, but missed. She walked right through the hole in the wall into the cave and started shooting away.
"Dammit, woman, that's my move!" I said and ran after her. I burst into the cabin like a big hairy freight train and saw goblins pouring out of at least six tunnels leading deeper into the mountain.
"Looks like your research missed the mark by a couple hundred goblins." I muttered as I leveled the Saiga at the mass of green-skinned monsters and let loose with a quick dozen shots.
"Yeah, I'll have to take that up with my research team when we get out of here." She said, ejecting an empty clip and reloading the Sig without missing a beat.
"I like your optimism." I swung the empty Saiga like a baseball bat and did my best Babe Ruth impersonation on the heads of five goblins. They made a sound like overripe cantaloupes when they crushed. I kinda liked it, but it wasn't the most efficient way of killing monsters. I dropped the shotgun and pulled Bertha. Every time she barked, two or three goblins fell. The big fifty caliber bullets didn't stop in the first goblin, just kept on cruising until they lodged in a wall or ran out of steam in another monster's body.
We held them off for a good five or six minutes, which felt like an hour to my bicep. Bertha is a heavy girl, and shooting massive rounds for a sustained fight is enough to wear even me out. But eventually I clicked empty on my last magazine and had to switch over to Grandpappy's sword. I holstered Bertha and pulled the cold iron katana over my shoulder.
We'd killed enough goblins to build a little wall of three-foot corpses in front of us, but I stepped right over that and waded into the fray for real. I didn't bother with finesse; I just laid about from one side to the other like I was harvesting grain with an old scythe. Green, disgusting grain that wanted to eat my kidneys, but grain nonetheless. The cold iron cut through the magical goblin flesh like it was butter, and for every step I took, half a dozen monsters fell. I barely looked up, just cut, kill, step forward. Cut, kill, step forward. Cut, kill, step forward.
Then it was cut, clang, and step back as I suddenly met resistance on my blade. I looked up and saw a human-sized goblin standing in front of me holding a sword. I'd never seen a goblin actually use a sword, but this guy didn't just put up a clumsy block, he actually parried my stroke and flashed out a quick strike at my knee that had me dancing back to keep my leg intact.
I stared at the critter, and it grinned back at me. "What the hell are you?" I asked. As far as I'd ever known, goblins didn't come in six-foot tall models, but this guy had all the other goblin characteristics. He had green skin, pointy teeth, pointy ears, he was just a little more human-looking and was really, really tall.
"I am Gorak, Goblin King. And now you die, human." He came at me, sword flashing dangerously in the low light. I blocked a couple of strokes, then he got on through and opened up a shallow but painful cut along my ribcage.
I looked down at the blood seeping through my favorite Led Zeppelin t-shirt, and saw red. Not just the red seeping from my side, but a fury the likes of which I hadn't felt in years. I stepped inside his Gorak's next swing and instead of trying anything fancy or impressive, just punched him in the nose. I felt the cartilage crunch and watched as he staggered back, shaking his head and wiping the blood from his face.
"I'll make you a deal, Goblin King. Gimme the first line of 'Magic Dance' and I'll let you live." Probably not a good idea, but I've always had a soft spot for Labyrinth.
"I don't know what you mean, human. But you have sullied the royal person with your touch, so now you die!" Gorak raised his sword high above his head and charged me. I sidestepped him and stuck out a foot, sending the Goblin King flying through the royal air to land on his royal face in the dirt and goblin guts that littered the floor of the cavern. I chanced a glance over at Amy, and saw that all the other fighting in the cave had come to a halt. Apparently single combat by the Goblin King was a big deal, so I decided to pay a little more attention. Good thing, too, since as soon as I turned back to Gorak he was back on his feet and aiming a slash at my throat. I blocked that quickly, but it was just a feint and he got a good cut in on my left thigh. I staggered a bit, but kept my feet. I looked down and saw that he had cut me almost to the bone. I needed to get this fight over with quickly if I was going to survive, so it was time to kill this assclown.
I made a clumsy lunge, putting too much weight on my injured leg and dropping to one knee. I saw Gorak smile as he fell for it and put everything into a huge downward stroke aimed at my head. If it had landed I would have been playing the Headless Horseman for every Halloween, but I was faking. I turned my stumble into a forward role and came up behind and to the side of the Goblin King. I stood up, lashing out with Grandpappy's sword as I came up, and cleaved Gorak from nuts to nose in one huge stroke. The two halves of the Goblin King split and fell into the dirt, splashing me with even more nasty green stuff. If you think goblins smell bad on the outside, I dare you to get sprayed with goblin guts a couple of times and then complain to me.
Silence fell on the cavern as the Goblin King died a quick but exceptionally painful death. Agent Amy pulled something gray and square off her belt and waved frantically to me. I walked slowly and methodically back to where she stood at the hole in the cave wall, partially because I didn't want to let the goblins see fear, but mostly because my leg hurt so bad it was all I could do not to lay down and crawl. None of the goblins moved as I waded through them to cave entrance, and in a few very long s
econds I was at Amy's side.
I waved my sword back at the Goblin King parts. "He did not remind me of a babe."
She shook her head and handed me the gray blob with a circuit board attached and said "Stick that to the ceiling, please."
I did, then looked down at her. "You had plastic explosives this whole time?"
"Well, yeah. How else am I going to seal the cave?"
"Then why did we go in there and wade in green guts and goblin blood? Why not just seal the cave from the very beginning?"
"You had a few things to work through." She said without batting an eye. "So I let you get out some frustrations. Now it's time to do the next logical steps - get you stitched up, then get you drunk."
"I'm up for that." I said. I reached up and mashed the plastic explosive into the ceiling of the tunnel, then lit both white phosphorous flares from my belt and dropped them on the floor just inside the cave. "That oughta hold the little buggers back until we get far enough away to blow this pop stand."
We started back toward the elevator, me limping pretty badly, and when we got in the cage to go back to the surface, Amy pushed the button on the remote detonator. A loud WHUMP! Filled the tunnel, and a wave of pressure almost knocked us out of the elevator. Amy crashed into my chest, and I just let her stay there for a minute, until we were almost to the top of the elevator shaft. The elevator car rose up into the daylight, and there stood Darlin' and her elephant gun, with two dozen miners holding shotguns behind her.
I held up my hands as I stepped out of the cage. "Don't shoot! I'm too damn big to be a goblin, and she's too damn pretty."
"Well, that last part's right, anyway." Darlin' said, lowering her rifle. "I'm glad you got your big ass back up here. I reckon that means the problem is solved?"
"Solved as we can make it. We had to cave in part of that tunnel." I said.
"I figured you would, You hurt?" She asked, looking at my leg.
"Little bit." I winced getting out of the elevator. She waved a little white-haired man over to me. He was maybe half my size with delicate hands and features, but all I cared about was the black bag in his hands. I made my way to a bench near the elevator and ripped my pants leg enough for the little doc to get at the wound.
Scattered, Smothered and Chunked - Bubba the Monster Hunter Season 1 Page 22