At around the age of three she’d started gathering shellfish. When she’d touched the razor-like shells, a sharp pain had shot through her as her tender young flesh was split with consummate ease. When she burst into tears, her mother had taken her hands and held them in the briny sea, saying, “This is just how your sister and I always took care of it.” In no time, the mollusks gave way to fish, and shells were replaced by scales as sharp as knives. As always, the blood gushed from her, and Wu-Lin stuck her hands into the salty sea without hesitation.
Sixteen years had passed. But today was the first time Wu-Lin had ever been ashamed of her sun-baked skin and rough hands—this morning, to be more precise. In the sun-dappled woods, a young man in black had danced with a bloody breeze. So beautiful it gave her goose bumps, his staggeringly sad visage had stirred something in her chest. He’d said his name was D.
Going over to the bed, Wu-Lin pulled out the backpack she’d hidden beneath it. Opening a leather flap, she inspected her clothes. All she had was another blouse and a change of underwear. The top was clean, but it had been patched in spots. Though sturdy, its color had faded. After putting on the fresh blouse and a pair of pants, she stood before the mirror.
Why didn’t I bring a skirt? she thought. At least that would’ve hidden these fat legs of mine. The one with the white flower print would make me look a little prettier.
But whom would she want to look so nice for? A gorgeous young man who wavered on the thin line between life and death with his emotionless swordplay. D.
Wu-Lin again rubbed her cheeks. Just then, she heard a sound at the door. The instant she turned to see a human shape, something warm slammed into her solar plexus and her consciousness sank into darkness. The next thing she knew, she was somewhere else entirely. With stone walls on all sides, the room seemed to be a basement of some sort—the ceiling was lit by electric lights. Her surroundings were painfully clear, and fear gushed from every pore on her. Wu-Lin was chained hand and foot to the stone wall. All along the wall hung those who’d suffered similar fates, now skeletons clad only in rags. Even more lay on the floor below the chains.
Wu-Lin let out a scream. And another, and another. Her every struggle sent her shackles biting into her wrists and ankles, where they tore ruthlessly at her flesh. She didn’t even notice the sound of a door opening somewhere.
Before Wu-Lin knew it, there was someone standing right before her—three people, actually. The ones to either side were clearly bodyguards by the look of them, but their boss in the middle was somewhat odd. His seven-hundred-pound frame was surrounded by a steel cage. Clothed in the largest three-piece suit imaginable, he lay on his side against the floor of the cage that held him a good three feet off the ground. He was like a slug that’d sprouted arms and legs. His face looked pushed in, and his pitifully sparse hair was parted to one side. With no neck to speak of, his head seemed to be melded right into his torso. The black stub stuck between his thick lips must’ve been a cigar. His eyes were thin as a thread, and his nostrils and mouth spread wide to either side. In fact, he was so hideously misshapen, he looked like a human that’d been given a frog’s head.
It had finally dawned on Wu-Lin that the cage around him—steel rings running horizontally and vertically—was not actually intended as a prison, but rather served to support his body. Each of the rings was jointed, and they twisted subtly to prop up the listing seven-hundred-pound frame. What’s more, the part of the device that made contact with the floor seemed to be some sort of walker.
“Nice to meet you, miss,” the clothed blob of flesh said. His voice was so shrill and nauseating it made the girl want to plug her ears. “I’m Gilligan. And I happen to have the pleasure of running this town. I had you brought here because there are a few little things I’d like to ask you about.”
“Let me out of here. And get these chains off of me while you’re at it.”
“There, there. If you’ll talk to me, we can do that soon enough. I suppose you’d like to know why I’d subject a pretty young lady like yourself to this sort of treatment. Well, it’s because this way will get you to tell me the whole truth faster.”
“What do you want to know?”
“For starters, I’d like to know a little something about the bead you brought to the curio shop. Where and how did you happen to get it?”
Wu-Lin’s eyes went wide with astonishment. Speared now by a far greater sense of hopelessness about her fate, the girl slumped against her chains. “You mean to tell me the guy that runs that shop . . .”
“There, there, my child. He and I have a little arrangement. Once or twice a year some clown will bring in something quite valuable without having the slightest clue about what they have. The deal is that the shopkeeper lets me know about it, and I buy said item for a reasonable price.”
“Give it back. I want it back right now.”
“I don’t happen to have it at the moment—you see, it was stolen,” Gilligan said, raising a horrendously short and fat hand to scratch his head. The plump appendage had the form of a child’s but was three times the size of an adult’s. As he moved, the ring that supported his arm creaked. He had only to put the slightest pressure on a joint, and the rings would then move his limb in that same direction. Without that bizarre contraption, he most likely wouldn’t be able to so much as lift a finger. Moreover, it was perfectly clear that if gravity were allowed to have its way with that great mound of flesh and fat, a horrifying death would await the man as all his internal organs were crushed by his own weight.
“Who in the world took it?”
Seeing the urgency in Wu-Lin’s expression, Gilligan laughed raspily. Even his own bodyguards looked unsettled by the sound of it. “Relax. We know who the thief was and where he is, and some of my people are on their way to collect the item. They should be back presently with both it and the culprit. But while I’m waiting, I need you to tell me a few things.”
“I don’t know anything at all. I don’t know anything about the bead.”
“You expect me to believe that some clueless little girl is running around with something like that?!”
Wu-Lin gnawed her lip. Her lovely countenance was imbued with a look of firm resistance.
“The Nobility,” Gilligan said out of the blue.
Wu-Lin’s expression wavered for a moment and then quickly returned to normal. But not quickly enough.
“See, I was certain you knew something about it. Well, now, this is starting to get amusing.” Moving both hands with what seemed to be a great effort, the human slug clapped them together before his own chest. In addition to the grinding gears of the joints, a revolting sound like a shellfish being cracked open shook the air.
“There’s no point in asking me anything about it, you know. There’s nothing I can tell you.”
Watching with a sort of lust in his eyes as Wu-Lin turned her face away from him, Gilligan said, “Good enough. You don’t have to if you don’t want to. I’m afraid you have me all wrong, Miss. I’m not asking you to tell me anything you don’t want to. To the contrary—it’s all the more enjoyable if you won’t tell me.”
Wu-Lin’s eyes went wide. There was a cruelty to the words of this mysterious man that shook her to the core. “What are you going to do?” she asked, the question pushed out by her fear.
“Are you in such a hurry to learn your fate?” Gilligan asked, holding the cigar out in front of himself with one hand. Clanking all the while, the legs went into action, carrying him to a spot on the floor less than three feet from Wu-Lin before they stopped. “Okay. I’ll show you then.”
Gilligan flicked the cigar with his fingers. Wu-Lin gasped, although it was almost a laugh. It wasn’t a cigar. The jet black stub twisted and unfolded, forming a longer creature that began creeping toward her feet. Like an inchworm, it folded and straightened its body, and on its head it had a pair of strangely oversized simple eyes and a thorn-like proboscis for a mouth.
“That nasty little insect is what’s
known as a ‘chatterbug.’ When one bites you, you can’t help but tell the truth,” Gilligan said, licking his lips.
“No, not that!” Wu-Lin cried, writhing. Countless beads of sweat streamed down her face, neck, and back. A single droplet from her wildly shaking face fell on the insect’s head, causing the unearthly creature to rear back in surprise. But in the blink of an eye it started forward again. It reached her feet, and then it climbed up on her shoe. She tried to kick it off, but only ended up making the shackles gouge deeper into the meat of her leg.
“Stop!”
Crawling across the girl’s ankle, it brushed the cuff of her pants.
“Stop it!”
It started to climb up the outside of her clothes.
“Stop it! Just stop it!”
It reached her blouse and kept climbing. The girl’s face was reflected in the insect’s dim black eyes all the while. And its sharp proboscis chirped incessantly.
“Don’t!” Wu-Lin screamed, thrashing her head back and forth like a woman possessed.
As the creature came to her full bosom—the slightest pale swell of which was visible in the cleavage of her clean blouse—it shuddered with delight and then crept in.
—
With a rusty squeal a door opened somewhere. The strange old man in the wide-brimmed hat and tattered cloak who walked over to Wu-Lin without making a sound was none other than Professor Krolock. Gazing long and hard at the young woman with her knees on the floor and both arms dangling from the chains in some horrible parody of a cheer, the old man said, “Simply awful.” But his voice didn’t hold an ounce of emotion. “When I heard those curs boasting about how good the girl they’d caught looked, I thought it might be you and had to come see. Sure enough, I was right. Bit by a ‘chatterbug,’ were you? But I’ll be—you still draw breath! I suppose I should put you at peace.”
The old man’s right hand vanished into his cloak, and when it appeared again, it clutched a quill pen. It was an ordinary pen, but the tip was razor sharp. The quill was from a supernatural creature called a messiah bird. That fowl sang only once in a decade, and only three times total in its lifetime—and those that heard its song were guaranteed to meet with misfortune.
Perhaps the girl sensed the professor’s presence, because Wu-Lin’s limp body once again showed signs of life. Her face rose. “Help . . . me . . . ,” she said.
At the same time, what looked like a black spring came out of her cleavage and made a powerful bound for the professor’s throat. The quill pen jabbed right through it.
Skewered in midair, the bug continued to struggle for a while, but then quickly settled down. Shaking it off so that it fell at his feet, the professor wasted no time in crushing it, and then placed his left hand on Wu-Lin’s neck. Due perhaps to the insect’s poison, the girl’s face was so horribly swollen her own parents wouldn’t have recognized her immediately. Quickly donning a puzzled expression, the professor remarked, “How unusual. Such tenacity. Speak, child. I shall hang on your every word.”
“Tell my sister . . . about this . . . Get the bead back . . . for her . . .”
“Understood,” the professor said with a grave nod. Behind his paternal demeanor dwelt a fearful shadow. “I shall get it back. Count on that. It shouldn’t prove terribly difficult,” he snickered.
Wu-Lin’s expression rapidly drained away. Swollen to twice their normal size, her lips framed one final and almost inaudible remark.
Gently shutting the girl’s eyelids after her head lolled to the side, the professor intoned what sounded like a spell, and then turned his back on her. Shocked, he froze in his tracks. The old man gazed absentmindedly at the tall form that stood before him. It wasn’t the bloody blade in the figure’s right hand that kept the professor riveted, but rather his positively dazzling beauty.
“You! How long have you been there?!” the professor asked, a ring of admiration in his voice. “I can’t believe you could be there without me noticing you. Never mind the fact that there were supposed to be lookouts posted up top. And tough ones, at that—strong enough to tear apart winged dragons with their bare hands.”
The old man’s gaze went to the ceiling, then instantly dropped again to the young man’s sword.
“Oh, I see—they were no match for you after all, were they? What brings you here, then? Are you somehow connected to this girl? I’ll have you know, I was only here to see to her in her last moments. I never harmed a hair on her head!”
Not speaking a word, the shadowy figure made his way to Wu-Lin’s corpse. Stopping, he extended his left hand and pushed back the hair that’d fallen across the girl’s brow. Perhaps that was the young man’s way of honoring her.
It was D. The Hunter extended his still-closed left hand, and when he opened it before Wu-Lin’s face and the professor spied the bead resting in his palm, the old man coughed loudly. As the professor effortlessly reached for the prize, D’s five fingers closed.
“Pardon me. You may not have heard her, but the girl asked me to do something for her. She said to find the bead for her. That’s no lie.”
“Where’s the girl’s sister?” D inquired softly. Apparently he had caught a few of the girl’s final words.
Coughing, the professor replied, “As I just finished saying, I’ll gladly bring it to her.” The old man spoke with perfect composure, extending his hand as he did so.
D’s hand opened first. But there was no bead in it.
“Where have you hidden it, you scoundrel?!” the professor cried out in amazement. And then, in a strangely calm tone he added, “I see. Regardless of how you might’ve come to know about this girl, I applaud your sincerity in bringing back the bead. It would seem that the person she asked me to get it back from wasn’t you. However, the bead couldn’t possibly be of any significance to you. Why don’t you simply name your price, and I’ll purchase it. Then I can deliver it to her sister. Once there, I’ll receive my remuneration, and everything will be wrapped up tidily. What say you?”
“Where’s the girl’s sister?” D repeated.
“Why, you wretched—”
“When you checked the girl for vital signs, she was already dead. Yet she managed to convey her wishes. And you weren’t the only one to hear them.”
“Oh. In other words, you hypothesize she’d have no problem with you delivering the bead, then?”
Slowly, D turned. The air froze.
The professor tried to back away but couldn’t. It was the ghastly aura emanating from this young man alone that chilled him to the very bone.
“I . . . I don’t know. Surely you could see that,” the professor replied. He couldn’t help but answer. “The girl didn’t say at all.”
“You knew the girl,” D said, his sword rising smoothly. “This is the last time I’ll ask you this. Where was she from?”
“Do you intend to . . . cut me down?” the professor asked. His gaze seemed to be hopelessly drawn to the tip of the blade poised right between his eyes. “Would you cut me down . . . me, an innocent man?”
A drop of fresh blood rolled slowly down the old man’s forehead.
“Florence,” the professor said in a hoarse voice. Shortly after that, as he thudded to his knees on the floor, he heard the sound of a door closing up above.
The professor was not quick to rise, but rather produced a handkerchief from inside his cloak and mopped the sweat from his brow. But no matter how he wiped at it, the sweat just kept pouring from him.
“I fear I must revise my earlier statement,” the old man said, his words hugging the ground. “‘It shouldn’t prove terribly difficult . . .’ That’s a fine joke now. However, now that I’ve seen his face . . .”
The professor held a piece of rolled-up vellum. Spreading the thin animal hide on the floor with trembling hands, he knelt on the edges to hold it down while his right hand went into action. His fingers clasped the quill pen. Soon enough his right hand ceased trembling and he ran the pen over the vellum—the very pen that dripped
with his own blood. While the eerie deed itself was similar to what’d he’d done to Wu-Lin on that early morn, the strokes of his pen were so much swifter now that the two cases couldn’t be compared.
Just how much time drifted by in that basement where the shadow of death hung, no one could say.
“Finished,” the professor declared. “I wouldn’t call it perfect—though it should prove moderately useful.”
Satisfaction and fatigue now sharing space on his countenance, the old man looked at the thin hide spread before him bearing D’s features etched in minute detail.
—
II
—
Exiting a basement in the shopping district, Gilligan quickly headed for home. Just as he’d expected, the girl had told him everything she knew before dying an agonizing death. Her pained, fever-induced throes had left him satisfied, and he was of a mind to head off to one of the whorehouses he operated, but there was something he had to take care of before he did so.
Entering the gorgeous estate that stood at the southern tip of town, he didn’t go to the main house, but rather to a fairly large outbuilding constructed to one side of the acre-and-a-half garden. As he did so, a number of dark, beastly forms moved toward him through the trees, but upon recognizing him as their master they soon disappeared again. Skillfully making his way across the stepping stones, he arrived at a wooden door studded with hobnails and pressed against it lightly. As it creaked open, Gilligan disappointedly clucked, “Some folks can’t do anything right.” But he seemed to reconsider that remark as he grinned broadly and headed inside.
Mysterious Journey to the North Sea, Part 1 Page 4