As I called the Shadow, I formed a heavy, protective bubble around the four of us. The only light in this bubble came from one Ravyn’s small red stones that she held forth in her left palm. The stone’s soft red glow gave the space the feel of a submarine.
“I’m going to take us to the place in the Shadowland where Nicholas was taken by Rose and then made the wrong choice by choosing Rose’s door—which led to a cell. We didn’t get to see all of the different doors in Nick’s memory orb, so I think that is the place to start. I’m not sure if that corridor corresponds with a single actual location or serves as sort of Transit Station within the Shadowland linking multiple different locations. Hang on!”
With the power of my Will, I sent our little capsule hurtling through the Shadowland towards a place we had seen only briefly through the memories of a man I had never met.
The passage didn’t take all that long, but the tension inside the capsule grew thicker with each passing moment.
Jim passed Excalibur back and forth between his sweating hands, using each handoff to dry the offending palm on his jeans.
The Frau shifted on her heavy paws, anxious to be moving.
Ravyn checked and doubled checked her array of pouches and pockets, making sure that the ties that held them closed were secure, but not too secure.
I flexed my palms and fingered the forearm sheaths where my familiar batons were holstered, ready to drop down into my hands with a flick of the wrist.
Sensing that we were drawing near to the place, I set the capsule down gently and looked to my companions.
“As best as I can tell from inside, we’re here. Let’s stick together until we get the lay of the land.”
The Frau grunted and snorted, presumably in agreement as the dark substance of the capsule dissolved, allowing her to set paws upon solid ground once again.
Jim yelped in surprise as Excalibur came alive in his two-fisted grip. He spun in place and lashed out behind the Frau as lumbering figure emerged from the fog, massive club in hand in a pulverizing downstroke that he and the sword managed to parry.
The force of the blow buckled his knees, but the blow that otherwise would’ve crushed Ravyn’s skull was deflected harmlessly into the earth beside the Frau.
Remember the strange physics of the Shadowland, I launched myself into the air as I dropped both batons into my palms and flicked my wrists to open them to their full extension on my way towards the beasts head.
The Frau swung around slowly so as not to unseat Ravyn and shuffled back.
Jim’s upstroke sliced into the troll’s leg just below the groin, Excalibur scythed through the rock hard flesh like a hot knife through butter. Dark fluids erupted in a thick spurting stream towards the spot where Jim had been, but his spinning attack had taken him to the side, sword held aloft in his best hitter’s stance.
Meanwhile I slammed into the troll’s head, smashing his nose and crushing one eye with a series of swings with the batons. The creature’s thick skull and plate like skin protected him from any kind of killing blow, but my attacks were enough to forget the foes at its feet as he dropped the club and reached for my hovering form.
Seeing his chance and feeling the pull of Excalibur, Jim stepped into a two fisted swing that would have made Gary Sheffield jealous and eviscerated the creature as the glowing, singing blade again slipped through the heavy armor of the troll’s hide. Jim had to dodge to the side as the rush of the creatures insides came with a gush.
It took the troll a few moments to realize that it had been slain. When it did, it collapsed onto his knees first, and the toppled forward with a loud, splashing whumpf!
I dropped down beside the thing, looking towards Jim.
His face glistened with sweat and exertion, but his eyes glowed with exhilaration. “Holy shit!”
“Are you alright?”
He nodded, looked at the blade, and gulped. “Yeah, thanks to this thing. I can’t believe how much fun that was! Ravyn, are you OK?”
Ravyn hopped down from the Frau’s back and bounded over to Jim. She planted a big, wet kiss on his lips before answering. “Thanks to you I am.” She spun to face me, accusatory finger pointing in my direction. “Do you think you can avoid getting me killed again, Rusty? If you do get me killed, I’m going to haunt you from now to forever.”
The Frau sniffed the fallen troll and swung her massive head around towards us. Her voice came through telepathically to all of us. “This guy isn’t the only one of these things that guards this place, but it has been awhile since any of the others have been here. I’d say we not take too much time celebrating this small battle when we might not have much time before someone else comes by.”
Showing posts with label Nick. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Nick. Show all posts
Monday, September 10, 2007
Saturday, January 20, 2007
A Mole's View...Part 2
With a cold kiss to Nick’s cheek and feral smile, Rose spun around and started walking towards the dark doorway in the far side of the vast rooms. Halfway back, she paused long enough to throw an inviting look over her shoulder and motion with the index finger of her right hand that Nick should ‘come hither’.
“Bring your little toy. My masters will be very interested in seeing it.”
Nick grunted and reached down to scoop up his CoonBot in one hand and the empty backpack in the other. He stuffed the critter and the controller into the pack as he followed this strange woman towards the door.
When Rose reached the door, she turned back one more time. “When you step through the Shadow this time, Nick, look for the door that has a likeness of my name on it, otherwise you will find yourself going somewhere you may well regret.” Her eyes narrowed as she spoke, her voice lowered and became quite sultry. “Do you understand?”
The whole view shook up and down as Nick nodded once. “Yeah, I’ve been through such portals before. I’ll watch for your door, babe. I’m not here to fool around. Lead the way.”
Rose shook her head and laughed. It was a deep throaty sound from someone with such a high-pitched nasal voice. “No, I’m afraid I will not be going with you on this journey Nick, I have other applicants that I must sort through. My job is not yet done tonight. You should know though, that everything that you have said here has been seen and heard by those that you are about to meet, so you don’t need to go through any unnecessary formalities with them.”
“Who am I going to be meeting?”
She smiled in response. “They will introduce themselves if they so choose.”
“I don’t know babe, there sure seems to be a lot of cloak and dagger funny business to this job. I thought I was through with that kind of thing years ago.”
She leaned up close to Nick again, her hand drifting from his shoulder down past his elbow before slipping further down and behind him to grab his ass. Her fingernails left chills wherever she touched him, raising goose bumps on his bare skin. “We have to be very careful Nick. We have some very powerful enemies who may be trying even now to infiltrate us.” Her eyes seemed to bore right through Nick’s and into mine. It was like she was speaking directly to me instead of Nick. “But the rewards of working with us are much richer than those of our enemies.”
Nick pushed her away with his free hand, hoisted his backpack with the other. “Alright then, let me go meet these masters of yours. I like rich rewards.”
He stepped through the door before she could respond.
The Shadow swallowed him, causing the image to go all black once again. Before long though, Nick’s vision adjusted to the dark hues and subtle variations of the Shadowland. He found himself in a long hallway with several doors on each side and he shuffled down it.
Each door had some sort of emblem on it. He paused by each on that he passed. The first door on the right was marked with a small green palm tree made of sparkling emeralds. The next door, on the left this time, was marked with a white tulip made out what might have been diamonds. The third door, still on the left side of the hall was marked by a softly glowing rose made of rubies.
Nick reached out and touched the rubies, perhaps to see if they were real or not, pulled his hand back when the door and the rubies faded out of existence, to leave only a darker shade of black shadow in its place. Another portal to step through. Nick stepped through it.
When the blackness faded away again, Nick found himself standing in a bare stone chamber with no windows or other obvious exits. “What the fuck?”
He swung around to the look for the exit again, only to find that the shadowy door had transformed into a steel door with a small barred window that was solidly shut.
He dropped the backpack to the floor and reached out with both strong hands to grab at the door. Using all of his strength to push at the door, he managed only to rattle it slightly in place.
“Hey, what the fuck is going on here? Why am I in a jail cell?”
Footsteps echoed on stone as someone approached from down a hall towards the cell.
Nick called out again. “Hey who’s out there?”
The footsteps continued to grow louder as whoever it was came closer.
“Let me out of this place!”
A small, round face of an older man with a maniacal eyes peeked through the bars at Nick. It was the face of a man I could never forget. El Diablito.
He cackled in his high-pitched voice. “So, Nicholas. You’ve come to spy on me for our friends, the ORC’s? I don’t like spies very much, Nicholas.”
“I don’t know what you are talking about, man!” There was a hint of desperation in Nick’s deep voice. He was clearly flustered and surprised.
“Oh, I don’t think that is being quite truthful, Nicholas. I have my own spies you know. I happen to know that you were sent by my adversaries among the ORC’s and that you are trying to work under cover to investigate me and my new organizations. I will not tolerate such attempts on my livelihood.”
“Look man, I don’t even know who the Hell you are and what your organizations are. I just heard about someone who might be hiring Casters with unique skills. I’m tired of making cabinets. I want to make some serious money.”
El Diablito cackled again. “Nice try young man. But I am not as easily fooled as poor Rose there. She’s a useful tool, but she has her limitations. You cannot deceive me with your fake protestations of innocence.”
Nick’s shoulders slumped and his view shifted from the door to the floor for a moment as he seemed to give up. He looked back up into the face of his captor. “OK, so what are you going to do with me?”
El Diablito smiled. “Oh, I’m going to let you live. I want your current masters to know that they cannot catch me as easily as they think that they can. I want them to see what they are going to be going up against when decide to make their move. So, as soon as I have extracted all of the information I need from you, I shall be releasing you with enough memories to make a fine little show to Ms. Fyre and her cohorts.” His eyes narrowed and his face and tone grew more serious. “And Nicholas, when you tire of working for a pittance, risking your life and limb for such a ‘noble cause’ and you instead wish to apply your obvious talents towards enriching yourself and your family, I want you to come back and see me. Know this, however, that I will know what it is that you intend in your heart better than you. If you return to me while trying to deceive me again, I will leave you in Rose’s bedroom here for her to do with as she pleases. Trust me, that will not be a very pleasant fate. That poor creature has needs that will leave you a ruined husk of a man once they have been fulfilled. And you would not be able to resist fulfilling those needs either.”
The recording stopped and the images faded away.
I looked up to see Jim standing there looking at a book from one of his many packed shelves. “I’ve been wondering when I would find time to read this thing.”
“El Diablito is recruiting these Casters? He must have some moles of his own inside our…I mean your…organization.”
He nodded soberly as he put the book back into its slot. “After Ravyn and the Frau recovered these memories from Nick and helped him return to a semblance of his normal self, he disappeared. We’re not sure where he is right now.”
“Maybe he took up El Diablito on his offer.”
Jim shrugged. “That’s certainly possible. Or El Diablito could have had one of his agents eliminate him once his purpose had been served. We don’t know just yet.”
“How much more information did the Little Devil collect from Nick about the ORC’s?”
Jim shook his head. “Nick didn’t have a lot of connections within the organization. He probably didn’t learn much from him that he didn’t already know. But we’re more concerned about Nick than we are about what he gave up about us.”
“I think my decision on which enemy to focus on has been made. I hate that little asshole almost as much as I hated Drake. He also knows too much about Alexa and Naomi. He needs to be dealt with, soon.”
“Bring your little toy. My masters will be very interested in seeing it.”
Nick grunted and reached down to scoop up his CoonBot in one hand and the empty backpack in the other. He stuffed the critter and the controller into the pack as he followed this strange woman towards the door.
When Rose reached the door, she turned back one more time. “When you step through the Shadow this time, Nick, look for the door that has a likeness of my name on it, otherwise you will find yourself going somewhere you may well regret.” Her eyes narrowed as she spoke, her voice lowered and became quite sultry. “Do you understand?”
The whole view shook up and down as Nick nodded once. “Yeah, I’ve been through such portals before. I’ll watch for your door, babe. I’m not here to fool around. Lead the way.”
Rose shook her head and laughed. It was a deep throaty sound from someone with such a high-pitched nasal voice. “No, I’m afraid I will not be going with you on this journey Nick, I have other applicants that I must sort through. My job is not yet done tonight. You should know though, that everything that you have said here has been seen and heard by those that you are about to meet, so you don’t need to go through any unnecessary formalities with them.”
“Who am I going to be meeting?”
She smiled in response. “They will introduce themselves if they so choose.”
“I don’t know babe, there sure seems to be a lot of cloak and dagger funny business to this job. I thought I was through with that kind of thing years ago.”
She leaned up close to Nick again, her hand drifting from his shoulder down past his elbow before slipping further down and behind him to grab his ass. Her fingernails left chills wherever she touched him, raising goose bumps on his bare skin. “We have to be very careful Nick. We have some very powerful enemies who may be trying even now to infiltrate us.” Her eyes seemed to bore right through Nick’s and into mine. It was like she was speaking directly to me instead of Nick. “But the rewards of working with us are much richer than those of our enemies.”
Nick pushed her away with his free hand, hoisted his backpack with the other. “Alright then, let me go meet these masters of yours. I like rich rewards.”
He stepped through the door before she could respond.
The Shadow swallowed him, causing the image to go all black once again. Before long though, Nick’s vision adjusted to the dark hues and subtle variations of the Shadowland. He found himself in a long hallway with several doors on each side and he shuffled down it.
Each door had some sort of emblem on it. He paused by each on that he passed. The first door on the right was marked with a small green palm tree made of sparkling emeralds. The next door, on the left this time, was marked with a white tulip made out what might have been diamonds. The third door, still on the left side of the hall was marked by a softly glowing rose made of rubies.
Nick reached out and touched the rubies, perhaps to see if they were real or not, pulled his hand back when the door and the rubies faded out of existence, to leave only a darker shade of black shadow in its place. Another portal to step through. Nick stepped through it.
When the blackness faded away again, Nick found himself standing in a bare stone chamber with no windows or other obvious exits. “What the fuck?”
He swung around to the look for the exit again, only to find that the shadowy door had transformed into a steel door with a small barred window that was solidly shut.
He dropped the backpack to the floor and reached out with both strong hands to grab at the door. Using all of his strength to push at the door, he managed only to rattle it slightly in place.
“Hey, what the fuck is going on here? Why am I in a jail cell?”
Footsteps echoed on stone as someone approached from down a hall towards the cell.
Nick called out again. “Hey who’s out there?”
The footsteps continued to grow louder as whoever it was came closer.
“Let me out of this place!”
A small, round face of an older man with a maniacal eyes peeked through the bars at Nick. It was the face of a man I could never forget. El Diablito.
He cackled in his high-pitched voice. “So, Nicholas. You’ve come to spy on me for our friends, the ORC’s? I don’t like spies very much, Nicholas.”
“I don’t know what you are talking about, man!” There was a hint of desperation in Nick’s deep voice. He was clearly flustered and surprised.
“Oh, I don’t think that is being quite truthful, Nicholas. I have my own spies you know. I happen to know that you were sent by my adversaries among the ORC’s and that you are trying to work under cover to investigate me and my new organizations. I will not tolerate such attempts on my livelihood.”
“Look man, I don’t even know who the Hell you are and what your organizations are. I just heard about someone who might be hiring Casters with unique skills. I’m tired of making cabinets. I want to make some serious money.”
El Diablito cackled again. “Nice try young man. But I am not as easily fooled as poor Rose there. She’s a useful tool, but she has her limitations. You cannot deceive me with your fake protestations of innocence.”
Nick’s shoulders slumped and his view shifted from the door to the floor for a moment as he seemed to give up. He looked back up into the face of his captor. “OK, so what are you going to do with me?”
El Diablito smiled. “Oh, I’m going to let you live. I want your current masters to know that they cannot catch me as easily as they think that they can. I want them to see what they are going to be going up against when decide to make their move. So, as soon as I have extracted all of the information I need from you, I shall be releasing you with enough memories to make a fine little show to Ms. Fyre and her cohorts.” His eyes narrowed and his face and tone grew more serious. “And Nicholas, when you tire of working for a pittance, risking your life and limb for such a ‘noble cause’ and you instead wish to apply your obvious talents towards enriching yourself and your family, I want you to come back and see me. Know this, however, that I will know what it is that you intend in your heart better than you. If you return to me while trying to deceive me again, I will leave you in Rose’s bedroom here for her to do with as she pleases. Trust me, that will not be a very pleasant fate. That poor creature has needs that will leave you a ruined husk of a man once they have been fulfilled. And you would not be able to resist fulfilling those needs either.”
The recording stopped and the images faded away.
I looked up to see Jim standing there looking at a book from one of his many packed shelves. “I’ve been wondering when I would find time to read this thing.”
“El Diablito is recruiting these Casters? He must have some moles of his own inside our…I mean your…organization.”
He nodded soberly as he put the book back into its slot. “After Ravyn and the Frau recovered these memories from Nick and helped him return to a semblance of his normal self, he disappeared. We’re not sure where he is right now.”
“Maybe he took up El Diablito on his offer.”
Jim shrugged. “That’s certainly possible. Or El Diablito could have had one of his agents eliminate him once his purpose had been served. We don’t know just yet.”
“How much more information did the Little Devil collect from Nick about the ORC’s?”
Jim shook his head. “Nick didn’t have a lot of connections within the organization. He probably didn’t learn much from him that he didn’t already know. But we’re more concerned about Nick than we are about what he gave up about us.”
“I think my decision on which enemy to focus on has been made. I hate that little asshole almost as much as I hated Drake. He also knows too much about Alexa and Naomi. He needs to be dealt with, soon.”
Sunday, January 14, 2007
A Mole's View...Part 1
I put the second orb into my jacket pocket. There would be plenty of time learn more about the ORC’s themselves later on.
I held the first orb, the one from the mole, in my hand and spoke the password. “Betsy.”
Immediately, I felt like I was swept up in a vortex of swirling colors, like being inside of a kaleidoscope that was being adjusted by an over-excited 5 year old child. I suppose it would have been quiet disorienting if I had a stomach to empty, but that wasn’t a concern for me. Instead, I relaxed and let the images sort themselves out. It didn’t take very long.
The image coalesced into a view from the back seat of older taxi cab. The tinny sounds of Indian music played in the background. I could make out the back of the purple turban-covered head of the driver of the cab, a bearded Sikh man of middling years.
The cab was moving, but it was dark outside, so the passing images were the neon signs of fast food restaurants, gas stations and convenience stores that could be found on the outskirts of nearly every American town or city.
I tried to focus on details that might give me a better clue as to where the cab was, but I found that I was constrained to the view of the person who had made the orb itself. The images and sounds that the maker of the orb saw and heard were the only images and sounds that came through on this recording. Again, rather than fight the frustration of such a limited view of events, I sat back and relaxed, content to see and hear what the mole was able to show me.
The cabbie’s head bobbed to the rhythms of the music coming from his cassette deck. The mole, however, was only cursorily interested in him. The image kept shifting from the windshield ahead to the piece of paper in the mole’s rough fingers. An address and a phone number showed on the paper: 25343 Covington Way and 555-9832.
The mole glanced back up to the display on the dashboard showing fare adding up. $19.51.
“Hey up, how much further?” The voice of the mole was loud and deep.
The cabbie looked back at the mole in the mirror as he responded. “Not much further, Sir. You get where you go when Gurmeet drive you, no funny business, OK?”
When Gurmeet turned his attention back to the road, the mole caught a small glimpse of his own face in the mirror. It was a rough, masculine face. It was the face of a man who faced many hard times in his life and had overcome those challenges through sheer force of will and more than a little dishonesty. I had seen similar looks on the faces of hundreds of perpetrators that I had arrested as a cop. The icy blue eyes were framed by a prominent brow ridge that sported bushy blonde eyebrows. The nose was on the long side, with a slight hook to the right (left because of the mirror?). His thin lips were firmly pursed in a look of not-so-slight anger or agitation. His upper lip and cheeks showed the stubble of a couple of days gone without shaving, but the stubble wasn’t long enough to hide the long, puckered scar that ran from the left corner of his mouth almost all of the way to his ear. His skin also showed several pock marks from a history of terrible acne or some other skin disease.
Seeing his reflection in the mirror seemed to irritate the man even further, as his mouth twitched in anger as looked back at the tolling meter. $22.27.
“You told me the fare would be no more than $25. I’m going to hold you to that, Gurmeet.”
Gurmeet bobbed his head and chirped out a polite answer. “Yes, Sir, that is the price I quoted. You no pay more.”
The image bobbed as the mole nodded his agreement and grunted in response. He looked down to the paper in his hand one more time and watched as he crumpled it up and tossed it to the floor of the cab.
“Sir, we are pulling up now.”
Good to his word, Gurmeet had the left turn signal on and was cranking hard on the wheel to pull the cab into the unlit driveway of a large McMansion nestled in amongst its nearly identical fellows in an otherwise unremarkable suburban community.
The cab stopped on the sloped driveway. Gurmeet got out of the cab and opened the passenger door behind him. “You see, Gurmeet knows stuff. That will be $24.78, please.”
The mole got up out of the cab, grabbing his small, worn backpack with his right hand. With his left hand he pulled out the two bills that were in his pants pocket. “Here, keep the change, and buy yourself a new air freshener, will you?” The mole easily stood six inches taller than Gurmeet, who did not appear to be a small man himself.
Gurmeet looked down at the crumpled up twenties in his hand and nodded eagerly. “Thank you, Good Sir. Here is my card. You call me direct if you need a ride back to the airport. I give you good deal, OK?”
The mole nodded and grunted. “Sure. Good night, pal.”
The mole watched from the sidewalk as Gurmeet slammed his door shut and jumped back into the front. With a friendly wave, Gurmeet back out of the driveway and sped off back in the direction of the airport. The wailing of the sitars and the female singing her cries of long lost love dwindling into the night as the cab turned from Covington Way back towards the main road.
The mole hoisted his backpack onto his left shoulder, glanced at the address plate next to the double door and began walking around the side to the back door.
With the music from the cab now gone, the night air was quiet. As with all of the homes nearby, the yard was perfectly manicured, with the grass mowed to the standardized golf course length and the bushes and hedges all trimmed to look neat and uniform. There were a number of smaller trees scattered throughout the yards, but they were still too young to stand on their own. This was clearly a recent development. Many of the houses looked to still be unoccupied.
The mole made his way to the elevated back deck of the huge house. The sounds of his heavy boots thumping on the wooden steps seemed loud, but he didn’t hesitate. He tromped up to the sliding glass door and tested it to see if it was open. Once he discovered that it was locked, he tried to peer inside, but the darkness inside the home was even deeper than night outside. Grunting again, he rapped loudly on the glass with his right hand, a thick ring on his ring finger making the loudest crack on the glass.
At first nothing happened. Then a face appeared just inside the glass door, almost as if by magick. It was a thin face of a woman who had seen almost as many hard times as the mole. She looked him up and down, eyes darting back and forth as she seemed to be watching for others as well. Finally a pale hand emerged from the darkness beneath her face and clicked the lock on the door. She nodded towards the handle on the door before both hand and face evaporated back into the inky darkness inside.
He opened the door and slipped inside the home, also glancing back to make sure that he was alone and unseen.
The image from the orb went completely dark, like I experienced when calling the Shadow to use it for travel from place to place.
When the image returned, it was quite clear that the mole was not standing inside the dining room of a suburban McMansion, but was now inside a worn out industrial warehouse of some sort. The light came from flickering fluorescent bulbs swaying in a stiff breeze. Puddles of water reflected that dim light, echoing with the drips of more water that also came from above.
The thin woman stood in a plain blue jumpsuit and boots, her frazzled hair framing her anemic looking face. Her arms were crossed as if she had been waiting impatiently. She was alone in the large, abandoned looking room.
Her sharp, nasal voice cut through the air as she spoke. “Name?”
The mole looked her up and down, glanced about the room. His eyes took in the darkened doorways and halls leading from this rather large, empty room. “Nick, Nicholas Kolkiwiecz. Who’re you?”
“You may call me Rose. State your purpose here.”
The mole shrugged. “Look, I heard that this was the place to come if you have certain talents and are looking for work. I sure as Hell hope that I’m in the right damn place or I’m going to make someone pay for my trip out here. I need work, not extra expenses.”
Rose didn’t look all that impressed. She uncrossed her arms and took a couple of steps towards Nick. Her head titled slightly to the left and down as she spoke, a sly smile creeping over her plain, drawn face. Her eyes were perhaps her only attractive feature, as they were large, almond shaped and brown. The rest of her face was pale to the point of being almost sickly. Her thin eyebrows had been drawn in after having been shaved, plucked or waxed clean. Her nose was long and thin, ending in two flaring nostrils that showed the redness of a drug addict while her lips were thin and colorless. Her cheekbones nearly protruded through her pale skin.
“You’re in the right place if you are looking for work, but I need to make sure that you have the talent to make it worth the while of my masters for you to speak with them. What talents do you bring to this party, Nick?”
Her lips pulled back as she smiled. Her teeth glittered and gleamed in the dim light, reflecting off of the silver and gems that were set in them. Her canines were the most modified, having been lengthened and given a fang-like sharpness to them.
Nick nodded, standing his ground. “Good enough. I’m very talented with my hands.” He let the backpack slide to the ground and brought his hand to show Rose. His hands were thick with calluses, showing the obvious wear and tear of a person who worked with tools on a daily basis.
Rose came even close, touching his hand with hers. Her fingers ended in talon-like nails that were painted a bright red. Her touch must have been cold, because Nick flinched ever so slightly with her touch.
“That’s nice, Nick, but we don’t need any cabinets built here.” She stroked her fingers up and down his right hand, her nails leaving a slight trail of white marks where they passed. “The things we’re building require a bit more finesse than your hands seem to be capable of producing, if you know what I mean?” Her smile was only a few inches from his hand now.
“Look Lady, I only work with wood and metal when I need to, when I need to look like I make an honest living.” He pulled his hand back from her face as she ran a tongue over the gems in her upper teeth. “My talents lie with other, less conventional materials.”
“Oh, and just what might those be, dear Nick?” Her eyes ran up and down his body, as if she were she was very hungry and he was a great meal.
Nick knelt down to his backpack. “Step back now, Miss, I don’t want you to get hurt.” He reached into the pack and pulled out a small black controller with a knob and several buttons. He then flipped back the flap covering the opening and stood up.
Curious, Rose knelt down towards the pack despite Nick’s warning. “Show me what surprise you have for us.”
“Alright, but I warned you.”
Nick mashed a button with one of his fingers and the pack rustled as if something was coming alive.
Rose leaned closer.
Nick turned the knob on the controller and pressed another button. The thing in the backpack erupted from inside with a leap to land right in front of the startled Rose. It was a raccoon with glassy eyes and a permanent snarl to its face. As Nick manipulated the buttons and the knob, the creature moved with almost lifelike precision and speed.
Rose laughed with delight as she reached out to touch the fur. “It feels so life-like. Did you use real fur?”
Nick nodded. “It’s almost all real, from the bones and sinew to the fur. It’s a real raccoon.”
She marveled at the creature as he made it dance and maneuver around in front of her. “How does it move around?”
“That’s my little secret. Let me just say that you can’t buy it in stores. But my talents are for sale, if you know what I mean.”
Rose looked up from the zombified ‘coon and back up to Nick with a new kind of appreciation. “Can you do this with other creatures? Bigger creatures?”
Nick nodded again. “Yep, anything that’s got a body with bones, muscles and skin. The bigger they are, the easier they are to work with.”
Rose smiled again, this time it was the smile of someone who is pleasantly surprised. “I think, Nick, that you need to speak to my masters.”
(To be continued…)
I held the first orb, the one from the mole, in my hand and spoke the password. “Betsy.”
Immediately, I felt like I was swept up in a vortex of swirling colors, like being inside of a kaleidoscope that was being adjusted by an over-excited 5 year old child. I suppose it would have been quiet disorienting if I had a stomach to empty, but that wasn’t a concern for me. Instead, I relaxed and let the images sort themselves out. It didn’t take very long.
The image coalesced into a view from the back seat of older taxi cab. The tinny sounds of Indian music played in the background. I could make out the back of the purple turban-covered head of the driver of the cab, a bearded Sikh man of middling years.
The cab was moving, but it was dark outside, so the passing images were the neon signs of fast food restaurants, gas stations and convenience stores that could be found on the outskirts of nearly every American town or city.
I tried to focus on details that might give me a better clue as to where the cab was, but I found that I was constrained to the view of the person who had made the orb itself. The images and sounds that the maker of the orb saw and heard were the only images and sounds that came through on this recording. Again, rather than fight the frustration of such a limited view of events, I sat back and relaxed, content to see and hear what the mole was able to show me.
The cabbie’s head bobbed to the rhythms of the music coming from his cassette deck. The mole, however, was only cursorily interested in him. The image kept shifting from the windshield ahead to the piece of paper in the mole’s rough fingers. An address and a phone number showed on the paper: 25343 Covington Way and 555-9832.
The mole glanced back up to the display on the dashboard showing fare adding up. $19.51.
“Hey up, how much further?” The voice of the mole was loud and deep.
The cabbie looked back at the mole in the mirror as he responded. “Not much further, Sir. You get where you go when Gurmeet drive you, no funny business, OK?”
When Gurmeet turned his attention back to the road, the mole caught a small glimpse of his own face in the mirror. It was a rough, masculine face. It was the face of a man who faced many hard times in his life and had overcome those challenges through sheer force of will and more than a little dishonesty. I had seen similar looks on the faces of hundreds of perpetrators that I had arrested as a cop. The icy blue eyes were framed by a prominent brow ridge that sported bushy blonde eyebrows. The nose was on the long side, with a slight hook to the right (left because of the mirror?). His thin lips were firmly pursed in a look of not-so-slight anger or agitation. His upper lip and cheeks showed the stubble of a couple of days gone without shaving, but the stubble wasn’t long enough to hide the long, puckered scar that ran from the left corner of his mouth almost all of the way to his ear. His skin also showed several pock marks from a history of terrible acne or some other skin disease.
Seeing his reflection in the mirror seemed to irritate the man even further, as his mouth twitched in anger as looked back at the tolling meter. $22.27.
“You told me the fare would be no more than $25. I’m going to hold you to that, Gurmeet.”
Gurmeet bobbed his head and chirped out a polite answer. “Yes, Sir, that is the price I quoted. You no pay more.”
The image bobbed as the mole nodded his agreement and grunted in response. He looked down to the paper in his hand one more time and watched as he crumpled it up and tossed it to the floor of the cab.
“Sir, we are pulling up now.”
Good to his word, Gurmeet had the left turn signal on and was cranking hard on the wheel to pull the cab into the unlit driveway of a large McMansion nestled in amongst its nearly identical fellows in an otherwise unremarkable suburban community.
The cab stopped on the sloped driveway. Gurmeet got out of the cab and opened the passenger door behind him. “You see, Gurmeet knows stuff. That will be $24.78, please.”
The mole got up out of the cab, grabbing his small, worn backpack with his right hand. With his left hand he pulled out the two bills that were in his pants pocket. “Here, keep the change, and buy yourself a new air freshener, will you?” The mole easily stood six inches taller than Gurmeet, who did not appear to be a small man himself.
Gurmeet looked down at the crumpled up twenties in his hand and nodded eagerly. “Thank you, Good Sir. Here is my card. You call me direct if you need a ride back to the airport. I give you good deal, OK?”
The mole nodded and grunted. “Sure. Good night, pal.”
The mole watched from the sidewalk as Gurmeet slammed his door shut and jumped back into the front. With a friendly wave, Gurmeet back out of the driveway and sped off back in the direction of the airport. The wailing of the sitars and the female singing her cries of long lost love dwindling into the night as the cab turned from Covington Way back towards the main road.
The mole hoisted his backpack onto his left shoulder, glanced at the address plate next to the double door and began walking around the side to the back door.
With the music from the cab now gone, the night air was quiet. As with all of the homes nearby, the yard was perfectly manicured, with the grass mowed to the standardized golf course length and the bushes and hedges all trimmed to look neat and uniform. There were a number of smaller trees scattered throughout the yards, but they were still too young to stand on their own. This was clearly a recent development. Many of the houses looked to still be unoccupied.
The mole made his way to the elevated back deck of the huge house. The sounds of his heavy boots thumping on the wooden steps seemed loud, but he didn’t hesitate. He tromped up to the sliding glass door and tested it to see if it was open. Once he discovered that it was locked, he tried to peer inside, but the darkness inside the home was even deeper than night outside. Grunting again, he rapped loudly on the glass with his right hand, a thick ring on his ring finger making the loudest crack on the glass.
At first nothing happened. Then a face appeared just inside the glass door, almost as if by magick. It was a thin face of a woman who had seen almost as many hard times as the mole. She looked him up and down, eyes darting back and forth as she seemed to be watching for others as well. Finally a pale hand emerged from the darkness beneath her face and clicked the lock on the door. She nodded towards the handle on the door before both hand and face evaporated back into the inky darkness inside.
He opened the door and slipped inside the home, also glancing back to make sure that he was alone and unseen.
The image from the orb went completely dark, like I experienced when calling the Shadow to use it for travel from place to place.
When the image returned, it was quite clear that the mole was not standing inside the dining room of a suburban McMansion, but was now inside a worn out industrial warehouse of some sort. The light came from flickering fluorescent bulbs swaying in a stiff breeze. Puddles of water reflected that dim light, echoing with the drips of more water that also came from above.
The thin woman stood in a plain blue jumpsuit and boots, her frazzled hair framing her anemic looking face. Her arms were crossed as if she had been waiting impatiently. She was alone in the large, abandoned looking room.
Her sharp, nasal voice cut through the air as she spoke. “Name?”
The mole looked her up and down, glanced about the room. His eyes took in the darkened doorways and halls leading from this rather large, empty room. “Nick, Nicholas Kolkiwiecz. Who’re you?”
“You may call me Rose. State your purpose here.”
The mole shrugged. “Look, I heard that this was the place to come if you have certain talents and are looking for work. I sure as Hell hope that I’m in the right damn place or I’m going to make someone pay for my trip out here. I need work, not extra expenses.”
Rose didn’t look all that impressed. She uncrossed her arms and took a couple of steps towards Nick. Her head titled slightly to the left and down as she spoke, a sly smile creeping over her plain, drawn face. Her eyes were perhaps her only attractive feature, as they were large, almond shaped and brown. The rest of her face was pale to the point of being almost sickly. Her thin eyebrows had been drawn in after having been shaved, plucked or waxed clean. Her nose was long and thin, ending in two flaring nostrils that showed the redness of a drug addict while her lips were thin and colorless. Her cheekbones nearly protruded through her pale skin.
“You’re in the right place if you are looking for work, but I need to make sure that you have the talent to make it worth the while of my masters for you to speak with them. What talents do you bring to this party, Nick?”
Her lips pulled back as she smiled. Her teeth glittered and gleamed in the dim light, reflecting off of the silver and gems that were set in them. Her canines were the most modified, having been lengthened and given a fang-like sharpness to them.
Nick nodded, standing his ground. “Good enough. I’m very talented with my hands.” He let the backpack slide to the ground and brought his hand to show Rose. His hands were thick with calluses, showing the obvious wear and tear of a person who worked with tools on a daily basis.
Rose came even close, touching his hand with hers. Her fingers ended in talon-like nails that were painted a bright red. Her touch must have been cold, because Nick flinched ever so slightly with her touch.
“That’s nice, Nick, but we don’t need any cabinets built here.” She stroked her fingers up and down his right hand, her nails leaving a slight trail of white marks where they passed. “The things we’re building require a bit more finesse than your hands seem to be capable of producing, if you know what I mean?” Her smile was only a few inches from his hand now.
“Look Lady, I only work with wood and metal when I need to, when I need to look like I make an honest living.” He pulled his hand back from her face as she ran a tongue over the gems in her upper teeth. “My talents lie with other, less conventional materials.”
“Oh, and just what might those be, dear Nick?” Her eyes ran up and down his body, as if she were she was very hungry and he was a great meal.
Nick knelt down to his backpack. “Step back now, Miss, I don’t want you to get hurt.” He reached into the pack and pulled out a small black controller with a knob and several buttons. He then flipped back the flap covering the opening and stood up.
Curious, Rose knelt down towards the pack despite Nick’s warning. “Show me what surprise you have for us.”
“Alright, but I warned you.”
Nick mashed a button with one of his fingers and the pack rustled as if something was coming alive.
Rose leaned closer.
Nick turned the knob on the controller and pressed another button. The thing in the backpack erupted from inside with a leap to land right in front of the startled Rose. It was a raccoon with glassy eyes and a permanent snarl to its face. As Nick manipulated the buttons and the knob, the creature moved with almost lifelike precision and speed.
Rose laughed with delight as she reached out to touch the fur. “It feels so life-like. Did you use real fur?”
Nick nodded. “It’s almost all real, from the bones and sinew to the fur. It’s a real raccoon.”
She marveled at the creature as he made it dance and maneuver around in front of her. “How does it move around?”
“That’s my little secret. Let me just say that you can’t buy it in stores. But my talents are for sale, if you know what I mean.”
Rose looked up from the zombified ‘coon and back up to Nick with a new kind of appreciation. “Can you do this with other creatures? Bigger creatures?”
Nick nodded again. “Yep, anything that’s got a body with bones, muscles and skin. The bigger they are, the easier they are to work with.”
Rose smiled again, this time it was the smile of someone who is pleasantly surprised. “I think, Nick, that you need to speak to my masters.”
(To be continued…)
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