Introductory part by Prayrie
***
Somewhere in the faraway land of La-la, on a hill overlooking Gorgeous Gorge, stands an aircraft hangar big enough to hold four football fields. Conspiracy theorists will tell you that a mysterious gentleman known as Daddy Luke had transplanted the faded old thing from Area 51, you know, after a supposed alien spacecraft crashed to pieces in New Mexico. I’m not allowed to expose anything or put theories to rest; however, I can tell you that, to this day, the people of the area amuse themselves by swapping yarns about the DEN. They talk about the weird noises they hear day and night, the bizarre lights, the glimpsed fantastic beasts, and the dreadful, prowling monsters. Personally, I can’t get enough of the angel song, and it’s a shame it’s so rarely heard. That’s partly my fault.
Anyway—
The trolls are mostly gone with the high winds now. The unicorns stop by occasionally—not in their shimmering herds anymore but in twos and threes. They’ll graze the sweet grass of the arable valley and catch up on their snooty gossip before moving on. As for the monsters, there was ever only one, unless you count the militants, megalomaniacs, and dark wizards who try to take over.
The monster won’t put up with any of them.
He barely puts up with me.
You’ll see…
SySixty pushed his red checker onto an open square on his opponent’s side of the game board. “King me,” he said. “Yet again.”
“I’d rather clock you one,” replied his opponent. Sitting opposite Sy at the game table, Wolfie smacked SySixty’s hand away from the checker. “Durned clone…you’re not much like your Original anymore except for this. Too good at games.”
“You’re the one who wanted to do this,” he said. “I haven’t been this bored since our Author benched me above the Marianas Trench on that nameless workboat—may it rest in peace. You and the Amulet Recovery Team played heroes in the Challenger Deep. I watched the surface of the sun for three days, remember? News flash: nothing new happened up there the whole time…it hardly ever does…”
The former coyote rolled her eyes as she topped Sy’s checker with another checker. “Nothing new, you say? Not even an extraterrestrial invasion force hiding behind the corona?”
“I wished.”
“You poor dear. Look, you know that our Author likes to irritate us more than grant wishes. When she’s bored, we’re bored, see? Think about it, we both dislike checkers. She dislikes checkers. Yet, here we are in our own Mini-pub, wasting a lovely morning, playing checkers.”
“Nah. She’s not bored. This feels worse than that. She’s gearing up for something big, Syz, mark my words.”
The longtime couple looked up from their checkerboard musings at the same time, their gazes locking along the way. A little bit of a shiver ran up and down Wolfie’s spine. Sy’s too, truth be told.
His lockable matter betrayed him not.
This is how it goes sometimes: hapless characters find themselves transfixed by their sudden mutual awareness of impending doom.
(Mua-hah-hah-hah-hah)
So…introductions: SySixty is the seven-footer to the left, a radium green-eyed “monster” in high-def warring muscle, kicked back on his hand-crafted twenty-ton cube chair, one leg propped on the matching ten-ton footstool. (He acts as if he never has any fun despite the evidence to the contrary.) He’s got his biker vibe going on— Edgy designs and the satirical words: “Delicate Soul” in blackletter type slide along the contours of his arms like a creepy screensaver. A red bandana attempts to organize his devil-may-care hair. Piercings and glinting silver do-dads everywhere. Bits of red jade. Silver chains. Fingerless motorcycle gloves and buckled motorcycle boots. (Blah, blah, blah, enough already. Everyone gets the picture.) His mimicked shirt reads: STAY BACK 200 FEET NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANYTHING BROKEN. As it turns out, walking black holes can be their own advertising.
Prayriewolf, on the right, is the slender gal in turquoise, perched on a barstool across the table from her fiercely coiffed husband. I’m a fan. I really like Wolfie’s dichotomous soul. See how the daredevil peeks out of the gentle rule-keeper, watching for the chance to counter her opponent’s next move, eyes glinting like newly minted pennies. This fair but wild-ish creature of sand-brown hair and dusty skin can just about run all day. She is a secret eater of sand fleas, a sculptor of fanciful forms, a rider of wind and horses, a collector of shells, hay strings, and meteorites, apt to lick a chin without warning. Gross? I’d call it a compliment if she does this to you.
In fewer words, these two characters are a couple of first-rate weirdos.
Oh, yes, the possibilities, they do resemble carrots (not the bad kind), dangling from the strings of many sticks.
You’re welcome.
Or, oops, depending on how you look at it.
“Who do you think will call us first? WOW, or Riva, or Br…”
Wolfie’s question had hardly hit the air before Sy’s phone lit up near his conquered black checkers. One of the dreaded ringtones began to play. Wincing, he accepted the call and tapped the speaker icon.
“Yeah, ‘Pitt, what’s up?”
“Hayseed DUUUUUUUDE! Where are you? Everyone at ComicCon wants to know what has become of bad old Diablo.”
“You say that every year. Every year you’re wrong. No one wants to know.”
“Okay, so ’Day of the Demon’ wasn’t exactly a blockbuster, but we still have our fans, eh? So far, I’ve seen one Razor Blaze, two Diablo’s, and three Sting Hardes. As usual, I’m winning. And you would die-die if you saw the crowds around my table. I’m literally wading through fans right now. Hear this?” (Insert a strange-sounding pause.) Brad’s voice returned to the connection, saying, “Shame on you for abandoning me to these rabid throngs and neglecting your autographing duties.”
SySixty flashed a grin as he imagined his actor friend sitting behind a cloth-skirted folding table, faking crowd noises into his phone. Wolfie leaned on her elbows closer to Sy’s phone to say, “Hey, Brad, it’s Wolfie—you’re on speaker—how are things?”
“Ow-oo! Beauty and her Beastly-boy, together; I love it! Things are good. And you?”
“Bored to tears.”
“Ole Brad figured you would be. You married the wrong guy, after all. You would never be bored if you had married me.”
“I’ll take your word for it,” Wolfie said. She began picking horse hairs off her cotton sweater.
Sy made a winding motion with his hand, a referee’s clock-like thing, not the loco-thing, although both possible meanings could have applied to the situation. He said, “So, Bradley, what’s the real reason you called?”
“It’s about time you asked. Freaky stuff is happening around here, man.”
“Well, it is ComicCon. Freaky is par for the course.”
Wolfie nodded between her propped elbows, now munching on a strand of her hair.
“Naw, man,” Brad said. “I mean, really freaky. It’s, like, freaky Friday through Thursday freaky. It’s all over the news here. Bodies turning up around town, looking like jerked beef, all dried and wrinkled. Mummified husks. The cops are beyond flummoxed. What’ll it take to get you here? I have a party happening tonight, but I don’t want to end up like a Slim Jim.
“If you’re looking for a bodyguard, there are plenty of options…”
“C’mon, Farmer Boy, what’s better than killing two birds with one stone? I’ll get to hang out with my buddy Diablo and stay young and beautiful at the same time.”
“Sorry. No can do. Wolfie says she’d rather eat cat turds out of the litter box than wade through your fans at ComicCon.”
Wolfie inhaled a loud, scandalized breath and kicked Sy under the table, an action every bit as effective as kicking the Hoover Dam. “Liar,” she growled as she reached down to rub her toes through her muck boots.
Brad continued his pitch, saying, “Did I mention the strange ships hovering over the city that aren’t props? And there are too many military types running around in dark clothing; they can’t all be cosplayers, right? I even saw a talking raccoon! Now, you tell me how to fit a kid in that small of a costume.”
Sy said, “Not that interesting…we have raccoons here.”
“Do they talk?”
“Kinda.”
“Oh. Well, I saw some of your people stalking around here,” added Brad, beginning to sound ever so slightly desperate, “And I’m pretty sure I glimpsed that girl you told me about—the one who likes Glocks….”
“Really…”
(Not Riva. Could be Lafe or Charlee, though…)
“Yeah, and before I could lay the Brad charm on this chick, some putz spilled his iced coffee all over me because the stupid raccoon blasted plasma energy through the Stargate with a honking-big space gun.”
Sy slid his propped leg off the cubed footstool. Sitting up straighter, he loomed over the table, closer to his phone. “Stargate? What’s a Stargate?” Based on the descriptive name alone, half a dozen different ideas tap-danced across his cognapparatus (cognition apparatus—a Wolfie term for his thinker).
Brad laughed. “Aha! I set the hook on the ‘Son of Black Star’ that time, didn’t I? Let’s FaceTime so I can see your eyes glow brighter while I reel you in.”
“Not a chance, Armpitt.”
“Well, then, I guess you’ll have to come out here if you want to satisfy your curiosity about the big, clunky wheel thing that—rumor has it—transports people to other worlds—and I’m not talking Disney Worlds.”
Sy and Wolfie exchanged looks. She shrugged.
“Tell you what, Skeeze-bag,” Sy said, “I’ll consider it. Give me a minute to confer with the Missus. Don’t get your hopes up. L8r, dude.”
SySixty tapped out. Watching Wolfie toy with the Underdog ring hanging from her necklace, he said, “Sounds like fun. What do you think? Are you up for a potentially deadly trip to California?”
“How do we get there? You’re too heavy for the seats on commercial airplanes, and I’m not flying Air Sy during the day. People ask too many questions when they see a flying Pterodactyl. We’re also out of floo powder, port-keys, cursed brochures, and magic backdrop portals. The teleporting ring Myth gave you stopped working after he and Myrrhawa went on sabbatical, and the dimensional hernias around here are way too unpredictable.”
“Schrödinger’s Cat might be willing to teleport us over there. Or Lady Fields of Heather if she’s available.”
“Wait a minute, Sy…what did you do with those magic AirTag things that link us to the APEC castle no matter where it goes? We can use those to visit the castle first. When it comes to strangeness, almost nothing happens that Tyrathca and your brothers don’t know about. I’m sure they can confirm whether Techno and Lafe are in San Francisco and catch us up on what’s going on with the mysterious deaths. We can head over to ComicCon from there.”
“Well, look there…a plan. You’ve always been better at those than I.”
“True, that.”
“Are you sure you want to do this?” Sy sat with his hand propping his chin, watching to see what his wife’s eyebrows would do.
Wolfie hesitated before saying, “I’m not keen on the deadly trip part, but yes, I’m sure. Maybe she’ll let me hang glide at Fort Funston. I’d like that.”
Bravado aside, Wolfie’s subtly puckered brow and her reference to a “she” betrayed her concern about facing another test from their Author. Despite its size, Sy’s ego was nothing to stand in the way of reassuring her. He picked up his phone. After a few taps on the screen, he set the phone down again. Unfolding and rising to stand, he offered his hand, teasing Wolfie up from her barstool. The music he’d piped to the jukebox via Bluetooth began to play. Piano notes first, then the violin strings…and then the slow, big drumbeats…Colton Dixon’s textured voice…the harmonizing backup…
“Well, Missus Kai, here we go again. Let’s not make it easy on her.”
PrayrieWolf twined her fingers through Sy’s bear-paws, her fingertips barely making it past his palms. She said, “What is this, Soldier Boy? A Harry Potter and Hermione Granger tent-moment, dancing in defiance of evil?”
“That’s a hundred percent what this is,” he said, drawing her to the open pub floor, encouraging his “pearl of great price" to relax and connect with the music even as her brain wrestled with what she’d agreed to do.
“We’ve got this, Syz. No fear, eh?”
“No, nay, and never,” she said, and laughed when the so-called monster spun her around.
…You told me once, you told me twice
You'll say it again a thousand times
With the love I have for you
Ain't a mountain you can't move
In the dark, I'll be the light
In the fight, I'm by your side
When you're weak, I'll be strong
Your hallelujah song
Oh, you're gonna make it through
With the love I have for you
No better kind, no greater truth
The love that I, I have for you
It's river wide, it's to the moon
You'll be alright, you'll make it …
Please pardon the interruption….
Some of the “DENizens”— Ripstop, Weasel, BigRig, Buzzkill, and Rack… and maybe even Tater and the new guy, Ralph— are dying to blow this tender moment sky high, all in good fun, of course. I don’t have the time for these cut-ups today, but this is the best point in the story to share some necessary background.
The DEN and its lands, which have provided a haven for domestic creatures and fantastic beasts for a long time, also extend their protection to people nowadays. SySixty’s allies, Riva the assassin and Alys the ex-demoness, started the trend of housing military veterans and mercenaries in need of a safe place to live during downtime. Everyone seems to love it. How do I know? Once past the stringent vetting process, many DENizens turn into pigeons— they are nearly impossible to get rid of unless they have a mission. After all, they’re loyal types, and the place is incredible. (You should see Sy’s ‘playground.’)
Honestly, I never expected that SySixty would have a quality that glues these rough guys and gals together beyond their respect for his abilities. They remind me of Robin Hood’s Merry Men. We’ll see how far it goes.
In the meantime, the DENizens probably won’t factor here, except maybe Charlee, who happens to be galavanting around California somewhere on vacation with her new boyfriend. She recently found her way back into Sy and Wolfie’s good graces after a terrible betrayal years ago, and she owes them. Big.
Back to our story….
About an hour after their courage dance and after making their separate preparations, Wolfie and SySixty met again at the appointed time in front of the DEN.
Wolfie asked, “Are you going to the APEC castle looking like that?”
“Are you going to the castle, smelling like that? Doesn’t bother me, but maybe you should take a shower before you start hugging people you haven’t seen in a while.”
“Gah! The muck boots…give me a few minutes, okay?”
After this short delay, Wolfie returned from changing her shoes. The woman eyed her waiting husband up and down and said, “I guess I won’t need these anymore.” She removed her sunglasses and stowed them in her backpack.
“Ha ha, you’re so funny.”
SySixty finished the long braid that lay down his back and adjusted his bandana—now black and patterned with skulls and cross-bones. He hadn’t changed much other than toning down the shiny stuff and the moving tattoos, but in the smoke-gray camouflage and combat boots, he resembled the other military types infesting the premises.
Aloud, Wolfie read the wording on his simple black tee:
“I bored through the Earth’s core, and all I got was this lousy t-shirt.”
Another line of text appeared as she watched:
“…and taller.”
He explained, “I figured this was easier than repeatedly answering the same question.”
“Good luck with that. Are you ready?”
“Not yet … there’s one more important matter we must address.”
“Like what?”
Sy pulled a sidearm out of a thigh pocket. Ignoring Wolfie’s look of horror, he double-checked the chamber and the safety— and made sure of a full clip. “I had Rack pull this out of the armory for you. Mandatory carry. Here, take it.”
Wolfie stepped back a little, back into the shade of the open hangar doorway. “You can’t be serious…”
“Take. It.”
“You don’t have to bite my head off, Commander Worry-wort,” Wolfie grumbled.
“Sorry— not sorry. This isn’t checkers. I want you to have a fighting chance.”
She stuck her tongue out at him.
In a softer tone, he said, “Take it, Wolfie… please.”
This was not the first time the coyote-girl had “gone heels’ as they say in Western movies, yet she accepted the gun with clear distaste. Weapons were not her thing, yet she’d married one. Ironic, huh.
“Where am I supposed to put this?”
He’d already pulled an odd-shaped, flattish object out of another pocket, of which there were many. “This is an AIWB— an appendix holster for carrying inside the waistband. And here’s a stronger belt than the one you have. And extra clips. Put these in your backpack with the gun. I’ll teach you about the trigger lock and how to conceal-carry after we get to the castle. Don’t worry, you’ll get used to it. If necessary, we can outfit you after we reach the coast. Those jeans are okay, but you’ll be more comfortable in the right gear.”
Wolfie stowed the gun and its accoutrements, mumbling, “Great. Just what I’ve always wanted…to look like you and the other reprobates around here.”
“What’s wrong with how we look around here? Anyway, don’t worry about it. Remember what Ripstop taught you on the shooting range.”
Wolfie sighed and said, “Soldier Boy, those lessons were ages ago…” She lifted the noticeably heavier backpack, and Sy helped her thread her arms through the straps and free the hair that became trapped in the process.
He said, “The training will come back to you when…no, if you need it. No fear, remember?” Sixty glanced down at the bracelet on Wolfie’s wrist: interlocking wolves, sliding around a channel. The jewelry wouldn’t allow her to shape-shift outside the magical pockets of the DEN, the APEC castle, or other secret pockets around the world, but he was glad she had it with her nonetheless. He took Wolfie’s left hand in his right and steered her into the sunshine.
“Ready?”
“As I’ll ever be,” she replied. Sy stretched forth his left hand. The APEC AirTag sat on his open palm like a tiny version of the “EASY” button as seen in commercials.
“This one is keyed to your Touch ID, so you have to be the one to push it. I couldn’t find mine.”
“Gotcha. Here goes nothing.”
Wolfie held her breath and pushed the button….
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
“Hmmmm…that was nothing, alright.”
“I think there’s a safety,” said Sy, “See if it’s on the bottom.”
“Aha, yep, there’s a teeny thumb switch. It’s on red. Moving it to green.”
“Great.”
“Ready?”
“Yep.”
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
“Come on, give me a break.”
“Maybe the battery is dead?”
“Batteries in a magical device? Really?”
“You never know, Sy. We’ve seen stranger things. Maybe we have to say something to activate it. Like, that cursed brochure required saying the key phrase with grammatical contractions, and you couldn’t do it until you broke the programming that prevented you from saying contractions. Where are the instructions?”
“I’m a guy. We don’t use instructions even if they exist.”
Wolfie blew air between her parted teeth and said, “Then let go of my hand so I can dig up my phone. I’ll Google the User Guide….”
“Syzygy, you’re brilliant. You gave me an idea. This magical device is based on a non-magical AirTag, right? There’s bound to be an app for it.”
Ahem…Author interruption again, sorry. Before we go any further, I need to warn you that at this critical juncture, SySixty isn’t going to release either Wolfie’s hand or the APEC AirTag. So, what’s a morphing blob of space matter supposed to do with two hands occupied? Unfortunately, I can’t describe what happens next without bringing into play the creepier aspects of the “Change-monster,” as the Whale-kind used to call him. Suffice to say, tentacles and extra fingers are involved. Please use your imagination wisely.
He is what he is….
After pulling his phone out of yet another pocket, Sy tapped and scrolled on the screen. “Found it. There’s a ‘FindMy Castle’ in the App Store. Five stars. Gotta be it. Installing now….”
“Hurry, please. I gotta pee."
“Chill, babe, this will only take a sec… skipping all the legal stuff… blah, blah, blah… I agree….”
“Holy guacamole.”
“Getting there. Okay, signing up for the account… entering your info in all the fields… done… my phone number… done… selling your soul… done… just kidding…they already have it… not kidding… setting up the username using your email address because I don’t want to get a gazillion spammy emails… done… tab down…typing password… igottA~P… tab down… typing password again: igottA~P”
“You’re such a goober.”
“Bummer— it wants at least ten characters. Retyping password: igottA~Pee…retyping password again: igottA~Pee… submit… Good, the little 3D castle is turning… Now it wants to verify your email address with a text… aaaaand… yes, there’s the text message notification with the verification code. I’m entering the code… that worked…it’s saving the unknowable passkey.”
Wolfie whined, “Sometimes I hate technology.”
“Almost there, babe. See? It says, ‘You’re all set.’ Gotta log in now….(longish pause with much tapping)… that worked… I’m in… closing the popup… closing another popup…going to ‘Account’… ‘Settings’… unchecking subscriptions to this… and this… and this… keeping that one… saving preferences… back to the main screen. No, I don’t want to take a survey… closing popup… Let’s see what we can find. Aha, here we go; there’s a Drop-down menu for ‘FindMy Castle Locations.’ Let’s drop down in the menu to select… not that… nope… too far. Here, this is interesting; Hogwarts is in the list, but it’s grayed out.”
Wolfie said sadly, “Even the app knows we’re banned.”
“Their loss. Going back up. Here’s what we want: APEC.’ Selected. That should do it.”
“About time.”
Sy looked up from his phone. “Are you ready?”
Wolfie nodded and held her breath again.
“Tapping the ‘FindMy Castle: APEC’ ‘Submit’ button… now….”
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Seriously?
“What?”
“It wants me to ‘Confirm Location.’ Whatever. ’ Tapping ‘Confirm’… the tiny castle is spinning again. I think it’s checking to make sure the castle isn’t teleporting right now. I suppose that’s important. Look, this is cool. There’s a map and coordinates. Even better, the APEC Castle is currently located near San Francisco.”
“Very cool… in an overly coincidental way.”
“Tapping the coordinates… It’s giving me another ‘Confirm’… Fine… Let’s confirm this little bash-turd… Good grief… Again? Now it’s just being mean. BioWar’s fingerprints are all over this UX… Finally… I have a screen with a huge green button that says: ‘INITIATE TRANSPORT.’ This is it. Ready?”
Wolfie looked askance at her husband. “You’re making me say so again?”
“Nope. Tapping… now….”
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
. .
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
“Well, son of a biscuit eater. The little spinning castle timed out on me. I’m back at the coordinates selection screen. Why didn’t you push the button?”
“Sorry, Soldier Boy—I didn’t think I needed to push the button again.”
“It’s fine… Give me a sec to reselect everything and get back to the Initiate Transport button… (time passes)… The castle is spinning… Confirm Coordinates… blah blah blah… Confirm… blah blah… Confirm… Confirm… There it is… I’m initiating transport again.”
“Should I push the button?”
“Yeah, the spinning castle is counting down; make like the Nike commercials and just do it….”
“I will. But Sy?”
“Yeah?”
Wolfie lit up with happiness for a beautiful moment and said, “I can’t wait to see everyone at the Castle after all this time. I miss the old days.”
Sy winked and said, “Me too.”
“Okay, I’m ready. ‘doing it’ in three…two…one….”
Squeezing Sy’s hand, Wolfie held her breath and pushed the magic AirTag button one more time….
***
No comments:
Post a Comment