Category: Short Story

“Miles?” The radio made its stuttering bleeping noise as the walkie-talkie cut back to silence.

Miles rolled over in his bed, and fumbled in the dark beside it, looking for the rectangle of plastic with its wonky extendable metal antenna. His fingers felt the nub of the retracted metal, with its small disk at its apex.

Static again, then Robbie’s voice. “Miles? Are you up? Over.”

Miles groaned, pulling the walkie up by its little disk, rolling onto his back. He kept his eyes closed as he held the walkie pressed against his temple. Reluctantly, he pushed the talk button.

“Robbie? Over.”

“Sorry,” the connection dropped for a moment and then came back. “You were sleeping?”

Miles cracked an eyelid in the direction of his nightstand, the flip dials of the gently lit face read 1:07am. “Yes, Robbie. It is 1 in the morning. What else would I be doing, man?”

“Yeah, sleeping. Sorry, Miles. Can we talk?” Robbie sounded hesitant, his voice further than the actual distance of the other side of the walkie talkie.

Miles sat up, rubbing his eyes. “What is wrong? Are you ok? Over.”

“Yeah, ok. I had the dream again.”

“The playhouse?” Miles’s eyes were forced a little wider. “Over.”

“It was different this time. You were there,” Robbie dropped, another beep. “Sorry, had to move my hand, I am hiding under my bed.”

“That bad, huh?”

“I don’t know why it scares me so bad.”

Robbie’s voice broke, he must have been weeping all along and Miles hadn’t picked up on it. Miles sat a for a moment thinking it through.

Robbie’s voice came back, tentative. “You still there? Uh, over.”

Miles pushed the button. “I am.”

“What should I do?” A question that was not a question. It was fear.

“Tell me everything,” Miles swallowed lightly, swinging a foot over the side of his bed and tiptoeing lightly to his bedroom door. He slowly pressed closed, hoping that his voice would not travel down the hallway to his parent’s room.

“The usual dream is that I am at the hideout by myself, reading. To get away from my sisters. They are annoying me. When the dream starts, I know it is a dream, but I can’t change it… I have to watch it. I have to watch it play out. This time, though, you were with me. And I wasn’t reading, we were waiting. Patiently. That is what made this one so scary.” Hiss, static… pause for a moment. “We knew it was coming. And we sat there. I was even in the same PJs I am wearing right now. It was so weird.”

“What was I wearing?”

“Uh, your Star Wars shirt, the one with the x-wing. Why?”

Miles looked down at his t-shirt, pulling at the x-wing that was crossing his chest. He had ran out of clean pajamas. “No reason.”

“Miles, we sat there, waiting for it to arrive,” Robbie sniffed, he must have been regaining his composure. “We saw the light filter through the trees as it come to us. In my other dreams, I always run. This time… we just sat there.”

“Isn’t that good? Doesn’t that mean we are fighting instead of running?” Miles tried.

“The thing, I know it is scary, like it will kill us. It could kill both of us now, Miles,” Robbie’s voice cracked again. “I am certain of it.”

“Robbie, you are safe at home, right?”

“Yes.”

“It was just a dream,” Miles tried, rubbing at the corner of his eye.

“Miles, uh… I think I need to go the playhouse,” Robbie started crying again, just sobbing into the microphone on his side.

“What?!” Miles exclaimed. He clamped a hand over his mouth as a furious afterthought.

Crackle, crackle, like tin foil on the other side, then dead air. Robbie filtered through again. “The nightmare has been the same for months, but tonight, the dream was different. I need you to come with me. I can feel it.”

“Are you being serious?”

“Miles,” Robbie’s voice was full of dread. Even over the air, it weighed heavily with palpability. “I have to go… uh… I have to go. Or the dreams will never stop. If I go alone, I know I will die. But, if you are with me, we stand a chance.”

Miles felt perplexed. “A chance for what?”

“I don’t know. But I have to go. I have to, Miles. Please come with me.”

Miles swallowed and felt the decision already taking shape in his chest. “Yeah. I will meet you at Burnside in ten minutes. Over and out.”

Robbie sounded as if a massive weight had been lifted. “Thanks Miles. Ten minutes over and out.”

Miles kept his t-shirt on, and slipped on his jeans from earlier in the day, fumbling as he tried to pull his jacket on quickly. With one arm in his jacket, the other hanging free, Miles grabbed his baseball bat without a thought, shoved it into his backpack and zipped it closed around the taped handle. He opened the door to his room and snuck down the hall, careful to jump over the third stair so it could not betray him with its squeal of nail on wood. He unlocked the side entrance off the garage, rolling his bike into the grass. Jumping on his bike, pedaling through the dew laden grass, leaving a contrail of a rubber tire behind him.

Robbie was waiting at Burnside, the stop sign sitting at an angle since some drunk driver had tagged it a few months ago. The street sign that said Burnside Avenue itself had a bullet hole at one corner from a 22, so the sign said Burnside Avenu, with the e decapitated. Robbie had not bothered to change out of his pajama shirt or sweatpants, only adding his puffy jacket over the top.

“Hey,” Robbie called from his Huffy bike.

“Hey.”

“I owe you. A comic?”

“Amazing Spider-man 252?” Miles attempted with a crooked smile.

“Sure. All yours.”

“Wow, you are messed up. Your Amazing Spider-Man 252, seriously?”

Robbie nodded, his eyes bloodshot and wide. “I need your help. It’s worth it.”

Miles’s brow furrowed and he shrugged. “We will worry about it later, Robbie. Let’s go?”

“Yeah.”

Robbie pushed at his pedals hard, pulling simultaneously at his handlebars, forcing himself up the hill. Miles followed close behind, as they pedaled in silence through the fog. The dirt track into the woods split off the main road near the water tower, winding its way along the crick towards the Patterson’s property. The overlook was an ignorable place for most of the youth in town, as it was not accessible by car, and did not offer much seclusion to make out. But for a bunch of kids just looking to build a hideout or secret clubhouse, it was perfect. Calling it the playhouse made it sound juvenile, but that is what Miles and Robbie liked about it. It was something old and shared between two kids that were on the cusp of puberty. They crested the hill, following the dirt track from the road, and in about 10 minutes of riding they found their shared place.

Robbie jumped off his bike, parking it against the customary tree and Miles followed suit.

“What now?” Miles asked cautiously.

Robbie shrugged. “We wait.”

“Just follow your dream?”

“I don’t think we need to,” Robbie stammered, his eyes going wide and his cheeks flushed red. He started to shake as if cold, pointing at the playhouse. “It is already here.”

Miles spun, dropping his backpack to one shoulder, and pulling the bat free. The playhouse was softly glowing, throbbing with a gentle blue glow. Miles pointed his bat like a sword, holding it in front of himself like he could stab something with it. “Stay behind me Robbie.”

Robbie nodded furtively, still pointing. Miles took a step forward, but the state of the playhouse did not change. The rough lean-to sides of the recovered plywood, hastily nailed to the small trees at the corners, looked as it always had. It’s roof was two walls of a portapotty long lost in a storm, with the corner serving as the weather proof peak of the roof. Small windows were cut into the plywood, covered on the inside with stapled swaths of fabric, giving no insight into waited within. Miles took another step, and another. He could hear Robbie’s breathing behind him, the rush inwards and outwards as he unknowingly toed the edge of hyperventilation. Miles pulled the bat over his shoulder, bringing his elbows up.

“Come out!” Miles yelled.

There was no response. The light’s soft throbbing did not change its pattern either. It just stayed inside the playhouse.

Miles looked sidelong at his friend. “I thought you said we were sitting inside and saw the light come down from the sky through the trees?”

“Yeah.”

“Do you ever see the light?” Miles inquired in a harsh whisper. “You know, actually see it?”

Robbie shook his head violently, making his curls bounce on his head. Miles took another step closer, he was almost to the edge of the small doorway, which typically was covered by a small tablecloth hung from a shower curtain rod, and pinned to be out of the way when they needed the breeze for the hot summer days. It looked like shit, but it was a pretty strong, safe, and weatherproof build from a couple of kids scrounging from the trash cans and dumpsters around town.

Miles pushed the end of the baseball bat slowly along the side of the curtain, and a massive throbbing pulse rang out from within, as if a gong the size of the moon had just been struck. They both felt it more than they heard it, its effect traveling among the trees around them like a shockwave, pushing leaves and debris as if a stiff wind had passed by.

They both stood absolutely stock still as if a giant was regarding them, deciding if two little boys would make good eating.

Miles pushed the bat in further, and slowly pushed the curtain up. “Wow.”

Inside, a small orb only the size of a grapefruit, hung gently in the air, pulsing with its hazy glow. Robbie peered in over Miles’s shoulder.

“What the hell is that?”

Miles shrugged. “It’s your dream, you tell me.”

“Think it is radioactive?” Robbie’s voice was full of wonder. For the sheer terror that he had for the last few minutes, Miles was amazed he was even conscious still.

“Well then we are both dead, genius.”

“I don’t think it is radioactive,” Robbie asserted, more to himself than Miles. “In the dream I was so scared, but now, I am not scared at all.”

“What do we now? Just stand here and stare at the orb of glowing alien farts?”

“Think we should touch it?” Robbie wondered.

“With what? The bat?” Miles offered incredulously. “I am sure as hell not going to poke it with my finger.”

“Sure.”

“Then you do it.” Miles offered the bat to Robbie.

“Together?”

“Spider-Man 252. Swear?”

“Yours, man. I had to do this,” Robbie affirmed.

“Then we do it together.” Miles offered the outstretched bat, and Robbie put his hands around the handle as well. “On three?”

The two of them, Miles in his Star Wars t-shirt, and Robbie in his long sleeve flying cows pajama shirt, holding a baseball between them unsteadily faced the uncertain future.

“One, Two, Three…” The two lunged forward at once, putting the rounded cusp of the bat against the floating orb.

Voices in the dark.

“One.”

Spiraling sound in multiple directions.

“Two.”

Time is unbound.

“Three.”

Edges of reality come unwound.

“Two.”

In the dark, absence of light, speeding movement in multiple directions, twisting with the stars spinning by at superluminal speed.

“Two.”

Miles felt his body around him, inconsistent as light, as if he was floating in a sea of nothingness. He thought he would be scared, but he was not.

“Two?”

The voice changed. Concern? Confusion? Uncertainty?

“Two?”

Miles thought he felt Robbie nearby, spinning as if in orbit of each other, the push and pull of two objects contesting and yet compelling one another.

“Miles?” Robbie’s voice sounded far away as if coming through the a radio, stuttering in the dark before it cut back to silence.

“Two…” The voice pondered. “There should only be one.”

Miles still could not see anything, only feelings his fingers and toes at the furthest extent of himself. He did not feel warmth or cold, only the shift and movement of what he was, who he was, in the unaffirmed space. “You got two, pal.”

Images started to flash before them. They were not things to see, they were things to feel, to experience. He felt the change in himself, as if he was not witnessing these images with his eyes, but his truest self. The part that existing underneath the layers of his flesh and bone.

There was darkness, then there was light. From the light sprang trillions of billions of millions of hundred quintillions of threads spiraling away into the dark, all the moments that would ever be or that have ever been. Universes of universes, not stacked nicely like dinner plates on a shelf, but thrown into heaps of abstract and congruent angles, aligning and yet at odds with each other. These universes branched and branched again. Most ended in darkness or heat, some ended with nothing at all since they failed to start, and yet others progressed into something else.

Life. Intelligence. Progression. Survival. Competition.

Miles tried to close his eyes, but the images continued. The gentle assault would continue until it was done. If he could look around for Robbie, he would have. But he knew that Robbie was going through this with him, together. “One, Two, Three…”

Time wound backwards, as reality reasserted itself, Robbie and Miles both had their hands on the handle of the baseball bat, lunging forward with wide eyes, pressing the cusp of the bat against the glowing object in their playhouse. Miles could feel the reality of it, as if he was back in the moment. He could feel Robbie beside him, realizing that they were moving backwards and forwards in time.

“Time. Time is a strange thing. We forgot that it exists.”

“Why?” Miles asked.

“You will see.”

“Both of us?” Robbie asked from far away.

“Both of you, it seems. Worlds need heroes. Universes need to be lead to the impossible futures. Your purpose is to be the heroes here so that you can find the others. The others in the dark.”

“How?” Miles asked.

“By being greater than you were destined to be.” The light flashed, the throbbing images flared away, as if being tossed over a shoulder nonchalantly. “Greater.”

The lights went out and Robbie and Miles were standing in an empty playhouse with a bat being held between them. They both looked at the bat, and then at each other, dropping it simultaneously.

“What?” Miles asked. Robbie looked different, but he couldn’t put his finger on it.

“You tell me,” Robbie laughed. “You are the one staring at me.”

“You look different.”

“I feel different,” Miles looked at his fingertips. The tips were smoking, just like the end of the baseball bat already forgotten on the floor of the playhouse. He felt energy everywhere. It was in cells, in the air around him, in everything. He felt like a norse god.

“Miles, your eyes are glowing,” Robbie smiled. He did not sound scared. “What are you thinking of?”

Miles laughed as the sparks danced on his fingertips. “Thor.”

Robbie stood up proudly, flexing his chest like an adult. “I feel like Superman.”

“Robbie…”

Robbie burst from the ground, flying upwards as if he was shot out of cannon. The playhouse disintegrated into hundreds of pieces around Miles, as lightning started to erupt from his shoulders.

“Wait for me!” Miles finished, leaping from the ground. He thought of Superman traveling faster than the Flash, and in a breath he next to his friend.

The air was cold, but it did not feel cold. The clouds were blown apart as they flew through them, laughing and twirling in the night sky. Both the boys would be ageless gods with an inscrutable future, only a promise of where they needed to lead to be their only guide.

However, what the boys did not know, being boys enjoying the gifts they had received, was that every universe required balance, and their opposite on the equation was not two, but one. As it had been through countless ages, when a hero was created, so was their antithesis. A villain.

A man picked up the phone and his men on the other line answered immediately.

A tinny voice came over the secure line, as if it was further away than just down the hall. “Yes, Mr. President?”

“Charles, please inform the staff that I wish to go for a run this morning… I feel rather… energetic.”

“Let me paint a story for you.”

“Ooh, I love stories,” Mary laughed, smiling at her date over a shared order of spaghetti and red sauce.

The lights were dim at the rear of the Italian place, for a bunch of reasons besides ambiance. Laura knew those reasons, and that was why she invited Mary out tonight. Eventually, when you like someone, you have to pull the trigger and and actually let them in to your complicated life.

“In the beginning…” Laura started.

Mary nearly spit out her wine. “In the beginning?! I thought you were going to tell me the story of why you dropped out of school or how you came to become a PI… but nope! I get ‘In the beginning!'”

Laura blushed lightly, trying her hardest not to laugh at herself. Mary was good at making her laugh. “It’s true though. Now hush.”

“Yes, boss.” Mary said with a wink, shoveling a spun fork of noodles into her mouth.

“Not at the beginning of time, but at the beginning of where my story matters…” Laura restarted melodramatically. “Human beings became what they are, right? No longer monkeys or knuckle dragger’s or homo-whatever-man, full fledged human beings came to be. They were intelligent in way that was unlike anything that had come before them. This made other, uh, races upset.”

“Hold on,” Mary interrupted again. “Other races?”

“See this is why I wanted to tell you a story, Marigold. I want you to understand me more.” Laura turned serious, lowering the corners of her smile. She took a swallow of the red, swirling her glass, and thinking about how to do this. She had had it all planned out, but of course, life does not follow a plan. “I want you to know who I am.”

“I know you, Laura. At least I know you enough. You know me too,” Mary grinned, her thin lips turning outwards as she smiled widely. “I know my mother would not approve.”

“She would not,” Laura acknowledged with a chuckle. “The story has a point… and I need you to set aside your disbelief for a moment and pretend you believe me.”

“Ok, ok.” Mary tried to look serious. “I will try to pretend.”

“Good enough. These other creatures were living things as well… just way more complex than flesh and blood. They had appendages of folded space-time for wings, and what we would call a halo encircling their multidimensional brains. These were the Precursors. They had names in other religions… any Jew, Christian, or Muslim would call them an Angel. But this is way before those religions were created. The Precursors were much like us, some were good, some were bad, and most fell in-between. They were exotic creatures that lived in a different ‘space’ than the humans, so they could perceive us, but we could only perceive them on occasion.”

“Ok…” Mary raised an eyebrow wondering where this was going.

“I know, I know. Stick with me,” Laura shrugged innocently. “The Precursors were in a weird spot. They knew there was a higher being than them themselves, and here they were seeing lower beings come to a place in development that they thought only they themselves could fill. The Precursors had been supplanted in creation.”

“The higher being… you are talking about God.”

“Sure,” Laura waved it away dismissively. “Anyways, the Precursors get all riled up about it, like really worked up. So they do what any intelligent species should know what not to do. They started a war.”

“Against the humans?” Mary asked with wide eyes.

“Nope. Among themselves. Some thought the creator knew better, others thought the creator was a farce. This battle raged for countless ages, until they came to a truce, kinda. One side agreed to pull themselves to one side of things, and the other side agreed to go to the opposite.”

“Heaven and Hell,” Mary observed. Her profession as a teacher fit her well.

“I guess, not that simple,” Laura dismissed it again. “But this battle had raged for so long and had so many twists and turns, that a huge host of things happened along the way. One, a whole bunch of new things were created or destroyed in the interest of waging this battle, the human race ended up being used as pawns between the two factions, and the last all-out conflict between the two sides happened roughly two thousand years ago.”

“I am not following you,” Mary giggled.

Her wine glass was empty, so Laura poured her more. “Not that important, all the background there is only the prelude. You have to know what happened before to understand what is happening now.”

“What is happening now? Besides you being horrible at romance?”

Laura rose her arms and waved around the restaurant and beyond. “This. All this. Our world that we live in has a deep, complicated history. All those millennia of fighting created supernatural fallout, and the humans are right at the center of it. This modern world we are living in is a bit of a sham. Most will never realize it.”

“Ok. So if I say that I believe your version of the ‘Origin of the Species’,” Mary countered using her teacher voice. “What kind of fallout are we talking about?”

“A little bit of everything. Some good, some bad. Some really bad. Humans are not the only intelligent species on planet Earth, and there is much more than people let on.”

“Like what?”

“Vampires. Werewolves. Ghouls. Fairies. Monsters. Witches. Demons. Angels. A bunch of other stuff that is worse.”

“You are teasing me!” Mary burst. She slapped playfully at Laura’s hand. “Here I thought you are being serious.”

Laura put on her serious face and nodded slowly, choosing to keep her mouth shut. Instead she picked up her wine glass and took a sip.

“You are not serious? I mean, are you serious? I mean we have been dating for two months now and my creepy radar has not gone off once, Laura.”

“Is it pinging right now?” Laura asked honestly.

“Uh… no?”

“It’s about to. I am going to invite Luigi over. He is the owner of this place. Real good guy, and you need to be on your best behavior. You are safe.” Laura spun her beaded bracelet on her wrist, feeling for the calmness spell. She flicked her middle finger across it, and pushed the diffused aura modifier at her date.

Mary sighed slowly as the spell washed over her. “It must be the wine, but I feel safe enough right now. How do you know this Luigi guy?”

“He is a friend that I met in Italy actually. I was backpacking across Europe in my rebellious early college days, and Luigi tried to eat me.”

“Sorry?” Mary’s eyebrows screwed themselves upwards in confusion. “I swear you said that Luigi tried to eat you?”

“Simple mistake really. I was sleeping, he thought I was easy prey. I blew off his arm, he plead for his life, I reattached his arm, he thought I was awesome. He asked for some help, I gave it, and a friendship blossomed from there,” Laura waved the older looking gentleman over from the bar where he was handling some paperwork. Laura stood up and hugged him.

“Mary, this is Luigi. Luigi, this Mary, my date.”

“Ah, Laura, she is as beautiful as you are,” Luigi grinned. His skin crinkled at his eyes, smile lines that seemed to be used often. “Nice to meet you, young Mary.”

“Nice to meet you, Mr. Luigi? Sorry… That was silly.”

“Luigi is fine. A friend of Laura’s is a friend of mine. Laura told me that she was going to tell you a big thing tonight! That is so exciting!”

“You are acting like she proposed marriage,” Mary smiled nervously.

Luigi looked sideways at Laura. “You bombed her didn’t you?”

Laura shrugged innocently. “Just a little one. It will smooth the edges.”

“Now, Laura. You can’t go around glamoring your dates in my restaurant,” Luigi said.

Mary shook her head, not following the conversation well.

“Mary, Luigi is a ghoul. That is a spirit inhabited shell fashioned from the flesh of other creatures. A bit Frankenstein, a bit ghost, a bit zombie… but they are preternatural hunters. Their spirit transmutes the flesh into a well oiled machine.”

“Oh you are too kind, Ms. Laura,” Luigi effused.

“Frankenstein was the Doctor, his creation was called the Monster. So it would be Frankenstein’s Monster,” Mary corrected calmly.

“She is a teacher,” Laura informed her Ghoul friend. “Luigi, would you mind unrobing your human suit?”

Laura sat back down and held Mary’s hand, calmly attempting to hold her still. She leaned over and whispered into Mary’s ear, “Luigi is really nice, so don’t freak out.”

Luigi looked over his shoulder to make sure no one was looking, and exhaled. One second, a kindly white haired Italian man was standing at the edge of the table, the next, a long limbed white skinned monster with a near snout formed by the massive jaws filled with gleaming white serrated teeth. He tilted his head at Mary with a wink, and then in a moment, he was back to his facade.

“I think I might need to either throw up or pass out,” Mary calmly stated. “I am not sure which. Maybe both.”

“Thank you, my dear Luigi. Let me know when you all have your All Saint’s Feast, I would love to attend again this year,” Laura said as she squeezed Mary’s hand tightly, trying to suffuse calm still.

“Of course, of course, take care of your date, Ms. Samson. You two are beautiful together, I mean it. If you both will excuse me, I have some orders to call in.” Luigi bowed slightly and headed back to the bar.

“That was like a white sallow skinned alligator with arms and legs that would look odd on NBA player,” Mary wondered aloud, mostly to herself. “I mean, that mouth had more teeth than at least three sharks put together. His fingernails were like talons. A bear would be envious.”

“He eats chickens, by the way.” Laura picked up her glass again, letting go of Mary’s hand. She was past the dangerous part of a shock response. Laura thought it went surprisingly well, considering.

Mary’s head went back in surprise. “What?”

“In case you were wondering. He eats live chickens. Just like a human,” Laura tapped her chin thoughtfully. “Except for the live part.”

“Huh, strange.”

It was Laura’s turn, “What?”

“It was weird, don’t get me wrong. If it wasn’t for the wine, I would have screamed. But you holding my hand, I felt entirely at ease. Like I was safer than safe. Then as the Luigi-ghoul did his thing, I realized that I was falling in love with you.”

“Well as much as I want to kiss you right now, I should probably tell you the last part of the big secret,” Laura mused.

“Oh god, you aren’t one of those things are you!?”

“They’re ghouls, and no, I am not one of those. I am a witch.”

“A what?” Mary grinned.

“A witch. A damn good one, too.” Laura declared.

“Oh thank goodness. I was worried for a split second. I can handle a witch.”

“Can you?” Laura smirked salaciously.

Mary smiled back, flicking her tongue across her lower lip. “Without a doubt. Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For being real. For being honest. I don’t quite understand what all this,” Mary waved her arms in pantomime of Laura’s earlier explanation. “But I still want to be a part of it. With you.”

Laura leaned forward over the table and kissed her date gently. “I think we should get out of here.”

Mary playacted pure innocence. “Without dessert? What? Are you crazy?”

“Can we get it to go?” Laura inquired, her serious face once again prominent.

Mary laughed.

“I never knew my mother,” Laura laughed, the edges of her buzz thickening to the point of blustery inebriation. “Although, I am fairly certain she was a succubus.”

“A succubus? Isn’t that some sort of demon?” Charles looked uncomfortable across the table, he kept alternating between adjusting the cuffs of his sport coat and pushing his glasses up his nose.

“Something like that,” Laura shrugged a single shoulder. “I learned a long time ago that true evil, and vice versa, true good, are rare things.”

Charles picked up his wine glass by the stem, swirling it around carefully in the muted light of Laura’s dining space. She couldn’t call it a dining room for the same reason that you cannot call a tugboat with a handgun duct taped to it a battleship. Laura’s place was small, but it was hers, and that is all that mattered. She had bought her combo office/flat from her Aunt Missy, when her aunt had decided it was time to retire from embroidery and turn snow-birding in Florida a full time gig. Laura ran her finger tip around the edge of her wine glass, making it hum a brief note in the lull of conversation.

“How is my lasagna?” Laura followed.

“I am glad you asked. This is the best lasagna I have ever had,” Charles smiled carefully around his mouthful of cheesy goodness.

“Ever?” Laura grinned.

“Ever.”

“Just so you know going into this, I am not going to sleep with you.”

“Huh?” Charles looked confused.

“I’m swinging for my own team,” Laura laughed brightly, pouring more wine into her glass.

Charles visibly relaxed. “Oh thank god.”

Laura grimaced playfully. “Oh thank god? I know I am hot, Chuck. It is ok to be disappointed.”

“I guess.”

“You guess?” In her fogginess of wine, she felt a small glimmer of actual insult. She flipped her blonde ponytail with one hand absentmindedly.

“Well, you know, it’s our professional relationship. It works for me. I… uh… felt a little uncomfortable coming tonight, to be honest.” Charles shifted in his seat, and took a quick bite of lasagna. “This is great lasagna though. Damn.”

“You can take the pan, my friend. It’s a thank you lasagna after all.”

“For what?”

“For the information you shuffle over to me. It’s been crucial this year. I know its been hard since your partner died… I know how we met was not under the best of circumstances, but, even after all that, thanks for reaching out here and there.”

“Of course, Laura. I have found your unique approach valuable, to say the least.” Charles grinned, and put a hand through his thinning hair. He was an attractive man, even with the hard miles of being a detective in a big city. He even managed to lose all the weight, but that was probably more because of his partner’s death than any fear of obesity. “But back to my question. You were saying something about good and evil?”

Laura took a sip of her wine and leaned back in her seat, kicking a barefoot heel onto the edge of her seat. “I was just saying good and evil is a range, right? A spectrum. There are very few things that are truly evil and the same can be said for the good side too.”

Charles frowned thoughtfully. “I guess I can understand the evil piece, but it is harder for me to accept the good. Being a cop first and all.”

“It typically is. It is easy to look for the best in everyone, and assume the best. It is harder to see the evil where you are not looking for it,” Laura shrugged again. “I know you are still working to understand my world, but I will tell you that I know vampires that are better people than half of the people I met at a typical church swap meet.”

Charles raised his eyebrow. “Swap meet?”

“Oh yeah. Big yard sale with a potluck. Surprisingly, you find some really good stuff.” Laura shook her head. “You key on the swap meet? But not the vampires.”

“After the Maeven, a vampire is easy.” Charles chuckled. “At this point, I assume that everything is true, and wait for you tell me if it is bullshit or not.”

“Good call.”

“Unicorns?” Charles raised a finger and put it against his forehead in crude mimicry.

“Yes. But not what you think they are.”

“Trolls?”

“Nope. That one is fake news. What people call Trolls are fairy folk of a different sort. Its mislabeled racism, and most folks don’t even know it.”

“Brownies?”

“Oh yeah, little fuckers.” Laura spat.

“Here is a hard one,” Chuck grinned around another bite of lasagna. “Zombies.”

“Yes and no?” Laura tried.

“Seriously? I get a maybe on Zombies!?”

Laura rolled her eyes. “Well they are reanimated deceased, but its not like they will bite you and you get the ‘zombie virus’ or anything. And they definitely don’t eat just brains.”

“Well that is good.”

“I said, just brains. I mean they eat all of you. They are not picky eaters.” Laura commented offhand.

“Gross.”

“Can be. They are typically pretty fastidious eaters. Nice and clean.”

“Double gross,” Charles stuck out his tongue and made a gagging face. “Let’s just get back to the first question I asked. Soooooo, your mom was a succubus?”

“That’s my theory. My dad told me a lot of stories about how they met.”

Charles pulled out his smart phone, and flicked his finger across the screen. “Huh. I was going to Google ‘succubus’, but it looks like I don’t have a signal. Not even one bar.”

“That’s just me. Complex electronics don’t like magic, remember? But I can tell you all about them,” Laura took another sip of her wine, her buzz was going the other direction as she tried to pull everything from the mental collage of her mother. It was a story cobbled together from hundreds of sources and little snippets of information, like a shredded photograph being held together by only scotch tape. “A succubus is a half breed. It’s half human, half demon. They feed off of sexual life force, draining their host’s life by seducing them. Sometimes over and over and over until their victim ages prematurely and dies.”

“That would make porn way more interesting. It could be a survival sport,” Charles teased.

Laura raised her eyebrow at the jest. “Actually, that would be the perfect cover. You could feed for a long time without anyone noticing.”

“Man you know how to pick the dinner topics over a thank you lasagna, Laura.”

“Quirky. That’s me.” Laura pulled her sweater sleeve up and smiled across the table.

“But your dad didn’t die. You told me that you visit him up in the mountains often?”

“Oh yes, he very much is alive. And that is part of the mystery. According to legend, Succubi and Incubi can’t breed. I think that is the secret they like to keep away from the rest of the world. They can breed. But for them, it is always a choice. Pregnancy never is an accident.”

“Hell, if all of us could be so lucky.”

“Try being homosexual. Works the same,” Laura said deadpan.

“Ha, I suppose it does.”

“And that is why my dad didn’t feel the effects. Taking life force is a choice. Somehow, somewhere, my mother decided she loved my dad. She loved him enough, that for her it wasn’t feeding, it was connection. She pushed that potential energy into making a baby.”

“But, wait, she still had to feed…”

Laura smirked. “You get it.”

“Give me a break, I am a detective. Remember?”

“She had to leave. If she stayed, she would have slowly killed him. Or she would have had to go elsewhere, and that would have been worse. My dad would not have understood.”

“He doesn’t know?”

“No, he doesn’t know. It is only a theory after all. Maybe she was a perfectly normal human woman that was hurting emotionally or mentally unstable. Those exist too. Don’t need a supernatural explanation for people that are just a mess.”

“Does he know about you?”

“Chuck, I could only come out to my daddy about one thing. I chose my sexual orientation. What I do for living is private investigation. He doesn’t need to know how and for what I go investigating. That would just upset him. He is a good man. Having a witch for a daughter would be unnecessarily upsetting for a man that prays on his knees every night.”

“So your theory is that your mom, being a succubus literally able to suck the life out of your dad’s dick, loved him too much and decided to ditch him with a fresh baby in order to save you both? That is fucked up. Ok, you win the messed up family award. I can’t even compete.”

“Yeah, enough about me. What about your parents?” Laura asked, changing the topic. She didn’t want to explain all the other reasons she thought her mother was a succubus. You know, besides, the huge obvious fact that she had proof from the damn woman’s mouth herself. But that was her little secret… and one of the reasons she had become a PI in the first place. Finding her mom was her first case. It wasn’t Laura’s first solved case, but it was her first opened one.

“Punxsutawney. Retired. My father is remarried to my stepmother for the second time, and still kissing her every night before bed,” Charles nodded, tilting his head to the side looking around Laura’s flat again. “Who taught you this business?”

Laura looked up at the ceiling, remembering her teacher with a grin. “An old bitch.”

“Damnnnn…” Charles exclaimed. “Old wound?”

“Not at all. Love her to death. Not my fault she likes to stay in the form of a dog.”

Chuck shook his head, amazed once again that such a strange life could be lead in a world where everyone thought this stuff was make believe, and surprise, surprise, he had found out that it wasn’t.

Laura continued. “She found me. Our kind are drawn to one another, like moths to a flame. That is why the stereotypical convents happen. Witches like to spend time with other witches. Until they don’t.”

“Huh, why?” Charles played a dumb card.

“Imagine a bunch of women all being catty bitches to one another… now imagine them all having new and creative ways to be catty.”

“Like magic spells.”

“Two for two, Detective. Help me clean up… you can take the pan, just return it to me after you wash it, ok?”

“10-4, Laura.” Charles pushed his chair back, and the legs caught the rug. It tipped backwards and fell with a clatter. “Sorry about that.”

“You probably just woke up someone in my work room,” Laura laughed.

“And who would that be?”

“Steve. He is an asshole. But he is my asshole, so I have to love him.”

“You have a cat too, huh?” Charles tried.

“Not quite. STEVE, GET YOUR DRUNK ASS OUT HERE AND MEET MY GUEST!”

Charles took his hands away from his ears realizing two things in the same moment. He was capable of clapping his hands over his ears at an extremely fast speed, and Laura could probably drown out a landing 747 with her voice alone.

“My fooking gawd, Laura.” A greasy growling voice wound its way into the kitchen and dining area from the hallway. A small winged demon, exactly what the polar opposite of cupid would look like, hovered into the small diffused pool of light. His skin was a brownish green, with leathery flaps somehow keeping his rotund body afloat in the air, and his head was cloven in two by a wide mouth that would look at home on a pit bull.

“Don’t take the Lord’s name in vain, you asswipe,” Laura said dryly. “This is Charles. Charles, Steve.”

Charles’s mouth was agape, watching the small goblin-like cupid antithesis float over to the table and grab a breadstick. Steve unceremoniously ripped in in two with a single bite.

“I am out of beer, Laura. So I can curse any thing, any where, any time I want,” Steve grumbled. “Nice to meet you, Chuckyduck. You can close your mouth now though.”

Charles clamped his mouth shut and stammered. “S..sorry. First time I have met a demon.”

“Really? You know Laura.” Steve commented with a straight face before breaking into peals of dry huffing laughter.

“And this is why I leave Steve in the other room. I conjured him years ago when I was trying to capture a werewolf, he helped me find the fix, and he hasn’t left since. Ironically, I thought I sent him back to where he came from, but somehow, he either is stronger than he lets on or I boned the spell. So now he is my fat little hairless cat. With wings! And a drinking problem. He flits around, drinks my beer, and defecates in a box.”

“So the worst cat ever, yeah, yeah, yeah,” Steve grumbled. “I need to pop out for more beer. And by the way, I defecate ash, so me finding any firepit is literally the same as you finding a toilet. Can I get your explicit and full permission to fetch some beer?”

“No need. I hid a case of the belgian white in the back of the the hall closet for just this moment. Help yourself,” Laura grinned. “Chuck, let’s clean up and get you on your way with your lasagna.”

“Ooooh, you made Apology Lasagna?” Steve crooned. “Can I have some?”

“No and no, this is Thank You Lasagna,” Laura corrected.

Steve scoffed. Chuck looked between the two of them confusedly, like he was watching an old couple argue.

Laura shrugged as she walked into the galley kitchen. “It’s versatile recipe, I suppose.”

Steve turned and flew back towards the hall, lifting a knobby hand over his shoulder. “See you around, Chuckyduck.”

Charles stood by himself for a moment, looking down the dark hallway and then to the lit kitchen, where the sound of a dishwasher filled with clinking and clattering filtered out, and he shook his head in amazement at the strange world he found himself dipping a toe into once again.

“Apology Lasagna is probably just as delicious,” Charles said to no one in particular.

“It’s a mirror,” Berkley scoffed. “What could a mirror possibly do?”

Jenkins was sitting on the edge of Berkley’s desk, leaning over his partner as he inspected the ornate artifact. It was old, but well cared for. “I have the faintest. But the guy took a tumble and this was left behind. Maybe it is a family heirloom? His mother’s?”

“Or he liked looking at his hair,” Berkley sighed. “I don’t think this will lead us anywhere, Jenks.”

Jenkins took the mirror and flipped it over to look at the back of it again. It was an antique for certain. The wrought metal handle twisted itself into the frame that held the mirror itself, with a engraved rear cover that depicted a ship of strange design. The sails were drawn and yet it appeared to be moving quickly through water… the artist had made some critical mistakes or had never been on a boat.

Berkley watched his partner with scrutiny. Jenkins had a way about hunches, and they usually proved right. “What are you thinking?”

Jenkins shook his head slowly as if he was pondering two different answers. “This is such a specific item… and such specific items have specific histories. Think about it, Berk, when was the last time we encountered a serial killer with an affinity for something like this?”

“Well… never. This is my first serial killer.”

“You know what I mean. Serial killers have their MO, right? They have their rituals, their behaviors… they usually stick to a pattern. It may appear to be different, but it usually isn’t. Human beings are creatures of habit, even the broken ones,” Jenkins held the back of the mirror up to his spectacled eyes, studying the minute detail of the scrollwork at the edge of the mirror backing. “Something as, unusual, as this is definitely a clue, my friend. This is not a smoking gun about the murders themselves, but it is a very real clue about our murderer.”

“Why was he carrying it?” Berkley tried.

“Exactly. Why was he carrying it? Why have a woman’s styling mirror from the Victorian era in hand while you commit such crimes?”

Berkley frowned and leaned back in his chair. The drop ceiling was yellowed and stained, each layer of color overlapping the others from the years of a leaking district building. He stretched his arms over his head and groaned. “It’s been a day. I need a drink and my bed.”

Jenkins continued to stare at the scrollwork along the edge. “Berk, I think there is writing here.”

“What kind of writing?”

“It’s hard to read,” Jenkins pulled out his phone and swiped his flashlight on. “Morta de-spenza nost… no… morta despencia nocti vert.”

The office lights all went off, and the only light in the room was from the e-lights down the hallway and Jenkin’s phone.

“What the hell? Power outage?” Berkley said.

“That’s not even Latin. It’s nonsense,” Jenkins said mostly to himself. He glanced up and slowly lowered his phone. “Uh, Berks?”

“Yeah?”

“It was just us in here right? Michele left a while ago?” Jenkins’ voice was trembling slightly. Just a tinge of fear… Berkley had heard that voice once before when a gunman had committed suicide in front of the station, it was subtle, but Berkley definitely understood it.

“Yeah.”

Jenkins raised a finger. “Then who is that standing against the wall?”

Berkley turned his head to see a dark figure starkly outlined against the far wall, opposite of the door to the hallway. Berkley jumped from his seat and pulled his sidearm in a frantic rush. “JESUS CHRIST!”

The dark figure did not move, just stood there, watching the two detectives react. The outline was indistinct, like a shadow on the water, moving and shifting with the invisible currents around it. It appeared the being was looking downwards, with its long black hair occluding its face like a shadow.

Jenkins stood slowly, lowering the mirror to his side, and set the phone down in order to pull his sidearm free from it’s holster, carefully keeping the muzzle lowered.

“Do not move!” Berkley commanded. The figure was absolutely still, lacking the movement most people made involuntarily. There was no swaying or subtle glances, the shape was an absence of movement. Berkley thought that the figure was not even breathing, as impossible as that could have been.

“Who are you?” Jenkins followed, attempting to keep his voice level.

“ENGLISH, I HATE THE ENGLISH,” the figure muttered at the end of the dark room. “YOU SUMMONED ME, BRITONS. YOU SHOULD KNOW WHAT POWERS YOU INVOKE.”

“Who are you?” Berkley reiterated, taking a step closer. He tried to ignore the pressing need to tell the creature that he and Jenkins were Americans.

Yet the figure was quiet and still as a statue in a serene garden.

“Answer the man,” Jenkins said.

“ONLY BECAUSE THE HOLDER OF MY MIRROR COMMANDS,” the figure replied, it’s voice a frosted breeze. “I AM MORNIVCH.”

Berkley looked at Jenkins and shrugged, keeping his Glock trained towards the end of the room.

Jenkins swallowed heavily. “Where are you from Mornivch?”

“MY MIRROR.”

“Uh… what is your purpose?” Jenkins tried instead.

“TO REFLECT THE DEAD AND TELL THEIR SECRETS.”

“What the hell d-d-does that mean?” Berkley stammered.

Mornivch raised his face towards the feeble light of the forgotten phone with its flashlight app shining forlornly from the desk. The creatures eyes were like mirrored silver, glinting brightly within the frame of blackness of its long black hair. “IT MEANS DEAD MEN CAN TELL ALL THE TALES THAT THEY MUST.”

“Can you tell us who used this mirror last?” Jenkins asked calmly.

“ONLY IF HE IS DEAD AND THE CORPSE IS LAYING AT MY FEET. I DO NOT SEE A CORPSE,” Mornivch observed with a sardonic tilt of his head. As if it was obvious, and also as if it was a question.

“Uh… morta despencia nocti vert,” Jenkins blurted, holding the mirror up to his glasses again. The lights of the office flickered to life, and the end of the room was empty again.

“Whiskey TANGO foxtrot, Jenks… What the ever-living-fuck just happened?” Berkley spun quickly in a circle, the barrel of his gun swinging in a swaying pattern at his crotch.

“Put it away, Berk,” Jenkins holstered his own weapon and picked up his cell phone, finally flicking the flashlight app off. “It seems we just acquired a very special hand mirror. And something tells me the rounds in your magazine are not nearly big enough to do anything about it.”

“So I am not hallucinating?”

“I never said that,” Jenkins rattled, petering out into a rough chuckle. “Although that explanation would make me feel better.”

Berkley holstered his sidearm and collapsed back into his old chair. “Now I definitely need that drink…”

“After that, I don’t blame you,” Jenkins saved him the trouble and pulled the handle of whiskey and a couple of mugs from the back of Berkley’s bottom drawer. He sloshed a couple fingers into both mugs, corked the bottle again, handing one of the mugs to his partner. “Although drinking this crap is an absolute last resort.”

“I would keep good stuff in my drawer, but it has a habit of disappearing,” Berkley said as he knocked back the mug. He grimaced as it went down.

Jenkins picked up the mirror again, inspecting the rest of it carefully. “You think we should take this over to Jenni?”

“I am not going to use a creepy mirror as an excuse to see my ex-wife, Jenks.”

“Oh come on. She is one of best researchers with access to some of the best knowledge bases in the world. She could make short work of this I bet.”

Berkley shrugged and poured another drink from the bottle. “Let’s just think this through… we have a serial killer who was finally cornered…”

“Off an anonymous tip no less,” Jenkins interjected.

“We chase the tip down… and sure enough a body, our guy, and all the evidence we need to nail the son of bitch, and he runs.”

“I go left, you go right, he goes over those trashcans, he drops this, and then he hits that alley…”

“And disappears,” Berkley finished. “Leaving us with a mirror, a body, and not much else.”

“You know…” Jenkins tapped his finger against the mirror.

“Actually use that thing? Are you serious?!” Berkley nearly spit out his whiskey.

“Why not? We have a body… and supposedly this mirror allows the dead to tell their story. I mean if it works, we could solve ANY murder!”

“Going out on a limb don’t you think?” Berkley asked. “Shouldn’t we just do our jobs? The way they are meant to be done? By performing actual detective work?”

Jenkins made a face. “I think…”

“You think what? A blimey fucking ghost is going to tell us who dun it? I admit, having it happen right in front of me was shocking… but it is a bad idea to play with things you don’t understand, Jenks.”

“Berk, it’s not a Ouija board.”

“I know! It’s a goddamn silver mirror with a spirit living inside of it. My mother, God rest her, would have contacted the Vatican at the sight of this thing, and the next moment had it in a ring of salt with a bible on top of it.”

There was a light knock at the door frame. “Gentlemen, I heard you might need some help?”

“Who the hell are you?” Berkley exclaimed. No one had walked down the hall. There were windows on either side of the doorway, the length of the hallway, and no tall blonde had walked in.

The woman walked into the office as if she owned the place in a glance. She was wearing faded black jeans, a bit tighter than what made Berkley comfortable, and a white V-neck t-shirt under a crimson leather jacket. Surprisingly, she was wearing a pair of Converse that looked like they had been fished out of a high school lost and found. The woman ran her finger along the edge of the other desks, and sat on the edge of one after inspecting her finger.

“My name is Laura Samson. And that mirror you have right there… that is bad juju, my friends.”

Jenkins pointed to himself and then the other detective. “I am Detective Jenkins, this is Detective Berkley. How did you get in here?”

Laura hooked a thumb over her shoulder, “The door.”

Jenkins licked his lips and ran a finger over the mirror absentmindedly. “And just how is this mirror bad juju, Ms. Samson?”

Laura tilted her head, and her ponytail cascaded over her right ear. “That is the Creakswood Mirror, crafted in 1871 from a broken mirror fragment found in the wreckage of the Blood’s Bounty off the coast of Scotland in 1804. The mirror itself was probably made near the Black Sea sometime before that. How the mirror got to the ship and then to the Scottish coast, and then to the Creakswood family is all a bit of mystery. What is not a mystery is that Mornivch’s essence is contained within it.”

Jenkins eyes had gone as wide as his face would allow. “How did you know the mirror was here?”

“The better question is how did I know that you used it? The answer is…” Laura leaned back with a smile. “A little demon told me.”

Berkley snorted. “Yeah sure, lady. Why don’t you find your way out of the station before I escort you out?”

“Sweetheart, you couldn’t do it if you tried,” Laura crooned. “But I am not here to measure dicks. I am here to help you with that mirror.”

Berkley shook his head, “Measure dicks?” he muttered.

Jenkins stood up with the mirror in hand, but he nestled it against his leg tightly.

Laura watched the detective called Jenkins holding the mirror carefully. The invocation was designed to be addictive. The addiction would let Mornivch loose more often, and that was the whole point of his existence now. The smaller mousy detective with the glasses must have been the one that released Mornivch, the overweight grumpy one named Berkley was just along for the ride at this point. Laura felt a smug need to punch the grumpy detective right across the jaw. “Just so you know, I happen to know who your killer is… and I will be glad to share that information if you hand that mirror over.”

Jenkins rolled his eyes and put his hand on his service revolver. “Yeah. It’s probably you, Ms. Samson.”

“I know this is the first time we have ever met, but trust me, you need my help on this one. That mirror is tied to very bad things,” Laura smiled tightly.

“We already know that. The serial killer,” Berkley sighed.

“That junkie is just the last in a long line of them. You should not be too worried about him committing more. Without the mirror, he will go into withdrawal, and the killings will stop. However, other powers that operate in this city will come for the mirror once it is known that it is without a sacrificial owner. Mornivch was a powerful summoner in the Urals in the 18th century, and his experiences are dearly sought after. Some would string out a bunch of innocents, night after night, in order to use the mirror, just like the pirate Black Brian. You see, the dead do tell tales alright, and Mornivch is deader than most, so of course, he has the best ones to share.”

“And that is why you want it?” Berkley scratched his head in confusion. Laura thought he was probably still chewing on the dick measuring comment.

“No. I have no business with the ancient cretin in the mirror, but I do have an interest to keep it out of certain hands.” Laura tapped her finger on the desk in time, flicking the fingers of her other hand between the sigils on her wrist beads. She built a containment spell, just in case. She folded her hand around the fount of energy as it coalesced in her palm. She did not want to call Mornivch from his silver mirror, but she would, if she had to. The containment would cause a lot of damage, of course. The building would probably cave in as the mirror was severed from it’s owner and the hundreds of souls that it took to make it were released in a very explosive fashion, but if the small mousy detective insisted on making this messy, Laura was prepared to go all in.

In for penny, in for a pound.

“So… how do you want to do this, boys?” Laura asked. She stood straight, ready for the one called Jenkins to do something stupid. He was holding the mirror next to his leg like he wanted to hump it. Destroying the mirror was probably for the best, but then she would have to figure out what to do with it’s inhabitant. Having Mornivch out and about was a problem in and of itself.

Jenkins turned subtly, moving the mirror out of sight. Berkley leaned back in his chair and sighed again.

“Lady, we are the cops here. You have this backwards. We tell you how it is going to be, and you deal with it,” Berkley said.

“I… uh…” Laura felt the trip of her trespassing charm spell at the back door of the station. She had dropped it out of an abundance of caution on her way in. Something wicked this way comes. “Shit.”

“That is what I thought,” Berkley grinned like he had just re-established his manhood.

“Not you, Detective. Someone else just walked into your back entrance. Just like I did,” Laura shot back. She quickly dissipated her containment spell back into her sigil bracelet, and pulled a standard #2 pencil from her inside chest pocket as she calmly backed up against the wall. Facing the door, waiting for the worst to happen with her only weapon held delicately between her fingers.

“What are you doing?” Jenkins asked worryingly. “Why are you holding a pencil?”

“I, uh… am waiting for whatever is coming after that mirror, Jenkins. Berkley, you might want to stand up.” Laura kept her eyes on the door, readying herself. She regretted leaving her snappers and the .38 at home. The wyvern wood was a powerful wand, and as soon as she used her trigger word, the actual relic would come crashing back into reality. And it was a relic that happened to release dragonfire upon command. A messy weapon, but wholly undetectable until she triggered it. The .38 would be way better, but what kind of idiot walks into a police station with a gun under their jacket?

A young woman floated down the hallway as if she was on rails. The reinforced glass outside their pen offices made it look all the more otherworldly, and Jenkins sounded like he was about to hyperventilate at the sight. Laura smiled at the reaction. The Maevens had this affect on people the first time they were seen. Imagine a young woman who died of heartbreak, something that was part ghost, part zombie, and part ghoul all at once. A Maeven was a heavy hitter in magic realm too, able to weave spells like the witches they would have become if they had not passed on. In the modern world, the Maevens were assassins of the highest order. They were able to phase through walls, shift magical boundaries, and blend into any crowd. This one was an out-of-towner for certain. They were extremely rare in the world, so having one show up in the same building that the Mirror was in was not a coincidence.

The young woman stopped before nearing the door and looked through the window at the three of them. The Maeven shook her head at the sight of Laura.

“Come on, sweetheart. Come on through the door,” Laura said under her breath and she added her best Pacino impression. “Say hello to my little friend!”

The Maeven stayed in place, floating up and down as if bobbing in a lake. “Release the Mirror to me and you may live.”

Berkley and Jenkins both had their guns out now, and Berkley shook his head. “The freaks come out at night, man.”

“This mirror is evidence,” Jenkins said matter-of-factly. He still clutched it tightly in his other fist. “You need to leave before you give us an excuse to arrest you.”

Laura rolled her eyes. “You two are dense, you know that?”

The Maeven shook her head again in mock sorrow. “I was not talking to you. The offer was for the Witch. Both of you will certianly die.”

“Now, now, little Maeven, let’s not make this a bigger problem,” Laura said.

The Maeven looked like she had died when she was only sixteen or seventeen, and had eyeliner streaked down her face as if she had died crying. She commanded, “Witch, give me the mirror!”

“Uh, Ms. Samson, can we shoot it?” Jenkins asked timidly. Something was finally getting through to him.

“You can try. Won’t do much besides piss her off.”

Berkley cursed. “What do we do?”

“You either come in or you leave, little Maeven,” Laura commanded back, ignoring the detective. “You are not getting the mirror. I laid claim first.”

Even for the supernatural races, there were shared rules that governed behavior and interactions. One of the oldest was the Rule of the Claim. It was one of the few ways property was established in a world without courts, police, or laws. Vampires and Werewolves did not get along, but at least they could interact with Claims without everyone killing everyone else in order to get what they wanted.

“You cannot claim what is ours.” The Maeven replied, her voice muffled by the glass. “The Creakswood Mirror is under claim with my sisters.”

“Then we take it outside and talk about it,” Laura tried.

“IT’S MINE!” Jenkins screamed, and fired rounds at the glass with his revolver. In the enclosed pen, the noise was deafening. The slugs went through the glass, fracturing it and sending spiderwebbed lines in every direction. In moments the glass was nearly opaque.

The Maeven was nowhere to be seen. Laura’s ears were ringing.

“And that is how people get tinnitus,” Laura exclaimed. “I think you made the situation much worse. So if anyone is keeping track, you are two for two.”

“Where is she?” Jenkins said shakily.

A ghost of white appeared from behind another desk on the opposite side of the pen, and crossed the distance to Jenkins in a heartbeat. The Maeven grabbed Jenkins head from behind and twisted it so hard the sound of breaking bones was nearly as loud as the gunshots that had come before it.

Laura grimaced and released her trigger word, “Woosh!”

The wyvern wood coalesced into reality, the pencil evaporating into a much larger piece of smooth wood, with a crest glowing branches at the tip covered in small double pointed leaves made of glowing fire. The length of the wood was like a bunch of ropes coiled together, each coil a small dragonlet in hand, their mouths opened wide and ready to spew flame. The leaves made it appear each cord of wood was licking its lips with a multitude of fiery tongues. Laura pointed it squarely at the Maeven and poured energy into the wand.

The result was immediate and dramatic. Thin spirals of flame turned into a massive gust of roaring fire, catching the Maeven in the side and encasing her thin white form in ethereal flame. The flame was so hot that paint on the wall next to her immediately bubbled and peeled away as if hit with God’s own blowtorch. The Maeven let out a horrific scream, pitched many octaves higher than a human voice should be able to go, and attempted to phase away to flee. Unfortunately for her, ethereal flame was just as supernatural as she was, so as she faded from sight, the flame went with her.

“Where did she go?” Berkley yelled, his hand still partially covering his eyes.

“Probably outside the building. She may be able to survive, but that blast would kill nearly anything,” Laura said breathlessly. The air smelled of burnt everything. “Sorry about your partner.”

Jenkins was laying on the ground face down, but that unfortunately meant he was lying on his back. The mirror was still clutched in his hand. Laura walked over, pulled the mirror free and looked at Berkley squarely in the eyes.

“You will need to handle this. I will go after the Maeven to make sure she doesn’t come back. When you are ready to handle your serial killer, call me.”

Laura handed the oversized detective a business card, he took it feebly, his mind still reeling from the encounter. He could only grunt in response. She turned on her heel and headed for the door.

“Wait… how, do I explain all this? My partner is dead in the station, man.”

“Blame your serial killer? He came after the mirror, strung out on drugs. Its not too far from the truth. Just don’t mention me.”

“Why is that?” Berkley numbly dropped his Glock on the desk and picked up the phone.

“Because, then I won’t help. And trust me, Detective Berkley, you need all the help that I can offer,” Laura walked out the door and was gone. And again, the windows of the hallway had no tall blonde walking away beyond them.

Berkley looked down at his partner, then the wall, then the shattered pen window. “Shit.”

Down the hallway he could hear uniforms running his way, typically late once again. The detective dialed the Chief and collapsed into his chair listening to the ringing as if it was miles away.