SEAN ROBIN HUGHES

Jeshua walked into the cave of ice, and came upon the presence of the Lord. The ice was alive, as if moving like a fire, dancing in the wind.

“Remove your tusk covers, Jeshua, for you are on holy ground,” said the Lord.

Jeshua reached up with his prehensile snouts and removed the covers from his four tusks, revealing the broken and notched second on his right side, as his progenitors did, and his parent-pairs before him. Jeshua was devout and loved the Lord, and the Lord looked upon him with favor.

“You may speak, Jeshua. You are my child, as your mothers and your fathers were,” the Lord breathed from the living ice that was of like fire.

“What do you ask of me my Lord God?” Jeshua bowed until his snouts brushed the ground in penitence. He held all four hands behind his back, keeping his single toed feet still and pointed towards the Lord in humility.

“My people suffer at the hands of the Obisd. You are to go upon the land of their Emperor and demand their freedom, my son.”

Jeshua rose his head in confusion to the living ice. “My Lord, I am not the right man.”

The ice flared outwards, shifting upwards with immense energies, laces of lightning arcing across the reflective surfaces. “Am I not the creator of the seas and the land? Am I not the creator of the heavens and the earth? Am I not the creator of the energies that fuel your suns, and the bodies of the sky that govern your seasons and your harvests? I can discern all things.”

Jeshua quailed in the ferocity of the Lord. Lowering his head once again in humility, he covered his shorn ears with each of his snouts, opening his four palms in obedience. “I hear you, oh my Lord.”

“You will go to the land of the Obisd. You will gain access to the Emperor and you will stand proudly before him to demand of him to set my people free.”

“Lord, my Lord, I am but a simple Irru seeking peace as commanded by your teachings to my progenitors, so how will I do such a thing?” Jeshua dared to raise his eyes, raising all four palms upwards, placating. “This seeks violence in the eyes of the Lord.”

“I will be with you in this. Take this staff and with it work my wonders.” The ice split and shifted, yet did not shatter, and from it a staff of pure absolith was formed. It was pure and unblemished. “You will not be an instrument for my people’s enemies to be destroyed, but instead learn of the future by which they will come to know me.”

“Can you see the future, oh my Lord?” Jeshua the Favored asked with fear, his hand holding the absolith staff, unblemished in his grip. Jeshua felt certain that he was to be immolated in his insolence.

A snout of ice caressed his cheek, calming him as his mothers had in his youth. “Young Jeshua, this is story that has been seen across all my peoples, across all my creations. You are not the first, nor will you be the last. In this knowledge, I know how this story ends. You must do your part, for your Lord has commanded it.”

“I am afraid,” Jeshua admitted.

“I will not send you alone. You shall be accompanied by your brother.”

Jeshua felt deep confusion. “My Lord, I weep in this, as I have no brother.”

The ice split again, the edges and faces unbroken, flaring and rearing outwards like a flower. From the ice, another Irru emerged. His eyes were closed, and his arms were crossing his chest as if he was newly born. Jeshua helped lower the unconscious Irru to the ground, careful to not allow his snouts to be crushed under his own shoulders.

“He will know how to help you in your tasks that are before you. He is blessed and of my heart,” the Lord declared. “He will awaken when I leave this place. He will know you, Jeshua my Favored, Irru most kind, of the Estian People so blessed. You will go to your people, and they shall be set free.”

“What shall I call him? My brother?” Jeshua asked, looking over the Irru made by God’s own hand, his lower right tusk was broken and notched as Jeshua’s own.

“His name is Moses, a prince of Egypt. A place long gone and long forgotten. He shall not remember. But he will still know what to do in his heart, for he is faithful, and he is your brother.”

Jeshua bowed, caressing the face of his brother with his snouts, memorizing the detail of the young Irru’s face, for he was holy. The cave fell silent and the ice was still, once again frozen without light.

The eyes of Moses opened and he looked upon his brother Jeshua with kindness. “Did he give you a staff?”

Jeshua held his staff proudly in one hand, showing Moses the glimmering end of its unblemished metal. Moses smiled widely, his snouts moving uncertainly as if being used for the first time.

“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.