“Ow. Fuck. Aren’t you supposed to be good at this kind of thing?”
My grandfather cocked an eyebrow at me as he pulled the needle out of my arm. “First off, don’t be a baby. That didn’t hurt. Second, nurses actually tend to be better with needles than doctors.” He smiled sinisterly. “I’m better at cutting you open. But, then again, you’d just heal back before I could do much of anything.” He tried to look crestfallen before giving me a grin.
I stood up from the lab chair and dabbed at my arm with gauze. “Well, it did hurt. Think about how bad you have to be at needle poking for something to really hurt me.”
He gave me a dubious look. “Mmm-hmm. Anyway, this is the last time to establish a baseline. After this we can go to monthly blood checks unless something comes up.” He was trying to stay lighthearted, but I knew he was worried and doing these blood draws only made him dwell on it more. When we talked about the changes I had gone through since swallowing the seed, the changes that my genetic code had gone through, I pretty much knew from what he wasn’t saying that it was irreversible, that I wasn’t even really human any more.
My point is I don’t know that checking my blood for changes is going to make much of a difference. Still, I can tell it helps him to approach it scientifically. Keeping track of things, categorizing and analyzing, it gives him something tangible he can work with. So even if it may not make a difference, I’ll put up with it. And besides, if anyone can figure out a way to make the impossible possible, I’m pretty sure it’s him.
We headed into the living quarters of “the Batcave” underneath Yager Solutions, Inc. and I was excited to finally get to plunder through his case files. He’d been talking about taking another look at one of his “floating cases” as he calls them. Typically a floater—he really loved my nickname for them, by the way—is something where he has some information or tip that something is going on, but not enough to be sure if it’s worth checking out or Outsider related.
He literally has folders on his laptop labeled Unknown, Mundane Unrelated, Supernatural Unrelated, and Outsider Related. When we pulled it up on the big screen, I immediately headed to Supernatural Unrelated. I heard him make a short grunt behind me and when I turned to look at him he was rolling his eyes.
“Go straight for that one, eh?”
I shrugged. “Why not? It’s cool. And I don’t see why we can’t work on non-outsider things. You probably did a lot of that in the old days.” I started scrolling through files before I paused and looked at him again. “Oh shit. Have you killed a bigfoot? How many bigfeets have you killed?”
He snorted. “None. They don’t exist as far as I can tell. But as you can see, there’s plenty of things that do. And most of them are dangerous and can carry a grudge. So you’ll forgive me if I think we should focus our efforts on one widespread otherworldly evil at a time rather than trying to ‘make a beef’ with every monster in the world.” He used air quotes around “make a beef”, so it was hard to hear the last part over me laughing.
“First off, it’s ‘start a beef’, not ‘make a beef’. ‘Make a beef’ sounds like you’re taking a shit.” I went on as he glowered at me. “Second…okay I don’t have a second beyond you have a valid point. Still, this stuff is very cool.” I clicked out and went to the Unknown folder. “So what’s this stuff?”
He leaned forward. “These are the ones that I haven’t been able to determine what category they fit in yet. They could be Outsider related, be nothing at all, or somewhere in-between.” He pointed at the screen. “Click on that one.”
I clicked and it pulled up a subfolder that contained an email and a video. The email said that the footage attached was taken at a secret lab that was run as a hotel. When I started the video, I could see that it was from a flying drone of some kind due to the angle and movement of the shot. There was no sound, but none was really needed.
The drone was hovering over the back lawn and pool area of what looked like a very nice hotel, and while it was impossible to tell where it was, I could make out a few trees in the distance when the drone banked to one side or the other. But my attention was mainly focused on the people slaughtering each other on the grass.
The video started after the violence was already unfolding, but best I could tell, five people were all actively trying to kill each other. Not in groups, but free-for-all. And not in some tactical or strategic manner. They were stabbing and biting and clawing at each other like animals. One guy had a gun, but it must have been out of bullets, because he was using its butt as a small club. After a little over ten minutes, they were all dead except the last one. It was a small woman with a blood-soaked ponytail and a knife wound in her back that would probably see her dead in less than an hour. Heedless of the pain, she ran/limped out of view, looking more keen to find another victim than get herself any kind of help.
When the video ended, I looked up at my grandfather. “What was that?”
His lips were a thin line. “That’s an abomination. Someone is using science, or at least scientific method, to refine a method of causing mass murder on command. From what I hear, the process is still prohibitively expensive to perform on a large scale, and it is not nearly as effective outside of a controlled, artificial environment like this one. Part of the reason some of these outfits use “realistic” scenarios is not just for the additional data, but because it sells well to their superiors. Superiors that don’t tolerate failure well.” He sat back, his mouth sinking into a frown. “So they manipulate the tests, lie about the infection vectors being used, all to make this kind of horror seem easier to spread and control.”
I felt my anger building. “Who would do this? We need to stop them.”
Grandpa nodded. “We do, and in time we will. But I don’t know for sure who is behind it yet. I suspect it might be the House of the Claw, as I know they are a larger organization than just the small cells we typically deal with, and some of the details match up with other things I’ve heard.” He rubbed his mouth and sighed. “But you have to understand, the contacts I’ve made over the years, they give me information when they can, but it’s not like googling something. A lot of times the information is limited and obtained at great personal risk by people that are just trying to do the right thing. This is all I have on this right now, so until we know more, we don’t have a way of proceeding. But there’s another one that I think we might know enough about to work on. Click on the folder called “Rave”.
Trying to push down my strong desire to hunt down the hotel people and hurt them, I did as he asked. It was a single .jpeg of a party flyer. It said that there was going to be a two-day rave in the desert a little over a week from now in the Nevada desert. It gave GPS coordinates at the bottom and said “Bring your fun if you want, molly water and yay may be around already….”
“You’ll have to forgive me, but I was never a club kid even when I was younger. What the fuck is molly water and yay?”
He patted my arm and laughed. “Glad to hear it. I didn’t know either, but after some research, it’s apparently saying they’re going to have drugs with methylenedioxymethamphetamine--or MDMA if you prefer--and cocaine in them. Molly and yay respectively. And yes, I feel dumber for even knowing that now.” He gestured to the flyer. “But the interesting thing is that I know that the party is actually starting six days earlier. And there’s going to be an Outsider there.”
“Why does this thing say the wrong date then?”
My grandfather shook his head. “This flyer…from what I’m told, it was posted at only a handful of places in a 200 mile radius around the site of the rave. And the date isn’t a mistake. These people aren’t being invited as guests. I think they’re being invited as food.”
“How do I look?” We had to stop and get me some “rave clothes” that I thought would work better than what I had when we hit Nevada. My hair was gelled up and I felt super douchey, so I hoped I was falling into one of the less-desirable, but credible, rave archetypes.
“Like a date rapist.” My grandfather was looking sourly at me over his tablet. He was still mad that my plan made sense and put me in danger while leaving him in the car. When I had pointed out that an incredibly well-preserved old man going into an Outsider-sponsored rave would probably raise some red flags, he didn’t argue, but I could sense his frustration and worry. I had tried to reassure him, but it would take time before he trusted me on my own, and I got that. For now, I was just excited to be on my first semi-solo mission and show him I could cut it.
I grinned. “Well, I guess that’ll do.” I looked out the window of the motel room we were in and saw it was getting dark. “We better get going.”
The plan was that we would go in separate cars, with him setting up covertly a couple of miles away so he wasn’t seen. I would text him as I could, if I could, with updates, but otherwise he would just be there in case I needed help or I didn’t come out after two hours.
As I drove up to the place, I was surprised by how relatively normal it seemed. It was a massive building that might have been a secluded airplane hanger or warehouse in a former life, but now it was covered in Christmas lights and tiki torches. There was a tall chain-link fence around it, but the throng of people waiting their turn to get in seemed more like an energetic rock crowd than brainwashed cultists or unwilling captives. I parked and got out, making sure to leave the car far enough from the building that any EMP blasts from an Outsider changing inside would hopefully be avoided. As I got into line and watched the people in front of me, my stomach sank. Everyone was in pairs.
I wasn’t sure if it was coincidence or if it signified something, but I had a growing idea that this was a couple’s dance and I was showing up without a partner. Still, there was nothing to do except wait and see. When I got to the door, a heavy-lidded woman in an old Pearl Jam t-shirt looked me over before glancing at her clipboard.
“Your partner late, or are you a solo?”
Swallowing the lump of cotton that had formed in my mouth, I tried to sound confident. “Yeah, I’m solo tonight.”
She nodded, glancing up at me and then back at the clipboard. “Okay. Go in and stay to the left wall. We’ll pair you up in a few minutes.”
I felt a growing unease that I had just entered into some weird desert orgy, and I had to fight the urge to go ahead and bail on the mission right then. But half an hour later, I knew it wasn’t an orgy. Instead, it was some kind of giant mutant wasp monster.
I had been paired up with small man named Pedro who kept nervously making small talk as we waited for the...whatever it was…to start. Pedro seemed like a nice enough guy, but he was really excited about meeting what he called “the Ascendant”. I assumed that was the Outsider, and that meant this almost certainly was some kind of House of the Claw mixer.
It’s hard asking questions about something you’re already supposed to know about, so I was limited on what details I could get from Pedro in the few minutes we had together. Apparently we were all “chosen” for this “honor”. He described it as a “new way to Ascend”, although he didn’t seem entirely sure what that meant or if it was even true. But what he lacked in solid information he made up for with enthusiasm, and when the young girl took the stage, he truly lost his shit.
He wasn’t alone. All around us I saw people flipping out, cheering, screaming and crying as a girl that looked to be about thirteen or so came out and waved. I cheered along too, but I was somewhat distracted. Looking around the crowd, I saw most people were dressed normally. Shit, Pedro was wearing fucking trousers and a polo shirt. I had dressed up like an asshole for nothing.
“Be calm and be well. The road to the new Ascendency begins here.” The girl was holding a small wireless mic, and her voice was soft but authoritative as it echoed through the building on loudspeakers set along the walls. The crowd fell still immediately, gazing up at her with rapt attention.
I expected more speeches and ritual, but instead, the girl was suddenly gone, replaced with a giant, evil-looking wasp thing. The electrical lights went out immediately, of course, but I saw now that there were torches strategically placed inside the building too. It was darker, but I could still see very well.
And I call it a wasp because it looked closest to that, though it had eight wings and such a distended, malformed green-grey abdomen that it looked like a wasp and a tumor had a baby more than anything else. People started yelling again, but not in terror. They were happy. Excited. When the distended abdomen split open to spill out something that looked like a spiky sea cucumber on meth, they cheered louder.
Holy fuck these people are crazy.
The wasp thing, its shriveled abdomen resealing and drawing up to reveal a long stinger, picked up its partner and flew out over the crowd. Settling on a couple, it dropped cucumber into the waiting arms of a squealing man while it settled on the head of his partner, an equally squealing woman. It was hard to see everything from that distance and between the people, but I saw enough. I saw the man swallow the cucumber whole and collapse on the ground. I saw the wasp sting the woman on the forehead, a small spurt of blood squirting out at the wound. Then the cucumber was crawling back out of the man’s mouth, and the wasp was carrying it to the next couple.
At this point, I was trying to gauge how long I risked staying before I bolted. No way I was letting either of those things touch me, but I still didn’t really have an idea what the point of any of this was. They were on the fourth pair now, and it was always the same thing.
Then I saw the man from the first couple get back up. He was unsteady on his feet, it didn’t slow him down much. He pulled a knife from his pocket and starting stabbing his wasp stung partner in the chest. She went down quickly and without resistance, and after a few more stabs he stopped, crawled a couple of feet away, and seemed to go to sleep.
It was horrific, but at first I took it as a sign of rebellion. Maybe the man realized what they were doing was super fucked up and was trying to kill the woman in some kind of protest or to stop her from becoming whatever they were supposed to be becoming? But no. No one seemed surprised or concerned about the violence, and as I watched, the other couples started doing the same thing in the order they were touched.
I glanced over at Pedro, who was staring raptly at the wasp and cucumber as it moved to its twelfth pair. Sorry man, this is all you. I eased away, making my way back to the door with no real problem. But there I was met by Ms. Pearl Jam and two giants who looked ready to take out their resentment for failed careers as linebackers or redwood oaks. I sighed inwardly as I approached.
“Hey guys. This is great, right? I just realized I forgot and left my headlights on. Let me pop out real quick and I’ll be right back.”
Ms. Pearl Jam pursed her lips. “Get back to your partner.” The two men glared at me menacingly to underline her command.
“Fuck. Fine then.” I stepped forward, smacking Ms. Pearl Jam in the head hard enough to send her skidding to the ground ten feet away before slamming my fists into the abdomens of the two men. Well, not into. Through. With both hands I felt something that I knew had to be spine, so I grabbed them and twisted inward, feeling more than hearing the twin snaps as they crumpled to the ground. Thirty seconds later I was in my car and blowing through the closed chain link gate.
I drove to the agreed upon spot for us to abandon the car and Grandpa picked me up. I soaked the car in gas and set in on fire, feeling guilty for vandalizing the rental car. It occurred to me later that I didn’t feel bad about killing the two men, but I told myself I did give them a chance to just let me pass. It still worries me that I’m not worried, but I’m not mentioning that to him yet. Dr. Barron has a lot on his mind already.
Like how I had fucked up our chance to stop them.
“I don’t get it. Why are they still there?” I was looking at a video my grandfather had gotten overnight, and it was clear even from the outside that the “rave” was still in full swing two days later.
He shrugged and took another bite of apple. “It’s hard to say. It may be that they don’t care that you know and escaped, though that seems unlikely since you basically broke two guards in half with your bare hands. It may be that they can’t stop now. Clearly whatever they’re doing is a multi-day process or they wouldn’t need so long between starting and when the victims show up. It might be that once they started at that location, it’s hard or impossible to complete it somewhere else. That is a lot of people, particularly in whatever state they’re in, to try and move.”
I nodded, but then a thought occurred to me. “What if they’re not worried because they already know about me. Maybe they can sense me and get me whenever they want.”
My grandfather frowned and sat down the apple. “I’ve thought of that. It’s possible, but I don’t think its likely. You don’t have a seed. I suspect you may be the only one…with your situation. So they may very well not even know about you yet, though over time they’ll figure out something with you being as strong and resilient as you are.”
I watched him for a moment. “You almost said ‘only one of your kind’, didn’t you?” He started to protest and I shook my head. “It’s okay. I know I’m not right any more. Not really human. I still feel like me, mostly, but I can tell a difference. But I’m dealing with it, and I’m keeping watch on the changes. I want to use it to help people. To help you.”
He leaned forward and put his hand on the side of my face. “You are human, at least in the ways that matter. You’re a good man, and I’m so proud of you. As far as these changes go, so far they’ve saved your life and mine more than once. We’ll keep being careful, but no more of this “you’re not a human” bullshit, okay?” His voice was soft but serious, and like so often happened, I found myself feeling better and more hopeful after just a few words from him.
Sitting back, he picked up his apple again. “Still, I’m not sure how best to deal with these things. There’s so many of them, and I don’t really like the idea of any of them getting loose in the chaos of us killing them. We can burn down the building and shoot any stragglers that come out, but there’s no guarantee that’ll work. And I think there’s too many for even you to beat to death with iron, assuming they’re even weak to it.”
I grinned. “I’ve actually got an idea about that. Have you ever heard of glitterbombs?”
So what we did was this.
First, we took out the three guards posted outside. He dropped them from over a hundred yards from behind a desert scrub brush with his suppressed rifle, one shot each. Second, we quietly soaked the outside of the building in thirty gallons of gasoline. Third, I went in with my satchel of goodies and made some new friends.
Things had deteriorated wildly in the four days since I was last here. Most of the people were stripped naked, there were pools of blood, shit and urine everywhere, and as far as I could tell, the people were taking turns killing each other and then being brought back to life by the wasp stinging their corpse again. I say this because the giant wasp kept doing its current round with the sea cucumber when I came in. There were several people that were down, but as the wasp found its way to them, they came alive again.
Their wounds didn’t really heal though. Instead, every time they were resurrected, new black tendrils of something began poking out and wiggling. Judging by the state of many of these people, a lot of which were barely recognizable as people any longer, they had been busy in my absence. And it wasn’t just half of them. Apparently they had been taking turns playing the victim, because they were all fucked up to one degree or another. But even now, with me busting in with all my goodies, most of them were fixated on either their partner or the Outsider duo, and it wasn’t until the glitterbombs started flying that I got their attention.
The bombs consisted of two small crates of fifteen jars a piece, similar to the nail bombs he had taught me to make back a few months ago. In crate one, there was acid that, according to the good doctor, should do an efficient job of eating through meat and bone. I felt pretty sure I could withstand it okay, especially if I was careful with where I threw them. But they were the fallback. The second crate was where I was going to start. The glitterbombs.
Instead of nails, they were filled with iron shavings. Lots of them. The jars weighed a ton, but that wasn’t a problem for me, and with the little explosive oomph each one had in the center, Grandpa estimated they should each cover an approximate forty foot radius in iron dust.
It worked like a charm. I started tossing jars, first a few long bombs to the back of the room and then alternating between the front and the back to keep them hemmed in. The screams and roars started almost immediately, and when the first jars hit the ones closest to me, I saw how well it was working. They practically melted between the iron and the impact, and I couldn’t imagine the acid working any better, if as well. The problem was there were so many of them. By the time I ran out of iron shaving jars, there were still around fifteen of the monsters left standing. A couple were seriously hurt, but the rest had managed to miss any of the fallout that hit their companions. I considered switching to acid, but I wasn’t sure how well it’d work and I was itching to try out my new bat.
I’d had it custom-made a couple of weeks before, and it had arrived just before we left to come out here. It was shaped similarly to a baseball bat, though it was slightly thicker in the handle and thinner at the end, and instead of being cylindrical all the way up, the last eight inches tapered back into a blade that made it look more like an axe than a bat if I turned it the right way. It also was made of 80 percent iron with a titanium core, so it weighed 150 pounds, but that was okay. In fact, it was just right.
The few survivors were coming out of their weird life and death cycle enough now to realize what was going on, and the first one headed towards me with an unsteady lurch, black tentacles flailing about from dozens of wounds all across the waxy folds of flesh rolling down his torso and legs. He let out a wailing roar, and I wanted to say something clever in response, but nothing came to mind, and no one was around that would appreciate it. So I just swung my baby, and the monster blew apart.
Three minutes later I was done. I was looking around for anyone I’d missed when I saw the wasp, its belly now distended and cancerous looking again. I guessed the cucumber was back inside, but what concerned me more was that I could see a fine dusting of iron on the Outsider and it looked none the worse for wear. It was hovering some distance away, just watching me, and I started casually looking around for something I could throw at it to knock it down so I could get to it. As if reading my mind, it suddenly darted for a window and crashed through it.
Cursing, I ran back to the door, already yelling for my grandfather to try and get it, but I was too late. As I made it outside, the night lit up with an orange glow from the flamethrower. Grandpa was standing over the withering thing, pouring flames onto it until there was little left but ash. He glanced up as I approached and I nodded.
“Good save.”
He nodded. “Yeah, it wasn’t sure which way to go after crashing through the window. Gave me the time I needed to spray it. Apparently it likes fire a lot less than iron.” He studied me. “How about you? You okay?”
“Yeah, I’m good.” I grinned. “I got to try out my bat too. It is very badass, I’ll have you know.”
He snorted. “A waste of money if you ask me, and way too conspicuous. But if you like it, that’s what counts.” He shot a thoughtful look at the building behind me. “Everything dead in there?”
“Should be, yeah, but we should burn it to be sure.”
“Oh we will. But first get the shovel from the trunk and rake what’s left of this thing back inside.”
Half an hour later, after we were satisfied that nothing had survived the fire we set, we headed out. We didn’t return to our old motel, but instead began working our way back east, taking our time. It was the first time we had ever really traveled together and it not been related to hunting something, and it was kind of nice. When we finally got back home, I was exhausted, but very happy with the way things had turned out.
I was going to go to my house, but I was too tired. Grandpa said he had some business to take care of and that he’d check in with me later, so I wound up laying on the sofa in the living quarters and falling asleep. I woke up to the ringing of a phone I didn’t even know was down here. It was one of his burners, but it was kept charged on an adapter, so I supposed it was important. The number was from an area code I didn’t recognize.
Opening the phone, I found myself unsure of what to say. I had no way of knowing who this was or who they might think they were calling. “Hello? Um, Jager Solutions. How can I help you?”
There was a brief pause and then a young woman’s voice. “I need to speak to Dr. Barron, please. It’s an emergency.” That voice. It was deeply feminine, with a richness that even over the phone made it hard to think. I realized I wasn’t responding and tried to focus.
“He’s not in right now. I’m his grandson, Jason. What’s the problem?”
When she spoke next, I could tell she sounded not just upset, but deeply sad. “It’s better if we talk in person. Tell your grandfather that it’s the girl he met in Seattle a few years back. At the old tire plant. He’ll remember. And tell him that I’m ready to tell him what I know about the Nightlands.”
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Credits
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