Nocturnal

Cloaks and Daggers

John Smith didn’t know what to think.

His Harley roared down the street. He followed the black station wagon. For once, he wasn’t afraid of some random gunman. He didn’t have the bandwidth to fear them, not with trying to process what he’d seen. That woman had delivered electrical shocks with metal whips. Did the whips generate the shocks, or did she generate them? Oh, and the small detail that he’d shot her in the face. Instead of hitting the deck and joining Club Bodybag, she’d jumped out of a third-story window. She should have been a broken thing on the sidewalk, but when he got down to the street, she was gone.

And it wasn’t just the girl with the chains. What was the deal with the gigantic, bony head? Robin had shot that man four or five times at point-blank range, yet the man had stood up.

So, yeah, maybe there were worse things to fear than snipers.

Robin, dead. Murdered like a goddamn druglord, gunned down in her own apartment. And her last words to John: looks like you’re not afraid to be a cop anymore. Well, she was wrong about that. He was still terrified, but Bryan needed help and that was that.

Lives were in danger. Time to step up and do his part.

The Magnum’s brake lights flashed. The car pulled into the parking lot of a closed Walgreens. The drugstore itself was on one side of the empty lot. Two-story buildings lined the rear and the other side, creating a walled-in space viewable only from the road. The Magnum drove to the back and parked. John pulled up next to it.

Bryan got out of the station wagon, a flat-black pistol in his right hand. A mask, the same color as his peacoat, hung down over his face. He looked around, then aimed the pistol up at a corner of the parking lot and fired. A camera erupted in a small cloud of sparks. He did it again with a second camera. Another look around to be sure he’d got them all, then he opened the front passenger door, reached in with his left hand and dragged out a black man by his neck. The man had a handcuff locked on his right wrist; the cuff’s partner dangled free from the short chain. John didn’t recognize the guy.

Bryan pulled the man to the front of the Magnum, then pushed until the man sat on the hood.

“You came out of a Muni tunnel at the Civic Center,” Bryan said. “You’re going to show us where.”

The man shook his head, shook it hard. “No sir, I don’t know where I was.”

Still holding the man’s neck, a masked Bryan leaned in. “Aggie, you’re going to show me.”

The man — Aggie, apparently — shook his head so hard his lips bounced from side to side. “No way! I’m not going back there!”

Bryan’s right hand came up; the barrel of his gun pressed into Aggie’s left cheekbone.

John’s hand shot inside his motorcycle jacket to the handle of his own weapon. “Bryan, stop it!”

“John,” Bryan said without turning around, “you’re either with me, or you’re an obstacle. Back off.”

Bryan was way past the edge. If John moved too fast, if he did anything wrong, that poor guy’s brains could splatter all over the car’s hood. Bryan had already killed one person that night, and acted like he wouldn’t hesitate to kill another.

“Backing off,” John said. “Just take it easy.”

The Magnum’s driver’s door opened and a man got out slowly. John didn’t recognize the heavily pierced, thirty something rocker.

Bryan pushed the gun in a little harder, tilting Aggie’s head to the right. Aggie’s eyes scrunched up tight.

“I don’t know you,” Bryan said. “I don’t care what happens to you. You’re either going to take me into that tunnel and show me where they kept you, or I’m going to pull this trigger.”

Aggie’s breath came in fast, short bursts. “Tunnel is hidden,” he said through clenched teeth. “Don’t know where it is, exactly.”

Bryan shook his masked head. “Not good enough.”

The rocker raised his hands, palms out. “Cop, listen. He can’t help us. Erickson has been hunting for their lair for fifty years. He never found it.”

“I’m not Erickson,” Bryan said.

John thought of going for his gun again, but that would only aggravate Bryan. Any added stress could make him pull that trigger. Come on, Terminator, snap out of it, he’s just a civilian.

Bryan leaned in until his eyes were only an inch from Aggie’s. “You’re going to take me down there, Aggie. I know that’ll scare you and I don’t give a shit. The only way you see the sunrise ever again is if you show me what I want to see.”

Aggie opened one eye. He raised his eyebrow in an expression of a man hopeful to make a deal. “The baby?”

Bryan shook his head. “No fucking way.”

Aggie opened the other eye. He stared back with fearful defiance. “Then shoot me. I’d rather eat a bullet than go out the way they do it.”

Bryan paused. He nodded. “Okay. You take us in there, and I’ll see what I can do. But I can’t promise anything.”

“If you did promise, I’d know you was lying,” Aggie said. “Now can you let go of my throat and get that goddamn gun out of my face?”

Bryan leaned back, pulled Aggie to his feet. Bryan’s right hand slid behind his back and into a hidden slot in the peacoat. Like a magician’s trick, prest-o change-o, the pistol vanished.

“One more thing,” Aggie said. “I ain’t going in without a gun.”

Bryan seemed to consider this.

“No way,” John said. “Bryan, he’s a civilian. Do you even know this guy?”

Bryan turned. Green eyes stared out through mask slits. “He’s taking us down. The man wants a gun? The man gets a gun.” Bryan turned to the rocker. “Adam, let’s see what you’ve got.”

Bryan started walking to the back of the station wagon.

“Hold on,” John said. “Bryan, what the hell is going on? Taking us down? Down where? And would you lose that retarded mask?”

Bryan lifted the black fabric and tucked it somewhere in the back of his skullcap. He suddenly seemed like the old stone-faced Bryan, emotionless save for a wide-eyed anger that didn’t waver.

“The monsters have Pookie,” he said. “Aggie said there’s a tunnel complex under the city. If Pookie is alive, that’s where Rex took him. I’m going in there to get my partner, and to get some payback for Robin while I’m at it.”

Payback for Robin. That was obviously shorthand for I’m going to kill anything that moves, and I want you to help me with the slaughter.

“You said Rex? You mean Rex Deprovdechuk? That little kid?”

Bryan nodded. “He’s the leader of the monsters, Marie’s Children, the things with the Zed chromosome that Robin told you about, whatever you want to call them. I don’t have time for this, John. I’m going to get Pookie. Those things in Erickson’s basement we told you about? Aggie says there are hundreds of them down there. That’s where I’m going. You can come with me, or you can leave.”

They’d taken Pookie. Robin hadn’t done anything to anyone, yet they’d killed her. She wasn’t the first person killed by Marie’s Children. The cult — or monsters, or whatever the hell they were — had a centuries-long history of murder. On top of those things, the man who had saved John’s life was asking for help.

John nodded. “I’m in.”

Bryan slapped him on the shoulder. “Good man. Let’s get geared up. Adam?”

Bryan walked to the back of the Magnum and everyone else followed. Another man, much older, got out of the back of the car. He walked with a cane. He offered his hand to John.

“Alder Jessup,” he said. “The younger fellow there is my grandson, Adam.”

John shook the older man’s hand, a normal action that seemed somehow bizarre considering the situation. “I’m John Smith.”

“Inspector John Smith,” Bryan said. “John is a cop.”

Adam rolled his eyes as he opened the back of the station wagon. “Another cop. If I was any luckier I’d piss rainbows and shit a pot of gold.”

The older man sighed. “Please excuse my grandson. He is on less-than-friendly terms with law enforcement.”

Metal pull-out drawers packed the Magnum’s payload area. Up on top of the drawers, in the narrow space where the driver could see out the rear window, sat Emma. Someone had bandaged the dog’s face, wrapping it with gauze and tape that was already stained with her blood.

Adam looked at Bryan. The rocker rubbed his hands together as if he were about to open a stack of presents on Christmas morning. “What do you need, cop?”

“Armor,” Bryan said. “Whatever you’ve got. And firepower.”

Adam started sliding out drawers as Emma looked down from her perch.

John looked all around, then back at the cases full of weapons, then at Bryan Clauser. A few hours ago, John had been cowering in his cozy, warm apartment. And now? “Bryan, are we really standing in a Walgreens parking lot passing out guns so we can find an underground complex and shoot monsters?”

Bryan nodded. “That’s right.”

“Hoo-kay,” John said. “Just wanted to clarify.”

Adam reached into a drawer and pulled out what looked like an M-16 on steroids.

“Jesus,” John said. “Is that an automatic shotgun?”

Bryan jerked his thumb at John. “Give that to him.”

Adam handed it to John, then passed over six full magazines. “That’s a USAS-Twelve. You know how to use one of those, Piggy Pigerson?”

“I’ll figure it out,” John said.

“Knives,” Bryan said.

Adam opened a smaller drawer to show three sheathed knives. “Only got three, and I get one.”

The old man reached out and tapped one with his cane. “I get one as well.”

Adam looked up. He didn’t look excited anymore. “Grampa, you can’t go in.”

The old man regally drew himself up to his full height. “I’ve been a part of this for my entire life. If there’s a chance we can find the home of these creatures and wipe them out, I’m going.”

“But, Grampa, you—”

Bryan reached in, took a knife and handed it hilt-first to Alder. “He knows the risks. We don’t have time for this.”

Adam looked angry, but he said nothing. He handed the last knife to John. John pulled the Ka-Bar out of its sheath. The flat-black blade absorbed the dim streetlights. Only the edge gleamed.

“A knife,” John said. “They eat bullets like candy, so you want me to stab them?”

Bryan nodded. “The knife is poisoned, just like the blade I put in big-head’s neck. Stab them in the heart, hold it in till they stop moving.”

John hoped he wouldn’t get close enough to put the blade to the test. He slid the knife back into its sheath, then attached the sheath to his belt.

Adam pulled out another drawer. Inside were three handguns just like the one Bryan had. Now John recognized them: FN five-sevens.

Bryan grabbed one, then held it in front of Aggie.

“Self-defense only,” Bryan said. “You will show us where to go, but I don’t expect you to fight. And if you point this weapon at me or anyone else here, even by accident, you’ll be dead before you have a chance to realize how stupid you are. Understand?”

A wide-eyed Aggie nodded and took the gun.

Bryan handed an FN to Alder, and one to John. Adam passed out magazines. John was running out of room to hold it all, so he made a little pile at his feet.

Adam again rubbed his hands together. “Now the good stuff.” He pulled a case out of the back and set it on the pavement in front of him. He opened it, then turned it toward the others as if it were a display case of fine jewelry.

John looked in the case and wondered if it wasn’t too late to get on his Harley and just start driving to anywhere but here.

Aggie leaned in. “Grenades?”

“Yup,” Adam said.

“Cool,” Aggie said. “Can I have one?”

Bryan shook his head. “Not for you.”

Adam pointed to the twelve grenades packed into the black foam in three rows of four. “Four thermite, four shrapnel, four concussion.”

Everyone but Aggie took one of each.

John looked down at his pile — USAS-12, FN five-seven, magazines for both, three grenades. “How the hell am I supposed to carry all this?”

Adam smiled. “That’s the best part.” He pulled out another long drawer, the biggest of them all. He reached in and handed over a bundle of cloth. John held it, let it unfold.

It was a dark green cloak with a hood.

“You’ve got to be shitting me,” he said.

“Put it on,” Bryan said. “When this is all done, you’re still a cop. You need to hide your face. It’s all armored up, might save your life.”

Adam handed another cloak to Alder, who rested his cane against the Magnum and started to put it on. Adam pulled one more thing out of the case — a jacket like Bryan’s.

“Hey,” John said, nodding at the jacket, “can’t I have that instead?”

Adam shook his head. “I made it, I get to wear it.” He slid it on, then looked at John. “Put on the goddamn cloak already.”

John did. He slid into the sleeves The front zipper turned out to be magnetic, a simple strip that sealed tight when he pressed it together. Inside the cloak, he found several deep pockets. He scooped up his toys and put them away.

Bryan took off his hat. He undid the mask and looked at the dangling fabric. “Adam, you got a marker? Something I can use to draw on this?”

Adam looked at him with a why would you want that expression, but he didn’t say a word. Instead, he reached for another case, opened it, then handed over a white paint pen. “Will that do?”

John watched Bryan take the pen, look at it, and smile. It wasn’t a healthy smile.

“Time to go,” Bryan said. “John, you’re in the car with us.”

Bryan opened the back door. “Aggie, in the middle. We need to talk on the way there.”

Aggie got in, followed by Bryan. Alder climbed in the other side, leaving John the front passenger seat. John looked at his Harley and wondered again if he should just get on it and get the hell out of here. His apartment was ten minutes away. He’d spent six years afraid of his own shadow, and now Bryan wanted him to go into tunnels and shoot monsters?

John wanted to leave, but he couldn’t — not if they had Pookie.

He got in the car and shut the door.

Bryan sat in the back, drenched in shadow. He took off his hat, opened the pen, then started to draw something on the mask. “Aggie, while we drive, you tell me everything you can about what happened to you in those tunnels, about everything you saw. Adam, get us to the Civic Center station, fast.”

The Magnum’s big engine growled as the station wagon rolled out of the Walgreens parking lot.