by Kate Danley
"Oh honey, but I have some things at the register. And then we can all go for weinerschnitzel and pretzels!"
I breathed deep and looked back at Killian. The coward was pretending like he didn't know us and that a plastic, backlit, sparkle motion Last Supper picture was faaar more interesting than it has any business being.
"Oh look, Mom," I pointed out my partner in the hopes she would 'get' that we were here in an official capacity. "Killian came by to say hello."
"Killian! Glad to see you were able to make it. When are you going to ask that daughter of mine out?"
"She has turned me down," he diplomatically replied.
"Oh, I have visions of you two..."
"We are about to become nothing more than a vision if you don't get out of here right away," I hissed, trying to hustle her in the direction of "not inside the shop we were about to raid" direction.
"Temper temper, Maggie." Mom clucked her tongue and turned to my partner. "Is she always this way?"
"She is."
"Well, maybe you can do better..."
I didn't have a chance to point out fraternizing between co-workers is frowned upon in the workplace because as I turned around, there was my mark.
Fritz came out from the back room carrying a large beer stein. He got one gander of me and ran the other direction. I took off after him in a flat sprint.
But it turns out that I wasn't the only one after him. The door tinkled and opened again and in walked a sight that made my eyes feel sorry.
Two vampires. Strike that. Werepires. They were vampires, but they were walking in the sun, and the only guys who were able to do that these days were the renegades my old landlord created under the light of a full moon when he got the werewolves to bite the vampires and the vampires to bite the werewolves and they all turned into one unhappy family under the watchful eye of their patriarch, the vampire Vaclav.
"Are you fucking kidding me?" I said, putting my hand on my silver stake.
"Step aside, Maggie MacKay!" one of the werepires hissed. "This one is ours."
"I've got a warrant for his arrest, boys," I lied, not knowing how aware werepires were of the World Walker implosion. "I'm afraid unless you want to turn this into an interdimensional legal issue, I'm going to need you to step back."
"No one will know you were ever here if you're dead."
So, there was a point to their logic, but there's an unspoken rule that once you get threatened by a vampire, you're pretty much in the legal clear for whatever remedial action you decide to take. And I decided the threat was real enough from these fine un-gentlemen that whatever vigilante justice I dished out would hold up if the courts decided to hassle me on the whole "you're not supposed to punch vampires when your license has been revoked" technicality. I took out my silver stake. "Let's do this," I said.
"MAGGIE!" I heard my mom cry. I spun around and Fritz had his arm wrapped around her neck and a gun pointed at her head.
"I thought you were looking after her, Killian!" I shouted. I turned and saw that Killian was slumped on the floor. I turned back to Fritz. "What the fuck did you do to him?"
"Some magical objects are a little more useful than others," the sly little German replied.
I picked up the closest statue off the shelf and chucked it at his elbow. It crashed against the wall and broke into a million pieces.
"Maggie! That was a Hummel!" said my mom, aghast.
It was the sign the werepires seemed to be waiting for because suddenly, it was a free-for-all melee of disastrous proportions. I don't know who was fighting who. I picked up an old golf club and just began swinging. I didn't want those werepires anywhere near my mom. I had a feeling that they didn't mind casualties if it meant they got their man. And Fritz was my man. I needed to get out of my sister's guest room and I swear to god I wasn't about to let those bastards get my prize.
I blocked one of the werepires by shoving a vase in his jaws just as they were about to close on my throat.
"MAGGIE! That's Wedgewood!"
"I'm trying to save your life!" I shouted back at Mom.
"Do it without breaking things! Do you have any idea how much I could sell those for on eBay?"
Suddenly, there was a grinding sound. The two, crap-laden shelves on the farthest end of the wall opened and out stepped a clockwork man. It was so not what any of us were expecting that we all just stopped.
He was over six feet tall and made of wood. In one hand he held a wooden stake, in the other, a gun. I suddenly realized the cuckoo clock we had been sent to recover wasn't going to fit into the trunk of my Dad's car. Next time, I was going to make sure Trovac provided us with pictures to scale.
"You have ten seconds to get out of my shop before I decide that your time has run out," Fritz shouted.
"You have my mom," I pointed out.
She patted Fritz's arm. "Oh, don't you worry about me, Maggie. As soon as you're gone, he's going to ring me up and everything will be just fine."
"No, I'm not," he said with confusion.
"Yes, you are," she replied. "You just don't know it yet."
The clockwork man began walking forward and showered a hail of bullets our general direction. I dove for the ground as the shelves above my head exploded, grabbed Killian around the armpits, and dragged him outside.
The werepires were out before us and the door slammed shut behind me. I heard the lock turn with finality.
The werepires looked at me. "No one shall leave Little Bavaria alive." And then they took off, running down the alley and leaving Killian and me alone with nothing but the garbage and the smell of rotting milk. In the distance came the tinny sound of an oompah record playing over bad, outdoor speakers.
I have no idea what they meant by their little warning since, as far as could figure out, we were all alive, but I wasn't about to call them back to clarify their parting shot.
Instead, I began slapping Killian's cheeks lightly in the hopes of getting him to wake up. His eyes began to blink and he pushed aside my hands. "Stop it, Maggie. I am sleepy."
He then tried to curl up into the fetal position, tucking his arm under his head as a pillow.
I was having none of that. "The slapping will continue until the consciousness state improves."
The elf grumbled and whined, but I kept hitting him and eventually, he pulled himself up into a sitting position. "Why won't you allow me to sleep, Maggie? I am so tired..."
"That jackhole threw a whammy at you, Killian, and if I let you succumb, you might be out like Rip Van Winkle and I can't afford to have you out like Rip Van Winkle."
I picked myself up and brushed off my pants and held out my hand to my partner. We needed to get him up and walking. He rubbed the back of his head.
"That magical artifact packs a wallop," he said. He took my hand and staggered to his feet, then allowed me to help him stumble down the alleyway. The distance from the shop seemed to do him a little good. He jumped up and down and slapped his sides with his arms like he had been caught in a blizzard and was trying to warm up. "How do you humans endure all of these magical attacks?" he groaned. "And why is everyone throwing magical attacks at me?"
"Probably because you hang out with me."
"I may need to rethink our partnership, Maggie."
"I've been saying that since day one." I walked back over to the shop window and crouched down. I peered through the glass and tried to see around the piles of crap. "So, my mom's been kidnapped... again."
"Your family seems to be kidnapped a great deal."
"They hang out with me, too."
"Again, there should be a reevaluation..."
"They're family. They're stuck."
"Allow me to repeat myself..." Killian replied.
He dodged the small stone I aimed at his feet.
"I can't believe there were werepires inside," I remarked. "Why the hell are the werepires after the same guy we're after?"
Killian was suddenly very alert. "Werepires? Here? Which w
ay did they go?"
I waved off his concerns. "That direction. Somewhere. They were done."
"Should we go after them?" Killian asked, looking down the alleyway.
I shook my head. "Mom's inside," I reminded him. "Let's wait and see if she comes out or if we need to burn this muthafuckah to the ground." I turned back to the store and took out my gun. "She seemed to know what was going to happen," I continued. "I have no idea why she thought it was a good idea to be at the center of the action, but who knows why my mother does anything." I shook my head. "She was spitting mad at me for busting up that shop. I'm almost scared of what she's going to say when we get her free." I took stock of our surroundings. "Okay, Killian, we need to see if there is a back door we can slip into. Or that they have slipped out of."
But it turned out, we didn't need to do a damned thing, because suddenly my mom came wandering out of the shop with her purchase in a tidy paper bag. She gave me a friendly wave. "Ah! There you are!"
I holstered my gun and ran towards her. "Are you okay?"
She looked at me like I had lost my frickin' mind. "Of course I am!" she replied. "I told you I would be fine. Why doesn't anyone listen to me anymore?"
Killian nodded sympathetically.
I still hadn't quite made the transition from 'your mom's been kidnapped' to 'everything's fine.' My heart was still racing in my chest. "How did you talk him out of whatever he was getting ready to do?"
"I had a coupon," she replied, like that explained everything.
"What?"
"I had a coupon! Part of his VIP group. Everyone hates a bad Groupon review."
"You threatened him with a bad Groupon review and that was enough to make him set you free?"
"They are all about customer service here," she said, like that explained everything. "I won't see you for dinner for a couple weeks, but do try to stop by Mindy's once you finish up here, would you? I hate to think of you having to cook for yourself after all you're about to go through."
"What are we going to have to go through?" I asked, looking between here and Killian and back again.
"Oh, I can't tell you that," she replied. "But it is going to be a mess, because you can never do things halfway, can you, Maggie?" She looked at Killian. "And don't marry that Queen of yours, Killian. I mean, I know you already know that, I know you're trying to keep your head low, but when it happens, don't let her force you into it. It will just be bad news for you."
"Mom?" I asked nervously. "What are you talking about?"
"You'll work it out," she answered. She took her bags and forced one into my arms and one into Killian's. "There are a couple things in here you'll both need."
"Is that why you were here?" I asked. "To give us bags full of stuff?"
"Of course!" she replied, puzzled by my bewilderment. "I knew you were going to need all this and it's not like your bank account has the sorts of funds to cover such a thing. Just say thank you, Maggie."
I peered into the bag and saw a couple days worth of clean clothes and some toiletries. "Um... thank you...?"
She patted Killian's cheek. "Also, it would have turned out much differently if he had taken you hostage instead of me. I like you, Killian. Maggie would never have recovered from what that future would have been."
Now it was Killian's turn to get a little uncomfortable. "Thank you for... preemptively saving my life...?"
"Anytime." She swung her bag over her shoulder and gave us a wink. "See you two crazy lovebirds in a couple weeks!"
She walked out of sight and Killian and I just watched her go. He turned to me. "I am not sure whether I enjoy having you being related to someone who is able to peer into the future or am terrified by it."
"Welcome to my world," I replied.
We turned back to look at Little Bavaria not entirely sure what to do now.
"Did you see the cuckoo clock?" Killian asked.
"Yeah. It appears to actually be a part of the building and it houses a wooden soldier who fires silver bullets."
"Ah."
We stood in silence for a bit more.
I opened up the bag. "Oh look. Mom got you a neckguard."
Chapter Seven
We sat in the quiet of the Hawaiian family restaurant. The gentle, swaying tunes of a ukulele drifted from the speakers overhead. A tropical fish bobbed around in a large tank flanked by indoor banana trees. Warm, sweet rolls sat upon the table. This place was a SoCal institution since the 1960s. We had swung by the bakery shop before sitting down. Killian was now hugging the swirl loaf of rainbow-colored bread we had picked up for Mindy as a thank you gift tightly to his chest. Took "comfort food" to a whole new level.
"WHY DID YOUR MOTHER PURCHASE ME A NECKGUARD???" Killian hissed at me.
The waiter, a large Pacific Islander wearing a turquoise shirt covered in emerald palm fronds, stopped by. He held up a stainless steel carafe and asked in his soft, lilting voice, "Can I get you some Kona coffee?" Killian and I both shoved our mugs his direction. He poured as he continued, "Pineapple cake? We're also running a special on our Spam sushi and tuna poke?"
"We'll have all of that. Also the Huli Huli chicken, the Katsu curry, and double the cake. And if you leave us with that coffee jug, it'll save you a lot of trips," I said, folding up my menu and handing it to him. He cheerfully wrote it all down, left the metal thermos, and gave me an understanding smile as he walked away. Listen, it's best to be fully stocked up when you're about to eat your feelings.
"Poke?" Killian hissed at me. "As you might say, we need to 'poke' all of those VAMPIRES, Maggie! Evidently, the threat to my life is dire enough to warrant a neck guard!"
"Listen, Killian," I said, resting my elbows on the table. "Mom's present doesn't mean a thing."
He shook the paperback holding his neckguard at me. "How can a gift like this be meaningless?"
It's a rough day when you realize your body isn't made of impenetrable steel. "Your neck was scratched by the succubi in the fairy forest," I reminded him. "It just means you have to be a little more careful. Think of it as a 'coming of age' gift...like a training bra. Except for your neck. And the support is more in the form of you not dying. Congratulations!"
"Did your mother see me perishing in the future?" Killian asked, returning to squeezing his bread a little tighter.
I reached out and pried the loaf out his arms, placed it between us, and tried to fluff it back into shape. "Naw. She does stuff like this all the time, just to remind folks to keep alert."
"She inferred that if she had not been at the store, something terrible would have happened to me."
"Killian," I said, trying to break it to him gently. "You're not practically immortal anymore. ANY normal human in that situation would have been in for a bad time."
Killian began rocking back and forth and shaking his head. "I was not meant to be mortal. I was never meant to be mortal."
"You're going to be just fine."
He held out his hands, which were trembling. "Is this an acceptable reaction?"
"You just had too much coffee," I tried to assure him. "Here. Have another cup. To settle your nerves."
"Is that how caffeine works for humans?" he asked as I poured.
"No. But it is what I do," I replied. "Sooner or later, if you have enough either you crash or your heart pops."
"Maybe we should feed some coffee to some vampires," said Killian, warming his hands on his cup.
"I'll check and see if that's a thing," I replied. "We might just end up getting some really alert undead types who are up all night banging on our door."
"They already do that."
"Well, even more so."
Killian wiped his face. "Maggie, I do not know if I am of assistance to you in this condition. I fell unconscious beneath a magic spell while werepires were in the building. I was unable to aid you in freeing your mother. You had to drag me out of the shop so that I was not killed..."
I waved his concerns away as our gentle giant of a waiter broug
ht us our first course. When he had walked away, I reminded Killian, "You have saved my life more times than I can count. This is just new and you're not used to the experience. Don't worry, Killian. It will get better."
"Before or after my weakness allows you to perish? Maggie, I would never be able to forgive myself if something like that were to happen."
"I know," I replied, still trying to soothe him.
He motioned to a purple bruise on his arm. "It hurts."
I tried to calm him. "You'll heal, Killian. And while I would much rather have eased you into this experience battling the forces of evil as a human, well... here we are."
"I never should have gone to that job interview in Little Bavaria."
"That's what I tried to tell you."
"It is quite a commute."
"I KNOW."
"And the whole dying thing?"
"That, too. But that's why Mom got you the neckguard. To help."
"We need new employment..." Killian muttered, pouring practically the whole sugar shaker into his coffee.
The waiter came back, arms filled with luau sized portions of Hawaiian fare. We paused as he filled the table. He seemed to have overheard the tail end of our conversation, though. "You looking for a new job, bro? We're hiring."
Killian looked at me like he was actually considering it. He motioned to basket of sweet rolls. "They have very nice bread."
"No," I said, holding my hand over the basket so I wouldn't be tempted by the doughy goodness to make a decision I might regret. "No. No more food industry."
"It ain't so bad," said the waiter.
"I know!" I replied, trying to figure out how to tell him it wasn't the food industry, it was potentially being the food in the food industry that wasn't sitting right with me. "We just had a really, really bad time at our last job and are reeeally thinking maybe it's time to go back to school. In medical transcription. Or something."
"Like on the television!"
"Yeah. We saw an ad last night. It looks like a safer choice for us."
"I feel you," he said, filling up our already full coffee cups. "But let me know if you change your mind. Always need people with experience."
