It all started in Ragnog, fueled Ragnog, and would end in Ragnog.
Under the tutelage of Kelsey McNally, the squad memorized the town. They learned every street and every building in the downtown area. They divided Ragnog into nine divisions and each member of the team had to remember the area allocated to them. Their training, map reconnaissance, and confidence in each other drove away any fears that began to creep into their minds as they thought about armed conflict with a powerful cartel.
Their map survey of the town may have been extensive but none of them had set foot in Ragnog. None of the nine had stepped foot in Ragnog.
From their time working for the Governor, the squad knew the diverse geography of Oklahoma. They had studied its regions. Still, they could not help but feel like they were going into an entirely different world as they drove from western Oklahoma through the Wichita Mountains, and finally down into Kiamichi country. They could feel tension grow as they drove closer towards their objective. They could not only feel it in themselves, but they seemed to sense in people as they neared Ragnog.
People in western Oklahoma had noticed the black SUV but carried on with their business. But, as the vehicle was closing into Ragnog, people of McCurtain County saw their vehicle and took pause.
The squad stopped at a Mexican restaurant in Idabel. They began flirting with the waitress, a young and beautiful woman. The waitress had dark features, and the Squad assumed she was Hispanic. Almost immediately Martinez and Chance started speaking in Spanish in an attempt to impress her. The waitress shook her head, laughing at them, and stated she only spoke English. It was a cute way of giving them the cold shoulder, but they were too arrogant to understand. Finally, as the meal came to a close, she asked them where they were headed.
“Got business just outside of Ragnog," said Books.
“Ragnog?" she asked.
"Ragnog," said Chance.
“No, no, no,” she said shaking her head. Each time she repeated the word, her Mexican accent came out stronger, “Es un ciudad de miedo y noche.”
She covered her face with her hands, and almost in an instant, an assistant manager came to her wrapping his arms around her and staring at the nine men that stood in front of her.
“What did you say to her?” the manager intensely stared at them they thought he must have been her brother.
“No,” she said shaking her head, “Ragnog, son tienan trabajo circa de Ragnog.”
“Mis hermanos,” said her manager, “your travel plans upset her. I apologize. Please, we will pay for the meal-”
"No, we will -" started Chance.
“No, sir, we insist -” he was interrupted by his sister who whispered something into his ear. “She says we will pay. She insists, and she insists you take this as well.”
Pulling her necklace from her neck, she placed it on Chance's neck.
“No puedo tiene un crucifix, soy un protestanto -" started Chance.
“Calle!!” screamed the man as held his sister, “mi hermano. Do not insult my sister by refusing her gift. She pleads for you to avoid that town.”
"We must go that way -" said Salvador.
“Idiota!” she cried, “there is nothing for you but death, do not go into Ragnog!”
Chance made no reply but looked at his comrades. No one replied. No one was mature enough to know how to respond to this woman who was in apparent despair.
“Yeah, sure, we’ll avoid it,” said Chance.
The girl continued to cry in the arms of her brother, the brother could see that Chance was lying, and his visage did not soften. He was just glad his sister could not see Chance's face as he lied to her. Still lost, and not knowing what to do, Chance softly patted the woman’s back. Soon, they were on their way. The brother stood still, comforting his sister, as the squad exited the restaurant.
"What do you think about that?" asked Salvador as they climbed back into the SUV.
"Hysterics and mysticism will not sway me," said Chance, as he looked down orcs at his crucifix. "We have come too far. We must go into Ragnog."
CHAPTER 6: RAGNOG, PART II
Gavan - Ragnog, Oklahoma
The squad was overwhelmed by the waitress’ reaction and they rode in silence. For sixty hard days they had trained, running no less than three miles a day and hitting the weights, but none of their training had prepared them for her. This woman had hit them harder than any of the strikes they had thrown. Chance had been hit pretty hard while training in Muay Thai. Hard power kicks against the legs had drained him physically, destroyed his stamina, and shaken him up mentally. But, this woman had hit harder than that. She was the sucker punch they hadn't seen coming.
Chance sat silently in the passenger seat, holding the crucifix, trying to recover from the blows.
He had grown up attending the church of Christ. He was sure his parents and mentors would have been ashamed of his arrogance and the refusal of the woman's gift. While it may have been Catholic in origin, the gift brought Chance back to the faith of his youth. He sat silently with the crucifix in his fingers, his eyes tracing every inch of it.
“Alright, we’re almost there,” said Kelsey McNally.
“What’s the first thing you want to do?” asked Chance.
“Let’s go get some intel,” said Martinez.
“How do you plan on doing that?” asked Compton.
“Let’s hit the bar," said Martinez.
Chance sat silently, thinking about the offer. His face showed his repulsion at the suggestion.
"Chance, you alright, bro?" asked Compton.
He bowed his head, looking down away from his friend. He tucked the crucifix into his shirt, hidden from his sight. "Yeah, Preacher. We can go.”
The bars in Ragnog were not like the small-town bars in the rest of Oklahoma. Something was different about the people who entered the bar. They looked like ordinary people in the way they dressed, but there was something in their facial expressions that gave the squad the chills. They appeared healthy in outward appearance, but their eyes told a different story. Their glassy stares reminded Q of horses he had broken back in Spencer. Something about them was unstable.
"Dude," said Pickett, "there is no one drinking in this bar."
Chance looked around and came to the same realization.
"And what is with this music?" Chance asked.
The music comprised primitive tribal music, a drum beat, and foreign tongues shouting in rhythm.
“You must be from out of town,” said the bartender.
The squad stumbled over their words as they tried to avoid the truth.
“Just driving through,” said Chance.
"Well, I can tell you that the whole town of Ragnog is glad you're here."
"What does that mean?" asked Martinez.
Another man from the town stood up. "Nothing, pardner. Ragnog is just glad you're here. We're a tight-knit community, but we are always welcoming of….guests."
Martinez pulled back, his face showing his puzzlement.
"Here, I don't drink, but please," said the man, "have a beer on me."
The man's voice and expression were blank, but there was apparent interest in the out-of-towners who had arrived in Ragnog.
An older woman reached out and gently grabbed Pickett by his wrist. "Yes, son! We are so glad you are here."
Pickett looked down at his wrist and then up at her. He was mad at himself for letting anyone get that close, and instantly he shook her off his wrist and began to create a distance from her. As Pickett inched away from her, he bumped into a large, bearded man with a trucker-style hat. The man had the same blank stare and smiled when he came into contact with Pickett.
"Glad to see you here," said the man, and placed his hand on Pickett's shoulder, "glad to see you all here."
The squad began to posture themselves for a fight, as the room grew more uncomfortable despite the attempt at hospitality.
"Please, have a drink," said the bartender.
�
��No, my friend,” said Martinez. "I do not feel like drinking tonight."
"Please don't be ugly," said the old woman "We are excited about your presence in our town."
The old woman reached her hand out and touched Martinez' shoulder.
"Mujera! Get off me!" cried Martinez and he brushed her hand off and stepped back.
There were now easily twenty people in the bar, who were inching towards them. The scene felt like an old sci-fi film, with apparent mindless people stumbling towards them. Martinez reached down and drew the concealed pistol from its holster.
There was no shock from the crowd. Instead of running away, the group continued to close in on the team. Other members of the squad drew their weapons too.
"Get back!" screamed Tex, as he drew his .357 Magnum from his waistband. "I will make a Picasso-style masterpiece with your brains if you step any closer!"
Ragnogians made no emotional outburst. They remained as they kept shuffling forward in their semi-catatonic state as the Texhoman drew the hand-cannon.
"Stop!" screamed a voice.
This voice was not coming from any of the squad members. It came from behind the crowd and Chance looked up.
A long-haired man clad in a black biker-style vest, jeans and boots stood behind the crowd. Just as he had screamed, the group stopped moving towards the Frat Squad.
The Squad still had their weapons in hand. Even so, they turned their back to the Squad and walked towards the long-haired man.
"I've seen that man before," said Compton. That biker. When we trained in Tonkawa, I met him there."
"That's on a completely different part of the state," said Aldridge.
"I know, and yes, that is weird," said Compton, "but not as weird as this."
"It's as if they are possessed a collective mind," said Aldridge.
The crowd walked past them ignoring his condescending remark.
"Let's get out of here," whispered Chance.
The squad moved back to their SUV with weapons still drawn.
They moved with their backs to the SUV and their weapons facing towards the crowd. When they got to their vehicle, Tex and Chance allowed everyone else to enter while they stood guard. Martinez started the car and slammed on the gas, speeding away from the bar.
"What is this place?" asked Tex.
"That old woman was dressed like she was going to a PTA meeting," said Pickett.
"Let's avoid that bar," said Martinez, "do we have any access to GPS?"
"No," said Kelsey McNally, "and these roads are nothing like the maps we studied."
As if on cue, the SUV rolled over the curb of a sidewalk.
"Elm Street," said McNally, "I tried to memorize the whole town, but this was not the section I was supposed to memorize specifically. This Elm Street is not like the one that I studied. Do you know how much time it would take to develop new curves in the street?"
"And there is no sign of any construction. No signs. Nothing," said Books.
"Those maps that I found were only a year old," said Kelsey. "In a year, the town has changed so much that we cannot recognize it. Our map reconnaissance is worthless!"
"This town is different in another way too," said Aldridge. "There are no churches. That is pretty weird for Oklahoma, would you not agree?"
"That is not true," said Preacher, "look over there."
Preacher raised his hand and pointed his finger and it began to shake noticeably.
"That doesn't look like a church to me," said Chance.
"That is what the sign says. The church of Ragnog" said Preacher. "Aldridge, what do you think about the architecture?"
"It is not typical evangelical Christian architecture," said Aldridge.
"That looks like the type of church your pagan ancestors would have worshipped in. Viking," said Pickett to Chance.
"I did not see that church on any satellite images," said Kelsey McNally, "this building would have been talked about by anyone that dared come into this town."
"Then that means this church is new," said Aldridge.
"It doesn't look new. It seems like something from a Lovecraftian world reached out and grabbed this town," said Chance.
"What do we do now?" asked Martinez.
"Well, I don't want to go into that bar again," said Chance, "the word culture stems from the word 'cult'; if we know what people think, we know how they will act. If we know what is in their heart, then we know everything. I think, instead of bars, we should have been looking someplace else."
"That church?" asked Martinez, "you want to send us into that church?"
Chance nodded.
"I agree with the Viking," said Frank. "I think our answers to Ragnog all go back to that church."
"We can't all go in there," said Chance. "We'll send some back to the hotel. They can pull security and get some sleep. Aldridge and Preacher will go to the church because they know philosophy, law, and language, then they’ll tell us more about the town’s culture. And then myself and Tex."
"Why us two?" asked Tex. "I am not a superstitious person, but I do not want to go anywhere near that building."
"Neither do I," said Chance, "but if something bad happens, you can blow us a hole in that church."
“We aren’t armed heavily enough,” said Martinez.
“Martinez, we have the munitions of an infantry squad," said Tex.
"Yeah, in the army we were trained to fight in three to one odds. Those numbers change with the number of munitions and a capable rate of fire, but it was never a good idea for a squad to take on an entire town,” said Martinez
***
The next morning, four members of the team were selected to go to church and they dressed up to go.
"But there's no way they know about us, right? At the end of the day, how do they know we don't belong in Ragnog?” asked Tex.
They stopped in front of the Ragnog church, and Frank got into the SUV.
"Well, Preacher, how was the church?" asked Chance.
"It was an experience," said Frank, his voice ringing with an accent the squad was unaccustomed to.
"Did you run into your family?" asked Martinez. "Because you just dropped back into a hick-accent that none of us has ever heard you speak in."
“Sorry, I must be...must be excited,” said Preacher.
“Excited? Some girl in there get your blood pressure up?” asked Chance.
“Yeah, I guess you could say that. That’s the first time I’ve ever seen stained glass windows in a Baptist church building before,” said Compton.
“It’s that weird?” asked Chance.
“The stained glass windows themselves? No, not really. The pictures, yeah,” said Preacher.
“The pictures?” asked Aldridge.
"Look. Baptists are Pre-Millenialists. Pre-Millennialists love to talk about the 1,000-year reign, and all of that good end-of-the-world stuff, but they had some sort of dragon on ‘em ‘er walls.”
“What?” asked Aldridge.
"I'm sorry, I'm just a little spooked, maybe gettin' a little riled up. My accent starts getting strong," said Compton.
“They had a dragon on their stained glass windows?” asked Aldridge.
"Yeah, but that wasn't as bad as other things," said Preacher.
“Dude, you have a minor in linguistics, why are you talking like that?” Aldridge asked.
"Funny, you should mention that. I got to use some of my linguistics training today -"
“Were they speaking in tongues?” asked Tex.
"You could say that," he said, shaking his head.
Martinez noticed that Frank's hands were visibly shaking.
"They were speaking in some language I had never heard before. It was rough and ugly, but the whole congregation was speaking and singing in it."
"Frank, we've been driving around all morning, and we have seen no one out. Was everyone at church?" asked Tex.
"Don't mock the name of churches everywhere by calling that building that. That's so
me sort of cult. This whole town, the town of Ragnog, is some sort of cult!" said Preacher.
Martinez, Tex, and Chance looked at each other, not sure what to say. They did not want to offend Frank by remaining silent, and they also did not want to contradict him in his present state of fear.
“You don’t believe me?” asked Frank.
The Dark Lord of Oklahoma Page 14
