by J. D. Oliva
“Are you okay?"
Cody looked over and saw Abi. It wasn't the happy childhood memory from a few seconds earlier, but it was nice to see nonetheless.
"I think so."
The creature was gone, and the world around them seemed solid again. Nick was the first to get back to his feet. He looked himself over, making sure his hands and fingers were still intact. He gazed around the warehouse seeing if they were still alone. When he was sure they were, he exhaled. It was a sigh so loud and dramatic that it sounded like he'd been holding his breath for minutes. Though, he may have been.
"What. The Fuck. Was That?" He asked.
They helped each other back to their feet and shared an awkward smile. Cody looked to his feet and saw the two by four. He grabbed hold of the broken board and proudly lifted it up. In that moment, he might as well have been holding Excalibur. He looked over it, knowing he'd just vanquished a translucent Mordred.
"I have no freaking clue," Cody said. "Some kinda skanky-looking banshee?"
"I think it was a vampire," Nick said.
"Don't be stupid. Vampires aren't made of blue...stuff," Cody added.
"Oh, but I suppose Skanky Banshees are?"
"She was a Djinn," Abi said.
"A what?" Cody asked
"You mean a genie? Like in Aladdin?" Nick asked.
"Sorta. In my religion, we have these demons. They're kinda like angels, but they don't have like a shape or anything. They're made of smokeless fire."
"What the hell is smokeless fire?" Nick asked.
"I'd say that's a pretty good description of whatever that thing was," Cody said.
"It's where the genie stories came from. When the Djinn refused to bow down before Allah, they were punished and made to walk between worlds unless they were trapped by a person. They're like living, evil magic."
"But we killed it, right?" Cody asked.
"Maybe."
“If that didn't kill her, where did she go?" Nick added.
"Are there more of them?" Cody piled on.
"Why are they here?" It came back around to Nick.
"I don't know!" Abi said. "Five minutes ago, I thought it was just a story."
"Abi, in your religion, how do people kill Djinns?" Cody asked very seriously.
"That's the thing. You can't kill a Djinn."
"Then what did we just do?" Cody asked.
"We might have made things worse," Abi said.
XXXIX
A group of fifth-graders ran screaming through the Texas Chainsaw Thanksgiving display. Each one clad in different Avengers outfits. Ironman outpaced the rest of the team, breezing past both Captain America and Thor. The sound of the chainsaw came roaring from behind. The assailant's face was covered by a World War I-era gas mask, hiding his features from the shrieking heroes. He swung the chainsaw wildly over his head, flailing about like Leatherface himself, only with a missing blade. He was just part of the show, even if this wasn't supposed to be his role. The fifth graders ran screaming into another room.
Bo Slater pulled his mask off and took a deep breath, not that he needed to breathe, it was a habit he'd picked up over the years. Sometimes pretending to be human was so consuming that he often forgot how not to be human.
Bo smiled as he licked the edges of his protruding buck teeth. It had been a few days since the Slater's opened their version of the Haunted Hallow and to his surprise, he hadn't killed anyone yet. He was having far too much fun in the chaos. It was always the chase that excited him more than the act. Sure, he had to eat eventually. Though, Kyra had killed more than enough people tonight to make up for anything that Bo hadn't accomplished on his own. Still, he did have to eat, but not this little league. There was no fun in eating kids. Small meals that brought on far too many questions, Roscoe was right about that. It was one of the few things that he was ever right about, as far as Bo was concerned.
Roscoe pulled Bo from home about thirty years ago. He had only been with the family a short time, in comparison to other members. It had been probably fifteen years since they tried pulling someone else over from their home. After Gus Slater died, an old timer who played Bo's uncle for a few years during their days wandering across West Texas, Bo asked if they were going to pull anymore over. Roscoe shot it down. He didn't want anyone else. He didn't need anyone else. That's what it was always about: what Roscoe wanted. They traveled where he wanted. They hatched plans that Roscoe thought up. They took as many family members as Roscoe thought they needed. The whole Slater clan was built to meet Roscoe’s desires. It was his right. Roscoe figured out how to come over into the human world. He wasn't the first, but he was one of the few to make the jump without being enslaved to any human. Bo had been here long enough to hear the stories of his people bound to chains, lamps, and other types of inanimate objects that ancient wizards used to entrap their kind. Bo knew they didn't belong here. Their bodies didn't hold up in this place, but back home they were slaves. Eternal creatures forged in the birth of existence, subservient to a real monster. That's why so many were willing to be slaves in this world. It's what their kind knew. Back home, they had no purpose, just existence. Roscoe figured out how to jump from their world to here. He knew how to bind themselves to people, using their bodies like the old wizards used chains and lamps. It was his plan. The only problem was, it was a boring plan. They travel around the country, pretending to be stereotypical Southerners, make a few kills and move on. You run into problems, jump into a new body. It was simple. Maybe too simple. At least they were free.
But why were there only three of them here? Why wouldn't Roscoe pull hundreds, even thousands of them over here where they could run wild? Where they could be free. Where they could rule. Bo knew the answer. Roscoe didn't want to do that. This world was Roscoe's playground and the only ones who could come over were whoever could help him get what he wanted. Roscoe set the pace for everything and made every decision. The only reason they were even in the Hallow was because Bo had figured out that if he was ever going to do something he wanted to do, he was going to have to convince the boss the whole thing was Roscoe's idea. Bo had the whole plan the moment he saw that yellow poster in the junior high, but there was no way Roscoe was going to go for it, unless Bo set enough breadcrumbs for him to follow. Roscoe was so arrogant he never considered anyone else could think on his level. Whatever. Roscoe was in charge and when you no longer served his purpose, you were gone. What gone meant, Bo wasn't sure. He didn't think his people could die, not in the same way that the humans did.
That's what they did. Their schemes, their plans, didn't matter. These fleshy beings, these things, these people were just food. If they killed them, so what, they were going to die eventually. Wasn't it better that they died feeding the immortals rather than just dropping dead because their shells were so weak? If they saw it from Bo's perspective, they'd get it. He saw how the humans treated animals and insects, creatures beneath them. They didn't value life, outside their own. They certainly didn't value freedom. They were exactly like the Slaters, just on a lower rung. They were toys for them to play with, and Bo was having a lot of fun. But he wasn't feeding. Not yet. Playing with his food was the only way Bo could really rebel against Roscoe without getting himself in trouble.
But he knew his time was coming. Bo was getting frustrated with the endless cycle and was voicing his displeasure more and more. It wasn't like he was trying to fight against Roscoe. That would be stupid. He was far too strong and understood what he could do with his body much better than either him or Kyra. Bo knew his usefulness was running out. So did Kyra, who spent forty plus years as a heavyset middle-aged Gillian. Now she reinvented herself as a hot, little blonde. Pretty damn smart on her part. If Bo was as brave as he liked to think, he'd jump into a new body and start doing his own thing. Rebelling against Roscoe was a scary thought. Who knew what he was really capable of doing. Scary as he was, the threat of an angry Roscoe was nothing compared to the thought of the Byzantine, and that's what was wa
iting for him back home.
SKKKRRREEEEE
Bo knew Kyra's cry. He'd heard it many times over the years, including just after he found that yellow poster that led them here. Bo perked his ears up, trying to locate the scream's source. Something sounded different. Her sound echoed and was much flatter than normal. It wasn't rumbling throughout the building like usual. Her voice was distant, trapped. That's when Bo knew where she was. There was a small mirror mounted on the wall behind him. Mirrors. It always sounded so corny. They couldn't look into a mirror for any extended period of time. It was like shining a flashlight directly into the center of the glass pane. The light would bounce back and forth from source to surface, and could be blinding to a human eye. Inside these fleshy husks, they were creatures of pure light and energy. Bounce that back and forth thousands times over and you create a force that bends time and space, reality breaks down. The mirror reflects something that should not be there in the first place. It was a violation of nature and the fabric of reality. That's how Roscoe figured out how to jump over in the first place. The mirrors reveal too much, especially to the people back home. There's a chance you could be pulled back through if you lost your shell. That's how each family member who was no longer with them met their end. It wasn't hard for Bo to fill in the blanks. He only had a minute before they started looking for him.
"What the hell did you do?"
Bo didn't look directly into the mirror, just in its general direction, but that was enough. He saw her, right in the center of the glass. There was Kyra in all her true glory. A blue shapeless mass of broken light moving like liquid behind the reflection.
"HEEEELLLLLLPPPPPP!! SKKKKKKRRRRREEEE!!!"
Bo tried not to look into the mirror. Instead, he watched the corners of the room bleed into the air, melting before him. He quickly threw the gas mask back on his head, hoping it would help contain any energy that might spill out from him. His eyes peered down one last time and saw pink, orange, and purple shapes engulfing the blue that was Kyra. He saw the lights, the other Djinn back home, sink into her blue form and rip it to shreds. Bo turned back and closed his eyes. He waited a moment until he was sure that they were gone. Again, what gone meant, he still wasn't sure.
"I told that stupid bitch to stop looking at mirrors."
He revved up the chainsaw and went back to work.
XL
Blake entered the Slater Compound at twenty hundred hours and started his mission. This was his best chance to take down the Colonel and solidify The Network's position. The only question was what to do with the Burk woman. It was obvious that she wasn’t working directly with Col. Slater, but in doing business with the enemy, she had unwittingly become an enemy agent herself. Enemy agents needed to be dealt with.
Blake saw a scene ripped from Texas Chainsaw. A bunch of mannequins dressed in grotesque clothes covered in streaks of dyed-red corn syrup. He'd seen much worse in his day though it probably scared the civilians pretty good. They had weak stomachs.
"Okay, Mr. Blake, we're in the Hallow. I've done everything you've asked. Please, tell me what you know about my children."
"Mrs. Burk, you are not the authority here. I am! And until I say otherwise, you will follow my orders!"
"Listen to yourself, you're just a nutcase with a gun. I made a huge mistake taking you here. I'm not going anywhere else. We're done. If you're actually gonna shoot me in front of all these people, go ahead."
The Burk woman had outlived her usefulness. Time to move on. Blake pulled the shotgun from his coat. Her eyes grew wide. She didn't take him seriously. No one ever took him seriously.
"Mr. Slater!" She cried out.
Instinctively, Blake turned and aimed. Nothing.
Blake turned back and saw her running down a dark hallway. She knew too much. If she got away and told others about The Network, Project Cicada would be jeopardized. Blake took off after her. She needed to go.
Blake turned and saw the vortex tunnel. The spinning lights reminded him of the LSD training program he'd endured during his training with The Network. Those were scary days, and the thought of going through them again was too terrifying for him to reconcile, but the mission needed him. Blake closed his eyes and walked through the tunnel. If he bumped into another patron inside, so what?
Blake came out the other end and slowly opened his eyes. The room was dark and almost empty, except for the cage at the other end. The strobing lights pounded away. This was a much worse place. He tried to get his balance but couldn't. He collapsed to the floor in a heap. Turning his head to the right, he saw something. Some kind of ape hanging from its feet, dangling from the bars of the cage. It rolled off and landed on all fours. Blake froze, his legs locked up underneath him. The ape creature tilted its head, trying to figure out what Blake was doing. He started fidgeting his hands inside the trench coat. The ape must have felt threatened because it charged forward, galloping toward its prey. This is exactly what he had been trained to handle.
"Stop moving," Blake said.
The ape creature didn't listen.
BLAM BLAM
Blake pulled himself up to his feet. The shotgun trembled in his hand. Doing his duty never got any easier. The body wasn't moving. Blake saw what happened to other members of the Slater Clan over the years. This was different. The body wasn't moving. He walked over to the monkey's carcass and poked it with the muzzle of the shotgun. This wasn't one of them. He kneeled beside its head and looked into the monkey's face when he realized he was looking at plastic and foam latex. He pulled the mask off and was taken aback when he saw the face of a girl no older than seventeen. Brunette hair draped across her forehead. Blake swept it away and looked into her empty green eyes. She wasn't one of them. Not yet. She didn't put up the fight Slaters normally did. Roscoe must not have finished her training. He did a good thing, stopping her before she had the chance to evolve into Colonel Dracula’s (a nickname one of The Network boys gave Roscoe years earlier) military-grade killing machines. Still, what a shame. Blake took out his Zippo lighter and placed the flame against the girl's costume. Within seconds, she was a Viking funeral.
"You were cute," Blake said. "I'm sure you would have made a wonderful mother."
XLI
Covered in egg yolk and brown streaks that he convinced himself were just a little mud, Connor Burk spent the last two hours wandering around Hawk Hallow. A month earlier, he watched Tyler Tomczak beat up his little brother. At the time, it seemed funny. Cody was getting way too cocky, and someone needed to put him back in his place. Tyler decided that he was going to be the man to do it. Cody needed that beating, and since his little brother was now bigger than him, he couldn't be the one to hand it out. A bitter pill to swallow for any older brother. When he got home that night, he fully expected to be in trouble with their mother. The grounding was going to happen. Something was getting taken away. Maybe his phone, something like that, but it would be all worth it just to see Cody humbled a bit. Only that didn't happen. Cody never said anything about the beating. He never mentioned that Connor had pretended that their mom was in trouble in a text. He never mentioned how his friends pelted Cody with punches and dog crap. Cody just came home and went to bed.
At first, that just made Connor angry. All the time they put into planning this attack and Cody didn't even care that he'd been humiliated in front of all his friends. Those were the exact words that Connor had said to himself, 'humiliated in front of his friends’.
That didn't feel right. When Tyler was planning this whole thing, he kept saying, "We'll show him, we'll make him feel the way they made us feel!" Connor never quite knew what that meant. He'd been friends with Tyler since the seventh grade, and no one ever made them feel humiliated. That's why Connor started hanging out with him. Tyler was older than them, sure, but he was also bigger, stronger, and he didn't take crap from anybody. Hanging out with him made Connor feel safe. No one would have ever done to Connor what they did to Cody. That would have been suicide. Tyler would have kil
led them.
High school was different. Tyler wasn't nearly the biggest or the strongest kid there. No one went out of their way to make them feel like outsiders, but no one made them feel welcomed either. They were just kind of the there. It didn't bother Connor. He was always just another face hanging out by the lockers. But Tyler didn't like it at all. He couldn't stand being a nobody. That's why they started going back to the middle school and causing trouble. Back there, he was somebody. Back there, he ran the show. When they went back, they were shocked to find out that everyone was talking about Cody Burk, his little brother. He was athletic, popular, and didn't seem to care. He had the chance to take Tyler's place as the monster in the halls, but he didn't. Instead, he just walked around feeling sorry for himself. Yes, their dad died and everybody did feel sorry for them, but Cody carried it differently. He was so quiet, just pretending that he wasn't something special. It pissed Connor off so much to see his brother getting all that attention and ignoring it. The same way he used pretend that he wasn't Dad's favorite.
After the accident, Connor cried for two straight days, but Cody didn't. Not a single tear. All anyone asked about for two weeks was why Cody didn't cry after Dad died? Everyone was so concerned, asking what's wrong with Cody? What about him? Even though he wasn't Dad's favorite, Connor loved him. He cried for days, but nobody cared. They only worried about Cody. How fair is that?
That night Connor sat in his room waiting for Cody to burst in and try to fight him. Connor couldn't wait. He knew Cody thought he could beat him up now that he'd grown so much, but Connor was ready. He was going to fight dirty, if that's what it took to win. But Cody never came into Connor's room. But why would he? Connor already got Tyler to beat his brother up for him. Even though that wasn't how it happened, that's how people were going to think of it. Connor couldn't fight his little brother, so he got his sixteen-year-old friend to fight for him.
