by John Ringo
“We don’t got one for your Uzi,” she said. “We’ll get that fixed. Like it, by the way. Where’d you get it?”
“I built it,” I said. “Want one?”
“I’ll stick with long guns,” she said. “Stayin’ back’s the only way I’ve survived this long. Gettin’ up close and personal generally don’t end well.”
“What got you started?” I asked as I started reloading mags. I need to clean my weapons as well, soon. But ammo first.
“Humboldts,” she said, darkly. She’d broken her 14 down and was cleaning it. “Hit our camp out the swamp. Killed some family. Took off with a cousin of mine. Didn’t know nothin’ bout Humboldts back then. I took off after her. Stupidest damned thing I ever done in my life and that’s saying something. They nearly got me but I found her. Turned out she was already one of them. She’d gone just plumb crazy.
“I was in it bad when MHI showed up. MHI fella put her down. He was right nice about it. Explained and everything. The green glow was sort of a clue. Got a call from MHI a couple weeks later. They’d done the paperwork for the Humboldts they could find I’d done for. Asked me if I wanted a job. Been doing this for four years.”
I’d never dealt with Humboldt Folk but I heard they were pretty horrific. “That’s a tough introduction.”
“You?” she asked.
“Shamblers,” I said, frowning. “At a tent revival of all things. Long story why I was there. I had a .22 converter for my Colt. I just ran around popping them. I was really busted up at the time. That was about the only problem I had with it. Not as hard as your story.”
“Was pretty bad,” she said, shrugging. “Nobody else was willing to go. ’Fraid of the hoodoo. It was stupid but I ain’t never been known for my smarts.”
“You’re damned good with that,” I said, pointing at her rifle with my chin.
“Been huntin’ and shootin’ since I was a kid,” she said, shrugging. “But I’ll leave the stubby guns and swords and axes for y’all men.”
I was done reloading and pulled out a pack of gear to sharpen Mo No Ken. I always started with that when cleaning weapons if Mourning had been used.
The kit consisted of a tiger shark skin sharpening strap and another of cloth. I considered the edge and skipped the shark skin. I hooked the cloth, which was attached at both ends to hardwood dowels, to one of the tables and started swathing the blade on the cloth strap.
“You sharpen it on cotton?” Shelbye asked.
“Silk,” I said, continuing the sharpening process. “That’s why it goes through limbs like butter. I’ve put this through the arms and necks of trolls, wights, and both legs of a vampire. And the neck, obviously. You name it, Mo No Ken has killed it.”
“Mo No Ken?” she asked.
“Sword of Mourning,” I said. “Yes, it has a name. It’s a two hundred year old, three soul blade.”
“Okay then. Gotcha,” she said, reassembling her M14. “You all into that Oriental stuff?”
“You could say that,” I said, smiling slightly. “The way of the warrior is the way of duty,” I added in Japanese.
“Huh? I ain’t into all that mystical bullshit. I just shoot the monsters and get paid.”
“I got into it in high school,” I said, completing the sharpening. I anointed Mo No Ken again and put it away. “My unofficial foster father was into it. He’d had a buddy killed by a sword in World War Two and got into it after that. He taught me kendo, the Japanese sword art. And about guns. Even gun smithing; he was the school shop teacher which was where we met. My family was and is very fucked up. He and his wife were and are my real parents.
“Later I kept studying. When I decided to get into this he helped me do the Uzi redesign and to find Mo No Ken. I’ve studied all sorts of martial arts, Oriental as you put it, and European. It’s all useful tricks.”
I broke down the Uzi next and did a rough clean. I wasn’t going to bother breaking down the silencer or the trigger group. It didn’t need it.
“Is there some point at which we can put down our heads?” I asked, reassembling the Uzi.
“Might as well,” Shelbye said. “Seems to have calmed down.”
I took a shower in my gear, hung it up to dry, took another out of gear, hit the rack and passed out like a light.
Thus ended my first day with New Orleans Hoodoo Squad.
CHAPTER 6
Hungry Like the Wolf
“Eat…” Trevor said, holding up a thumb. “No, no, drink. Water. Maybe beer, but something that keeps you hydrated…”
I had been in New Orleans for a few weeks. We were having our pre-full-moon team meeting at the Hoodoo Shack. It was ten AM on the day before the full moon and we were eating barbeque courtesy of Monster Hunter International.
“So…drink,” Trevor said. “Not liquor. Keep hydrated. Eat,” he said, gesturing at the barbeque. “Kill monsters.”
“Sleep?” I said. “Shower? Clean weapons?”
“That’s for when the moon’s past,” Jonathan Baldwin said. “You got a replacement for your Uzi?”
Jonathan was from NYC like Agent Buchanan. Jonathan was a bit chubby looking but he’d already smoked me at running, chasing down an imp on Front Street. Brown hair and eyes he was a fair shooter but not much at close range fighting. He’d been with MHI for less than two years after killing a nest of kobolds in a building where he’d been the super.
“Two,” I said. They were still in my trunk and, no, nobody had messed with them. I was still bunking at the office.
I hadn’t found a place to live. Someone, possibly something, was looking for me.
My second day Trevor had given me a card and directions to Madam Courtney’s Real Estate.
* * *
Madame Courtney’s office was in Bayou St. John. She had various voodoo items hanging in the window but the sign plainly said Real Estate.
There was more hoodoo in the front room which had a reception desk. A pretty young black woman led me into the back through, yes, a bead curtain to meet with Madame Courtney.
Madame Courtney was in her fifties wearing a flowing native African dress, bright crimson shawl and a colorful rag wrapped on her head. She was about covered in various houdoun charms and amulets. The dimly lit office featured only a table covered in black cloth.
“Sit, Hunter,” the real estate agent said. “Sit, sit.” She pronounced it seat.
I sat at the table wondering where the crystal ball was.
“You need a home,” she said, her arms wide, as if calling the loas for guidance.
I forbore to say that’s generally why people come to a real estate office.
“You,” she said, drawing it out. “You who have never known a true home. You, speaker to the saints! You, with the mission!” Meeeeeshuuuun! She was leaning back with her arms wide and her head thrown back, her voice rising. “You, player of women! Word smith! Bard! Gifted in tongues!” She was shouting and shaking. “A home for the warrior not a saint! I call upon the loas! Find this warrior a hoooome!”
She calmed down, panting, and wearily pulled out a deck of tarot cards.
“We shall read your path,” she murmured. She shuffled the tarot then drew the first card.
“The Fool,” she said, setting it down. “This is your past. A new beginning.”
“I got a transfer.”
“More than that,” Madam Courtney said. “Did you have a near death experience?”
“More like a dead death experience,” I said.
“This refers to that,” Madam Courtney intoned. “The Fool is a powerful card for you, Oliver Chadwick Gardenier. You are a man renewed and returned. The loas do not do such without a reason.”
She drew the next card.
“The Hanged Man,” she said. “This is not a sign of death but a sign of a change in focus, a change in perspective. This represents your new home here in New Orleans. There is much change in perspective in New Orleans. Some things will be revealed to you here that make you understand y
our purpose in life.”
She drew the third card.
“The Four of Cups,” she said. “This represents your needs in the present. A place to rest, recuperate, heal. This represents what I must find for you with the help of the loas.
“The Eight of Cups,” she said. “This represents present obstacles. You must find a new path and give up the known. You must seek a higher perspective. This does not mean you must change your ways in terms of becoming more moral. It seems to indicate you must become more of what you are. You must strive to become greater in your skills, in your doing. You must become the most fierce warrior possible. To focus on becoming a living weapon.”
“A sword saint?” I asked. “Ever seen The Seven Samurai?”
“Yes,” Madam Courtney said, nodding. “Thus you must have the home, a life, that will support that. You must focus, Oliver Chadwick Gardenier. You must focus on becoming more.”
I hoped that included being more of a lady’s man.
She drew the fifth card.
“The Hermit. A need to take stock of your current condition. To put it in modern terms, you need to find yourself. Understand yourself.”
“Uh, sure?”
“The Three of Pentacles,” Madam Courtney said. “You will have opportunities to grow and improve. To become greater in your skills.”
She drew the last card.
“The Seven of Wands. So, the others become clear.”
“Why?”
“The loas are preparing you. There shall come a great battle. Not any of the normal ones you will engage upon. No matter how great, these are but the training, the tests. A great battle, one that will turn on the edge of a knife and if your side fails it will mean the end of all things. It is that battle for which the loas prepare you, forge you like a sword to their destiny. A living weapon. In that battle, you will have one task for which you must be prepared. In that battle, you must become greater. You must be the perfect weapon. Or the world will fall into darkness.”
“Okay,” I said when she was done. She hadn’t asked me about location, style, square footage, anything. I had no idea what any of it meant in terms of finding me a place to live. I knew some houdoun worked. I was a monster hunter, after all. But I wasn’t sure it was up to finding me an apartment. “I was just sort of looking for a good apartment. Fairly central. Decent neighborhood would be nice.”
“No,” she said, in a deep, strained, voice. “No apartment for you! Your destiny is here for many years. You need a fine home to return to after your battles. You are a seer. You need peace to contemplate the mysteries of the universe.”
She shook herself again and took a deep breath.
“There’s no fee,” she said in a perfectly normal tone. “My cut is half the broker’s fee which is paid by the seller not the buyer. How’s your credit?”
“I don’t really have much. I generally pay cash.”
“To get a mortgage you’ll need your last two year’s 1040s,” she said. “Are you a get-it and spend it type?”
“I’ve got some investments if that’s what you mean. I could probably cash those in for a decent house much less a down payment. Even if I wanted to buy a house, which I’m not sure I do, you haven’t asked me how much I want to spend?”
“This is up to the loas,” she said, spreading her hands again. “I do not find the home. The loas find the home.”
“Okay,” I said, dubiously.
“You a seer, returned to us from the lands of the dead, you doubt the loas?” she said with a merry laugh. “Trust the loas.”
She led me out and said she’d give me a call in a few days, couple of weeks max. That had been two weeks ago. A paralegal had turned up from a law firm looking for documents on my financials. I’d given them to her. That was all the contact we’d had since her tarot reading.
* * *
“If this full moon is like the last one, pretty much you nap in your car,” Shelbye said. She was over the limp and her ribs had healed.
“Keep a cooler in your car,” Alvin Nunez said. “That’s what I do. Drinks, some food.”
Alvin was a “native born Texican.” He was definitely Hispanic but his family went back in Texas to before they’d broken away from Mexico. He didn’t have an ancestor at the Alamo but he did have some in the army that avenged it.
He and Jonathan had both been out, injured, when I first arrived. They’d since been cleared back to duty.
Trevor’s injured leg was still slowing him down so he would be handling the phones at the office.
“How many magazines you got?” Trevor asked me.
“Ten,” I said.
“Not enough,” he said. “You need more than ten. I’ll make some calls. Get some more for you.”
“You probably need about thirty,” Greg Wise said. He’d only been with the New Orleans team for three months. Difference being he’d come straight from MHI training. “If this is like our last full moon…You won’t believe how much ammo you go through.”
He was right.
We were all still hoping that the last full moon had been a fluke, and that things would return to normal, or at least normal by New Orleans standards.
“The moment the moon rises over Lake Ponchartrain, God kicks the dust of New Orleans off his sandals and Satan comes to town,” Trevor said. “Be ready. This ain’t Satan’s town. It’s ours.”
* * *
I wasn’t on-shift for the day if there was a call. I’d been handling calls day and night for the last week and a half. I had the afternoon off. So I started what was to become a tradition for me whenever I had the chance. I called it Last Rites.
First, I would take a very long shower. I would scrub myself practically raw and shave, eventually, pretty much my whole body. Generally, I’d actually use Nair on most of it. Some people react poorly to it. I never did.
Then I would check all my equipment meticulously. I would make sure everything was in as perfect working order as was possible given the circumstances. Sometimes it had been a bad month and I had to roll with stuff that wasn’t fully repaired. Shit happens. But I’d check and fix as well as possible.
Then I would go to church. I’d go meet my father confessor, make my confession, and take communion.
Then I’d go have a really good meal.
I thought the food in Seattle was good until I got to New Orleans. Hated the heat, the job was, obviously, a little too profitable, hated the bugs—damn, some of the regular cockroaches and spiders in New Orleans should count for PUFF—but the food. My God, the food!
But at this point I was still new. Working one day with Shelbye, she’d taken me to a Creole place over in Faubourg Marigny called Sasson’s. It was sort of a hole-in-the-wall, just a concrete building with a kitchen in it and an order window off Spain Street with some tables outside. Couple were shaded by live oaks. It was busy so we ended up sweating out in the sun.
I looked at the menu and had not a clue. I spoke French but this wasn’t French. Shelbye ordered for me.
Andouille gumbo. It was like being back in Heaven again.
The traffic and the heat were not my idea of a perfect setting but the food!
So a few days before the full moon I called and asked to speak to the owner or head chef or somebody. It wasn’t a “chef” sort of place but the food was chef worthy.
Note, this was about the time that Paul Prudhomme was making big waves in cooking circles and putting New Orleans on the map for gourmets.
I’ve eaten at K-Paul, met Prudhomme and even been invited to eat at his chef’s table in the kitchen. Prudhomme is good, don’t get me wrong.
Sasson’s made Prudhomme look like a ham-handed côme. (That’s French for junior cook.)
Anyway, I called Sasson’s and ended up talking to the owner and chief cook and bottle washer Jean Sasson. I told him I was Hoodoo Squad and was planning on having a late lunch, early dinner at his place.
“I would like to ask a favor,” I said in meticulous Parisian French
. “I do not know your strengths. If you were condemned to death and told to cook your last meal, what would you cook?”
“It will be the day of the full moon, yes?” he asked, seriously. “I shall serve you only my best.”
“Merci, monsieur. Vous comprenez.”
So at three PM, under the shade of a live oak tree, I found myself sitting at a concrete table, eating a seven course meal that would have made Escoffier weep to be able to replicate. I didn’t have to go to the order window, Monsieur Sasson’s pretty daughter (and protégé) served. So I also got a pretty face to look at.
It was hot, it was noisy, I was sweating my ass off, it was delicious.
Then I would go home, at that point the barracks, and carefully kit up. When I was done, up to and including having my Uzi rigged and Mo No Ken slung, I would stand in front of a full length mirror.
“I am the warrior elite,” I would say to myself. “Satan had better watch his ass.”
Last but not least, I would get in Honeybear and drive over to Breakwater Park on Lake Pontchartrain. I would crank up the AC, put on some tunes, slide my seat all the way back and watch the moon come up. People would be out fishing. Young couples would be walking hand in hand along the lakeshore.
I would be waiting for the first call. And about the time the moon was fully exposed over the lake, it would come in.
* * *
“Momma, I was gonna go over to Randal’s,” James Robinson, sixteen, said trying not to fume. “I can eat there.”
“You’re going to sit down and eat the supper I made or you’re not going out at all tonight,” Ginger Robinson replied, sharply. “I don’t think that boy’s a good influence, anyway. You’re always getting into fights when you go out with him. Now go set the table before your father gets home.”
The Robinsons lived in Metairie. Metairie was fairly standard middle-class suburb. It had its problems, what town didn’t, but by and large it was in the safer part of the New Orleans area. Houses were painted, lawns were mowed, cars were in good condition. People kept up appearances and worked hard to make a better life for their children. American Middle Class.
And the Robinsons were a perfect example of that. Mister Robinson worked at Port of New Orleans as a stevedore. That might sound like a minor job but he ran one of the massive on-off load AT-AT cranes and made good money. Mrs. Robinson was a home-maker and worked at the church doing all the little things like getting the altar clothes cleaned and pressed and polishing the offertory vessels that needed to be done and someone had to do them. Their daughter, Kristina, fourteen, had just missed getting on the JV cheerleading team and was hoping to make it next year. She just had to train harder and suck up enough to Coach Jermaine.
