by Tom Bont
Angela had a hard time distinguishing his ‘surprised’ look with his everyday ‘dour’ look.
Kent checked his tie’s knot and stretched his chin up for a moment. He closed the folder and slid it across his desk. “Over the last week, we’ve received reports from Atlanta, LA, and Chicago. Find out who’s making this shit and stop them. Use your W1 clearance if you have to. If that’s not enough, come see me. I’ll get whatever clearance you need.”
Three days later, they still hadn’t found any leads to who was manufacturing the powder. Everyone assumed the spree originated in the DFW area because they were the ones who’d figured it out. But when they scoured the archives, it appeared New Orleans was the most likely location as Suspect Zero showed up there first. The police interrupted Caleb Simoneaux robbing a bank. When he didn’t respond to commands, they shot him. When he didn’t drop, they shot him some more. When he took off down the street, everyone assumed he had a bulletproof vest on. Eventually, his foot slipped into a French drain, pinning him until the cops caught up with him. Soon after, he bled out and died. They took the yellow powder under his nose was some new form of PCP and closed the case.
Based on the new information, Kent assigned the entire Fort Worth Task Force W field office to going through import records and customs forms. He brought cots in for everyone, himself included. No one went home. Everyone worked. He assigned high priority for anything along the Gulf Coast. Angela had never combed through fertilizer receipts for anyone planning another Oklahoma City bombing, but what they were doing must have been close. No one had computerized the vast majority of the sales and transfer forms yet, and 5th-grade dropouts appeared to have filled them out; she didn’t realize there were so many different ways to spell tree, frog, and worm.
Two days and nine hushed-up reported cases of “zombie attacks” later, they found what they were looking for. A self-proclaimed psychic in Mobile, Alabama, Madam Agatha, had ordered all the ingredients on the list, plus a few others everyone scratched their heads over.
FBI SWAT raided her house. She might have been psychic after all; she wasn’t there. When all-clear rang out through their ear comms, Angela and Danny examined what could only be described as a voodoo laboratory the SWAT team had found in the attic. While the photographer took detailed pictures of all the items in the workbench refrigerator, Angela scanned the various containers, reading the names written on the sides.
“Toad teeth, hummingbird wings, werewolf fangs…”
Danny scooted over next to her when she’d read the latter aloud. “I wonder how she managed that!”
Angela ignored him and continued down the line. A plastic baggie containing a yellow powder labeled coupe poudre. “Zombie powder right here! And…bipalium secretions…Hey! I think this is it.” She plucked a mason jar from the table and scraped the grime off the side. “There’s close to a quart of the stuff here.” She shook the jar, turning it sideways and back. “It’s gooey.”
The site forensics supervisor came over and gently pointed at the jar. “Agent, if that is indeed bipalium secretions, there’s enough toxin in there to kill a small town. Please…carefully set it back on the bench.”
Angela stared at the jar like she was holding a sleeping rattlesnake and set it down as if she might wake it up. “How much of that goo does one of those worms make?”
“If this is pure, she’d have needed to collect it from thousands of worms over a couple of years’ time. An average four-inch specimen only secrets a few grams of the stuff every couple of days.”
Danny was leaned over, hands on his knees, squinting at the jar. “Sweet! So where are all those worms…?”
The photographer interrupted them. “Agent Hollingsworth? I found something here. Looks like the deed to an old warehouse down on the riverfront.”
Angela read the document. “So, it is. So, it is.”
Angela stared at the blurry lines of the old, brick warehouse through the foggy night. Blacked out windows stretched along the top near the roof, while occasional flickers of light slipped out from around their edges. She flipped the wipers switch, squeegeeing mist from her windshield to show randomly working streetlights casting faded yellow splotches along the uninhabited sidewalks. Buoys from the waterfront chimed lonely clangs while the occasional ship’s horn answered back with the same forlorn sadness. The stench of fish chafed against her, even through the closed windows. Two giant rats scurried into a drainage opening, dodging a Ford Pinto as it roared up the quiet street. It pulled to a stop next to the warehouse’s side entrance.
Her ear comm relayed the message, “Grandmother has arrived.”
She peered through the fog further down the street to the FBI team’s tactical vehicle, disguised as a bread truck. There would be no SWAT tonight. They were a hammer. Considering the materials found in Madam Agatha’s attic, Kent had decided discretion was needed rather than a shock and awe building clearing. He didn’t want to risk the suspect contaminating the riverfront with whatever she was storing in the warehouse if cornered. Everyone had volunteered to enter, but he chose Angela and Danny. They’d caught the case.
“Grandmother has entered the cabin,” Kent relayed. “You’re up, Red Riding Hood.”
“Roger, Wolf and Red are up,” Angela said. She twisted her head to the side and shared a grin with Danny. She got to pick their call-signs for this operation.
They slipped out of their car and slinked along the sides of the buildings leading to the warehouse. The door was locked, but Danny came prepared; he pulled out a lock pick gun. Three seconds later, the doorknob clicked as the tumblers dropped into place. Brad and Bill, their backup, slid up next to them. They were to wait at the door until called.
Angela swung the door in while Danny covered her. He nodded once, and they stepped into a long hallway, the beams from their flashlights disappearing into the murkiness. The floor was wet and slimy in places where it had sunk lower than the rest. It reeked of mildew and mold. Incandescent bulbs hanging by their power cables flickered on and off sporadically, transforming their shadows into moving apparitions. They followed the hallway to the right and came to a stairway on the left.
Danny tapped her shoulder. He pointed to his ear and upstairs.
Angela’s heartbeat pounded in her chest as she nodded her head. She licked her lips and took the lead, slowly climbing the stairway. Shuffling noises drifted down to her the higher she went. One step before reaching the top, she glimpsed back to verify Dany was in position. Behind him, the hallway looked like a black hole with the occasional glimmer of flickering lights giving the impression of a lightning storm. She took the remaining steps, her head breaching the edge of the loft’s floor.
Flickering candles turned the vast, shadowy space ominous. In the center of the smoky room sat a large black cauldron on a grate above a brick fire pit.
Someone’s gone full Grimm’s Fairy Tale.
An electric vent, mounted in the roof, vented the smoke from the fire. She ran up the remaining three steps so Danny could join her. A long table sat on their right with a gruesome hoard of jars and pails, candles and Bunsen burners, powders and liquids scattered along it. There was even a human skull with a melting candle on top of it.
As Danny stepped from the stairway, an old woman with frizzy grey hair and wearing a 40-year-old sundress, Madam Agatha if the driver’s license photo was to be believed, elbowed aside a curtain dividing off part of the loft into a back room and headed towards the cauldron. Her skin hung in flaps and wrinkles. She looked like she was melting too.
She was focused on the contents of the wicker basket she carried, so she gave a little lurch when Danny erupted with, “Get down, police!”
Angela moved alongside him. “FBI! Drop it! Drop it! On the floor!”
Madam Agatha held up one hand to block Angela’s flashlight glare and spit to the side, toppling the basket at their feet as she did so. The floor turned slick as human body parts scattered all around them. Angela and Danny pulled up sho
rt and stepped carefully.
Angela glanced sideways at Danny as he growled. His eyes were pale blue. She figured the scent of fresh death had tickled his lupus.
Madam Agatha recited passages in an unknown language. Electricity charged the air, and the hair on Angela’s body stood up.
Danny didn’t wait for her to finish whatever spell she was casting. He squeezed his trigger as Madam Agatha swept her arm to the side. His hands swung wide in response.
The witch cackled as his bullets splintered the wall to her left.
A ruffling noise from behind her. Angela spun around. “Jee-zus!” she cried out. A hammerhead worm, man-size, slithered towards her out from under a pile of mildewed straw and old rags.
So much for six inches! Guys can’t measure shit!
“Danny, I’ve got a problem!” she yelled, up on her toes as she skipped and skidded backwards.
The worm continued sliding towards her but stopped when it got to some of the body parts lying on the floor. It engulfed a leg, and the acid from its embrace melted the foot and calf as it worked its way up to the thigh.
She took a step back. Fired a triple shot. The bullets spawned no damage.
No meat. Too much goo.
A hunch. She kicked the remaining body parts into the far corner. The worm followed them.
A loud growl snatched her attention, and she spun back to Danny and the hag. He’d performed his renovatio and was in full lupus form, ripping himself free of clothes.
“Lupus Sapiens!” the old crone screeched. “Frenator, too!” She pulled a silver dagger from under her dress, flipped the hilt open, and took a deep snort from it. She shook her head and dropped into a knife fighter’s pose. Knees bent. Weight on the balls of her feet. Her eyes flashed with vigor. The grip on her dagger, firm, sure. “Now be still! I need your blood!”
Danny dropped to all fours and raised his snout to the ceiling, loosing a howl. Dust shook from the timbers in the old warehouse’s ceiling. The windows rattled and threatened to shatter.
Chill bumps ran the length of Angela’s spine. This wasn’t her first wolf fight though. She fired three shots but missed as her pistol jumped sideways in response to the witch whipping her hand about again.
Madam Agatha showed no fear. She put her hand into a pocket, and yanked it out, throwing a yellowish powder at Danny as he took his first menacing steps towards her.
He stiffened in his tracks.
Oh, shit!
A garish laugh erupted victoriously from the hag’s toothless craw.
Angela took another step back from the worm and yelled, “Danny! Get your shit together!”
His eyes turned bloodshot.
He sneezed. Once. Twice. Three times.
With slow deliberation, he raised his gaze to the old woman. A deep, rumbling growl rose from his feet, through his musclebound midsection, and wove through his teeth and past his lips.
“Fuckin’ Frenatus!” the crone screeched with her whole body. She gripped her dagger tighter and rushed the werewolf.
More shuffling from behind. Angela spun around. The worm had finished the last of its meal. She climbed up onto the workbench.
Gotta be something she’s using to control the fucker!
Her gaze landed on a large plastic bottle with a rubber hose and a sprayer hanging from its side. Two empty salt boxes sat next to it. A dark grin crossed her face as she remembered when she and Chris used to sprinkle salt on the snails in the backyard. She rapidly pumped the handle on the top of the tank while Danny and the witch growled and screeched at each other.
As the gooey fiend glided towards her, she pointed the nozzle at its head and pressed the trigger. Faster than she thought it could move, it scampered for the corner, curling up in a ball when it ran out of space. She walked hunched over down the workbench, following it, continuing to shoot a steady stream of saltwater over its body. Large pieces of translucent flesh sloughed off and plopped onto the wooden floor.
She slipped down off the bench as the crone and Danny circled each other. Blood ran freely from her partner’s arms where the silver dagger had repeatedly found its mark. The witch was unharmed.
Moving too fast for Danny to catch, the hag leaped and spider-crawled up the wall to the ceiling. Her toenails elongated, digging into the wood, and she hung from the bottom of a rafter like a bat. She was a demon possessed as she slashed at Danny. He dodged the silver weapon hack after hack.
The old woman screeched, “Be still dammit!” and held her arms out to her sides.
Danny seized the advantage. He swung a massive arm back into the crone’s head, knocking her off her bat-perch. She dropped back to the floor but landed on her feet with a twist a cat would be proud of. Ducking a double swipe of werewolf claw, she pressed in again, fast and agile, scoring another gash on his chest.
Angela took aim at the old woman’s center mass. And waited.
Danny was tiring. The silver? He backed into a corner. Too late, the witch realized the feint as she showed her back to Angela.
Three silver, 9mm slugs found their marks in the old hag’s back, staggering her, but not dropping her.
She spun on Angela, face twisted with hate. “You’re next, bitch!”
The crone saw the shock on Angela’s face as Danny leaned down, but she dodged to the side too late. His great maw bit through her skull, popping it like a torpid grape.
“Red Riding Hood, we’re coming up!” Brad relayed over the radio.
“Stand by!” she responded. Then, “Danny, get out of here!” she yelled off-mic.
Danny sniffed her foot and leaped through the curtain, leaving Madam Agatha’s mangled body behind him.
“Stairwell clear!” Angela announced.
Brad and Bill ran up in classic cover formation. They scanned the scene, saw the old woman’s headless body on the floor, and took up covering positions in different corners.
“Where’s Officer McIver?” Brad asked.
“Back here!” a weak voice called out. Danny stumbled through the curtains, blood running from his arms and stomach to the floor. “Ange—” Her name cut off as he fell against the wall.
Angela keyed her mic as she rushed over. “Agent Down! We need medical services up here. Now!”
She cradled his head while Bill applied pressure to his wounds. “What happened to his clothes?” he muttered as he eyed their ripped remains.
Danny raised his head. “Tell Heather—”
“Shut up, redneck! You ain’t dying today!”
Brad, his face white, joined them after clearing the back room. “Good God, who are these people?” Then, seeing Danny’s condition, regained control, and ripped his shirt off for a make-shift bandage to staunch the flow of blood.
Danny’s face turned pale. He was on the cusp of passing out.
“I can’t stop the bleeding!” Bill exclaimed.
Angela slapped Danny’s face. “Wake up! How do we stop the bleeding?”
Danny’s eyes rolled open. “Wolf…wolfsbane.”
Brad and Bill both stared hard at her with faces closed.
“He’s a werewolf, guys,” she confessed to them with a long breath.
They blinked, and Brad smiled.
“Well, shit!” Bill said. “Why didn’t you say so!”
“Yeah,” Brad added. “That explains some things.”
Danny drooled but nodded his head. “Tablespoon. Quart…water. Rub…”
Angela pointed her head at the workbench. “Brad!”
He dashed over. “What am I looking for? Wolfsbane?”
“Danny!” Angela cried, “Wake up! Stay with us!”
“Found it!” Brad exclaimed. By the time he’d made the concoction, Danny’s pulse was weak and rapid. As soon as they rubbed the mixture into his wounds though, the bleeding slowed. Angela hoped it was the mixture working and not him dying.
“How much of this are we supposed to use?” Bill asked.
“No idea,” Angela muttered. “Use it all.”
For the next few moments, none of them spoke a word as they rubbed their bloody hands over Danny wounds. By the time they’d poured out the dregs of the mixture, Danny’s breathing had steadied, and his pulse had strengthened.
“Hang in there, partner,” she said, running her hand over his forehead.
The steady beeping from the monitors intruded into Angela’s sleep. It’s what allowed her to relax, though. A quick squeeze of Danny’s hand gave her the reassurances she looked for. Warm. Calm. He was alive. Her partner was alive. That’s all that mattered. She’d dozed on and off throughout the night, the chair in his ICU room not comfortable enough for real sleep. But sleep was what she needed. The last 24 hours had taken its toll, and when she came down off her adrenaline rush, her body decided a square chair was comfort enough.
She peeked up from her uneasy sleep when Heather ruffled through some charts. Sometime in the night, she’d arrived in Mobile as promised. It comforted Angela knowing that Heather was on the scene and doing her thing. She took his pulse—regardless of what the machines told her—and checked his pupils. The reason Angela and Heather got along so well was when things turned south, they both kept their shit in one sock.
“Morning.” Angela relished her stiff yawn and lazy stretch. “How’d you get here so fast?”
“Daddy.”
“Oh.” Angela forgot at times that a United States Marine Corps general had perks. Like getting your daughter the doctor a seat on one of the military’s Air Mobility Command flights. Anytime. Anywhere. “They put you over him?” She pointed her head at Danny.
Heather peeked over her shoulder at the door. “I exerted my ‘family physician’ privilege.”
“How’s he doing?”
“Good,” Heather said with a smile. “Too good actually, but I’m not complaining.” She straightened his sheets. “Eighty-four stitches on fourteen different cuts. Why the hell didn’t he shoot the fucker with the knife?”
Danny mumbled, “Because chicks dig scars.”
