The Wyvern in the Wilderlands: Planeswalking Monster Hunters for Hire (Sci-fi Multiverse Adventure Survival / Weird Fantasy) (Monster Hunting for Fun and ... Hunters and Mythical Monsters) Book 1)

by Eddie Patin

  "... and it's the best kind of income. Passive income," a different voice was saying. Jason didn’t realize when YouTube's autoplay had moved him on to another video. "I'm not out there knocking on doors or working tons of hours every week or trying to sell 20,000 units. This is a business that sells itself, so you can focus more on..."

  Jason zoned out again, looking around at the houses and yards surrounding him. He idly stabbed his cane into hard chunks of snow and ice at the edge of the sidewalk. There were Halloween decorations in many windows, and some of his neighbors had even set up inflatable monsters in their yards, along with cartoon bats hanging from trees, scarecrows, and coffins set to open and close with automatic motors.

  He liked Halloween. It was a time of year when Jason could dress up and be other characters just like in DnD. That said, he hardly ever went out on Halloween night, electing instead to stay home and pass candy out to the treat-or-treaters. But he liked the idea of dressing up just the same...

  Jason swiped away the video exuberantly talking a lot about passive income without really saying anything—the guy was probably trying to sell his system or something—then scrolled on and on, looking for something interesting. Something new.

  It was all the same. Jason felt like he'd watched everything in his newsfeed—everything that wasn't bullshit. He really needed to find a new hobby so that he could find new channels...

  Jason’s fingers did the motions like they always did, moving along the videos that YouTube presumed he would like based on his history, but his mind was elsewhere. There was something uneasy growing inside Jason, and it was something that had been growing in him for a long time. He didn’t know what the feeling was, so instead, he just felt anxious and bored during his free time now. He had a lot of free time. On top of that, now without his DnD group, Jason wondered what the hell he was going to do with himself...

  Maybe it is time for me to do something productive, he thought, boots crunching through the snow and ice. But what?

  Jason was thirty-three after all, and even though he played his age off like nothing to worry about with Ben last night, he did feel a strange worry—something that made him want to just get up and run as fast as he could. There was a buzzing energy trying to explode out of every pore of Jason’s skin, something restless that crawled around inside of him, but he didn’t understand what he wanted; what his subconscious wanted.

  So Jason pushed it down. He watched movies. He played games.

  "Once I made this switch in my mind," another voice on his phone said, "it's been mind-boggling how my earnings have gone up! And there are so many ways to get passive income—you don't have to do it my way, you can do any sort of—"

  "Ugh," Jason exclaimed, switching to another. He waited for the ad to play through its five seconds of annoyance then listened to the next video, smashing at another piece of ice with the tip of his cane as he walked.

  "The best tip for getting your life organized is from an old quote: 'plan tomorrow today'. Very basic, right? It's funny, because a lot of us use to-do lists, and some of us have been taught not to because of various gurus and their own ideas about organizing, but you know what? I tried it, and it works! Always keep a day ahead, right? The thing is, when I tried using a to-do list, and then I went to bed, I was left with that list ruminating in my mind. And when I woke up, I found that the list had evolved a little. I had some new ideas, and I woke up refreshed and ready to tackle my day..."

  "I should make a to-do list," Jason said to himself.

  As he steadily walked on to the far end of Kestrel, Jason paused to look at an amazing inflated spider on someone’s driveway. The cartoony arachnid was huge—maybe ten feet across and undulating from the constant flow of air being pushed through its orange body and eight segmented legs by the hidden fan inside.

  "Cool spider," he said to himself with a grin, lingering on the eerily realistic form of it. Even though the creature’s face was goofy, Jason could imagine that thing coming alive. The legs were proportioned just right to where they reminded him of a monstrous tarantula, and its abdomen and thorax looked really good too. Jason paused, staring, and his imagination started to flow. He thought for a moment that a real colossal spider of the same size could leap out of the inflated thing at any moment, as if the orange nylon shell was just a veil; an illusion. Jason imagined the terrifying beast bursting forth from its synthetic skin, its long legs covered in hair like wire bristles, colored with dark browns and greys and black—maybe with red or orange bands here and there, yeah! Jason could imagine a monstrous face with black, glittery eyes the size of golf-balls and slick fangs the size of steak knives, full of venom. He fantasized about the horror of it, and what he could possibly do to protect himself—draw his Glock and shoot it in the face? Or put several rounds into its big, armored thorax? Would it be pointless to shoot such a huge spider in that fat, furry abdomen the size of an elongated beach ball? Could Jason even stop such a thing with a 9mm pistol? Or would such a monstrous spider just knock him down in an instant and stab him in the neck and chest with its fierce fangs, pushing the venom in, sucking his blood out while he lay there, shuddering and dying on the driveway...?

  No, Jason thought. Spiders aren’t vampires. It would let him writhe and expire from the poison, then it would wait until his body started to dissolve on the inside. Eventually, it would suck out the Jason soup then move on, probably looking for some neighborhood kids to feed on...

  Jason smiled and shook his head. The huge orange spider wobbled and shuddered from the air being forced through it.

  He moved on and switched videos.

  "Napoleon Hill said that if you want the mind to pick up an idea," someone said, "and form a habit so that the mind will automatically act upon that idea, then you've got to tell the mind what you want over and over and over again—there's no end to it. Write down a clear description of your major desire in life—the thing that you would be most willing to sacrifice for your idea of success. And remember before you begin writing that your only limitations are those which you set up in your own mind, or permit others to set up for you. Then, write down a clear statement of precisely what you intend to give in return for that which you desire from life. After that, start in right there—where you stand now—and begin giving. Memorize both of your statements—what you desire and what you intend to give..."

  Listening to video after video, Jason eventually turned around at the end of the street then headed home. He smiled at the big spider on the way back. He liked it a lot. Then, Jason thought that he really did need to start taking things seriously and get his life in order.

  But what did he want?

  What do I really want? he thought, his mind buzzing with numbness.

  "Let’s make a to-do list," Jason repeated to himself, his boots crunching through the snow. "Make a to-do list. Brainstorm what I want out of life. Let it ruminate..."

  He knew that making a to-do list wasn’t the biggest part of getting his shit together, but it was a start. It really was time to start. Jason had to figure out what he was going to do, and he knew it. Otherwise, he’d still be working shitty jobs that he had to put up with when he was fifty-five and barely paying off his expenses.

  I’ll do it, Jason thought. Give it some real thought. Build my empire, as Ben said.

  When Jason’s coffee was finally empty, he hooked it onto his gear and slung it out of the way with paracord. Jason loved paracord and always had some with him. He could make anything with it. Hell—he had over a hundred feet of it looped up inside his backpack right then.

  When he returned to his parents’ house, stomping the snow off of his boots and letting himself in through the front door, Jason felt really motivated. He really wanted to brainstorm some ideas about finding some direction, making plans, and putting his future in order...

  After my shower, he thought.

  Jason stretched, cleaned up, then sat down and played video games until it was time to leave for work. Around noon, af
ter changing into his work uniform, Jason grabbed his cane and stepped out onto his front porch again, staring at his phone and shuffling through YouTube videos on the way to his car...

  But something in his way caught his attention and made him pause.

  The patio chair that normally sat off to one side of his front door under the living room window had been moved to stand directly in his path. In the middle of the seat, sitting all alone and shining in the sunlight, was some sort of stone.

  "What the hell?" Jason said to himself, staring at the obstacle in his path. "Who...?"

  Immediately switching his cane to his left hand so that his right was open to draw his Glock if he needed to, Jason tentatively stepped out from the doorway, slowly with small steps, looking to the left and right, scanning the neighborhood around him...

  There was no one around.

  He approached the chair and leaned down on his cane to look at the stone. It was the size of a small river rock, and it was some sort of crystal—a length of geometric quartz or something not quite as long as his pinky finger, colored a faint shade of blue.

  Reaching down, Jason paused again to scan his surroundings, then touched the stone. It was cool, like the rest of outside, and felt a little strange—Jason couldn’t explain it—as if it buzzed gently with some sort of energy aura or some such nonsense...

  "Weird!" he said quietly. "What the hell is this doing here?!"

  Obviously, someone had left it. They'd moved the chair from its place and put the stone on it for Jason to find. But why? he thought. And where are they?

  Jason didn’t have time to look around. He had to get to work.

  Peering closely at the crystal, Jason turned it over and over again in the sunlight for a moment, then he jammed the stone into a free pocket and walked on to his car after locking up the house.

  "Check it out later," he told himself.

  With that, Jason made his way across the front walkway with his cane, gingerly climbed into his old Ford Escort, and left.

  Jason smiled on autopilot as he tore up the three movie tickets handed to him, putting the top half of the tickets into the depository and handing the other halves back to the smiling trio of customers.

  "Theater six on your left," he said. "Enjoy the show!"

  The next two customers approached him: a man in a leather jacket with a pretty dumpy-looking girlfriend.

  "Where’s Dreamer in the Window?" the man asked, giving Jason his tickets.

  Two men leaning against a wall far across the theater lobby suddenly caught Jason’s attention. He’d seen his share of weirdos, sure—you’re going to see eccentrics sometimes when working at a movie theater—but these guys stood out, dressed as strangely as they were. The two men were either waiting for someone, or up to no good. Jason was a concealed carry permit holder and watched for things out of place. One of the men was tall and lean with a big nose and a scraggly, dark beard on a dangerous face, hair cropped short. Beard-guy must have been in his late twenties, skinny and wiry, dressed in a weird motorcycle jacket or something that was mostly covered up by an imposing dark brown duster coat that reached down almost to his feet—something Van Helsing the vampire hunter would wear. Maybe cosplaying for the superhero movie? Jason wondered. The guy with the long jacket smirked as he talked sideways at his friend, but his eyes were lively, and they met Jason’s gaze here and there. The other man looked like an athletic, young Native American with a severe face and long, jet-black hair. He was dressed in an old army jacket and layers of dirty clothes. He looked like a bum. The Native American dude was staring right at Jason with a pale, piercing glare from across the bustling room, and he nodded solemnly as his friend spoke to—

  "Hey, man!" the customer with the leather jacket exclaimed, waiting. His girlfriend played with her phone. "I said where’s Dreamer in the Window?"

  Jason looked back at the movie goer waiting in front of him, then looked down at the tickets in his hand. He tore them and gave back the stubs. "Theater three on your left. Enjoy!"

  "Thanks," the man grunted, then pulled his woman along with him down the hall.

  As the next couple approached, Jason looked over to the other end of the lobby again.

  The strange men were gone.

  "Huh," he said to himself. They must have been waiting for someone after all.

  The next people in line—a trio of young women—offered him their tickets, chatting excitedly.

  Jason worked mindlessly, not really thinking about the smiling or bored faces around him, except for occasionally sizing people up that tripped red flags in his head. He couldn’t really help it anymore, packing all the time like he did. Jason was always on the lookout for threats, even though he knew that his chances of ever having to draw his pistol in self-defense were slim to none. He tore tickets and directed people based on the movie titles printed on the pieces of paper, answered the questions they had from time to time, and he smelled each bucket of popcorn as it passed, watching the big clock on the far wall.

  Normally by now, Jason would be thinking vaguely about what movie to watch that night when things slowed down. But instead, tonight, his mind was on the crystal that sat in his pocket.

  Where’d it come from? he wondered. Was it some sort of prank; just the random entertainment of some kid? Did some twelve-year-old just pick up that crystal from someone’s landscaping on Kestrel Drive while walking by and say to himself, What will this guy think if I just move his chair and leave this quartz here for no reason? How funny!

  When Jason finally had a break, he sat in the little employee area, holding the slick stone in his palm, looking it over under the harsh fluorescent lights of the room.

  He turned the crystal over and tried to look through it, still feeling that strange sense of energy buzzing through its hard, geometric surface. When he randomly tapped it once with his finger, Jason gasped as he saw a blue spark suddenly leap across the inside, like lightning leaping across storm clouds!

  "Whoa..." Jason muttered, tapping it again and again. Each time he struck the stone, even with the soft tips of his fingers, the crystal sparked blue on the inside—not exactly very easy to see in the harsh light of the breakroom.

  Later, when Jason's shift slowed down and the manager was starting to loosen up on the staff, he made his way into the night’s last showing of Maximum Payback, stopping to stand in the little side-hall leading to the seats. He leaned up against the wall and watched the loud show in the dark, touching the hard shape of the crystal through his pocket.

  It wasn’t long before Jason had the crystal out again and tapped at it again and again in the darkness of the theater. He marveled at the bright blue arcs and belches of light flashing across the murky interior of the stone. The lightning and sparks were much brighter in the dark, and beautiful!

  At one point, Jason noticed that several moviegoers were watching him play with the crystal from their side seats. He was causing a disturbance. Embarrassed, Jason moved to put the crystal back into his pocket, but fumbled, and let the stone fall to the dark floor. Instead of hitting the low carpet, the crystal managed to land on the strip of metal running along the edge of the floor with a tick. Jason gasped as the stone shot a tiny bolt of electricity outside of itself, extending from the stormy sparks within and arcing over the metal strip for an instant before the blue light disappeared.

  "Holy shit!" Jason whispered, immediately lunging for the stone even though doing so really hurt his knee.

  He snatched up the crystal and put it back into his pocket.

  Amazing! Jason thought. What a cool rock. He’d never seen anything quite like it—never something that shot electricity out like that before...

  With some time to kill until the end of his shift, Jason settled in against the wall again, using his cane to take the pressure off of his knee. He really wanted to just sit down in one of the extra seats, but if he did that, he might get fired.

  The main character was in some sort of epic gunfight with the bad guys
, and there were loads of fast sweeps and close-ups—very actiony. And muzzle flash—holy shit, the muzzle flash! The scene was loud, and Jason couldn’t help but count the rounds firing from the hero’s 1911 pistol. He stopped counting after twenty-five shots, and smirked as the character fought on with infinite ammo.

  Jason’s thoughts kept returning to the crystal.

  What kind of rock creates electricity? he wondered.

  He’d call Ben in the morning after his walk. Maybe Ben would know...

  Chapter 6

  The next day, Jason woke up late.

  It wasn’t a big deal—it was Sunday and he didn’t have to be anywhere. But it seemed to be getting harder and harder to stay up all night playing video games and not get eight hours of dead, dehydrated sleep.

  Jason groaned, spread out in his tangled covers, sweating because the sun was already warming up the room. He looked at his phone, noting that it was a bit after noon.

  "Ugh ... damn it."

  Whatever.

  Play until four, sleep until noon—what difference did it make?

  Then, immediately remembering the most important thing on his mind, Jason sat up in bed and reached over to his nightstand, snatching up the crystal. He held it up to his face, tapping at the stone with his fingertips and watching the cloudy, blue lightning echo through its translucent form. He put it against his face and felt its cold, hard surface on his skin. Jason was certain that he could feel some sort of buzzing energy coming from it.