by Marty Chan
“How did you get here?” the teen asked.
The raggedy man cocked his head to the side. “I came here like all the other travellers-s-s. Through Demon Gate.”
“You’re an illegal. Thought you were a burglar at first, but no human thief steals eyes.”
Ole Lukoje cracked a thin-lipped smile. “Ah. Yes-s-s, I think I found what I need.”
“Stop there.” The teen raised his weapon. “Hands out. Put the bag on the floor.”
The man in the tattered suit obeyed, dropping his satchel. He kicked it across the floor, spilling out some of the contents. Then he backed toward the window.
“Don’t move,” the teen ordered. “I said, don’t move.”
The goggled saviour strode forward. Squish. He lifted his heavy black boot. Something sticky and stringy clung to the sole. Ole Lukoje vaulted onto the young man’s shoulders and his taloned gloves tore through his duster and thick wool shirt. Both fell to the floor. The teslatron slid under the cabinet. The raggedy man flicked dust into the teen’s face, but the particles pinged harmlessly off the tinted goggles. The teen bucked off his attacker, rolled to his feet, and whipped his duster open to draw a volt pistol from his holster. A pencil-thick cylinder flew out the end of the sleek barrel. Ole Lukoje ducked out of the way. An electro-dart cracked the window and a web of electricity dissipated against the non-conductive glass.
The raggedy man swept the lamp from the nightstand and hurled himself out of the window. The cherubic boy, meanwhile, sat bolt upright on the bed, screeching. The teen tried to calm him, but his bug-eyed goggles sent the boy further into a panic. He ripped the goggles off to reveal an anchor-like nose and bushy eyebrows.
“Easy, kid. My name’s Ehrich Weisz,” he said with barely a trace of his former accent.
“Get away from me! Monster! Monster!”
Ehrich ignored the screaming as he ran his hand through his mop of brown hair. He jumped to the window, but the raggedy man was already halfway down the street. Ehrich hurriedly checked his wounds as he crossed the bedroom. Ole Lukoje’s talons had dug deep enough to draw blood, but not enough to slow him down. He holstered his volt pistol and picked up his teslatron. The coil sat askew on the barrel. He cursed the delicate design of the weapon, then pulled his goggles over his eyes and flipped the green filters over the primary lenses. Night turned as bright as day. He left the screaming boy, stepped over the fallen mother, and rushed outside. The hunt was on.
The Hunter’s Trail
Posh mansions and apartment buildings with intricate stonework bracketed the wide cobblestone road, but Fifth Avenue did not dazzle Ehrich; not when he had his gaze set on tracking his quarry, which he had first spotted, while on patrol, casing the mansion with the mother and her son. The raggedy man was nowhere in sight. Ehrich tracked south in the hopes of spotting some sign of the killer. He lingered outside another mansion, eyeing the light in the upper floor window. A woman stepped in front and pulled the curtains closed, but not before she shot a suspicious glance at Ehrich. None of the wealthy inhabitants had any idea that a deadly stalker was in their midst. He suspected they were more concerned about commoners like himself traipsing past their manicured lawns.
Though he had spent two years in New York, he still couldn’t adjust to this dimension’s city. Technological advancements in weapons such as his volt pistol and teslatron rifle were a marvel. So were the steam-powered generators that heated the warehouses in Fulton market. The dirigible moored on the Statue of Liberty’s raised torch still gave him pause, but some things did not change.
“Get your evening news. All that’s fit to print,” a young girl in a dirty grey smock yelled out. She eyed Ehrich. “You want a paper?”
He fished two pennies from his pocket and held them out. When she reached for them, he closed his fist. “I don’t want yesterday’s news. I want to know what’s happening now.”
The girl wiped her sleeve against her lips, never taking her gaze off his hand. “That’ll cost you extra.”
He smirked. The girl reminded him of the year he had spent on the streets hawking newspapers to make enough money to buy a cooked yam or a bag of roasted peanuts, his only meal on some days. To survive in the Bowery, you needed to know how to take advantage of whatever opportunity sprang up, and this girl smelled opportunity.
Ehrich reached into his pocket and fished out three more pennies. The girl’s eyes twinkled as she stared at the coins on the palm of his hand. He closed his hand before the guttersnipe could even think about snatching the pennies.
“You know they tell me not to talk to Demon Watch hunters,” she said. “I’m taking a big risk here. Should be worth more than what you’ve got there.”
“Bully for you, but this is all you’re going to get,” Ehrich said. “I’m sure I can find a hungrier newsie down the street.”
“No, no, I’ll take it.” She opened her hand.
Ehrich had survived long enough in the Bowery to avoid this trick. “Not until you tell me what you know.”
“But if I tell you, then you have no reason to pay me.”
“You’re going to have to trust me,” he said.
“They say we’re not supposed to trust your kind. Heard you grab kids like me off the street and make ’em work in Demon Gate over on Devil’s Island.”
“Sure,” he said. “Demon Watch is always on the lookout for strays. That dimensional portal doesn’t run itself.” One thing Ehrich had learned in his time in New York was how to manipulate someone’s assumptions to his advantage. “If you don’t give me what I want right quick, I can haul you back with me so you can work with the worst of the worst. The ones down in the prisons. Think the Dimensionals out here are bad? Tip of the iceberg.”
The guttersnipe’s eyes widened. “You wouldn’t…would you?”
The truth was Demon Watch did recruit orphans, but they found more skilled and better-motivated trainees from orphanages than on the streets. This girl couldn’t even cut kitchen duty, let alone a shift in Demon Gate. On the other hand, Ehrich had proven his mettle early on and graduated from cleaning dormitories to hunter training within a few months. By the looks of this stick of a girl, she’d be turned back to the streets before she could say her name. Of course, she didn’t need to know that.
“Yep, you’d be perfect for Demon Gate. Get you nice and close to the new arrivals. Some of them can be nasty. So, do we have a deal?”
She nodded.
“Good. I’m looking for a man in a black tattered suit. Curved nose like a hook. Went running past here a minute ago.”
Trembling, the girl pointed along the road leading toward the heart of the Bowery. Ehrich grimaced. His old stomping grounds. He grabbed the girl’s hand.
“You promised you wouldn’t…” she wailed.
He dropped the coins into her hand then set off after the raggedy man. Soon, the gated mansions were gone, replaced by the seedy tenements that blocked out the sky. The Bowery teemed with night owls peddling their wares under dangling telephone wires, hanging shop signs and colourful awnings. Thick Irish accents competed with guttural German and Italian as merchants bandied back and forth with customers. Ehrich winced at the stench of dead oysters and stale potatoes. He passed a couple of dark-skinned women hawking corn from their pushcarts.
“Corn for sale. Sweet, sweet corn for sale,” one sang, beckoning him with her skinny ebony finger.
“Not interested.”
“You need to eat some—” She stopped when his duster flapped open to reveal his weapon.
She backed away, singing to another potential customer. The street teemed with people but none of them were his prey.
“Anyone come across a tall man in a raggedy black suit?” he asked.
No one answered. Bowery denizens did not talk to figures of authority like coppers or Demon Watch hunters. His volt pistol and goggles gave him away. He pulled his tan duster closed to hide the weapon. As much as they hated Dimensionals, this collection of merchants, scam artis
ts and hoodlums hated Demon Watch even more. No one was going to talk to him.
Dirty-faced men in shoddy outdated sack jackets stumbled along stone sidewalks to find the nearest tavern. A street urchin squeezed between the men and snatched a hot cob of corn from a cart. The vendor nabbed him by the ear.
Then an unearthly shriek shattered the night air. Ehrich sprinted to the end of the block and veered into a narrow street. Even in the dark, he recognized this place—Bandit’s Roost, an alley where thieves and murderers lurked. He drew his pistol and flicked the switch on the side of his bowler hat. A faint glow chased the shadows away. Drying clothes hung on overhead lines strung between the brick tenements. The uneven cobblestones echoed under Ehrich’s boots as he crept past barrels and porches. To the right, he noticed a stairwell leading down, most likely to a gambling den. Crates and garbage littered the alley. He stepped over the debris, expecting someone to jump out from the darkened doorways on either side of him.
A bright glow lit the end of the road. Ehrich hurried toward it until he reached the sliver of a shimmering portal hanging in the air. The gateway slowly expanded while the raggedy man hopped over a female corpse, waiting for the portal to grow wider.
“Turn around,” Ehrich barked, raising his weapon.
Ole Lukoje hissed.
“Come toward me. Slowly.”
The raggedy man glanced back at the portal, but it was too narrow. He slid his hands into his jacket pockets.
“No, no. Hands where I can see them this time.”
He obeyed, but as his hands rose, dust poured from his fists. The cascading stream landed on the corpse, and her body began to twitch. The woman sat up, her bloody throat ripped open and her empty eye sockets glowing a deep blue. The front of her tattered, grey, cotton shirt was stained with blood. She rose to her feet and grabbed a metal pipe from the garbage pile next to her.
Ehrich aimed his volt pistol at Ole Lukoje, but the reanimated woman blocked the shot. Every time he adjusted his aim, she jumped in the way.
“Move!”
The raggedy man let out a sickly cackle. “The dead won’t obey you.”
“I said move.” He fired, but the woman batted the dart away. It struck the brick wall behind her, erupting into a blast of electricity. The dust had endowed her corpse with unnatural speed and strength.
The portal now was wide enough for the raggedy man to slip through. Ehrich threw himself to the side of the alley and fired high over the woman’s head at the portal. Branches of electricity lit up the gateway like an oil-soaked rag catching a flame just as Ole Lukoje reached his hand into the opening.
The portal instantly closed in on the raggedy man’s arm. He shrieked as the gateway sealed up, lopping off his arm just below the elbow.
Meanwhile, the reanimated woman lurched toward Ehrich who managed to squeeze off one more shot as she swung the pipe at his hand. The electro-dart flew wide and struck the frame of an opened window. Energy danced across the lace curtains, sparking into flame.
Pain shot up Ehrich’s arm and he dropped the weapon. He slammed his other hand into the woman’s solar plexus, but it had no effect. She swung the pipe at his head, forcing him to duck. Ehrich spun away before she could swing again. He stumbled into a busy thoroughfare, crowded with late-night patrons leaving a local rum hole. The sight of the woman’s bloody throat and glowing eyes halted their drunken hijinks, allowing the frazzled Weisz to slip between them and escape.
The harsh glow of arc lamps on Houston Street was a welcome sight. He scrambled away while the reanimated woman chased after him. The loud crackle of a nearby arc lamp startled her, and she gave the lamp a wide berth.
Ah ha, thought Ehrich. She has a weakness.
He sprinted to the next lamppost, hoisted himself up the thick pole and shimmied up. He was about halfway to the top when a shrill whistle pierced the night. The woman cocked her head like a curious bird, then cawed. The raggedy man approached, looking like the Grim Reaper himself, clutching the cauterized nub of his right arm. The muscular Weisz tried to climb higher, but his grip slipped and he slid down the post where his pursuer was waiting for him. He landed awkwardly on his left ankle, and grabbed the post to steady himself.
Before Ehrich could get to his feet, the woman caught him under the chin with her pipe and pressed it against his throat, pinning him against the post. He struggled to break free, but the undead woman was too strong. Stars began to dance before his eyes.
Ehrich tried to shove the woman away, but she didn’t budge. Her glowing eye sockets flared brighter and the gash across her throat looked like a cruel smile.
Ole Lukoje hissed, “S-s-stop.”
The pressure eased slightly off his throat.
“The pleasure of extinguish-s-shing this fles-s-sh bag’s-s-s life will be mine,” the raggedy man said.
“You’re under arrest,” Ehrich gasped.
The mottled-faced Dimensional giggled. “Empty threats-s-s from a dying boy.”
Ehrich kicked the poor woman in the mid-section, but she didn’t even flinch.
“Hey, ugly! Over here,” a voice interrupted. Ole Lukoje whirled around to see a blond-haired boy in a tan duster aiming a teslatron rifle at his chest.
“Charlie!” Ehrich gasped. “Watch out for his dust!”
The eighteen-year-old kept his weapon aimed at Ole Lukoje. “Thanks for the warning. Margaret, Louis—let’s bag him.”
Charlie advanced, herding the raggedy man to the right, where two other hunters were waiting. They rushed behind Ole Lukoje and tossed a net over him. Ole Lukoje struggled to break free from the wire mesh while Margaret pinned him.
The reanimated woman yanked her pipe from Ehrich’s throat and ran to save her master, leaving Ehrich dazed and gasping for air. Louis tried to draw his volt pistol, but before he could aim, she swung the pipe and knocked the weapon out of his hand—then she speared Louis in the gut with its sharp butt-end. His hiccupping gasps sent chills down Ehrich’s spine.
Ehrich dove for the pistol and shot into the reanimated woman’s exposed back. Her body twitched as the energy coursed through her system. Points of light exploded under the skin of her face and her glowing eye sockets flared a bright blue before fading out. Whatever power controlled the corpse was destroyed, and her limp, broken body crumpled to the cobblestone street. Ehrich rushed to Louis, who lay clutching the pipe imbedded in his stomach. Blood pooled across his shirt.
A shrill whistle pierced Ehrich’s ears. He turned to see the raggedy man, still under the net, rolling on top of Margaret. A moment later, Charlie managed to slam the butt of his teslatron into the back of Ole Lukoje’s head, knocking him out.
Charlie pulled the goggles from his face and nodded at Ehrich. “How’s Louis?”
He shook his head. His friend ran a hand through his dirty blond hair and took a breath. Behind him, two new hunters—Gino and Wilhelm—rushed up.
The lanky Wilhelm panted, “Crowd held us up. We got here as fast as we could. What happened?”
“Help Margaret wrap up the illegal,” said Charlie.
Gino snapped to attention. “Yes, sir.”
“On it,” Wilhelm said.
“Ehrich, give me a hand with Louis.”
“Yes, lieutenant.” Ehrich answered, knowing better than to show too much familiarity with the squad leader of the Demon Watch hunters, even if Charlie Campbell was his best friend.
Suddenly, a voice cried out, “Bandit’s Roost is burning!” Hawkers left their pushcarts and rushed toward an orange glow down the street. The night sky was lit up over the Bowery.
Ehrich’s throat closed as he recalled the electro-dart sparking against the curtains. He turned to his friend. “Charlie, we have to help them.”
The team leader shook his head. “No, we have to get Louis to the surgeon. A fire in the slums is the least of our worries.”
Ehrich took one last look at the orange glow, hoping he wasn’t the cause. But the sinking feeling in his stomach told him he knew
the truth.
Search for a Scapegoat
Normally, George Farrier enjoyed the newspaper. It was his one respite against the overwhelmingly tedious routine of running Demon Gate. He appreciated reading about the daily events of New York, even the odd grisly murder, because the stories transported him away from the daily grind of the facility.
Today, however, the front-page story brought him right back to Devil’s Island.
The newspaper headline read: Bowery Blaze. Accompanying the article was a cartoonist’s illustration of a Demon Watch hunter dancing in front of a blazing tenement. He lowered the broadsheet, rested his elbows on his oak-top desk, and sighed at the fresh-faced teenagers standing at full attention the entire time he had been re-reading the article. Their dingy dusters seemed out of place in this opulent setting of antique furniture and exotic trinkets.
Some people collected coins. Others collected art. Farrier collected souvenirs from the Dimensionals who came to New York. The array of items on a nearby rosewood table ranged from a necklace of serrated teeth to a colourful egg with animated images scrolling across the surface. On the far side of the roomy office, an Oriental cabinet bore more trinkets: a golden orb with mechanical wings, a mantle clock with glowing green numbers, and a brass spider clutching red silk between its mandibles.
The barrel-chested commander leaned forward in a leather chair that creaked under his weight, and he placed his ham-hock hands on the newsprint, showing off the scars running up the length of both arms. Farrier’s salt and pepper beard gave his face some grace, but there was no hiding the scars across the bridge of his nose and over his left eye. A Civil War veteran, he wore his wounds like medals.
Farrier’s gaze took in Ehrich’s torn duster, then moved on to Charlie and the three other surviving members of the squad: the snub-nosed bruiser, Margaret, who had helped capture
Ole Lukoje; the rake-thin whiner, Wilhelm; and the lazy-eyed joker, Gino. Only Louis was absent; he lay in the infirmary, fighting for his life.
