Midnight Squad: The Ties That Bind

by J. L. M. Visada

Niki asked, “So what song do you hear?”

  Grim mumbled something. I didn’t understand it, but Danika must have because she started howling with laughter. “It’s not funny.” Grim barked.

  “It’s…hahaha…pretty…hahaha…pretty…oh God I can’t breathe.” Danika was still howling, but now she’d even started snorting.

  “What? What is it?” I asked.

  Penny cackled, “Grim hears the Chicken Dance song when people are about to die.” Suddenly Penny couldn’t fight anymore. She doubled over laughing. The van was shaking between the two women’s laughter. The rest of us just stared in disbelief.

  “It’s not funny.” Grim growled.

  “No…no…you’re absolutely right. It’s not funny…IT’S FUCKING HILARIOUS!” Niki roared with laughter. Each of us started laughing as the reality of the situation sank in.

  Janine kept trying to comfort the big lug, but she kept snickering before she could actually say anything. Grim blushed a deep red. Penny leaned over and kissed him on the cheek, leaving bloody lip prints on the side of his face. “Oh honey, you have to admit it’s pretty funny. I mean you’re worried about your powers corrupting you, and one of your powers involves the chicken dance.” Grim glared at her, and then it sunk in. His eyes softened, and then took on a playful glint. Finally a deep rumble settled through the van as he started to chuckle. It wasn’t too long before he was howling with laughter along with the rest of us.

  “Why on earth would He make you hear the chicken dance when someone is about to die?” Katy snorted.

  “He says it was so the weight of what is happening won’t overwhelm me.”

  “Really?” I stuttered through my giggles.

  “Yeah, but I think that was only part of it. It might have been the biggest part, but I think he also did it because he has a twisted sense of humor.” Grim said with a hint of frustration.

  Janine sputtered, “No, the Lord wouldn’t make light of something as serious as death.”

  “Remember when he asks the haters which is easier, to forgive someone’s sins or to take up your mat and walk? Then the haters got all pissy because he forgave the man’s sins. So then Jesus tells the guy to take up his mat and walk. The guy does just that. It’s almost like something out of Monty Python. Now, God knows everything, so of course he knows what they are going to do. So he was setting them up for the gag from the beginning.” Grim smiled.

  “Still, it seems kind of mean to make fun of the dying like that.” Janine grumbled.

  “No, mean would be making them hear the Chicken Dance when they were about to die. Making me hear it is just his way of giving me a cosmic noogie. He loves us like family. So like any big brother he’s not above a little good natured ribbing.” Grim seemed happier, like a weight had been lifted off his shoulders, but then again he always seemed happier talking about God.

  “So, were you just going to keep it a secret forever?” Niki asked.

  “He didn’t even want to tell me. I only found out because we were at the wedding of an old friend of his from the military. They played the Chicken Dance, and Grimmy dove under a table like it was an air raid. I thought he was having some kind of mental breakdown. He explained it to me later, and then wouldn’t talk to me for hours after that because I laughed so hard.” Penny snickered.

  “How mortifying.” Grim grumbled.

  “Wow, I thought maybe Jesus had given you some really incredible powers, but it sounds like you just got handed one of the lamest powers ever. Is there anything else you can do?” Danika asked patiently.

  “Well I can make the scythe, and the cloak of black smoke that lets me teleport. Well, actually teleport isn’t exactly correct. I sort of open an alternate path from point A to point B. It’s like I create my own hallway. It’s hard to explain. I mean I’m moving, but it’s like I’m moving in pieces. Like half of me goes to wherever I want to travel, and then the rest of me runs to catch up.” Grim said carefully.

  Niki sputtered, “So what happens if you try to go too far?”

  “We stop having conversations like this.” Grim said darkly. “If I was an angel then I could probably teleport in and out anywhere I wanted to go, but because I’m just human…I’m limited by my body. At least I get the scythe, or I’d say I got hosed on the deal.”

  Janine asked, “What’s the scythe do?”

  Grim stated matter-of-factly, “It cleaves the soul from the body. It doesn’t actually harm anyone physically, but it cuts the tether that holds a soul in the body, and you all saw what happens after that. It sends the soul immediately to wherever it belongs. Heaven or Hell, the scythe gets you there quick, fast, and in a hurry.”

  Grim threw the car in drive, and we went to the nearest car wash. We stopped and Grim got out. He dropped two coins in, and then waved at Penny to get out and come over to the carwash spray gun. Penny moved slowly, and the rest of us got out of the vehicle. I think we were all curious about what was about to happen.

  “No! I will not!” Penny yelled.

  “Yes you are, we can’t have you going into the hotel like that.” Grim yelled back.

  “I’ll get my shower at the hotel.”

  “No, you’ll get it here, because if they see you looking like this then we’ll never make it past the front door.” Grim retorted.

  “Fine just be carefu….HEY!” Penny screeched as the water struck her in the face. Grim started hosing her down, and trying to hide the giant grin that kept growing bigger as he quickly had Penny looking like a soaked rat. After a few minutes he put two more coins in and handed her the spray gun.

  Penny howled like an angry cat, “REVENGE!” and then proceeded to hose him down with extreme prejudice. The rest of us just stood back and laughed. Penny was hosing Grim down, and paying an uncomfortable amount of attention to Grim’s nether region. His “nethers” were going to be squeaky clean before Penny got done.

  Finally, they finished and we had to wait for them to drip dry. Penny’s hair was wet and slicked back, and the water made her body armor look extra shiny. I tried not to drool, and succeeded…mostly. Grim kissed her forehead and then pulled her in for a hug.

  “So, just out of curiosity…should we be concerned that Grim left a general screaming like a madman, and curled up in a puddle of his own piss?” Katy said disapprovingly.

  “Nah, he had it coming. Besides, I didn’t do anything permanent to any of them. The snipers will wake up with a headache; the men operating the tank gun will be fine. Maybe a few bumps and bruises, but nothing that won’t heal. The general will be fine in a few hours. In fact he probably won’t even remember getting sucked down to begin with.” Grim grumbled, and I got the distinct impression that he was wishing the general would remember it for the rest of his life. “Besides, the body armor is so amazing that they’ll overlook my little outburst. Now the real question is when did DD start throwing right crosses like she’s a boxer?”

  “They hurt my friend, and I panicked. It’s not like I actually hurt him.” I sputtered.

  “Yeah, but still, I’m not used to watching you go all Rocky Balboa on someone. Was it as fun as it looked?” Grim smiled.

  “I think I almost broke my hand on his face.” I blushed a little. Let’s face it, I’m not exactly intimidating.

  Grim laughed, “Don’t worry; at least you got the satisfaction of giving that asshole a good pop in the mouth.”

  “I’m a little reluctant to sell them the armor now. I don’t like that they treated Penny that way.” I said, trying to make it sound like I’d do that for anyone, and not just because she was…special.

  Penny wrapped an arm around me, and gave me a big bear hug before saying, “It’s sweet that you’d think about giving up millions, potentially billions of dollars because you didn’t like how they treated me, but we need the money.”

  “We don’t need the money bad enough for them to treat you like that.” I grumbled.

  Grim came over and put his arm around me. I was now the meat in a Penny an
d Grim sandwich…thinkunsexythoughtsthinkunsexythoughtsthinkunsexythoughts…think….oh God they feel so good. I struggled to avoid grabbing both of their firm, yummy backsides. Grim grinned at me and then said, “We need that money. We need the security it will bring us because we aren’t exactly safe. We’re too exposed.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “What he did to Penny. That wasn’t a case of miscommunication. He was trying to kill her. It was a trap to kill one of us. Thank God it failed.” Grim brushed Penny’s cheek.

  “What!” We all screamed in unison.

  “I should have known something was fishy. I mean the whole place was set up for a test, and for some random reason they hide a tank behind boxes. I knew it was there, but I didn’t put it all together.” Penny sneered.

  “I’m just glad you’re okay.” Niki said nervously. “But how do you know it wasn’t just that the bastard was just being an asshat and pushed the demonstration too far?”

  Grim’s face turned stone cold, “What do you think we were doing when I pulled him down?”

  “But you were only down a few seconds.” Janine said.

  “Time…it’s just different when I do that. Seconds can be hours, and hours can pass in seconds. I can stay inside The Black for as long as I want. It is the distance that I travel that can cause problems. So while I had him down there I did some…interrogating.” Grim sighed in pleasure. Which was a little creepy that he’d enjoy “interrogating” anyone that much. It was a side of Grim that I didn’t want to ever become familiar with.

  Chapter 10

  We started driving back to the Leitmotif, and Grim told us everything he got from his time with General Garrett. The man admitted he was trying to kill Penny. He had wanted to make it look like a training accident. I was just thankful that he’d chosen Penny instead of Grim. Well, I wasn’t happy that he’d chosen either, but at least Penny survived it. If he had shot Grim then we’d be planning a funeral right now. I had to fight back tears when I thought about it.

  Grim explained that the general told him that he’d been given orders to kill Penny by a group of people calling themselves “The Darkness”. The moment he said the name, Danika and Penny both got very nervous, and Janine just flickered like a strobe light. They really and truly looked spooked, and I didn’t think Penny could be spooked.

  Niki saw it as well, “Why are you three freaking out? Is it that bad?”

  Penny and Danika both nodded. Janine said nervously, “Do you know the old saying about how the Devil’s greatest trick is that he convinced the world he doesn’t exist?” We all nodded and waited for her to continue. “Well. The Darkness subscribes to the same theory. They are more myth and legend than reality. The only thing anyone knows for sure is that they try to keep vampires, werewolves, and other things hidden as legend. When something tries to step out into the human world and make itself known…The Darkness comes to smack it down.”

  Penny nodded, “It’s one of the reasons my kind has hid for so long. They fear the retribution of The Darkness. The last vampire brave enough to step into the light…it didn’t end well.”

  “What happened?” Grim looked really concerned.

  “Well Bram Stoker wrote a pretty good biography about him. Of course some of the details were sensationalized, and he got some facts wrong, but the biography was pretty spot on otherwise.” Penny was nervous.

  “So part of the reason you like the movie Dracula is because of Bela Lugosi, but part of it is because this guy was kind of like a hero to you?” I said, being careful with my choice of words.

  “Not just my hero. He was a hero to my people. He was the first of us to ignore The Darkness’ threats and step out into the light. When they destroyed him they wrote “death to all the Lightbringers!” in his blood on the wall behind him. No one, not vampires, not werewolves, nothing tries to make themselves known to humanity. If they do, then they risk the attention of The Darkness. Oh fuck…by saving the world and going public we might as well have hung up a flashing neon sign that says come kill us please. OHSHITOHSHITOHSHITOHSHIT!” Penny was rocking back and forth nervously, and would have kept sputtering, but Grim reached over and gave her a good shake. She kept rocking, but now she kept quiet. Panic was just pouring off of her.

  “So you were planning on telling us about the crazy cult like group when?” Niki asked.

  “Well. it’s been over a century since anyone heard from them, and even before then their activities were mostly just rumors. Someone would go missing, or we’d find their head, and it would be attributed to The Darkness. I kind of assumed they no longer existed, or at least I was hoping.” Penny went back to rocking forward and back.

  “I only know the legends, but stories about The Darkness are the ghost stories we told to each other around the campfire as kids.” Danika whispered.

  “So The Darkness is the stuff of nightmares for the creatures that cause nightmares?” I asked, realizing immediately how insensitive it probably sounded to Penny and Danika. I expected angry stares, but instead all I got were haunted nods.

  “They’re the ghost stories that keep Vampires hiding in their lairs, and keep werewolves from coming out in public. Fairies, elves, gnomes, weres, trolls….and pretty much everything else hides from people because they are afraid of what The Darkness might do to them.” Janine’s words were shaky. Even she was rattled.

  “So they are like terrorists?” Grim stated. His eyes narrowed, and I watched his knuckles turn white as he gripped the steering wheel.

  “In some ways that is a very good assessment, but in others it fails. They use brutally violent tactics, just like any terrorist group. They might slaughter a whole group just to make a point. They don’t really see a difference between their declared enemy, and innocent civilians. So in all those ways, they are exactly like a terrorist group. Also, like many terrorists, they work independently of one another. So one hand might not really know what the other hand is doing. In those ways you are absolutely correct. In other ways they are more like a cult. They carry out their missions, and duties with a religious zeal. They would do whatever their leader tells them.” Janine said carefully.

  “So who is their leader?” Grim said, and I could see from the glint in his eyes he was already planning a counterattack.

  Penny’s voice was hollow, and afraid, “No one knows. Some say that it’s a shapeless beast, others say it is an entity beyond anything we could understand, and some say it’s the devil.” She was trembling in fear.”

  “What do you say?” Grim whispered.

  “We’re fucked.” Penny’s voice was a nervous whisper. There was a finality in it that made my stomach clench.

  No one spoke. After a couple minutes Grim shrugged and we all quietly stepped out of the vehicle. We walked into the hotel and went directly to our rooms. Normally we’d be cutting up, or even picking on one another, but seeing Penny actually afraid scared the bejeebers out of the rest of us. This wasn’t like watching her cringe and hide under the covers while we watched some horror movie. That was fun, and a little funny. Seeing Penny completely spooked, there was nothing funny about this. If The Darkness is something that scares her, then what does that mean for the rest of us?

  I sat in my room and tinkered with my computer. I was hoping to find more information on them. All I found when I searched was information on a band, a comic book, a video game, a movie called The Darkness Within, and a bunch of YouTube videos with Johnny Cash’s song I See a Darkness. There was nothing useful. I had to at least give them credit for practicing what they preached. There was no record of them that I could find anywhere.

  I searched for hours, but nothing. A knock on the door got my attention. My eyes were tired from the search, and I had the beginnings of a headache. “Come in.” I said. My voice sounded tired, and beaten down and I cleared my throat and reminded myself that I should at least try to not sound like a zombie. Everybody was pretty stressed, and I needed to at least try to sound a little upbeat
. There was no reason I should let my frustration make the situation worse.

  Penny poked her head inside, “Can we talk?”

  I looked at her, and for the first time ever, she looked horrible. Her pale skin was peeling a little. The expression “looking like death warmed over” never seemed more apt. Her normally beautiful eyes were dull and faded. I immediately leapt to my feet and ran to Penny.

  “Oh my God, what’s wrong?” I grabbed Penny by the shoulders, and some of her skin ripped under my hands. It was practically like rice paper.

  “I’m fine…mostly.”

  “You don’t look fine. You look like-“

  “A starved vampire?” Penny said slowly.

  “No, like a corpse.”

  “There isn’t much of a difference.” Penny grumbled.

  “Penny…we have to get you some blood. You can’t keep this up.” I was almost frantic. I’d never seen her look so bad.

  “For the last time…I...AM…IN…CONTROL…OF…MY…HOUSE!” Her eyes started to turn red, but then faded quickly. She didn’t even have the strength to be angry. This was serious.

  “Penny? Please eat. Can’t Grim spare a little at least?” I stammered.

  “He’s given all he can give safely. Maybe by tonight or tomorrow he could spare a little.” Penny said slowly. She talked like a drunk trying to convince you they are sober. Her words were slurred, but she kept trying to sound like she was fine.

  “How did you get like this? You didn’t look this bad when we came up here.”

  “It takes a little while before decomposition really starts to show.” Penny sighed, and sounded like someone letting the air out of a balloon.

  “Maybe Katy will help? “

  “She’s already said no. She said it wasn’t her problem.” Penny groaned.

  “Sheesh, no wonder Grim said he was done with her.” As soon as the words left my mouth, Penny’s eyes gave a faint flare of life.

  “He said what?”

  “He said he was done?” Even as the words left my mouth Penny was showing new signs of life.