Grimm Awakening

by Bryan Smith

  Mona shook her head. “You’re in no position to taunt me, Jack. Remember that.”

  “I’m in no position to do much else, Mona. Remember that.”

  Mona didn’t say anything for long moments. She looked at Jack with a face devoid of expression. Jack had long associated hell and demons with fire. With heat. But heat wasn’t what Jack felt now. There was a coldness issuing from Mona that would have chilled a polar bear. He sensed movement from the balcony below him and he welcomed the opportunity to shift his attention elsewhere.

  The little girl was standing at the edge of the dark balcony’s railing. But Jack saw that his earlier assessment of her age had been significantly off the mark. She had looked like a prepubescent girl sitting back there in the shadows, but now he could tell she was somewhere in her early to mid twenties. But she was small, standing no more than five feet from head to toe (and that was being generous). She was slim and ghostly white, with a black pageboy haircut framing a very pale face. She was wearing a sleeveless green dress and was barefoot. She stood in a languid pose, with her feet crossed at the ankles and an arm tucked beneath her breasts. Her other hand moved the lollipop in and out of her mouth as she regarded Jack with unreadable brown eyes.

  He was still looking into those strangely hypnotic eyes when he heard Mona say: “Get that worthless sack of shit back up here. You, go fetch my tools.”

  Tools?

  Jack didn’t like the sound of that. A desperate panic seized him and he looked at the strange girl with the most imploring expression he could muster. He fought the urge to call out to her. Alerting his captors to her presence would accomplish nothing. It might even mean bringing harm to the girl and he didn’t want that--despite her apparent disinterest in his plight.

  Holding her gaze, he mouthed the words “help me”, taking care to form the words as clearly as possible. He repeated the silent plea, then opened his mouth to do so another time--and froze when he heard the words in his head.

  “I may help you,” a feminine voice told him. “I haven’t decided yet. Are you worth saving?”

  Jack gaped at her. Save for opening to admit the diminishing lollipop once again, her mouth hadn’t moved. She was really speaking inside his head. According to Andy O’Day, true telepaths were rare but the ones who did exist tended to be mentally unstable. Great. Just what he needed--his fate in the hands of a pint-sized lunatic.

  He heard girlish laughter in his head.

  “Yes,” came the intruding voice again, “I am a lunatic. But you still haven’t answered my question--are you worth saving...Jack Grimm? That is your name, isn’t it?”

  Jack spoke aloud: “This is starting to creep me out.”

  Mona leaned further over the railing above him. “Who are you talking to, Jack? Is there someone down there?”

  “Just talking to myself, Mona. I’ve been hanging like this too long. Becoming delirious.” He raised his head to grin at her. “Say, have I told you to go fuck yourself lately?”

  Jack watched her knuckles turn white as she gripped the railing hard in an effort to contain her fury. She looked at the man holding him by the ankle. “Get that asshole back up here.“

  The man didn’t move.

  Mona glared at him. “What the hell is wrong with you? Do what I say if you don’t want to die.”

  Jack frowned. As surreptitiously as possible, he shifted his gaze back to the dark-haired girl. He thought: “What’s going on?”

  The disconcerting presence in his head replied, “My abilities aren’t limited to telepathy. I’m exerting a bit of control over the man holding you. I want you to answer my question.”

  “Yes,” Jack thought, “I am worth saving. I’m one of the good guys, honest.”

  A brief, contemplative silence ensued. Then the girl thought. “Good enough. You may be seeing me again, Jack Grimm.”

  Jack’s frown deepened. “Who the hell are you?”

  “My name is Raven Rainbolt.”

  From above, Mona spewed epithets and commands. She was positively apoplectic. Jack drew in a startled gasp of air as he began to move quickly upward. He got one more glimpse of the dark-haired mystery girl--Raven, he reminded himself--before she disappeared from view. Then he was upright again, standing on the balcony on unsteady feet. Mona punched him in the face and he toppled like a third-world army facing the United States Marine Corps.

  But Mona wasn’t finished venting her rage.

  Jack watched through bleary eyes as she reached for the man Raven Rainbolt had somehow immobilized. She ripped the hood off his head and Jack gasped reflexively at the sight of a face that looked as if it had been dipped in some very corrosive substance. Her right hand whipped out and her fingernails raked bloody trails across the hideous countenance. Then Mona grabbed the huge man by the crotch and the neck and lifted him over her head.

  Jack could only gape at this. For once, wisecracks eluded him.

  Mona moved with little apparent effort--she almost seemed to be gliding across the balcony--and stopped at the railing, where she heaved the doomed slave into the great big emptiness.

  Mona stood at the railing and watched the body descend.

  Jack cleared his throat and recovered his voice. “Jesus...”

  Mona turned to look at him. Her nostrils flared, her face flushed, and her wide eyes gleamed with excitement. Jack hated to admit it, but she looked supremely sexy just then. He didn’t think he’d ever seen anything sexier.

  Which was just all kinds of wrong.

  But true. Shamefully, shamefully true.

  He gulped. “Goddamn. Holy shit. I could use another drink right about now.”

  Mona smiled. “So could I. Then you get to decide what I use on you next--the blowtorch or the power saw.”

  Jack winced.

  If he’d had the strength, Jack might’ve flung himself over the balcony railing then. But there was no time for further contemplation of suicide. The remaining devil slave hauled him to his feet. Mona braced her hands against Jack’s chest and gave him a hard shove. He crashed through the sliding door amid a shower of glass. His head struck something unyielding and everything went black.

  9.

  The alternate realm Andy’s murmured hoodoo chant transported them to looked a lot like hell’s OverDark district to Lucien’s eyes. So much so that he briefly thought he’d been transported back to hell. There weren’t many things Lucien feared, but a return to the realm of his birth was near the top of that very short list. Should he ever return to that forsaken place, the hellpack would hunt him mercilessly. And they would capture him, he was sure of that. Not even Theodore Grimm’s network of renegade operatives would be able to help him.

  But this wasn’t hell. That was obvious to Lucien within a few moments. Like OverDark, this was a world in dire need of an industrial revolution. Horse-drawn carriages clomped over cobblestones. Dirty-faced children clad in rags prowled the streets. Several women--most of them slightly less dirty than the foul-smelling street urchins--were clustered around the mouth of a trash-strewn alley. In manner and attire, they resembled the Victorian-era prostitutes Lucien had seen in OverDark. They called out lewd come-ons to passing men. One man stopped to negotiate with a woman in an ankle-length red dress.

  Andy O’Day smacked his arm. “Stop gawking at the tarts. We’ve got drinking and talking to do.”

  Lucien blinked. “Sorry.”

  Siegel grinned. “Give the boy a break, O’Day. Hey, Lucien, I know a special lady. See that one in the green dress? Yeah, the one doesn’t look like she’s rolled around in shit lately. That’s Madeleine. Dame’s got a mouth like a Hoover vacuum.”

  “A what?”

  “A Hoover…never mind.”

  Madeleine had long auburn hair, a curvaceous body, and the kind of long, slim neck that would make a vampire drool. She saw Siegel pointing her out and blew the old man a kiss. Then her gaze shifted to Lucien. Her luminous green eyes locked on his and Lucien felt his pulse race.

  He
looked at Andy. “Get me inside somewhere. Now. Before I do something we’ll all regret.”

  Andy smiled. “Tell you what. If we can get Jack out of the Maverick, we’ll all come back to Skellington to celebrate. Lovely Madeleine will still be here, I assure you.”

  “Skellington?”

  “That’s the name of this shining beacon of a city.”

  Andy turned away from them and began to walk up the street, moving away from the cluster of prostitutes. Lucien and Siegel followed, with Lucien casting a last, yearning glance at Madeleine before turning away from her. A hundred yards further down Andy turned left down another street. This street closely resembled the one they’d just departed, except that there were more business establishments and more people. Andy walked down another block and crossed the street behind a slow-moving carriage.

  Lucien spied their probable destination. It was a ramshackle pub in a small green building with blacked-out windows. A crooked sign above the batwing doors read:

  O’SCANLON’S PUB

  Estab. 1958

  Lucien grunted. “Interesting. This world calculates the passage of time in a manner similar to your own.”

  Andy smiled as they paused outside the batwing doors. “Simple explanation, really. This is just an alternate version of my world. Remember when I said it was right next door? In a way, it is. This version of earth has evolved at a slower pace than the one we just left. It’s the early twenty-first century in this world, but this place likely won’t see the advent of smart phones and online social networks for centuries to come, if ever.”

  Andy pushed through the batwing doors and they walked into a pub that struck Lucien as a livelier--and more old-fashioned-- version of The Dead End, the hole-in-the-wall dive bar where he’d first met Jack Grimm in Greytown. The Dead End’s defining characteristic was a pervading atmosphere of gloom. It was a place where deceased bottomed-out drunkards spent eons upon eons drinking and wallowing in their regrets. Damned boozers sat in silence in booths and interacted with each other only rarely. In that sense, the contrast between The Dead End and O’Scanlon’s was stark. The atmosphere here was festive. Working men and career alcoholics clustered around tables and booths, engaging in raucous conversation and exchanging bawdy jokes. Close to a dozen card games were in progress. At the far end of the establishment a woman in a pink dress sat at a battered piano and led a rowdy chorus of voices through a barrelhouse boogie.

  Andy shoved his way through the crowd, eliciting the occasional angry curse or half-hearted threat. He made his way to the long, gleaming bar and slid onto the only remaining empty stool. Lucien and Siegel hung back a bit behind him and intermittently dodged stumbling drunks.

  The bartender noticed Andy at once and his pug-ugly face instantly brightened with a broad grin. He was fat and florid-faced and had a messy tangle of thinning gray hair. He leaned his immense belly against the bar and yelled: “Andy O’Day! As I live and breathe! It’s been too long, my friend. To what do we owe the pleasure of your company on this fine day?”

  Andy grinned right back at him. “We seek drink, and much of it, as well as a place quieter than this to discuss matters of great import. Is the Red Room available?”

  Lucien sensed a change in the barkeep’s mood, a shift from pleasant good-humor to humor tinged with wariness. “Aye, it is. The Red Room is beyond the budget of most of my patrons.” There was a sparkle in his eyes, a businessman’s anticipation of a big payday in the offing. “But not, of course, for a man of your means, friend.”

  Andy reached into his jacket’s inner pocket. Lucien spied a flash of gold as Andy passed a closed fist over the bar. The barkeep palmed the payment and the handful of coins disappeared into a pocket of his apron. He signaled to an assistant, a skinny, pimply young man with a mop of unruly brown hair. “Sidney, mind the store for a bit, will ya?”

  Sidney was pouring beer into a wooden stein from the tap of a beer barrel. He glanced their way. “Sure thing, Sean.”

  Sean moved to the end of the bar, raised a wooden flap, and joined Andy and his compatriots. “If you’ll just follow me, gentlemen.”

  The big barkeep shoved his way through the crowd, heedless of the curses of his customers. Andy slid off the stool and followed him, with Lucien and Siegel following in their wake.

  Lucien glanced at Siegel. “What is the Red Room?”

  “It’s just what the name implies, son--a red room.”

  They skirted the thick crowd gathered around the piano and reached the far end of the bar, arriving at a nondescript brown door. Sean produced a key from another pocket and unlocked it. He stepped through the open door, then turned and closed it once the other men had passed through it. They were in a short, lantern-lit hallway. The floor was dusty and there were faintly visible cobwebs here and there. Sean led them to the end of the hallway and with a nod indicated a flight of wooden stairs.

  He reached into his apron pocket again and brought out another key. This one he passed to Andy. “I trust you still know the way.”

  Andy nodded. “I surely do, Sean.”

  The barkeep smiled. “I’ll leave you to it, then.”

  The big man retreated to the opposite end of the hallway, opened the door there, and a wave of music and laughter rolled in. Until that moment Lucien hadn’t noticed how effectively soundproofed this hallway was--the sound coming from the bar was like that of a television snapped on at high volume. Then Sean O’Scanlon was gone and the noise vanished with him. Pure silence followed the click of a turning lock. Lucien was struck by a sense of unreality--it was hard to believe a raucous barroom was going full-tilt just beyond the wall to his left.

  With no further preamble, Andy began to descend the stairs. Lucien gestured for Siegel to follow first, then he trailed after the old man. The stairs creaked beneath their feet but seemed sturdy enough. The musty smell of the hallway was less in evidence the further down they went. In fact, the air was improbably fresh, almost like conditioned air. Assuming he could trust Andy’s account of this world’s level of technological advancement--and he had no reason to doubt it--that shouldn’t be possible. But by the time they reached the bottom of the staircase Lucien trusted his senses--the air here was artificially cooled and was subtly tinged with some pleasant scent.

  They followed Andy down another, longer hallway that was clean and nondescript. The door at the end of the hallway was the passage’s lone remarkable feature--it was painted a shade of bright red. Andy unlocked it with the key supplied by the barkeep and entered the Red Room.

  The room was about the size of a small apartment. And Siegel had been right--varying hues of red were the only colors in evidence. The profusion of crimson was so overwhelming at first that Lucien had to squint, but his eyes soon adjusted to it the way a human’s would adjust to sudden darkness. There was a single red table at the center of the room. It was ringed by four straight-backed red chairs. A well-stocked bar painted a deep shade of auburn occupied the room’s far left corner. The floor was hardwood varnished a rich shade of scarlet.

  A woman in a short dress entered the room from another door, a door Lucien was certain hadn’t existed until it opened. He watched the door swing shut as the smiling woman came their way. To say that the door ‘closed’ wasn’t quite accurate. It disappeared. Lucien’s brow knitted as he scrutinized the seamless expanse of red wall.

  Perhaps this world lacked the technological advances that had been both blessing and curse to Andy’s world, but it didn’t lack for magic. At least this little corner of it didn’t. Which, now that he thought of it, went a long way toward explaining why Andy O’Day and the barkeep were on such friendly terms.

  The woman introduced herself as Delilah. Her dress was red, of course. And it wasn’t just short, it was almost nonexistent. It was more like a slip, a flimsy piece of lingerie that clung to her shapely body in a way that stirred anew the horniness awakened by the streetwalker Siegel had pointed out earlier.

  Lucien realized the woman had said
something to him and blinked. “What?”

  Delilah laughed. The sound carried a strong erotic undertone that sent a shiver up Lucien’s spine. “I merely noted your obvious appreciation of my body, you handsome devil.”

  “Um...”

  “I could remove my dress for the duration of your stay. Improve the view, so to speak.” She winked. “Nothing is forbidden patrons of the Red Room.”

  Lucien felt vaguely embarrassed. “Um...no. That won’t be necessary.” He coughed. “I mean, you are lovely. But…um…we have business…and…”

  But then Delilah was laughing again. “Relax. Just wanted you to know the option was available. If you gentlemen will just have a seat...”

  They moved to the table, where Lucien pulled out a chair and dropped heavily into it. He was relieved to be off his feet. Until just then, he hadn’t fully realized just how weary he was. Siegel and O‘Day looked similarly relieved.

  “Now, then, how would you boys slake your thirst tonight?”

  Andy spoke first. “I’d like a pint of your finest stout.”

  Siegel said, “Double rye, doll. And bring the bottle.”

  Lucien drew in an involuntary sharp breath as Delilah’s hand fell on his shoulder.

  “And you, handsome? What sounds good to you tonight?”

  “I’ll have bitter ale, if you have it.”

  Delilah gave his shoulder a squeeze. “Oh, we do. We have anything you want.” Lucien tried not to sneer at the other men’s chuckles. “I’ll be back with your drinks directly, boys.”

  Then she was gone--and Andy and Siegel exploded with laughter.