"Not if we can help it," he answered as he walked away, Monster Hunters trailing behind. Our group headed for the parked chopper. Skippy and Edward were busy "liberating" fuel and prepping for takeoff. Our mud-soaked gear was already stowed, and we were ready to go. Harbinger stopped before the hulking chopper, taking a long drag from his cancer stick. "Mount up, crew. Let's get out of here. It's been a strange day."
"We got company." Holly nodded back toward the command tent. Agent Franks was following us, as stoic and impassive as ever. He trudged through the damp grass, hard eyes fixed on our group. He had been busy caring for his men, and had not yet had a chance to change out of his mud-drenched, and surely leech-and-tick-infested armor. He stopped, hands awkwardly at his side.
We waited while the emotionless soldier found the words.
"Thanks."
He snapped a hard salute, ramrod straight, and parade-ground perfect. Harbinger, Sam and Lee instinctively returned the gesture. The rest of us stood there stupidly. Franks made eye contact with each of us, squinty and cold, held his arm rigid for a long moment, and then let it fall. He spun on his boot heel and stalked back toward the tent.
"So does that mean we're friends now?" I asked.
"Hell if I know," Julie answered. "At least he didn't slap you around again."
The others moved for the chopper. Harbinger grabbed me. "Not so fast. Me and you need to talk for a second." He gestured over his shoulder and we walked away from the others. I saw Julie watching after me, looking concerned, and then she was gone into the vehicle's interior. Skippy fired up the turbines, and the powerful engines began to whine.
"What's going on?"
"I really don't know."
"You don't need to keep secrets from me. We're a team."
"You should talk."
He shrugged. "No big deal. I have some issues, sure, but I don't have the ability to twist the laws of physics like you seem to do. Care to explain?"
"Damn it. I told you what I know, Earl." I flushed with anger. "If I knew how to put an end to this, I would tell you. If I knew how to kill that slimy son of a bitch, I would do it."
"Can you find him?"
"I haven't been able to so far. The Old Man doesn't seem to be able to tell me."
"What about when you saw the vision? The road sign? When he got here?"
"The one that almost killed me? You want me to try that again?" I asked incredulously. Not that I had not already thought of it myself. It was a desperate ploy, but we were running low on time.
"If we can't find him, then we're all dead tomorrow anyway. You saw those things. Imagine them crawling over the whole world. Billions of them. Hundreds of billions of them. Orange shells as far as your eye can see, and squid things that look like blimps floating overhead. And that will just be the first wave. Then the big things will come."
"You've seen them too?" I asked in surprise.
"Yes, I have. I might not have magic powers or whatever the hell it is you've got going on up there." He poked me in the forehead. I was too stunned to react. "But I've been on the other side. I've seen that place."
"In '95. You went into the rift to pull out Julie's dad…"
He nodded slowly, the memories of the red-skied alien world eternally burned into the dark corners of his mind. I had at least one person who understood what was at stake.
"They're coming, Earl. I don't even know if the Cursed One realizes it or can see it. I don't know if he knows what's waiting for him to use that box, that thing… I'm scared," I admitted.
"I am too. And at this point, I'll be honest, I didn't think there was much out there that could scare me anymore." Harbinger was not lying or trying to appear tougher than he was. He was telling the truth. He had moved past the concept of fear, operating instead upon animal cunning and self-preservation instincts. Until now.
"We have to stop him," I stated. "I'll do whatever it takes."
"Find the Place. Find out where he's hiding. I don't care if you have to beat it out of that ghost. Get me a name, a town, something, anything. And we'll teach this clown not to mess with MHI."
"I will." I had no idea how I was going to do it, but I knew that the responsibility fell on my shoulders, on me alone, and perhaps on an old Jewish Hunter who had been dead for half a century.
"Let's get out of here then." He started toward the chopper. "I would wish you sweet dreams, but honestly, I hope you have horrible ones. I hope you see this evil thing and get his address, 'cause I'm personally gonna kick his ass."
I sat by Julie for the chopper ride back to the compound.
"How are you doing?" I struggled to communicate over the internal engine noises.
"Not real good." She patted my hand. "Just when I thought that maybe my dad wasn't as evil as I thought, he sets us up. He sent us all to die. He covered for that evil bitch." She spat. "I believed him."
"Well, he's gone now," I assured her. I suppose that we should not have been so surprised at his treachery. He had been willing to risk everything to bring his beloved back. Of course he would be willing to merely lie for her.
"At least we know he's dead. The Feds must have cut his head off and burned the body by now."
"Most likely."
"One down. One to go," she said angrily.
I tried to change the subject from her death vendetta against her parents. Almost any subject was lighter than that. "So, can we technically consider today a first date?"
"I guess. Next time, how about we do dinner and a movie?" She laughed as the tension broke.
"Ha. What girl wouldn't want to crawl through a haunted swamp, get killed, and travel through time? That's one heck of a date."
"You must have dated some strange women."
"Actually I haven't dated very many women at all. I haven't had much luck."
"Why?"
"They usually think I'm weird." That much was true. Slightly strange, kind of big awkward, and ugly-I was no charmer.
"Me too."
"You think I'm weird?" I shouted over the noise.
"No, I mean that people have always thought that about me. You know, crazy girl, always talking about monsters. Spends all her time shooting, building bombs, or practicing how to chop things up. Hangs out with a bunch of crazy people. Paranoid, delusional, lives in a compound, that kind of thing. It takes a real toll on relationships."
"See, I think that sounds perfect."
"You would." She leaned against me.
Across the troop compartment, Holly made gagging motions. Julie and I both flipped her the bird. She winked at us and went back to harassing Trip.
"Sorry to interrupt you lovebirds," Harbinger said over the radio, "but we've got business. Julie, see what other teams you can contact and find out their status. Owen has something he needs to do too."
"I need to get some sleep," I told her.
"I know, it's been a tough day."
"That's not what I mean. I need to make contact with the Old Man. I need to find the Cursed One. Tomorrow night is it."
"Are you going to try to see through his eyes again?"
"I don't know," I answered. "I've got to do something."
She looked out the window and sighed, shuddering slightly.
"Be careful."
"I will."
"Come back to me. I can't lose anybody else."
"I promise."
"Boy! Much has happened," the Old Man exclaimed. "What have you done?"
"I turned on the artifact, I guess," I answered.
"Is as I feared. This is terrible. Much terrible." He shuffled toward me, hobbling on his cane.
"Hey, we're all still alive. It sure beats the alternative."
"No," he answered. "Not better at all. Not for you."
"Hey, I'm the one that had a spine sticking out my aorta."
"Better to be dead than be cursed tool of the ancient evil."
"I'm nobody's tool," I said angrily. I was getting really tired of everybody treating me as if I was stupid. "I did the best that I could."
"No, Boy. Now is much worse than before." His bony hand grabbed me by the arm. "Come, hurry. One last memory to show."
I stopped him, pulling away. "No, Mordechai. I don't have time to screw around. Just give me a straight answer for once. Where is he, and how do I kill him?"
"You not are ready for such things." He looked at me, his hard eyes drooped in sadness. "Boy, to do such a thing would make you dead for sure. Not just dead. But maybe worse. Much worse. Cursed like he is even."
"But I'm not evil," I said defensively.
"No. Surprised I have been by you being so good." He lifted his cane and thumped me in the chest. "Good, but sometimes stupid. Brave, but proud. Too proud for own good. If not more careful, pride will kill you and blow up world. Think you can solve problems, but no patience to learn. Want to rush. Do things now." He puffed himself up and did a very poor imitation of me. "I am Boy. Now, now, now. Hurry, hurry. I can do everything. No need to learn first!"
"You would need about two more of you to do a good impersonation of me, you old midget," I told him. "Plus I don't sound like that at all."
"Bah. You are good boy. But no longer can you worry about what you are. You are Monster Hunter. Your father, he made you warrior. Do not-how you say?-pretend to be something else. No time for doubt. No time for 'normal' " He spat the word.
"You know about that?"
"I live in your head. What? I not pay attention? Now I ask one thing. Just one. Do this for me. I promise before time run out I show you new vision. At that time, what do have to lose? Your brain probably pop, serve you right. But world is destroyed right after anyway."
"Fair enough. What do you need?"
He thumped me over the head with his cane. Hard. "Shut up your big mouth and pay attention!" he snapped. "Last memories while Cursed One was still just man." He put his hands on my head. "We leave quick before he makes change. To be in his head at time, surely you die."
I rubbed the bump on my head. I just did not get much respect around here.
"Let's do this," I said.
Lord Machado's memories.
Were of dirt. Brown dirt.
I woke up. Face down in the mud. Lying crumpled in my armor at the base of the mighty pyramid. I must have tumbled the entire way. The rain had stopped, and the jungle sun burned down upon me. I staggered up, heaving against the weight of my plate. Crusted blood coated my body, and wept from my many wounds.
My artifact.
I crawled up the stairs, pulling myself forward on my hands and knees, so very weak, and the pyramid was so very tall. I pulled, gasped and kicked, raggedly crawling my way ever higher.
I blacked out repeatedly, only to find that I had climbed higher without knowing it. My skin burned in the sun and my delirium and thirst increased. I began to crawl past bodies, past the torn remains of my soldiers who had so bravely fought the stone guardians. I cursed them for their betrayal. I cursed Captain Thrall.
Finally at the top, I kicked away the giant feasting buzzards. My ax was embedded through the back of the captain's now-empty suit of mail. His body was gone.
The artifact was gone.
I screamed at the sky. Cursing everything, swearing vengeance upon all, I tore my blade free, shaking it overhead. I vowed to regain that which was mine.
The body of the priestess Koriniha was face down in a puddle. The carrion birds had pulled her open and eaten freely. Her fine robes were crusted with dried red, stained with her spilled organs. The buzzards reluctantly hopped away as I approached.
She was the key.
I had to bring her back.
We were two weeks from the city, a hard trek through dark jungle paths. I could not carry her weight all that way, especially alone, wounded, and without provisions. I knelt beside her, and with my ax, carefully stripped the flesh from her bones, breaking joints as necessary to reduce her to her component parts. When I was done, I bundled the broken skeleton into a soldier's cloak, and tied it tight with a belt. I slung it over my back and stumbled down the pyramid, in the direction of the city. Surely one of the remaining dark priests would know what to do. If I could bring back my concubine, she could reunite me with the artifact. Nothing was going to stop me.
Days passed.
Delirium increased.
I ate bugs and small animals raw, crawling, dragging myself ever onward. Fever rushed through my body. Eating away at me. Burning me. Killing me. I did not sleep. I pushed onward, through the darkness, strange beings and spirits watching me along the jungle paths, urging me onward toward my destiny. I did not abandon my armor, nor my ax. They were symbols of my authority, and I would not give my enemies the satisfaction of abandoning part of my birthright to rust in the never-ending rain of the hated jungle.
My first sign of the city was the towers of black smoke and the clouds of milling vultures.
It was a city of the dead.
A month had now passed since my expedition had left. The bodies of the people were mostly in their homes, on their sleeping mats, pustules open on their decaying forms, taken by a fever.
I walked down the empty streets. The brilliant songbirds had starved in their cages. The only movement I saw was the carrion animals inside the doors and openings as if they were the new owners. In a way they were. Stray dogs, brought here by my men, prowled the streets, fattened by the vast stores of available meat.
Fires had caught, and now burned out of control, with no one left to fight the blaze. The air was thick with smoke and ash. I did not know if any of the people of the city had survived, but if they had, then they had fled this cursed place.