leaves

Chapter 10 - Too Used To Death

Featuring more yakuza scumbaggery.

Chapter 9 - Endless Yakuza Hunger

Froge go nom nom nom

Chapter 8 - One Step Closer to Divinity

Sp00ky stuff mates

Chapter 7 - Stealing Your Door, And Other Extreme Sports

STEAL THE DOOR FROM THE FRAME STEAL THE DOOR FROM THE FRAME STEAL THE DOOR FROM THE FRAME STEAL THE DOOR FROM THE FRAME STEAL THE DOOR FROM THE FRAME STEAL THE DOOR FROM THE FRAME STEAL THE DOOR FROM THE FRAME RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Chapter 6 - Love Gurus For Hire

Phil and Lumina reveal their true power, the power of shipping! Who will they target next?

Chapter 5 - Welcome to the Underground

Looks like the monsters are unionizing this chapter!

Chapter 4 - Yakuza Town

Don't have much to say other than cheers to ya'll and have a good week!

Chapter 3 - Neon Monk Funk

Jean's deck was one I wanted to bust out for quite a while. Glad to finally use it, and there's still a few more parts to it yet to be revealed!

Chapter 2 - Borger Time With Froge And Friends

Borger shoppe. Nom!

Chapter 1 – An Unfrogettable Start!

Here's chapter 1 lads, good to be back.

Chapter 32 - Twilight Zone

Cass waited by the barn for a full day watching the flames die down. Even as night passed into morning, then afternoon and night again, she did not move from where she sat on the hood of Mr. Moon’s car, rifle cradled in her arms like a protective charm. She didn’t know exactly what she was waiting for. Would Mark miraculously rise from the ashes, after he’d been turned into precisely that? Or would that madman come back instead, leaving it up to Cass to stop his particular brand of murderous insanity? Or would Mr. Moon’s ashes collect back together, reforming the bastard so she could shoot him in the head one last time.

Yet after a day there was nothing. The flames died down to glowing embers. The barn, once a ragged testament to a long-lived farmstead, was now nothing but cinders. No shouts came from within. Nor was there movement from behind walls that no longer existed.

Cass was alone at the farm. Only she still drew breath. Yet, a part of her wondered if that breath was real. Was she even still alive? Or was this some sort of purgatory, trapped alone on the farm where everything ended for all eternity?

She pinched her arm, wincing in discomfort as a flash of pain shot through her nerves. This was no dream.

As for being purgatory, that was still yet to be determined.

Another day passed and Cass hardly noticed. There were still no changes to her surroundings. She was still the only living person on the farm.

The sun traveled through the sky faster than she could ever have imagined possible. Was it really going that fast, or was her perception of time just screwed up? Cass blinked in a futile attempt to bring the world back in focus.

And at that precise moment, she saw a strip of grey skin amongst the ashes. Cass heaved herself off the hood of the car and went over to investigate. The skin was grey, similar to the color of ashes but different enough to stand out. It was not moving at all, whatever person or thing it belonged to was seemingly content to stay still… or perhaps they were just dead, and somehow their body wasn't burned up all the way.

The ashes swirled around her shoes, staining the leather as she walked. A cinder, still scorching hot, settled on her windbreaker, melting a tiny hole in it before Cass could brush it away. Then her shoe hit something soft. Cass prodded the soft object with the barrel of her rifle, moving it just enough to reveal the sticklike form of the alien.

Its body was unblemished. Not a single inch of its flesh was scorched or burned in any way. Its eyes still looked up at her, appearing to see right through Cass’s body to the sky beyond like she wasn’t even there. And, perhaps to the alien, she wasn’t there. Had it ever reacted to anything that had been done to it? It was brought into a car crash, shoved in a trunk, buried in hay, had its throat bitten out, its flesh consumed, and trapped in a burning barn.

Even then, it still lay there silently. It spoke no words and moved no muscles. The only part of it that twitched was its eyelids, which blinked once every couple of minutes.

Cass scoffed, shaking her head at the sight.

What even was this? The object of such desire that had men killing each other in droves for control over it. Sure, it had some sort of healing powers, but she now knew those had limits. Or perhaps were those limits those of the human body, instead of the healing ability? Was turning to ash the final sign that their bodies couldn’t take the physical destruction any longer? No matter what it was, the madman found that out. Mr. Moon found that out. Mark… found that out. The ability was miraculous, but it had limits.

An emotion shot through Cass with all the force of a rushing tsunami. Anger, but with a crushing sadness behind it. Her brain screamed at her to destroy it. Even if she couldn’t find out how to do that now, with enough time she might have a chance. Burn it to a crisp, never to be killed over again.

But then reason stemmed that tsunami. A cold sort of reason that spoke in a chill voice in the back of her head. What if Mr. Moon had reported the location of the alien to be Carlston, and more men with guns got sent over to take it back? What if more people she knew and cared about died while men in suits combed through her town in search of it?

That cold voice was the same voice that had told her countless times to take a shot at Mr. Moon. But this time, Cass did not resist. It was as if a checklist had formed in her head, and she was a robot bound to follow it step-by-step, never deviating until those orders were completed. Her body moved on its own, with Cass's mind taking the back seat and simply watching events occur like she was sitting on a couch with her dad enjoying a TV show after school.

The alien was hoisted over her shoulder and dumped inside the trunk of Mr. Moon’s car. The keys, still in the ignition, were turned and the car roared to a rattling life, still running but also very much feeling the aftereffects of the crash. Her hands gripped the steering wheel, the leather still slick in some places from Mr. Moon’s blood.

The car eased its way out of the driveway, rumbling along country roads that Cass knew like the back of her hand. She needed something obscure. Out of the way. Something that no one would even bother to visit months from now.

Eventually, she found it. Heading off the dirt road, Cass parked the car outside an old, depilated one-room schoolhouse. Its white paint was chipped and fading, while weeds grew out of the cement sidewalk leading up to the steps. The flagpole outside was nearly bent in half, having received the wrath of some storm or other natural force and been found lacking. This building, one she knew had been built in the days of the pioneers, hadn’t seen use in nearly eighty years.

No one even bothered to come by anymore to cut the grass, even though the schoolhouse was a historic building. That was just how little people cared about it, an old, rotting one-room schoolhouse in the middle of nowhere, a decent distance from Carlston or any other town. Sure, many people knew of it, either from word of mouth or after driving past it, but no one cared about it.

In a sense, it was the perfect hiding place for the creature. Cass popped open the trunk, heaved the alien back over her shoulder, and stumped her way up the cracked brick steps of the schoolhouse. The door, all wooden and rotten, opened after Cass put her shoulder into it, to reveal a littered collection of broken desks and cracked chalkboards.

Cass walked gingerly up the aisle, watching for wooden floorboards too rotten to step on. Above, a wasp floated lazily in the air, paying little attention to Cass’s journey. At the front of the classroom, Cass dumped the alien right on top of the old teacher’s desk, arranging it so that it would be the first thing anyone would see upon entering the schoolhouse.

She sighed, breathing in the musty air. It smelled like forgotten history. Perhaps in another fifty, or even twenty years, even the schoolhouse itself would be forgotten completely. It was a strange sense, because in another way, if Cass tilted her head just right and squinted her eyes, she could almost imagine what it must have looked like back in the day when it was still in use.

Clustered students, some watching with careful attention to the teacher, others doodling on the little chalkboards stacked in the corner out of boredom. During the summer, the end of spring, and the start of fall, the room would be blistering hot, just like how it was now. Even with the windows cracked it would still be a hellish environment. Then during the winter, it would be freezing cold, the small cast-iron stove in the middle of the room struggling to heat the building enough for the students to safely study.

Then Cass blinked and the vision was gone. She was alone again, just like she was alone on the farm after the fires faded. With one last glance at the alien, Cass left the rotting piece of forgotten history, firing the car back up and rumbling back down the dirt road to the paths more frequently traveled.

It didn’t take her long to reach the highway, even with how remote the schoolhouse was. If one knew which roads to follow, it didn’t take long to get much of anywhere. Parked by the ramp leading onto the highway, Cass heaved herself out of the car and approached a payphone. Judging by the amount of graffiti, assorted debris, and broken glass around it, the phone saw little, if any use.

But still, her body was like a robot following a checklist. She clutched a handful of quarters liberated from a small compartment in the center console of the car. She wrapped her right hand in her windbreaker, then slid the payphone off its hook. The quarters fell rattling into the box one by one as Cass made her call.

“This is the FBI tipline, how may I be of service to you today?” The calm voice of a woman emanated out of the phone.

“The subject of the Nirvana Project can be found in the old schoolhouse next to the intersection of Q Road and Terrace Drive.” Cass said in as deep of voice as her vocal cords could manage, slamming the phone back on the receiver before the woman could ask any more questions. She couldn’t be sure if that information would make it to the right people, but hopefully the words ‘Nirvana Project’ would ring some alarms.

Then the alien would get picked up by some men with guns, it would be far from the town, and if they tracked the phone, it would only lead to a derelict payphone. Wrapping her hand in her windbreaker would prevent fingerprints from being gathered, though that would matter little at all since Cass wasn't in the system. There would be no fingerprints to compare to even if some were found. With luck, unless disaster struck, the FBI wouldn't know Cass even existed.

With that final task done, Cass turned, started the car up, and disappeared down another dirt road.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

After Cass’s waiting ended, and her robotic checklist came to an end, Cass went back into town and showed up to school the next day to finish up the last week of classes. Each time the principal asked if she wished for time to mourn, and to finish her classes later, Cass would look at him with a sad, tired smile and decline. She needed people around her. She’d spent too much time alone at the Henryks farm, watching ashes swirl in the breeze. Not all of the people around her were friends, in fact some were people she blatantly disliked, but they were all familiar. They were all individual pieces to the calming, gentle puzzle that was a small town like Carlston.

By the time the final week was over, Cass’s grades were in the middle of the pack, nothing out of the ordinary. She graduated in the middle ranking of her class, right next to her close friends Jen and Ashley. The day after graduation, Cass received a job offer from Dino at the diner, which she accepted in a heartbeat. Work kept her busy, the good people kept her smiling. On some nights, when the moon was high and the business was slow, Cass could almost imagine the ghost of her father sitting in a corner booth with all the other people of the town who'd died, sipping down endless phantom milkshakes and laughing over nothing in particular. That daydream never failed to make her smile, as bitter as it felt to know they only lived on in her heart now.

And though her life went on, surrounded by friends and familiar faces, Cass always made time to revisit the old farm once a year, staring at the fading ashes while thinking about nothing in particular.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

A chubby hand gently placed the phone back on the receiver. Finally, after so many weeks, the alien was back under FBI control. Mr. Sun sat back with a sigh. It was in a new black site now, one so secretive that no outside communication was even possible, and no one – from the scientists to the security detail, could leave. Only himself and the President of the United States of America knew of its existence. The team that had retrieved the alien from the schoolhouse flagged in the tipline conversation had been dealt with. It no longer mattered if anyone had gotten a glimpse of them moving the alien from Kansas back to Washington D.C.

Getting the Nirvana Project back online was of extreme importance, and keeping it secret was everything. They were a team of volunteers, just the same as Mr. Moon’s was. They knew what would happen after.

As for Mr. Sun himself, he was in his office, far past usual working hours and late in the night. He took a long drag of his cigar. There were only two living souls in his office. Mr. Sun himself, and the watcher, who was there to make sure Mr. Sun did what he had to do.  

“It’s over.” Mr. Sun muttered to no one in particular. “Guess that means it’s time.”

“It is, sir.” The watcher, a man in a black suit with sunglasses that covered his eyes replied in a monotone.

Mr. Sun felt the weight of the metal in his other hand. He wasn’t used to it, not like Mr. Moon was. Suddenly, it all felt strange, so strange that it was almost comical.

“Ha, after all this time clawing my way up. Dobson, do you know why this is happening?”

The watcher, a man named Danny, shook his head. “No, sir. I do not, and I wish to keep it that way.”

“Good man.” Mr. Sun muttered, his amusement fleeing as soon as it arrived, “Good man. That’s the right answer. One last thing-“

“Yes sir?”

“Remind those suits upstairs about my contingency involving our little promise.”

“I don’t know what that is, sir.”

Mr. Sun shook his head. “The right people will. They made a promise in exchange for the lives of good men. I expect them to keep it in the end. You don’t need to tell them anything else.”

“Yes sir.”

Mr. Sun took one last drag of his cigar. It was funny. He wasn’t ever much of a smoker, but now that smoke felt like the purest air filling his lungs. The cigar was placed in an ashtray on his desk, the first time it had ever been used. Then his right hand rose, a flash of metal gleaming within his chubby grasp. The metal dug into the side of his head, cold and unfeeling.

“This, I do for my country. So our children, and our children’s children can prosper.” Said Mr. Sun. The solemn words did little to settle his nerves. A glass of whiskey was set before him, poured wordlessly by Danny. Mr. Sun smiled thinly. One last mercy, huh? The glass was snatched up and quaffed in one greedy gulp. It was no way to enjoy good whiskey, but that hardly seemed to matter much to him anymore. It burned all the same, traveling from his fiery mouth to settle at the bottom of his stomach like hot coals giving him the strength to do what needed to be done.

It was the best whiskey he’d ever tasted.

“Yes sir.” Danny replied, still with that infuriating monotone voice of his. With his last thoughts, Mr. Sun idly appreciated how close Danny was in temperament to how Mr. Moon used to be. Perhaps with ten more years of experience, Danny could be just as useful to the next director as Mr. Moon was to him.

And then with a deafening bang, Mr. Sun pulled the trigger of the revolver pressed into the side of his skull. His head slumped lifelessly onto the desk in a mess of bright red blood. After a few seconds, Danny stepped forward, placed two fingers on the side of Mr. Sun’s neck, and nodded. Then, with the death of Mr. Sun confirmed, he moved away to wordlessly leave the room and the body behind, the door closing with an empty clicking sound that echoed around the space.

------

And that's a wrap. At 32 chapters, Urban Nirvana is finished. It was a fun project and I learned a lot of stuff that will be useful later. Of course there's still some stuff about it I'm not super happy with, but overall I'm rather fond of this project. It's my first completed original work. Feels weird saying that.

Anyways, what people might be more interested in than my final observations on this project is what project will be next? Well, I am proud to announce that work will begin on a sequel novel to A Frog Out of Water, tentatively titled "A Frog Back In Water" that will be set in the first yugioh series, also known as Duel Monsters (following Yugi and the gang). I am currently planning on releasing the first chapter around the usual time next Sunday. As stated a few weeks ago when I realized the end of Urban Nirvana was in sight, there will be no advanced patreon chapters for the Frog sequel because it's a fanfic and I personally don't think that would be ethical. No shade on those that do, this is just a personal decision. So yeah, quite exciting.

As always, huge thanks to all patreons and readers for sticking with me in this interesting 'original novel' experiment. I do not know if I'll branch off from fanfiction again, but it was a fun experience for sure. See ya'll next week, with hopefully the first chapter of A Frog Back in Water (or a really, really good excuse. hopefully not that tho).

Peace

Chapter 31 - Battle Without Honor or Humanity

His gun was gone. Mr. Moon hadn’t the faintest idea where it had been lost, but neither did he have the time to think over it. Before him was a massive bald man, covered in thick hues of dripping crimson blood. The man was grinning, almost as if he reveled in the chaos filling the barn.

Head still foggy, Mr. Moon dipped down, retrieving a Franchi SPAS-12 clutched in the hands of a massive dead Russian man. From the feel of it, there were still a few shells loaded in the pump-action shotgun. He gave it an experimental pump, testing the weight of it in his hands. It was heavy, just as he was used to, though for some reason his left hand felt the weight more. It was as if something had… changed with it. But what? His head was still terribly foggy. What had happened to his hand, if anything at all? It felt like there was an answer to that, but it was held just out of grasp.

He shook his head, right as the bald man let out a raucous laugh and began advancing. Mr. Moon whipped the barrel of the shotgun up, letting three blasts out in quick succession, all of which caught the bald man straight in the chest. The man was blasted back on the first shot, brought to his knees with the second, and on the floor with the third. A bloody, gaping hole was opened in his chest by the 12-gauge shells, one that which Mr. Moon could see pulsating organs and quivering muscle exposed within.

Yet, before his gun could lower more than half an inch, the bald man moved. He sat up, and for a second his eyes were as foggy and confused as Mr. Moon’s were. But then the confusion cleared, and the man was back up on his feet, snarling and laughing as one.

A shout came from the girl, on the other side of the hole in the barn, but Mr. Moon paid her no mind. He stared at the bald man with narrowed eyes and tossed away the now-empty shotgun. That man possessed a strange ability, something Mr. Moon had never seen before in his life, but he had little time at all to ponder it. Mr. Moon walked steadily over to a haystack nearby, grabbing a pitchfork from the side of it to level at the bald man. Regeneration. Limited, or unlimited? If it was limited – then he would find the limits and haul the body back to D.C. for the lab techies to ogle over. If it was unlimited, well, then he wouldn’t go down without a hell of a fight. That would at least give time for the civilian to run.

"Girl!" Mr. Moon shouted, keeping his eyes trained dead on the bald man's every movement, the head of his pitchfork pointed right at the man's chest, "Get out of here! Now!”

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Cass gave a little start at Mr. Moon’s words. They sounded almost entirely different than how he spoke earlier. And his hand… it was hard to see from where she stood outside the barn, but it looked to have grown back.

Still, there was no freaking way she was running now. Not after what that monster did what he did to Mark. Cass tossed away the Sig Sauer. It was empty and therefore useless to her. Frankly, even when it had bullets, the gun wasn't all that useful. Each shot she landed was shrugged off by the crazy man like they were mosquito bites.

Then amidst a sea of thoughts scattered by grief and panic, an idea floated to the forefront of Cass’s mind. The handgun wasn’t working. Mark’s strength had only slowed the madman. But there were still weapons available. When Mr. Moon used his shotgun on the man just a few moments earlier, it looked to have done a real number on him. Was the issue power? When Mark’s body melted into ashes, was it because the bald man was striking so savagely that his healing was somehow overwhelmed?

Cass blew a stray strand of hair away from her mouth as she watched Mr. Moon lunge at the bald man with his pitchfork. Power. The Sig Sauer did not have enough. Both shotguns were in the barn and empty of shells. But what about the car? Mr. Moon had a spare Sig in there he gave to her. A spare Sig, which was in the same case as a rifle he told her not to touch.

A rifle.

Cass sprinted around the side of the barn, ignoring the shouts and laughter from inside. A rifle would have good odds of having more power than a pistol. She yanked open the rear doors of Mr. Moon’s car. Inside, right where she left it, was a suitcase. Cass flicked open the clasps to reveal the disassembled parts of a rifle, and her mind grounded to a halt.

Crap.

Hands shaking with adrenaline, Cass bulldozed through her uncertainty and began to try and slot the parts together. The barrel was easy enough, it screwed into the main part of the gun. The stock gave her trouble, but then her eyes caught the gleam of a thin silver pen, one she was able to match the size of to a small round slot in the front of the stock. The pen clipped the stock to the gun. Then the scope slotted in on top, and the bolt slid in under that.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Power coursed through his bones like electricity flying through a power line. Adrenaline shot through his body like high-grade fuel being pumped into a race car. Jack was in his element, striking and tearing and laughing at the puny opponent before him. Similar to the bulky boy before, the lizard in the suit was able to regrow its limbs – doubtlessly some freaky lizard ability was given to it by a hidden shadow cabal watching the fight play out from the background.

Well, let ‘em watch. Jackie boy would give them a show, then find them, kill them, and wear their skin like a line of fashionable summer menswear.

Crackling warmth brushed against his back as burning oil splattered out of the burning engine of his noble steed. It had ignited shortly after he’d crashed it into the barn (for dramatic effect), but with the fire unattended, it had changed from a mere flicker to a healthy, roaring blaze threatening to consume the entire building. It was glorious. Never before had Jack felt such joy. Not during his yearly tax evasion, not during his battles against the Miami Police Department, not even back in ‘Nam.

This was true bliss. Jack could feel it, like the touch of an angel of war on his cheek.

A knife slammed into his eye socket, and Jack’s rare moment of inattention was split apart. The blade worked its way past bone, into flesh, tendons, and blood vessels beyond.

He…

His hands, strength soaring through them, grabbed the head of the creature in front of him and crumpled it like paper.

What was his name?

Why was he here?

He had a purpose. He knew that for sure. But what was it?

There was a man in front of him. A smaller man, one who looked just as confused as he felt, but that confusion did little to stop the smaller man from biting away at him with knife, axe, and pitchfork.

He replied in kind. As for why, he could not quite tell, only that it felt right. He would blink, and the smaller man's skin flickered, dancing between being covered with bright green scales, and then back to looking human, albeit a bit bloodied and scorched.

If he asked the smaller man what their purpose was, would that man know?

If he asked the smaller man what his name was, would that man tell him?

It was all so… foggy.

Why?

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Another roar leaked out from the barn, accompanied by the smell of smoke. Cass’s head whipped around while her hands scrabbled around the case to collect the scattered bullets for the single-shot rifle. There was smoke leaking out from behind the broken barn door. Something, or someone, had started a fire. In the extremely flammable barn.

Cass ran around to the other side of the car, hurriedly loading a round into the gun. She leaned down next to the hood and placed the wooden stock of the rifle on the metal to steady it. She peered down the scope past the broken doors.

Inside was a madhouse of smoke and blood. The pitchfork was no longer in Mr. Moon’s hands, having impaled itself right through the madman’s left shoulder. The madman himself was busy tearing Mr. Moon’s limbs off one by one, while Mr. Moon stabbed the man's neck with a knife in his still intact left hand.

From where Cass stared, far removed from the chaos inside, it looked like two rabid animals tearing into each other without care for hurt or death. Even as they savaged each other, wounds knitted back together, and limbs regrew. However, not all stayed the same. There was something in their faces, what little brief flashes Cass could see whenever one of them turned in her direction. She wasn’t sure at first, but the more she stared through the rifle scope, the surer she became.

They looked… off. Mr. Moon’s eyes were unfocused, his face flicking between rage and confusion. Like he wasn’t sure what he was doing here, but he could very much feel someone attacking him, so he retaliated in full. The madman’s face was only a bit different. It flickered between rage, jubilation, and that same confusion Mr. Moon had.

Those were emotions Cass never thought she’d see in any sort of fight, much less a fight to the death. Two men fighting, but neither of them seemed to know why they fought, only that they must, like animals following nothing but base instinct.

No matter. She didn't know what those emotions she saw meant if they meant anything at all. Cass steadied her grip on the rifle, captured her breath deep in her chest, and let her finger close on the trigger.

The recoil was far worse than any hunting rifle she’d ever fired before. It hammered deep into her shoulder, physically knocking her back a few inches. Cass jammed her eye back into the scope, just in time to see the madman’s shoulder turned into a fountain of blood and viscera. The man shuddered, but then the wound once more began to heal before her very eyes. Mr. Moon didn’t even acknowledge the shot coming from behind him, only taking advantage of the madman’s broken balance to tear the pitchfork out of the bald man’s shoulder to impale him in the stomach.

Damn. She’d been aiming for the head.

Cass yanked the bolt back to eject the spent cartridge, stuffing another one in as fast as possible. Her breath built up in her chest, her eyes steadied, and her finger descended on the trigger. This time she was ready for the recoil, but this time she missed. The bullet sailed past the bald man by mere inches.

The madman ignored this bullet like the one before. Leaving the pitchfork in his own freaking chest, he tore into Mr. Moon with his fists, each strike punching through the agent’s chest like his flesh was made of paper. Cass ejected the spent bullet.

A flicker of flame filled her vision through the scope, and as Cass reloaded and peered back down, she finally saw what the fire came from. The engine of the cop car that had crashed into the barn was aflame, roaring with an inferno the greedily gulped at all the dry hay, the insect-bitten wood, and the spare fuel for the tractor that the barn contained. Each second that passed saw the blaze get bigger, devouring haystacks, climbing walls, obscuring doors, and creating such great smoke that the two men fighting inside were barely visible.

Cass’s breath caught in her throat. For a brief second, she’d almost yelled out a warning to Mr. Moon.

But then the second passed and Cass’s finger curled on the trigger.

This time, the shot hit home. The recoil of the rifle barely phased her, with how Cass braced her body against it, so the sight of the madman’s head exploding filled her vision. The man’s body toppled, Mr. Moon’s body following it as he dove to the ground with his knife to tear at his opponent’s flesh.

Cass snapped the used round out of the rifle, replacing it just as Mr. Moon came back into view once more, an axe sticking out of his head. The madman stumbled upward, half his head still missing, to the point that Cass could still see pulsating grey matter exposed to smokey air.

The fire raged more fiercely than ever. Both men were bathed in flames. What flesh they had that wasn’t melting like candle wax under the heat was battered at by fist, knife, and axe. Neither man made to move out from inside the flaming inferno, seemingly laser-focused on nothing else but destroying the man in front of them.

Another round was sent screaming out of the rifle barrel, turning the madman’s head into a bloody mist.

And this time, she did not see him get back up. Seconds later the smoke filled her vision. Cass coughed violently but did not move away. She reloaded the rifle with the final cartridge in her hand and waited. Seconds passed, which turned into minutes.

Yet, there was no movement from the barn. Flaming timbers fell to the ground, their structure destroyed by the fire. There was no human movement. An explosion came from within the barn, one she assumed originated from the police car within.

Still, there was no human movement.

Cass waited. She waited with her finger tensed on the trigger, the rifle stock digging into her shoulder. She had to make sure.

The fire consumed more of the barn. The walls fell, revealing the inside. There were no bodies within. There was no Mark, no bald man, no Mr. Moon. It was all ash and flame.

Then movement. A man, half burnt but still alive, stumbled through the broken barn doors. His legs were on fire. There was an axe sticking through his shoulder, one that his right arm worked to remove. His left arm up to the shoulder was nowhere to be found.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

The man in the charred suit stumbled out of the barn. The fog was unbearable, just the same as the flame licking at his wounds. Who was he? It nagged at him like a hole in his stomach.

What was his name?

Why was he here?

Who was the man in the barn?

The man in the suit blinked slowly.

Man in the barn?

Was there a man in the barn?

He couldn’t remember. For the life of him, he just couldn’t.

As he stepped through the doors of the barn… for some reason, he wasn’t quite sure why he was leaving the barn. Was there something wrong with it? His back felt awfully warm but…

What was going on with his back again? Nothing about it felt out of the ordinary… if he could remember what ordinary was.

As he stepped through the doors of the building he thought he was in at some point, a girl stared at him from the other side of a car. It was a nice car, albeit somehow familiar. Was it her car? She had good taste if it was hers. She stared at him through some sort of lens attached to a barrel. A gun, the man belatedly realized. She had a gun. Why did she have a gun? The girl seemed like a nice person. Why would a nice person need a gun?

What was a gun? The term sounded familiar. He should have known that, but he didn't. What a shame. Maybe the girl would know if he could remember how to ask.

At a second glance, her face was streaked with tears, and her eyes looked at him with hate. It was enough to weigh his shoulders down with sadness. She hated him.

But why? He didn’t want to be hated. No one in the world wanted to be hated. Right?

The man blinked and the question went away. What was he thinking about again? It was all so foggy. Even blinking felt like it took ages instead of seconds.

The girl. Maybe she knew him. Could she help him figure out what was going on? The man had a feeling he should know himself, but it was all so foggy.

There was a girl staring at him, strange emotions etched into her face. In front of her was a car. It was a nice car… or was it? He had a feeling it should be nice, but he wasn't sure.

Who was he? Why was he here? He had a purpose once, but for the life of him, he couldn't tell what that purpose was anymore. He looked around for anything that could tell him what his purpose was. There was a girl kneeling behind a car, maybe she knew?

It was hot. The summer sun beat down on him with all his might. Yes. Summer. Summer sounded right. But when the man looked up, there was no sun. It was nighttime. The moon was out in full view. How could the summer sun be warming him, if it wasn’t there? Was it summer?

The moon. There it was, the moon in its full glory.

The man blinked slowly. How was that familiar? It felt familiar and not familiar at the same time. His mind was much too foggy. He looked back down and straight ahead. There was someone next to the car. Who were they? Did they have a name?

The man couldn’t remember his.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Cass stared at Mr. Moon through the scope of her rifle. In her head, memories tore past like speeding cars on a freeway. Her dad fell to the floor in slow motion after a bullet ripped through his brain. A cloth was jammed over her head, with water following it to drown her on dry land. Revenge held off by a promise made to someone she cared for. Someone that she wasn’t sure was around anymore.

So much death over so little time, all because of those men. Fear, hatred, sorrow, and much more. Hatred curdled in Cass’s heart, laying there like a deep and festering wound that she wasn’t sure would ever fully heal. It was all she had felt while waiting in the bush by her house and more. None of this was caused by that dreadful nasty voice in the back of her head, though at the same time, she no longer had to resist the urge. Cass’s mind, at this moment, was as clear as day. The deal no longer mattered now that Mark was… gone. It would all end tonight.

Her finger closed on the trigger. The final round spat out of the rifle barrel. Mr. Moon’s body shuddered as the bullet snapped into his head, blasting it half apart as it traveled through the air to be lost in the fire.

And Mr. Moon fell to the ground like a puppet with its strings snapped, never to rise again. His body shuddered. His hands collapsed into ash, followed by his legs, his remaining arm, his chest, and then his head. The wind picked up, just as it had done for Mark.

The ash had dispersed, leaving nothing behind.

--------

Next chapter is the final chapter.

As usual, cheers to every patreon and reader!

Peace

Chapter 30 - Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood

The needle of the speedometer trembled from where it hovered somewhere high in the hundreds. Ordinarily that speed, on a country road filled with twists and turns, would be lunacy, but he knew there was no time to waste. The remaining Russian, Vladischov, had a head start of at least five minutes. It was unknown how long finding the alien would take. In the barn, under a haystack. Those were the directions Cass Thomson had given back in the Russian safe house.

However, those directions were certainly ones that could have been a little bit more specific. In the barn, yes. Under the haystack, yes. But which haystack, if there were multiple? How big was the haystack? How big was the barn? Would the alien serve to be the metaphorical ‘needle in the haystack’, proving exceedingly difficult to find in a short amount of time considering the other potential issues?

All those questions and more buzzed around the inside of Mr. Moon’s head like irritating flies, only serving as momentary distractions from the wrenching pain coming from his left arm. It was strange. The loss of his hand was unfortunate, but it also felt like he could see at least some things more clearly. The girl's face was etched deeply with a mixture of revulsion and hatred. Then, buried beneath both of those feelings, he could also see a slight tinge of pity. Mr. Moon could see her glancing at the pistol in her hands. He could almost hear the gears grinding in her head. To shoot him, or not to shoot him. She grappled with that pointless question constantly.

In reality, the answer to that question did not matter at all compared to the timing of when that question was answered. As long as it was after the alien and Mark were both in FBI custody, Cass Thomson could do as she wished.

Mr. Moon’s eyes narrowed. The farm was now in view, or at least what Cass indicated was the correct farm. That indication was backed up by the presence of a pickup truck with broken windows haphazardly parked right outside the barn. Mr. Moon slowed the car as soon as he saw that, quieting the engine as best as he could. Cass’s breath hitched.

This was it. The culmination of multiple days’ worth of bloody work. Tracking the Russians to Carlston, the sacrifices of Steve, Dag, Cathy, and the Carlston PD. It was all for this one moment.

Mr. Moon cut the engine twenty feet away from the pickup truck. There was still no movement from the barn. The barn doors were cracked open a hair’s breadth, just enough for a large Russian man to squeeze through. Cass nervously clutched her borrowed Sig Sauer while Mr. Moon popped open the car door and slid out with his SPAS-12 shotgun dangling from his right hand. Near his chest, the reassuring weight of his own Sig Sauer rested within the safety of the holster strapped under his left arm.

Making sure to catch Cass’s gaze, Mr. Moon held a finger to his lips for silence. There was still a chance to end this in one fell swoop with an ambush of their own, as long as they stayed as quiet as church mice. Moving silently, Mr. Moon moved off the gravel driveway to creep along the grass. Closer and closer he drew to the barn, and still there was no noise. A glance to the side saw Cass doing the same, albeit a slight bit more shakily.

And then the silence was broken by blaring sirens.

Mr. Moon threw himself to the side just in time to avoid a hail of bullets splitting through the wood from inside the barn. A curse formed on his lips, but before he could say anything, a speeding patrol car roared out of the night, blue and red lights like spotlights in the darkness. Yet, there were no police officers in the car, the one racing down the driveway at simply insane speeds.

It was the madman, hooting and hollering, hanging his body halfway out the window with a glee accentuated by the bloodied police uniform haphazardly thrown around his torso and the… what seemed to be scraps of human skin and ligaments decorating the top of his bald head in some sort of macabre hat.

He was given no more time to observe. The police car finished its journey by smashing into the barn doors with such force that the wood was turned into more of a pile of splinters than an actual barn door. Mr. Moon clicked his tongue. This had just gotten much, much more complicated.

Any more thoughts on the matter were banished as Mr. Moon scrambled to his feet, yelling for Cass to take cover while the sounds of gunfire within the structure intensified. He raced for the open doors, peeking around them to reveal Vladischov firing wildly at the madman, who had the grey, pencil-thin neck of the alien wrapped tightly in his hand. Mr. Moon’s eyes narrowed.

Finally. His target was in sight.

Neither one of the men had noticed their two observers yet, so great was their fire and fury in the fight. He caught Cass’s wide eyes, nodding before moving into the barn between scarce bits of cover. The movement was just in time, as Vladischov’s eyes widened, and he directed a shot from his stolen SPAS-12 toward Mr. Moon. The pellets struck a support beam, kicking up a cloud of dust from the old, battered wood. Mr. Moon leaned out, replying with a blast from his own shotgun.

The momentary distraction was immediately exploited by the madman, who with a crazed yell of “DEATH IS HERE!”, bit deep into the alien’s neck to slurp down large chunks of the stick-like creature’s flesh, before throwing it away like trash to a dumpster and charging toward the Russian with murderous glee.

Mr. Moon relaxed his grip on the shotgun, letting it slide down so that the pump-action part of the weapon was fully in his hand. He then yanked the shotgun up in the air, using the force of the movement to pump out the used shell to replace it with a fresh one. Normally the action would be done with two hands, but considering the circumstances, he would have to make do.

Mr. Moon let out another blast from his shotgun into the tangled pair of men, catching the madman neatly in the side. With each shot the weapon fired, the recoil hammering into the crook of his arm was nearly too great for him to control one-handed. No doubt it was affecting his accuracy, but there wasn’t any time at all to try and fix it.

Then, Mr. Moon’s eyes widened. There was no way to get a perfectly clear view of the madman, as he was rolling in the dirt with Vladischov, but he could almost swear that the madman’s wounds from the shotgun pellets were… closing.

It hit him with all the force of an oncoming freight train. The trigger. Despite all their experiments, to his knowledge the scientists at the black site had never actually tried injecting the creature’s blood in anything yet. All of their focus was poured into attempting to understand how the regeneration worked, not how it could be applied to others. That was something reserved for later.

The madman bit into the alien. That was obvious enough. But Mark? Mr. Moon gave his shotgun another one-handed pump while he thought, ducking back behind the wooden support pole as the Russian managed to free himself from the clutches of his attacker and sent a shotgun blast of his own toward Mr. Moon. Mark. He was in possession of the alien before and after the raid on the police station. What if at some point he was wounded, and the alien’s blood had mixed with his own?

It was a stretch. A mile-long stretch that even Mr. Moon could acknowledge. On the other hand, it was clear the madman had the ability now. The wounds littering the man’s body were healing at a rapid rate, even as the madman leaned back his head and laughed uproariously as Cass emptied the magazine of her Sig Sauer into his back, her eyes wide with fear.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Vladischov stumbled back, his lungs burning from exertion. How had this all gone so wrong? One moment he was searching the barn for the alien, then the next moment a police cruiser tore through the door to disgorge a lunatic that simply shrugged off anything Vladischov did to him. Then creeping along the sides of the barn from cover to cover, each on opposite sides of the barn, the FBI agent and the girl were taking potshots at everything that moved.

Vladischov backed away from the laughing madman, flinging himself behind an old green tractor while he tried to wrap his head around the situation at hand. Somehow those two escaped from the safehouse. Danten was either dead or captured. The lunatic seemed not to care about who he attacked, and the alien was cast aside on the ground like a discarded trash bag. It was so close. If could just…

A bullet slammed into the metal tractor and Vladischov discarded that line of thinking. Once everyone else in the barn was dead, only then could he take possession of his target. He sent a shot from his revolver over to the FBI agent creeping down his left side, before launching himself away from the tractor as it was lifted in the air by the screaming lunatic. The madman’s muscles strained to hold it over his head. Several bullets slammed into his flesh, but the man did not even acknowledge them, and the wounds healed within seconds before Vladischov’s very eyes. If the situation hadn’t been so dire, he would have been gladdened to see for himself the proof that the weapon Moscow wanted so badly was a reality instead of a fairytale.

“DEATH IS HERE!” The madman yelled again, throwing the tractor at Vladischov, who dodged with a sinking feeling in his stomach. The tractor rolled, hitting the back wall of the barn and breaking through the wood in an instant.

Vladischov whipped around, wasting no time in seeking cover again. This time, however, several shotgun pellets clipped him in the leg, eliciting a grunt of pain from his scarred mouth. He spun to the side, aiming his revolver at the girl slinking down the right side of the barn. The pellets were mere flesh wounds, but the flesh wound was enough to slow him by a mere second, long enough for a glancing pain to erupt around his skull. The last thing heard, before the darkness closed in, was the sound of a woman screaming the name ‘Mark’.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Mark’s chest heaved with exertion, but he continued to slam the wooden board in his hands into the Russian’s skull over and over again until it was nothing but blood, bone shards, and visible grey matter. He could hear Cass screaming out his name, terror in her voice. He looked up, just in time to see the crazy bald man running toward him howling with laughter.

Mark let out a snarl of rage, raising his arms to meet the oncoming threat. He didn’t know what came over him. His head was hazy, full of fog like it was some great big empty valley. He remembered waking up in a car on the side of the road. In the front seat there was a dead woman. Once he’d processed that (and vomited a little), Mark had slid out to see a dead man lying on the road. The guy was huge, a bit bigger than even Mark was.

A feeling had shot through his brain saying that Mark should know who those people were. They were familiar for sure, but why? He’d never seen them before in his life. Then another feeling had shot through him.

Cass. She was in trouble. The problem was, Mark hadn’t the foggiest idea where she was. There was no sign of his girlfriend anywhere. Nothing along the road, nothing back in the car with the dead woman, no notes, no bags, nothing!

Still, they’d been dating for over a year. Known each other for much longer than that. She was the girl he hoped to marry someday after he graduated high school and blazed through college. He’d wracked his brains, over and over again. Nothing, nada, squat. Until finally, it was as if Cass herself had whispered in his head.

The old Henryks farm. Why? He still hadn’t the foggiest idea. However, what Mark had learned long ago was that Cass was always right. She was smarter, better, and kinder than he could ever be. Her voice would always guide him along the correct path.

After reaching the farm, Mark had practically turned it upside down trying to find Cass. He’d torn through the house. Nearly uprooted the remains of the garden. Dashed through the forest, all while shouting her name. But there was never an answer to his pleas.

At least, until the sound of gunshots came from the barn. As soon as Mark ran over to the wooden structure, the back of it exploded in a shower of splinters and other shrapnel, followed by a freaking tractor soaring into the air. The shrapnel had caught him square in the chest and carved deep grooves into his skin, but to Mark’s wonder, those grooves healed within seconds.

Once the dust settled, the scene before Mark was enough to turn his vision red with rage. There was a man, covered in scars and tattoos, pointing a gun at Cass. Every other living creature in the barn faded away to nothing once Mark saw that. Nothing else mattered in the world, and the world itself moved in slow motion.

Cass was always the smart one.

But Mark was the strong one. For Cass, he could move mountains.

He had covered the distance between himself and the scarred man in less than three seconds, blitzing forward at speeds that, if he was thinking straight at the moment, Mark would have realized were impossible to reach without seriously damaging one’s muscles. Along the way, a splintered board was snatched up in his grip.

Mark could see the scarred man’s fingers begin to squeeze the trigger. Yet, those fingers did not move fast enough. The length of wood in his hands descended once, twice, and then a third time with a sort of brutal efficiency of a man who knew very much well how to seriously hurt someone. The threat was diffused before the trigger of the gun could even be pulled. Mark could feel a flicker of pride settle warmly in his chest at how fast he’d managed it.

Cass screamed his name again, and just like that his mind was snatched away from the past to be back in the present, no matter how foggy and confused that present was. His girlfriend’s face was a mask of tears, there were thick bloodstains all across her windbreaker, and there was a handgun clutched in her grip. She looked both like a scared girl out of her depth and like an avenging Valkyrie warrior soaring out of the heavens to seek retribution. For what, Mark did not know, only that because it was Cass seeking it, that retribution would be found.

“Mark! Look out!”

Mark’s eyes flicked over right as a sledgehammer-like fist slammed into his chest, crunching through bone and tearing through flesh. He could feel the fist scrape against his organs, shattering his spine before coming out of his back. Mark’s chest heaved, but the world was back to that dreamlike state. Had the fog thickened?

The fist was wrenched out of his chest, but Mark did not fall to his knees. He could feel the hole in his flesh closing up, so he grabbed the laughing madman and replied in kind by smashing his forehead into the man’s nose, breaking it in one single movement. Then Mark tensed his muscles, straining at the man’s sides as he lifted him high up into the air, before flipping him to his back and bringing the man’s body down hard on his knee. There was the crunch of a spine breaking in half, but Mark had no time to process the sound.

A flaring pain erupted from his legs. Mark threw the man aside, looking down to see the blade of an axe biting deep into muscle. That moment of distraction proved far too lethal. Before Mark could look back up, he was on the ground, feeling a warm liquid gushing out of his neck while the bald man tore at the flesh in his chest with his bare hands, gulping up Mark’s organs with the sort of gusto normally only reserved for a starving man at a five-star restaurant. He could feel the strength leaving his bones, but curiously enough, at the same time he could feel the strength returning with the same speed.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Mr. Moon heard Cass’s screams as the bald man began to eat at Mark’s organs, but ignored them in favor of moving closer. Her screams were heartfelt, but they were nothing but pointless noise right now. By his count, Mark should have died several times in the past twenty seconds. Truly, the durability given by the Nirvana Project was astounding. The data from this fight would amaze the lab techs back at the sight for certain.

Any further contemplation on the subject was interrupted as Mr. Moon unloaded the contents of the final shell in his shotgun into the bald man’s back, blasting him off the boy to land a few feet away. It hardly did much. Already the madman was back on his feet, his bloodstained mouth bared in a savage grin.

Mr. Moon tossed aside his shotgun and pulled out his Sig Sauer, backing away and squeezing the trigger as fast as he could while the madman ran toward him. Each bullet, though they smashed perfectly into his chest, was disregarded as if they were nothing but mosquito bites.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Cass let out another scream of horror as Mr. Moon was launched backward in the air like a ragdoll being thrown away by a child's temper tantrum. The bald man hadn't even flinched as Mr. Moon had calmly landed shot after shot on his body. Cass added her own gunfire to the mix, but it was like trying to put out a roaring inferno with handfuls of water at a time. The shots only served to draw the madman’s attention to her.

But unlike Mr. Moon, Cass did not slowly back away. She ran like the devil himself was behind her, sprinting not toward the barn door (for it was further away), but for the hole the tractor had made in the back of the barn. She jumped through the hole just in time, feeling the air woosh over her head as the madman’s fists closed not over her neck, but over thin air. Then a roar of pure, undiluted rage split the air, and Cass looked back.

Mark was back on his feet, the remains of his organs slinking back into his chest as she watched, causing foul bile to rise to her throat. Cass could see a missing chunk in his liver reappear as if nothing had happened. Mr. Moon was on the floor, laboriously dragging himself away with his damaged left arm clutching his chest. Mark swung his fists against the bald man’s side, hammering away with strength that Cass knew quite well was able to dent steel. It was more strength than that, now. His fists punched through the madman’s flesh, just as the madman’s fists punched through Mark’s own. His eyes were unfocused and confused. He hardly seemed to be present at the moment, forcing his body to keep moving through sheer adrenaline and rage alone.

Cass peered down the sights of her pistol, but the pair were grappled close together now. Any shots from her weapon had just the same chances of hitting the bald man as they did Mark. For several seconds they exchanged blows, dented skin and splintered bone tearing apart yet also knitting back together in mere moments.

Then, an opening. The bald man’s fist sunk deep into Mark’s chest again, tearing out of his back before the man threw Mark away to the ground. Cass took the chance in an instant, snapping off five shots in a row to hit him square in the chest.

But the bald man ignored them. He ignored the bullets in favor of grabbing a steel pipe, hefting it experimentally in his hand. Cass let out a horrified scream, firing the last bullets in the gun’s magazine, but that did nothing to stop the pipe from impaling Mark through the head.

Mark’s hands sluggishly rose to grasp at the pipe, but the bald man was laughing even louder now. He kicked away Mark’s left hand, grabbing his right hand and tearing it off Mark’s body like a sadistic child would remove a limb from a bug. Mark’s movements grew feebler by the second, his remaining left hand merely slapping against the iron pipe, instead of firmly grasping at it like he had earlier.

Mr. Moon was nowhere to be seen. No one else stirred inside the barn, other than the bald man and Mark. Cass pulled the trigger of her gun once more, but nothing happened. It was empty. Dimly, in the back of her mind, the nasty voice in Cass’s head reminded her of the extra mag Mr. Moon gave her.

Of course. How stupid. Stupid, stupid girl.

Cass pulled the extra magazine out of the pocket of her windbreaker while her other hand pressed the switch to eject the empty one. It fell to the ground with a clatter.

The bald man grabbed a length of wood, slamming it into Mark’s chest even while he continued to feebly paw at the pipe in his head. Cass pulled back the slide on the Sig Sauer and let loose hell from the weapon. The muzzle flared with each bullet fired. A pressure built up in between Cass’s ears, but she ignored it.

She ignored it, just like the madman ignored the bullets tearing into his chest, head, and arms, no matter how they made the man shudder with each hit. If she could just draw his attention once more!

More and more lengths of wood and steel pipes speared through Mark's body. He vomited up blood, and his left arm fell away from the steel pipe in his head. His left arm was torn off. His eyeballs were gouged out and eaten. His organs were strewn across the dirt but this time, they did not draw back into his body. No matter how many times Cass shot the bastard, nothing stopped him. Yet, she couldn’t think of any other way to try and drive him off so Mark could get a breather!

And then, so fast that even Cass had to blink and look again to make sure her eyes did not deceive her, Mark’s body collapsed inwards. The skin pulled together, trembling and smoking, and then there was nothing but ash. Every inch of Mark’s body had turned into ash. Even the bald man paused for a second, confused at what he saw.

“No…” Cass croaked out. It felt like a spear of despair was splitting through her body, worsening by the second as the wind picked up, dispersing the ash until there was nothing back. She had a feeling, a terrible rotting feeling in her body, that this was it.

Mark’s body was no longer reforming. The ash was not coming back. There was no movement now that it was gone. Had Mark escaped death one too many times this day for it to be allowed one final time?

Was Cass alone now, for good this time?

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Mr. Moon was dying. He could feel it right down to his bones. When the bald man threw him, he’d broken something important. He was bleeding internally and the thoughts in his head were sluggish.

Dimly, he could hear the roars of Mark as he fought the bald man, along with the desperate shouts of the girl. She was trying to drag the madman’s attention away from Mark.

That did not matter.

Mr. Moon crawled along the ground. It was hard, crawling with one hand and no strength to speak of, but crawl he did. He could see that… thing at the edge of his vision.

Would it work? Would it work as it did for the bald man, and for he assumed Mark?

What did it matter? Either it would work, or Mr. Moon would be dead quite soon.

His fingertips brushed against the grey skin of the stick-like figure. Even amongst all the violence in the barn, it still hadn’t moved from where the madman had thrown it. It lay there, staring with an empty gaze at the roof of the barn. Mr. Moon bared his teeth in an animalistic snarl, wrenching the last of his strength from his bones to drag his mouth to the alien’s neck. It was still healing, even now, but its flesh hadn’t fully closed up.

Mr. Moon bit down as hard as he could into the alien’s flesh. It was a revolting sensation, as if he was chewing through a pile of the most putrid sewage imaginable.

Cass let out a scream more horrible than any before, but it fell on deaf ears. Mr. Moon could feel his organs burning.

Oh, how they burned. They burned as they knit back together. Internal hemorrhaging ceased, bones fit back together, and his hand… his left hand was back. Mr. Moon marveled at the sight. The limb worked perfectly again like it was never damaged at all.

And just as Mark died for a final time, Mr. Moon stood up to his full height, blinking slowly.

His head was foggy.

What was his purpose here? It was important, he knew that for certain. Enough to stake his life on the outcome.

He could hear a girl screaming. Did he know her? Did she know him? Her voice was familiar and foreign at the same time. No matter. Answers could come later.

For now, it was his duty as an agent for the Federal Bureau of Investigation to defend a civilian in danger.

---------

After a whirlwind of a night, all that are left is Cass, Mr. Moon, and Jack. Fighting in an abandoned barn in a derelict farm, with no backup coming. Yet, two more secrets of the Nirvana Project has been revealed, one that even Mr. Moon was not aware of - how to gain the ability, and that it has limits.

Probably about 2 chapters after this one left until the end of this story.

As always, huge massive mcthankies to all patreons! Ya'll keep me going. Same goes to all the readers sticking with me on this rather interesting journey and departure from the norm.

Peace

Chapter 29 - Running on Empty

Before the chapter starts, FYI for all paying Patreon members: I expect to finish with Urban Nirvana within a month, maybe a month and a half. After that I plan on writing a sequel to Frog out of Water. There will be no advance chapters for Patreon members for that as it is a fan work. I have no issue with other authors monetizing their fan works, I just view it as personally unethical and will not be doing that. So, keep that in mind whenever your renewal date for your subscription comes up. What you do with that information is up to you.

Without further ado, back to your regularly scheduled chapter.

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The scarred Russian man left right after the location of the farm spilled from Cass’s lips for the second time that day, leaving her and Mr. Moon alone with the man, Danten. The way he leered at her as if he was hoping something would happen to give him the excuse to kill them painfully, chilled Cass down to her very bones.

For several minutes the room was quiet. Danten stood smiling near the door. Mr. Moon settled on the floor; his face still set in that stony mask of his. Cass couldn’t bring herself to speak a single word, even while her mind raced. Was there some way out of this mess? Was help coming? Or did Mr. Moon give up? Was she going to die in this depilated house right next to her most hated enemy?

Eventually, the stalemate was broken by the helicopter pilot producing a pack of cigarettes from his breast pocket.

“I’m gonna head out for a smoke, you two don’t go anywhere, ya hear me?” The man chuckled at his own terrible joke. How could they go anywhere? They were handcuffed to a sturdy metal pole. It would take a bodybuilder on steroids to move that sucker.

As soon as the door closed behind Danten, however, Mr. Moon lifted himself to his feet.

“You’re a father.” Cass said, her words sounding like a mix of a statement and a question. The people she’d seen in the picture were practically a world apart from the expressionless man beside her. The picture was of a normal family at the beach. A man, a woman, and a young boy. The man, who Cass quickly recognized as Mr. Moon, hardly looked like the same murderer that was standing beside her. The man in the picture, while having a similar face, was… smiling. He was leaning back, his arms wrapped lovingly around the woman and the boy. Instead of the usual soulless suit, the man was wearing a truly horrendous Hawaiian shirt. One so loud she could almost hear the cloth screaming at her through the photo. Ugh, the pastels. It was enough to make Cass vomit, die, resurrect, vomit for a second time, and then die again for good.

Then there was the woman. She was smiling just as joyfully as Mr. Moon was in the picture, though her presence was much gentler and more subdued. No Hawaiian shirt for her. The woman’s hair was kept up in a sensible ponytail and she wore a sensible t-shirt and shorts with a sunhat on top. In fact, Cass got the impression from her gaze that she was exasperated Mr. Moon wore the shirt in the first place, though it was a sort of loving exasperation, like at the end of the day she was happy that Mr. Moon was happy, even if the shirt seared the retinas of any sane onlooker.

The boy in the picture, seeming as young as five years old, looked like a bundle of energy. He was eternally captured by the camera mid-shout, like he was yelling out some weird joke that only the three people in the picture could understand. He had sand in his hair, a stick of driftwood shoved through a belt loop in his swimsuit, and a strange bug in his hand. The boy was, in essence, similar to just about any other young boy Cass had babysat for in the past around town.

Cass kept the sight of that picture right in the forefront of her mind and looked at Mr. Moon, who stared back at her with those empty dead fish eyes of his. What had happened to make the family man from the picture turn into the bastard she saw now?

“I am.” Mr. Moon replied, the words as casual as could be.

“Does he know his father’s a murderer?” Cass venomously replied.

“It doesn’t matter.” Mr. Moon said.

“What?”

“My son is why I am here. The others had similar situations. Bringing the Nirvana Project back online is everything.”

Mr. Moon did not elaborate on that. Not about that still-mysterious ‘Nirvana Project’ he’d explained only in the briefest of terms back at her dad’s house. Not about his son’s circumstances, or how it tied to the rest of his team. Then it hit Cass like a roaring freight train.

Mark’s ability to heal after the alien did something to him. The goal of the project being to transfer the alien’s healing to humans. Mr. Moon being here for his son.

Was his son hurt? Hurt to the point that modern medicine couldn’t even help? In a flash, every one of his actions clicked into place like the pieces of a puzzle. The willingness to sink to any low. The lack of reaction to the death of his teammates one by one.

It was the actions of a father trying to save his son.

Make no mistake, Cass still felt an endless hatred for the scumbag, but that hatred was now marred by a kernel of understanding. She knew now why Mr. Moon had done all those hateful things. He was no longer an unknowable monster, but a person with his own motivations to do what he did, no matter how horrible his actions were. In the end, he was a father trying to save his son.

The scrabbling sound of fingers against leather broke Cass’s train of thought. She looked over to him in muted alarm, watching as the FBI agent contorted the back of his left foot to touch his right hand. His hand scrabbled against his dress shoe, moving from the scuffed leather top to dig his fingers into the heel. Her eyes widened. The heel of a dress shoe would normally be made up of several stacked layers of leather. In essence, not a material easily damaged. However, Mr. Moon’s fingers were able to easily peel away the layers to reveal a metallic sheen.

A few more tense seconds and that metallic sheen was revealed to be a handleless blade, about the length of a palm with the thickness of a finger. It was no lock-picking tool, or at least not one that she’d seen before. The blade was too large to fit in a keyhole. It was also definitely not the kind of tool that could file through any sort of metal without taking literal ages. Did he intend to scrape away the concrete floor to free the pole? No, that would make little sense either. The concrete was neither chipped nor new. It was as solid as could be.

Mr. Moon looked her dead in the eyes.

“Do not speak a single word.”

Cass nodded. There was another unspoken sentence trailing behind that one. A sentence implying her throat would be slit if she failed to follow those directions. But then, the importance behind those words became clear. The handleless blade came close to Mr. Moon’s cuffs, as close as he could by contorting his wrists. It did not seem like an easy task, with his hands being bound behind his back like they were. Yet, the blade did not touch the handcuffs themselves. Instead, the edge of the knife rested against his left wrist. Cass swallowed an unspoken question. Just what was that man trying to do-

Cass choked back a scream of horror as Mr. Moon took a deep breath and began methodically sawing through his left wrist. Bile soared up her throat, but that too was forced down. The only sound from Mr. Moon other than the scrape of metal against flesh was soft, pained groans that slipped from his lips to accompany each stroke of the knife, even as Cass’s cheeks were dusted with blood.

Cass lurched into movement, leaning as far away from the madman as the handcuffs restraining her to the pole allowed her to be. But even with that, Cass couldn’t put enough distance between herself and Mr. Moon to avoid the splashes of blood coming from the man sawing off his own freaking hand. She could feel the droplets of blood dripping down her cheeks, only to be joined by more and more speckles of the warm liquid.

It was too much. Cass tore her eyes away and vomited as quietly as possible. She could hear the knife crushing against gristle, slicing through tendons, sliding through muscle and flesh, and scraping against bone. Somehow those were louder than any shout could ever be. Another shuddering groan came from behind her while Cass wiped her mouth against her shoulder. Movement followed. She saw Mr. Moon stumble away from the pole, breath ragged and clutching the stump on the end of his left arm. One end of the handcuffs was still fastened around his right wrist, but the other end swung free.

Cass’s stomach lurched once more, but nothing came out other than sickening bile from the very depths of her being. Mr. Moon sank to his knees, his face white as a sheet and paler than she'd ever seen a person before. For a moment he was still – utterly stock still, to the point Cass began to wonder if the man had blacked out right then and there. Something like that would be understandable in a situation like this. But then, movement.

Mr. Moon’s right hand slipped away from clutching his left wrist to shakily undo the leather belt around his waist. The belt was wrapped around his wrist so tight that the leather groaned slightly, and finally, the steady flow of blood changed to something more like a sickeningly slow ooze akin to molasses flowing downhill in January. The makeshift tourniquet had worked.

“I’ll be back.” He said with a strained, shuddering voice.

Cass blinked, frantically nodding while her brain tried to process the sheer insanity of what she’d witnessed. To have a chance of escaping before either of the Russians came back, the man cut off his own freaking hand.

This-

Seeing Mr. Moon be so composed after being captured by the Russians had scared her.

But this?

Once more, Cass felt more fear than she ever thought possible.

The door responded to the one-handed man’s touch, opening as smoothly as could be. The helicopter pilot hadn’t locked it on his way out. An act born out of arrogance and the surety that they couldn’t escape. Then the door closed. The minutes following were nearly the longest in Cass’s life, second only to the time she’d spent waiting in that bush for her time to strike.

A shout of alarm rang out, swiftly followed by the booming roar of a shotgun. Silence invaded once more.

The door opened. Mr. Moon’s pale face emerged, his remaining right hand holding a small key while the brutish, jet-black form of a shotgun sat cradled in the crook of his left arm. Cass recognized it. The shotgun was one of the weapons taken from Mr. Moon’s car.

Without a word, Mr. Moon walked over and released Cass from her handcuffs. She took a few shaky steps away, eyes still wide and darting between the man’s face and left arm.

“Come. No time to waste.” Mr. Moon curtly ordered.

Cass nodded, following him wordlessly. She consciously avoided looking at the floor, to where she knew lay a severed hand. Once out of the house, she held back yet another surge of foul bile as she saw Mr. Moon step over what she assumed to be Danten’s corpse. Its face was a bloody ruin, half-caved in and mangled to pieces with shotgun pellets. Scattered on the ground nearby was a pack of cigarettes. Danten had been taken by surprise while smoking. Did he even have time to realize what had happened or was it over before his brain could process it?

Mr. Moon’s car was still parked where it had been left on the weed-filled driveway. One of the trucks with a broken window was missing. Yet, Mr. Moon didn’t go for another one of the stolen vehicles, instead sliding into his battered car. It started with a sputter that turned into a steady rumble, the headlights bathing the area with a harsh yellow glow. Cass hastily slid into the passenger's seat.

Once the car began its rough journey down the driveway, Mr. Moon’s curt voice filled the air once more. It was still strained, a fact that Mr. Moon seemed happy to ignore, and which Cass lacked the courage to point out.

“Back seat, suitcase under the seat. Inside is my rifle and a spare Sig. I assume you know how to use a handgun?”

Cass stretched her body back, nodding while she looked. It did not take her long to find the suitcase. Cass palmed the Sig Sauer. It was an uncomfortable weight in her hand. Like it was trying to drag her down to the ground. She was far more used to something like a revolver, but this new weapon would do. No hammer to mess with, only a safety switch and a slide to ready before the gun could be used. Simple. She could spin around and shoot Mr. Moon right now in a matter of heartbeats. It would be easy. In fact, it would be even easier than the last time she’d thought about it. The man was down a hand, for heaven’s sake. Flick the safety, rack the slide, turn, shoot. Simple.

Cass shook her head slightly. No.

Mr. Moon continued to speak, seemingly oblivious to the nasty voice that whispered in Cass’s ear.

“Take the Sig Sauer. Put the extra mag where you can easily reach it. Don’t touch the rifle. When we get to the farm, stay on high alert. There should be police in the area so watch yourself and avoid friendly fire. Securing the alien is the priority. Once that is done, we retreat, schedule a meet to hand off the alien, and then find Mark.”

Mark. Cass’s breath caught in her throat. The insanity of Mr. Moon’s recent actions had temporarily made her forget about the guy.

“He’s alive?”

Mr. Moon glanced away from the road long enough to catch Cass’s eyes and hold them for a second.

“I would be disappointed if he wasn’t.”

A worried breath caught in Cass’s mouth. Mark was alive – no, should be alive. To delude herself with surety would be stupid. Something like that would be tempting fate, enticing its fickle qualities to deliver Mark’s unmoving corpse instead. On the other hand, Mr. Moon seemed sure Mark was still alive.

“Cass.”

Mr. Moon gestured toward the glove compartment with his chin. She opened it up hesitantly. Normally, a glove compartment would contain a vehicle manual, registration, and some insurance papers.

The only things in this glove compartment were a roll of bandages, a bottle of whiskey, and a gun. Before Cass could even process the absurdity of it all, A hand reached out to her. Cass looked over, watching as Mr. Moon rested the stump where his left hand used to be on the steering wheel while his right was held open to her.

“Whiskey.”

Great. Now the man wanted to drink and drive.

Nevertheless, Cass shrugged and handed over the whiskey. Mr. Moon wrenched the cork out of the top of the bottle with his teeth and downed half of the foul liquid in one go before sticking it between his legs. The man grimaced, shaking his head and blinking rapidly. He breathed in and out, doing so several times in a row, with each breath more rapid than the last. The half-empty bottle of whiskey rose in the air, and then he dumped the contents of the bottle on the end of his stump. Mr. Moon howled in agony. The sound filled the cab of the car, splitting Cass’s ears while she scrabbled backward to get as far away from the madman as she realistically could.

Mr. Moon hunched over the wheel, still driving the car at a speed that Cass really did not feel comfortable knowing at the moment, or any moment at all.

“Bandage. Please.” Mr. Moon groaned, throwing the empty bottle into the back seat to clutch the steering wheel with his right hand. Cass stared at the roll of bandages, flicking her wide eyes between the white cloth and the bloodied stump next to her.

She no longer had the urge to vomit. Instead, it all felt… surreal. As if this was happening on TV and Cass was just a passive observer in a living room somewhere else in the world. On the TV, the girl hesitated, but eventually grabbed the bandages to begin rolling tightly around the shady FBI agent’s wounded arm.

The girl had ample reasons to hate the man, but at this point in the TV show they had no choice but to be temporary allies. Otherwise, all would be lost. The agent would fail to get the MacGuffin he’d been chasing since the start of the show, the girl might never reunite with her friend (who might be dead), and the Russians would be victorious. All of that would be almost certain to happen if the FBI agent bled to death on their way to the farm.

No show should end like that. So, Cass watched the girl’s hands gingerly finish binding up where the agent’s left hand used to be. She watched as the girl glanced at the gun in the glove compartment and at the gun sitting in her lap with the roll of bandages in her hands. Sometimes Cass wondered if the girl on the TV screen would ever decide to throw it all away to get her revenge, finally listening to the faint voices in her ears telling her to do it.

Then Cass blinked, and she was back in the moment. No more was she disassociated, watching her own actions taking place from a distance. It was all real once more. Mr. Moon took his arm away from her and continued to drive in a silence only broken by the roars of a straining car engine being pushed beyond its recommended limits. Cass stared at her hands. They were stained with blood that was not her own.

It felt like no matter how hard she wiped them against the car seat or even her windbreaker, the blood refused to fully leave her skin.

-------

Cass gets +1 to her traumatized stat while Mr. Moon shows that there is nothing he won't do to get the alien back under his control. Meanwhile, more of the Nirvana Project is revealed and the stakes have never been higher. One Russian left. One FBI agent left. Cass is on the move. Mark's status is unknown. Jack is lurking who-knows-where. The police are en-route to the farm. Who will get there first, to gain control of the key to the Nirvana Project?

I leave you with those questions until next week. As always, huge thanks to all the patreons and readers alike. Couldn't do this without ya.

Peace

Chapter 28 - Crucifix Of Light

The stolen two-seater Chevrolet pickup truck slammed into the side of the FBI agent’s Buick to a shrieking chorus of broken glass and crumpled metal. Vladischov was out of the vehicle’s cab in a flash – while the impact had been brutal, unlike his prey he was ready for it. What pain he felt kept him sharp through the mild concussion he could feel in his brain. Not optimal, but the pain from the seat belt-induced friction burn on his shoulder counteracted it for now.

Still, no time to waste. In the corner of his eye, Vladischov could see the remains of his team dragging themselves out of the second stolen pickup truck they’d used to ram the other car. Speed, power, and surprise. That was the best way Vladischov could think of to counter the FBI team after the thrashing they’d received in the most recent skirmish.

A sense of disgust bordering on disappointment swirled in his gut, threatening to mix with and ruin the half-bottle of vodka he'd downed prior to the operation's start. Two strong men lost in a flash – one of them being the team’s sniper to boot. It was bad enough that Vladischov had been forced to add their helicopter pilot to their ground forces team to make up for the differences in numbers. There was no choice in the matter. Ms. Orlova was a fine agent, but two people were not enough to do what needed to be done.

Bah.

Vladischov stalked over to the wrecked car, nose wrinkling in disgust from the harsh stench of spilled gasoline. Was it from the car or his truck? He couldn't say for sure. Movement came from the driver's seat of the car and Vladischov's pump-action shotgun was ready in a flash. The weapon, a Mossberg 500 pump-action shotgun, was perfect for such close quarters. After a hacksaw did its work to shorten the barrel and cut off the stock, the shotgun would not only still pack a lethal punch, but it was also incredibly easy to conceal under a coat.

Shouts came from the other car, swiftly followed by the sound of a different Mossberg discharging once, then more shouts. Vladischov risked a glance over at the commotion, if only for a second.

Fortune was with him. At the very moment Vladischov glanced over, he saw the thin agent’s partner tearing his way out of the front seat of the car, heavily bloodied yet alive. The mountain of a man’s hands closed around Mrs. Orlova’s throat in a heartbeat, even as she struggled to bring her arms up to stop him. The shotgun in her hands had been lost at some point in the chaos. The helicopter pilot, a mercenary named Danten, hastily spun to face them both while firing wildly with his pistol.

Something stirred once more from the cab, and for the second time in the span of half a minute, fortune was with Vladischov. The driver of the black-painted Buick was halfway through drawing his gun by the time Vladischov’s attention snapped back, allowing the bulky Russian just enough time to surge forward and knock the weapon out of the man’s hand in a disarming strike.

Then in a split second, the thin FBI agent changed tactics, lunging out of the broken car window to catch Vladischov in a tackle made feeble by shock and injuries sustained in the wreck. The thin man’s hands frantically wrestled with Vladischov’s grip in a desperate last-ditch attempt to gain the advantage by taking the shotgun. It was a decent strategy. Without his handgun, the agent would have been at the mercy of Vladischov’s Mossberg if he didn’t immediately close the distance. Not that he wanted to use it in the first place.

Danten’s weapon discharged five times while Vladischov threw away the shotgun in favor of landing several punches on the thin man’s face, followed by a bone-crunching smack of his forehead slamming into the FBI agent’s nose. The agent’s grip weakened. Vladischov’s face morphed into a sadistic grin. Several more punches were enough to make his opponent’s hands fall away completely. Another two strikes saw the man’s eyes lose focus. Vladischov rose, watching for a heartbeat to enjoy the sight of his enemy lying in a puddle of his own blood. It truly was enjoyable. Vladischov stooped once more to retrieve his Mossberg, pointing it right at the torso of the FBI agent as he feebly attempted to rise.

That small movement stilled soon enough once the agent came face to face with the barrels of the shotgun, and he raised his hands in surrender.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Mr. Moon stared at the cold barrel of the shotgun in the Russian’s grip. A small part of his brain, perhaps the part affected most by the shock of the crash and the following brawl, idly pondered how fickle fortune could be sometimes. What was that saying… Murphy’s law, was it? Anything that can go wrong will go wrong. It was an adage Mr. Moon tried to always keep in mind, but one could not plan for every eventuality. He’d taken into consideration the possibility of a Russian ambush, but with all the other constraints piled onto his shoulders, there had only been so much he could have done to prevent one.

At a second look, this was a good enough spot for an ambush. Darkness, plentiful tree cover, and a side road not clearly visible from the main road Mr. Moon had been on. All one had to do was simply wait on the side road with the headlights turned off and keep a careful watch. There would be few cars on the road at this time, if any at all, so hearing the rumble of an engine in the distance would be easy. Doubtlessly there was some network of side roads that allowed the Russians to get ahead of Mr. Moon and his team from wherever they had been spying from. 

Moreover, it seemed they’d filled one of the gaps in their ranks. Mr. Moon could see the new man in the corner of his eye. The man appeared rather ordinary, wearing a dark blue button-up polo and a pair of tan khakis. It wasn’t an assembly of clothing one normally would expect to see in the present company, but looks could be deceiving. And judging by the fact that the new man had shot Dag five times in the head without blinking, they were quite deceiving.

Losing Dag was a problem. The man was a powerful ally capable of going toe-to-toe with just about any man in a straight-out brawl or shootout. Though, by the looks of it, Dag had managed to take one of the Russians with him. Her neck still clutched in Dag’s massive bear-like hands, the Russian woman Mr. Moon had spotted fleeing from the ambush a few days ago was deathly still. In his last act, Dag had succeeded in crushing her throat before the man in the polo could finish the job.

Unless the Russians had any more assets in play, the scarred man and the man in the polo were the final two. Unfortunately, with the loss of Dag and, assumably, Ms. Miller as well, Mr. Moon also had no other assets in play than himself, Cass, and Mark – if the two teens could even be called assets. In one day, his team of FBI agents was annihilated. Fickle fortune indeed.

“Put these on.” The shotgun-wielding Russian spoke in a gravelly voice, tossing a pair of handcuffs onto Mr. Moon’s lap.

Mr. Moon remained silent but slowly acquiesced. While he did so, a few more pieces of the puzzle fit into his head.

Namely, the Russians did not seem to know Mr. Moon was on his way right at that moment to retrieve the alien. If they did, he would be dead by now. So would Cass Thomson, who by the muffled groaning sounds coming from the cab of his car, was still alive as well. Was this what his ex-wife would call irony? The farm was about five minutes from their current location, but the Russians didn’t know it at all.

So that meant… yes. The next stop was probably a safe house, where he and Cass Thomson would be tortured for what they knew. The Russians had to have been following them, watching and waiting for any one of Mr. Moon’s team to leave the city limits for the relative isolation of the country roads. They couldn’t have known for sure that it would actually happen, but after their latest ambush failed it was likely the only option left for the Russians.

The handcuffs cinched tight around his wrists. Mr. Moon was roughly hauled up, while the man in the polo joined them.

“It’s done.” The man spoke with quiet tones. He had an American accent, but that hardly spoke of much. Any accent could be changed with enough time and effort.

Mr. Moon kept his expression in a tight poker face. So, killing everyone in the second car was their plan from the start. It made sense. With only three Russians in total, trying to capture Dag, Ms. Miller, and Mark along with Mr. Moon and Cass Thomson would have been much too risky. One agent and one civilian would be a much more manageable number. Their plan was a mixture of risk and extreme daring, two things that had suffused every one of the Russian's plans from the start.

Something more interesting than that was that the Russians did not appear to know about Mark’s… situation.

Interesting indeed. Mr. Moon kept his poker face up in an unwavering front to prevent any information from leaking out. The girl understandably had no resistance to torture. Thus the Russians would inevitably find the farm. Once they took control of the alien, both he and Cass Thomson would be dead. But they did not know the boy had the ability to survive what would normally not be possible.

Not only that, but when, not if, the location of the alien was divulged, the Russians would face a choice. Mr. Moon and Cass Thomson could not be disposed of until the alien was safely in their hands. Until that happened, there would be a possibility of the location being a lie. The Russians could not let their only leads on the alien die before they found it. Meaning, that either the Russians would have to take one or both of them to the farm, or they would have to split their forces so that one man guarded their prisoners in a safe house while the other retrieved the creature.

Of course, there was a third possibility, in which both men went to the farm after leaving their prisoners in a secured room, but that would be a slight bit too foolish for the Russians to do. They would never consider leaving a captured FBI agent unguarded.

The chances of survival were slim, but if Mr. Moon was correct in his assumptions, there was still a chance. A slim chance of escape, and a much larger chance that Mark would revive at some point later on, whether that be a minute from now or in a few hours. Moreover, there were also the police. Before leaving the former Chief’s house, Ms. Miller had directed them to the farm. The Russians would win in a straight gunfight, but theirs was a presence potentially uncounted for, another domino in the lineup waiting to fall.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Cass’s head pounded worse than ever before. After the impact, it felt like she was floating free in outer space, at least until a rough set of hands grabbed her, cuffed her (again), and flung her into the back seat of Mr. Moon’s car. Soon after that, the chief scumbag himself, Mr. Moon, was flung in right beside her, his bruised and bloodied body slamming to a halt against the now-empty shotgun rack that took up a third of the back seat.

Any hopes of being able to heartily congratulate whoever had given Mr. Moon such a beating shriveled up and died with the entrance of a scarred man, brutal but with a calculating look in his eyes, sliding into the driver’s seat of Mr. Moon’s car. The passenger door opened, revealing another man who, wearing a button-up polo shirt, looked extremely out of place amongst the suits the other men wore.

Cass whipped her head over to look at Mr. Moon in alarm. Around the mask of blood covering his face, the man’s expression was as empty and composed as usual. That expression on his face did more to fill Cass with a feeling of unrelenting fear than anything else that had happened in the past few days. After the recent chaos, blood, and death, that man still looked composed.

“Ooohh, nice toys,” The man in the polo murmured, a note of surprise creeping into his voice as he admired the brutalist pump-action shotguns liberated from the rack, “A pair of Franchi SPAS-12 shotguns. They really do give you feds the good stuff. This car’s great too. Can’t believe it’s in better shape than our trucks even after all that. Crazy, huh? The wonders of taxpayer dollars. Not that I pay taxes, of course.”

The man in the polo playfully held out his hand to shake, grinning as both Cass and Mr. Moon simply stared at him in response. On Cass’s much more readable face, the unspoken words of ‘I’m in handcuffs and you’re a lunatic, how the heck do you expect me to shake your hand’ were plain for all to see.

“Hiya. The name’s Danten. I’m a ‘copter pilot by trade, but very soon I’ll be your own very special interrogator for the day. You two and me, we’re gonna get real acquainted then. I can’t wait for you to meet Besty. Best pair of pliers I’ve ever owned!”

Oh cripes. It took all of Cass’s remaining strength to avoid saying that out loud. No doubt her face betrayed all the fear she felt, but Cass still didn’t want to give that freak the satisfaction of hearing her voice that fear as well.

Once the two men in front turned their attention back to the road, and to extracting the car out of the mess the wreck had left it in, Cass sneaked another glance at Mr. Moon. At first glance, his eyes still appeared calm. But that wasn’t all. The more she looked at him, the more Cass became certain. There was a calculating look hidden deep in his eyes. Mr. Moon still had a plan even after how wrong it had all gone.

And as much as she hated relying on the scumbag, Cass couldn’t see any other option.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

As it turned out, Mr. Moon was right. After a few turns to switch from the country road to a barely maintained dirt road in the middle of nowhere, the next stop was indeed something that could be called a ‘safe house’. In this case, it was more of a depilated structure masquerading as a sort of house instead of an actual house, but at the end of the day it was a roof with four walls that no one else knew about. In essence, a safe house. No matter how run-down it was. Several more vehicles, all with broken windows, sat outside the house.

There were enough stolen cars to last the Russian’s reckless tactics for a while. They had to be from homes in the country or from the surrounding towns. Otherwise, reports would have made their way to the Carlson PD by now.

He and the girl were callously hauled out of the backseat of his damaged, yet still-running car. Department-provided vehicles were always much sturdier than one would initially assume, which was one of the perks of the job. In this case, his Buick had merely limped out of the crash, while the two pickup trucks the Russians brought were reduced to non-functional wrecks on the side of the road.

The Russians kept them both stumbling forward across the weed-covered gravel driveway as quickly as their legs would work. The outside walls of the house soon faded away to reveal the inside, covered with peeling cigarette-stained wallpaper, vines curling through broken windows, and chipped wooden floors. It was a classic two-room house in the country. By his guess, it was built sometime in the 40s, considering it actually had wallpaper. Any older and the great depression wouldn’t have allowed money to purchase luxuries like wallpaper, any newer and the wallpaper would be in better shape.

The main room, which would be best classified as a combination of a living room and kitchen, was derelict. Two chairs and no other furniture to speak of. In the corner was an oven with its door ripped clean off. Some sort of bird nest was inside the oven, empty for now. Near the back of the room was the only new thing in the house – what looked to be a solid wooden door, untouched by nature and connected to the wall by a set of brand-new hinges.

That room, Mr. Moon assumed, was where he and the girl would be held. Within seconds, his assumption was found correct. The helicopter pilot, Danten, put his palm on the doorknob to ease it open without a sound, with not even a single squeak of protest coming from the hinges. Either they were freshly greased, or the hinges were even newer than brand-new.

 Past the wooden door was a second room, one that was as bare as the first aside from a steel table and chair, and an iron support beam stretching from the floor (concrete, instead of wooden like the rest of the house) to the ceiling. There were no windows, and contrary to the appearance of the rest of the house, the walls looked well-maintained. Perhaps Dag could have broken through them, but that feat was beyond Mr. Moon’s abilities.

Mr. Moon and Cass were shoved into the room, the girl landing with a sickening ‘thump’ and a yelp on the concrete floor, while Mr. Moon stumbled to keep upright. Keeping one’s balance when the hands were cuffed behind the back required a good deal of dexterity to be applied. He’d learned that at Quantico, the FBI training facility, many years ago.

The sound of metal settling against wood was next, the bulky Russian having set aside his sawed-off Mossberg against the doorframe in favor of pulling out a Sig Sauer from his waistband. Mr. Moon recognized the familiar black metal pistol instantly. It was his, stolen after the wreck. He knew the magazine held 17 rounds. It would be more than enough to kill them both several times over.

“Listen closely and carefully.” The man spoke with a thick Russian accent. “Danten is going to temporarily remove your handcuffs. Then you are to shuffle toward the support beam, very slowly, and then you will put your wrists next to it. After that, he will cuff you to the pole. If you try to escape, I will shoot you. If you try to hold Danten hostage, I will shoot you. If you use him as a shield, I will shoot through him to shoot you. I would rather not do that as he is a better pilot than I.”

Danten sheepishly shrugged. “Vladischov will do it. Please don’t make him. I kinda like living.”

Mr. Moon carefully nodded. His mind tucked away that name. Vladischov. It was good to link a name to a face. He didn’t recognize the name, but maybe he would in the future. As slow as could be, Mr. Moon shuffled toward the beam. After a brief second, Cass’s footsteps followed him. Good. The girl did not seem willing to do anything stupid. Her life was still important for keeping Mark in line and as insurance in the instance they lied when telling him of the farm.

Rough hands made the handcuffs fall off his left wrist, before his hands were dragged closer to the pole and the cuffs were fastened back around his wrist. Mr. Moon glanced back as the same was done for Cass Thomson. The cuffs were around the pole, putting the length of metal between his back and his hands. Without removing the cuffs, the pole, or somehow sneaking the key, he was going nowhere anytime soon.

Then a hand dipped into Mr. Moon’s pocket, pulling out his wallet, two paper clips, and a handful of spare bullets for his Sig Sauer. The wallet and the bullets were tossed to Vladischov, while the paper clips fell into Danten’s pocket after the man gave Mr. Moon a cheeky grin.

“Sneaky man.” Danten chuckled, “Think about picking the lock after we left? Sneaky.”

Mr. Moon made a slight shrugging motion with his shoulders but otherwise did not respond. Anything he voiced aloud, any emotions he let flicker across his face, those would be puzzle pieces the Russians could use to gain more of an advantage than they already did.

Next, Danten searched Cass Thomson’s pockets, revealing nothing aside from a small penknife. The man tucked it into his pocket and turned to Vladischov.

“All clean big man.”

Vladischov looked up from where he had been studying the contents of Mr. Moon’s wallet.

“Now that you aren’t sniping at us from a block away, I see you are a rather bland man.” Vladischov grinned, withdrawing several things from the wallet. “Cash, that goes without saying. A driver’s license. It says your real name is Mr. Moon. No date of birth.” The Russian grinned again, clearly enjoying the moment. “A lie, I presume. Cash and a driver’s license. Then there’s a picture.”

Vladischov unfolded the photo in his hands to take a look at it. It was quite wrinkled. Soon enough, Mr. Moon would have to replace it with a newer copy. That was the price he paid for keeping it in his wallet.

“Touching.” Vladischov nodded. His grin had disappeared, replaced with the stone-cold face of a professional. “You have a boy? And a wife. Lucky man.”

The man held the photo out for all to see. As Vladischov described, it showed a woman, her blonde hair kept in a neat ponytail, cheerfully smiling under the noon sun. At her side was a young boy, face smudged with dirt and as happy as could be. Mr. Moon kept his face empty. The less Vladischov knew for sure, the better. Even if it was about something as ordinary as his family life.

Once it became clear Mr. Moon had no response, Vladischov crumpled the photo in his hand and threw it into the corner of the room. Then the man switched topics, as abruptly as could be.

“The alien. Where is it.”

Mr. Moon could feel Cass Thomson stiffen up. With them both cuffed to the pole, her arm was brushed up against his. And like a shark smelling blood, Vladischov instantly noticed that reaction. The scarred Russian stalked closer to the girl, leering into her face as she tried to wiggle away.

"My offer. Location or Danten tortures you until you break. From the looks of it, you're soft enough that it'll happen quick."

To Mr. Moon’s mild surprise, the girl did not immediately give up the location. Instead, she stared at the man without speaking a word. Admirable, but pointless. Mr. Moon needed either the Russians to split up, or for all four of them to go to the farm together. Only then, when the pieces were moving once more, would he have a chance to turn things around. Wasting time here was pointless. Acquiring avoidable wounds would only put them deeper in the hole.

“Tell them.” Mr. Moon’s voice broke the tension in the air. Cass turned toward him in surprise, while Vladischov appeared more curious. Danten, meanwhile, muffled a bout of chuckles. They truly had not expected to hear him say those words. Yet in their faces, Mr. Moon could see they mistook his order as resignation in the face of the inevitable, instead of a faucet of the plan coming together in his mind.

Mr. Moon kept his face deadpan. “I have business to attend to. Tell them the location and be done with it.”

"Business to attend to?" Danten's laughter was no longer muffled. "What a guy, cool as a cucumber when we have you dead to rights. Perfect. Saves us the minute it would have taken to squeeze the info out of the girl."

But still, Cass Thomson hesitated. Mr. Moon twisted his head to the side, temporarily breaking his deadpan gaze to fix a look of mild exasperation on his face. Only then did the girl finally say the location. He could have said it as well, but the Russians likely wouldn’t believe him. Training agents to resist torture was a common practice in all intelligence agencies. 

“The Henryks Farm. Due East ten, maybe twenty miles from here.”

"Where on the farm." Vladischov retorted.

“Barn. Under a haystack.”

After those directions were given, the silence returned. Vladischov carefully studied Cass Thomson’s face, before ultimately deciding that whatever he saw in her unguarded expression, he believed.

“Stay here.” Vladischov’s voice rumbled as he swept toward the door, only pausing to grab his Mossberg, “If I do not radio back in half an hour, kill them painfully.”

Danten nodded, flashing a carefree grin. "You got it, boss."

The door closed behind Vladischov with a solid sound. Mr. Moon resumed holding his poker face and studied the situation. Only one guard, a maximum time of half an hour, and they were both cuffed to a sturdy pole. Mark’s condition was unknown, and Mr. Moon knew not if the tattered remains of the Carlston PD would arrive at the farm in time to run into Vladischov.

There still was a chance, but Mr. Moon had to admit the situation could have been better. Making this work would be like threading a needle with a gun pointed at his head.

-------

More blood, more death. Things are moving faster and faster as more pieces get removed from the board, both the Russians and the FBI get more desperate, and Jack continues to inject his brand of madness into the situation. Now the Russians know about the farm. Will Mr. Moon and Cass escape in time to take the alien? Will the remains of the Carlston PD arrive in time? Where is Jack in all of this?

In other news I've been enjoying a Pokemon Nuzlocke in the Unova region (gen 5). I've also been testing my patience a bit with shiny hunting in the game. Nothing yet, and I don't expect anything, but I've never gone shiny hunting before so it's an interesting experience.

Hope Ya'll had a good New Years, and here's to 2025 being a cool year! As always, huge thanks to all patreons and readers!

Peace

Chapter 27 - Bad Company

The Henryks farm. Mr. Moon didn’t recognize the name at all, but that did not mean much. The country was filled with old farmsteads, both ones still being actively worked and ones rotting away to nothing in both the physical sense and in the sense of memory. Frankly, the hiding spot was not bad at all. Out of the way, unknown to most, and assuming by the word ‘old’ that preceded the name of the farm, it was also unused. If the girl and the boy had been killed before the information got out, then the alien very might have well been hidden away forever.

That was another welcome boon gained from his decision to accept Mark’s deal. Boon it was, but the newfound cooperation was still covered in a veil of awkward air from the boy, combined with the piercing glare of Cass Thomson. She seemed on the verge of snapping at any moment, a feeling Mr. Moon truly did understand. He murdered her father. Revenge would be natural. He had a feeling her revenge would happen eventually, but not in the near future. The girl’s concern for Mark and the rest of the town outweighed her desire for revenge. Once that was taken care of… the ‘eventually’ part would probably come up soon after that. But by then his job would be over and it wouldn’t matter which one of them died. It wouldn’t matter at all.

A grunt of pain came from the kitchen. Dag was sitting on the edge of the table while Ms. Miller affixed a makeshift splint to his left arm. Nothing was broken to speak of, but the agent’s hand-to-hand brawl with the madman was rough enough to fracture the bone in several places. Medical attention would have been better, but it would have to do. Now that the location of the alien was known, no time could be wasted. Not even if Mr. Moon was fairly certain the people in this house were the only ones with knowledge of the location. Who could tell if Lady Luck would smile at the Russians all of a sudden? They couldn’t even afford to wait for the police Ms. Miller had called in before the fight to arrive.

“So…” Mark’s awkward voice interrupted Mr. Moon’s musing. He turned to face the boy, wordlessly prompting him to finish voicing the question.

Mark glanced down at his own body, visibly hesitating before continuing to speak.

“What did it do to me? Is this supposed to happen? Am I still human?”

Mr. Moon stared at him for a moment longer, choosing his words carefully before he answered. Mark was now a viable test subject and would naturally find out parts of the project in the future. The question remained, how much to voice aloud, for walls could have ears when least expected.

“The Nirvana Project,” Mr. Moon cautiously began, “Is a government initiative centered around the abilities that alien possesses. It cannot be killed by any method we have tried so far. Any wound it experiences heals in seconds, minutes, or even hours depending on the severity. Our goal is to understand that ability and find a way to transfer it to a human subject. You appear to be a successful case. Your remaining humanity is a question for the scientists to debate.”

The house was silent. Dag was busy unrolling his shirt sleeve to cover the makeshift splint as best as he could, while Ms. Miller had put out her cigarette in a nearby ashtray and was busy reloading her revolver. Meanwhile, Mark and Cass were staring at Mr. Moon with eyes wide open.

“A successful case…” Cass eventually muttered. Her wonder had swiftly faded into distrust, which she openly cast onto Mr. Moon. “Is Mark the first? Is something going to happen to him?”

“I wonder.” Mr. Moon said noncommittedly. “No other test subject has survived this long.”

The silence following those words would have been suffocating for an ordinary person, but Mr. Moon simply brushed it aside and turned toward the kitchen. Now that the location was known, they had to act fast. Speed was their greatest ally considering his team was weakened and the cooperation with Mark and Cass was tenuous at best. The girl was resourceful, but only the barest of threads prevented her from acting out on a desire for revenge.

If the situation changed to make them enemies again, things would become… complicated. Even Mr. Moon was not entirely sure how to permanently stop Mark. No. This needed to be done and dusted before those two could get ideas or either of the two other enemy groups could complicate things further. Keeping ahold of this newfound advantage, as faint as it may be, was everything now.

“Ms. Miller,” Mr. Moon said, “Ready your equipment. Direct police reinforcements to the Henryks farm. Tell them to proceed with all speed but with due caution. As soon as the alien is secured, work with Mr. Sun to set up a handoff point. Once the alien is placed in a black site, we’ll call in backup and do a full sweep of the town. The lunatic has been reckless and making enough big moves that we can use dealing with him as our official reason to get involved. It’s already far beyond what any local police force could realistically handle, so calling in the FBI to take over is only natural. Then we can flush out the Russians with a full team. With the alien out of the way, there shouldn't be any risk of leaks by then.”

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

That cold man talked about it all so easily. Mark’s survival being a miracle. Some sort of lunatic government project. Bringing in another team of men with guns to kill all the Russians. Death. Murder. Cover. Black sites. It was a whole ‘nother world and Cass was knee-deep in the thick of it all. Even though the thought of putting a bullet in the head of Mr. Moon had been dominating Cass’s mind for days now, it still was hard to believe the FBI agent could speak of all that like a neighbor idly discussing the weather.

There was no more discussion after that. Mark was clearly unsettled after hearing about the 'Nirvana Project'. He kept staring at his hands as if he expected his own body to start falling apart any second. It was more information than Cass expected to get. This was… Mark truly was important if he was the only person to live this long.

The woman, who'd briskly introduced herself as Ms. Miller, finished loading her revolver and turned toward gathering up a portable radio set. The larger man, Dag, had mostly covered the splint on his arm with the sleeve of his suit jacket. He’d retrieved his handgun from Mark, and it was nestled in the holster strapped to the underside of his shoulder. Both her and Mark’s hands were empty of weapons. If the agents wanted to kill them… this would be the time.

Yet, they didn’t. As casually as Mr. Moon, Dag, and Ms. Miller seemed around the idea of murder, Cass and Mark still drew breath. It was… It made Cass’s head hurt. They seemed genuinely willing to hold up their end of the deal. Was Mark worth that much as a test subject? He had to be. Otherwise, once the location of the farm was out, they would have been killed just like her dad.

As Cass’s thoughts continued to rise into a rolling boil inside her head, Mr. Moon launched into another set of orders. They were to drive to the farm. Two cars, with Mark and Cass kept separate. An obvious safety measure just in case they were lying about the location. She would be in the car with Mr. Moon, while Ms. Miller, Dag, and Mark were in her dad’s squad car. The successful retrieval of the alien was paramount. All other objectives were secondary. She could understand that now. Though Mr. Moon was still tight-lipped about the precise details of the Nirvana Project, it was still obvious to her that what happened to Mark was far more serious than Cass ever could have imagined before.

If, and that was a bit ‘if’, that ability could be freely transferred? Well, on the bright side, it could eradicate disease, wounds, and maybe even death. On the other side… Cass could already imagine soldiers being doped up on that stuff and being sent to fight in the front lines, undying warriors that any nation would eventually fold against. In retrospect, her dad’s death made sense. The implications of the project succeeding were huge. The implications of the news spreading prematurely were even bigger than that.

The nation possessing that power would become the only superpower in the world, a hegemon above all others. If news got out before it was ready, well, the world had already been on the brink of nuclear holocaust with the Cuban Missile Crisis in the 60s. This would be worse. No other nation would allow America to complete the project, and for good reason.

That, however, did nothing to soothe Cass's feelings. It only put what she knew into a fresh context. Her desire for revenge still burned bright, even as she slid into the passenger seat of Mr. Moon's car. It was just…

Her mind was at war. The rational and the irrational sides of it locked in deadly combat. There was a shotgun rack in the backseat of the car. She could see it in the rearview mirror. Cass could almost hear the guns calling out to her, whispering in alluring tones for her to wait for Mr. Moon to be distracted, sneak back, somehow get the rack open, and see what a shotgun could do to a human skull. Would it be like blowing up a rotten pumpkin? Or would the bone still be intact after?

Would she feel better?

Then reason took over. She couldn’t try anything. Mark seemed valuable as a test subject but who knew how far that protection would stretch? If Cass tried to kill Mr. Moon, Mark would doubtlessly help her. Would that overshadow his usefulness? No. No way. She’d been over this over and over in her head. Cass couldn’t do anything at all. Her hands were figuratively tied.

The car lurched into motion as she thought. Cass wasn’t in the mood for conversation, and Mr. Moon was naturally taciturn, so the vehicle was silent other than the quiet rumble of the engine.

She hated this. Every second she sat in the car next to that monster trying to play nice, she hated it.

The town faded away, soon replaced by suburbs. That too quickly fell away in the rearview mirror as the city limits were reached, then replaced by trees and the country roads Cass knew so well. Every so often Cass would break the silence to give a brief set of directions, which Mr. Moon would wordlessly obey. The man was watchful, eyes darting around the road searching for movement. Heck, he wasn’t just watchful, he looked downright paranoid. Glancing at shadows moving under the headlights, keeping the radio off to listen for noises, and staring into the darkness between the shadowy trees.

The butt of his gun poked out from under his suit jacket. It was within easy reach of the man. All he had to do was move his right hand away from the steering wheel, dip it under the jacket, pull it out, and shoot her. If she was a betting girl, Cass would bet cash money that Mr. Moon could do all of that before she could react. On the other hand, she could try and grab it for herself. Lunge over, take the gun, shoot the bastard. The range would be a negligible factor in the accuracy of the shot. The main concern would be if he had time to put up a fight. Could she do it? Was Cass fast enough? The stupid, hotheaded, irrational part of Cass’s brain urged her to do it. Steal his gun. Do it. The gun. Steal. Now.

Cass blinked. Just like that, in the blink of an eye, reason grabbed the talking stick and took the stage center in the theater of her mind. Forget putting her brain into two different rational or irrational parts, this was more like putting the really bad decision on one side of her palm, the really good decision on the other, and rapidly flipping her palm back and forth. Which side would it land on? Cass didn’t know. Back of her palm. Front of her palm.

Flip it. Flip it again. Be stupid, take the gun. Be smart, leave it be, and cooperate. It was crazy. Cass had been over this a number of times of which the total sum she wasn't even sure of anymore. Ten times? Three times? A hundred? Back at the house when the deal was offered. During the explanation of the project. In the bush. Why was she still going over this? It felt like each time a decision started to feel firm in Cass’s head, an hour, a half hour, or even ten minutes would pass, and the question would come right back with a different answer to boot. The nasty voice in the depths of her head, slithering right back inside her ears whispering to let it all go to Hell.

She stared out of the window as hard as she could, without heeding how the straining of her eyes began to summon slight stabbing pains near the front of her brain. So what? It could join the party, seated to the right of the ringing in her ears and to the left of the spot of honor, the painful throbbing sensation near the top of her forehead where Mr. Moon’s pistol connected with her skull. It hurt then. It still hurt now.

Trees whipped past. How fast were they going? Cass wanted to look over to the speedometer, but that would put the handgun back in plain sight. Could she even trust herself with that view anymore? Soon the darkness between the trees started to blend into one. Blurring the trees together, it practically made the wooden trunks fade away into a state of perfect invisibility. All that stretched past that window was a land of ink far removed from the world where Cass existed inside the confines of the quiet car.

There were no bushes, branches, side roads, gravel, animals, nothing. It was all one, an entirely separate world she could see from the other side of a window. If she rolled it down, would it enter the car? It was already silent inside the vehicle. The night outside felt silent to her as well, though Cass couldn't be certain until the window was rolled down. Perhaps there could be birds singing, ones that would break the spell of the night.

But what if it entered the car? The trees were already blurred together into nothing. Would she join them? Forever part of that charcoal fabric stretching out further into reality than she could ever comprehend? That would be nice, sinking right into it like a cushy couch after a long day at school with a soft blanket wrapped snugly around her shoulders. Or would it? The worst part was Cass didn’t know for sure anymore.

The harder Cass’s eyes strained to distract from her grasping thoughts about the gun, the more it seemed like the ink outside was slipping right through the window. Yet, she hadn’t opened it. Neither of her hands were touching the handle near the bottom third of the car door that would roll down the window. The window was up. How did it get through?

Cass blinked once, then twice, but on the third she kept her eyes closed. She could feel it now. Similar to how her stray thoughts grasped to redirect her brain toward taking the gun, the inky darkness grasped at her body to pull her into some kind of dream. She didn't know for sure if it truly was a dream, but it felt like it would be. A dream where her dad was still alive, Mark was still at college, and Cass got a job at the diner.

It wasn’t the first time she’d had that dream. This was, however, the first time it arrived while she was awake.

Or was Cass awake right now? The entire ordeal was surreal. One day she was on the brink of finishing her last year at high school, the next she was questioning her own sanity in the car of a remorseless killer driving to a farmhouse with an alien tucked in the barn. Some sort of Russian kill squad was roaming around town, and a heart-eating mass-murderer was doing mass-murdery things all about the place. Wasn’t that crazy? That was a chain of events only movies would bother to put forward. Aliens, a revenge subplot, drama, whatever. It was li-

A pair of familiar eyes emerged from the world on the other side of the window. Chief Thomson. Cass Thomson’s father. Her dad. He looked at her from the other side of the window. No words, just staring. His stare was the only thing different – a small blip of a face in a sea of darkness. Dad stared right at her. His blazing ginger hair felt like it lit up a small part of that world, from the top of his head right on down to his funny little mustache. His eyes, they said something, but for the life of her, Cass was not sure what that was. Condemnation? Reassurance? Driving her to revenge? Beseeching her to let it go? Grab the gun? Get justice through the law?

Cass stared back at him like a deer caught in the headlights. Her dad did not blink. Yet his eyes – his eyes were so expressive. They spoke of a world of conversation if she could only just understand. If she could hear what his eyes were saying, if not for the pane of glass separating them both! Cass waved. Her arms felt like limp pasta noodles, but what strength she could summon into her muscles was barely enough to move them into action.

Nothing was different. Her dad’s face poked out of the world on the other side of the window. Was he actually there? He was not waving back. Why couldn’t she understand what his face was saying? Then there was movement. Her dad’s arms reached up to reveal his favorite cowboy hat held in a palm. The hat moved up and was casually deposited on top of his head. It looked like any moment he’d speak to crack some dumb pun, tip his hat, and head on back to work. But there was no sound. Chief Thomson turned around, hat still perched snugly on his head, and walked off, fading away into the darkness.

Cass forced her eyes open, and ‘bam’, just like that, the trees snapped back into view. The world of ink was gone, replaced by a twilight that was swiftly fading into the darkness of the night. The dream, as short as it was, it too disappeared like water spilling out of her cupped palm. Before long it was nothing but faint snippets in the deepest corners of her mind. Yet, those snippets lingered, like the tinnitus picked up from the gunfire and the probable concussion picked up from Mr. Moon.

The silence was more than suffocating now. If something more than suffocating was possible, that is. Smothering? Choking? Similar words but they felt different. She was less than a foot or two away from the person she hated most in the world. Cass wished that Mark was in the car with them, if only to slightly ease the tension, but she knew they were split up for a reason. Keeping the eggs from being in a single basket while preventing the two from plotting. Simple, yet clever. The question of Cass’s safety would keep Mark in line. The question of Mark’s safety (even though he had that alien weirdness about him) would keep Cass in line.

Almost as if to break the silence on cue, Mr. Moon let out a shout of alarm, spinning the steering wheel in his hands to evade something Cass couldn’t quite make out in the darkness. She could only tell it was moving fast. A fraction of a second later a terrible impact tore into the car, driving the breath clean from Cass's lungs. The silence was gone, replaced by the screaming of car engines, the crunching of metal bending, and the brittle sounds of glass breaking. Dimly, in the back of her mind that was separated from all the sudden chaos, Cass could hear the crunch of metal and glass that spoke of another car colliding with the one Mark was in.

Cass had no time to ponder over that information. The world turned topsy-turvy, the car skidding back from whatever force struck it until Cass’s side of the vehicle smashed against a tree bringing the vehicle to an abrupt stop, and sending shards of broken glass from the car window slicing into her cheek.

------

Cass begins to question her own sanity, something clearly not being helped by the fat concussion Mr. Moon gave her plus all the trauma she's experienced in the past couple of days. Not for long, though, as an enemy ambushes the group before they reach the farm! Is it the Russians, ready to make another move? Or is this the madness of Jack striking again?

Bad Company is a really good song made by a rock group of the same name. I actually used to have the album featuring it on CD a while back, maybe ten years by now. When I learned to drive, I didn't own a phone or iPod or anything like that (the truck didn't have an aux cord to hook it up to anyway, it was made in the late 80s/early 90s, so many years before that became standard around the early 2000s) and the truck I learned to drive in had a radio that barely worked. It did, however, have a CD/Cassette tape player built into the dash. I lived in the country around that time so good radio stations were very scarce and mostly out of range. Thus, I got a shitton of mileage out of that Bad Company CD. It's been a while since that and sadly life felt fit to part me from that CD. It disappeared one year and couldn't find it since. Hardly matters since Spotify/YouTube exists now but there was just some sort of magical feeling about being on a long roadtrip, opening up the center console in the front seat, and figuring out which CD or Cassette tape I wanted to slam in for the next few miles.

Anyways that's enough nostalgia for me. Everyone, as usual I have the utmost gratitude to all patreons supporting me, along with each and every reader sticking with me week after week. See ya'll next week, and I hope you all have a wonderful New Years celebration!

Peace

Chapter 26 - She Swallowed Burning Coals

Mr. Moon lowered the revolver in his hands once it became clear the madman was not returning. In a flash it had started, in a flash it had ended. Dag let out a pained grunt as he stepped away from the broken window. The man had taken a serious beating. Mr. Moon had as well – a fact that his ribs made sure to remind him of. They were cracked at the very least. All that one punch.

The sound of a match being struck came from the kitchen, and Mr. Moon glanced over in time to see Ms. Miller lighting a cigarette. Outwardly the woman appeared calm, but with a closer look, there was a slight trembling of her fingers that betrayed her inward feelings. Shock, adrenaline, and a bit of distress in the wake of Steve's death. He could understand. Mr. Moon stooped down low to gather his Sig Sauer from the ground, using his other hand to ease the hammer on the revolver back to a resting position before tossing it back to Ms. Miller.

Once that was done, Mr. Moon turned his eyes to the body the madman had thrown through the window. It was headless, but the torso was wrapped in a bloodied dress shirt of which an empty pistol holster poked out from under. It was most likely Steve, or what was left of him. The Kevlar the man liked to wear under his dress shirt was missing. The fallen agent’s chest was caved in. The ribs were broken to pieces, and even from where he stood, Mr. Moon could see the man’s heart was missing. That detail alone confirmed the madman was the same assailant behind the gas station murders.

Still, it was obvious Steve hadn’t died without a fight. The madman was wounded, though not heavily enough to impact his movements. But the blood loss would still matter in the long run, forcing the madman to seek treatment or patch up his own wounds. That would come with obvious risks that could benefit Mr. Moon and what was left of his team. Seeking treatment would force the madman to travel a town over to a hospital or doctor's office that would ask questions.

Even though Ms. Miller had been working hard to keep the outside world in the dark, it would still be a large man walking in with a bunch of stab and bullet wounds. It would be immediate grounds for a report to law enforcement. If the madman patched up his own wounds, however, that would come with the risk of the treatment not fully working when being done by an amateur, and this town (plus the surrounding towns) were far too small to have any back-alley doctors strolling around.

Mr. Moon continued to mull the options around his head, going back and forth between possibilities until his train of thought was abruptly interrupted by Dag’s shout.

“GUN!”

Mr. Moon whipped around, running over to Dag with his gun drawn. The man was standing in front of the office, his fearsome bulk filling most of the doorway. Dag's shoulder moved to the side slightly as soon as he sensed Mr. Moon draw close to him, revealing another large man pointing Dag's Sig Sauer at them both. Mr. Moon's face remained blank as he studied the situation. Other than the stolen gun the man was not particularly well-armed. In one hand rested the Sig, the other hand held a folding pocketknife. Several of the zip ties restraining Cass Thomson to the chair were already cut through.

In the tension-filled silence that followed, Mr. Moon came to one conclusion: this man, who was nearly as large as Dag, must have been Cass Thomson’s mystery companion, the same man Steve spotted leaving with the girl after the Chief’s murder.

"Back. Off." The man's voice eventually rang out in the office. It was shaky. Scared. But also determined.

Mr. Moon tilted his head slightly to the side.

“I’m afraid we can’t do that.”

The man blinked. A bead of sweat ran down his brow.

“I’ll shoot you.” The man said.

“Then we all die.” Mr. Moon replied.

The man held Mr. Moon’s gaze, staring deep into the agent’s eyes. Cass Thomson stayed silent, though her face was a whirlwind mixture of fear and hatred.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Mark’s tongue darted across his dry lips. This was bad. Mega bad. The gun was a horrible deathly weight in his hand. If only that crazy fight had lasted a few more seconds. Two zip ties were left. Once those two were cut, he and Cass could have broken a window and fled. But no. The classic Mark luck kicked in to send the big guy back inside the office looking for his scattered weapons. Then again, the classic Mark luck threw a gun into his own hands. Without that to start a good ol’ Mexican standoff, Cass would probably be dead, and Mark would be figuring out the maximum limits of his healing ability.

Think, Mark. Think! The silence was deafening. Both of the creepy agents were staring him dead in the eye with their weapons drawn, almost like vipers waiting to see an ounce of weakness in their prey before they struck. One had a shotgun, one had a pistol. What could he do? If Cass had been dead when he walked in, Mark would have been willing to die too. But she was alive. That meant he could die, but Cass needed to live. Just because his life was worthless didn’t mean Cass’s was.

The pocketknife was cold in his hands, the same feeling as the gun but nowhere near the weight.

And that was it. For once in his life, Mark could feel a worthwhile idea forming in his head.

"You two. Starsky and Hutch. I am going to raise my pocket knife. Don't shoot."

The thin man, whose body was partially obscured by the larger man’s bulk, cautiously nodded his head. There was a faint gleam of curiosity in his eyes. Frankly, it was the first emotion Mark had seen in the man’s face ever since the standoff began.

Mark ever so slowly raised his pocketknife in the air, going from waist height to level with his face. It was a gamble. However, this gamble had originated with something Cass had said earlier. It wasn’t completely born out of Mark’s mind. That meant it actually had a chance of working, which wouldn’t have been the case for a ‘Mark original trademarked plan’.

Once the pocketknife drew even with his face, Mark halted. This was it. The blade drifted near his left cheek. Then the cold metal bit into his skin. A quick slice – quick to avoid pain, but deep enough to draw plenty of blood for the agents to see. Cass squirmed in her seat as she saw the cut, but Mark flashed a smile to her to say this was all according to his plan. Who knew for sure if this would mean anything to the men opposite of him. But in the movies, when something freaky like that alien happened, the guys in suits were always on the lookout for test subjects.

The thin agent stared at him for only a moment. Then, his eyes imperceptively widened. The cut on Mark’s face was healing. Mark could feel it healing. The itchy skin knitting back together in seconds.

Mark grinned a sharklike grin, using the motion to hide his sheer pants-crapping terror.

“This means something to you. This isn’t normal.” Mark’s question hung in the air like a guillotine poised to fall over someone’s neck. Whose it was, Mark had no idea yet.

The agent eventually nodded.

“Here’s the deal,” Mark cautiously ventured once the agent appeared determined to remain silent, “Whatever that alien did to me, I bet that’s what you’re after. I get hurt, my body heals real fast. That ain’t normal. So here’s the deal. I’ll be your test subject or whatever. That’s what you lot usually want, right? You can figure out what that alien can do to normal guys like me. And Cass tells you where the creature is.”

“And in return?” The thin man questioned in a lifeless monotone.

“In return,” Mark replied, “You let me and Cass live. You don’t touch Cass no more. Once you get the alien, you leave the town and don’t come back.”

The thin man’s eyes bored into Mark’s own, as if they were tearing through his mind searching for any signs of a lie. Meanwhile, Cass began to struggle against the remaining zip ties, fighting to catch Mark’s eyes. She was angry. He knew why. The thin man killed her dad and now Mark was trying to strike a deal.

Well, it was either this or have both of them die like dogs bleeding out on the floor of the office. Again, if it was just Mark alone, he would be fine with that. But Cass… she was better than him. She deserved to live, even if Mark didn’t.

“Very well.”

Mark blinked in surprise. Even though he’d offered the deal, part of him hadn’t expected the man to accept it that readily.

“But,” The man went on, “If Cass Thomson lies about the location of the alien, I hope I do not need to spell out what will happen.”

Mark hesitantly lowered his gun. The two agents did the same, though without any form of hesitation. Then he stepped forward and shook the thin man’s hand. Mark hadn’t the heart to turn around and face Cass. Forcing her to work with her father’s murderer… not only that, but there was a line of blood on her forehead near her hairline, and a lingering sense of fear even Mark could pick up about her. Cass was still wearing her pajamas and windbreaker, for heaven's sake! His gut raged for him to pulverize the two agents. That was one of the few good things his father had taught him. Never put your hands on a woman. It was a good thing his head was leading the scene for now.

She would despise him for this. But conversely, Mark also knew she would keep the deal. Not for herself, but for him. That was the thing about Cass. Her rage toward the thin man would never be able to overcome her kindness, even toward a man like Mark, who was only an ex-boyfriend. That was just how Cass was. Her kindness was like a warm, ever-present sun shining down on this cold world.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

The final two zip ties fell off her wrists, but Cass barely felt them in the face of the pure nausea that filled her stomach. Mark was…

She didn’t even know what to think now. The rational part of her brain, the same part that felt like it had taken a backseat these past few days, shouted that Mark was right. Not only would this save the poor guy’s life, but whatever could get those lunatics out of her town the fastest was best. With each day that passed, more people died.

She didn’t want that. Cass knew almost everyone in the town. To bury more of her neighbors, more of the people she grew up around, it would be agonizing. For her, for their families, for everyone.

However, the irrational part of her brain still filled with murderous rage and primal fear screamed and raged for her to grab Mark’s gun before he gave it back to the big guy and shoot Mr. Moon in the head, consequences be damned. Only a few minutes ago that monster in the shape of a man was torturing her. How did that lead to cooperation? At any moment he could go right back to doing that. Cass could still feel it. The water seeping through the cloth on her face drowning her on dry land. The rushing tide of panic overwhelmed all other feelings, stripping them away to uncover that primal, base emotion of pure terror. Those men couldn’t be trusted.

Those two parts of her brain relentlessly brawled for dominance. Hatred of Mr. Moon. Dread at the possibility of more torture. Fear for her friends and neighbors. Desire to save Mark’s life.

But then Cass caught Mark’s eye, and the irrational part of her brain was finally suppressed for just the briefest of moments. He was so scared, and so worried about her. Something in Cass’s chest broke like glass. Somehow, she would still try to get revenge after this was all over if she could. But Mark… she couldn’t do this to him. Whatever resolve she’d had in that bush was gone now, swept away by her concern for Mark. Those men couldn't be trusted… but they were laser-focused on the alien. Maybe if they got it back, combined with whatever they could learn from Mark, maybe that would be enough for them. Hah. A pipe dream, really. A pipe dream built on fragile hope. If it worked, it worked. If not, Cass could get a little bit more time alive to think of a new plan, at least.

“Fine.” Cass hoarsely muttered. Just saying that word alone felt like she was swallowing burning coals. “Moon or whatever your name is, you are a son of a bitch coward that shot my dad in the back for nothing. But for Mark, I’ll do it. That alien you were asking about; we hid it in the old Henryks farm in the barn. A few miles away from here. You grab it and get out of my town. I hope you rot in the depths of Hell for eternity.”

She hated those words, even the insulting ones. Merely speaking with the coward, much less agreeing to work with him, it felt like she was betraying her dad. Was this it? Giving up on avenging his death just like this? After all Mr. Moon had done? It was disgusting. It felt like her entire body was being bathed in sewer slime that would never come off no matter how many showers Cass took. But she just couldn’t. She couldn’t. It wasn’t just her alone. If it was, this would have ended in a hail of gunfire like she originally intended. But she wasn’t alone in this right now. Mark needed help to get out of this alive, just as he was oh so transparently trying to help her.

She couldn’t do this to him. Not anymore. Her resolve was gone, and Cass hated herself for it. Her resolve had been drowned under that rag; the corpse of that resolve being tossed aside by what she saw in Mark’s eyes.

Oblivious to her internal struggle, or perhaps just utterly apathetic to it, Mr. Moon nodded his head, already appearing to be quite comfortable with the deal Mark made.

“Very well. We will go there immediately. You will join us.”

It was pretty obvious his words were not an invitation, but a requirement.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

His body stung. It was like a thousand bees were pushing the stingers on their butts right into Jack’s flesh. But that was the price of a really good fight like he’d just had. Jack smiled and squeezed the tube of superglue over yet another one of the myriad of wounds that littered his body. Being forced to retreat from a fight. He could count the number of times that had happened on the fingers of one hand. There was that one time he fought his demons in the police station… then there was that other time with the cartel after he ate that leader guy. Tasty, but a bit stringy in parts while other parts had a bit too much fat. The cocaine in the guy's system added a bit of spice to the cuisine. Five stars out of ten, wouldn't eat again.

“I dunno, what do you two think?" Jack abruptly asked the other two. No response. Jack looked over to the couch. He could see them lying there. Lazy bones, the both of them.

There was something about that house. The two lizardmen that the woman had fled to were strong. The man Jack fought in the basement was strong. Jack appreciated that, but the presence of so many strong men was an anomaly in a town like this. Then there was the girl. The one he’d glimpsed tied to a chair in the side room. She was not there of her own will. Jack could smell it – a mixed stench of fear and murderous rage, though the former overpowered the latter almost entirely. Information was being dragged out of her. How interesting.

His opponents were professionals. Professional killer lizardmen stuffed in suits. They were used to blood and death. Back in Miami, that would be expected. The filthy streets of the city swarmed with gangbangers, cartel members, shadow demons, lizardmen, and spiderwomen. But in a small town? An anomaly. This was the reason his friends from the news sent him here. Those lizards were up to something. It would take patience, but Jack knew if he watched carefully, he could find out precisely what that something was.

So, Jack continued to apply superglue to his wounds, staring out the window to the lizard house in the distance, watching and waiting for something to happen. The two rotting corpses on the couch, a man and a woman, said nothing throughout all of this. The house was as quiet as a grave.

----

Things are happening faster and faster. Bigger plays, less secrecy. The alien is so close to being back in Mr. Moon's hands. How long will the cooperation between the FBI and Cass last? Will this truly be Mark's fate, to live the rest of his life as a test subject in some dark corner of the world? The Russians have been quiet - where are they? Jack lurks and plots, always dogging the team's footsteps. Now that the mad hound has found the scent of his prey, he will not let it go. The endgame is approaching.

The pokemon tournament in the discord server continues to go well. I've also been continuing to do some planning for my next work, the sequel to Frog Out of Water. Should be fun!

As always, huge thanks to all the patreons for funding my coffee addition. Cheers to all you readers, hope to see you again next week! And, Merry Christmas to those who celebrate it! I hope you all have a fun and safe holiday!

Peace

Chapter 25 - Fight Your Demons

Once more it felt as if the world was holding its breath. That was what it appeared to be in Cass’s eyes. The door separating the office from the hallway and the living room was cast wide open. Even as she violently shivered, fighting the rising bile in her throat amid attempts to keep her eyes off the discarded rag and bucket on the floor, the situation looked strange. It had all started when the agents answered the door to let a strict-looking woman inside. Whatever she’d said had set Mr. Moon and Dag on high alert.

Both men had taken up watchful positions around the house. Mr. Moon crouched beside her dad’s recliner, gun at the ready, while Dag stood in the office doorway holding a shotgun in one hand while the other clutched a pistol. The woman’s voice was coming from the kitchen, along with occasional bursts of radio static. Cass strained her ears to listen. It almost sounded like… police communications. The woman was coordinating with the police for backup.

Something had gone wrong. Cass knew it for sure. But what? Was it those crazies from the police station? Whatever it was, they’d stopped interrogating… no. That was the wrong word. Torturing. They’d stopped torturing her. The thin man seemed desperate to get the location of the alien out of her mere moments before, but they’d switched gears just like that.

Scratch that. Something hadn’t just gone wrong. Something had gone horribly wrong.  

Mr. Moon’s head was constantly moving to look at the front and back doors. Dag was equally as watchful. Careful tension appeared to fill both of their bodies like springs being held back to the utmost in preparation for one crucial moment. The men’s faces were grim. She could almost smell the blood, at this point still imaginary, gathering around the bodies of the murderers.

A second later, Cass’s questions were answered by the sound of shattering glass.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Mark slowed to a halt as soon as he reached the back door. For the briefest of moments, he’d entertained the thought of bursting right through the door for a sort of shock and awe type of approach. But then, right as he approached ramming speed, something stopped him. It was Cass. Not in the flesh or anything, but her voice. Specifically, her voice in his head. A memory of her voice from the good old days. Back when they were in high school together. Back when they were dating. Back when he was happy.

Cass smiled at him. It was right after a game. Football, Carlston High School versus one of their rivals in Manhattan. They’d won. Mark played well but… well, he was a bit of a blockhead. Mark knew that, everyone knew that. He made a few mistakes in the heat of the moment, during the game.

‘Think, Mark. Think. It’s a big world. I can’t be around you 24/7. Heck, I can’t be on the field next to you. I’ve gotta stay in the stands. Think before you act. You’re strong. Fast. If you would use your brain, nothing can stop you.’

That’s what Cass had said, smiling at Mark and giving him a playful punch in the shoulder.

A sharp stabbing pain lanced through Mark’s heart. The good old days. There were so many smart people in the world. Scientists and inventors and whatnot. Why hadn’t any of them made some sort of device that could tell a guy when the good old days were there before they slipped away? Those were the happiest days of his life. He should have savored them more.

Mark viciously shook his head. Memory lane could wait until this was over, he was alone in his parents’ house again, and there was some booze to help him forget about the present and future. He leaned down, grabbed the doormat with one hand, and casually tossed it aside to reveal a small key nestled underneath. It fit the lock in the door perfectly, and it slid open with a soft 'snick'. Mark peered through the gap in the door, reflexively holding his breath to keep as quiet as possible. He could see the big guy right off the bat. His head was turned toward Mark, but there was a shotgun held at the ready in his hands.

But before Mark’s brain (tiny as it was) could start working on a new plan, the sound of glass shattering echoed like an explosion throughout the house.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

One moment, Mr. Moon’s eyes were flitting across what he could see in the living room, the hallway, the office, and the kitchen. It was quiet. If Ms. Miller hadn’t arrived, the night would have been an ordinary one. It was too quiet. Did the attacker truly lose the trail back at the other house?

As it turned out, Mr. Moon’s question was answered as soon as it popped into his head.

Steve’s corpse flew through the closed living room window, accompanied by the sound of shattering glass. Mr. Moon yelled for Cathy to get down, the rare use of her first name sending the woman instantly diving for the floor, and then the room erupted into a flurry of action as a screaming bald man covered in blood launched himself through the broken window.

An axe in one hand and a shotgun in another, the madman moved at the same time Mr. Moon and Dag did. The madman’s shotgun roared out, catching Dag clean in the stomach and sending the man reeling to the floor from the force of the shot. Mr. Moon, still taking cover behind the recliner, emptied five rounds from his Sig Sauer into the man’s chest. The madman stumbled heavily backward, but otherwise, he did not slow or show visible signs of pain.

“BODY ARMOR!” Mr. Moon shouted a warning to the other agents in the room. His arms rose to switch aim from the larger target of the chest to the smaller target of the head, but the man was on him before he could let loose another barrage. The recliner was tossed aside like it was made of paper. The man’s axe sliced through the air, but Mr. Moon rolled aside just in time so that it only nicked his suit jacket. For some reason, the shotgun had been tossed aside after its first shot. Did it only hold one shell at a time?

Now that the madman was closer, Mr. Moon was able to make out more details. Several wounds littered his body, but the man moved with speed defying any sort of weakness. Either he was inhumanly tough or was on serious amounts of drugs. Both?

The madman wore a ragged sleeveless white undershirt, and underneath that poked out the telltale black cloth of Kevlar body armor. From what he could tell, the body armor itself was tattered as well, as if someone had sliced through parts of it with a sharp object. Perhaps an axe.

It would weaken the material, but body armor was still body armor. It would still prove quite effective against his Sig Sauer. Still, the slices were important knowledge. It showed the material wasn’t rated as a stab vest. Useful to know if his weapon was lost and he had to resort to the knife kept in his belt.

Before the axe could tear through the air once more, the massive bulk of Dag, both his weapons abandoned, crashed into the madman’s back while Mr. Moon scrambled away to create some space. For once, Dag Sterner was matched in size and strength by an opponent. His partner’s arms wrapped around the madman’s neck to establish a chokehold, but the man simply let out a crazed laugh, almost as if he was reveling in the combat.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Arms as thick as tree trunks wrapped around his neck, but Jack felt only joy. This was it. Tracking the woman from that house was the best decision he’d ever made. His chest stung from where the thin man shot him. The bullets were strong, filled with purpose and the desire to kill. If not for the Kevlar looted from his slain opponent earlier, perhaps his blitzkrieg would have turned out differently. But here he was.

Jack truly was a champion blessed by the gods themselves.

The thin man was scrabbling backward. Creating distance while his friend tried to restrain Jack. That same friend’s weapons were discarded. Maybe from Jack’s shot loosening his grip. Maybe because the thin man would have been in the line of fire.

Smart. Counterpoint: Jack tensed his neck muscles to invalidate the chokehold, making it unable to fully cut off his precious air supply. Next were his back and waist muscles. They too tensed as Jack pushed himself forward, hauling the big man over his back to slam into the floor with enough brutality to crack whatever was beneath the carpet.

“AHAHAHA! DEATH IS HERE!” Jack leaned back up and screamed the words out, his very being drenched in pure ecstasy. His wounds, particularly the ones received from his most recent battle, stung in protest from his every move. But at this moment, Jack was euphoric. Adrenaline, both natural and drug-induced, raced through his veins. White powder speckled his nose, and his brain thundered at Mach 10 from the methamphetamine in his system.

Jack was invincible. Immortal. Unstoppable. He was a god. A blood god of flesh and bone.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

The screaming, bloodied madman shrugged off three more shots from Mr. Moon’s handgun like they were nothing but an irritation. One to the side of the neck, one to the right shoulder, and one scraping the throat. That was the problem with body armor and also the very reason why standard firearms training emphasized a focus on chest shots. Successfully hitting the much smaller target of the head in the heat of a high-stress situation like a firefight was an extraordinarily difficult feat, even for a marksman of Mr. Moon’s level. But, with body armor in play, the ammunition in Mr. Moon’s Sig Sauer couldn’t fully penetrate past that protection. It was a lose-lose situation unless some amount of luck came into play. Gamble for the headshot or waste bullets on the Kevlar.

The madman continued to move quickly, bloodied but very much alive. Mr. Moon’s gun was noticeably light in his hand now, a telltale sign that the magazine was empty, or nearly so. One more shot, a missed one this time, and it truly was empty. Dag was moving as well, but sluggishly after being slammed headfirst into the ground. His partner’s eyes were unfocused. The fact Dag still moved at all was a testament to his partner’s strength.

The roaring sound of gunshots echoed out from the kitchen as Mr. Moon was forced backward to avoid the slicing edges of the axe, the steel edge whistling by with millimeters to spare. However, what followed the blade was an explosion of pain. Mr. Moon’s vision went black and filled with stars as he vaguely felt himself being launched backward to collide with the wall. His lungs heaved, desperate to regather the air knocked out of them. He’d been punched. Punched hard enough to be thrown back several feet and, by the feel of it, crack several ribs. It was like the madman was wielding a sledgehammer instead of bare fists. Moreover, Mr. Moon’s hands were now empty. The Sig Sauer had been lost, flung from his grip when he was struck.

Mr. Moon surged to his feet, using the adrenaline rushing through his body to power through the weakness in his legs. Dag was back up too, his empty hands curled into boulder-like fists as he dueled with the madman, both men trading concrete-shattering blows heedless of injury or pain. At some point after punching Mr. Moon, the madman lost his axe. A second glance revealed its blade buried in the floor.  

Mr. Moon’s palm rested on the butt of his knife, but then his eyes turned to the kitchen. Ms. Miller was crouched behind the table, her revolver pointing at the grappling duo as she tried to line up a shot.

His weapon was missing, but Ms. Miller’s remained. If his Sig had little effect… Mr. Moon sprinted into the kitchen. Ms. Miller tossed over her revolver without a word, instantly understanding his goal. She knew the play. Mr. Moon was a field agent and a well-known marksman in the department. She was a communications specialist, more used to sitting behind a desk than being in the middle of a life-and-death struggle.

Mr. Moon spared a glance down at it, taking a second to observe the weapon. It fit in his palm well enough. From what he could see, three of the original six shots were already spent. Nothing appeared wrong with the sights. Iron sights, as basic as they came.

Mr. Moon’s head snapped back up to focus on the brawl in the living room. He could make that work. Dag was sent stumbling back after a mighty punch to his chest. The madman stooped down to scoop his axe off the floor, and Mr. Moon took that chance to strike. One round screamed out of the barrel of the Smith and Wesson revolver, catching the madman neatly in his torso. The madman stumbled to the side several steps, half-turning to face Mr. Moon with a bloodied, yet excited grin.

Mr. Moon’s finger squeezed the trigger again. He did not aim for the head, nor did he need to. His Sig Sauer did not possess the power to penetrate Kevlar. Nor, in all honesty, did the Smith and Wesson revolver in his hands.

However, the .44 Magnum rounds chambered in the revolver did not need to penetrate to have a worthwhile effect. Each one of the high-powered rounds that struck true would have felt like a deranged horse kicking the madman square in the chest with all its strength. They would crack bones. They would drive the breath from his body. They would rupture organs. No man, no matter how crazed or drug-addled, could fully shake that off. That was the key difference between Mr. Moon’s Sig Sauer and Ms. Miller’s Smith and Wesson Model 29.

The second shot sent the madman reeling backward – still very much alive, but unbalanced and gasping in pain. Dag capitalized on that, driving his shoulder into the madman’s body in a football-esque tackle that drove the madman into the wall with enough force to crack it. Two bone-crunching punches followed as Dag’s fists slammed into the madman’s body over and over, his opponent reciprocating each one with a blow of his own.

By now, Dag was roaring as fiercely as the madman was, though without the cackling laughter the mysterious attacker possessed. The madman’s head rushed forward to crack against Dag’s skull, sending the agent stumbling backward. Mr. Moon lined up his last shot. His eye peered down the iron sights. Nice and steady. Breath in. Hold the breath.

A marksman of lesser experience would have been tempted to switch targets to the head now that Dag was out of the way and the madman was unsteady. The head was a sure kill, something that a torso wrapped in body armor was not.

Mr. Moon was no such amateur. The sights lined up with the madman’s chest, the largest target on his body, and Mr. Moon’s index finger provided the few pounds of force needed to discharge the weapon. The madman was driven stumbling back into the wall. A half-second later Mr. Moon's view was once more obscured by the bulk of Dag, the man having drawn his knife and moved in to slash away at the madman’s stomach. The madman stopped the blade with his palm, letting the blade bite through flesh to be halted by tendons, but his smile was laced with fresh blood.

The madman was enjoying this. Every punch and every wound. Both ones received and given.

Dag abandoned the knife, clearly judging that the precious seconds it would take to free the blade would be better used to grab the madman’s head, slamming it against the wall not once, nor twice, but three times in succession to crack the wood itself. The madman grabbed Dag’s waist with both hands, heedless of the knife still stuck in one of them. He first pushed Dag away, letting loose a barrage of bone-crunching punches.

And then, with a wink, a grin, and an unspoken promise to see them again, the bald madman used the space created to rush over to the broken window and dive back out into the night, disappearing as quickly as he’d arrived.

-------

In the end it took two field agents, a communication's specialist, and the wounds accumulated from fighting Steve to drive Jack away. However, now he knows precisely where to find a really good fight. The question remains, when will Jack strike next? And what is Mark up to, sneaking in at the same time as the fight? Did he manage to free Cass and escape?

Find out next week (maybe)!

In other news, round 2 of the pokemon tournament in the discord server is going smoothly so far. It's also getting super cold outside. Some mornings heading to work I start wondering if my nuts are going to freeze off. Here's hoping for no frozen nuts.

As always, huge thanks to patreons and everyone reading this story.

The Leaf Club: https://discord.gg/jfRn8j5GaE

Peace

Chapter 24 - In Hell We Live

For once in Cass’s life, being in her father’s office at home was not a comforting feeling. The fireplace, once so warm and cozy, felt otherworldly now. Like it served another master, one more uncaring and malicious than her dad could ever be. The display on the wall above the fireplace was still empty, the hunting rifle nowhere to be seen. Her captor had made sure of that.

At her wrists, the cold metal of those damnable handcuffs bit into her skin. They were cinched just a notch too tight. Not enough to cut off circulation, but too much for Cass to try any of the tricks her dad taught her to get out of cuffs. Even if she dislocated her thumbs, there still wouldn’t be enough room for her hands to wiggle out.

That was a pity. She had the time – after being unceremoniously thrown into her dad’s office and zip-tied to a chair, the big guy had stepped back out without another word. She’d heard something being pressed against the door. Wherever Mr. Moon was, she did not know. It was just Cass, tied to the chair behind her father’s desk, hands bound behind her back. If she could get free before the agents returned…

Cass shook her head bitterly, ending that train of thought before it even got started. The handcuffs were too tight. Nor did she have the strength to break them apart. That was something Mark might barely be able to do on his best day. Not little ol’ Cass. Her legs were tightly bound to the chair as well. To get free of the zip ties she would need a free hand and a knife or scissors.

A spark flitted through her mind to restart the train of thought. Maybe if she wiggled. The handcuffs were too tight, but the zip ties? Cass could feel they had a bit of give from them. If she rubbed her skin hard enough to break it a little bit and use the blood as a lubricant, she might be able to slip through. It was worth a try. She began to struggle, straining against her plastic bonds as hard as she could.

“Cass Thomson.”

Cass’s eyes closed in response to the monotone voice coming from the door. It had been opened at some point while she was still thinking of ways to escape. A deep well of frustration bubbled up in her stomach, but Cass forced herself to keep her face calm. The man in the suit was back, a bucket and a rag in his hands.

“Let me remind you. If you try to run again, I will put a bullet in one of your kneecaps.”

Cass’s body stilled. It was over. The man walked further into the room and set the bucket on the floor. Now that it was closer, Cass could see that it was full of water, almost to the brim. Almost as if he hardly cared about her attempts despite his own words on the matter, Mr. Moon pulled a folding chair inside of the room and nodded to her politely.

“You have information that I want,” Mr. Moon began as Cass settled into her father’s chair as best as she could.

Cass continued to force her face to keep a state of blankness, much like how the man in front of her appeared.

“I’m just a nobody. I don’t matter. I don’t know anything.” Cass replied.

Mr. Moon’s hands fiddled with the rag. It was dark blue. She didn’t know why the color struck her all of a sudden. Perhaps it was because the man holding it was so utterly ordinary. The rag in his hands was at least a slight contrast to his dull black business suit. If he hadn’t killed her dad, Cass wouldn’t have given him a second look if they’d passed each other by on the street.

“You were present when the Russians raided the police station several nights ago,” Mr. Moon’s hands stilled. His eyes pierced right into hers. It was like he could see into her very soul, tearing through it in a ruthless and focused search for the truth. “That night, at that location, was also the last verified sighting of a peculiar creature. Sticklike, to the point it would be impossible for a normal human to survive. Yet the eyes are detailed, again far more than a normal human’s eyes would be. It breaths, but does not move or speak. It can be wounded, but those wounds heal soon after. Like magic.”

If this had been before her dad’s death, Mr. Moon’s words may have very well hit Cass like a sack of bricks to the stomach. However, now all she felt was a mild feeling akin to, ‘Ah, I was right. The government really is looking for that thing’.

Cass shrugged noncommittedly. The bastard wanted it? Sucks for him. That automatically meant she would be happier with the creature forever out of the man’s reach.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. Say, how about this? You uncuff me and give me my gun. Then we see how tough you are in a straight fight. I’ll give you ten paces. Or, we can play Russian roulette! I'll slip all six rounds into my revolver. You can go first.”

Mr. Moon’s empty eyes stared back at her, causing Cass to shudder. They weren’t quite to the point that she felt she was staring at a corpse, but it was close. The man, as far as she could tell, truly did not care about her, other than perhaps for the information Cass had. If she had to put it into words, it was like she barely existed in his eyes. She wasn’t even an ant. Ants existed. You saw them on the sidewalk, gazed at them for a second, and moved on with your life. She didn’t even merit that effort in Mr. Moon’s eyes. There was no argument in Cass’s mind. If she didn’t know where the alien was, she would be a lifeless corpse in that bush by now and he wouldn’t lose a second of sleep about it.

“The hard way it is.” Mr. Moon said, standing up from his folding chair. He picked up the bucket of water and walked over to her, even as Cass frantically struggled to break her bonds. Her legs moved a fraction of an inch, but she didn’t have enough space to kick the man. Then the massive bulk of Dag was there in a flash, holding her head back and steady. The rag was pressed hard against her face. The cloth was thin, with the faint yet pungent scent of oil transfused into it. The back of her mind, the part detached from it all, noted that it was probably one of the oil rags from the garage. It was something her dad would have wiped his hands on while working on his car. Sure smelled like it.

Then water poured over her face, and as it soaked through the rag, all Cass felt was a tsunami of panic and fear. She was drowning. Drowning on dry land. Ironic. Her arms fought to rise, to clear off her face, but the handcuffs kept them pinned behind her back, even as her skin was torn to ribbons from her struggles. She couldn’t breathe. Water filled her nose, her mouth, everywhere. Her lungs heaved in panic and desperation, but that only served to make it worse. Cass had no air in her body. It was all water now. Her head began to thrash around, but one massive palm was still enveloping her skull to hold it rock steady. She was going to die. Not in that bush, but here. A crushing sense of fear the likes Cass had never felt before rushed through her body with all the force of a wild freight train.

Cass was going to die in her father’s office alone drowning on dry land she couldn’t breathe she couldn’t clear her face she-

The rag was lifted away. Cass’s lungs heaved in great mouthfuls of sweet fresh air like bellows stoking the furnace of life. Tears stung her eyes as she choked and gasped.

"The alien. Where is it." Mr. Moon's voice, muffled through her sense of smothering panic, filtered into her ears like a viper's venom. Cass heaved in another breath of beautiful life-giving oxygen. She couldn’t do it again. Whatever hate she had, whatever resistance, it was smothered and drowned under the water. If she didn’t tell Mr. Moon all she knew about the alien, that rag was going back over her face. She was going to drown again.

Something inside of Cass shattered.

But then, just as she shakily began to open her mouth to give up the farm, the doorbell rang. Once, twice, then thrice in quick succession. Mr. Moon and Dag both shared a look, nodding and then running toward the door. Cass was tossed to the side, laying sideways on the ground tied to the chair like an abandoned rag as the two men rushed out of the room. Both men had their guns drawn. Vaguely, her mind noted that this was it. She could try to run again. Her wrists and legs were bleeding now. She might be able to slip out from the zip ties. If Cass was lucky, she could unlatch the window and slide out before they returned, even if she couldn’t shake off the handcuffs.

But her limbs felt heavy, like sandbags. Her lungs still burned, heaving for air and the desperation to purge the water still inside. Her breathing was rapid. Her vision flickered. Black spots coated her eyes, and the only emotion she could feel was pure panic. Cass could still feel the rag pressed against her face, even as it lay on the floor a few feet away from her, abandoned just like she was. She could still feel the water pouring over her face. It too pressed against her, filtering through the imaginary cloth with little resistance. The faint smell of oil was no longer faint. It was overpowering. It choked her. It filled her lungs, her heart, and her bones.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Cathy rang the doorbell again. And again. And again. Three rings, a few seconds of silence, then three more. Repeated. That was the signal. Three, stop, repeat. During each moment of silence, Cathy shot a look over her shoulder, searching for anyone following her. No one had left the safe house yet that she could see. Though, it really wasn’t a safe house anymore. Nothing safe about it. Just a house. The house was as quiet as a grave from where she looked.

The door opened after the second trio of rings. Mr. Moon stuck his head out, gun drawn and eyes darting around for threats before he ushered Cathy in, closing and locking the door after her.

“Report.” Mr. Moon curtly said. Dag paced around the living room. His Sig was out as well, and a shotgun was in his left hand, the butt nestled in the crook of the large man’s elbow.

Cathy flicked open the cylinder of her revolver, loading in the .44 Magnum rounds one by one while she spoke.

“The basement of the safe house was breached by an unknown intruder several minutes ago. Steve made the judgment to retreat but was attacked by the intruder and fell down the stairs. I removed what equipment I could and ran here while he bought time. Steve was most likely killed in action."

Mr. Moon took in her report without a word, only sharing a look with Dag. Then he motioned with his head toward a room further down the hallway.

“We have a prisoner with possible intel on the alien. Use your radio to call for reinforcements from the precinct. Prevent the surrounding towns from hearing it. Then give Mr. Sun a status update. We hold here until they arrive.”

Cathy snapped her revolver shut, the increased weight of the weapon settling reassuringly into her palm. She quickly walked into the kitchen, putting her purse on the table, along with the sparse radio equipment she'd salvaged from the house. The radio receiver rested in her palm, with Cathy speaking into it in a calm, unhurried tone.

“All units be advised; backup is requested at the Thomson residence. A suspect is at large, considered armed and extremely dangerous. Proceed with caution.”

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

In one hand, Mark held a sandwich. In his other hand, there was a second sandwich. One for him, one for Cass. If she was super hungry, then it would be two for Cass instead. He’d gotten a few bites in during the wake. It wouldn’t be the end of the world if his sandwich had to be sacrificed.

“Cass.” Mark whispered, drawing near to the bush he remembered his friend being nestled in. He was on the other side of the fence, keeping the white picketed barrier between him and Cass’s house.

There was no answer. Mark repeated himself, whispering as loud as he could while still keeping it a whisper. “Cass! You there? I have food.”

Still, there was no answer. Mark risked straightening up slightly, enough to get a peek over the side of the fence. As he did, his eyes widened to roughly the size of dinner plates. The bushes, were, well, mangled. Nearly destroyed. Something human-sized had crashed through, heedless of broken branches. Mark’s breath caught in his throat, and he hopped over the side of the fence. His legs landed with a muted thud on the ground. His hands shot to the dirt to steady his balance, and Mark’s eyes widened further as a strange sticky substance met his fingers.

He pulled his hands up. It was hard to see, but he was close enough to the street that the streetlights were able to provide a little bit of light. The substance was sticky. Slightly warm, and looked dark red in the dim light.

It was blood. Mark’s eyes darted around, frantically searching for Cass, for anything. But there was nothing. He was the only person, living or dead, in the bushes. He nervously wetted his lips with his tongue. The bushes were destroyed. There was blood on the ground, but no bodies or discarded weapons. Was Cass dead? Did she shoot that guy? Was her body inside the house? Or was she captured?

Mark’s heart rate quickened to a frantic pace. He shot up, vaulting back over the fence and dashing across the neighbor’s lawn. He had to get away. He had to get help. If Cass was dead, he could be next. If she was alive, he could still be next.

If Cass was dead.

A lance of despair shot through his chest at the thought. Mark halted in the middle of the neighbor’s driveway. There were no lights to be seen in the windows of the neighbor’s house. No movement. In Cass’s house, he could see some life in the windows. No people, just lights with curtains drawn. His hands were empty, the sandwiches long abandoned in the bushes out of haste and fear.

What if Cass was alive? What if she got caught?

Mark collapsed to his knees. Salty tears dripped down his cheeks, but what came from his mouth was laughter. Not joyful nor happy laughter, but more of a grim, self-pitying mirth bordering on flat-out despair.

“Look at that,” Mark cruelly sniggered, “Cass is in trouble, and I ran. What a joke.”

His sobbing laughter rose into a crescendo, uncaring for the noise he made. Then as suddenly as it started, it stopped. Mark was silent, staring at the concrete driveway. His hands pressed against the cool yet rough surface.

“I ran.” Mark’s voice was utterly devoid of emotion now. “I ran. When I called Cass after the wreck, she hopped right over to help. Even with how much crap I gave her over the breakup back in school. Because she is a good person, and I’m worthless trash.”

He sighed. Then what felt like a switch flipped in his head. Mark gritted his teeth so hard it felt like they would shatter, and then his fists rained down on the concrete, punching and battering at it until his skin split and his bones creaked. Over and over again. Specks of blood splashed against his cheeks, his knuckles popped out of place, and his skin gave way to stark white bone.

Mark's strikes slowed and then stopped. He held up his hands, watching as his flesh ever so slowly knit back together. Was it faster this time? It felt like it was healing faster. His skin itched like a thousand mosquitos were hard at work at the same time as the flesh was repairing itself.

Who cared.

"I guess this is what I always do," Mark muttered helplessly. "I run away."

“I run away.” Mark repeated.

That phrase. He repeated it for a third time. But this time, he rose to his unsteady feet. What if he didn’t this time?

Could he?

Or was he just a yellow-bellied coward to the core?

He ran from his relationship with Cass in school. He ran from college when he proved to be a failure. He ran. Like a witless, gutless coward. Like a worthless dog crawling on the ground for scraps of attention garnered from being a big fish in a tiny, miniscule pond. A frog in a well.

Cass was in trouble. She might even be dead.

Mark’s head turned to look at the Thomson residence. For once, once in what felt like a very long time, his mind was made up. He was stupid. But Mark’s fists were big, and his back was strong. If Cass was alive, he would bust down the door and get her out of there for round three with the feds. He could put his healing to the real test. Maybe he could actually be useful for once in his life.

And if Cass was dead, then it wasn’t like he had much else to live for at this point.

Mark hunched over, quieting his breathing to the utmost, and rushed toward the fence, leaping over it effortlessly to run toward the back door of the house. Quickly, quietly, and as calmly as he could considering there were professional killers with guns inside.

-----

Featuring Cass getting waterboarded and further traumatized, Mark finding some courage amid his severe crippling depression, Cathy escaping from the clutches of death, and Jack's location being currently unknown. Things are heating up!

Been playing some Age of Wonders 4 lately. Its a pretty neat Civilization clone with a swords and sorcery focus. Other than that I've just been keeping it chill. Path of Exile 2 looks somewhat interesting though. I plan on checking it out when it fully releases and I can play it for free (because I am a cheap bastard). We'll see if it holds my interest. I played the first game for a bit, beat the campaign and all, but it kind of lost me after that. I can't believe the first week of December is already over. Feels like the year is slipping by all of a sudden. Or has it always been like this and I only noticed it now? I feel like I say this every year haha.

As always, huge thanks to all of the patreons and the readers for sticking with me on this new adventure!

Peace

Chapter 23 - Counting Bodies Like Sheep

Steve held out a cautioning hand to Ms. Miller, beckoning her to stand away from the door to the basement. It could be nothing. It could be hooligans breaking into the house for fun thinking the occupants were still at the wake. Hell, it could be a raccoon. A big raccoon.

Steve eased the safety off his Sig Sauer and racked back the slide, readying the deadly weapon for immediate use. The gunmetal was a cold lump in his right hand, cold and formed into an ugly shape that could spit out chunks of lead to decide particularly deadly arguments once and for all.

His left hand ghosted forward to grasp the handle of the basement door. It opened slowly, but silently. Once that had not been the case, but mere hours after moving into this house Steve had made himself busy giving every hinge a good greasing. He’d seen men killed before over a creaky door. He was determined not to add his name to the list. Once the door was a quarter open, his hand abandoned the doorknob to flick on the light switch. It clicked, but nothing came on.

Definitely not a raccoon. The bulb was busted. No raccoon would do that. Steve moved slightly to the side so the doorframe would cover more of his body and held his Sig at the ready.

Steve shot a look toward Ms. Miller. An unspoken conversation passed between them, quickly and concisely. Someone was down there with malicious intent. His every instinct screamed for him to retreat. To make tracks for the street as fast as possible. To hell with their cover. To hell with information gathering. Their line of communication with Mr. Sun in Washington was too important to risk. Losing the equipment was unfortunate, but Ms. Miller’s life ranked higher on the priority list Mr. Moon gave him after the briefing. A fight would be too disadvantageous.

Behind him he could hear Ms. Miller darting toward her bedroom to grab what equipment she could carry. Steve’s own body turned to help, to lock the basement door shut, to give them a few precious seconds to turn tail and run. But then, what felt like a bolt of pure roaring fire pierced through his right leg. The world tilted backward. Only, after a second, Steve realized it wasn’t the world tilting, but him. His back brushed against the half-open door, pushing it fully open and then meeting air past that.

Steve’s hands windmilled as he fought to stay upright. Every second he was exposed was another second his attacker could strike again. The fire in his leg intensified. His balance failed. Steve tumbled down the stairs, his leg howling out in pain as it bounced off every step. He fought to tuck his body in, to keep his Sig Sauer clutched securely in his hands so it would not be lost or accidentally discharged. He was falling into the darkness to join whoever the hell was down there. Unless Lady Luck smiled, Steve was already a dead man walking. But a dead man could still buy enough time for Ms. Miller to warn Mr. Moon.

Then his body came to a halt at the end of the rickety wooden stairs, in the murky-black depths of the basement.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Jack’s javelin struck true, piercing the leg of the half-turned man at the top of the stairs. The man fell backward, perhaps surprised by the sudden strike taken the moment his back was turned. Jack moved in a flash. He surged to the bottom of the stairs right as the man, wearing a now-blood-flecked white collared shirt and a pair of slacks with a hole in them, tumbled to a halt.

The man reacted quickly, wrenching his gun up to point toward Jack, but by then it was too late. Jack’s foot lashed forward to knock the weapon out of the man’s hand, followed by a steady right hook to the chin. The man was flung to the side, disappearing behind the pitch-black curtains of darkness. Wherever the gun landed was unknown. The black gunmetal of the weapon blended in perfectly with the darkness of the basement.

An animalistic snarl of rage tore through the basement, but not from Jack’s lips. It was the man in the collared shirt, lunging out of the darkness with a combat knife in his hand. The man lunged, movements jerky from his wounded leg, but by now Jack had his axe ready and parried the knife to draw forth a shower of sparks. One of them landed on Jack’s face, causing a maddened smile to split across his features amid the stinging pain. Jack’s opponent had correctly judged running for the stairs was futile with that leg of his.

“Ha. Haha! AHAHA! I SHALL KILL AND EAT! AHAHAHAHA! DEATH IS HERE!”

The collared-shirt man matched Jack's bellows of joy with a wordless roar of his own. He swept his knife out, causing Jack to jerk back, then answered with an axe swing of his own. The swing bit lightly into the man’s shoulder, drawing out a thin line of blood. That was good. Good! A fine match! A fine opponent! Two men, honest men doing their utmost best to kill each other! This was what made life worth it!

Then the man’s knife darted forward. This strike sliced into Jack’s own forearm, but he hardly felt it past the adrenaline that raced through his veins like premium gas through a race car. He tightened his muscles, relishing the feeling of his own meat twisting around the smooth steel blade, trapping it beneath his skin for a split second – long enough for Jack’s steel-toed boot to lash out like a battering ram against the white-shirted man’s wounded leg. The man howled out in agony, his body shuddering violently, but he did not run from the source of his pain.

That truly was a genuine surprise to Jack. The man retreated not an inch, instead focusing every drop of his strength into wrenching the blade of his combat knife, all seven inches of wicked-sharp steel, out of Jack’s arm. Jack’s muscles trembled and then failed as the steel withdrew with a 'shlicking’ sound of blood-wetted steel drawing against living flesh. The blade could no longer be trapped in the cage of Jack’s formidable body.

Jack’s axe squealed in delight, joyfully biting into the man’s shoulder again and again and again, just as the man’s knife slid in and out of Jack’s chest, scratching against ribs and bones and tendons, beating and biting and mangling. Jack’s laughter rose to fever pitch with each strike from the axe and dagger until his mouth was flecked with bloodied foam and the man’s strikes grew ever weaker.

Finally, after the weakest stab of them all, Jack flung the man away, delighting in the crunch of bone as the collared man’s body struck a wooden support beam.

But still, the man drew himself to his feet. Whether it was through adrenaline, training, or sheer willpower, the man stood. Thus, Jack was genuinely surprised for a second time by his opponent. The combat knife shook in the man’s hand, but otherwise held firm. Jack’s teeth, bloodied and foul from his wounds, flashed in the darkness.

“AHAHA! DEATH IS HERE!” Jack screamed.

Then the man in the collared shirt let loose one last howl of fury in defiance against his death and charged. Jack sidestepped the stabbing knife, raking the blade of his axe against the man’s back as the charge went past. The man swiveled, still moving quickly despite the blood spurting from his ruined leg. The knife caught Jack in his side, but the wound was shallow. His opponent was already too weak to manage a killing blow. This effort was naught but a firework shot into the night sky. Bright, beautiful, but doomed to quickly fade away into nothingness.

Jack tossed away his axe like a bag of trash being thrown to the curb. To keep it would be to hold too great of an advantage over the enemy. This fight was far too fun for that. His fists, as sturdy and unyielding as chunks of concrete, hammered against the man’s chest, cracking ribs, bruising organs, and splitting flesh. The man struggled to withdraw his knife from Jack’s side, but Jack twisted his torso to remove it from the man’s grasp.

His hands beat at Jack’s face, at first with calculated strikes toward Jack’s eyes, but those strikes soon morphed into frantic, unfocused blows as Jack fit his hands around the man’s face and began to squeeze his thumbs into eye sockets that were the perfect shape to fit them.

The man’s eyes soon failed, popping like grapes against Jack’s power. The man screamed out again, this time not in rage, but in agony. In fear.

But for a third time, Jack was pleasantly surprised. The man’s hands had stopped beating at his face, whipping around to pluck the dagger from Jack’s side to slam into Jack’s chest, the blade of cold steel only stopping when it ran into Jack’s fifth rib.

“HA! GLORIOUS! GLORIOUS!” Jack screamed in exaltation. Truly he was blessed to find an opponent such as this! Still screaming and panting, Jack continued to grasp the sides of the man’s head, slamming it into the concrete floor again, and again, and again, until bloodied skin gave way to white bone and grey brain matter, the skull splitting like a rotten pumpkin dashed against the ground.

Jack leaned back, smiling while his barrel-like chest heaved for air and his wounds sang stinging hymns in protest of being exposed to the cool night air filtering past the broken door. A glorious battle against a nameless foe. It was a shame Jack had failed to get the man’s name. He might have remembered it for a few years.

Now, the question remained – was there another in this house, and would they provide such a battle to equal or even exceed his fallen foe? Jack hauled himself to his feet. He grabbed his discarded axe, bringing it up to his mouth and darting out his tongue to slurp up the sticky residue on the blade.

Time to continue the hunt.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Cathy could hear Steve dying in the basement. And from the sounds of it, he was putting up one hell of a fight.

Steve was as good as dead, as soon as that length of rebar pierced his leg to send him falling down below. There was nothing she could do to help. Judging by the lack of gunfire, her colleague had lost his weapon on the way down. She doubted a gun would be useful down there, anyway, considering the lights were disabled. That wouldn’t change even if she went to help. All her help would do would be to add another lifeless cadaver for Mr. Moon to discover.

The door to her room was flung wide open in reckless abandon, with Cathy rushing inside to grab whatever she could carry. She had to travel light. Doubtlessly Steve was trying to buy her as much time as possible. They both knew how important her task was. Only the heavens knew if Steve could buy enough time to make it to the house Mr. Moon had commandeered. 

Cathy’s teeth clenched so hard that a molar cracked. Other than that one reaction, she moved in a businesslike fashion – calm, efficient, and brisk. Her face was set in its usual calm, almost stoic mask. Steve was doing his job. She needed to do hers. The secure line of communication between Carlston and Washington could not be interrupted.

Nor could her control over the local radio waves be contested. Without Cathy’s ability to manage that traffic, redirecting support from the outside to essentially cut off the town from all extra variables, the job Mr. Moon and Dag had would be made extraordinarily harder. Without her working to keep information on the alien under wraps, the whole town, perhaps even the surrounding towns, would be forced into a sea of flames, for dead men could tell no tales.

First was her purse, snatched up in her hands and slung around her shoulder. Judging from the shouting coming from the basement, the revolver concealed within could be useful. Next was a portable radio set with a signal jammer, three walkie-talkies, and a notebook with various ciphers and key phrases to set up secure comms once she was safe once more.

Cathy rushed back into the hallway. By now the basement was quiet. There were no more shouts, no more maddened bouts of maniacal laughter.

Steve was most likely dead.

Heavy boots stomped up the stairs, slow and steady. Rough breathing followed, loud enough that Cathy could hear it in the hallway. She risked a glance, her body already halfway to the front door. There was no one to be seen in the doorway leading to the basement.

But whoever was climbing the stairs, it was not Steve. He would have made his presence known to her. A keyword, a specific whistle, just about anything from a short list of possibilities she had memorized off a note card on the drive to Kansas. It was a protocol that had been drilled into the bones of every field agent so as to prevent friendly fire.

Another booted footstep stomped against the wood, and Cathy made a split-second decision. While her left hand gripped the handle of the front door, already in the process of opening it, her right hand dipped into her purse, drawing her Smith & Wesson out into the air. Another footstep.

Cathy’s gun roared out in response, sending six .44 magnum slugs hurtling down the hallway toward the open basement door in a matter of seconds. Cathy hardly trusted her luck would be enough to avenge Steve. All the bullets could do was buy her more precious seconds. Her back brushed against the front door, pushing it open a few more inches and freeing up her left hand to fish around her purse for her speedloaders.

Her right hand flicked the revolver sideways to pop open the cylinder and shake out the empty cartridges to clatter against the wood floor. The sound was deafening in the silence left in the wake of her last shot.

There was a pause, and then another heavy footstep. Cathy slammed the speedloader into the revolver’s cylinder and flicked it shut, before letting her weapon roar once more. The sound was deafening in the enclosed space. Her hearing felt like it was physically twisting and muffling at the same time, a pressure building in her ears to squeeze at the fragile insides of her head.

The front door was most of the way open, her body halfway out into the night sky.

Cathy flicked open the revolver once again and slammed in her final speedloader. After the next six shots, she would have to reload the old-fashioned way, shoving the magnum cartridges in one by one in that painfully slow manner. Yet, without even waiting for another footstep, Cathy expressionlessly emptied all six shots into the general direction of the basement.

And then, she turned and fled.

------

In a flash, Steve is dead and Cathy's cover is broken. Mr. Moon's plan begins to crumble, but not all is lost. A lead has fallen into his clutches in the form of Cass, who has information on the alien. However... Jack is beginning to move openly and the remaining Russians still lurk in the shadows, waiting to strike.

In other news the pokemon gym leader challenge happening in the discord is still going well. The tournament part of it has finally started. It's pretty cool. I also finished a nuzlocke of Hoenn. It was fairly difficult and there are way too many water routes with too few of pokemon selection in them. I had to abolish the no duplicate clause in the last third of the game because of that.

As always, huge thanks to all patreons and all those sticking around to read this story!

Interested in occasional community events, or just plain ol' hanging out with a swell community? Join The Leaf Club: https://discord.gg/jfRn8j5GaE !

Peace

Chapter 22 - Midnight Danger

Cass flung herself to the side as Mr. Moon came crashing over the fence, a coarse string of swears flying from her lips as her hands scrabbled for her pistol. In the innermost parts of her mind, the sight of the agent’s gun pointing right at her face registered, but it was drowned out by the screaming wall of pure rage that occupied the rest of her head. The feeling was still as scorching hot as it had been seconds after seeing her dad’s lifeless body fall to the ground. If she was fast enough, lucky enough, angry enough, then she might still manage to unload a few rounds into his chest with the Colt.

Cass’s fingers brushed against the grip of her handgun. However, before she could even wrap the rest of her fingers around the weapon, the world exploded in a blinding flash of light and pain. Her vision went black, and then gradually returned complete with what looked like handfuls of stars floating over her eyes. Something made of cold metal was cinched tightly around her wrists, but Cass could only lay there, lungs heaving as her mind tried to process what had just happened. Her forehead felt strangely warm and wet. Something was dripping down it, but slowly.

The world moved all of a sudden – but then Cass realized it wasn’t the world moving. She was being dragged to her feet, her wobbly feet that were busy competing with her head and her hearing in the ‘Betraying Cass Olympics’. She wasn’t quite sure which one was winning, but there was certainly hot competition for the gold medal in that category.

Before her legs could finish steadying up, Cass was flung from the bushes to land with an ungainly squawk on the ground. Her head felt strained as she moved it around to look back, catching a glimpse of the thin FBI agent pushing through bushes that clawed away at his white collared shirt like they were trying to cage him up forever. Frankly, Cass’s foggy mind decided, the bushes could have the monster. They could have him until she got her head screwed back on right and found her gun.

Cass’s hands strained to rise, to grab something, anything to beat at him with, but for some reason they wouldn’t come up from behind her back. Something ice-cold was preventing them from exercising their normal range of movement. Soon enough, Cass realized why. There were handcuffs cinched tight around her wrists.

Cass began to struggle more violently than ever, cursing and shouting as her head began to pull itself out of the sticky molasses it had been in after that flash of light and pain. Her legs lashed out, catching Mr. Moon in the shin, but the man didn’t even react to the strike. He leaned down to grasp her arms where they were cuffed behind her back, and Cass fought ever harder. She could hear the door to the house being slammed open, meaning that his moving mountain of a partner was seconds away. Cass got another good kick in, this time eliciting a ‘tch’ from the otherwise expressionless Mr. Moon. It wasn’t much, but the kick created an inch or two of distance, an amount Cass immediately used to surge to her feet. If she could just get to the street-

And her vision morphed back into a flurry of stars and dark spots as something quite solid and metallic was smashed against her head for the second time in less than half a minute. Her legs went limp, like cooked spaghetti noodles being cast onto the grass, and for a few moments, she laid there on the ground, gasping to reclaim the breath that was driven from her lungs.

The world felt out of focus, almost like fragments of a dream she was observing from a safe distance instead of the reality it was. This time Cass realized the cause. She’d been struck in the head by the pistol clutched tightly in Mr. Moon’s right hand. The bottom edge of the grip still had traces of her blood dripping off it.

A muffled voice said something, but it felt like her hearing was worse than ever. Then she was hoisted to her feet, and the voice repeated itself.

“If you try to run again, I will put a bullet in one of your kneecaps.”

Those words, spoken in a purely uncaring tone as if Mr. Moon was idly commenting about the weather instead of hurting someone, were like a bucket of ice water being poured on Cass’s head. Her vision, still beset with flashing stars as it was, sharpened intensely, and the ringing in her ears subsided slightly so that the man’s voice could be heard.

Cass flicked her eyes around to get a better idea of the rapidly developing situation. She was in the sideyard, meaning she, Mr. Moon, and the steadily approaching Dag were in clear view of the street. If anyone were to drive by, they would see one of their neighbors being brutally assaulted by two out-of-town FBI agents. The sight might be enough for them to intervene, especially if she started screaming.

But then Cass’s brain registered that the streetlights were on. The world was getting darker. It was evening. Everyone would be at home by now, especially because of the recent murders. No one wanted to be out past dark with that sort of nasty business happening around town. She could scream, but that would probably be filed by Mr. Moon under the ‘running’ clause and she would eat a bullet to the kneecap.

Frankly, that was something Cass could live with if she knew the results would end in a swift death for Mr. Moon, but that was the problem – it was much too uncertain. If she actually managed to get help, what then? Mr. Moon would shoot her neighbors just like he did Cass's dad. Those kindly people she grew up around would be gone. There would be who knows how many new dead bodies littering the streets for their families to find and mourn.

And similar to how she had sent Mark away to the wake, Cass couldn’t bear that to happen. Even considering how dearly she wished for Mr. Moon’s death.

Any further thoughts were swept away as Dag’s massive hands closed around the handcuffs to lead Cass stumbling inside her house. A thin stream of blood dribbled down the side of her face to drip off the tip of her chin, but Cass ignored it.

Now, now. How the heck was she going to get out of this bind?

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Once the angry ginger in grubby superhero pajamas was transferred to his partner’s careful watch, Mr. Moon pushed his way back into the bushes to grab the hunting rifle and the handgun Cass Thomson had been in possession of a few moments before. The bolt-action rifle was a bit of an older piece, though clearly it was well cared for. The size of it matched up with the empty weapon display in Chief Thomson’s study. The gun must’ve been borrowed from there. The pistol, a Colt Trooper .357, was a service revolver commonly used by policemen all across the nation. It too was likely once her father’s, and the piece was just as well cared for as the rifle.

However, now that the action was over for the time being, several questions were gnawing away at Mr. Moon’s mind. Why was Cass Thomson here? Why was she in the bush with a rifle? The weapon was knocked away in the brief scuffle before Mr. Moon pistol-whipped her, so he couldn't be for sure what precisely it was aimed at, but the general direction was at the front porch. From that information he could assume the sights were aimed at the door.

Meaning Cass was most likely trying to assassinate either him or Dag. The motive appeared simple – Steve reported a man and a woman leaving the house the night Chief Thomson died. He could only assume the woman was Cass Thomson, and she was a witness to the Chief’s murder. Despite the overall lack of a detailed physical description, Steve did say she had a ponytail, and the woman would have needed ready access to the house. Cass Thomson fit both of those qualities. Who the man was, though, remained a mystery.

He wouldn’t know if she was that woman for certain until the interrogation was completed, but it made sense. The question was answered through basic deduction. The next question, though, and one he was far more interested in, was a bit less simple.

Did Cass Thomson take the alien from the police station on the night of the raid? Did she know where it was at this moment?

It was, in its essence, the most important question of all. If the alien could be secured, the only tasks left would be erasing the remaining witnesses and returning the creature to a secure facility in Washington.

Mr. Moon shook open the cylinder of the revolver, emptying all six cartridges into his hand to be shoved in his breast pocket, while the gun itself was temporarily tucked into his waistband. The safety on his own weapon was flicked back on, and then the Sig Sauer was securely slid back into the holster hanging under his shoulder, where it sat snugly with its grip facing outwards ready for action. Next was the hunting rifle. Mr. Moon’s hands expertly slid back the bolt to eject the unused rifle cartridge, sending it clattering away onto the driveway. Then once the bolt finished sliding back into place, Mr. Moon slid open the garage door, the rifle dangling nonchalantly in his offhand, and began to rummage around for a bucket and a rag.

------

Aaanndddd now Mr. Moon has someone with valuable intel. Any guesses on what he wants to do with that bucket and rag combo? Also, best of luck to Cass. Hopefully Mark sacks up and does something to help, otherwise she will be in for a world of not very fun times that ends with a bullet being put in her head once all the info is squeezed out of it.

What a week. This chapter has been brought to you on time (against my expectations) because I had to end up canceling my plans this weekend. This chapter is much shorter than normal because the reason behind my plans being canceled is me being sick for most of the week. I'm much better now, but my brain is still a little bit cooked. So, have a little bit of a shorter chapter because of that (sorry for blue-balling the Jack fight).

Anyways I'm just glad this dogshit week is over. Happy Thanksgiving to those who celebrate it!

Peace

Chapter 21 - Divine Madness

It felt like a mirror of her desperate escape from the police station. Everything traveled in slow motion. Moving the tiny muscles in her fingers to begin squeezing the trigger felt like she was trying to push a mountain across a football field instead.

And then it all shifted. Dag stepped forward right as Mr. Moon placed his hand on the doorknob, obscuring the smaller man from her view. Cass almost let a muffled curse fall from her lips, but she held it deep within her chest next to the breath that was keeping her body steady. She could still take the shot. The clear line of sight was gone, but she could still try. The problem was – she couldn’t see Mr. Moon anymore. Where was his head? If Cass directed her aim at the upper part of Dag’s chest, would that be around the same height?

It should be. She hadn’t moved the rifle after setting the rifle sights on Mr. Moon’s head. Unless… he was indeed in the middle of pulling the door open. There was a step up to the door – no more than an inch in height, but if his foot was on it, the height of his head would change. Moreover, Dag’s chest was broad. As broad as Mark’s, perhaps even more. She’d heard the term ‘barrel-chested’ in books before, but until now Cass hadn’t truly understood what it would be like until she saw Dag. She would have to shoot through the chest and hope Mr. Moon’s position hadn’t changed much.

A rifle bullet through the chest might not kill, but it would definitely put a guy down for a while. It would take care of Dag for sure.

But she didn’t give a hoot about the big man. This stakeout, sending Mark away, all her frustration and boiling rage was centered around one man. Mr. Moon. The man with the stupid fake name who shot her dad in the back of the head like a filthy coward. Who cared if Dag died? She wanted the thin man’s lifeblood spilling down the steps and his brains splattered across the siding of the house. Shooting Dag through the chest and hoping it hit Mr. Moon when it came out the other side, hoping that its direction and force wasn’t blunted by bone, fat, and muscle, felt foolish. Utterly foolish. Her weapon was a hunting rifle. The chance of those odds working in her favor was unlikely.

Cass’s teeth bit deep into her bottom lip to draw a steady stream of blood. It didn’t matter. She had exactly one shot before her position was revealed, so that one shot needed to be a sure chance at killing that man. It wouldn’t matter otherwise. Her finger fell away from the trigger, the digit only a few pounds of force away from launching a round of hot spitting metal at lethal speed at the agents. Eventually the men would come back out. She would wait and take her chance when that happened. Until then, she would lay in the thick and scratchy bush without moving a muscle.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Mr. Moon tossed his suit jacket onto the couch in the living room. That, and the slight drooping of his shoulders were the only signs of his exhaustion. Patrolling the town for a pair of Russians and a raving lunatic with only two federal agents plus a sparse handful of police officers sometimes felt like a Sisyphean task - futile and unending. The Russkies were laying low ever since their failed ambush. It was as expected, considering they lost two men from their already extremely limited pool of manpower.

The lunatic, whoever he was, also hadn’t shown himself since the gas station massacre. Ms. Miller hadn’t picked up any useful traffic on the radio. Likewise, her regular reports to Mr. Sun were just as dry.

Was this it? Part of him wondered if this Mexican standoff of theirs would last months. No faction knew where the alien was for sure. The Russkies lacked the manpower to deal with Mr. Moon and the police, and he couldn't find hide nor hair of them. The lunatic was a wildcard but seemingly uninterested in the prize Mr. Moon was fighting over with the Russians. Hypothetically, Cass was the key to it all. Hypothetically she either had the alien or at least knew where it was. But like the Russians, she was nowhere to be found either. She hadn’t shown up to school, none of her acquaintances knew where she was, nor had she come back to her house.

Mr. Moon rolled his shoulders, bringing up a hand to massage his muscles to relieve some of the weight of the Kevlar vest concealed under his white dress shirt. Long days and long nights with minimal personnel to work with. It was nothing new to him, as much as Mr. Moon would have preferred otherwise.

“Moon.” Dag’s sharp, yet quiet voice rumbled out behind him. Mr. Moon’s hand shot toward the holster strapped under his arm, his thumb already halfway through flicking off the strap holding his Sig Sauer in place before he finished turning to face his partner.

Dag was standing next to one of the windows in the living room that looked out to the driveway. One of his fingers was holding the curtain barely a centimeter or two away from the window, providing just enough space for an eye to peek through.

“There’s someone in the bush. Side yard, close to the front. Tip of a gun barrel. It’s not poking through. My guess is it’s aimed at the door.”

“A small person or a small gun.” Mr. Moon mused. While he spoke, his feet took him to the back door. “Keep watch.”

This was… unforeseen. A Russian? If they were going for an assassination, they were better off taking one of the houses down the street and sniping from the attic or an upper floor. Hiding in the bushes would do fine in killing him or Dag, but the survivor would have plenty of time to return fire. A sign of desperation, perhaps? The ambush at the house was already risky. Perhaps the Russians were gambling everything on taking him and Dag out. It had to be desperation. It reeked of such desperation that it bordered on amateur! It defied every move the Russians had made so far. Before this, sure they’d taken risk after risk, but nothing they’d done could be called amateur, merely bold moves within their ability to pull off. Until now.

Mr. Moon’s left hand eased the back door open as carefully as possible to reduce all noise the door could potentially make while his right hand palmed his handgun. The door silently swung open. His thumb flicked off the safety while his other hand racked back the slide to finish readying the weapon, and he began to ghost across the back lawn. His feet traveled with all the speed he could muster while the faint bits of unavoidable noise were drowned out by the warm summer breeze that whispered overhead.

Dag had said the side yard, close to the front and probably aimed at the door. That would mean the assassin was waiting for one of them to step out of the house. For a brief moment, a stray thought crossed Mr. Moon’s mind, one which wondered why a shot wasn’t taken when they’d entered the house, but it was brushed aside to be examined later.

Right now, in this very moment, there was a chance. Mr. Moon moved as silently and quickly as possible, taking care to avoid even crunching the grass with his shoes. There was a chance that he could avoid killing whoever was in the bush. It wasn’t because of mercy. The thought hadn’t even crossed his mind.

No, in this case his goal was information. A lone assassin lying in wait in the bush. A target who had a chance of knowing where the other Russians were. Capture the target, squeeze them dry, organize a strike against the rest of the Russians, and then Mr. Moon’s search would have a far more forgiving time limit. Though, on the flip side, dropping the Russian in the bush from thirty feet with his Sig would be a whole lot less complicated.

Huh. In a way, he was like the Russians – chancing a risk instead of following the safest path.

Mr. Moon drew close to the house. He pressed his shoulder up to the siding and slid another inch forward to risk a quick peek around the corner of the building. From this distance he could see the area Dag pointed out, but the angle made it impossible to see which overgrown bush held the assassin. No matter.

From what he could tell, the bushes were extremely thick all around. They pressed up against each other and the white-picket wooden fence behind them.

If he tried to slide behind the bushes, the ruckus would alert his target. It would be beyond any amount of noise that could be excused by the wind. Hopping over the fence would be quiet, but he would have to hop back over when he got close. Possible, but once he hopped back over there would be an immediate scuffle. However, sneaking up next to the bushes and walking down would be much too risky. The moment the assassin turned their attention away from the sights of their gun would be the exact moment Mr. Moon would be spotted.

Hop the fence it was. If the intent was to capture, a scuffle would happen regardless. Close quarters could help him avoid a gun battle, which would have naturally come with the risk of lethally shooting his capture target.

The fence was well-maintained, reaching just above the height of the lower part of Mr. Moon’s chest. He quickly crossed the rest of the backyard to slide up to it, his offhand grabbing the wood experimentally once he was close enough to the bushes for his body to be mostly obscured by them. It hardly flexed at all. Once he put his full weight on it, that would change, but it seemed sturdy enough that hopping over it wouldn’t cause too much in the way of wobbling. The other side of the fence was clear as day. It was only grass, no bushes to be seen. As long as he stuck the landing, it should be quiet.

Mr. Moon sent one last glance toward the sideyard. There was no movement coming from that area. No rustling of bushes, no sounds of gunfire, no shouts from Dag. His free hand clutched the top of the fence, and in one smooth movement he vaulted over the top to land in the grass on the other side. The grass rubbed against his shoes as he expertly landed, stooping low to keep his profile under the edge of the fence.

All the while, there was still no movement on the other side.

Mr. Moon silently crept toward the bushes in question. Closer. And closer. And closer. The wooden slats making up the fence were placed close enough to each other to fully obscure Mr. Moon’s view of the other side, so the second floor of the Chief’s house was his only indicator of how close he was to his target.

Twenty feet away.

Mr. Moon continued to creep closer. His gun was still held in one hand, his other hand kept free in anticipation of leaping back over the fence.

Ten feet.

The summer evening breeze brushed his neck and pushed against his dress shirt, the suit jacket having been left lying on the couch. His Kevlar vest rested heavily on his shoulders and chest. Somehow the weight felt more suffocating than it normally did, even though he usually wore it every day, even at the office. It was his ever-present shield, sufficient enough to stop most low-caliber bullets.

Five feet.

The fence still obscured his view. Mr. Moon was sure he was close, but how close? Should he risk it now or move a few more feet? He straightened up to peek over the top of the fence. The bushes were still thick enough to make it impossible for him to see the assassin, but Mr. Moon could see the windows on the first floor of the house. Behind one of the windows, a curtain quivered, signaling Dag’s watchfulness. If anything at all were to go wrong, his partner could immediately lay down covering fire.

A bird chirped overhead. Mr. Moon made up his mind. Even if he was still a few feet away from where he assumed the target was, the assassin’s gun was likely still trained on the door. It would take time for them to swing around to aim at Mr. Moon, or to drop the weapon and grab their sidearm.

In a split second, Mr. Moon grabbed the fence and leaped back over it, sacrificing every bit of stealth in favor of speed and power. The bushes loudly protested as his body crashed through them, eliciting a woman’s voice to gasp in shock. Mr. Moon’s hand yanked his Sig Sauer up to point at his target…

And for the first time since he came to this town, Mr. Moon experienced a feeling of genuine surprise. The bushes parted, revealing the form not of a Russian agent, but that of Cass Thomson.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

The garage door rumbled to a shut. Seconds later, the first few lights inside of the house flicked on.

This, and more, was what Jack could see from his super stealthy lookout on the other side of the street. He’d claimed it mere moments after the man and the women he’d tracked from the funeral home returned to their abode. It was nothing but a normal house. Basement, garage, main floor, etc.

Jack was given a brief glimpse into the garage when the couple’s van rolled inside. That too seemed ordinary. Boring, ordinary, humdrum, and mundane. Jack was sick to the stomach thinking about it. How could those people be so boring? Well, he supposed they must not be entirely boring. The woman’s voice was all over the radio directing police patrols in the area. She had to be interesting.

Jack gave a satisfied nod to no one in particular. His mind was made up. The demons at the gas station were a good warmup, so now he’d test the might of the ordinary townsfolk. The best approach would be in this case also the fun approach.

As soon as what looked to be the bedroom lights flicked on, Jack made a mad dash toward the side yard, looping around to the back yard to reveal a closed basement door. Score. A very fun approach.

A one, and a two, and Jack’s axe slammed through the puny wooden door trying to prevent his great self from entering the pitch-black confines of the basement. The noise was deafening in the twilight, but that was on purpose. The splintering of wood, the crunching of glass, it was all music to his ears. The door didn't last long – falling off its hinges backward with all the force of Jack's final titanic swing to reveal a yawning portal of inky black soup that reached into the unknown.

Movement faintly responded from the floor above. Jack grinned. That was fast. He would need to be faster. Quickly and loudly, Jack whipped out a rock from his pocket and threw it at the shadowy outline of the bare lightbulb that, when turned on, would doubtlessly illuminate the confines of his new arena. Light would be boring. It would be cheating. It would be too easy.

Jack stepped forward into the basement and stooped down to grab the fallen door. He heaved it up, muscles barely even straining until it was leaned back into place to block the exit. Now he had a chokepoint. The stairs, oh so hard to see, were about ten feet in front of him. His opponents would have to travel down them to meet him in battle.

Jack grinned and licked the edge of his axe, delighting in the taste of the blood and cold meat scraps congealed on the wicked-sharp edge of the weapon. He could faintly hear a man’s voice on the main floor. Would he come down? Or would he make Jackie-boy come to him?

The door at the top of the stairs rattled. Jack clenched his hands. His trusty yet cheerful axe lounged in his left hand. In his right, there was clutched a mighty javelin (of sharpened rebar). Whoever peered through that door would find their leg pierced with cold, true iron that would cripple them, making his target unable to run from his challenge of mortal combat. One that Jackie-boy would win, for his hearts were greater than any normal man could possess.

He was the reaper. The exterminator. The death-dealer. The harbinger of the afterlife with fangs honed through countless battles in the parking lots, swamps, and storms of Florida. Only the strong would survive, for only the strong would be worthy of facing greater trials in the future. Strength. Cunning. Rage, and joy. Those were all that mattered now.

Jack’s grin widened. This basement would be a grave which he would gleefully dance atop. It would be party time, starting in t-minus 10 seconds. And his dance partner was approaching with a loaded gun, if that faint ‘snick’ of a safety being flicked off wasn’t but a figment of his imagination.

Groovy.

-------

And things escalate by a lot. Mr. Moon comes face to face with Cass, Jack is in Steve's motherfucking basement raring for a bloodbath, and Mark is probably still off by himself dealing with his crippling depression. The Russians are who-knows-where, but things are still getting spicy. All the while, the alien is still chilling in the barn, its location unknown to all parties other than Cass and Mark.

In other news I finished the Sinnoh nuzlocke. Then I immediately started a nuzlocke in Hoenn. We'll see how it goes.

Expect a late chapter next week because I have plans on the weekend that will leave me not too much time to write. Hoping to still drop a chapter by sometime Monday. Or who knows? If the stars align I might be able to get enough time on Friday to write instead.

As always, huge thanks to the patreons and all you lovely readers.

Peace

Chapter 20 - Don't Fear the Reaper

Compared to the steadily darkening sky, the warm light leaking out from the windows and the open door of the Sothermen Funeral Home felt like there was a completely different world contained inside the building. Or was it just him?

Mark couldn’t tell anymore. It felt like everything in his world was turned upside down that night he decided to go driving. It felt like the worst mistake in his life, a feeling more bitter than even his short time in college. Both were his fault, but crashing and somehow picking up that alien in a drunken blackout haze of a state was proving to ruin not only his life, but the lives of the people he cared about far more than him getting kicked out of school.

It felt like each day was bad and then the next day would find a way to be worse. Worse and worse and worse. And now this. His old buddy Tom was putting his kid brother six feet under in a closed-casket funeral. A bright kid whose future was cut short. Was it Mark's fault? He picked up the creature. Accidentally of course, but it still happened. The alien, as Cass deduced, was probably what brought all those crazies to town.

If he had just stayed home or found another road to drive on. Maybe crashed into a tree and died for good. Sort of a ‘Boom! Lights out!’ situation. Then none of this crap would be happening. The Chief and the rest of the good men at the station would still be alive. Cass would still be happy. Tom would still have a brother.

A sharp pain on the back of his hand broke Mark out of the spiraling dark thoughts. He looked down in numb curiosity. His nails had dug deep into his own flesh, enough to draw a thin stream of blood from the broken skin. He glanced around, but no one was near enough to see. It was just him outside, other than a man and a woman smoking under a streetlight a good twenty feet away. They were busy sharing a bottle of what looked like vodka, smoking, and talking without care for whatever Mark was doing.

He looked down again. His flesh was moving. It was just a small amount of broken skin. Nothing more than a scrape, really. His nails hadn’t dug very deep. Yet his flesh was moving. The thin stream of blood halted. The pale skin knitted back together before Mark’s eyes to leave the back of his hand clear, without even the faintest of scars. There was even hair, thin to the point of nearly translucent, regrowing over it to match the hairiness of the rest of his hand.

It was impossible. Truly impossible. Even a guy as worthless and dumb as Mark knew that. The broken skin was surface level, but it would have needed a while to heal to where there would be no signs of the damage left. His broken nose took about a day to heal (which also was much faster than would be natural). Though, he supposed it would make sense for smaller wounds to heal faster. Huh. Smaller wounds heal faster. He was already getting used to treating whatever that creature did to him as normal.

What would happen if he chopped off his own arm? Would it grow back? How fast? If his nose took days, would a limb take weeks? His hands were shaking just thinking about it, but not from excitement. From fear. What did that thing do to him? Would he eventually become as catatonic as the alien seemed to be? Would he get used to the healing and then have it stop someday, maybe at the worst possible time? He survived a car crash. Could he survive a bullet?

If he climbed to the top of the tallest building in Carlston and jumped, would he die?

Mark licked his lips. They felt parched and cracked as if the burning sun was beating down on them all day without rest. He was thirsty. So, terribly thirsty. Like a man crawling through an endless scorching desert. Not for water, but for alcohol. For liquor. The nectar of life, the only thing good that had come out of his time in college. Anything to put him in a drunken haze, a state where he wouldn’t care about the past, the present, or the future. He wouldn’t care about anything. Not all the death. Not Cass, left alone in that bush while Mark the pigheaded fool went off on his own to do something pointless. Nothing. At least until the booze wore off and reality sunk back in. He should have stayed. Tom was truly glad for his company, but he should have stayed with Cass. Stupid, stupid Mark.

Part of his mind whispered to walk over to the smokers and ask for a cig. Join their conversation, feel the rush of nicotine, and put off the exhaustion weighing him down for a few more minutes. The smokers looked like a tough crowd, world-weary and experienced. A man with scarred cheeks and a woman with dull grey hair, both with grim faces drawn tight to guard against the world. Expressions like that were mimicked in the faces of all the men and women in town who were in fear for their families and in mourning for those lost to madmen.

Except for whatever grief or exhaustion he felt right now, Mark knew Cass felt worse. Same with poor Tom, or anyone else who’d lost a loved one recently. In the face of what they’d been through, he had no right to sink away into vices. He knew that. Why was it so hard to resist, then, when he knew that for sure? It felt like there was a tug-of-war game going on in his mind. He could imagine it now. The side backing his vices was roided up beyond belief, and the side backing common sense was built like stick figures.

Gravel crunched next to him and Mark cast a glance to the side, grunting an acknowledgement toward the newcomer. The tug of war in his mind stopped.

“Hey Mark. Guess you really are back in town." Ashley's tired voice greeted him. The short girl, someone he was only an acquaintance with because of her close friendship with Cass, dropped to a crouch next to him, hugging her knees to her chest.

“Ashley.” Mark replied. Offhandedly he wondered if his voice sounded as tired as hers did.

“Have you uh… seen Cass around?” Ashley’s voice faltered for a second. “She hasn’t been in school since… you know… and no one answers at her house or when I give her a ring. She wasn’t even around for her dad’s funeral. I… don’t blame her. No one does. But we’re all worried.”

Mark stared straight ahead, as if his vision could pierce through the coming twilight to gaze far into outer space. Was that where the creature had come from? Outer space? In a flying saucer, zooming to Earth to get good men killed? Did it know it drew all these crazies into a peaceful town? Or was the alien incapable of complex thought? It never seemed to move or make noises, so maybe it was? If it was… what a mockery. So much fear and death for something that can’t even think.

“Sorry. I haven’t.” Mark kept his face straight while he lied. “Our breakup was a while ago. She moved on. I did too. With her dad being… gone, she’s probably on her own trying to figure something out. Cass is good at that.”

Ashley bitterly sighed. “You still know how her brain works that well, huh? I bet she’s on her own too. Wouldn’t be surprised if she’s trying to go after whoever took the shot. I wish she'd come back. Times like this it's best to have a hug. To have friends around. Have a shoulder to cry into.” She stood, drawing to her full height. It was barely up to the midpoint of Mark’s chest. “I think my folks are about to head out. You take care, Mark, and if you see Cass, tell her Ashley’s super worried. Same with Jen. We all are. I don’t know if we can help, but if she asks, we’ll try our darned best.”

Mark silently nodded and Ashley stepped away to join her parents in their car on the other side of the street. It was getting dark. Things were winding down in the funeral home. Tom had already gone home. There was no point in lingering. He stepped back inside, grabbing a few sandwiches from a table inside. Cass would be hungry, even if she tried to deny it.

By the time he dipped back out into the evening air, the two smokers were gone, same with Ashley’s family and most everyone else. It was just him now, alone outside in another world with a handful of cold sandwiches and the sound of crickets chirping.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Cass’s breathing was regular. In, out. In, out. Rhythmic. The whining in her ears drowned out the quieter noises, like the buzzing of grasshoppers, or the crickets that would normally be acting up by now as the evening came. Even days later she was still surprised at how much damage was done to her hearing just by having guns fired in the same room without ear protection. She supposed her dad’s insistence on headgear while hunting made sense now. Would it ever go back to normal?

In, out. She could hear her breathing better than the other noises. Was it because it was happening inside her chest? Or was she just imagining the noises? In, out. Small breaths. Not large ones, nothing like the deep ones she would use to calm down in a freaky situation. Small breaths to keep her body going.

Her mind felt somehow detached from the situation. Was it boredom? She’d been sitting in the bush all day. No movement other than cars passing by. No suited scum walking up the driveway. Nothing but her breathing and a few bugs in the bush to keep her and her rifle company. In, out. It was as if she was meditating, but unwillingly. Cass’s mind screamed at her enemies to hurry up. To come back to the house they stole for a rest. Everyone had to rest eventually.

She’d taken the scope off the rifle. The bush was close enough that it would be a hindrance. Iron sights would do just fine. All Cass needed was for them to show up, get out of the car, walk up to the door, and then BANG!

It would be just like going deer hunting with her dad, but at closer quarters. The bush she was in was much closer than any deer stand her dad liked to frequent, both in distance and elevation. Deer in a suit. Deer in a suit with a gun.

It was strange, though. Beyond the infernal ringing in her eardrums, Cass could almost swear she could hear gravel crunching. But when she looked for cars or people, there were none. Was it happening in her head? Was she going crazy? Sometimes she felt crazy. Sometimes it felt like the parts of her head were swapped. It used to be the nasty part of her head, the part that told her to do mean things, was kept safely in the back, ignored. That the nicer part of her head, the same part that spurred her to help Mark when he called her scared and desperate, was at the forefront of driving her decisions.

But now it was swapped, and she barely even cared. The nasty part of her head was screaming incoherently for Mr. Moon to die and bugger the consequences. Was that crazy? Was she crazy? Maybe the gravel noises were because she was so desperate for something to happen that Cass’s mind was making stuff up. By all rights she shouldn’t have sent Mark away. It would be easier with two people, both in keeping watch and taking action.

But it was on purpose, obviously. Cass was hoping the men in black would come back before he did so when she took the shot, Mark wouldn't be caught in the crossfire. Her rifle was bolt-action, single-fire. She had a pistol, but the accuracy would be worse. Chances were once she popped Tall and Thin, Mr. Big and Bulky would fill her full of holes before her six-shooter could step in. Mark didn’t need to die too, and she knew the big lug would try to help. He would try to help and die. It could give her the window she needed to kill the second man at the cost of Mark’s death.

Cass felt callous. More so than she ever had in her life before. But she wasn't callous enough to do that. Mark had his own problems, even she could see that, but those problems were fixable. Hers, though, no one could bring her dad back. Mark would be better off at the wake helping old friends grieve. And who knows? Maybe he could get some useful info. Unlikely. Then again, aliens existing was also unlikely, yet here she was.

She looked around again. No one was here. The streets were empty. The neighbors were all inside or at the wake. The sound of crunching gravel was in her head. It wasn’t real. Cass breathed in and breathed out, massaging her forehead with her hands. She sat her cheek against the rifle, giving into the buzzing in her ears and her rhythmic breathing.

In.

Out.

Cass’s eyes shot wide open. The gravel may have been a nothingburger, but the sound of a car engine shutting off wasn’t. A glance at the driveway showed that hateful man’s car – a Buick Regal T-Type car. Boring and painted an unremarkable black, quite unlike the beautiful blue of her own Rambler. There. The car doors creaked open and the gravel crunched for real now. The barrel of her rifle was still trained on the door to her house, no sense in swinging it around hastily. She could wait.

Mr. Moon stepped out of the vehicle first, followed by the big guy, Dag, heaving himself out of the passenger’s seat on the other side. Even from her bush, Cass could sense their exhaustion. It was an emotion hiding under a more professional mask, but such obstacles couldn’t hide their true faces from her for long. She could see it in the form of their shoulders slumping ever-so-slightly, how Dag's tie hung crookedly from his shirt collar, and in the way Mr. Moon used a hand to massage the back of his neck for a few sparce moments.  

The black-suited pair stepped away from the car. Cass rested her cheek back on the stock of her rifle so that her eye could stare down the iron sights to point right toward the door. As soon as Mr. Moon touched the handle, she could shoot. The conditions would be perfect for that. Then the trick would be dealing with the big guy.

Cass smirked, but the motion was filled with a simple sense of helplessness instead of any sort of malice. The trick, huh? It wouldn’t matter. After her first shot landed, she’d probably be dead so long as the big guy stood and fought instead of running for the hills. Her only advantage was surprise. Once that was gone, she was gone.

Mr. Moon crossed the driveway, with Dag dogging his footsteps. Cass’s index finger inched toward the trigger. Her thumb flicked the safety off. It wouldn’t take much at all. Just a simple squeeze of a trigger. Five pounds, maybe six pounds of force. That would be all the pressure she needed to put on the trigger to fire the weapon. The man stepped on the porch. Cass took a breath and held it deep in her chest to steady her body.

Seconds that felt like hours passed. A breeze slipped through the branches of the bush to pound on her skin. A tiny bit of hair escaped from her tight ponytail to dance across her vision. A bead of sweat fell down the bridge of her nose. Her held breath felt like a heavy, aching ball in the bottommost depths of her stomach.

Mr. Moon neared the door and Cass’s finger began to put pressure on the trigger.

After this, none of it would matter.

------

Watch as Cass steadily goes insane camping in a bush with a sniper rifle like a seasoned COD player while Mark continues his path to achieving crippling depression. Tune in next time to see if they ever discover healthy coping mechanisms or if they're all plain fucked and will never find true happiness again unless it's at the bottom of a bottle!

In other news I've continued to mess around with pokermans. Been trying to do a nuzlocke in Pokemmo in the Sinnoh region. Never done a nuz before so it's pretty interesting. I am really, really good at making reckless decisions that tend to end in a teamwipe. I've already had to restart like 3 times, maybe 4. Idk it's starting to blend together.

Don't think I have anything else to say this week so as usual huge thanks to the patreons and all you lovely readers.

Peace

Chapter 19 - Never Meant to Belong

Life Celebration for Those Threads Cut Short

7:00 p.m., Tuesday

Sothermen Funeral Home

All Are Welcome

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Steve finished wrapping the coal-black tie around his neck, absentmindedly watching Ms. Miller pull a tray of gooey chocolate chip cookies out from the oven. The motions his hands went through were automatic at this point. It was a benefit brought forth by years of office work and supervisors who expected to see a suit and tie every day. Unfold the shirt collar. Drape the tie around the neck. Place the wide end of the tie over the narrow end. Cross the wide end under the narrow end. Repeat, keeping the loop loose, then push the wide end through the loop and tighten. Finally, fold the shirt collar down and shrug on the suit jacket.

Did Cathy follow the same mechanical motions in baking those cookies? She seemed rather used to it. Was it the barest glimpse of a different life? Steve looked down, adjusting the cuffs of his shirt. Everyone on the team had a different life somewhere. Steve was no different. Hell, it was why they were all here. Even Mr. Moon, with how calm and almost empty the man appeared, had a reason other than ‘Mr. Sun told him to do it’. Well, to be fair, Mr. Sun’s orders were a pretty damn good reason to do something, but this mission was different.

It was risky. It was one of those tasks you needed extra motivation for. It was why Mr. Sun came to him. He assumed it was the same for Ms. Miller, Dag, and even Mr. Moon. They all had something – no, someone in their lives that required the Nirvana Project to get back on track.

Steve’s fingers unconsciously tightened around his cuffs, but within half a second his appearance was mastered, slipping from serious back to his usual easygoing self.

It was why he hadn’t spared a second thought about that policeman Mr. Moon had to pop. Or those kids at the gas station that got wrapped up in their little shadow war. Or any of it at all. Not a single thought, aside from what those factors could mean to the mission. None of it mattered as long as the Nirvana Project could continue. It was why they were all there. It was why Steve was putting on his black tie best, Cathy was baking cookies, and the van was warming up in the garage.

Everything had a purpose. This ‘life celebration’, or whatever the townsfolk wanted to call it, was just the same. It was a perfect way for them to sink deeper into the fold, to increase their acceptance in the town, thus also increasing their ability to discreetly gather information from those who would think speaking to an FBI agent was too intimidating, but would have few qualms in spilling the beans to a fellow neighbor after a long night of copious drinking.

It would help hide their communication center and ensure there were no questions asked if Steve had to suddenly dip out of town to discreetly pick up a shiny new gun for Mr. Moon. Why would they ask questions, of course? Steve and Cathy were one of them. They were folk of the town.

Steve's hand darted forward, catching one of the still-cooling cookies off the tray Mr. Miller had just placed on the counter. Her hand slapped him away, but it was too late. The cookie was in his grasp and then sliding down his gullet.

“Dang.” Steve roguishly grinned, “Them’s some fine cookies.”

“They’re for the wake.” Ms. Miller replied in irritation. “Don’t take any more. I don’t have time to bake extras and buying some from the store would be an insult. These are the kind of people to notice that detail.”

The woman held Steve’s sheepish eyes for a moment longer before turning away toward her bedroom, muttering something about getting changed. Steve took a step toward the tray of cookies, but regretfully sighed, shoving his hands deep into his pockets.

“They taste just like Janna’s. Coincidence, or is this the same recipe?” Steve muttered to himself. His voice was low, low enough that it couldn’t be heard more than a few feet away.

Steve sighed. Gooey, super chocolatey, and with enough butter added that he could practically taste it in the final product.  It was nostalgic. For the briefest moment, he could almost see a different kitchen in front of his eyes. Copious bright baby blues dotted the walls, breaking up the rest of the paint colors so that no part of the kitchen wall could ever even be slightly considered dull or boring. A beautiful and familiar woman, the apple of his eye, spinning around the kitchen in a cheerful bustle, slid a tray of cookies onto the counter to cool before offering her hand to him for a dance. Jazz music played on the radio and rays of sunlight streamed through the windows. It was… wonderful. Truly.

“Come on, dahling! Let’s dance the day away!”

A grin spread across Steve’s face. And then he blinked, and the illusion was shattered. The kitchen returned to its regular dull white. Janna was gone. There was no music playing. The grin settled from an honest one into more of a mocking expression. Steve let out a chuckle and moved over to the cabinet, grabbing one of the empty plastic containers inside to put the cookies in once they were done cooling.

He glanced at his watch. Twenty minutes until the wake, or the life celebration, or whatever they wanted to call it. They would probably make it in time.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

The first car passing by gave her a nugget of hope. Was it him? It rolled on past the driveway. No. It wasn’t Mr. Moon. Nor was the second or the third. The fourth car passed the bush Cass was crouching behind. It wasn't his car either. The white-picket fence behind her dug into her back, and the branches of the bush dug into her sides. The bushes were thick, a whole row of them resting against the fence that separated her yard from the neighbor’s yard. Enough to easily obscure Cass’s slim form. They were originally meant as another way to increase privacy, with the denseness of the bushes and the fence itself combining to make it rather difficult to see through.

Cass waited for hours. Hours that bled into the entire freaking day. There wasn't much room behind the bush. When the time came, she would need to settle into an awkward angle lying down on her side to be able to see down the scope of her hunting rifle. It was… extremely inconvenient and may even have an effect on her accuracy, but given the distance between the bush and the front door was around fifty feet, hopefully that wouldn’t matter. Her options were slim otherwise. Maybe she could try and rest the barrel a bit higher, on one of the thicker branches of the bushes? That way she could shoot while crouching.

Her car was safely tucked out of sight in Bill’s garage. It hadn’t taken her much to convince him – simply stating bluntly that she intended to seek revenge for her father’s death, and needed her car out of sight for a bit did the trick. The old man seemed almost… impressed, perhaps respecting that she was following this path, instead of trying to talk her out of it like most of the other adults in the town probably would have.

Mark’s bulky frame made the next bush over shudder lightly as he shifted his position yet again. Cass shot an annoyed glare over to him. Words weren’t needed to communicate that he really needed to stop doing that. A glare did just fine.

“I’m… I think they’re gonna be a while. Probably out on patrol with the rest of the cops.” Mark eventually said in hushed tones. “Bill mentioned a wake today, why don’t we go and get some more info there? Plus, one of them at the gas station was the kid brother of an old friend of mine. I should… go. Make sure he has a friend to talk to.”

Her hands tightened around the stock of her rifle. They tightened to the point that the smoothly polished wood creaked in protest. Bill had mentioned the massacre earlier, but she hadn’t paid much attention. Her focus had been on Mr. Moon. It still was. But then Mark found the flier for the wake stapled to a telephone pole down the street. He didn’t need long to bring Cass up to speed on the whole event.

Cass didn’t intend to go. She had work to do and if it wasn’t done, she wasn’t sure if she could keep going.

That didn’t change how she felt when she saw the developed photos that went along with the flier. Some of them were kids she’d known. Kids she’d babysat for in the past when they were much younger. Now they were dead, the same as her father. The only difference was her father was shot in the back by a man he trusted, while those kids were butchered by some mad assailant when they were fooling around late at night, just like kids their age usually did. Kids she knew. People she knew. She’d watched them grow up.

Now they were gone. Just like that. It was nice to have company, but Mark had a point. At this rate she was looking at spending the full night in the bush. Cass wasn’t even sure if the night would be enough. It could be days before the scumbags came back.

“Yeah.” Cass sighed. “I’ll stay here. Give their parents my love and tell them I’m sorry I can’t make it. Brian’s that friend of yours, right? His little brother was a good kid.”

Mark stood, his body creaking in protest over the movement after crouching behind a bush for so long. “He was.” He looked around and sighed, just as Cass had earlier. “He was.”

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

The flier for the ‘Life Celebration’ was gripped in meaty hands almost the size of trash can lids. Hands that flexed in, and out, and in again. Crinkle the paper. Smooth it out. Crinkle it. Smooth it.

Jack smoothed it out one last time and placed it flat on the roof. His bloodstained hands dipped into his pockets, pulling out a plastic bag full of white powder. He opened it and shook a liberal amount out onto the smoothed-out flier, before pressing his nose against the small mound and inhaling it all. The rest of the powder in the bag went into his mouth, as did the plastic bag itself as a nice little chaser. With a few crunches, his teeth shredded through it all and it disappeared down his throat. Jack let out a satisfied sigh. Somehow, he felt even sharper than before.

Lying flat, he inched his body out to the very edge of the roof of the Sothermen Funeral Home. Below him the open windows let rays of warm light and heavy conversation escape from the building. He hung his head off the side of the roof to get his ears closer to the open windows while still keeping his head out of sight. He wasn’t sure why he’d decided to attend (if hanging out on top of the roof equaled attending, of course. Who could say? That was in the realm of the Greek philosophers of old.), but it had seemed like a good idea when the flier had first been blown into his legs by the fickle winds of the world.

Jack could remember it as if it were yesterday. Mainly, because it was yesterday when he’d seen the flier. A life celebration thrown like a party to celebrate his achievements in ridding this tiny-ass town of its population of shadow demons. And also that one clerk who tried to interfere in honorable mutual combat. Shame on him.

“-thanks, I’m glad you like the cookies, Sherry!”

Jack blinked.

What?

He scooted closer to the edge, lowering his head to nearly be flush with the top of the window. What? That woman’s voice… it was familiar.

“Yes, they were delicious. Tom… would have loved them. He would have stayed right next to the whole batch and snuck bites all night. No leftovers with a boy like that! But… now…”

No, not that voice. Not the weepy weepy super sad voice that wouldn't shut up to let him listen. Jack made a mental note to track down that… Sherry? Yeah. He was pretty sure the weepy lady's name was Sherry. To track down that Sherry later and tear her jaw off so she would shut up and stop being a weepy-weepy stupid face.

But the other voice. Jack waited patiently like a hunter in a bush watching for prey. Except Jack was on a roof and he was listening instead of watching.

“How about this, I’ll make some more when we get home. Then when we’re done, Steve and I can bring them over and we can talk all about Tom. It’s okay. Lean into my shoulder and let it all out. Tears aren’t something to be ashamed of. There you go, Sherry.”

There. The crying reached a fever pitch but the woman’s voice (not the weepy lady, the other one) was still understandable enough.

A grin spread across Jack’s face. A feral one stained red with the blood of worthy demons whose strength was added to his own. That woman’s voice was familiar.

The last time he’d heard it was over the radio.

“Wattson… the game is afoot,” He muttered. For Jack was a good boy and had been rewarded with the sight of the police’s radio operator. Kill her and the hunt in this town would become far more interesting, filled with prey scattered and disorganized after their communication lines were cut.

------

This chapter has been brought to you courtesy of grammarly, which has succeeded in supremely irritating me by including zero options that could let me turn premium (paid) suggestions off so they stop clogging up my fucking editing feed. Fuck you grammarly eat my ass. I'm switching sites. Literally don't give a shit about any of your worthless options other than the spellcheck/grammar check.

Rant over. This chapter has also been brought to you by daylight savings time fucking with Leaves's sleep schedule. It isn't really causing any issues for me per say, I just forgot about it so I'm awake pretty fucking early, thus chappie time is early today.

In other news, I've been continuing to plan for the frog sequel. It's pretty fun. Hoping to write up a mock chapter or two soonish (with how I move, maybe in a month or two) to get a feel for how things might go. Uh don't expect to actually see anything on it until I actually start releasing tho. But if I am uncharacteristically fast in doing this I'll let ya'll know.

I also finished my Ghibli movie marathon. There's a few I haven't watched yet but they don't look too interesting so I am saving them for a night in which I am extremely bored and have lots of booze with me. Ending ranking is: Castle in the Sky is the best, followed by From Up on Poppy Hill, Spirited Away, and The Secret World of Arrietty. My Neighbor Totoro was pretty good, same with Princess Mononoke. Kiki's Delivery Service was meh but the soundtrack was amazing and I was fucking wasted when I watched that one, so it got a few extra points than it would have if I was sober. Howl's Moving Castle had great music but I just couldn't get into the plot. Probably would be ranked higher if I was as drunk as I was when I watched Kiki's. The Wind Rises gave me crippling depression for the night. Porco Rosso was alright. Only Yesterday was terrifying with how the smiles were animated on the characters. Easily the worst one. Whisper of the Heart was alright but largely forgettable.

Anyways I understand if ya'll lynch me for calling Kiki's Delivery Service meh. As always, huge thanks to patreons and readers alike. Until next weekend!

Peace

Chapter 18 - Dispossession

Mr. Moon slipped the gloves off his hands, pulling himself from a crouch to his full height to observe the new arrivals on the scene. His gloves, still dyed rust-red with dried blood from his investigation, were placed on top of the nearby gas pump for later use. People were still swarming the station. The remains of the town’s police force, a handful of firefighters called in to assist until paramedics from the next town over could arrive… and the parents of the slain teenagers.

Dag was with them now, prying all the information he could from them while Mr. Moon conducted ad-hoc examinations of the corpses. He was unsure if any useful information could be gathered from either source, but they had to try. The bodies told some sort of a story, and the parents might know a scarce handful of details that could be teased from their mouths in between their understandable grief. Anything could help. Times, habits, acquaintances, etc.

It was nasty business all around. As described by the first men on the scene, each body was utterly brutalized in an unsettling display of animalistic savagery. Yet, in Mr. Moon’s eyes, there was a method to the assailant’s madness. The blows appeared savage, yes, but they all told a story. One blow to mangle the body, while all subsequent wounds were lethal – a killer that enjoyed hurting at first before finishing the target off.

The most mangled of the corpses sported an axe wound in the shoulder, another in the chest, and some kind of heavy blunt strike to the ribs – strong enough to crush straight through the bone to flatten the organs within.

Judging from the blood liberally splattered close to the gas pump, Mr. Moon had to assume this teen was close to the attacker. The axe struck, but caught the shoulder instead of somewhere that would be an immediate killing blow. Both wounds after that were kill-shots. Frankly, if he had to guess, the teen was likely dead after the second strike. The rib strike was done after death.

The second subject sported a handful of broken fingers. This teen was the one strangled with the rubber gas hose. His windpipe was crushed flat, and there was bruising on the few unbroken fingers that spoke of an attempt to pull the hose away for one last gasping breath. Clearly the assailant had the advantage in physical strength to prevent that.

Next was the teen with the broken spine. The boy’s body was shaped in a nearly perfect right angle. Through tears in the back of his shirt, Mr. Moon could see flecks of white bone sticking out through torn skin. It was vertebrae, broken and mangled from the force that had broken the boy’s back. His head was crushed, deformed in the shape of a shoe. The attacker had stomped on his head hard enough to crush the bone itself. That wasn't an easy feat to do. Skulls were built to be naturally strong to best protect the brain.

The final corpse on the asphalt was similar to the first. One axe wound to the shoulder, proving not immediately lethal, yet highly damaging. Then followed by a kill-strike to the skull. After that was the clerk inside of the gas station. Judging from the broken window next to the cash register that looked to the outside of the station, the clerk had spotted the altercation, attempted to phone the police, and received a metal pipe thrown like a javelin through his chest for his troubles. In contrast to the dead teens outside, his death was instant. No sadistic first strike that served only to wound for this man, just one shot that got right down to business.

However, there was one final observation left, one that interested Mr. Moon the most: the hearts of two out of the four dead teens were missing. In their place were gaping chest wounds and ribs that appeared to be cut through by a particularly sharp knife or saw. The teen with the broken fingers and the one with the broken back both had chests hewed through like that. Judging from how clean the wounds were, they were likely made after the time of death. There were no jagged edges or other marks around the wounds that could have told the story of one last desperate struggle.

Why were the hearts missing? There was no point. The boys were already dead. Could it be the mark of a serial killer? It was right out of a serial killer’s playbook to take trophies. But if that was the case, why not take the hearts of all four, or five if the clerk was included? Had the attacker been disturbed after taking the first two? It couldn’t be one of the townsfolk. If it had, the report would have come sooner or there would have been an additional corpse at the gas station. Nor did he believe the Russians could have stumbled upon the scene. At the time of the murders, they would have likely still been licking their wounds. Could he be wrong about that? Could the Russians still be on the move, been spotted by the killer, and interrupted the process?

Unless… Mr. Moon’s eyes narrowed, flicking between the two missing their hearts. The bruises on the strangled one’s fingers told a story of resisting death. But the broken back? Hard to say, other than it was different in the aspect that the body possessed no axe wounds. The head was likely crushed to provide a killing blow after the spine was broken. Not like it changed much. The shock from a broken back likely would have killed the boy in the end. The only difference would be the time it would take.

Mr. Moon began to pace, going from one body to the next. The grief-soaked conversations between Dag and the parents faded to a dull hum in the back of his mind. As did the voices of the officers keeping the townsfolk from crossing the police tape. Such was the strength of Mr. Moon’s focus.

It was a stretch. But, other than the clerk (who had been swiftly killed to stop him from calling the police), the two missing their hearts had comparatively different deaths than the others. Broken fingers and then strangulation for the first. Snapped spine into death via crushed head for the second. Compare that to the other two – axe to the shoulder, axe to the chest for the first, axe to the shoulder, axe to the skull for the second.

Neither of the two missing their hearts had axe wounds on any part of their body. Were they considered more ‘worthy’ than the others? If so, how was ‘worth’ determined? Fighting back? Running? He had too few clues and no witnesses. If it were any other time, it would have been fine, but this was happening in the middle of his mission to get the Nirvana Project back on track. As if his job couldn’t get any more complicated.

Mr. Moon shook his head, clamping his eyes shut before yanking them open again. He was reading too much into this. The missing hearts told the same story as all the other wounds – the story of a sadistic lunatic who killed for pleasure. There could be a story there that offered a window into the killer’s mind. Or there could not.

The steady footsteps of Dag approaching told Mr. Moon that they’d gathered all the information they could here.

“Anything?” Mr. Moon asked. Dag held up a small notebook, the item dwarfed in his massive hands.

“Local school kids. They liked to hang out here. Bust some streetlights, stay up late, usual hooligan stuff.” Dag replied. “Wrong place, wrong time is my guess for all this. You?”

Mr. Moon looked at the cluster of hysterical parents on the other side of the police tape.

“Hard to say. Meet you at the car?”

Dag nodded and the men parted ways, Dag heading for the card while Mr. Moon grabbed his gloves and walked over to the parents. He could tell just by a glance that they were seconds away from swarming over the tape to be at the sides of their children.

He could understand that. The heart-wrenching feeling of being a parent unable to do anything to save their child from harm. The hysterical fear one felt when looking at the unmoving body of a son or daughter, wondering if something, anything could have been done to stop this. What felt like a blanket of grief smothering all other feelings until nothing but a dull, empty ache remained.

“Let them in, help them take the bodies to the funeral home. I’ve seen all I need to see. Debrief at the Thomson house after this." Mr. Moon leaned over and muttered to Paul, who nodded and lifted the police tape for the parents to duck under. It was like a dam being broken in the middle of the rainy season. A flood of parents, more than just the ones with fallen children, rushed into the area toward the bodies.

Mr. Moon looked at the sight one last time before he turned to head back to the car. A bloody night made real by the sun’s rays. Another killer set loose in a town already balanced on a precipice around a war hardly anyone could fully see.

As he walked, Mr. Moon’s hand absentmindedly slipped into his pocket and pulled out his wallet to unfold. His eyes glanced down, but just for the barest of moments. Then the wallet was folded up and slid back away, concealed once more.

A few feet away his car had rumbled to a start. The noise was loud, but not loud enough to fully drown out the cries belonging to the parents of the four fallen teens behind him.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

It was still her house. The place Cass grew up at. Her dad had bought it nigh on twenty years ago before she was born. It had the same corners. She could see the same cracks in the driveway that the same weeds grew through. Her father always meant to seal those up. Never got around to it, though. Life always found ways to interrupt.

Why did the house look so alien to her eyes now, when it was only a block away? Was it still even her house anymore? Or was it now a clump of wood, cement, and nails with some paint slapped on the outside, ready for another family to move in?

“-bloodthirsty murderers, the lot of them. If it weren’t for those boys from the FBI and our own lawmen riskin’ life and limb to drive them away, I reckon this town would be facin’ dire straits. Well, more dire than it is already, I reckon.”

Cass turned her attention back to Bill, who was stroking his neat silver beard with hands dotted with liver spots, hands made tanned and strong by hard work under the hot sun. A neighbor of hers who had lived in the town for his whole life, the elderly man was always more than happy to stop in his yard for a chat.

Normally it would be a quick exchange of words before Cass went to school, but this time she had a purpose of far greater importance – information gathering. The fact was that she truly had no idea where those two murdering scumbags were staying. Cass had seen them at her house plenty of times, and Bill mentioned they were constantly on the move doing stakeout duty with the rest of the officers.

Her first thought was they were sleeping at the station. There were cots in the breakroom and guns in the armory. Of course it was only a thought. She’d need to ask around or do some stakeout to confirm it. Thus, good ol' Bill. If they were staying somewhere, gossipy Bill would probably know. Not like she blamed him. The small-town life was nice, but sometimes there wasn't much to do other than gossip away.

The other reason to stop and chat with Bill was to gauge the perception the town had of Mr. Moon and Dag. Could she tell everyone she met the truth?

With how Bill talked about those men, evidently not. Certainly, there would be some who might believe her. But for the most part it would be the words of a high school girl against those of two government agents. More than that, Mr. Moon and Dag had already killed two of the maniacs who attacked the station, earning them respect and trust in the eyes of the town. They were seen as men who could get the job done and avenge the Chief. Even if most knew Cass, that was a tough gap to bridge.

Even if she screamed the truth from the rooftops, all it would probably do was spread confusion, confusion that would turn Mr. Moon's eyes on her and make it easier for those men from the station to murder more people before they were stopped.

"Yeah I tell ya," Bill continued to chatter on, oblivious to how Cass carefully steeled her face to obscure her obvious hatred for the agents, "That tall and thin feller has a strange name, but he sure is handy with a rifle. Went right up in Ted's attic, as cool as a cucumber, and dropped one of them Russkies that was taking potshots at our boys in blue. Then the big guy, that Dag feller, busted right through that front door like it was at a football game! Then bam bam, another Russkie dead on the ground! I tell ya. Two lawmen with steady hands taking down the bad guys guns a ‘blazing. If it weren't for all the good men that've died lately, I'd call this something straight out of the movies. Now it’s just a bloody mess that we all hope gets finished soon.”

“And… the gas station?” Mark prodded, the only indicator of his nervousness being how his shoes scraped at the grass. Bill fell silent for a moment, his head slightly bowed.

“Aye.” He said in a disheartened voice. “Those poor kids. I tell ya, I ain’t letting my boys go out after dark until this is all over. My heart goes out to Cindy and the rest, having to bury their sons. No parent should have to do that. They can’t even do an open-casket funeral. It ain’t right.”

Then Bill’s eyes came up to meet Cass’s, blazing with righteous indignation. “Cass, don’t make no mistake! Your da, them kids, the fallen officers, they’re all gonna get justice! The feds are hot on the trail of those Russkies. Soon they’ll be in jail or dead. Of course, if I sees them…” The man’s words were cut off by an angry growl as he clenched and unclenched his hands, “Ohhh, I oiled up ol’ Bessie last night just in case. She still shoots straight and true. If I sees them, Bessie’s gonna roar louder than she ever roared at Charlie back in ‘Nam.”

Cass nodded solemnly. In that, she and Bill were of the same opinion. She placed a hand on the old man’s shoulder. Here was the kicker. Straight face, steady tone, don’t give Bill a reason to be suspicious. This is nothing but a simple question from a well-meaning gal hoping to help out.

“And if I see anything important, where can I find this ‘Mr. Moon’?”

Bill softly grinned.

“Even after what you’ve gone through, you still have the fire in you to do good. Your da really did raise a fine daughter. No one’s in the precinct right now. It’s a building full of ghosts. Heard Paul saying it’s not defensible enough, with half the doors and windows still broken. I think that Mr. Moon's been using your da's office as a home base since there are a lot of files on the town in there. He can get his thumb on the pulse of the town while sticking in a place that two armed men can reasonably defend."

Cass’s hands nearly tightened into clenched fists before she got ahold of herself, reducing the movement to a mere tremor of her hands. Bill's and Mark's voices both faded to a dull hum only present in the very back of her mind.

Those bastards. Those unforgivable worthless sewer rats. First they shoot her dad in the back, and now they steal his house. No, actually, that was okay. She knew that house, backyard, front yard, side yards, and inside like the back of her own hand. It was going to be okay. Those rats would defile the house a bit, but the advantage gained by knowing the layout would help her run a rather lethal version of pest control.

She took a few imperceptible breaths in and out to steady herself before thanking Bill for his time and turning away to go back to her car. She had a bush to find. Something big enough to hide her body while being in the view of the house. Preferably where she could see a window. Or the front door. Then it would be like she was hunting with Dad again. Stare down the scope. Still your breath. Wait. Wait. Wait for the perfect moment. Wait for the deer to stop. Then BAM!

Already, in her mind’s eye, she could see it. The bullet from her dad’s hunting rifle piercing right through the suited scumbag’s brain as he steps outside for a breath of fresh air.

Perfect. Karma.

--------

Phew the town gets crazier and crazier. Jack is fully unleashed and Cass builds up her plan to get some fucking revenge served nice and hot.

Another week passes. It's starting to get colder outside now. Been watching more Ghibli movies, it's been pretty fun. So far my ranking still places Castle in the Sky at the top, but Spirited Away is tying with From Up On Poppy Hill for my second favorite. Princess Mononoke was pretty darn good too, same with Totoro. Kiki's Delivery Service was pretty decent. The music and animation was amazing, the story less so. Just didn't really land for me. Howl's Moving Castle was also pretty nice. Good music, good animation, but like Kiki's the plot didn't fully hit home for me. Looking forward to seeing more this upcoming week as I travel through the Ghibli catalogue.

Anyways that's all folks. Huge cheers to patreons and all you lovely readers.

Peace

Chapter 17 - Snow in Summer

Five in the morning. That was when Mr. Moon got the call. It wasn’t a notice from Ms. Miller, but rather a panicked radio message from Paul, the temporary chief of police. The man had hardly been thrilled about the sudden promotion – a feeling that Mr. Moon could understand. In the frantic hours after the Russian ambush had been foiled, the two FBI agents revealed the grizzly assassination in the Chief’s own house, a terrible event that had happened mere minutes before Paul called for backup.

A Russian sniper, taking advantage of the chaos on the other side of town to eliminate the Chief and therefore throwing the department into a worse state of chaos than it already was. It was fortunate that Mr. Moon and Dag had been on the scene to provide stability, chase off the sniper, and back up the rest of the precinct.

Or at least, that was the official story. Other than Mr. Moon’s team, Cass Thomson, and her mystery friend, none knew the truth. Paul believed the story. Why wouldn’t he? It fit. The Russkies already had a sniper present at the ambush. If they had one, they very well could have two.

In addition, Mr. Moon had also prepared the scene before the murder was revealed. The bullet from his Sig Sauer, the very same one that passed through the back of the Chief's head, torn through his brains, passed through the front, and drilled into a kitchen cabinet, was found and meticulously pried from the wood to be dropped into a pocket and forgotten. In its place was a used rifle round from a previous battlefield. However, perhaps replacing the round was unnecessary. Paul hadn't thought of checking it.

Thus, Paul, as the most senior officer left on the force, was inducted as the temporary Chief. A temporary Chief with drastically limited resources and a promise of backup that would never come, courtesy of Ms. Miller’s hard work intercepting and directing the local radio traffic. Mr. Moon’s investigation concluded swiftly. The Russians were the only people who were suspected in the matter of the old Chief's death, with the proper time and motive being quite blatantly obvious. Paul went home, Mr. Moon and Dag settled in for a long overnight stakeout of the Thomson residence from their car, parked a block away, and the night slipped on by.

Until five in the morning.

Mr. Moon sat bolt upright, the handheld radio placed on the car’s dashboard between him and Dag so that both men could hear it. Five dead at the gas station. A store clerk and a group of young teenagers, all of them brutalized in a display of animalistic savagery that left Paul’s voice shaking over the radio just describing it. The estimated time of death was somewhere between ten and midnight of last night. Meaning it happened after the assassination of the Chief and the conclusion of the Russian ambush.

Mr. Moon caught Dag’s eyes. His too were narrowed in slight confusion. Not for the description of the carnage, of course. They’d both seen far worse. No, their mild confusion was over both the timeline and the act itself. It was certainly not above the Russians to kill a group of kids. However, those men also wouldn’t bother to do such a thing unless it benefited them in some way. Otherwise, it would be a waste of bullets and time. Causing a massacre when they should have been licking their wounds after a failed ambush? Preposterous.

 Moreover, the description of the murders… it was all wrong. Strangulation with a gas hose. Gaping wounds and crushed chests, topped with a kid nearly snapped in half and an iron pipe sticking out of a clerk’s chest like a thrown spear.

It was unprofessional, truly. Something a mindless savage, or a soldier drunk on slaughter would do in the heat of battle. The Russkies, however, were professionals. Bloodthirsty? Sure. They had zero issues raiding an FBI black site. Nor did they hesitate to strike at a police station full of armed officers. But each move they made was still professional and calculated to the end like a surgeon's knife expertly cutting through a patient. If men like the Russians really had attacked the gas station, those teens would have been filled with handgun ammo and the clerk would've been sniped in the head from three hundred feet. Not whatever… this was.

The black site raid was to acquire the alien. The station attack was to retake the creature. The ambush last night was a bit sloppier, but likely a play to gain information and hostages – which would have worked, if not for Mr. Moon and Dag, who were up that point completely unknown to the Russians. It was all brutal yet professional and each action they took had a clear goal attached.

Mr. Moon eased his car down the road while he thought. It was still a few minutes until the gas station. Perhaps more would be revealed when they had their own eyes on the situation. Hopefully. Worst case, this meant there was another variable loose in this delicate situation, one that was brutal and unpredictable.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Dino’s Diner was buzzing with life. Late in the night, the lights shone a warm glow over the building that made everyone inside feel cut off from the world, but in a good way. Like the diner was a refuge from the hardships of life. A place that people could escape to, even if for but a few hours, to enjoy good food and good company.

It was like an island of calm in the center of the storm of life, with Cass weaving in between tables as if she was a bird elegantly flying through the harsh winds, making them seem like nothing but a calm ocean breeze. She’d gotten the job and taken to it like a fish in water. The diner, once a hangout spot for her and her friends, was now a part of her life that she continued to enjoy, albeit in a different way than before. It gave her the fulfillment of a job well done alongside people she knew and trusted.

From a table a few feet away, her dad waved a greeting. Cass smiled back, the expression as warm and gentle as a morning sun peeking over the horizon. Balanced over her shoulder was a heaping platter of plates stuffed to the brim with food still sizzling with the residual heat from the grill.

To an outside observer, the pile would appear precarious, as if a gentle gust of wind would be enough to make Cass drop it all over the floor. That was not the truth, however. There was a method to the madness. Daly, one of the long-time waitresses who’d worked there even when Cass was still in elementary school, showed her the trick. It was all about balance. Dino would stack the plates just right in the kitchen, and as long as Cass kept the proper balance, it would all hold true.

Cass reached over the platter balanced on her shoulder to grab it with both hands to set it on the table that her dad and a bunch of guys from the station were sitting at. It was quite a large order of food, but she was used to it. They stopped by for dinner at Dino’s almost every day! A few of them were packing on some extra pounds because of that, but her father’s only response was to schedule more department-wide fitness mornings to stay in fighting shape.

“Alright! I’ve got a number ten, two number three’s, a four right off the grill, a number nine with no pickles, a Dino’s special, five milkshakes tall and frosty, a bottomless basket of chili-cheese fries, and a small apple pie. Pie’s on the house tonight!”

Hands raised one by one as Cass went through the orders, expertly sliding them across the table to each man.

“Enjoy!” Cass waved at the group. They all shouted various affirmatives back at her in response. Their voices bounced around the busy diner, adding their cheerful tones to the hustle and bustle of the place. Cass took a moment to breathe it all in. The smell of delicious food being cooked by Dino in the kitchen. The occasional drafts of night air mixed with the faint hints of cigarette smoke filtering in each time the door opened. How did the cheer in the air even have a smell? It was an emotion, a concept, but she could feel it deep in her lungs!

Cass let the happy breath out and moved over to the table that Ashley and Jen were at, sliding another round of milkshakes toward her girls. The three of them were still as close as ever, even after graduating high school. Ashley had found work at the police station as the secretary. Jen was going to a community college a few towns over but often found excuses to visit Carlston. Cass was pretty sure the girl would come back to the place after her degree was done. She loved the town too much to leave for good, and a nursing degree could be used practically anywhere.

That was the same wavelength Cass was on. This town… it was home. It was a warm, cheerful home, just like the diner was. Who cared that it was small? That it hardly had any stores, that the population had hardly changed since Cass was born? It was their slice of simple paradise. It was a town where everyone knew your name.

Another burst of raucous laughter erupted from the table where all the policemen were, Paul having apparently told one whopper of a joke. All bets were off whether it was a particularly rude one or some strange inside joke only men would understand. A group of smokers were happily chatting out in the parking lot while their food was being prepared. The picnic tables in the grass off to the side of the lot were filled with teens horsing around and ignoring their studies. Once upon a time Cass would have been among their number. Now she watched, content to see them enjoying the freedom of youth.

Cass was happy.

The dream broke and Cass opened her eyes. Daylight was streaming through the curtains of her acquired room to land directly on her face. She rubbed her face, the action doing little to soothe the itchiness brought by the tears that accompanied her to dreamland. It was a place she wished to still be in. The fragmented memories of her dreams, nothing but a half-remembered dream of a dream, still swirled away in her head. Fantasies of what could have been.

The nasty, terrible voice in the back of her head told her in cold words to ‘Wake up sweetie and smell the crappy roses, that dream is never going to happen. Dad’s dead and his killer is walking around like nothing happened.’

She shrugged the sheets off her body. The bed had been left there in the wake of old Henryk’s death. It was large enough to be determined as not worth the effort to lug down the stairs. The sheets had been found in a forgotten closet near the pantry. No longer did her chest feel the raging heat of grief. It was all cold now, like icy shackles were restraining her heart and snow was covering her frozen shoulders. Cass didn’t know if that would ever change.

Unsteady steps took her out of the bedroom. The stairs outside the room led downwards to the living room where she could see Mark sitting. The man looked to have hardly slept a wink. His face looked terrible. Just as bad as hers probably still looked. The shower hadn’t done much to fix that.

“Morning.” Cass’s rusty voice caused him to jump, breaking the man out of whatever thoughts he was trapped in. He tossed her an apple, which Cass clumsily caught and bit down on. It seemed neither of them had the energy to make breakfast.

With slow steps, Cass finished descending the stairs to join Mark in the living room, crunching away at her apple as she walked. She sat on a wooden rocking chair next to the unlit fireplace, her eyes flicking across the room while she thought. The hunting rifle was resting against the brick fireplace. Her pistol was probably still on the kitchen table, which was out of sight from the living room.

Half of the apple disappeared in chunks down her throat before Cass finally spoke.

“I’m going back. Taking the rifle and my car.”

Mark flinched in his seat. It seemed he could guess what she planned to do.

Cass didn’t care. He could come or he could stay. It mattered not to her.

“What about the thing in the barn?” Mark abruptly switched topics. Maybe he was still trying to think of a way to persuade her to stay safe. Or maybe he wouldn’t try at all.

Cass shrugged.

“What about it?”

“If it really is the reason all this started, shouldn’t we do something about it?”

If he had been speaking to a Cass that was a day younger, she might have agreed. However.

Cass shook her head. “Later.” She replied after taking another large bite of the apple. Each piece felt like it was hurtling to the end of an empty stomach, echoing away as it hit the bottom. “First the scum in the suit dies. After that I’ll figure something out.”

Cass didn’t wait for him to respond. She finished the apple, tossed the core out of an open window for the animals to have, and then grabbed the rifle and her keys. She still wore her grubby superhero pajamas. Her windbreaker was still wrapped around her shoulders. It would have been sensible to change clothes. If she looked hard enough there were probably a few old sets of clothing in some forgotten closet around the property.

Maybe it was another sign of how the world was turned upside down, for her to decline to do so. But in the back of her head, spoken by that nasty, terrible voice, she really, truly could not bear to give up the last things linking her to her old life. Not even if they were just a pair of grubby pajamas and a windbreaker.

Striding out of the house with the pistol in her pocket and the hunting rifle resting casually on her shoulder, she walked up to the barn and yanked open the doors. The haystack was still undisturbed. Cass shot a disgusted glance at it, a glance that held the unspoken words, 'If you'd never come to my town, my dad would still be alive.'

It was nothing more than a look, though. Dealing with that ‘Mr. Moon’ fellow was a more pressing matter.

She popped open the car door, setting the rifle in the passenger seat before she slid into the driver’s seat. Then the passenger door opened. The rifle was lifted into the air by a massive hand. Cass looked up, catching Mark’s eyes. He studied her, his face formed into an unreadable expression before he slid into the seat with the rifle set on his lap.

Mark didn’t say a word. Neither did Cass. She started up the car, filling the barn with a gentle rumbling that was once music to her ears. Now it was just the sound of a car starting. She placed her hand on the shift to put her car into drive. Warmth infused the top of her hand, causing Cass to glance over. Mark’s hand was placed over hers. He caught her gaze and nodded before his hand fell away and his gaze slid over to look out the window.

Cass put her eyes back on the open door and the car ambled out onto the road to the unsteady melody of gravel crunching under the tires.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

‘Scrape’

‘Scrape’

The sound of an axe rubbing against a whetstone filled the air. It was music to his ears. The whetstone was a nice one. A bit talkative, but nice.

“Hey.”

“Hey!”

"Hey, Jack!"

Jack paused, looking at the whetstone trying to speak to him. It had lips but no eyes. Not like it needed eyes to talk. No one needed eyes to talk. Unless there was some strange language out there that used eyes to talk? That would be kind of cool actually.

“Good work on fighting your demons, Jack! Me and the boys were wondering when you’d hash it out with them. You’ll have to get that one that got away, though. No sense in leaving a job unfinished.”

Jack curtly nodded. Then he smiled as the sensation of flesh crumbling underneath his fists came back as a fond memory. It was beautiful. Top ten memory, for sure. Ranking right above that one time he took out the lizardman with a metal tent stake, and right below his yearly summer Olympics preparations of going to the city at night and practicing his javelin-throwing skills on any skin stealers or muggers he could find.

As the warm memories flooded through him, Jack realized it was time for a break. He sat aside the whetstone, which groaned in pleasure as its back hit the cool surface of the metal table, and reached over to his snacks. He wasn't usually a snack person. It was kind of a money drain, and too many sweets tended to give a guy a gut that could interfere with a quick murdering, if that was needed at the moment.

But, when snacks presented themselves for free, well, he would oblige. To do so would be an utter waste of a perfect (and free) opportunity. Jack strained his arm to reach over to his most flavorful snack, hanging from the side of the shed he was sitting next to. It was buzzing gently, but that would soon change.

He grabbed the wasp nest in his hand and plucked it off the shed like one might pluck a juicy apple from a tree. The insects kicked up a fuss, but before they could explode from their nest, he shoved the buzzing delicacy into his mouth and chewed. It was a bit stingy, as wasp nests tended to be, but Jack was too strong for their poison to have an effect. Frankly, he was too strong for just about any poison to have an effect. It was a nice result of all his hard work microdosing poisons for breakfast each day. One by one, switching poisons each time his body got used to them enough that he didn’t feel numb from it anymore.

He could feel the wasps stinging the inside of his mouth (or trying to, most of them were too weak to break through the lining), but he continued to chew with crunchy relish. The wasp larva popped in between his molars like tiny little grapes, with a bit of a sour tinge to them. The nest was a bit dry, but the juices of the adult wasps did wonders in helping it go down to settle happily at the bottom of his stomach.

Jack let out a loud burp of satisfaction once the nest was all the way down.

“Juicy.” He grinned. The whetstone chittered in agreement, while his axe hummed in satisfaction over being wicked sharp again. It was almost always sharp, but cutting through bone was sadly a great way to quickly dull a blade. Now, though, now the edge would be back to cutting through bone like a knife through butter or smashing through it like a hammer on rocks. It all depended on the angle and force used in the strike.

“-All units be advised, multiple homicides reported at Skinny’s Gas Station. Suspect unknown.”

Jack cast a glance at the police radio as it buzzed to life with a woman’s voice made faint through the crackling of radio waves. He flicked the volume a notch louder and opened a bag of gummy fruit snacks acquired from that same gas station. He ate the strawberry ones first, following them with a few of the orange ones and a strong chaser of rubbing alcohol right out of the bottle.

“Is it the Russians?” A man’s voice answered, tight with exhaustion and fear. Jack’s eyebrows raised. Russians? In this particular town? At this particular time of day? How odd. He'd known from the start there were interesting times in Carlston. A chance to prove, perhaps even increase his might. Who could've guessed this town also contained scum-sucking communist heathens?

The man’s voice was never answered, though the woman continued to repeat her advisory every five or so minutes, until an hour had passed by and Jack’s gummy fruit snacks were exhausted.

The woman’s voice was cold. Uncaring. Obviously a radio operator working from some office to manage communications, but even an operator’s tone would normally have more life to it.

Maybe she was a demon, too?

-----------

Phew I've had a busy week this week. Work's been zooming along like usual, the pokemon run in the discord is going well, and I've been watching some Studio Ghibli movies I've always meant to get around to watching. From Up on Poppy Hill is truly a wonderful movie. Strongly recommend. It isn't quite my absolute favorite Ghibli movie, but it's high on the list. My overall favorite would be Castle in the Sky, though, due to the fact that's what I grew up with. Not the movie, per say, but when I was little my mom found a full-color 4 part manga version of Castle in the Sky in a book sale hosted by a local library. It was cheap so she got it for me and I cherished it for quite a while. Sadly it's long-lost now after a few moves and life being life, but the memories remain. Many years later I finally got a chance to see the movie itself (it was in a local theater as part of a limited re-run for an anniversary of Ghibli) and it was quite good. The manga did it justice.

Well, that's enough of memory lane for now. Until next week, my friends. As always huge thanks to patreons and readers alike.

Peace

Chapter 16 - Nightcall

Mr. Moon unconsciously tapped out a drumbeat on the steering wheel with his fingers. There was little sense rushing even after hearing what Ms. Miller had to say over the radio. Whoever it was that Steve saw, they were likely gone in the wind now. On foot, but with the sense to keep away from the roads. A man and a woman. The man, tall and solid. The woman, slim with a ponytail. Having just slipped out of the Chief’s house, they would have doubtlessly been witnesses to the murder. That would fit the timeline. The question was, who were they?

A police officer was out of the question. Mr. Moon had been introduced to every surviving member of the Carlston PD by now. There were no women on the force and as for the men, while none could be described as completely out of shape, neither could they be pinned as the ‘tall and solid’ type. Perhaps another observer could have mistaken them for that, but a man of Steve’s abilities would not have mentioned those physical traits if they didn’t glaringly stick out.

Who else would have a reason to be in the house? A friendly neighbor? Possible but unlikely. No reason for them to hide from himself or Dag before the murder occurred. A family member? The Chief lacked a wife, as far as Mr. Moon could tell. His daughter, perhaps?

Then it hit him. The thought spiked through his mind like a bolt of lightning tearing through the sky.

The picture. The one hanging on the wall, featuring the Chief’s daughter… Cass? Yes. That was her name. Cass. If he recalled correctly, she had a ponytail in the picture. That detail hardly said anything at all on its own. Nothing but pure coincidence.

However, the pale blue Rambler Cass was leaning against in the photo told another story altogether. The car parked outside the station was the same model and color. It was as close to the front door as could be. What if the Rambler was hers?

The Chief’s house was barely visible now in the gaps between houses. From what he could see, both squad cars were where they had been left earlier, untouched. The cars were still sitting low to the ground, indicating the tires hadn’t been changed out. Mr. Moon wrenched the steering wheel sideways, drawing out a shrill screech from the tires as his car hopped a curb and trampled some petunias in his haste to get on the next street. His foot pressed the gas pedal all the way to the floor and the engine grinded away in protest of the sudden move.

Dag let out a grunt of surprise, one hand palming the grip of his Sig Sauer while his eyes darted sharply around the area looking for threats Mr. Moon might’ve seen that he’d missed.

“The car, the one at the station.” Mr. Moon said, a slight bit of irritation breaking up his usual steady voice. “If it’s gone when we get there, our third party is the Chief’s daughter.”

Dag’s eyes sharpened.

“She has the creature?”

“Or knows where it is.” Mr. Moon confirmed. “And is likely a witness to the Chief’s death.”

Dag clicked his tongue. The fact of that possibility being inconvenient if true was something they both could understand without putting it into words. In the very best-case scenario, that would mean the girl would follow them hellbent on revenge.

Worse case? She would be sly enough to get proof and expose them to the police, forcing the two of them to cause a bloodbath neither man wanted to happen. Such a thing would be messy, needlessly dangerous, and the very definition of unsubtle. Not to mention they would still have to deal with whatever Russians remained at that point. All in all, a mess only marginally better than ordering the Air Force to glass the town and pick the alien from the smoking rubble.

Within minutes the police station appeared in the distance. Dag and Mr. Moon both leaned forward in their seats, eyes straining to rake across the front of the building. Then they saw it.

Or rather, they saw what was not there. The blue car was gone. There were no other vehicles in the parking lot.

Separate, the pieces were nothing but a simple coincidence. Joined together, they were everything. It all fit together like a giant jigsaw puzzle. An unlikely puzzle, but a puzzle all the same. The picture. The car. The hairstyle. Ready access to the Chief’s house. A person important enough to the Chief that he would be willing to tell a baldfaced lie to a federal agent to keep her out of harm’s way. The blue car, abandoned around the time of the attack and now missing.  

“Cass Thomson… and her mystery friend.” Mr. Moon muttered, temporarily pulling the car to the side of the road. “Where in the world are you?”

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Cass threw her car into park, turned off the engine, and hopped out into the darkness of old Henryk’s barn. In the span of seconds, the creaky wooden building went from being filled with the rumbling of her car's engine, to the silence of an ordinary country evening. No sounds of cars driving around, or neighbors caught in cheerful conversation. Just crickets and frogs droning their songs with the night sky as their audience.

There was barely any light to speak of in the barn. Just enough that Cass could be sure she wouldn’t trip over a loose board, but still not enough to see even halfway across the building. The haystack where they’d stuffed the alien still loomed like a dark blob, sitting forgotten in a dusty corner like they’d never left it in the first place.

Cass turned away from the pile of hay. The creature within was important enough to kill over, but right now it felt like her shoulders were already being crushed under the weight of the day’s events. Mark’s heavy hand fell on her shoulder, but Cass ignored it, numbly walking out of the barn to the house. She wasn’t bothered after that, though past the infernal ringing in her ears, Cass could still hear Mark’s heavy footsteps behind her as the man slowed his ordinarily quicker pace to doggedly follow her into the house.

The door creaked open, a lonely sound nearly drowned out by the croaking of bullfrogs. In the back of her head, a numb thought floated by that there had to be a creek or pond nearby, for the bullfrogs to sound this close. She flitted past the kitchen, pausing only to tug the pistol out of her pocket to lay on the table.

At this point, Mark finally split away, leaving only a few words hanging in the air.

“Hey. If you want to talk, I’m here.”

Cass absentmindedly nodded. Her heart still felt like it was being crushed, but she still couldn’t bring herself to snap at the man to leave her alone. Not when he was just trying to help. Heading up the stairs, Cass pushed the bathroom door open and paused, staring blanking at the mirror in front of her.

There was a girl in the mirror. Cass didn’t recognize her at first. The girl’s eyes were tear-stained. Her face was lined with weariness, with disheveled hair formed into a ponytail barely kept in line by a ragged hair tie. A second passed. Dirty superhero pajamas, windbreaker, and ginger hair. Then the realization struck – it was her. It was just Cass’s reflection.

Cass let out a tired sigh. She shed her clothes and stepped into the shower. Anything to try and feel human again. The weight of the nearly scalding water was like a waterfall beating down on her head, but Cass didn't feel it. She closed her eyes, moving her head out from under the water to rest against the cool tile that made up the shower wall.

Then Cass let out a series of choked sobs that were barely masked by the sound of water crashing around her. She fell to the floor, hugging her knees close to her chest. She was never, ever going to see her father alive again. She was alone, now.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

The next morning, the sun rose in the same spot in the sky it rose every morning. The same parts of town were dyed in the same warm hues. The same people woke at the same time to do the same chores, see the same people, and speak the same words they spoke every day.

Carlston was a small town. A lot of days were much the same. That was one thing Ralph liked about the small-town life. He didn’t need an alarm when he had chickens in his backyard. The rooster made sure to wake him up at the crack of dawn each day. Ralph didn't mind. Them eggs were good eatin'. What was that saying? A dozen eggs a day would make a man strong? He could only do half that much, but half was still some.

So, he would wake up every morning at the crack of dawn. Drink some coffee, then go out to grab whatever eggs were waiting for him in the coop. Usually there were far more than he could eat by himself, so a few would get turned into an omelet while the rest got carefully placed into a cardboard carton to be sent away to friends and neighbors as gifts given freely. After breakfast was taken care of, Ralph would always head over to the gas station. Usually not to get gas, surprisingly enough, but to see the lads.

Well, maybe the word ‘lads’ was a bit too young of a word to describe him and the rest of the old codgers that liked to meet up there and swap stories, but sometimes he liked to feel young. That was the privilege of the old, knowing the words to make themselves feel young again. Even if it was but for a few minutes before aching bones reminded a fella how many years his body had been chugging along.

By his count, about seventy. Good ol’ seventy-some years. Each and every one of them had been spent in Carlston. Well, maybe a few days in total were used up in some of the nearby towns. Variety being the spice of life and all that (not too much variety, just a wee bit).

Anyway, that was beside the point. Meeting up with the other old codgers each morning was a time-honored ritual for longer than he could remember. Usually the conversation would be light. Something like how the crops were going for those of them who were farmers, how Ralph's chickens were faring, or what their kids or grandkids were up to, etc. This morning, he was hoping to figure out what all those loud noises were last night. It was something odd, but the noises were coming from across town – too far for him to tell for sure what they were. Maybe some of the other old coots had a better idea.

All of that would be solemnly discussed over clutched cups of coffee, questionable gas station burritos, and the halfhearted glare of the cashier burdened with the knowledge that no, they would not be buying anything else, and yes, they would be puttering around all morning. Shucks, that lad behind the cash register would be happy enough later when Ralph lent him an old tux (worn by a much younger Ralph back in the day) next time the lad went on a date with his gem of a girlfriend.

The thing about Ralph, and where he lived, was that the gas station wasn’t within walking distance. Good thing he had a tractor. It would rumble along the streets, chugging and huffing loud enough to remind Ralph he was still alive, but quiet enough that ol’ Thomson wouldn’t have to pull Ralph aside for a boring conversation about noise ordinances and how most people don’t like to be woken up at the crack of dawn.

Ralph politely disagreed with that sentiment. Sure a guy would be a bit tired at first, but the chance to see the world in all its beauty, being graced with the morning sunlight, was a sight few things in the world could top. He was personally of the opinion that the sight was enough to give a man a different view of life itself. Still, the Chief was a good man. There was merit in heeding his words.

Not only that, but there was something about riding a tractor down the street that made it better. Maybe it was the gleam of the paint under the sunrise, shining so much that it almost covered up the rust spots he kept forgetting to fix up. Or could it be the sheer simplicity of the machine, compared to those fancy sports cars the youth liked to rip around the back country roads in? The slow speed of his vehicle sure was nice. Left plenty of time for a man to enjoy the morning air being mixed with the smell of diesel fuel.

His tractor turned the corner with all the grace of a bull in a china shop. The gas station bloomed into view… and Ralph’s eyes widened.

“What in tarnation…” He whispered to himself, the words nearly drowned out under the ‘put-put’ sound of the tractor’s engine.

It was a bloodbath. His body tilted, unable to keep his balance on the simple iron tractor seat out of shock and horror. He threw the gears of the tractor into neutral and stumbled off the machine, his old heart thundering at what felt like a thousand beats a second. Body parts were scattered across the concrete. A boy lay still, a rubber gas hose still wrapped around his crushed neck.

Another kid was motionless on the ground. His body was deformed in the middle, like someone had tried to physically snap him in half – and nearly succeeded before they got bored of the job.

Any further observations were lost to Ralph as he deposited the half-digested remains of his omelet onto the street, with some of it splashing onto his work boots.

There was not a single living soul in or around the gas station other than Ralph.

----------

And Cass gets away - but not without confirming Mr. Moon's suspicions. Jack's actions at the gas station are revealed under the light of the dawn. Soon it will be reported to the police, meaning Mr. Moon will have to adapt to another player in the game while managing a department that has just lost its chief. Meanwhile Cass plots to find a bush somewhere and snipe Mr. Moon in the head at her first opportunity.

Feels good to be back after the break week. In other news my Baldur's Gate 3 run has been put on the backburner since I'm getting burned out on it. Good news though, I'm doing a Pokemon challenge run with some of the lads in the discord server that's pretty fun so far. That's been taking up a decent amount of my free time, combined with my work on Urban Nirvana and my off-and-on planning for the frog sequel. Phew, I got pretty busy without realizing it!

Think that's all, so as always huge thanks to Patreons for keeping me stocked up on coffee, along with each and every person who takes the time to read my story. Is much appreciated ya.

Join The Leaf Club: https://discord.gg/jfRn8j5GaE 

Peace

Chapter 15 - The Dogs

Cass’s breath hissed through her teeth as she surveyed the damage. All four tires on their ‘borrowed’ patrol car were slashed. It was the same with her dad’s car. Every tire was damaged past the point of usefulness, with deep and long slashes that would prevent them from holding air for even a few seconds. It looked like a knife had done it, a rather sharp one to cut right through the rubber. Tires could be surprisingly sturdy at times.

“Those scum…” She harshly muttered. It was obvious the suit-wearing murderers still suspected there was another person in the house, even though they had been forced to rush off and assist Paul. Cass shivered at the thought. Those two men would be heralded as rescuing heroes. Not one of the policemen of the town knew Mr. Moon shot their Chief.

Still. As much as she yearned to climb on the roof and shout the truth to the sky for all to know, Cass knew how vital it was to safely get free of the house before Mr. Moon returned. Only then could she plot a path to a vengeance that wouldn’t only be her word against theirs. Cass knew all the men in the precinct. They’d worked for her father for years. But in their eyes, she was just the Chief’s kid. Even if they were fond of her, the word of Mr. Moon would probably be rated higher.

Mark’s heavy footsteps jolted Cass out of her spiraling thoughts, and she looked up at the man, who was walking around the cars to observe the damage. The hunting rifle dangled casually in one of his meaty hands. Clearly he didn’t plan to use it if things went south. That fit. He was never a good shot. At least Mark could carry the weapon for her.

The footsteps stopped and Mark looked at Cass. His eyes looked tired, much like how hers felt.

"Cars are toast," Mark announced. Cass started to open her mouth and unleash a biting response to his obvious declaration, but Mark continued to speak before she could get any words out. “What about your car? Think it’s still parked out front at the station?”

That…

Cass tilted her head in thought. It would have to be. There were only two places her car would’ve ended up after that night. Either her dad would’ve taken it back to the house, or he left it at the station to deal with later. It obviously wasn’t in the garage right now. That meant it had to be at the station.

It would be a bit of a walk. But… Paul was shouting something about the corner of State and Fairlawn Street over the radio. If they stuck to backyards and stayed far away from that area, along with the route one would take from her house to that corner, the two of them could probably get there just fine. Then they could get her car and drive off. All that would be left after that would be for Cass to do a bit of stakeout work, figure out where Mr. Moon was staying, hide in a nearby bush, and dome him in the head from 300 feet with the hunting rifle. It had a decent enough scope for the job. It would almost be like one of her dad’s old war stories about men with guns hiding away in trees to ambush unwary G.I.’s.

Then all that would leave… Cass unconsciously bit her lip in thought. The big guy would be a problem. He would likely take issue with Cass killing his partner. Plus those maniacs from the station. Maybe with luck, the two opposing teams could kill each other off. It would save her some work. They could be shooting each other to pieces right now while she pondered.

She shook her head. Bad Cass. A shootout in the town meant people she knew all her life could get hurt. Not only that, but her thoughts were spiraling again, and they didn’t have time for that.

“Come on. Let’s get my car.” Cass gestured to Mark, walking back into the house toward the back door. Mark silently followed her. The house was quiet, unnaturally so. At this time of the evening, her dad should have been bustling around the kitchen. Cass would’ve been waiting by the phone for her interview results. Dino was supposed to get back to her any day now. She was sure she aced it.

Maybe tonight would have been a grill night. The weather was nice enough to make the thought tempting. Hamburgers, hot dogs, green peppers, onions, melted cheese, all the works sizzling away on the portable grill under her father’s watchful eye. The timer would be ticking away on top of the oven, counting down the minutes until Cass could pull the fries out to reveal their golden sizzling shapes. Making oven-baked fries with freshly harvested potatoes, that was the way to do it for sure.

Cass passed the kitchen. In the corner of her eye, she could see her dad’s body limply strewn about on the floor. Her vision blurred worse and worse each second her eyes lingered. Cass roughly dragged the back of her hand against her face, but the hot tears streaming down her cheeks were cleared only for the briefest of moments. Mark said something, but his voice was muffled, almost drowned out by that infernal ringing noise in her ears. Cripes. The ear-shattering gunshots Cass had experienced in close quarters had affected her hearing worse than she originally thought.

Cass shuddered and continued walking, unknowingly biting at her lip hard enough to draw a thin stream of blood. She couldn’t even give him a proper burial right now. Not with the combined threats of Mr. Moon and the guys who attacked the station hanging over her shoulders. She had to get moving and keep moving.

Behind her, Mark flinched as he too reached the point where the Chief’s body was visible. She could hear him retching again, but this time nothing splattered onto the floor. His stomach was as empty as hers.

The back door clicked open. Cass sent one last mournful gaze around the inside of the house, and then she stepped out onto the patio. Before her, an entire line of backyards was laid out. White picket lines mingled with tall wooden fences and sturdy chain link barriers. Most of the yards were deserted by now, and almost none of them could be fully seen from the street.

Cass glanced at Mark.

“Alright. It’s time to go.” Cass sighed and took the first step onto the grass.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Dag was leaning back taking a breather on one of the few chairs that had remained intact from the grenade blast by the time Mr. Moon arrived at the broken front door of the house. The slab of wood was hanging loosely off its hinges, crooked and askew from the forces it had endured.

Mr. Moon rested his briefcase on the floor and observed the room. Shattered furniture, cracked walls, and a dead man on the ground. Nothing unusual, considering a grenade had gone off in the space.

“Report?”

Dag smushed the butt of his cigarette into the ceramic ashtray by his side to put it out.

“One dead Russkie down here, plus the one you sniped up on the second floor. Officer Joseph got hit. He is in critical condition, Officer Paul’s providing first aid. An ambulance is on its way from a town over. ETA is twenty minutes at minimum.”

Mr. Moon nodded along. Two dead John Does on the Russian side, one officer out of action on their side. Adding the Chief to the body count meant his list of available assets was down by two in full. Not completely ideal, but he couldn’t realistically expect much better. The Russians were formidable, after all.

“Then there’s two left we know about.” Mr. Moon concluded. “A grey-haired woman and a large, scarred man ran out the back door right before you breached. I was unable to hit them. The man wore a suit. Close-cropped hair. Heavily scarred face. The woman was in a dress, with glasses and shoulder-length hair.”

Dag nodded, wordlessly committing the sparse descriptions to memory.

It was a shame the entire group couldn’t have been wrapped up here. The chance had been almost perfect, with the Russians making such a desperate play out of the blue. However, just this happening in the first place was able to confirm a few facts, at least. Number one - the Russkies didn’t have the alien. Otherwise they would have faded away into the night instead of picking a fight when they had a gradually decreasing supply of manpower.  

That meant fact number two, his theory of a third party being at the station, was also essentially confirmed. Unless of course, the police of this town were being unusually adept at secrecy, to the point where they could hide the creature from himself and Dag. That was unlikely, though. This was a small-town precinct. They wouldn’t have any reason to hide the alien away. So considering the fact that the alien would never move by itself, there simply had to be a third party.

“What about the homeowners?”

Mr. Moon’s abrupt question caused Dag to fall into a thoughtful silence before answering.

“I asked the neighbors. Apparently it’s a middle-aged couple. They’re on a vacation to the West Coast for a week to see their son. The Russians must have slipped in the back so no one noticed the house was occupied.”

Mr. Moon curtly nodded, picking up his briefcase and walking out of the house. Heavy footsteps behind him indicated Dag was following. The dust had settled from the ambush. There was little they could do here. By now the rest of the officers had arrived, and they had already begun to get the statements of everyone who lived on the block. Mr. Moon ignored them all. That information would be most useful when it was fully gathered and turned into a report.

Until then, they had a cleanup of their own to perform. The blame for the Chief's death being pinned on anyone other than a Russian sniper would be extremely inconvenient if Mr. Moon wanted to freely pursue his goals.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

The ‘crack-pop’ of a beer can being opened was one of the most beautiful sounds in the world. That was something Steve had known for quite some time. It had to be a cold beer, though. Only heretics could settle for a warm beer. It had to be cold. If there was condensation or even a bit of frost buildup on the outside, even better.

“Ah… that’s the stuff.” The man next to him sighed contentedly and leaned back in his lawn chair as much as a man realistically could in a cheap lawn chair (in effect, not very much). A second man gave a grunt of agreement, and Steve added an approving hum of his own.

These two men were his neighbors. Well, some of his neighbors at least. The block was quite a bit larger than that. They were just his immediate next-door neighbors. Maybe in a few days he would expand his circle of acquaintances to those who were non-immediate neighbors. No need to rush it, though. Steve and Ms. Miller needed to blend in. That meant doing things in the unhurried manner of a man and his wife enjoying the small-town life. You don’t move fast in the small-town life.

Not everyone seemed to get that.

For starters, a muffled ‘bang’ had come from the Chief’s house about ten minutes ago. Soon after that, screeching tires had heralded Mr. Moon’s car flying out onto the street.

Steve didn’t say anything then. The two men with him were drunk enough to not recognize the gunshot. Or perhaps they did, and thought it was just a rowdy kid or a hunter hanging around a bit too close to the city limits? Eh. It hardly mattered.

About a minute ago, two people had slipped out the back door of the Chief’s house. The evening was late enough that shadows obscured their features, though of course the distance didn’t help either. He could see that backyard from his backyard, but the houses weren’t exactly close. The best he could tell was that they were a rather bulky, solid man, and a much slimmer figure. He could barely make out a ponytail on the latter. A woman? Or a slim man with a strange choice of hairstyles. Probably a woman.

Steve took another sip of his ice-cold beer. Ah. How refreshing. The cool liquid splashed down his throat to settle joyfully in his stomach.

On the patio table next to a pile of empty beer cans, a folded piece of paper innocently waited like a scrap of discarded trash. Soon it would disappear. Ms. Miller had already peeked in on the trio from the upstairs window, a movement Steve had noticed and given the appropriate gesture for in response. A simple hand sign that indicated he’d seen something important. She would find a good excuse to pop out and grab his note soon enough, whatever it would take to make the action natural. Steve’s best guess is that she would use the pretext of grabbing their cans for recycling. That was all the rage now, saving the planet one aluminum can at a time. Then all she would have to do is radio Mr. Moon with his observations and the ball would be in that man’s court.

Steve crushed the now-empty can in his hand and stacked it on top of the pile of empty cans. The structure almost looked like an alcoholic leaning tower of Pisa. He was pretty proud of that. One of the men with him reached into the cooler, grabbed a fresh beverage, and tossed it to Steve, who casually caught it with a muttered thanks. He popped the tab, sipping at the ice-cold liquid inside.

This was the way to do it. No running around waving a gun like Mr. Moon and Dag were doing. Just a bit of guard duty, a bit of stakeout, and a nice bit of bonding over beer with the neighbors. This was the reason he stuck with the Criminal Investigation division. While the others were busting their asses, all Steve had to do was play a part and pay attention.

Yeppers. What a life to live.

-------

Woah woah woah! Leaves you stupid piece of shit, you plague ridden rat! You said this week would be a later chapter! Well, the thing I anticipated to happen this weekend did not end up happening. So, I was able to have my usual writing time. However there will be no chapter next week since I will be extremely busy.

In other news my solo honor mode run in Baldur's Gate 3 is sapping my will to live. Never before have I wiped this many times in act fucking one. Sometimes it's due to my own stupid choices. Other times it's because of absolutely shit RNG. I'd say 40/60 on that, with the 60% of wipes being because of shitty RNG (JK it's probably more like 50/50 because I'm a moron who makes bad decisions, and the nature of solo honor mode heavily punishes those.)

I've also been doing some more planning for the Frog Out of Water sequel. Still a ways away from release but it's fun to think about during the times I'm taking a break from pondering Urban Nirvana.

As always, huge thanks to patreons for the coffee and all you lovely readers quietly supporting me from the sidelines. Seeing the view count slowly tick up gives me happiness.

Join The Leaf Club: https://discord.gg/jfRn8j5GaE 

Peace

Chapter 14 - Zero Eclipse

Houses whizzed by like blurred afterimages in the distance under the rapidly darkening evening sky. The sun had already dipped below the horizon, marking the transition from early evening to twilight.

“Less than a minute out.” Dag rumbled into the handheld radio, more for the benefit of the cops on the other side than for his or Mr. Moon’s.

Mr. Moon glanced at his watch. One minute. According to what little they’d heard over the radio of the situation, the Russians were holed up in an unused house. When a squad car had passed by, the ambush was triggered.

“Dag.” Mr. Moon said the man’s name, getting his attention before nodding his head toward a briefcase nestled on the floor in the back seat. Dag quickly got his meaning and grabbed the briefcase. He tossed it in Mr. Moon’s lap, where it landed with a solid ‘thump’. Wordlessly, Mr. Moon momentarily slowed the car to pop open the driver’s side door and tossed out the briefcase. He slid out onto the ground, with Dag swiftly hopping up over to the now empty driver's seat, his foot pressing the gas pedal all the way down to the floor to continue speeding toward the ambush. The entire transition hadn’t even taken more than five seconds.

Mr. Moon picked up the briefcase. It had a pleasing weight in his hand. A type of weight only solid, reliable gunmetal could bring. He paused to adjust his tie, and then he was off. Being under a minute out from the fight meant it was only a block or two out. In fact… Mr. Moon cocked his head to the side to raise one of his ears higher in the air. Yes. He could hear gunshots in the distance. Coming from the North, if he had to guess.

 Without waiting a second longer Mr. Moon glanced around the neighborhood. Most of the houses in the area were single-story homes. Likely a basement below, but most of them lacked the sole feature he was looking for. House by house was mentally cataloged and discarded until finally he turned and started running toward a house near the end of the block. His shiny black oxford shoes click-clacked against the asphalt, but his face was completely unperturbed, as if this was an ordinary day-to-day occurrence for the man.

The house at the end of the block was the very picture of ordinary suburban life. Bright lights shined merrily around the windows. A family could be seen through the windows enjoying dinner, and a car, its body shining and well-loved by its driver, was resting in the open garage.

Mr. Moon knocked on the door. The sound shattered that sense of peace, just like the gunshots in the distance. After a few seconds the door opened. A man looked at Mr. Moon with a quizzical smile, though quickly that smile morphed into confusion once the man recognized the gunshots echoing through the air.

“How can I help you?”

Mr. Moon skipped the pleasantries in favor of pulling his badge out of the breast pocket situated in the underside of his suit jacket.

“FBI. I need access to your attic. Hide your family in a basement or safe room.”

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Dag power-slid Mr. Moon’s car into position right next to the police car sitting on the edge of the road, right in front of the ditch. Crouched behind the car was a blue-uniformed officer with a service revolver clutched in his hand, while another officer huddled at the bottom of the ditch frantically putting pressure on his bleeding stomach. Dag immediately dived out of the car to land with a roll next to the officer behind the squad car.

“Sitrep.” Dag grunted. While the officer, who he vaguely remembered as Paul, explained the situation, his eyes ceaselessly roamed around the area drinking in every detail he could see.

“Damn bastards sniped Joseph. Sniper is on the second floor. At least one other guy near the door keeps shooting at us too.”

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Mr. Moon climbed the ladder into the attic, grabbing at the railing with one hand while the other one held secure the briefcase tucked under his arm. Quickly the rest of the attic revealed itself. It was a shadowy room, a sort of darkness influenced by the twilight of the world around the house, but there was just enough light to see what he needed to see.

Mr. Moon crouched next to one of the three circular windows in the attic and popped open the lock on the suitcase. Inside the suitcase were several parts of a gun, all nestled comfortably between layers of padding and cloth. He glanced up once, listening to the distant gunshots, and then began to assemble the sniper rifle piece by piece, with quick motions honed by years of experience.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Dag lowered his body to the ground to see under the car. From where he was lying, he could just barely see the house in question. One of the front windows was shattered, and if he squinted, he could make out the barrel of a gun poking out. His eyes flicked up, but the body of the car blocked him from seeing any part of the second floor.

Two known Russians in the house. Out of the original squad that hit the black site, one had been captured there and another died in the police station shootout. That meant two more were unaccounted for, assuming they hadn’t added to their numbers since the station. If he was a Russian, Dag would have one man waiting by the back door to combat any sort of attempted flanking action. The final man would need to be stationed next to the front door in case the police tried to breach.

In short, assuming they followed Dag’s line of thought (which was likely, as the Russians were professionals), there were two men at the front door, one at the back, and a sniper on the second floor.

After mentally cataloging possibilities, Dag held out his hand to the unwounded officer, motioning for him to stay down. Then, he crawled back over to Mr. Moon's car, popping open the backseat door and grabbing the other case that was resting in the footwell. Like the sniper rifle Mr. Moon liked to keep around, this suitcase was Dag's own preparation, requisitioned from the armory back in Washington D.C. for this very purpose.

He snapped open the lock of the suitcase. Paul’s breath hitched, the man instantly recognizing the contents for what it was – an M79 grenade launcher. A single-shot weapon that broke open near the stock to load, the stubby weapon was a relic of the Vietnam War used for the simple purpose of erasing any room-size enemy position currently being an eyesore. It was similar in looks to a sawed-off shotgun, but the tubular barrel, meant of course for firing grenades, was a much larger one than any shotgun would ever have.

Dag pushed away the latch that locked the barrel with one finger, causing the barrel to pop open while his other hand casually grabbed one of the stubby 40mm grenades nestled in the lining of the suitcase. He carefully slid the grenade inside the weapon.

However, he didn’t fire it immediately. Dag closed his eyes, listening to the occasional pop of gunfire from the house. There was little use moving now. The signal would be obvious. Counter-sniping always was.

Beside him, Paul took advantage of the short break to push open the cylinder of his revolver and reload his weapon. Each click the revolver's cylinder made when it moved was like sweet music in the air. It was a nice distraction from the chaos of the house.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Mr. Moon stood behind the circular window, both feet placed solidly on the floor. The surface creaked, the wood protesting against the man’s weight. From the attic he could see his car in the distance, parked right next to a police cruiser. Dag’s massive figure crouched behind it, along with one of the town’s officers. The Russians were most likely in the house on the other side of the road. The question remained, what would his target be? Mr. Moon’s perch wasn’t fully facing the house. Instead, he was situated at an angle that obscured the entire front side of the Russian’s house from his view. There were windows on the sides, of course, but those had curtains. The curtains were neither thin nor particularly thick, but their mere presence was enough to make it extremely difficult to see the people behind them.

However, extremely difficult was a different word than impossible. Mr. Moon breathed in. He held the air tightly in his stomach and then released it. Over and over again until his body was utterly calm and still, the adrenaline in his veins almost feeling submerged under the current of an icy river that swept through his body to numb it.

He breathed in one last time, but this breath was one he held. His heart rate slowed. His body stilled.

And in that moment, a faint shadow moved on the other side of the curtains.

Mr. Moon’s finger tugged at the trigger.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

A splintering ‘crack’ tore through the air. Dag’s head jerked up and he burst out from behind the car, aiming and firing in one smooth, practice motion to send the explosive ordinance thudding through the broken window, the same one he’d seen a gun barrel poking through a moment before. As soon as the grenade cleared the barrel, Dag flung himself back to the ground as a hail of bullets answered, hugging the asphalt until a bone-shaking explosion rocked the surroundings and set off the car alarms of every vehicle on the block.

“Now! Breach!” Dag roared. The grenade launcher would take too long to reload. By the time he could slam another round in, the Russians would be able to recover from whatever disorienting effect the explosion would have on them. So, he threw it away and drew his Sig Sauer. The handgun looked tiny in his massive hands, but that had no effect on the weapon’s lethality.

Paul added a roar of his own, his fury over the ambush and the wounding of his comrade adding a raw, almost primal rage to his voice. Dag grasped the side of the car so hard the metal creaked, and launched himself over the top while Paul slid over the hood.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Mr. Moon let out the breath from his aching lungs. Immediately he moved away from the window and toward the second of the three glass portals in the attic. The sniper was likely dead, but still, Mr. Moon's body continued to move according to his training and habits. After the first shot was taken, a sniper that stayed at rest was a dead man.

His right hand abandoned the trigger to slide back the bolt of the rifle, ejecting the empty metal cartridge to knock against the wooden floor while his left hand took a fresh bullet from his pocket to replace the used one. In less than two seconds the cartridge was in, and Mr. Moon slammed the bolt home. He set his eye back to the scope, this time eyeing the back door instead of the second floor. He breathed in. He breathed out.

And then his lungs were filled once more, holding the breath and stilling his body to the utmost.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Dag didn’t bother going through the window. He braced his shoulder like a football linebacker hunting for the blood of a quarterback and the wooden door, already weakened by the grenade, folded before his might. A man was lying in a pool of blood on the floor, his scarlet hands scrabbling around the carpet for his gun. Shrapnel littered the walls, the floor, the ceiling, and the man on the ground.

Dag swiveled mid-run and shot the Russian three times in the chest. The man fell still.

Paul hopped through the broken window right next to him, his revolver held at the ready. Another 'crack' of a sniper rifle split the air, and in an instant, the Russian on the floor surged upward to tackle Dag, the gun on the floor lying forgotten.

Dag mentally cursed. Body armor. The bullets had only stunned the man, instead of being the kill shots Dag intended them to be. Any more thoughts matter were swept to the side once the Russian collided with him. Dag stumbled back, but there was one key factor.

Namely, the man was big, but Dag was bigger. Bigger and less shellshocked than someone who’d recently experienced a grenade detonate in the same room as them. The Russian yanked a knife out of a sheath at his side and plunged it into Dag’s waist. Dag grunted in pain and grabbed the man’s head in one hand. He lifted the Russian bodily into the air, tensed his arms, and then slammed the man’s skull into the nearest wall to stun him.

Then over and over again, even as the Russian flailed away frantically with his knife, Dag smashed his boulder-like fist into the man’s throat until something broke. One moment the bone that formed the Russian’s windpipe resisted his strikes. The next moment, the Russian’s throat was deformed like a punctured hose. The man gasped and choked for air. Any amount of concern for his fight with Dag was abandoned in favor of clawing at his own neck. Tiny splashes of blood jetted out of his mouth, with every strangled gasp.

Until the Russian fell limp. This time for good.

Dag tossed the Russian’s body away like a piece of trash, ignoring Paul’s wide eyes in favor of turning to face the rest of the room. It was empty. Shattered, cracked, and broken, but empty. No scrap of furniture had escaped fully unscathed, and as he glanced again at the dead man on the floor, he could even see several large splinters of wood sticking out of his back. The lights throughout the house were dark. No movements could be heard.

Dag nodded to Paul and the two men began to sweep the house room by room.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Mr. Moon slid the bolt back to pop the used round out of his rifle. A large man, almost as large as Dag was, had run out the back door after Mr. Moon's partner breached through the front. Mr. Moon naturally took a shot at him, but in all fairness, moving targets were much more difficult to hit. The bullet hadn’t done much more than graze his target. Then, when he was reloading, a woman had dashed out the back to follow the man.

After that there was nothing.

Mr. Moon moved to the third and final window, patiently peering down the scope toward the back door for five minutes before dropping to a knee and beginning the process the disassemble his sniper rifle. Each piece was silently placed back into the suitcase one by one. Then, by habit instead of necessity, he picked up the two empty rifle cartridges on the ground. It wasn’t a necessity in this case, as it hardly mattered if anyone knew he had been in the attic, but habit was habit. He slipped the used cartridges into his pocket, picked up the suitcase in one hand, and climbed down the ladder to the main floor.

In less than ten minutes, the gunfight was over.

---------

Phew things keep heating up! Another skirmish with the Russians, Moon countersnipes the sniper, Dag throat punches a man to death, and grenade launchers are fun! Now the question remains - what are Mark and Cass up to while this is happening? How will the Chief's death be explained? When will the gas station murders be discovered? This is the same night as when Jack fought the shadow demons, so it's just a matter of time!

In other news I've been getting back into Baldur's Gate 3 lately. Took a nice break from it and I'm back to do a challenge run I've been stalling on - Solo Honor Mode! It's tough as nails and often feels like I am slamming my balls in the car door. Never before have I wiped this many times in Act 1, both due to my own terrible choices, seriously bad RNG, and really fucking stupid game mechanics (I mean seriously, you take a spell like Darkness. It says if you don't have the ability to see through magical darkness, you can't make ranged attacks into or out of the cloud of Darkness. So why, Larian, can motherfucking enemies throw motherfucking weapons at my dude who is in the middle of the motherfucking magical darkness cloud? Why?). Anyways it's pretty fun and if I don't go insane trying to complete this challenge, it'll be a nice addition to my collection of challenge runs.

Btw expect late chapter next weekend since I'll be a bit busy. Probably looking at a Monday release. Maaayyyybeee Tuesday release at the latest.

As always huge shoutout to all patreons and readers. Lova ya.

The Leaf Club: https://discord.gg/jfRn8j5GaE

Peace

Chapter 13 - I Talk to the Rain

“Second floor’s clear!” Dag’s voice thundered from above. Mr. Moon did not reply, only filing Dag’s report away in his head while he continued to methodically search through the main floor. The living room was empty. So was the entrance, the hall, and the hall closet. Part of him wondered if this was nothing but an example of his paranoia. An extra squad car parked out front hardly meant for sure that there was another officer in the house. Considering no one came running after hearing a gunshot, odds were he truly was being paranoid for no reason.

On the other hand, Mr. Moon had just shot the chief of police in the back of the head. In an operation as delicate as this one was turning out to be, he couldn’t risk news of the murder being revealed in the wrong way. No, better for no witnesses to be around other than himself and Dag. Then he could claim it was done by a Russian sniper with none the wiser.

Mr. Moon walked down the hallway, glancing at the back door and noting that it still appeared locked before moving into the chief’s office. Compared to the spartan look of the hallway, the office was practically a full-on lounge. A fireplace, empty at the moment, but with large splashes of soot on the brick that spoke of heavy use. A thick wooden desk faced the door, one utilitarian wooden chair behind it while two more comfortable lounge chairs were placed in front.

On the walls were several more pictures, some featuring the chief posing with a grin next to his daughter, others showing various scenes of a hunt. Trophies of those hunts were littered around the wall – deer, elk, turkey, and even one bear head stared lifelessly down at Mr. Moon from where they were mounted. Above the fireplace were two hooks, clearly meant to hang some sort of firearm that was at the moment, missing. Most likely a hunting rifle. Perhaps it was at some hunting lodge or taken down for cleaning. Mr. Moon couldn’t claim to know much about hunting seasons and whatnot.

He completed his quick sweep around the room. Few objects could realistically hide the body of a grown man, other than perhaps the large desk, which he checked behind to reveal nothing but air. The fireplace, meanwhile, would be much too small for anyone but a child to scoot up, and none of the chairs were positioned in a way to block an observer’s line of sight.

Mr. Moon turned, heading back into the hallway… just in time to hear the crackling of a radio coming from the living room.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Cass’s breath caught in her mouth. Blue Tie had disappeared, his footsteps fading toward where she thought the office was. That was their moment. If they moved fast and silently enough, they could squeeze out the back door with none the wiser.

And then the walkie-talkie still strapped to her… dad’s belt. It crackled to life. A voice came out of it, garbled to the point that Cass couldn’t fully understand it without an extreme amount of focus. In an instant she could hear Blue Tie’s footsteps returning, the man dashing down the hall, through the living room, and arriving to crouch at the side of the man he’d murdered in cold blood. Her eyes narrowed in pure, undiluted hatred, fingers creeping along the stock of her hunting rifle. The pantry was cramped, almost unbearably so with both her and Mark standing in it. At most the walk-in space was meant for one person to quickly dip in, grab an item, and leave. But… if she…

Cass squeezed her back as tightly into Mark’s body as possible, causing the bulky football player to take half a step back – the only amount he could retreat by without bowling over the shelves behind him. That movement left just enough room for her to bring the muzzle of the rifle up around waist level, with the stock of the gun poking into Mark’s stomach even as he sucked in his chest. It was incredibly close. Each centimeter higher she nosed the weapon up was a centimeter closer to the tiny gap in the mostly closed door.

Mark's hand frantically patted at her shoulder. Undoubtedly he was freaking out over what he could see her doing under the dim light streaming in from the crack in the door. Cass ignored him. The shot was iffy. On one hand, the scum was five, maybe six feet away from where Cass stood. On the other hand, she would have to hip-fire the rifle. The crack in the door was too small for her to use the scope on the weapon to any noticeable effect, and it was already a difficult enough task to bring the rifle up to a firing position at her waist in the cramped confines of the pantry.

Nor could Cass open the door any wider, or even step out. She was angry, not stupid. She’d seen how quickly Blue Tie drew his weapon and fired. The man was a professional killer while she’d gone hunting only a handful of times with her dad. The difference would be enough to mean her death. And as much as Cass wanted to spray Blue Tie’s brains across the living room as soon and accurately as possible, she also owed it to her dad to survive. Throwing away her life only for the barest chance of a better shot would just make him sad when they met again in the next world.

The revolver in her other hand trembled, though if it was from fear, rage, or simple adrenaline, Cass did not know. Two guns could even things out. The distance would mean the lesser accuracy of the pistol wouldn’t matter much, though Cass would have to use her thumb to pull back the hammer each time before she fired. A downside of the single-action nature of the weapon.

She could shoot through the door, no need to open it wider. Unlike in the movies, her dad had always told her to never rely on any door, whether car or house, to keep her safe from bullets. Not unless it was several arms-widths of steel thick.

Cass’s index fingers curled around the triggers of both weapons while her thumbs flicked each of the safeties off. She took a deep breath, releasing it then drawing in another. This second breath she held in her lungs, keeping her body as steady as possible so as to not mess up the shots. Her finger began to tighten.

Then the second man, the one Blue Tie called Dag, walked into view to stand next to her father’s killer. Cass closed her eyes and regretfully let out her held breath. The rifle was a single-shot bolt-action weapon. The revolver was single-action. Even if she managed to kill Blue Tie quickly, her slow rate of fire would leave Dag time to kill both her and Mark for sure. Nor would her accuracy be all that great, with the hip-firing and the closed confines of the pantry preventing any real usage of the sights. She would be trading Blue Tie’s life for her’s and Mark’s. Dad wouldn’t like that. Not even a bit.

Damn it all.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

The radio clipped to Chief Thomson’s waist buzzed again, this time with Paul’s voice.

“-Repeat, requesting immediate backup at the corner of State and Fairlawn! Shots fired, unknown number of assailants! Repeat! Requesting immediate backup!”

Mr. Moon unclipped the radio from the chief’s duty belt.

“Copy that. This is Mr. Moon. Dag and I are en route.”

He threw the radio into Dag’s hands without waiting for a response. The two men ran outside to the car.

“Russians probably. No one else is insane enough. What about the possible witness?” Dag rumbled, glancing at the cop car parked on the driveway. Mr. Moon paused next to it, shooting Dag a meaningful look before pulling a knife out from his belt.

Dag's face lit up in understanding and he pulled out his hunting knife. Mr. Moon's knife slashed through the rubber tires of the patrol car while Dag ran for the open garage, slashing open the tires of the chief's car one by one. The entire action took no more than ten seconds. Now if anyone wanted to use either vehicle, they would need to track down three more tires or accept they would have little-to-no control over the steering, along with a vastly decreased speed and being quite conspicuous.

At this moment that was all they could do. If the Russians were on the move again, neither Mr. Moon nor Dag could waste time at the house. The Russians, and the alien, were simply a higher priority than a witness that might not even exist.

“If our witness truly does exist, this should cut his options down by quite a lot. He’ll need to take it slowly, jack a car, or move on foot. All are conspicuous options.”

Once the tires of both cars were sitting flat on the ground, Mr. Moon and Dag piled into his car. Mr. Moon threw the vehicle into gear and screeched out of the driveway with only the barest glance spent at the house in the rearview mirror.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Cass waited five minutes in silence before easing herself out of the pantry, rifle held at a readied position in one hand while her other hand still clutched her dad’s Colt revolver.

The house was silent. Empty, aside from her and Mark. Even past the dreadful ringing in her ears, Cass had been able to hear the screeching of tires as the two murderers raced out of the driveway toward whatever Paul had radioed in for. Hopefully Paul would be okay. Blue Tie – no, Mr. Moon, that was his name according to Paul. Mr. Moon seemingly wanted to keep the murder quiet, so she couldn’t quite see him attacking Paul for no reason. Mr. Moon. What a stupid name. Probably a fake one, knowing how that cowardly bastard liked to act. Couldn’t even be brave enough to hand out his real name.

Cass shifted her eyes down to her dad. Her heart leaped up into her throat, while Mark loudly lost his lunch in the background once his vision followed hers. No glassy eyes were staring at her, nor was he barely breathing or trying to give last words. It wasn’t like any movie she’d seen.

Her dad was just dead. He was lying on his stomach, the back of his head coated with blood amid pieces of shattered bone.

Cass joined Mark in emptying the contents of her stomach. The motion made it even worse, as when she doubled over, her eyes flicked over the splatters of blood on the wall. Acidic bile mixed with hot tears that stung her eyes.

Soon her stomach was empty. Cass spat out the last strings of stomach acid, walking over to the sink to run her mouth under the faucet. Once they were both as recovered as they were going to be, Cass tossed the rifle to Mark, who jumped in surprise before catching it. They really were alone in the house, so no sense in clogging up both her hands.

Just Cass, Mark…

And her dad. Dead on the floor.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

“-Taking heavy fire from the South side! South side! We-“

The radio crackled as Cathy switched frequencies.

“-Hey, I’m going over to the gas station for some munchies, wanna come, Billy? I-"

The frequency switched again.

Again.

Again.

And again.

Over and over Cathy flicked through the different channels and frequencies. Some were inputted into the notebook in her lap for future reference. The standard police frequencies, the HAM radio frequencies preferred by the locals (or at least the few locals who bothered to use something like that), and a few more were marked down in her usual chicken scratch handwriting.

It wasn't the only radio in the room. The entire bedroom was filled with equipment – some silent, some buzzing with nothing but static, others lively with the sound of people speaking. The bed was shoved off to the side in the corner, sheets undisturbed as Cathy worked tirelessly to not only gather information but to also keep the team's comms running smoothly and securely. Department radios, secure phone lines, and even a connection to the office back in Washington. All of those required a communications specialist to manage them.

Her purse sat empty on the nightstand, part of it hanging off the end to make room for a pitch-black rotary phone. The weapon that had once been kept concealed inside of the purse, an S&W Model 29, was placed well within arm’s reach of Cathy on the desk she worked at next to a glass of ice water. She didn’t expect any problems. The house was nondescript, none of the neighbors suspected them, and Steve was not only busy infiltrating the community, but also serving as the first line of defense for the team’s communications hub. Still, better to be safe than sorry. It always was, especially when she could hear men dying over the radio waves.

----------

Greetings and salutations fellow humans. Not much to say today. Just been enjoying that September Fall weather for all its worth before the chill of Winter descends.

As usual, huge thanks to patreons, ninja editors, and all you lovely readers. Couldn't do this without ya.

Peace