Tuesday 7 November 2017

Chapter 25, part 2.



Chapter 25 continues! The usual warnings apply this is a rough draft so expect the occasional grammatical faux pas. Also contains adult language and situations. Thanks for reading!





Sam led the three of them out of Strangefellows and around the corner to a gravel parking lot to where a sunshine-yellow car was parked. It looked like the unwanted result of an alcohol-fuelled liaison between a Teletubby and a toy car from a Mc Happy Meal.

“What’s that?” Aleph asked.

“It’s an Aztec,” Sam replied, unlocking the doors.

“Does it run on bubble juice?”

“Heisenberg drove one,” said Sam, folding himself into the driver’s seat.

“And you think that owning the same shitty car as a fictional Meth kingpin is a selling point?”

“She may not look like much, but she’s got it where it counts. Not every car has pyromantic script etched onto the engine block.”

“It still looks like a toy.”

Sam shrugged, “Better than a VW Beetle.”

“Not that it has any bearing on the current crisis, but sure, I’ll bite. Why not a bug?”

Sam gave her an incredulous look. “The Bug was designed by Hitler. It’s fascist transport.” He said this as though he was explaining water was wet.

She blinked and looked at Dimitri for confirmation.

“Pretty sure he’s right. At least about the design part,” he said, casually aiming himself at the front passenger-side door.

Aleph gave him a little jerk of the head, Dimitri scowled and diverted to the rear door.

“Sure, but it’s what people did with it that counts, nobody that I know of committed genocide from inside of a Volkswagen,” said Aleph.

“Would you wear Hitler’s sweater?”

“Probably not,” she admitted.

“Point and match.”

“Millions of hippies would disagree with you,” she said to Sam, getting in herself and arranging Minnaloushe on her lap.

The Kellas cat had regained consciousness back in Strangefellows. He was sore and refused to speak beyond a few words. There were a couple local vets and doctors who would work off the books on off world beings, but he would get better care in Senak.

They lurched out of the pot-hole pocked parking lot and filtered through narrow side-streets until they hit Bridgeport and merged onto the Knight Street Bridge heading toward South Van.

It wasn’t Aleph’s favourite route, but she didn’t ask Sam to divert when she realized where he was taking them. It was the most direct way to Memorial Park and she could deal with some discomfort for the sake of speed.

The Knight had been guarding the bridge since it opened to traffic in the mid-seventies and had been a fixture on the old Fraser Street Bridge years before that. It was about as close to being a real knight as she was, but since it guarded the Knight Street Bridge, and since, given the option, people would always fail in their attempts to be clever, the name had stuck. It was one of the few things around that was capable of killing beings like her, and she could happily admit that passing it made her skin crawl.

The construct, and a few others like it, had been created at the same time as the coastal gun emplacements during the Second World War when the fear of invasion from Japan had been a very real thing. The war hadn’t just been about bombs and bullets, the arcane community on both sides had been heavily involved.

Since the war, the Knight had been largely left alone, siphoning kinetic power from the Fraser River as its currents slid past a sigil-covered bronze cartouche attached to the bridge footing below. Its one duty since The War had been to require anyone over a certain metaphysical weight to check in on their way over the Fraser River. This morning that meant her.

She saw the Knight in the distance as they ascended the slope of the bridge. It stood planted on the edge of the pedestrian path towering a good dozen feet above the bridge deck. It had made a roughly human-shaped body for itself out of sand-smoothed branches, frayed mooring rope, and old fishing nets. On its driftwood shoulders it had placed the bleached skull of a seal. As they approached, it turned darkened eye sockets toward them and the challenge hit her like an unexpected medicine ball to the face.

She just knew she’d have a headache for the rest of the morning. She gathered her scrambled senses, passed on her credentials, and waited.

She might be imagining it, but its challenge seemed to be sharper than usual this morning. The Knight hadn’t denied her crossing before, she didn’t recall anyone having been denied, but it as the seconds ticked past she couldn’t help but become concerned. They were approaching the centre of the bridge doing north of eighty kilometers an hour and they would be past the spot where it stood guard in mere moments. She didn’t know what would happen if she didn’t have permission to pass before they reached that point, but she didn’t want to find out.

Just as she felt her fingers circle around the handle of the e-brake, she received a mental nod of acceptance. She let out a held breath and took her hand off the brake. The empty seal skull swivelled to track them as they zipped past.

Sam gave a set of cheery beeps of the horn, unaware how close he’d been to disaster. Like anyone with a drop of arcane talent, he was able to perceive The Knight, even if it chose not to interact with him. She didn’t like to think about what might have happened if it decided that she couldn’t pass.
The Knight was immensely powerful but hadn’t shown anything in the way of brains or initiative before. It was more of a worrying landmark than it was a threat. It was the cooling tower of a nuclear reactor in the distance; Concerning, but seen so often that it melted into a background of other more demanding worries. Now, Aleph had to wonder how aware it was of the world around it. Old tricks left to their own devices sometimes got quirky and ended up developing personalities. Was the Knight aware what was happening in the arcane community? It was was a worry for later, she had enough in front of her to think about.

They passed over the north shore of the Fraser and began up the hill into South Van, passing houses, apartments, and gas stations as they went. In a little under ten minutes, they were pulling into a poorly-lit parking lot that annexed Memorial Park from the west. There were still a number of police cruisers and forensic vehicles in evidence. Off to their right, Aleph could still see the diffuse glow of the forensic tent.

Ahead of them, the shadows of bare maple trees reached up in the darkness on either side of the paved pathway. Whoever had designed this place really had a thing for tree-lined paths. While it might be great for a bit of shade in the summer, Aleph knew from her last time here that they also made ideal hiding spots for an ambush.

Just as those thoughts occurred, a faint breeze disturbed Aleph’s hair and brought to her nostrils the faint scent of alcohol and formalin.

“Hey Sam, Dimitri!” Aleph called over her shoulder, stooping over to look at the ground. “Come here and have a look at this.”

Dimitri trudged up to her with Sam close behind. He leant in to look at the bare pathway where she was pointing.

“What? It’s the ground. I’ve seen it before.”

“Look closer,” she grated.

The two men crouched in around her to examine the undistinguished bit of darkened asphalt. Being as furtive as she was able, Aleph carefully pulled Minnaloushe from where she was holding him inside her jacket and urged him into Dimitri’s arms.

“What are you…”

“Shut up. This is an ambush. Sam, give him your keys.”

“Sure,” said Sam, putting action to words. “Um, why did I give him my keys?”

“Because unless we’re up against angry robots, a Webmage and an injured Kellas Cat aren’t much good in a fight.”

“Technomancer, and I’ll kick the asses of whoever gets in my way.”

“Sure, tough guy, whatever you say. If it gets hairy I want you to take Minnaloushe back to Strangefellows and hole up there.”

“I’m not really that great in a fight either,” Sam admitted, trying to search the darkened trees, without being obvious about it. “Shouldn’t we all go back? There’s strength in numbers.”

“Maybe there is, but I have an idea that fits in nicely with your skills. Have you ever lit a plum pudding at Christmas?”

Sam looked confused.

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