Always You Part 11
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Just catching up? Read the previous installment here.
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2.
The mission was simple enough.
The second Familiar lived out in Violetsville, a good half hour drive away. You know the town: a completely barren wasteland, suitable for the background of Mad Max and for building menacing-looking shack homes if anybody had the burning desire to do so. There were a few decent places out that way, but geographically speaking, the nice bits were isolated by the shit bits.
And since Jeanette was running low on gasoline and I couldn’t be bothered with tracking down a parent for gas money, we rode in Kenneth’s car.
Oh, I’m sorry, I’m not allowed to call it a ‘car.’ Let me rephrase.
And since Jeanette was running low on gasoline and I couldn’t be bothered with tracking down a parent for gas money, we rode in Kenneth’s bright red, kicking bachelormobile.
“Damn straight,” Kenneth lauded himself while his cowlick fought the freeway winds, “And don’t you forget it.”
What, you use this bottle of ketchup to score with girls?
“Henry, this ‘bottle of ketchup’ has scored with girls, moms, sorority chicks…don’t be jelly.”
I suddenly felt bad for making Paloma sit in the back. Who knows what diseases she could be contracting at that very moment.
“Seriously, though, Henry,” he glanced at me, “The cut looks good on you. You look more like a guy with his own crew.”
My own crew. Yeah, about that.
“What did I look like before?” I regretted asking the second the words left my mouth.
“Like you went to some hipster-dipster college where wearing shoes to class is a matter of choice,” he smirked.
In my defense, not all colleges are like that. I just happened to attend one where girls saw a shortage in eligible bachelors not as something horrible and stifling to the sex drive, but rather as an excuse to never shave anything ever. Ever.
It’s funny because you think I’m kidding.
We took the curving road out of Miranda Cove and slowly but surely watched civilization take a bathroom break. The sky cleared up as we simultaneously left the requisite big-city-smog-layer. Air in my lungs actually tasted cleaner, or at least less cancerous. Take that, modern disease.
With the road wide-open for another twenty minutes at least and nothing to see but a long straight road in both directions, Kenneth felt compelled to “show off what his baby can do.”
“You don’t have to, honestly.” Don’t do it on my behalf.
“Don’t be such a chicken, Collins,” he flapped his gums to cover up the sound of a pedal literally hitting metal.
Have you ever gone above a hundred and fifty miles per hour in a car down the freeway? It doesn’t feel like an episode of Speed Racer, contrary to popular belief. It feels more like an episode of Fear Factor, except without prize money, safety harnesses, or Joe Rogan.
Ah, Joe Rogan. Talk about a badass. The dude would eat crickets on the show just to prove he could. Somewhere in Asgard, Mr. Rogan is probably toasting Thor with his beer stein made of virgin pelvises and thunder.
“So what’s the deal with the kid?”
“Who?”
He pointed to a sleeping Paloma.
“She’s a friend,” I felt my voice catch a bit. “She’s got a stake in this too.”
“Works for me,” Kenneth shrugged.
We got off the highway and navigated a few surface streets to come to a neighborhood looking like something out of a drug addict reality show. Smashed-in windows, dry soil where there should have been a lawn, and just to add to the ‘we’re going to get killed’ vibe, this neighborhood didn’t even have a sidewalk. The curb just ended by the car.
Kenneth got out quickly, cracking his knuckles and whipping out his phone. I woke up Paloma and helped her get out of the back. She wanted to help out? Well, we might need it.
“Operator, we’re here.”
The unmistakably reserved, likely annoyed voice going to his ear…
“Got it,” he slapped the phone shut and tossed it in his pocket.
“What’d she say?” I pulled any worry from my voice.
“Familiar numero tres is inside. That’s literally all we know. So, don’t get shot.”
When that didn’t make me look any more relaxed, Kenneth punched me in the arm. “Don’t worry, kid hero. We’ll get your girl back.”
Goddamnit, Kenneth, she’s not my girlfriend.
…Unfortunately.
“Hey, it’s not the universe’s fault you moved.” Thanks for pointing that fact out. It’s not like I’ve noticed that for a while now.
We walked up the blasted cement walkway to the front screen door, me and Kenneth resembling some bizarre re-imagining of Luke Skywalker and Han Solo. I hesitated at the front door, given the uncomforting surroundings; he slammed on the wall with the might of a grizzly bear on adrenaline.
“Open up,” he shouted, “We want to talk to you.”
Oh, for fuck’s sake.
He banged a few more times, my face in my hands and remembering all of the pitfalls of working with Kenneth from years back. He stopped after a couple minutes and looked at me with an expression of genuine confusion.
“There’s no one in,” he said. “Weird. Carina said this was the place—”
The door opened right into Kenneth’s jaw—
A pair of hands grabbed him and tossed him inside the house, his body crashing against the wall and rolling onto a hardwood floor—
I pulled the hands outside—
A big guy, not unlike the other ones I’ve had the pleasure of encountering on this fair vacation, but nothing I couldn’t handle. He gripped my collar and rose a balled fist—
Screw that! You just have to lock his wrist in, turn slightly to break it, and smash your elbow against his nose to send Humpty-Dumpty crashing down. I pulled the door all the way open and rushed in, Paloma close behind.
Cue another of the generic mook squad flying into the [rather depressing] living room face-first, busting up both a bookshelf and his aforementioned face. Kenneth’s punching arm had only gotten better in the passing years.
After the requisite minute passed when we could be sure nothing else would come at us, we dropped our fists and surveyed the room. Evangeline’s place had a decent décor to hide the constant drug smoking; this place was just drugs. Half-finished lines of cocaine lay on the coffee table, with more in bags on the couch. An electric scale lay haphazardly on top of some unwashed dishes, and upside down.
“You dare,” a girl’s raspy voice choked at us, “You dare bring a vessel into my house?!”
When she finally came into sight, the second Familiar was a sight to behold; only, I mean that in the most disappointing way. Belly spilling out over hilariously tight jeans, black hair grease-ridden, and about as tall as me, she looked far less than happy to see us.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said.
Kenneth took the floor: “You must be the Familiar. We need to speak with you. It’s about tomorrow’s events.”
“I have a name, assholes,” she groaned, “I’m Samantha.”
Samantha promptly finished the lines and sat on a crushed-in sofa.
“You hurt my boys,” she mused.
Yeah, well, they came at us first. It’s not my fault that they can’t keep up.
Aww, look at me, sounding all big and bad.
“Let me guess,” she said slowly, “Zack Forest sent you here? He’s got your friend hostage?”
Hey, look! Somebody actually reads this thing!
“How did you know that?” Kenneth asked.
“Evangeline can see the state of reality, so she knows when things end, right?” She sounded almost motherly, if my mom snorted crack cocaine. “I’m the opposite. I see exact events, kids. Exact events.”
“But you don’t know when they’ll happen.”
Paloma said something helpful. She’s trying.
Not that Samantha appreciated it—
“Get that thing out of my house, Henry Collins,” She roared. “You should have known better. Do it.”
“I don’t know what you—“
“Out!”
Before I could make a scene of it, Paloma had already left the building. Somebody needed a dose of self-esteem.
“What was that about?” I asked when the door closed. “She’s just a kid. She didn’t beat your guys up, we did. What’s your problem?”
“My problem is that she’s a vessel. You did know that, right?”
Know what?
She motioned for us to sit on the couch. We did.
Samantha propped her feet up and stretched wide. Hopefully she wouldn’t go all…well, drug-addict-y until we left.
“She wasn’t going to tell you, so I will. She’s a Familiar.”
Come again?”
“Or at least, she could be. The kid’s so blank because she doesn’t have…what the fuck, let’s call it a ‘soul’. She’s trying to bond to you because it’s what Familiars do, but she can’t.”
Hold up. We’ve had a kinda-sorta-not-really Familiar the whole time?
“Pretty much,” Sam sniffled, “And now I’m going to tell you she’s the key to this whole thing.”
“What do you mean, key?” Kenneth asked. He could be professional when he wanted to, despite how only two of the people in this room could even spell ‘professional’.
Samantha groaned again. She must have been in the middle of something, like probably more illegal chemicals. “Like I said, I’m going to tell you.
“Now, you’re going to tell Zack Forest that the last Familiar works in Miranda Cove. He’ll rush out to get her, probably tonight, and that’s when you’ll have your shot.”
We’ll have our shot?
“You’ll have to kill him.”
Oh, wait. She meant, like, literally “shoot him”.
Go figure.
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Read the next installment here.
