24 – The Maggots of Myrk

It only took six hours before things went to shit.

“That’s the twelfth cop car that’s gone in the opposite direction from us,” Daniel commented as Leslie pulled his oversized truck off to the side of the road, making way for the emergency vehicles. “Thirteenth… fourteenth,” he added as two more blazed through an intersection ahead of them.

Erika watched them go, eyes drifting up to the turbulent column of smoke stretching up to the clouds.

Leslie started pulling back into the street, only to jerk the wheel back to the side as the loud horn of a firetruck blared.

“And the fifth firetruck,” Daniel added, watching it swerve into the oncoming lane to avoid a group of cars stopped at a light. “Are we sure we’re headed in the right direction?”

Leslie waited an extra minute, double-checking over his shoulder to ensure the coast was clear. “The Eclipse runs the cops—or at least, they work with them. Presumably they’re handling whatever problems are going on in that direction. I doubt we have much to offer that they can’t work out themselves.”

“I can’t get a hold of The Adjustment,” Erika said, wondering if there was a point to sending off another text. “I imagine she’s busy with whatever those cops are dealing with.”

Her phone remained remarkably inert, considering that the city was in a state of chaos. Shelter in place orders repeated over and over again on news reports and emergency broadcasts, yet none were all that specific about what was going on, saying an incursion of dangerous migrant wildlife in the streets required professional handling. Social media was a little more informative: the metal birds appeared around the city, but most of the focus was on the mass of maggots swarming out from a department store near the trainyard.

The Hunters were all aware. Rick, Sofia, Anna, and Daniel’s elder brother were all en route to the museum. The Puppet was on their way too, though only The Warrior and The Stalker, along with a few cultists; The Strategist wasn’t up for a fight and The Healer apparently did not get out of bed for minor apocalypses.

However, none from The Eclipse, The Church, or The Castle had tried to contact her.

The Castle, most of all, should have called. They were the ones who put the problem on her shoulders. Were they angry she had sat around for too long, trusting in The Adjustment’s assurance that things were being worked on? Erika didn’t know, and the not-knowing left her feeling worse than any accusation could have.

It probably didn’t help that Erika had shattered another chain.

She didn’t know how many chains were left, and that was starting to make her nervous. Knowing The Mummy’s goons could pop out of the woodworks, spirit her off to that prison, and then trick or otherwise force her into breaking another chain had her teeth on edge.

The monk implied that they would leave her alone between chain breakings, making her wonder if it took time and effort to make those mini-chains.

Hopefully, they wouldn’t have another prepared so soon, because Erika intended to break a whole lot of shit tonight.

She couldn’t do anything about the chains right now, but she could at least help fight the fires she had inadvertently started.

Her eyes flicked up to the billowing smoke in the distance before she shook the guilt off and focused on what she could do here and now.

A buzz brought Erika’s attention back to her phone. “The Puppet just arrived. They say things look calm in the area for now.”

“That makes me think we’re headed to the wrong place even more,” Daniel said.

“Unless something changed, that statue and its door will still be there. I don’t know about you, but I’m glad for it; I don’t want to force myself through a door swarming with those things.”

“It’s alright to be nervous,” Leslie rumbled from the front seat, patting his son on the shoulder.

“I’m not—”

“We’re here,” Leslie interrupted, pulling up alongside a familiar black SUV—the same one The Stalker used the last time she visited the museum. “No streetside parking?”

“If the cops have time to ticket you tonight, things clearly aren’t as apocalyptic as they look,” Erika said as she kicked open the door.

With a snort, Leslie looped a rifle over his shoulders and picked up his sawed-off shotgun from between the seats.

They didn’t approach the SUV right away, stopping just before it at two other vehicles, one small sedan and Anna’s motorcycle. The owner of the latter approached right away, clad in leathers, with a concerned look on her face.

Leslie clapped a reassuring hand to her shoulder. “Your mother is home with Piper right now. There were no issues on the way.”

“Okay… okay, good.”

“If you want to go be with her—”

“No,” Anna stopped him with a firm tone in her voice. “Rick filled me in. Sounds like this shit is bigger than a little haunting. If someone doesn’t take care of it, we’d be in danger anyway.”

“Seems like The Eclipse should handle this,” Rick said, approaching from the sedan with his fingers fidgeting over the handle of his sheathed sword. Sofia moved behind him, eyes twitching back and forth.

Alongside them, Daniel’s muscular elder brother stepped away from the sedan’s trunk, brandishing far more tactical-looking gear than their father’s rugged game hunter equipment. He even had goggles with several lenses mounted on his head, though he wore the front flipped up, leaving his eyes visible. “Erika. Dan,” he greeted, eyes lingering on his brother. He opened his mouth as if he were about to ask something, then thought better of it.

“The Eclipse is busy fighting symptoms and public perception,” The Warrior called out with a boisterous grin on her face.

“Wonder how they’re going to cover this one up,” Daniel muttered.

“Oh, they’ll call in help from out of town—get the entire country in on it, if they need.”

“Country? Like—”

“Every major city has a group like The Eclipse. They’re mostly independent from one another, but when big shit goes down, they’ll all work to keep things under wraps. Useless,” The Warrior spat. “With modern technology, it is only a matter of time before their little masquerade comes crumbling down.” She made a show of peering around, shooting a look at The Stalker in the process—who shook her head in the negative—before settling on Erika. “No Castle?”

“If you’re going to say told you so, go on and get it over with,” Erika grumbled. When she had called up The Warrior to ask nicely not to attack The Castle if they showed up to help, The Warrior laughed in her face.

“Rats that scurry in the shadows will not come out when the cat shows up.”

Erika blinked at the metaphor, then decided she didn’t really care about theatrics or even conversation at the moment. “Did your new catalyst work out well?”

“Wonderfully,” The Warrior grinned, waving over a cultist from the SUV. Erika recognized him as one cultist from earlier, one who had helped keep The Strategist moving. Working with Simone, they lugged over a heavy crate. “Given the short timeframe, there isn’t as much as I would have liked to have for an operation like this—and the van isn’t fixed,” she added with a scowl. “But combined with some munitions we already had, this should be enough to fight off a reasonable horde of monsters.”

After the cultists set down the crate, a light kick of The Warrior’s shoe popped it open. Black foam lined the interior, surrounding a quartet of revolvers. Each revolver had its own array of ammunition underneath, made up of three dozen bullets per array, pressed into the foam. The bullets came in a variety of colors, though a fiery red dominated most.

Erika held back her disappointment regarding the foam-to-bullet ratio. The Warrior said the bullets took time, effort, and resources, and her catalyst, while it helped, did not conjure them from nothing.

“I’m actually leery about loaning these out, but we’re low on our people at the moment,” The Warrior said, picking up one revolver. She popped it open, showing off the empty barrel, before taking up a selection of bullets—three reds, one green, one blue, and one black. “Reds are heat and fire-based. Given we’re fighting bugs, I assume fire is a good choice. Greens are toxic—don’t touch whatever comes out. Blues should freeze anything they hit, and note that we do not live in a cartoon where surviving a flash freeze is possible. Black is your I need everything in that area to die instantly bullet. I was only able to make two of those, and I’m keeping both.”

Holstering the revolver, she lightly kicked the crate toward The Hunters. “If you don’t think you can count bullets, you might want to stick with what you’ve got. If you’ve got a gun that fires .45 ACP, you can use it with these cartridges, but I wouldn’t expect your gun to survive firing a bolt of molten plasma hotter than the surface of the sun.”

The Hunters hesitated, glancing to one another. Erika could see the wariness on their faces at being presented with all this obviously dangerous equipment. Although tempted to take up one of the remaining revolvers, just to break the stalemate, Erika refrained. She had magic powers. Leslie and Anna were normal humans, and Sofia’s psychic sensing probably wasn’t much use in combat against swarms of maggots.

And whatever else they might face.

“Chop chop, don’t have all day,” The Warrior said, donning a black tactical vest over her camisole.

Leslie stepped forward, picking one of the identical revolvers from the case. He tested its weight, inspected it from end to end, and finally removed several bullets from the foam padding. Most went into his pockets, but five went into the revolver, leaving one cylinder empty, which he left in the position in front of the hammer.

“Anna?” he said, turning slightly with a second gun offered.

While they worked out the guns, Erika drifted off to the side, joining up with The Stalker. “Can you see any masked cultists, that naked chick, or anyone else concerning?”

Her eyes, already shimmering with her power, flicked to Erika before gazing off into the distance once again. “I haven’t been able to see the masked people since you broke the statue here,” she said, her voice somewhat distant.

“Weren’t you attacked by some earlier, before getting kidnapped to that other world?”

“Like, five, but they all killed themselves. Didn’t get a good look at their masks either.” Her teeth clenched. “That naked bitch pisses me off. Still can’t track her down. My one outstanding trait is that I can find anyone, and I can’t find her.”

“Don’t sell yourself short,” Erika said, clapping a hand on her shoulder. “You saved my ass from that other tattooed guy.”

The Stalker perked up, eyes losing their shimmer as she stared at Erika for an uncomfortably long time.

“You… alright there?” Erika asked, shifting away.

“Fine,” The Stalker snapped, glaring off into the distance. “I was just thinking… It doesn’t matter. Later. I should be patient right now.”

“Okay…”

“Most of The Eclipse is fighting something, but I can’t see what. Nothing near here.”

“Maggots, probably,” Erika said, glad the conversation had moved on. “Got any info on The Church or The Castle?”

“I don’t think I’ve seen anyone from The Church.” The Stalker didn’t sound confident, which Erika found odd given her skill set.

The Fixer’s words from when she asked about their robot form came back to her, a casual, offhanded comment about The Analyst’s purpose being data collection, and how her existence facilitated that with a suite of stealth abilities. So, perhaps there was someone besides the naked chick who could hide from her shimmering eyes.

“The Butler and The Maid are lurking near The Eclipse, but neither look engaged in the fight. Bet they’re waiting for a good opportunity to jump in, grab something valuable, and run away like cowards.”

“How many of The Castle have you seen before?”

The Stalker shifted. “They don’t get out much,” she answered—a non-answer.

Which just told Erika that the entirety of The Castle could be standing with The Butler at this very moment.

Leslie called out, stopping Erika from quizzing The Stalker further on what she could and could not see. “We’re ready to head in,” he said with a firm glance around.

Anna and Sofia both held pistols, the latter looking more frightened of it than of the museum, while Anna looked determined. Erika still hadn’t talked with her; too much had been going on, and too much was still going on. Rick was off to the side, conversing quietly with The Warrior, though both paused at Leslie’s words.

“My cultists will be watching our retreat,” The Warrior said, directing several of the people she brought with her. “We don’t want anything cutting us off.”

“Victor,” Leslie said, nodding to his eldest son. “You’re with them.” He looked to Daniel, but held himself back from giving a similar command.

Victor pursed his lips in disappointment, but didn’t argue, moving to join up with The Puppet’s cultists.

“Right. Guess I’m up.” Pulling a bobby pin from her pocket, Erika headed over to the museum and opened it up just like she did the first time she broke in. Remembering the alarm system, she hurried over and shut it off.

Knowing which way to go, Erika led the way through the dimly lit museum, bat in one hand and mundane 1911 from Leslie in the other. The cultists split off behind her, taking up defensive positions, while the rest of the group followed. Rick tossed his cardboard tube aside, though he left his sword sheathed. The way Daniel held Leslie’s sawed-off looked remarkably comfortable, as expected of someone raised around an armory of firearms.

“Here we are,” Erika announced as the group entered the Semblance of Man’s room. The statue was just as she had left it, more organic than it had been when she destroyed it, but otherwise unchanged.

The Warrior promptly stepped up, grazing the rim of her glasses with a finger. “I don’t feel any magic in it, though it might be more complex than a quick glance shows.”

“I’m almost certain the first version was special, but this is its replacement. Either way, we aren’t here for it,” Erika said, turning to the mural. Tucking her bat under the crook of her arm, she took her bobby pin and slid it straight into that odd rift she had found. With a breath, she twisted her wrist and broke open the doorway to the other realm.

A foul stench rushed out as the air pressure shifted, making her gag. Several coughs joined her until The Warrior stepped forward, swapped shells in her shotgun, and fired straight into the opening. A gust of wind blasted forward, carrying the smell of a crisp morning with a hint of lemony cleaning chemicals.

“It wasn’t that bad the first time around,” Erika gasped, barely getting the words out between cleansing her nose with fresh breaths.

“The first time, you said the Mother of Maggots was behind a fleshy membrane,” Rick said, coughing lightly, “which then broke.”

Erika grimaced. From his tone, Rick didn’t mean it as an accusation, but it felt like one all the same.

“No maggots swarming out,” Anna said, eyes narrowed.

The Stalker flashed a cruel grin. “Maybe they all flooded out to fight The Eclipse. Lucky us.”

The darkened realm beyond the doorway hadn’t been so dark the first time around. At the time, she had a flashlight, but several guns, all pointed toward the opening, also had flashlights mounted on them. Erika squared her shoulders, teeth grit, not about to let a little oppressive atmosphere stall her.

The upper portion of the temple wasn’t there anymore; Erika distinctly remembered shattering several pillars on her escape, just to buy herself some time, but even the rubble had been cleared away.

The Warrior pulled out another gun, this one with a wide, shotgun-like opening, but bright orange and as long as a small revolver. Making sure that everyone lowered their guns, she stepped back into the opening, raised the gun toward the sky, and fired off a blindingly bright orange flare. It jammed into the ceiling high overhead, raining down its light into the cavernous interior.

Five steps away from the doorway in, Erika spotted it—a corpse. It looked torn to pieces, eaten and scavenged, but its clothes remained intact enough for her to identify it: the postman. The one who originally brought her in there, who brought her to The Fixer, and then tried to seal the gate to keep her there. The Stalker killed him, saving Erika even back then.

Nobody had cleaned up the corpse.

“That look how you left it?” The Warrior asked.

It took a quick glance to realize that she wasn’t asking about the body. The Warrior’s eyes were off in the distance, up the steps toward the ziggurat.

While someone hadn’t cleaned away the postman, they had been hard at work on the temple. Although she hadn’t glimpsed the aftermath of its collapse, she could still see that they had cleared away the rubble, tossing it off the side of the pyramid. The gateway opening where the membrane had been was plainly visible from the pyramid’s base now, lacking the archway eaves.

A maggot crawled out, scurrying along the wall. It paused, eyeless maw aimed in their direction. Hissing and chittering, it scurried forward, leaping from the wall.

Halfway down the steps, The Stalker stepped forward, snapped her gun up, and fired without even aiming. A mundane bullet shattered a ring of teeth, then splattered black blood against the stone of the temple as the bullet exploded out the other end.

“Pathetic. These are what The Eclipse is worried about?”

A waft of foul air surged through the temple’s opening, staining the fresh air The Warrior made. Chittering accompanied the stench as dozens more maggots poked their heads over the top of the ziggurat’s steps. A handful of larger creatures, like those Erika killed in the subway, joined them, all glaring down for one, bated breath.

“I think it is the numbers that concern them,” The Warrior said with a cheery grin as she swapped shells in her shotgun. “I, on the other hand, love an enemy that lets me test out some more exciting enchantments. Dragon’s breath sounds appropriately insulting toward the actual dragon that can’t stop these monsters.” With a glowing red round loaded, she cracked the shotgun closed, aimed, and pulled the trigger.

A wall of fire engulfed the pyramid.