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"When You See the Red Buffalo"
"When You See the Red Buffalo"
1/29-1/20/2015
I.
The bar called End of the Line was well named. It was fifteen miles away from the nearest town, and towns in Wyoming were far apart in the first place. Even here in the eastern part of the state, not that far from Cheyenne, there seemed to be nothing for mile after mile but the dark sky and the snowbound ground. The road leading to the bar had been plowed, but chest-high drifts lined the road so that Jocelyn felt almost as if she were driving down a narrow tunnel with only her headlights as illumination. Finally, the road widened to end in a round parking lot still covered with a layer of snow that had been packed down by tires.
Four big pick-up trucks, one Jeep and a snowmobile were parked in front of the bar. Yellow light spilled out through wide picture windows and racuous honkytonk music echoed into the frigid night air. The End of the Line was a two story building with an addition at one end that didn't match the original construction. Pulling into the lot, Jocelyn exhaled and relaxed after the long drive through winter back roads. "End of the Line is a damn good name," she said out loud.
Knowing what conditions were going to be, the Tel Shai knight was wearing the full field suit with its heavy boots, snug pants and waist-length jacket. She pulled on the gloves and sealed them to her jacket cuffs. Jocelyn Garimara had just turned thirty, a small thin woman with rich dark brown skin and glossy straight black hair. Most Americans were puzzled by her apparance and few guessed that she was an Australian Aborigine of the Matho tribe. The fact she had almost no accent remaining after a lifetime of travel added to her ambiguity. Jocelyn reached to the seat behind her and took the helmet sitting there, lowering it over her head and closing the visor. When she sealed the helmet to the high collar of her jacket, she was completely enclosed.
Getting out, she could not even feel the vicious wind that was making the snow swirl in little eddies around the parking lot. The light enhancers in her visor had cut in automatically but she didn't really need them at the moment. Jocelyn stood by her rented car, taking her time to study the situation. There was a truck with a plow parked by the side of the bar, but no other road she could spot. Anyone entering or leaving the area had to use the way she had just come.
Walking toward the door with its blue neon sign BEER ON TAP, she reflected wryly that many women might be a little uneasy going alone into a bar way out in the wilderness at two o'clock in the morning. But then, not many knew the reassurance of having the Red Spectre waiting inside them to be unleashed. She opened the door and stepped inside. At that blast of chill with her entrance, all heads turned. Jocelyn lifted her helmet off and smiled pleasantly at the twenty people in that overheated stuffy room. The smell of beer and sweat and cigarettes slapped her senses.
Behind the bar, a fat man with a handlebar mustache grinned happily at seeing her and wiped his hands on his apron. Three men at the bar and two men playing pool glanced up in curiosity, checked her out for a moment and then went back about their business. Jocelyn took a step into the room and saw something in one corner that stopped her where she stood.
Sitting behind a round table which was covered with empty beer bottles and loose money sat an enormous man. He must have been six foot six and wide enough that an ordinary man could stand hidden behind him, but his bulk was all well defined muscle. He was wearing a plain white T-shirt stretched taut over hard pectorals and biceps, jeans and boots. The man had a busty blonde woman sitting on his lap, ripping off pieces of a hot roast beef sandwich and feeding him one bite at a time. Standing behind him, leaning on him, was a second woman with curly dark hair that almost reached her waist. She was giggling in the giant's ear.
"Galvan..." Jocelyn grumbled to herself. "Of all people.."
The big man saw her and laughed out loud. White teeth flashed in a dark beard heavily flecked with grey. Galvan had a tan somehow, even in Wyoming in the winter, and his skin was almost the same hue as his curly hair. He chewed on another piece of the sandwich, then slapped his huge hands together in a dusting motion. To the dismay of the blonde, Galvan lifted her easily off his lap and put her to one side as if she were a kitten that had fallen asleep.
"Hey, hey, HEY," she protested. "What's this?"
"It breaks my heart but I must bid you both a fond farewell," Galvan told them as he rose, towering a foot taller than either of them. "I know this woman! I am sure she comes with a storm about to break right behind her."
As the Tel Shai knight approached, helmet held in the crook of her arm, she smiled at the flustered faces of the women being so unexpectedly dismissed. "Galvan. Of all people. I suspect we are both really here for the same reason."
"Luta-Tatanka," the big Melgar answered. "The Red Buffalo of Death."
II.
It was as if he had blown a whistle to signal for silence. Everyone in that bar stopped talking and turned to stare. By coincidence, at that monent the song on the jukebox ended as well.
A man sitting at the bar lurched up and moved toward the Melgar. He was a pot-bellied hulk in a red checkered shirt and khaki pants, with a cap that had ear flaps, and he came over to jab an accusing finger at Galvan. "You have got no business saying that name."
Not imtimidated in the least, the giant smiled at that confrontation. "Kings and warlords have tried to still my voice. No one has ever been able to keep from speaking my mind."
"God knows that's true," Jocelyn added under her breath.
"You don't understand," the man went on. "I'm just looking out for you. You're bringing bad fortune down upon your own head by saying that name out loud. Don't you know what you might be calling? Don't you know what has happened out here on the high plains?"
Galvan looked down at the man, not unkindly, and held up a fist nearly as big as the man's head. "It is not I who have anything to fear."
Shaking his head, the man surveyed the bar and saw everyone was listening. "Buddy, you don't understand. This is for your good. I shouldn't even be saying this much. Nine people have died since last winter, I don't want to be the tenth and neither do you. When you see the red buffalo, your time is up."
The big Melgar frowned, lines deepening in his face. "I thank you for your concern, my friend. But I have been slaying monsters since before you were born. Watch." He dug through the loose money on the table in front of him and came up with a coin. "See. A silver dollar." As easily as snapping his fingers, Galvan held the coin between thumb and forefinger and bent it in half so the edges touched. He handed the silver dollar to the amazed man and smiled.
"I.. Whoa. Well, I tried. I'm going. Stan, you coming with me?"
"Not me," answered a voice from the bar. "I just refreshed my glass, Joey. Hang out a while yet."
"No. No." The man dropped the bent coin on the table with a clang, grabbed his heavy down-filled coat from the chair where he had been sitting and yanked it on. "We all know the curse that's on our heads. I'm not waiting until this bar gets trampled to the ground."
As the crowd watched in silence, the man called Joey zipped up his coat and pulled leather gloves from a pocket. He went out, closing the door behind him with a slam that made everyone jump. After a long uncomfortable moment, the bartender came out to cross over and put money in the jukebox. The familiar reassuring voice of Waylon Jennings filled the room. The people made a show of starting conversations again, and the two men at the pool table racked the balls for another game.
Jocelyn Garimara picked up the silver dollar and examined it. "Nice trick."
"I bore the Legacy of Malberon long before Sulak," answered Galvan as he found a bottle on the table that was still half full. "Mayhap King Holmir ordered me to step down as Champion to make way for the next generation, but I still have a few good years left in these old bones."
"We only met once before and there wasn't time to chat," she said as she started to pull out a chair for herself. "I'm sorry I chased away your... companions."
Galvan glanced across the room to where the two women were at the bar. One shot him a venomous look and turned her back. "Ah, so it goes," he said. "Still, I enjoy lovely company even now."
"Don't waste your pick-up lines on me," Jocelyn scoffed. "Listen, we've been following the strange deaths in this area. Sable will send the rest of our team tomorrow but I came ahead to scout things out. What do you know?"
"You are all business, I see. So be it. You no doubt are familiar with the belief that a white bison is good luck and a spiritual blessing? But the rare red bull is a truly bad omen-"
His words were cut off by a long ringing scream from outside. The door slammed open and the man called Joey staggered in as if he had been hit by lightning. He crashed up against a table and barely held himself up.
"I saw it! It looked me in the eye the way a person does!" he yelled before slumping to the floor. Even as he fell, Jocelyn had rushed over to support him. She looked up in surprise. "He doesn't have a pulse. He's not breathing."
"When you see the red buffalo..." someone muttered.
The bartender had hurried over and was crouching nearby as Jocelyn straddled the man and began CPR. "Miss.. miss, I'm sorry, that won't do any good. I already called. It'll take nearly an hour for an ambulance to get out here. The sheriff's on his way too."
Ignoring him, Jocelyn kept up the CPR more than half an hour before finally giving up. Someone helped her to her feet and she swung her aching arms. "Did he have a history of heart problems? High blood pressure?"
"Not that I ever heard him mention," said the bartender, who had brought a sheet from the back room to cover the body.
Taking Jocelyn to one side, Galvan told her in a low tone, "I looked around. No footprints in the snow of any animal, bison or otherwise. In case you were wondering."
"The thought had occured to me. Thank you. Now I wonder what he saw or thought he saw."
It was nearly dawn by the time the sheriff and his deputy were done examining the scene. They released all the patrons of the bar, who trudged out wearily to their trucks to go home. The corpse had been taken by the EMTs, statements had been made and signed by everyone. The sheriff had never heard of the Kenneth Dred Foundation, and although he accepted Jocelyn's credentials with the NYPD and Department 21 Black, he wasn't impressed by them. "New York's half a world away."
As the bartender locked everything up and retired to his own rooms in the back, Galvan led Jocelyn up a flight of open stairs on the outside of the building. "I'm renting a room here for the moment," he explained. "Your team is on their way here today?"
"Not until late afternoon or early evening," she answered. Jocelyn had fetched her knapsack with its change of clothes and personal items from her car, thinking of washing up and brushing her teeth. She went inside with him, sat down in a chair, tugged off her heavy boots with a sigh of relief and shrugged out of the field jacket with its inner armor layer. She was wearing a black crewneck shirt beneath. "Oh, that's better. I'm so tired."
Galvan had yanked off his own work shoes and wool socks to stretch out on the double bed. He almost filled it. "Might as well get some sleep. Our crusade will start up soon enough."
"OUR work?" she repeated. Jocelyn came over and sat down on the edge of the bed he left unoccupied. "Are we teaming up then?"
"That's enough Midnight War for one night," Galvan said with a prolonged yawn.
As if not realizing what she was doing, Jocelyn laid down next to the huge Melgar, feeling the comfort of the warmth and solidity of his massive form. She turned to face him. "You're right," she said drowsily and was surprised when they started to kiss.
III.
At the diner in the town of Chancellor, twenty miles from the scene of the weird death, Jocelyn Garimara worked on her omelet and sipped her lemon tea. Glancing down at her body, at the modest ledge of her breasts and the lean thighs beneath the field suit she wore again, she remembered what that same body had been doing a few hours ago and she felt her cheeks burn hotly.
She had been soured on sex by what the Sphinx had demanded of her while she was in his service. That seemed so long ago now. She had still been a teenager. Recent dates and even a brief romance or two had been just surface interactions that went nowhere. Jocelyn felt nothing in common with American blacks. Their culture was not hers, she did not feel any kinship or sense of common history. She was slightly more attracted to American white men, especially educated ones who tended to think about the same questions that troubled her. But even there, the secrets that she had to keep about her Red Spectre and her membership at Tel Shai always meant a certain distance between her and any men she might be interested in. It was a problem many in the Midnight War faced.
But last night had opened all the doors. The long slow lovemaking with a man who was both gentle and apparently tireless had changed everything. Jocelyn felt so peaceful and at ease that it bothered her in a way. She had forgotten what the afterglow felt like.
Across from her in the booth, Galvan was contentedly finishing his second plate of pancakes and sausage, gulping down juice and coffee. Of course, she thought, he eats the way he drinks and does everything else. But he is not Human, he is a Melgar. Their bodies were more robust and durable than Humans, with an average lifespan well over two hundred years. He looked as if he were a well-preserved fifty or so, with grey in his hair and beard, lines in his weathered cheeks. But she knew he had been born in the days when Wyoming was populated by fur trappers and settlers and when cowboys were still herding cattle drives.
Seeing Galvan smile at her as he wiped his mouth with a napkin, Jocelyn spoke for the first time in several minutes. "There's something I've never been clear on. The Legacy of Malberon. One man and one woman in each generation of Melgarin develops incredible strength. This was Malberon's plan to ensure that his Race would always have a champion."
"True enough," replied Galvan. He picked at his now-empty plate as if disappointed there was nothing more remaining. "What is your question, then, Joss?"
She started to object to receiving the nickname 'Joss' but let it go. "I just had a vague idea that one champion replaced the next, like a title being passed on. I've met Sulak. He is still active and roaming the adjacent realms. And here you are as well. It's something new to take in."
"You have touched on a sore point with me," Galvan said in a pleasant tone that did not sound at all annoyed. "Sulak won the tournament we both participated in, but on points from the judges. His style and form were considered more accurate than mine. And he scored points on sparring with multiple opponents. I was asked by our King to step down and hand the white mantle to Sulak. I did so, grudgingly of course."
"I hadn't known any of this."
He waved a broad hand dismissingly. "Few Humans even have heard of the Melgarin, much less of our history and customs. You are exceptionally well versed in lore, Joss. Never the less, what comforts me is this. Even though he is fifty years my junior, I am still much stronger than Sulak. I know he must seem impressive to Humans, but believe me... if the need arose, I could tie Sulak into a knot."
'And I wonder what Sulak would say about that,' she thought to herself. The Link at her belt buzzed. She unclipped the electronic device and said, "Excuse me. Hello. Sable? Where are you? I see...." Jocelyn had a brief conversation and then returned the Link to its holster. I told them it would be best if we met at the End of the Line, where they can look for clues. Are you ready to leave?"
"Oh, certainly," the giant Melgar said. He had put a blue flannel shirt on over his white T-shirt and now he dug in its pocket to leave a few twenties carelessly on the table. "I have only met your captain, Sable, and yourself before, but I have heard of this Demrak Jin. I think working with a Gelydra might be well, interesting." He heaved up from the booth, so big and solid that more than a few patrons of the diner stared openly.
As she reached for her field jacket, Jocelyn frowned. The animosity between Melgar and Gelydra went back centuries. Mostly it was still bitter because of the 1929 occupation of Ulgor by forces from Androval. The deaths and suffering were still fresh for beings who lived as long as they did. She hoped Denmrak Jin was on good behavior today.
It was a bright clear day and the sunlight on all the whiteness produced enough glare that Jocelyn slid on her polarized sunglasses. Driving on snow-covered roads back toward the bar, they chatted about Australia. It seemed that Galvan had spent most of World War Two there and in New Zealand, fighting the Japanese invaders. He said he had loved the country and found the Australians' rough, unpretentious nature easy for him to get along with.
"I'm afraid I never did get to spend any time with your people," Galvan said. "There was the time Mark Drum and I saw what lives inside Ayers Rock. We stayed with Abos for a week in the desert, they were generous hosts, but that was my only experience with them. I know your kin have suffered great injustice.. even more than the American Indians did."
"You got that right," she answered without noticeable emotion. "My grandmother was part of the Stolen Generation. She was taken as a child to live as a maid for a white family on the other side of the country. Poor Gram, she never saw her family again. The only good that came out of that grief was that her daughters went to school and ended up with decent jobs."
"And you? You sound cultured, did you go to college?"
"No," Jocelyn said. "I have my own story. When I was twelve, the Red Spectre manifested from my body..." She broke off and was silent. Galvan did not press her to continue.
To break the uncomfortable silence, Jocelyn asked, "Did you come to Wyoming specifically because of this Red Buffalo?"
"Oh, no, no," Galvin said. "I always wanted to see Yellowstone. My plan was to camp out in the Park but I was sidetracked when I heard about the strange deaths." He smiled over at her with a complete lack of self-consciousness. "When this is all over, perhaps you would like to join me there. Yellowstone in winter..."
"We'll see," she said. "There's the End of the Line and what looks like an SUV. Seems like my teammates got here before we did."
The bar was closed and the truck usually parked behind it was gone. Standing in the lot were three figures, a man and a woman in the black field suits and a woman in a skintight grey outfit. Jocelyn pulled over next to the SUV, put her helmet on and sealed her suit. As she opened her door and stepped out, the green readout on the inside of her visor told her the windchill was twelve degrees Fahrenheit. No wonder her teammates had also decided to wear the field suits, which kept them comfortable.
The KDF team gathered close together. They started communicating through their helmets at first. Lauren Sable Reilly and Timothy Limbo were in the field suits, greeting Jocelyn and asking about the situation. Then Galvan got out of the passenger side of the rented car. He was wearing only work boots, jeans and a red flannel shirt over a white T-shirt, bareheaded, not seeming to notice the cold. He raised a big hand in greeting, teeth flashing in the dark beard. "Well met indeed!" he boomed.
Standing slightly apart from the others was a small slim woman wearing boots, snug pants and long-sleeved tunic all made of grey sharkhide. Sheathed across her back in an ivory scabbard was a wide-bladed knife about three feet long. She wore nothing on her head. Her Race of Gelydrim lived in Arctic waters without protection. Demrak Jin's stiff short white hair bristled in the freezing wind and her usually sullen face was openly hostile as she spotted the huge man coming up behind Jocelyn.
"Galvan!" Demrak Jin spat. "A Melgar, here? What are you up to?" Her right hand moved up behind her shoulder to grasp the hilt of her weapon.
Standing next to her, Sable put a restraining hand on the Gelydra's forearm. "Stand down," she said, speaking openly through the speaker in her helmet's jawbar. "Galvan has worked with me before. He's not the enemy."
"I know the Melgarin," Jin insisted. "You have to watch them. They will get your horse pregnant and steal your dishes if given half a chance."
Hearing this, Jocelyn Garimara stiffened visibly and stepped close to the giant. "Galvan is here to help investigate the strange deaths, Jin. Let's show some respect."
"Very well. If you say so." The Gelydra pointed an accusing finger. "But I have my eye on you, Melgar."
Galvan did not seem put off by this at all. He laughed and moved forward to loom up over the KDF team. "Good to see you again, Sable. You have heard what happened here last night?"
"Yes, we received a report from Jocelyn while she was watching the sheriff question everyone." The team captain was a woman of medium height and build but nothing could be seen of her features because of the visored helmet. "Glad to have your help. We could use some raw strength on this team. I have been searching the immediate area using my enhanced senses. Over there, by the bar, there are faint traces on the snow."
"Hoofprints, I take it? I couldn't find any," the big Melgar said.
"Hoofprints indeed," replied Sable. She pointed at what seemed to be a perfectly smooth area of snow that had had its surface melt a bit in sunlight and then freeze again to leave a glaze of ice. "Very faint, almost microscopic in fact. Tracks of an American Bison, a male considerably larger than the biggest recorded specimen. And yet, the tracks appear to have been made with the lightest pressure possible."
"That's weird," Timothy said, speaking for the first time. "I thought a big buffalo weighed about a ton."
"They do. This is not a natural beast but a gralic construct of some sort. I wish you all could see these tracks. There are a dozen of them here but no trail coming or going. The beast that poor man saw did not come here by walking. It just appeared and disappeared." Sable shook her helmeted head. "My guess is that the Red Buffalo is like Bakwanga's Black Lion that we used to have on our team. It's not a living beast."
Making a circle around the parking lot, she pointed to a series of footprints leading from tire tracks to the front door of the bar. "Only his toes left marks. Joseph Barrie was running for his life. You can see where he dropped his keys. A police officer picked them up when they took his truck."
"You have better eyes than I do," Galvan said. "Very impressive."
Beside his captain, Timothy held up an open hand and three small tornadoes of faint vapor spun in from different directions to hover around him. "No wonder my caspers couldn't find anything. No trail to find. You can go, fellas." The three swirling shapes popped out of existence.
Galvan said, "Now THAT is something new. I have never seen anything like those little dust devils before."
"My friendly ghosts," Timothy told him. "They can go anywhere and I can see whatever they see. Sometimes they seem to get ideas of their own. Hi, my name is Timothy Limbo, well Timothy Lambert actually but that's how I'm known in Midnight War."
The Melgar reached over to shake hands. "Galvan son of Merendor. Former Champion of Androval. Sable and Jocelyn here I have already met."
"And WE know each other well enough," muttered Demrak Jin, standing with arms folded across her chest.
"Now, Jin," Sable said mildly. "I believe the bar does not open until four this afternoon and we can come back. For right now, I have arranged a meeting with a local historian, Mrs Eleanor Duggan. She has written some interesting articles about Old West folklore. All right, Jocelyn and Galvan, if you want to follow us to town?"
"Sure," Jocelyn answered. As she turned to head back to her rented car, she heard Demrak Jin call a warning, "I'd make that Melgar sit in the back if I were you. Away from women."
"Well, I'm NOT you!" snapped Jocelyn, surprising everyone. "Learn some manners, Jin." She stomped off to the car and waited for Galvan to join her before getting behind the wheel.
As they watched her drive away down the narrow road, Timothy whistled. "Huh. Seems to me like she sorta likes that big galoot."
"Our only concern should be finding this Red Buffalo and ending its menace," Sable said. "Come on, team."
IV.
The Town of Chancellor Public Library had originally been a three-story residential home built in the days of extended families and several servants. It had obviously been upgraded recently, with a concrete access ramp for wheelchairs, a glass front door that slid open automatically and five computers in a row for patrons to use. On the second floor was a Community Room, where everything from local quilting clubs to after-school tutoring went on. Sable had arranged for her team to meet here. A folding card table and seven chairs had been brought in and they assembled there, closing the soundproofed door behind them.
Seventy-one years old but alert and energetic, Eleanor Duggan had a cloud of permed silvery hair around her face. She was well dressed and groomed, and made a good impression. The historian had three books to her credit, although they had been published by a small outfit which only sold through the mail. She also had more than two dozen articles in various journals and magazines about local history and folklore. Wrapped in a red and white sweater too large for her, Duggan sat at the head at the table and smiled blissfully at her visitors.
Sable had removed her helmet and unzipped her field suit jacket. She was a naturally attractive woman who seemed unconcerned with her looks. The straight black hair was brushed straight back from a high forehead, the large dark eyes and full lips wore so little make-up that it wasn't clear she had any on. As she shook hands with the elderly woman, Sable's slight overbite made her smile very appealing. "Thank you for coming out to meet us on such a cold day," she said.
Mrs Duggan grinned back at her. "Oh my dear. I am so excited about this. Tel Shai knights! I had never dared hope to meet any in the flesh. What a thrill. And you, my dear-" here she nodded at Demrak Jin- "Forgive me, but you ARE from Ulgor, are you not?"
"I'm a Gelydra," Jin admitted, trying not to scowl. Somewhere when they had stopped for gas, she had purchased a small bag of pretzels and now she chewed on them without thinking to offer any to anyone. "The hair gives me away, eh?"
"Oh, yes, it's so distinctive. And you sir, you are a Melgar I believe. The famous Sulak, perhaps?"
Everyone snorted and tried not to laugh. The giant smiled politely and said, "No, ma'am. I am Galvan son of Merendor, a Champion of Androval but not Sulak in any way."
"Oh. My apologies. Well. I have thousands of questions for you all but I gather you are here to ask me questions instead." The woman folded her withered hands in front of her. On her left hand, a wedding band of plain gold caught the light.
Sable leaned forward. "When everything is done, I promise we will meet for an afternoon and discuss anything you like. But right now, matters are urgent. There was another Red Buffalo death last night."
"Yes. Poor Joey. He was a good-natured old soul who didn't ask for much in life. I expect you want to know about the Red Buffalo, though. Luta-Tatanka was the Sioux name for the apparition. The first mention we have of it is from an 1854 letter. The beast has appeared many times since then, not at any set intervals or for any specific reason. It just shows up and always leaves death and destruction behind." She sighed unhappily. "Often, Luta-Tatanka is a solid creature seemingly of flesh and blood. It is big enough that a tall man cannot see over its hump. Both its hide and its fur are a bright red, and it has black and shiny horns. The beast has been known to trample lone travelers, to knock over autos and kill the people inside, to crash through picture windows and demolish the interior of homes."
"Yikes," Timothy Limbo said without realizing it.
"But just as often, it seems to be a phantom, just a vision seen in the distance by those about to die. The people who spot Luta-Tatanka often die of sheer terror... as would be the case with Joey last night. Or they run in panic off a cliff or mishandle a rifle so that they shoot themselves. Then the beast seems to be an avenging spirit. The saying goes, 'When you see the Red Buffalo, you have seen your last sunrise.'"
Everyone sat hushed, waiting for her to continue. After a long pause, Sable asked, "Are there any stories of how this monster came to be? An origin, so to speak?"
"Yes," Mrs Duggans answered. "The tales tell of a Kanut shaman named Mountain Cat who invoked his tribe's own particular gods to seek revenge for being driven off their lands. According to the legend, Mountain Cat fasted and prayed and cut his chest and arms until he had no blood left. But from the pool of blood around his body, a red shape took form and that night Luta-Tatanka rampaged through a farm developed on land where Mountain Cat had grown up. The farmer and his wife, three children and a hired hand were all found nearly flattened by sharp hooves in the morning." The old woman indicated a thick manila folder beside her. "I have photostats of the story from the WIDE VALLEY GAZETTE, October 31, 1854."
"Hmmm," Demrak Jin muttered. "Where can we find some of these Kanut people? We should have words with them."
Mrs Duggan raised her shoulders and lowered them. "They are an extinct nation. The last full blood Kanut died in 1958, I believe. All that is left are some blankets and wood carvings and jewelry the tribe had made." She hesitated, then went on, "But I suppose there is still Kenny Akecheta."
"Akecheta... that sounds familiar, somehow."
"It means fighter or troublemaker," the old woman said. "He's a local boy, grew up here in town and was in the Army for two years. Kenny claims to be one-quarter Kanut, the rest being Lakota, and he is very interested in his Kanut heritage. Over the years, he has done a lot of digging in the hills to the west of here and come up with arrowheads, pottery and so forth which are definitely Kanut."
Sable asked, "Sounds like it might be a good idea to talk with him, as well."
Mrs Duggans pushed back her chair and got up. She moved just a bit stiffly but she was steady on her feet. "Let me think where he is staying," she said. "North of town, I think. To be honest, Kenny became much too bitter and obsessed with how the Kanut had been mistreated by the settlers. I found his company so unpleasant that I haven't spoken to him in at leaat a year." The old woman walked over to the large double windows that showed the snow-covered woods behind the library property and gazed out.
Uncertain whether the meeting was over or not, some of the KDF members stood up as well. Sable in particular took a few steps to stand behind Mrs Duggan while waiting for an answer. A second later, Mrs Duggan gasped and shouted, "Look! Look, there it is!"
In a flash, Sable was beside the elderly woman, one hand pressed against her back, staring down at the huge shape standing on the edge of the parking lot. Fourteen feet long, massive and ominous, the bright crimson animal raised its head and stared up to meet their gaze with eyes which held a lambent glow. It was a stunning sight in the bright afternoon sunlight. As Sable and Duggan gaped, the Red Buffalo raised one front hoof and stamped it.
Still at the table, Jocelyn Garimara slumped forward and her head dropped as if she had passed out. Erupting up from her body with a hissing crackle, a dark red outline in her shape hovered in the air for a second and then flashed across the community room to pass harmlessly through the window as if made only of light itself. The Red Spectre hurtled down to crash directly into the Luta-Tatanka like a lightning bolt striking, and both entities vanished with a peal of thunder that rattled the windows of the library.
Everyone had hurried over to watch, but it was Galvan who had the presence of mind to carry a folding metal chair with him. The big Melgar placed it beind the old woman and eased her down to sit on it. "There. Easy now," he said with a solid reassuring hand on her shoulder.
"I saw the Red Buffalo..." gasped Eleanor Duggan, breathing rapidly. "It looked up at me. It's my doom."
Sable turned and spoke in a stern tone, "And you also saw our own Gammon chase it away. That creature is not invincible."
As she spoke, the life-sized gralic being swirled together outside where it had been dispersed and flew in through the window to merge again with its host. Jocelyn took a deep breath and sat up, shaking her head as if to clear it.
"Are you okay, Jocelyn?" Sable called over.
"Yes.. yes, captain. I'm good." The Australian woman rose and came over to join them all. "Whew. That hurt. My Gammon and that monster canceled each other out. That has only happened once or twice before. It felt like sticking your finger in an electric outlet."
"I saw it, I saw it," Mrs Duggan repeated.
Galvan went down on one knee in front of the elderly woman and smiled. "We all saw it. None of us are going to die today. You will live. The Red Buffalo has met people who are not afraid of it." The big bearded face showed complete confidence. "These are my words. Evil is powerless against courage. I swear to you that my friends and I will destroy this nuisance once and for all."
She gazed into his face and visibly relaxed. "Are you sure?"
"Absolutely. The Red Buffalo has met its own doom. I swear it!" The Melgar rose up to tower over everyone in the room. He met Jocelyn's eyes and said, "Your Red Spectre is indeed an awesome force, Joss."
"'Joss?'" repeated Timothy Limbo to himself.
"All right, team. Stand by for orders." Sable went to the table, fetched her helmet and zipped up her field suit jacket. "Mrs Duggan is still shaken and I don't blame her. One of us will stay with her at least tonight. Jocelyn, that's your assignment."
"What? Captain, we just saw my Gammon can neutralize the Red Buffalo. Shouldn't I be part of the hunt?"
"What we just saw shows that you are best qualified of all of us to protect Mrs Duggan. It's not enough to drive the beast away, we need to meet it when it's solid and end its menace," said Sable firmly.
"No, wait a minute-" the Australian woman began but she was cut off.
"Jocelyn Garimara. That is a lawful order from your Tel Shai captain." Lauren Sable Reilly seldom felt she had to stress her authority over her team. "Stay with her until you are relieved. Understood?"
"Yes, captain," Jocelyn answered in a civil tone. "I see your reasoning."
"The rest of us will go visit this Kenny Akecheta," Sable continued. "With Galvan's strength as an asset, we should be able to confront this beast if it appears."
"I am well known as a slayer of monsters," the big Melgar said. "The two-headed bull, the winged serpents, the Shark That Walks."
"Agreed. But! Galvan and Jin... I want no friction between you two. You will work together without snarky little comments. We are going into serious danger here. Am I understood?"
"Very well," Demrak Jin answered. "I hear and obey."
"Good. Mrs Duggan, do you have a car outside?"
"Yes. My faithful Olds. I'm still driving."
"Jocelyn will accompany you, if you agree," Sable said. "Do you want her company and protection?"
"Oh heavens, yes. I feel much safer with the host of a Red Spectre beside me." The old woman turned to the unhappy Australian standing behind her. "We can stop at the Chinese restaurant on the way to my house and get some take-out. Sound good?"
"Fine with me, I'm starving." Jocelyn tucked her helmet in the crook of her arm and nodded to her teammates before leaving with Eleanor Duggan, but her eyes moved to meet Galvan's for a second. Sable noticed as she noticed everything.
V.
On the ride north, Sable drove the SUV while Demrak Jin sat in stony silence in the passenger seat. Behind them, Timothy and Galvan were getting along well, chatting happily in a way that made Jin fume even more.
"So, what I've always wondered is how you guys with the Legacy of Malberon get so buff?" the young blond man was asking. "I mean, you're strong enough that lifting weights must do nothing for you. Do you like, roll giant boulders up hills or something?"
Galvan laughed. "The big muscles aren't strictly necessary. You've met Princess Valera. She has strength in a class with Sulak and nearly equal to mine. Yet she looks like a normal woman in good shape. The truth is that we Melgarin are by nature inclined to be muscular with low body fat. Our testosterone levels are high."
In front, the Gelydra woman mumbled sourly to herself, and Sable lightly tapped her arm in reprimand.
"You have to do SOME exercise, right?" Timothy continued.
"True enough, Tim. Running and stretching. We also have a system where we pit one group of muscles against another. Trying to raise an arm while holding it down with the other arm, for example, or doing the same with our legs. This has the advantage it can be done anywhere."
"Oh, isometrics. That's cool."
Sable interrupted, "I'm pulling over here. Mrs Duggan told us that Kenny Akecheta lives up this dirt road. Doesn't look like it's been plowed since the snowfall two days again."
"If we get stuck, rest assured I can simply push us out," Galvan said cheerfully from the back seat.
"I appreciate the confidence," Sable replied. "Very well, let's see." She turned onto a narrow unpaved road not much more than a trail and headed up it. On either side were pine trees standing starkly up from the snow, but the undergrowth was buried.
Ahead of them was a small clearing that had a strange scorched area to one side. It looked as if someone had built a series of bonfires there over a long period of time. Nerarby was a battered Ford Explorer and a shack that seemed to have been handmade. Simple wooden planks nailed together, a plain door and no windows, tar paper covering the roof. Atop one corner, a steel pipe protruded and grey smoke seeped from it. The smell of burning wood was noticeable.
Hanging on the door was a large dreamcatcher, its circle with the web within made of leather strips over a bent twig. It was the only decoration or identification to be seen. Parking near the truck, they all got out and approached the shack. It was warmer than the day before because the wind had died down, so Sable and Timothy left the visors up on their helmets. Neither Galvan nor Demrak Jin seemed to even notice the freezing air.
"Can you send one of your little pals in there?" asked Sable.
"Sure. Looks like plenty of cracks for access." Timothy Limbo held up his hand, palm up, and one of the tiny vortices spun into life over it. "Go take a peek, okay?"
Even when watching for them, the caspers were difficult to see. This one whirled through the air and into the shack through a hole in a rotted board near the ground. Timothy got a distracted expression and said, "He's in there. Appears to be drawing in chalk on a piece of cardboard.. what? Get back here!"
As he spoke, the casper flashed through the bright winter sunlight and orbited around Timothy as if for protection. "He knew my boy was there. Beats me how, but this guy just sat up and looked right at my casper. It's okay, buddy, you can go now."
The front door slammed open and Kenny Akecheta stormed out. He was not a big man, wiry rather than muscular, wearing a heavy quilted jacket and denim jeans. If not for acne scars, he would have been a presentable figure, with thick shiny black hair worn long over a square face. At the moment, all any of them noticed was the fury in his expression.
"Get out of here! Nobody said you could come here." He stomped toward the four strangers. The massive bulk of Galvan seemed not to impress him at all.
"This is not your private property," Sable began quietly, "It's public land. You are squatting.."
"It used to ALL be our private property! The Kanut owned the whole valley and the Lakota left them alone," Kenny Akecheta yelled. "Have you come here to steal the last bit of land left unclaimed?"
Demrak Jin interposed herself between her teammates and the angry man. In her grey sharkhide outfit, with her strange features and bristling white hair, she could be an unnerving sight. She watched him come up toward her without budging an inch.
Staring into her cloudy dark blue eyes, Akecheta shouted, "White thieves! Haven't your people done enough to mine?"
"MY people never even met you savages," she snarled.
This was so obviously the wrong thing to say on every level. Kenny Akecheta drew his open hand up by his head to slap her face but, faster than anyone could follow, Demrak Jin jumped up and drove her right knee hard into his chest. Even as the breath was knocked out of him, she smashed down her elbow to the back of his head. It all happened in a blur. He was on his hands and knees, gasping and unable to catch his breath, even as she touched back down.
The Gelydra snapped her head around to watch her partners. Sable said, "Are you perhaps taking your anger out on him, Jin?"
After a long pause, the Ulgoran woman nodded, "I guess I might be. Sorry, captain."
Striding over, Galvan picked the dazed man up off the snow by the back of his jacket the way one picks up a kitten by the scruff of the neck. Regaining his senses, Akecheta was further confused as he moved his legs about without making contact with anything. It took a few moments for him to realize that he was being held about six feet off the ground. Galvan did this with one arm fully extended, evidently not straining in the least.
"The world is full of grievances and grudges," the big Melgar told him sternly. "At some point, we must learn to let go and move on."
Demrak Jin blinked and gave Galvan a curious look. Was he also talking to her?
"You might let him down now," Sable told the huge Melgar, who complied with some reluctance.
Kenny Akecheta backpedaled a few feet and then regained his nerve. "What - Who are you people? You're not natural born Humans, that's for sure."
"We have come here to put a stop to the terror," Sable told him. "The Red Buffalo must be destroyed."
"Hah! Good luck with that. Luta-Matatanka is a holy force. He is the spirits of all the Indian children who starved in the winters because white men slaughtered the great herds. He is the spirit of all the young braves who rode to face repeating rifles with only the lance and the knife. He is the spirit that restores the balance--"
"He is the spirit of punishing people for what their great-grandparents did!" snapped Sable. "If a dog bites you, you do not drown its puppies."
The Indian mystic glowered and pointed at the scorched area nearby. "Do you know what happened there in 1878? A family of Kanut were slaughtered by the horse soldiers.."
"The Kanut committed their own share of massacres against the Indians!" responded Sable. "I have done some research. This land was owned by the Crow and the Blackfoot until the Kanut took it by force. They took it with the tomahawk and the spear, and they killed as many women and children of their own color as the white men did." She jabbed a finger hard at his chest. "Your own hands are not clean, Akecheta, and neither is your conscience."
Kenny Akecheta shook with anger. "There is no use trading words with those who have no honor." He swung around and went to lower himself to the ground in front of his shack. Head bowed, hands clasped in front of him, he began to chant in a weird hollow voice.
"Hey, we ought to stop him," Timothy warned. "He's fixing to call that monster, don't you think?"
A deep rumble sounded in the ground beneath their feet. "That's what we came here for," Sable answered. She snapped shut the visor on her helmet and drew her resonance gun from its holster at the small of her back. "On guard, everyone."
As Kenny Acheteka's voice rose, chanting faster and higher, the snow on the ground began to swirl in eddies although there was no breeze. A faint sulphurous stench was evident. Demrak Jin reached behind her shoulder and drew her knife with its three-foot bone blade she had crafted herself. With that weapon in hand, she suddenly seemed even more dangerous. She was eyeing Akecheta as if trying to decide where to stab him first.
"I should kill him now," she told Sable in a pleading tone, "Before he can do any harm."
"What? No, that might release the creature permanently. And we have no proof yet this man has committed any crimes, let alone that he poses a credible threat. Although, it looks like we will soon find out." The team leader raised her resonance gun in both hands and braced herself with one leg ahead of the other.
Kenny Akecheta's voice had acquired an echoing quality that was unnerving. He began to clap his hands and stamp one foot in a rhythmic sequence as he chanted. Over the scorched area of bare blackened dirt, lurid scarlet force boiled and grew brighter.. and a solid shape eight feet at the shoulder was suddenly looming up over everyone. Luta-Tatanka snorted steam from its nostrils.
VI.
Looking exactly like a huge male bison, except for its color and size, the Red Buffalo's shaggy hide was in fact a bright crimson. So were its faintly glowing eyes. Horns and hooves were shiny black, though. As the unnatural beast materialized fully, it snorted again and lowered its massive head to glower directly at the four outsiders who stood facing it.
Racing forward, Demrak Jin leaped up off the ground entirely and drove her knife down behind the head, where the hump began. Her intention seemed to have been to have cut into the spine. Instead, the bone blade snapped cleanly in half and, before she could land on her feet, the great bull's head swung around and spun her twenty feet through the air to crash into a pine tree with murderous impact.
"Tim! Check on her!" Sable yelled just before she unloaded a clip of seven resonance shells. The detonations burst around the Red Buffalo's head and forequarters in a thunderous barrage. Each explosion was calculated to knock a grown man down with cracked ribs or broken leg but not usually be fatal. The rapid sequence of seven blasts did no visible harm to the giant beast. Sable ejected the empty clip and reached for one which held the anesthetic darts but she did not seriously expect them to have any effect either.
She felt herself gently pushed to one side as Galvan strode past her. The Red Buffalo charged, stamping forward like a wall of flesh in motion and it seemed nothing of flesh of blood could have survived its attack. The big Melgar braced himself, drew back his fist and drove it forward in a simple straight blow that crashed directly between the monster's eyes with an impact that sounded like a hammer hitting stone. The Luta-Tatanka was halted, stumbling back a few steps from that blow but Galvan himself was knocked entirely off his feet.
"Surprised, aren't you?" yelled the Melgar champion, jumping back up. "You're big! But in my day I fought monsters bigger still and I slew them as I shall slay you." With that, he plunged closer and seized one of the sharp horns in each hand. For some reason, the monster could not simply lift his much smaller opponent into the air. Galvan strove to force the Red Buffalo's head down to the snow. Across the Melgar's back and shoulders, massive muscles suddenly bulged enormously and his shirt split entirely.
"I don't believe it," whispered Timothy. "Nobody's THAT strong!"
For an endless minute, the two struggled. Galvan seemed fully in his element now. This was what he had been born to do. Unable to force the beast to its knees, the giant Melgar abruptly let go with his right hand and crashed his elbow down across the top of the Red Buffalo's broad skull. The beast bellowed in pain and knocked Galvan over to trample him savagely underfoot.
"He'll be killed!" screamed Demrak Jin. Before she could join the fight, Galvan had gathered his footing and straightened up. Slowly but inexortably, he stood up and threw the monster off of him to crash on its side. The Melgar seemed unhurt. As the Red Buffalo rolled over and got back up on its feet, Galvan bludgeoned two left-right blows to the head that the monster appeared startled by. In its long brutal existence it had never been defied in this way.
Off to the side, Kenny Akecheta was still chanting but his voice had become shrill and agonized, as if his throat was raw.
Again, the Red Buffalo charged and again Galvan seized a horn in each hand but this time he was driven back. The Melgar champion lost his footing and fell onto his back. Now he was trying desperately to keep those glossy black horns from goring him open. The combatants strained and struggled but hardly moved as each fought with every bit of strength they had.
Only slightly bruised but completely enraged, Demrak Jin had gotten her feet and was searching for her weapon. She found the hilt and eight inches of the snapped blade in the snow, and her feral snarl was alarming from a throat that seemed Human. Timothy Limbo had been helping her up, and she slapped his hand aside. "That beast must die."
Slowly, almost imperceptibly, the monster had been pressing its head down lower. The sharp points of those black horns were within inches of Galvan's face. Sable reached in her jacket for a flash-bang grenade, not expecting it to harm the beast but perhaps distract it. She circled around the Red Buffalo to its other side.
Unexpected by anyone, a car roared up and skipped to a reckless halt on the hard-packed road surface. Mrs Eleanor Duggan was behind the wheel of an Oldmobile at least twenty years old. As the car slid up against a snowbank, the passenger door swung open and Jocelyn Garimara emerged. Incongruously, she was holding a white cardboard box filled with brown rice and had chopsticks still in her hand. As she took in the situation, the Australian woman dropped that container and slumped back down in her seat.
Erupting from her body came the Red Spectre, fast as light itself, to crackle through the air in a flash, slicing entirely through the immense bulk of the Luta-Tatanka. Dark blood and bits of flesh sprayed high in the air. The stink of burning meat and hair was foul. Swinging around, unharmed by the encounter, Jocelyn's mystic Gammon landed lightly and stood by as the dying creature slumped down in a heap. The Spectre resembled a featureless outline the same size and shape as Jocelyn itself, shimmering hotly in the sunlight. After a few seconds, the gralic being rose up again and glided across the clearing to ease back into Jocelyn's body.
With some effort, Galvan managed to lift the monumental head of the dead creature up off him. Timothy helped him to his feet and said, "Wow. I'm a believer now."
"Had to see me in action first, eh?" The Melgar examined a long scratch that ran across his exposed chest, but only a thin line of blood showed. It was his back and shoulders that were bruised and scraped.
Getting out of the car and using a cane on the uneven snowy surface, Mrs Duggan called over to Sable. "I insisted we come here, Ms Reilly. Please don't blame Jocelyn. She didn't want to disobey your orders but I insisted we see what was happening."
Sable holstered her gun and raised her visor to reveal a face grinning with relief. "It turned out to be the right thing to do, Mrs Duggan. I was concerned that Akecheta would send the Luta-Tatanka after you, but it materialized here instead."
"And when it was in a solid form, it was no match for my Gammon," Jocelyn said. She had picked up her container of pork fried rice, found that none had spilled, and took a mouthful. "So it all worked out for the best."
VII.
From off to the side, Demrak Jin announced, "The sorcerer is dead."
Everyone hurried over. Kenny Akecheta had not moved, except that his head now lolled down loosely on his chest. Even before she reached him, Sable's enhanced senses told her he was in fact dead. She examined him as a mstter of routine but knew she would not find a mark on him.
"His lifeforce was linked to the Red Buffalo," she announced. "You could say he was the anchor that enabled it to materialize in this real world. I imagine the coroner will just have to mark it down to unknown natural causes. And from what I've read of these cases, the body of the beast itself will not be around much longer either."
"Oh, my God, Galvan, you must be freezing," Jocelyn interrupted. "Look at you."
"There is a blanket in the trunk of my car, dear," Mrs Duggan said. As the Australian woman hurried to fetch the thick comforter and wrap it around the Melgar's bare torso, Galvan protested he was fine.
"Oh, shush," said Jocelyn to end the matter.
Taking Mrs Duggan to one side, Sable had a brief discussion with her. "It would be best if none of this turned up in your articles. In fact, I'd strongly recommend that you not even mention what you've seen to anyone you know. The Midnight War is secret for good reason."
"Well.. I suppose..."
"One danger is that government agencies may take an interest in you. You'd have the Mandate recording your phone calls and reading your mail and writing down who you have lunch with. Just their idea of security regarding the paranormal."
"Oh, I must say I wouldn't care for that," the elderly woman said. "Can't we get inside somewhere? The chill is seeping into my poor bones."
"Certainly. You might as well return home. We'll meet with you before we leave the area to discuss all that's happened. At least we know you're safe."
"Ack! Look. The buffalo is falling apart," Timothy Limbo called to everyone. It was true. The enormous ripped-open carcass had started to collapse in on itself. It sagged and dripped and was melting like a candle as they watched.
"Doesn't exactly smell like spring lilacs either," Tim observed. "Phewwww..!"
"By the time the police get here, there won't be anything recognizable," Sable said. "Just a pile of slime that will eventually evaporate. Speaking of the police, I'd better call them and explain to them we came out here to ask Kenny Acheteka some questions and found him this way."
Demrak Jin held the hilt and the broken segment of her knife in front of her, regarding them the way one might look at a beloved pet who has died. "Cursed be that wizard, may his spirit never find rest," she said. Then, looking up at the big Melgar, she grudgingly continued, "That was a good fight, Galvan. You are as brave and as strong as you claim to be."
Diplomatic enough not to over-react and ruin her attempt at courtesy, the former Champion of Androval simply replied, "Thanks."
Starting her car, Mrs Duggan rolled down the window. "Are you all going to stay here? Or do some of you want a ride to town?"
"If you wouldn't mind," Galvan said, "perhaps you could drop me at the End of the Line bar? My luggage is in the room I rented there."
"Not a problem."
As Galvan slid in to fill the passenger seat and rub his head against the interior of the car roof, Jocelyn Garimara opened the back door. "I will take him if you wouldn't mind leaving us at the library where my car is. My knapsack and clothes are still in Galvan's room." Not quite catching the implications of what she had just said, she turned to face her startled teammates. "What?"
2/28/2016
1/29-1/20/2015
I.
The bar called End of the Line was well named. It was fifteen miles away from the nearest town, and towns in Wyoming were far apart in the first place. Even here in the eastern part of the state, not that far from Cheyenne, there seemed to be nothing for mile after mile but the dark sky and the snowbound ground. The road leading to the bar had been plowed, but chest-high drifts lined the road so that Jocelyn felt almost as if she were driving down a narrow tunnel with only her headlights as illumination. Finally, the road widened to end in a round parking lot still covered with a layer of snow that had been packed down by tires.
Four big pick-up trucks, one Jeep and a snowmobile were parked in front of the bar. Yellow light spilled out through wide picture windows and racuous honkytonk music echoed into the frigid night air. The End of the Line was a two story building with an addition at one end that didn't match the original construction. Pulling into the lot, Jocelyn exhaled and relaxed after the long drive through winter back roads. "End of the Line is a damn good name," she said out loud.
Knowing what conditions were going to be, the Tel Shai knight was wearing the full field suit with its heavy boots, snug pants and waist-length jacket. She pulled on the gloves and sealed them to her jacket cuffs. Jocelyn Garimara had just turned thirty, a small thin woman with rich dark brown skin and glossy straight black hair. Most Americans were puzzled by her apparance and few guessed that she was an Australian Aborigine of the Matho tribe. The fact she had almost no accent remaining after a lifetime of travel added to her ambiguity. Jocelyn reached to the seat behind her and took the helmet sitting there, lowering it over her head and closing the visor. When she sealed the helmet to the high collar of her jacket, she was completely enclosed.
Getting out, she could not even feel the vicious wind that was making the snow swirl in little eddies around the parking lot. The light enhancers in her visor had cut in automatically but she didn't really need them at the moment. Jocelyn stood by her rented car, taking her time to study the situation. There was a truck with a plow parked by the side of the bar, but no other road she could spot. Anyone entering or leaving the area had to use the way she had just come.
Walking toward the door with its blue neon sign BEER ON TAP, she reflected wryly that many women might be a little uneasy going alone into a bar way out in the wilderness at two o'clock in the morning. But then, not many knew the reassurance of having the Red Spectre waiting inside them to be unleashed. She opened the door and stepped inside. At that blast of chill with her entrance, all heads turned. Jocelyn lifted her helmet off and smiled pleasantly at the twenty people in that overheated stuffy room. The smell of beer and sweat and cigarettes slapped her senses.
Behind the bar, a fat man with a handlebar mustache grinned happily at seeing her and wiped his hands on his apron. Three men at the bar and two men playing pool glanced up in curiosity, checked her out for a moment and then went back about their business. Jocelyn took a step into the room and saw something in one corner that stopped her where she stood.
Sitting behind a round table which was covered with empty beer bottles and loose money sat an enormous man. He must have been six foot six and wide enough that an ordinary man could stand hidden behind him, but his bulk was all well defined muscle. He was wearing a plain white T-shirt stretched taut over hard pectorals and biceps, jeans and boots. The man had a busty blonde woman sitting on his lap, ripping off pieces of a hot roast beef sandwich and feeding him one bite at a time. Standing behind him, leaning on him, was a second woman with curly dark hair that almost reached her waist. She was giggling in the giant's ear.
"Galvan..." Jocelyn grumbled to herself. "Of all people.."
The big man saw her and laughed out loud. White teeth flashed in a dark beard heavily flecked with grey. Galvan had a tan somehow, even in Wyoming in the winter, and his skin was almost the same hue as his curly hair. He chewed on another piece of the sandwich, then slapped his huge hands together in a dusting motion. To the dismay of the blonde, Galvan lifted her easily off his lap and put her to one side as if she were a kitten that had fallen asleep.
"Hey, hey, HEY," she protested. "What's this?"
"It breaks my heart but I must bid you both a fond farewell," Galvan told them as he rose, towering a foot taller than either of them. "I know this woman! I am sure she comes with a storm about to break right behind her."
As the Tel Shai knight approached, helmet held in the crook of her arm, she smiled at the flustered faces of the women being so unexpectedly dismissed. "Galvan. Of all people. I suspect we are both really here for the same reason."
"Luta-Tatanka," the big Melgar answered. "The Red Buffalo of Death."
II.
It was as if he had blown a whistle to signal for silence. Everyone in that bar stopped talking and turned to stare. By coincidence, at that monent the song on the jukebox ended as well.
A man sitting at the bar lurched up and moved toward the Melgar. He was a pot-bellied hulk in a red checkered shirt and khaki pants, with a cap that had ear flaps, and he came over to jab an accusing finger at Galvan. "You have got no business saying that name."
Not imtimidated in the least, the giant smiled at that confrontation. "Kings and warlords have tried to still my voice. No one has ever been able to keep from speaking my mind."
"God knows that's true," Jocelyn added under her breath.
"You don't understand," the man went on. "I'm just looking out for you. You're bringing bad fortune down upon your own head by saying that name out loud. Don't you know what you might be calling? Don't you know what has happened out here on the high plains?"
Galvan looked down at the man, not unkindly, and held up a fist nearly as big as the man's head. "It is not I who have anything to fear."
Shaking his head, the man surveyed the bar and saw everyone was listening. "Buddy, you don't understand. This is for your good. I shouldn't even be saying this much. Nine people have died since last winter, I don't want to be the tenth and neither do you. When you see the red buffalo, your time is up."
The big Melgar frowned, lines deepening in his face. "I thank you for your concern, my friend. But I have been slaying monsters since before you were born. Watch." He dug through the loose money on the table in front of him and came up with a coin. "See. A silver dollar." As easily as snapping his fingers, Galvan held the coin between thumb and forefinger and bent it in half so the edges touched. He handed the silver dollar to the amazed man and smiled.
"I.. Whoa. Well, I tried. I'm going. Stan, you coming with me?"
"Not me," answered a voice from the bar. "I just refreshed my glass, Joey. Hang out a while yet."
"No. No." The man dropped the bent coin on the table with a clang, grabbed his heavy down-filled coat from the chair where he had been sitting and yanked it on. "We all know the curse that's on our heads. I'm not waiting until this bar gets trampled to the ground."
As the crowd watched in silence, the man called Joey zipped up his coat and pulled leather gloves from a pocket. He went out, closing the door behind him with a slam that made everyone jump. After a long uncomfortable moment, the bartender came out to cross over and put money in the jukebox. The familiar reassuring voice of Waylon Jennings filled the room. The people made a show of starting conversations again, and the two men at the pool table racked the balls for another game.
Jocelyn Garimara picked up the silver dollar and examined it. "Nice trick."
"I bore the Legacy of Malberon long before Sulak," answered Galvan as he found a bottle on the table that was still half full. "Mayhap King Holmir ordered me to step down as Champion to make way for the next generation, but I still have a few good years left in these old bones."
"We only met once before and there wasn't time to chat," she said as she started to pull out a chair for herself. "I'm sorry I chased away your... companions."
Galvan glanced across the room to where the two women were at the bar. One shot him a venomous look and turned her back. "Ah, so it goes," he said. "Still, I enjoy lovely company even now."
"Don't waste your pick-up lines on me," Jocelyn scoffed. "Listen, we've been following the strange deaths in this area. Sable will send the rest of our team tomorrow but I came ahead to scout things out. What do you know?"
"You are all business, I see. So be it. You no doubt are familiar with the belief that a white bison is good luck and a spiritual blessing? But the rare red bull is a truly bad omen-"
His words were cut off by a long ringing scream from outside. The door slammed open and the man called Joey staggered in as if he had been hit by lightning. He crashed up against a table and barely held himself up.
"I saw it! It looked me in the eye the way a person does!" he yelled before slumping to the floor. Even as he fell, Jocelyn had rushed over to support him. She looked up in surprise. "He doesn't have a pulse. He's not breathing."
"When you see the red buffalo..." someone muttered.
The bartender had hurried over and was crouching nearby as Jocelyn straddled the man and began CPR. "Miss.. miss, I'm sorry, that won't do any good. I already called. It'll take nearly an hour for an ambulance to get out here. The sheriff's on his way too."
Ignoring him, Jocelyn kept up the CPR more than half an hour before finally giving up. Someone helped her to her feet and she swung her aching arms. "Did he have a history of heart problems? High blood pressure?"
"Not that I ever heard him mention," said the bartender, who had brought a sheet from the back room to cover the body.
Taking Jocelyn to one side, Galvan told her in a low tone, "I looked around. No footprints in the snow of any animal, bison or otherwise. In case you were wondering."
"The thought had occured to me. Thank you. Now I wonder what he saw or thought he saw."
It was nearly dawn by the time the sheriff and his deputy were done examining the scene. They released all the patrons of the bar, who trudged out wearily to their trucks to go home. The corpse had been taken by the EMTs, statements had been made and signed by everyone. The sheriff had never heard of the Kenneth Dred Foundation, and although he accepted Jocelyn's credentials with the NYPD and Department 21 Black, he wasn't impressed by them. "New York's half a world away."
As the bartender locked everything up and retired to his own rooms in the back, Galvan led Jocelyn up a flight of open stairs on the outside of the building. "I'm renting a room here for the moment," he explained. "Your team is on their way here today?"
"Not until late afternoon or early evening," she answered. Jocelyn had fetched her knapsack with its change of clothes and personal items from her car, thinking of washing up and brushing her teeth. She went inside with him, sat down in a chair, tugged off her heavy boots with a sigh of relief and shrugged out of the field jacket with its inner armor layer. She was wearing a black crewneck shirt beneath. "Oh, that's better. I'm so tired."
Galvan had yanked off his own work shoes and wool socks to stretch out on the double bed. He almost filled it. "Might as well get some sleep. Our crusade will start up soon enough."
"OUR work?" she repeated. Jocelyn came over and sat down on the edge of the bed he left unoccupied. "Are we teaming up then?"
"That's enough Midnight War for one night," Galvan said with a prolonged yawn.
As if not realizing what she was doing, Jocelyn laid down next to the huge Melgar, feeling the comfort of the warmth and solidity of his massive form. She turned to face him. "You're right," she said drowsily and was surprised when they started to kiss.
III.
At the diner in the town of Chancellor, twenty miles from the scene of the weird death, Jocelyn Garimara worked on her omelet and sipped her lemon tea. Glancing down at her body, at the modest ledge of her breasts and the lean thighs beneath the field suit she wore again, she remembered what that same body had been doing a few hours ago and she felt her cheeks burn hotly.
She had been soured on sex by what the Sphinx had demanded of her while she was in his service. That seemed so long ago now. She had still been a teenager. Recent dates and even a brief romance or two had been just surface interactions that went nowhere. Jocelyn felt nothing in common with American blacks. Their culture was not hers, she did not feel any kinship or sense of common history. She was slightly more attracted to American white men, especially educated ones who tended to think about the same questions that troubled her. But even there, the secrets that she had to keep about her Red Spectre and her membership at Tel Shai always meant a certain distance between her and any men she might be interested in. It was a problem many in the Midnight War faced.
But last night had opened all the doors. The long slow lovemaking with a man who was both gentle and apparently tireless had changed everything. Jocelyn felt so peaceful and at ease that it bothered her in a way. She had forgotten what the afterglow felt like.
Across from her in the booth, Galvan was contentedly finishing his second plate of pancakes and sausage, gulping down juice and coffee. Of course, she thought, he eats the way he drinks and does everything else. But he is not Human, he is a Melgar. Their bodies were more robust and durable than Humans, with an average lifespan well over two hundred years. He looked as if he were a well-preserved fifty or so, with grey in his hair and beard, lines in his weathered cheeks. But she knew he had been born in the days when Wyoming was populated by fur trappers and settlers and when cowboys were still herding cattle drives.
Seeing Galvan smile at her as he wiped his mouth with a napkin, Jocelyn spoke for the first time in several minutes. "There's something I've never been clear on. The Legacy of Malberon. One man and one woman in each generation of Melgarin develops incredible strength. This was Malberon's plan to ensure that his Race would always have a champion."
"True enough," replied Galvan. He picked at his now-empty plate as if disappointed there was nothing more remaining. "What is your question, then, Joss?"
She started to object to receiving the nickname 'Joss' but let it go. "I just had a vague idea that one champion replaced the next, like a title being passed on. I've met Sulak. He is still active and roaming the adjacent realms. And here you are as well. It's something new to take in."
"You have touched on a sore point with me," Galvan said in a pleasant tone that did not sound at all annoyed. "Sulak won the tournament we both participated in, but on points from the judges. His style and form were considered more accurate than mine. And he scored points on sparring with multiple opponents. I was asked by our King to step down and hand the white mantle to Sulak. I did so, grudgingly of course."
"I hadn't known any of this."
He waved a broad hand dismissingly. "Few Humans even have heard of the Melgarin, much less of our history and customs. You are exceptionally well versed in lore, Joss. Never the less, what comforts me is this. Even though he is fifty years my junior, I am still much stronger than Sulak. I know he must seem impressive to Humans, but believe me... if the need arose, I could tie Sulak into a knot."
'And I wonder what Sulak would say about that,' she thought to herself. The Link at her belt buzzed. She unclipped the electronic device and said, "Excuse me. Hello. Sable? Where are you? I see...." Jocelyn had a brief conversation and then returned the Link to its holster. I told them it would be best if we met at the End of the Line, where they can look for clues. Are you ready to leave?"
"Oh, certainly," the giant Melgar said. He had put a blue flannel shirt on over his white T-shirt and now he dug in its pocket to leave a few twenties carelessly on the table. "I have only met your captain, Sable, and yourself before, but I have heard of this Demrak Jin. I think working with a Gelydra might be well, interesting." He heaved up from the booth, so big and solid that more than a few patrons of the diner stared openly.
As she reached for her field jacket, Jocelyn frowned. The animosity between Melgar and Gelydra went back centuries. Mostly it was still bitter because of the 1929 occupation of Ulgor by forces from Androval. The deaths and suffering were still fresh for beings who lived as long as they did. She hoped Denmrak Jin was on good behavior today.
It was a bright clear day and the sunlight on all the whiteness produced enough glare that Jocelyn slid on her polarized sunglasses. Driving on snow-covered roads back toward the bar, they chatted about Australia. It seemed that Galvan had spent most of World War Two there and in New Zealand, fighting the Japanese invaders. He said he had loved the country and found the Australians' rough, unpretentious nature easy for him to get along with.
"I'm afraid I never did get to spend any time with your people," Galvan said. "There was the time Mark Drum and I saw what lives inside Ayers Rock. We stayed with Abos for a week in the desert, they were generous hosts, but that was my only experience with them. I know your kin have suffered great injustice.. even more than the American Indians did."
"You got that right," she answered without noticeable emotion. "My grandmother was part of the Stolen Generation. She was taken as a child to live as a maid for a white family on the other side of the country. Poor Gram, she never saw her family again. The only good that came out of that grief was that her daughters went to school and ended up with decent jobs."
"And you? You sound cultured, did you go to college?"
"No," Jocelyn said. "I have my own story. When I was twelve, the Red Spectre manifested from my body..." She broke off and was silent. Galvan did not press her to continue.
To break the uncomfortable silence, Jocelyn asked, "Did you come to Wyoming specifically because of this Red Buffalo?"
"Oh, no, no," Galvin said. "I always wanted to see Yellowstone. My plan was to camp out in the Park but I was sidetracked when I heard about the strange deaths." He smiled over at her with a complete lack of self-consciousness. "When this is all over, perhaps you would like to join me there. Yellowstone in winter..."
"We'll see," she said. "There's the End of the Line and what looks like an SUV. Seems like my teammates got here before we did."
The bar was closed and the truck usually parked behind it was gone. Standing in the lot were three figures, a man and a woman in the black field suits and a woman in a skintight grey outfit. Jocelyn pulled over next to the SUV, put her helmet on and sealed her suit. As she opened her door and stepped out, the green readout on the inside of her visor told her the windchill was twelve degrees Fahrenheit. No wonder her teammates had also decided to wear the field suits, which kept them comfortable.
The KDF team gathered close together. They started communicating through their helmets at first. Lauren Sable Reilly and Timothy Limbo were in the field suits, greeting Jocelyn and asking about the situation. Then Galvan got out of the passenger side of the rented car. He was wearing only work boots, jeans and a red flannel shirt over a white T-shirt, bareheaded, not seeming to notice the cold. He raised a big hand in greeting, teeth flashing in the dark beard. "Well met indeed!" he boomed.
Standing slightly apart from the others was a small slim woman wearing boots, snug pants and long-sleeved tunic all made of grey sharkhide. Sheathed across her back in an ivory scabbard was a wide-bladed knife about three feet long. She wore nothing on her head. Her Race of Gelydrim lived in Arctic waters without protection. Demrak Jin's stiff short white hair bristled in the freezing wind and her usually sullen face was openly hostile as she spotted the huge man coming up behind Jocelyn.
"Galvan!" Demrak Jin spat. "A Melgar, here? What are you up to?" Her right hand moved up behind her shoulder to grasp the hilt of her weapon.
Standing next to her, Sable put a restraining hand on the Gelydra's forearm. "Stand down," she said, speaking openly through the speaker in her helmet's jawbar. "Galvan has worked with me before. He's not the enemy."
"I know the Melgarin," Jin insisted. "You have to watch them. They will get your horse pregnant and steal your dishes if given half a chance."
Hearing this, Jocelyn Garimara stiffened visibly and stepped close to the giant. "Galvan is here to help investigate the strange deaths, Jin. Let's show some respect."
"Very well. If you say so." The Gelydra pointed an accusing finger. "But I have my eye on you, Melgar."
Galvan did not seem put off by this at all. He laughed and moved forward to loom up over the KDF team. "Good to see you again, Sable. You have heard what happened here last night?"
"Yes, we received a report from Jocelyn while she was watching the sheriff question everyone." The team captain was a woman of medium height and build but nothing could be seen of her features because of the visored helmet. "Glad to have your help. We could use some raw strength on this team. I have been searching the immediate area using my enhanced senses. Over there, by the bar, there are faint traces on the snow."
"Hoofprints, I take it? I couldn't find any," the big Melgar said.
"Hoofprints indeed," replied Sable. She pointed at what seemed to be a perfectly smooth area of snow that had had its surface melt a bit in sunlight and then freeze again to leave a glaze of ice. "Very faint, almost microscopic in fact. Tracks of an American Bison, a male considerably larger than the biggest recorded specimen. And yet, the tracks appear to have been made with the lightest pressure possible."
"That's weird," Timothy said, speaking for the first time. "I thought a big buffalo weighed about a ton."
"They do. This is not a natural beast but a gralic construct of some sort. I wish you all could see these tracks. There are a dozen of them here but no trail coming or going. The beast that poor man saw did not come here by walking. It just appeared and disappeared." Sable shook her helmeted head. "My guess is that the Red Buffalo is like Bakwanga's Black Lion that we used to have on our team. It's not a living beast."
Making a circle around the parking lot, she pointed to a series of footprints leading from tire tracks to the front door of the bar. "Only his toes left marks. Joseph Barrie was running for his life. You can see where he dropped his keys. A police officer picked them up when they took his truck."
"You have better eyes than I do," Galvan said. "Very impressive."
Beside his captain, Timothy held up an open hand and three small tornadoes of faint vapor spun in from different directions to hover around him. "No wonder my caspers couldn't find anything. No trail to find. You can go, fellas." The three swirling shapes popped out of existence.
Galvan said, "Now THAT is something new. I have never seen anything like those little dust devils before."
"My friendly ghosts," Timothy told him. "They can go anywhere and I can see whatever they see. Sometimes they seem to get ideas of their own. Hi, my name is Timothy Limbo, well Timothy Lambert actually but that's how I'm known in Midnight War."
The Melgar reached over to shake hands. "Galvan son of Merendor. Former Champion of Androval. Sable and Jocelyn here I have already met."
"And WE know each other well enough," muttered Demrak Jin, standing with arms folded across her chest.
"Now, Jin," Sable said mildly. "I believe the bar does not open until four this afternoon and we can come back. For right now, I have arranged a meeting with a local historian, Mrs Eleanor Duggan. She has written some interesting articles about Old West folklore. All right, Jocelyn and Galvan, if you want to follow us to town?"
"Sure," Jocelyn answered. As she turned to head back to her rented car, she heard Demrak Jin call a warning, "I'd make that Melgar sit in the back if I were you. Away from women."
"Well, I'm NOT you!" snapped Jocelyn, surprising everyone. "Learn some manners, Jin." She stomped off to the car and waited for Galvan to join her before getting behind the wheel.
As they watched her drive away down the narrow road, Timothy whistled. "Huh. Seems to me like she sorta likes that big galoot."
"Our only concern should be finding this Red Buffalo and ending its menace," Sable said. "Come on, team."
IV.
The Town of Chancellor Public Library had originally been a three-story residential home built in the days of extended families and several servants. It had obviously been upgraded recently, with a concrete access ramp for wheelchairs, a glass front door that slid open automatically and five computers in a row for patrons to use. On the second floor was a Community Room, where everything from local quilting clubs to after-school tutoring went on. Sable had arranged for her team to meet here. A folding card table and seven chairs had been brought in and they assembled there, closing the soundproofed door behind them.
Seventy-one years old but alert and energetic, Eleanor Duggan had a cloud of permed silvery hair around her face. She was well dressed and groomed, and made a good impression. The historian had three books to her credit, although they had been published by a small outfit which only sold through the mail. She also had more than two dozen articles in various journals and magazines about local history and folklore. Wrapped in a red and white sweater too large for her, Duggan sat at the head at the table and smiled blissfully at her visitors.
Sable had removed her helmet and unzipped her field suit jacket. She was a naturally attractive woman who seemed unconcerned with her looks. The straight black hair was brushed straight back from a high forehead, the large dark eyes and full lips wore so little make-up that it wasn't clear she had any on. As she shook hands with the elderly woman, Sable's slight overbite made her smile very appealing. "Thank you for coming out to meet us on such a cold day," she said.
Mrs Duggan grinned back at her. "Oh my dear. I am so excited about this. Tel Shai knights! I had never dared hope to meet any in the flesh. What a thrill. And you, my dear-" here she nodded at Demrak Jin- "Forgive me, but you ARE from Ulgor, are you not?"
"I'm a Gelydra," Jin admitted, trying not to scowl. Somewhere when they had stopped for gas, she had purchased a small bag of pretzels and now she chewed on them without thinking to offer any to anyone. "The hair gives me away, eh?"
"Oh, yes, it's so distinctive. And you sir, you are a Melgar I believe. The famous Sulak, perhaps?"
Everyone snorted and tried not to laugh. The giant smiled politely and said, "No, ma'am. I am Galvan son of Merendor, a Champion of Androval but not Sulak in any way."
"Oh. My apologies. Well. I have thousands of questions for you all but I gather you are here to ask me questions instead." The woman folded her withered hands in front of her. On her left hand, a wedding band of plain gold caught the light.
Sable leaned forward. "When everything is done, I promise we will meet for an afternoon and discuss anything you like. But right now, matters are urgent. There was another Red Buffalo death last night."
"Yes. Poor Joey. He was a good-natured old soul who didn't ask for much in life. I expect you want to know about the Red Buffalo, though. Luta-Tatanka was the Sioux name for the apparition. The first mention we have of it is from an 1854 letter. The beast has appeared many times since then, not at any set intervals or for any specific reason. It just shows up and always leaves death and destruction behind." She sighed unhappily. "Often, Luta-Tatanka is a solid creature seemingly of flesh and blood. It is big enough that a tall man cannot see over its hump. Both its hide and its fur are a bright red, and it has black and shiny horns. The beast has been known to trample lone travelers, to knock over autos and kill the people inside, to crash through picture windows and demolish the interior of homes."
"Yikes," Timothy Limbo said without realizing it.
"But just as often, it seems to be a phantom, just a vision seen in the distance by those about to die. The people who spot Luta-Tatanka often die of sheer terror... as would be the case with Joey last night. Or they run in panic off a cliff or mishandle a rifle so that they shoot themselves. Then the beast seems to be an avenging spirit. The saying goes, 'When you see the Red Buffalo, you have seen your last sunrise.'"
Everyone sat hushed, waiting for her to continue. After a long pause, Sable asked, "Are there any stories of how this monster came to be? An origin, so to speak?"
"Yes," Mrs Duggans answered. "The tales tell of a Kanut shaman named Mountain Cat who invoked his tribe's own particular gods to seek revenge for being driven off their lands. According to the legend, Mountain Cat fasted and prayed and cut his chest and arms until he had no blood left. But from the pool of blood around his body, a red shape took form and that night Luta-Tatanka rampaged through a farm developed on land where Mountain Cat had grown up. The farmer and his wife, three children and a hired hand were all found nearly flattened by sharp hooves in the morning." The old woman indicated a thick manila folder beside her. "I have photostats of the story from the WIDE VALLEY GAZETTE, October 31, 1854."
"Hmmm," Demrak Jin muttered. "Where can we find some of these Kanut people? We should have words with them."
Mrs Duggan raised her shoulders and lowered them. "They are an extinct nation. The last full blood Kanut died in 1958, I believe. All that is left are some blankets and wood carvings and jewelry the tribe had made." She hesitated, then went on, "But I suppose there is still Kenny Akecheta."
"Akecheta... that sounds familiar, somehow."
"It means fighter or troublemaker," the old woman said. "He's a local boy, grew up here in town and was in the Army for two years. Kenny claims to be one-quarter Kanut, the rest being Lakota, and he is very interested in his Kanut heritage. Over the years, he has done a lot of digging in the hills to the west of here and come up with arrowheads, pottery and so forth which are definitely Kanut."
Sable asked, "Sounds like it might be a good idea to talk with him, as well."
Mrs Duggans pushed back her chair and got up. She moved just a bit stiffly but she was steady on her feet. "Let me think where he is staying," she said. "North of town, I think. To be honest, Kenny became much too bitter and obsessed with how the Kanut had been mistreated by the settlers. I found his company so unpleasant that I haven't spoken to him in at leaat a year." The old woman walked over to the large double windows that showed the snow-covered woods behind the library property and gazed out.
Uncertain whether the meeting was over or not, some of the KDF members stood up as well. Sable in particular took a few steps to stand behind Mrs Duggan while waiting for an answer. A second later, Mrs Duggan gasped and shouted, "Look! Look, there it is!"
In a flash, Sable was beside the elderly woman, one hand pressed against her back, staring down at the huge shape standing on the edge of the parking lot. Fourteen feet long, massive and ominous, the bright crimson animal raised its head and stared up to meet their gaze with eyes which held a lambent glow. It was a stunning sight in the bright afternoon sunlight. As Sable and Duggan gaped, the Red Buffalo raised one front hoof and stamped it.
Still at the table, Jocelyn Garimara slumped forward and her head dropped as if she had passed out. Erupting up from her body with a hissing crackle, a dark red outline in her shape hovered in the air for a second and then flashed across the community room to pass harmlessly through the window as if made only of light itself. The Red Spectre hurtled down to crash directly into the Luta-Tatanka like a lightning bolt striking, and both entities vanished with a peal of thunder that rattled the windows of the library.
Everyone had hurried over to watch, but it was Galvan who had the presence of mind to carry a folding metal chair with him. The big Melgar placed it beind the old woman and eased her down to sit on it. "There. Easy now," he said with a solid reassuring hand on her shoulder.
"I saw the Red Buffalo..." gasped Eleanor Duggan, breathing rapidly. "It looked up at me. It's my doom."
Sable turned and spoke in a stern tone, "And you also saw our own Gammon chase it away. That creature is not invincible."
As she spoke, the life-sized gralic being swirled together outside where it had been dispersed and flew in through the window to merge again with its host. Jocelyn took a deep breath and sat up, shaking her head as if to clear it.
"Are you okay, Jocelyn?" Sable called over.
"Yes.. yes, captain. I'm good." The Australian woman rose and came over to join them all. "Whew. That hurt. My Gammon and that monster canceled each other out. That has only happened once or twice before. It felt like sticking your finger in an electric outlet."
"I saw it, I saw it," Mrs Duggan repeated.
Galvan went down on one knee in front of the elderly woman and smiled. "We all saw it. None of us are going to die today. You will live. The Red Buffalo has met people who are not afraid of it." The big bearded face showed complete confidence. "These are my words. Evil is powerless against courage. I swear to you that my friends and I will destroy this nuisance once and for all."
She gazed into his face and visibly relaxed. "Are you sure?"
"Absolutely. The Red Buffalo has met its own doom. I swear it!" The Melgar rose up to tower over everyone in the room. He met Jocelyn's eyes and said, "Your Red Spectre is indeed an awesome force, Joss."
"'Joss?'" repeated Timothy Limbo to himself.
"All right, team. Stand by for orders." Sable went to the table, fetched her helmet and zipped up her field suit jacket. "Mrs Duggan is still shaken and I don't blame her. One of us will stay with her at least tonight. Jocelyn, that's your assignment."
"What? Captain, we just saw my Gammon can neutralize the Red Buffalo. Shouldn't I be part of the hunt?"
"What we just saw shows that you are best qualified of all of us to protect Mrs Duggan. It's not enough to drive the beast away, we need to meet it when it's solid and end its menace," said Sable firmly.
"No, wait a minute-" the Australian woman began but she was cut off.
"Jocelyn Garimara. That is a lawful order from your Tel Shai captain." Lauren Sable Reilly seldom felt she had to stress her authority over her team. "Stay with her until you are relieved. Understood?"
"Yes, captain," Jocelyn answered in a civil tone. "I see your reasoning."
"The rest of us will go visit this Kenny Akecheta," Sable continued. "With Galvan's strength as an asset, we should be able to confront this beast if it appears."
"I am well known as a slayer of monsters," the big Melgar said. "The two-headed bull, the winged serpents, the Shark That Walks."
"Agreed. But! Galvan and Jin... I want no friction between you two. You will work together without snarky little comments. We are going into serious danger here. Am I understood?"
"Very well," Demrak Jin answered. "I hear and obey."
"Good. Mrs Duggan, do you have a car outside?"
"Yes. My faithful Olds. I'm still driving."
"Jocelyn will accompany you, if you agree," Sable said. "Do you want her company and protection?"
"Oh heavens, yes. I feel much safer with the host of a Red Spectre beside me." The old woman turned to the unhappy Australian standing behind her. "We can stop at the Chinese restaurant on the way to my house and get some take-out. Sound good?"
"Fine with me, I'm starving." Jocelyn tucked her helmet in the crook of her arm and nodded to her teammates before leaving with Eleanor Duggan, but her eyes moved to meet Galvan's for a second. Sable noticed as she noticed everything.
V.
On the ride north, Sable drove the SUV while Demrak Jin sat in stony silence in the passenger seat. Behind them, Timothy and Galvan were getting along well, chatting happily in a way that made Jin fume even more.
"So, what I've always wondered is how you guys with the Legacy of Malberon get so buff?" the young blond man was asking. "I mean, you're strong enough that lifting weights must do nothing for you. Do you like, roll giant boulders up hills or something?"
Galvan laughed. "The big muscles aren't strictly necessary. You've met Princess Valera. She has strength in a class with Sulak and nearly equal to mine. Yet she looks like a normal woman in good shape. The truth is that we Melgarin are by nature inclined to be muscular with low body fat. Our testosterone levels are high."
In front, the Gelydra woman mumbled sourly to herself, and Sable lightly tapped her arm in reprimand.
"You have to do SOME exercise, right?" Timothy continued.
"True enough, Tim. Running and stretching. We also have a system where we pit one group of muscles against another. Trying to raise an arm while holding it down with the other arm, for example, or doing the same with our legs. This has the advantage it can be done anywhere."
"Oh, isometrics. That's cool."
Sable interrupted, "I'm pulling over here. Mrs Duggan told us that Kenny Akecheta lives up this dirt road. Doesn't look like it's been plowed since the snowfall two days again."
"If we get stuck, rest assured I can simply push us out," Galvan said cheerfully from the back seat.
"I appreciate the confidence," Sable replied. "Very well, let's see." She turned onto a narrow unpaved road not much more than a trail and headed up it. On either side were pine trees standing starkly up from the snow, but the undergrowth was buried.
Ahead of them was a small clearing that had a strange scorched area to one side. It looked as if someone had built a series of bonfires there over a long period of time. Nerarby was a battered Ford Explorer and a shack that seemed to have been handmade. Simple wooden planks nailed together, a plain door and no windows, tar paper covering the roof. Atop one corner, a steel pipe protruded and grey smoke seeped from it. The smell of burning wood was noticeable.
Hanging on the door was a large dreamcatcher, its circle with the web within made of leather strips over a bent twig. It was the only decoration or identification to be seen. Parking near the truck, they all got out and approached the shack. It was warmer than the day before because the wind had died down, so Sable and Timothy left the visors up on their helmets. Neither Galvan nor Demrak Jin seemed to even notice the freezing air.
"Can you send one of your little pals in there?" asked Sable.
"Sure. Looks like plenty of cracks for access." Timothy Limbo held up his hand, palm up, and one of the tiny vortices spun into life over it. "Go take a peek, okay?"
Even when watching for them, the caspers were difficult to see. This one whirled through the air and into the shack through a hole in a rotted board near the ground. Timothy got a distracted expression and said, "He's in there. Appears to be drawing in chalk on a piece of cardboard.. what? Get back here!"
As he spoke, the casper flashed through the bright winter sunlight and orbited around Timothy as if for protection. "He knew my boy was there. Beats me how, but this guy just sat up and looked right at my casper. It's okay, buddy, you can go now."
The front door slammed open and Kenny Akecheta stormed out. He was not a big man, wiry rather than muscular, wearing a heavy quilted jacket and denim jeans. If not for acne scars, he would have been a presentable figure, with thick shiny black hair worn long over a square face. At the moment, all any of them noticed was the fury in his expression.
"Get out of here! Nobody said you could come here." He stomped toward the four strangers. The massive bulk of Galvan seemed not to impress him at all.
"This is not your private property," Sable began quietly, "It's public land. You are squatting.."
"It used to ALL be our private property! The Kanut owned the whole valley and the Lakota left them alone," Kenny Akecheta yelled. "Have you come here to steal the last bit of land left unclaimed?"
Demrak Jin interposed herself between her teammates and the angry man. In her grey sharkhide outfit, with her strange features and bristling white hair, she could be an unnerving sight. She watched him come up toward her without budging an inch.
Staring into her cloudy dark blue eyes, Akecheta shouted, "White thieves! Haven't your people done enough to mine?"
"MY people never even met you savages," she snarled.
This was so obviously the wrong thing to say on every level. Kenny Akecheta drew his open hand up by his head to slap her face but, faster than anyone could follow, Demrak Jin jumped up and drove her right knee hard into his chest. Even as the breath was knocked out of him, she smashed down her elbow to the back of his head. It all happened in a blur. He was on his hands and knees, gasping and unable to catch his breath, even as she touched back down.
The Gelydra snapped her head around to watch her partners. Sable said, "Are you perhaps taking your anger out on him, Jin?"
After a long pause, the Ulgoran woman nodded, "I guess I might be. Sorry, captain."
Striding over, Galvan picked the dazed man up off the snow by the back of his jacket the way one picks up a kitten by the scruff of the neck. Regaining his senses, Akecheta was further confused as he moved his legs about without making contact with anything. It took a few moments for him to realize that he was being held about six feet off the ground. Galvan did this with one arm fully extended, evidently not straining in the least.
"The world is full of grievances and grudges," the big Melgar told him sternly. "At some point, we must learn to let go and move on."
Demrak Jin blinked and gave Galvan a curious look. Was he also talking to her?
"You might let him down now," Sable told the huge Melgar, who complied with some reluctance.
Kenny Akecheta backpedaled a few feet and then regained his nerve. "What - Who are you people? You're not natural born Humans, that's for sure."
"We have come here to put a stop to the terror," Sable told him. "The Red Buffalo must be destroyed."
"Hah! Good luck with that. Luta-Matatanka is a holy force. He is the spirits of all the Indian children who starved in the winters because white men slaughtered the great herds. He is the spirit of all the young braves who rode to face repeating rifles with only the lance and the knife. He is the spirit that restores the balance--"
"He is the spirit of punishing people for what their great-grandparents did!" snapped Sable. "If a dog bites you, you do not drown its puppies."
The Indian mystic glowered and pointed at the scorched area nearby. "Do you know what happened there in 1878? A family of Kanut were slaughtered by the horse soldiers.."
"The Kanut committed their own share of massacres against the Indians!" responded Sable. "I have done some research. This land was owned by the Crow and the Blackfoot until the Kanut took it by force. They took it with the tomahawk and the spear, and they killed as many women and children of their own color as the white men did." She jabbed a finger hard at his chest. "Your own hands are not clean, Akecheta, and neither is your conscience."
Kenny Akecheta shook with anger. "There is no use trading words with those who have no honor." He swung around and went to lower himself to the ground in front of his shack. Head bowed, hands clasped in front of him, he began to chant in a weird hollow voice.
"Hey, we ought to stop him," Timothy warned. "He's fixing to call that monster, don't you think?"
A deep rumble sounded in the ground beneath their feet. "That's what we came here for," Sable answered. She snapped shut the visor on her helmet and drew her resonance gun from its holster at the small of her back. "On guard, everyone."
As Kenny Acheteka's voice rose, chanting faster and higher, the snow on the ground began to swirl in eddies although there was no breeze. A faint sulphurous stench was evident. Demrak Jin reached behind her shoulder and drew her knife with its three-foot bone blade she had crafted herself. With that weapon in hand, she suddenly seemed even more dangerous. She was eyeing Akecheta as if trying to decide where to stab him first.
"I should kill him now," she told Sable in a pleading tone, "Before he can do any harm."
"What? No, that might release the creature permanently. And we have no proof yet this man has committed any crimes, let alone that he poses a credible threat. Although, it looks like we will soon find out." The team leader raised her resonance gun in both hands and braced herself with one leg ahead of the other.
Kenny Akecheta's voice had acquired an echoing quality that was unnerving. He began to clap his hands and stamp one foot in a rhythmic sequence as he chanted. Over the scorched area of bare blackened dirt, lurid scarlet force boiled and grew brighter.. and a solid shape eight feet at the shoulder was suddenly looming up over everyone. Luta-Tatanka snorted steam from its nostrils.
VI.
Looking exactly like a huge male bison, except for its color and size, the Red Buffalo's shaggy hide was in fact a bright crimson. So were its faintly glowing eyes. Horns and hooves were shiny black, though. As the unnatural beast materialized fully, it snorted again and lowered its massive head to glower directly at the four outsiders who stood facing it.
Racing forward, Demrak Jin leaped up off the ground entirely and drove her knife down behind the head, where the hump began. Her intention seemed to have been to have cut into the spine. Instead, the bone blade snapped cleanly in half and, before she could land on her feet, the great bull's head swung around and spun her twenty feet through the air to crash into a pine tree with murderous impact.
"Tim! Check on her!" Sable yelled just before she unloaded a clip of seven resonance shells. The detonations burst around the Red Buffalo's head and forequarters in a thunderous barrage. Each explosion was calculated to knock a grown man down with cracked ribs or broken leg but not usually be fatal. The rapid sequence of seven blasts did no visible harm to the giant beast. Sable ejected the empty clip and reached for one which held the anesthetic darts but she did not seriously expect them to have any effect either.
She felt herself gently pushed to one side as Galvan strode past her. The Red Buffalo charged, stamping forward like a wall of flesh in motion and it seemed nothing of flesh of blood could have survived its attack. The big Melgar braced himself, drew back his fist and drove it forward in a simple straight blow that crashed directly between the monster's eyes with an impact that sounded like a hammer hitting stone. The Luta-Tatanka was halted, stumbling back a few steps from that blow but Galvan himself was knocked entirely off his feet.
"Surprised, aren't you?" yelled the Melgar champion, jumping back up. "You're big! But in my day I fought monsters bigger still and I slew them as I shall slay you." With that, he plunged closer and seized one of the sharp horns in each hand. For some reason, the monster could not simply lift his much smaller opponent into the air. Galvan strove to force the Red Buffalo's head down to the snow. Across the Melgar's back and shoulders, massive muscles suddenly bulged enormously and his shirt split entirely.
"I don't believe it," whispered Timothy. "Nobody's THAT strong!"
For an endless minute, the two struggled. Galvan seemed fully in his element now. This was what he had been born to do. Unable to force the beast to its knees, the giant Melgar abruptly let go with his right hand and crashed his elbow down across the top of the Red Buffalo's broad skull. The beast bellowed in pain and knocked Galvan over to trample him savagely underfoot.
"He'll be killed!" screamed Demrak Jin. Before she could join the fight, Galvan had gathered his footing and straightened up. Slowly but inexortably, he stood up and threw the monster off of him to crash on its side. The Melgar seemed unhurt. As the Red Buffalo rolled over and got back up on its feet, Galvan bludgeoned two left-right blows to the head that the monster appeared startled by. In its long brutal existence it had never been defied in this way.
Off to the side, Kenny Akecheta was still chanting but his voice had become shrill and agonized, as if his throat was raw.
Again, the Red Buffalo charged and again Galvan seized a horn in each hand but this time he was driven back. The Melgar champion lost his footing and fell onto his back. Now he was trying desperately to keep those glossy black horns from goring him open. The combatants strained and struggled but hardly moved as each fought with every bit of strength they had.
Only slightly bruised but completely enraged, Demrak Jin had gotten her feet and was searching for her weapon. She found the hilt and eight inches of the snapped blade in the snow, and her feral snarl was alarming from a throat that seemed Human. Timothy Limbo had been helping her up, and she slapped his hand aside. "That beast must die."
Slowly, almost imperceptibly, the monster had been pressing its head down lower. The sharp points of those black horns were within inches of Galvan's face. Sable reached in her jacket for a flash-bang grenade, not expecting it to harm the beast but perhaps distract it. She circled around the Red Buffalo to its other side.
Unexpected by anyone, a car roared up and skipped to a reckless halt on the hard-packed road surface. Mrs Eleanor Duggan was behind the wheel of an Oldmobile at least twenty years old. As the car slid up against a snowbank, the passenger door swung open and Jocelyn Garimara emerged. Incongruously, she was holding a white cardboard box filled with brown rice and had chopsticks still in her hand. As she took in the situation, the Australian woman dropped that container and slumped back down in her seat.
Erupting from her body came the Red Spectre, fast as light itself, to crackle through the air in a flash, slicing entirely through the immense bulk of the Luta-Tatanka. Dark blood and bits of flesh sprayed high in the air. The stink of burning meat and hair was foul. Swinging around, unharmed by the encounter, Jocelyn's mystic Gammon landed lightly and stood by as the dying creature slumped down in a heap. The Spectre resembled a featureless outline the same size and shape as Jocelyn itself, shimmering hotly in the sunlight. After a few seconds, the gralic being rose up again and glided across the clearing to ease back into Jocelyn's body.
With some effort, Galvan managed to lift the monumental head of the dead creature up off him. Timothy helped him to his feet and said, "Wow. I'm a believer now."
"Had to see me in action first, eh?" The Melgar examined a long scratch that ran across his exposed chest, but only a thin line of blood showed. It was his back and shoulders that were bruised and scraped.
Getting out of the car and using a cane on the uneven snowy surface, Mrs Duggan called over to Sable. "I insisted we come here, Ms Reilly. Please don't blame Jocelyn. She didn't want to disobey your orders but I insisted we see what was happening."
Sable holstered her gun and raised her visor to reveal a face grinning with relief. "It turned out to be the right thing to do, Mrs Duggan. I was concerned that Akecheta would send the Luta-Tatanka after you, but it materialized here instead."
"And when it was in a solid form, it was no match for my Gammon," Jocelyn said. She had picked up her container of pork fried rice, found that none had spilled, and took a mouthful. "So it all worked out for the best."
VII.
From off to the side, Demrak Jin announced, "The sorcerer is dead."
Everyone hurried over. Kenny Akecheta had not moved, except that his head now lolled down loosely on his chest. Even before she reached him, Sable's enhanced senses told her he was in fact dead. She examined him as a mstter of routine but knew she would not find a mark on him.
"His lifeforce was linked to the Red Buffalo," she announced. "You could say he was the anchor that enabled it to materialize in this real world. I imagine the coroner will just have to mark it down to unknown natural causes. And from what I've read of these cases, the body of the beast itself will not be around much longer either."
"Oh, my God, Galvan, you must be freezing," Jocelyn interrupted. "Look at you."
"There is a blanket in the trunk of my car, dear," Mrs Duggan said. As the Australian woman hurried to fetch the thick comforter and wrap it around the Melgar's bare torso, Galvan protested he was fine.
"Oh, shush," said Jocelyn to end the matter.
Taking Mrs Duggan to one side, Sable had a brief discussion with her. "It would be best if none of this turned up in your articles. In fact, I'd strongly recommend that you not even mention what you've seen to anyone you know. The Midnight War is secret for good reason."
"Well.. I suppose..."
"One danger is that government agencies may take an interest in you. You'd have the Mandate recording your phone calls and reading your mail and writing down who you have lunch with. Just their idea of security regarding the paranormal."
"Oh, I must say I wouldn't care for that," the elderly woman said. "Can't we get inside somewhere? The chill is seeping into my poor bones."
"Certainly. You might as well return home. We'll meet with you before we leave the area to discuss all that's happened. At least we know you're safe."
"Ack! Look. The buffalo is falling apart," Timothy Limbo called to everyone. It was true. The enormous ripped-open carcass had started to collapse in on itself. It sagged and dripped and was melting like a candle as they watched.
"Doesn't exactly smell like spring lilacs either," Tim observed. "Phewwww..!"
"By the time the police get here, there won't be anything recognizable," Sable said. "Just a pile of slime that will eventually evaporate. Speaking of the police, I'd better call them and explain to them we came out here to ask Kenny Acheteka some questions and found him this way."
Demrak Jin held the hilt and the broken segment of her knife in front of her, regarding them the way one might look at a beloved pet who has died. "Cursed be that wizard, may his spirit never find rest," she said. Then, looking up at the big Melgar, she grudgingly continued, "That was a good fight, Galvan. You are as brave and as strong as you claim to be."
Diplomatic enough not to over-react and ruin her attempt at courtesy, the former Champion of Androval simply replied, "Thanks."
Starting her car, Mrs Duggan rolled down the window. "Are you all going to stay here? Or do some of you want a ride to town?"
"If you wouldn't mind," Galvan said, "perhaps you could drop me at the End of the Line bar? My luggage is in the room I rented there."
"Not a problem."
As Galvan slid in to fill the passenger seat and rub his head against the interior of the car roof, Jocelyn Garimara opened the back door. "I will take him if you wouldn't mind leaving us at the library where my car is. My knapsack and clothes are still in Galvan's room." Not quite catching the implications of what she had just said, she turned to face her startled teammates. "What?"
2/28/2016