dochermes

"The Last Days of Submergia"

3/25-3/26/2018

I.

"The irony is so strong that I even understand it," said Demrak Jin. "Me, inside a submarine. Heh." The small Gelydran woman stood by the front viewport with her arms folded, staring out into the dark waters lit by brilliant beams from the SELKIE. Huge fish loomed up in that illumination, only to dart away again instantly. They were one hundred yards below the surface of the Pacific, out past the furthermost islands of the Hawaiian chain. Jin seemed amused at her own reaction. She was not pretty by conventional standards, having a flat sullen face with its pug nose and cloudy blue eyes. Her shock of stiff white hair bristled as if touched by static electricity. But the Gelydra had a charisma that made her the center of attention wherever she went. Her strange outfit of some rough-textured grey material, long-sleeved high-collared tunic and pants tied with thongs, added to the visual impact she made.

Coming up behind her with a paper cup of coffee, Galvan loomed a full foot taller over her five feet three. In his more mundane clothing, jeans and sneakers and tight khaki T-shirt, he was an imposing V-shaped mass of hard well-defined muscle with wide shoulders and a narrow waist. The giant Melgar gently placed a hand on Jin's shoulder, and the hand and her head were nearly the same size. "Hah, little shark! You must aching to be out there, swimming on your own, circling around this slow clunky shuttle?"

"Oh, do I EVER!" she scoffed. "But these years working with the team have finally taught me a little patience. I'm surprised at myself but I think I can wait for the right moment to plunge out there where I belong."

The interior of the SELKIE 's every available inch was taken up with dials and gauges, as well as access panels that held cryptic numbers or jumbles of letters. The arched ceiling was not high enough for Galvan to stand fully upright, he had gotten used to crouching or holding his head bent forward. Under their feet, the throb of powerful engines could be felt as the rear jets shot water behind them for propulsion. Turning away from the viewport, Demrak Jin glanced up at her lover of the past two years. "How close is this domed city now?"

"The pilot said it'll be in sight within a few minutes," came a husky female voice from behind them. Both turned to see Jocelyn Garmara approach. Their team leader was a slim young woman with the smooth dark brown skin and thick glossy hair of her Aboriginal tribe. Wearing the black field suit with its high boots, snug pants and waist-length jacket, she looked confident and professional. "I'm anxious to get there myself. This trip has made me a touch claustrophobic."

Galvan shrugged his massive shoulders. With his full head of dark brown hair and well-tended short beard, he had a rugged, reassuring look to him. More than once, people had compared him to a lumberjack. The deep, self-assured voice added to the effect. "Ah, even when we are inside Submergia, we'll still be at the bottom of the sea with tons of water overhead, captain."

As Jocelyn made a non-commital grunt in reply, one of the scientists approached from the rear of the craft. Behind the bulkhead at their rear was the engine room and cargo holds, where he had been making sure everything was fastened securely. This was Dr Raul Rivera of the University at Mexico City, a surprisingly young man with thick-lensed glasses perched on a sharply-beaked nose. "Hey there," he sang out. "The pilot wants us sitting down when we dock. It's usually pretty smooth but there might be some bumps and thumps, one never knows." He reached out to take Demrak Jin by one arm and immediately snatched his hand away. "Ow!"

The small white-haired woman glanced up at him. "My clothing is made of sharkhide. It is abrasive."

"I'll say!" Dr Rivera stuck a bleeding finger in his mouth. "Sorry. Can you three strap yourself down on that bench over there, please?"

Galvan and Jocelyn complied, lowering themselves to a shallow metal bench and pulling on the restraint straps across their torsos. But Jin hesitated. "Look! There it is!" She pointed through the thick plexiglass window down to where the famous Submergia sat on a rocky ledge. Three hundred yards across, the facility was enclosed by a clear dome that was not a single unbroken surface but which was made of reinforced segments which included several access ports and a thick upward tube evidently for venting gases. Under the dome, a number of small one-story structures stood interconnected in a symmetrical layout. Coming out to watch the SELKIE's approach were twenty people wearing loose jumpsuits of pastel beige, baby blue or light green. From where they sat on the bench, both Jocelyn and Galvan could survey the advanced research facility. "Amazing," the big Melgar muttered. "The audacity of Humans always impresses me. You have climbed every mountain, walked on the Moon, crossed the worst deserts and reached both Poles. And now you dare to live in the ocean depths."

"Oh, this isn't the deepest part of the ocean by any means," Dr Rivera laughed. "We won't even try to build in the Marianas Trench for another generation. Submergia is located deep enough for research but not so deep that we can't evacuate in our emergency shuttles if necessary."

Still standing, not making any move toward joining her teammates on the bench, Jin gave a derisive snort. "Ulgor stands many miles deep and does not hide behind such protection as that glass bubble. My realm is deep below the surface, where the War Squid thrive and light comes only from the green powder."

"Ummm... okay. I'm not sure what you mean by all that, miss." Rivera pointed at a wide rectangular port projecting from the side of the dome, its outer end open to the water. "That's the airlock where we'll be entering."

Gazing out at the research facility, Jocelyn shook her head. "There is more of the unexplained here than you had expected."

"I'm afraid so," answered the scientist in a low tone. "Those sightings of naked blue men outside the dome... with no diving suit or equipment, angrily staring in.... Everyone is distraught over that."

( the rest of the story )

"Sea Star"

I.

[5/12/2018]


"I called Jeremy at home. He's on his way," Sable said. She stepped out of her office into the wide front hall of the KDF headquarters building. The walls were mostly taken up by shelves packed with ancient books, with esoteric items interspersed among them including bronze statuettes, wavy-bladed daggers, one skull of an unidentifiable horned animal and a nicely framed oil portraut of a sour-faced Puritan dressed all in black. But, in a corner back toward the door to the kitchen, a sturdy wooden stand held a fish tank which bubbled as pumps circulated the salt water. Standing at chest level, the tank had unusually thick walls and a folding metal top which was kept locked into place.

For the first time, Demark Jin noticed strips made of a pale metal ran along the edges of the tank, and that a finely-crafted wheel of that same metal formed part of the lock which held the tank closed. Ensalir. Silver charged with protective gralic force by the immortal Eldarin themselves. Why would ensalir borders be necessary? The woman from Ulgor had an unfriendly expression on her face even when resting, but now the cloudy blue eyes were actively sullen and angry. At only five feet three, with short bristling white hair and a wide pug face, Jin was not what most people would consider attractive but her ferocious presence made her hard to ignore. Now, she swung around to face her captain.

"I wanted to ask about this earlier, Sable," she said. "Most of these creatures in the tank are indeed from Ulgor, as Jeremy always told visitors. The hermit crabs that build their castles from pebbles, the seahorse with fangs. Even that luminous squid with the transparent body. But I had never seen a sea star like this one. It seems dead. The eye is clouded over."

Coming up next to her partner, Lauren Sable Reilly peered into the tank. Jin knew that her captain had enhanced perception and could see and hear beyond what normal flesh and blood organs could achieve. Lying on its side in the gravel at the base of the tank was a orange creature with a central body large as a person's hand and five thick appendages. In the hub of the beast, a single red eye was glazed and unseeing.

"That thing always watched me when I came near the tank," Jin said as if deeply offended. "Its eye moved. At first, I thought it was amusing but the beast got on my nerves. It stared as if it was aching to get out of there and attack me. Sometimes I thought I should simply stab it with my bone knife and solve the problem."

"It's good you didn't. Finally dead. By natural causes, too." Sable stood and placed a hand on the Ulgoran's narrow shoulder. "There is a strange story behind that tiny animal, Jin. But then, this building houses many thousands of artifacts, each with a strange story of its own. It would take years to explain them all."

Demrak Jin shrugged and folded her arms across her chest. "I do not understand. Tell me more."

"I don't see why you can't learn about the case. It just has never come up before." Sable gave a final hard stare at the dead creature in the tank and then led her teammate toward the open office door across the hall. "Let's have a seat. It all began when the first KDF team was getting started, almost forty years ago..."

( the rest of the story )

"Initiation of Furious Buddha"

9/1/2018

I.

The second hour at the feast was about all that Sheng could handle. He was growing increasingly uncomfortable. His problem was that he looked Chinese, probably hailing from the North considering his cheekbones and eagle-beaked nose. He only spoke barely passable Cantonese and he was here with his Uncle Pao, who was so thoroughly Chinese that he couldn't be taken for anything else. So everyone spoke to him with puns and references that he had no clue about.

But in fact, Sheng Mo-Yuan had come from the adjacent realm of Chujir. Tel Shai lore claimed that Chujirans were the distant ancestors of what had become the Han people, though this had no evidence to support it. When they had met by chance, the old man Pao had immediately claimed Sheng as his nephew, partly because of the coincidence of their family names but mostly because both were lonely men with no true family, and both of them had accepted this.

Seated at the huge round table, Sheng found himself shoveling down great quantities of food as everyone reached past him or handed him samples to try. This won his hosts over. The saying was that Chujirans would eat anything they could pin down and he was a typical Chujiran in that regard. Even though he had told everyone he had unfortunately been brought up in the very white wilderness of Nebraska, his gusto at eating everything from chicken feet to clotted duck blood soup brought him credit. He would have eaten dog if it had been offered; back in Chujir, he had done so a few times.

Nearly all of the people at that table were Chinese men middle-aged or older. The one exception to his left was a young woman with amazing glossy black hair hanging straight past her shoulder blades. Not only was she asking Sheng about his career as a private detective, she sat attentively listening to his responses. This was an endearing trait and he was becoming fond of her.

The final scraps were being scraped together. The excited and rather loud conversations slowed as digestion began to bog everyone down. It seemed clear that the gathering was drawing to a close. One by one and then in pairs, the men thanked their host and left the house.

In a cluster at the other side of the table were four octogenarians including Uncle Pao. They wiped their mouths with linen napkins and rose together, perhaps a bit stiffly. The master of the house, Yen Li, was a stout old man with both black hair and beard streaked with white strands. He was impeccably dressed in a lightweight tropical suit and tie. "Young Sheng, will you join your Uncle to the hospitality of my den?"

Standing up himself, seeing the nod of approval from Uncle Pao, Sheng replied, "It would be my honor." To be honest, he would rather have spent some time with that friendly girl. His romances had been spaced way too far apart to suit him. But all his instincts told him something big was underfoot, maybe a major case for his Fist For Hire Agency.

The four old men led Sheng and Pao to a room at the rear of the mansion. High-ceilinged, wood-paneled, its walls were filled with bookshelves broken by a few traditional scrolls or small bronze figurines. Comfortable overstuffed leather armchairs were arranged in a circle around a table holding a humidor, bottles of wine and gleamingly clean glasses.

As the elders settled gratefully into the comfort of those chairs, Yen Li gestured for Sheng to join them. Two of the old men selected cigars and puffed away for a few seconds before settling down. Yen Li unbuttoned his brocade vest with relief before speaking.

"I have known Sheng Pao-Wang only a few years," Yen began. "Yet I have learned he is a man of honor who harms no one and who is always ready to help those in need. A better friend can hardly be found."

"Stop, stop, I blush," Uncle Pao laughed.

"And he had told me many colorful tales of you, Sheng Mo-Yuan. Sometimes known to the whites as Argent. You are said to be a knight of Tel Shai, that ancient order whose origins are lost in time. Not only are you a Master of Kumundu, you are said to have the remarkable ability to make your body hard as rock, to increase your speed and strength beyond limits of what even Chi can enhance. But you can only enact one of these properties at a time. Have I been misled?"

Sitting upright at the edge of the plush chair, Sheng shrugged. "No, sir. All that is true. I have been given a gift for which I am most grateful."

"That is good to hear, since you may walk on a perilous road soon. My other friends here tonight have enjoyed long lives and survived hard times. We do not choose to go to the police with our problems. It is better to handle our troubles ourselves and let the outsiders remain unaware."

A few murmurs of agreement sounded from the three old men in the circle. The eldest there, with long silver hair and sunken cheeks spoke, "We represent the Chinese-American Benevolent Society of Lower Manhattan, young man. To be blunt, we are a Tong much like those founded nearly two hundred years ago in this country. Where the authorities will not help us, we help each other."

Sheng kept his face grave and hoped he would not say the wrong thing now.

Yen Li continued, "I must speak names better left unmentioned, names stained with many crimes and much wickedness. Wu Lung. The Manchurian. The Spinner of Webs. They have been quiet in recent years, perhaps occupied elsewhere or perhaps finally gone from this life. A new would-be threat has surfaced. We would wish to keep him from putting down roots in our community."

Uncle Pao spoke up for the first time. "My nephew is discreet. He will not volunteer information to the authorities. Secrets remain behind his teeth."

"So we had hoped," Yen Li admitted. "Young Sheng, you are said to be familiar with the many schools of assassins who trouble this unhappy world. One of the worst of these has been reported here, in our Chinatown. Have you ever heard," and even behind the closed door of his own den, he lowered his voice and leaned forward, "... have you ever heard of the Furious Buddha?"

( the rest of the story )

"Witch, Devil, Ghost"

11/1/20018

I.

When he entered the lobby of the Aurelio Tower on Fifth Avenue, Jeremy Bane had been immediately greeted by a young woman with an amazing mane of wavy black hair past her shoulders and a pleasant reassuring smile. His Kumundu training alerted him that she was way above average in terms of physical conditioning. From the balance in her stride, the way she kept aware of everything behind her and how she presented her stronger side to him, Bane realized she had some martial training, too... self-defense courses at the mininum and more likely a full-scale mastery of some fighting art. She was as much bodyguard as hostess, he thought.

Corroborating this, the metal clipboard she tucked under one arm did hold a sheaf of papers, but the clipboard was thicker than usual and had a rounded handle in the middle of its back that would allow it to be used as a weapon or as a shield. The rather thick fountain pen fastened to the top of the clipboard looked as if it had been gimmicked, probably to spray some noxious chemical.

The eccentricity in her clothing also interested him. Her dark grey pantsuit outfit had barely visible chalk lines running along both jacket and pants. The off-white silk blouse with its double strand of pears also was decorated by thin light grey lines. The effect was not blatant but once he noticed it, he also saw that her jet black hair had a few silver strands running parallel from forehead down her back. She caught him noticing this and gifted him with a smile. It was only then he recognized how pretty she was.

"Mr Bane? Good morning. I'm Christine Alfred, Mr Aurelio's aide. If you'll come with me..." She led him across the vast cavernous lobby, her heels clicking on the marble floor. Groups of middle-aged men in suits conferred in hushed tones here and there, while a few younger men hurried on evidently urgent errands. In the center of the lobby was a fountain which burbled reassuringly. They made their way past a deep reception counter staffed by a regal Asian woman who nodded solemnly as they went to a plain unmarked panel in one corner. This swung on hidden hinges to admit them into a small private elevator.

The assistant did not touch any controls. The elevator hummed smoothly and rose upward by itself. She was watching the Dire Wolf with a mixture of fascination and uneasiness. "It's rare indeed that Mr Aurelio admits anyone to his office that he hasn't known for years and, to be honest, most people have to wait weeks for an audience."

"He must think I can be useful," Bane replied without inflection. The Dire Wolf was dressed all in black as usual, slacks and turtleneck and sports jacket. Six feet even, still gaunt and active even at sixty, he had a narrow feral face under short black hair which was flecked with increasing numbers of white strands. It was those intense pale grey eyes that fascinated and even unnerved everyone he met. She was regarding him the same way she would watch a real wolf that had suddenly entered her path.

The cage doors hissed open and they stepped out into the elegant office of the Richest Boy On Earth.

Bane had of course stood in throne rooms of actual kings and emperors in Androval, Signarm and Chujir. Aurelio's office was not garish or overdone, it was all dark polished wood and deep plush carpets, with gold trim on furnishings that was not ostentatious but seemed a natural accent. Some comfortable chairs and low tables stood to one side behind an open wooden frame and there was a flatscreen TV on the wall behind that area. The air was dry and almost chilly.

Behind a desk larger than most beds, a young man rose to his feet and put down a tablet he had been studying. The famous heir to the Aurelio family network of businesses and enterprises could not have been more than nineteen. He was below average height, slim and well-toned in a tan suit with a yellow tie and a few accents of gold in his watch, right-hand ring and tie tack. Auric Aurelio seemed to be monochrome, with his dark blond hair and even tan blending into the same tones. Even his light brown eyes with their gold flicks matched. He flashed a brilliant smile of textbook perfect teeth and gestured for his visitor to approach.

"Jeremy Bane! The Dire Wolf. I've heard stories about you all my life," the youth said with evident delight.

"Well, here I am," replied Bane without enthusiasm. "That was a creative way to get my attention."

"Ah, please have a seat. Stripesy, you sit in on this as well. No notes, please, this is a personal matter." As Bane and the woman called Stripesy settled into plush leather chairs in front of the desk, Aurelio sat back down himself. "Yes, I hoped it would please you. A considerable donation to various soup kitchens and warming centers and homeless shelters along the West Side near Times Square, funding them for years..."

"You found out my childhood was spent there," Bane said. "I was an orphan of the streets. I know that life. You've helped hundreds of people who had no reason to expect hope. But you did it rather than simply offer me a fee and I have to wonder why?"

Aurelio was still smiling, with no signs of calculation. He seemed genuinely delighted. "Stripesy here did some research. You have officially retired and closed your Dire Wolf agency. I didn't think any offer of money would tempt you to take a new case at this point. But hopefully, if you approved of my donations, you might be curious enough to at least hear me out."

The Dire Wolf sat upright in the chair, palms down flat on its arms and fixed his pale eyes on the billionaire. "I'm listening."

"Mr Bane, over the years I have learned a bit about the Midnight War. Much more than any of the media dare report, more than even most so-called experts on the occult ever discover. Your career has been remarkable. For decades, you protected the human race from threats they didn't even imagine existed."

"Go on."

"This should be confidential, please. You are still a licensed Private Investigator, Mr Bane. Even if you haven't taken me as a client yet, I hope that what I tell you will considered privileged information."

"You already know I'm a closed-mouthed guy," Bane said.

"Yes, yes of course. Still, this is hard for me to reveal. It's my younger sister, Mr Bane. Gwynifer. Since childhood, she has shown remarkable psychic gifts and all her free time has been spent hiring various tutors in the mystic arts. Gwyn started with Reiki lessons and crystal-seers but she long ago moved on to darker and more dangerous teachers. I believe she somehow located a Dartha here in this very city and studied under him."

Sudden tension crackled in the air like static electricity. Bane's voice had hardened into steel. "A Dartha! Tell me everything."

"That lasted a year. She also met with a few elderly men who claimed that they had been members of Red Sect back in the old days. I am afraid even Those Who Remenber have taught her some of their nonsense. Gwyn is not a dabbler by nature, Mr Bane. She plunges headlong into her hobbies. I am sure she has become a genuine no-fooling Witch of great ability and she intends to gather some of the worst creatures of the night to be her servants. What plans she has for them, I can't say but the possibilities give me nightmares."

( the rest of the story )