Monster Hunter Memoir: Saints

  * * *

  “If this thing comes out, don’t fucking hesitate with the napalm,” my words muffled by the visor of the silver suit.

  We had never used a decoy bomb pig on this fresh of an eruption. The worm could still be right beneath the surface. The plan was to get the pig in position with cover from two flamethrowers. Decay was on one and Sam Haven on the other. Jon Glenn and I would drag the pig.

  “Got it,” Sam said. “Looking forward to burning your ass.”

  “The good news is we have an eruption point. We’ll set the pig down near that and then get the fuck out.”

  “I’ve done this before,” Glenn had helped Milo with the heavy lifting for a few of those. “Let’s just do it.”

  We found the hole right near where we’d found the symbol. Before it had been a little section of hallway and two small storage closets. Both of the closets were gone now. The walls were in splinters and the built-up crap that had been stuffed in them was scattered everywhere. The worm had even broken out the walls between the two sides of the duplex. The other side was just as trashed.

  “Let’s just stop right here,” I said to Glenn as we reached the destroyed area. “It should be close enough.” We still had to set the wires and prep it. The detonators and safeties were on the outside of the pig up under its belly. The wires were coiled by them and held on with tape, ready to be set. I grabbed one as Glenn grabbed another and stretched them out.

  As we were doing that, there was a rumble from under the ground and in a flash the kifo worm was just there.

  I didn’t hesitate. I pulled the safety on the fuse, turned and yelled: “Run!”

  I was still holding the wire in my hand. As I bolted, it triggered the fuse.

  Glenn, unfortunately, had looked at the worm. I don’t know if he’d never looked at one before when they were killing them or if it was the incredible size of the thing. He’d fought hoodoo on his own for years but it had been “normal” stuff. Zombies. Weak vampires. A werewolf. The sort of shit you see in movies. He’d done it right, he’d done it smart.

  He’d never seen anything like the kifo worm. And, unfortunately, he reacted like most people do the first time they see anything supernatural. He froze.

  Pro-tip: There is a time to save your buddy and a time to save yourself. Knowing the difference between the two is important. And accepting that sometimes you leave people behind is also important. I’m not justifying letting Glenn die there. I’m explaining. Jon Glenn outmassed me by about a hundred and fifty pounds. I could not pick him up and carry him out with any sort of speed. If I’d even hesitated long enough to grab his arm and pull him, the worm would have gotten us both.

  I repeat, there’s a time to be a hero and a time to run like hell. If you don’t learn that, you won’t last long in this business.

  As it was, the only reason the worm didn’t catch me was Sam Haven. He didn’t hesitate either. He filled the hall with fire.

  The worm scooped up the frozen Glenn and our “offering” and disappeared back into its hole to avoid the napalm.

  “Shit,” I said, running through a house which was now thoroughly on fire. “Shit, shit, shit…”

  “Wasn’t anything you could do, man,” Haven said, patting at the flames.

  “I know that.” We were leaving behind little droplets of napalm and getting the house even more thoroughly involved. But I still have to live with it.

  * * *

  “Honest to God, we were trying for discreet,” I said, holding up my badly burned glove in a Scout’s salute.

  “I only count three of you,” Campbell said.

  “Thing erupted while we were setting the trap. Glenn froze. Sorry, but we didn’t see any sign of your agents.”

  About then there was another serious rumble from underground and the burning house more or less exploded. The kifo worm was massive. It reared up through the roof, hissing and whistling in agony.

  They’d brought up a fire truck and were rigging hoses to get the house fire under control. At the sight of the kifo worm, most of the firefighters froze in horror. The smarter of them ran like hell.

  Despite being covered in napalm, out in sunlight and with a hundred pounds of thermite burning in its gut, the kifo worm was only mortally wounded. And seriously pissed. It grabbed one of the frozen firefighters with a pseudopod and pulled him into its mass, absorbing the body in a flash. Sam and Decay weren’t exactly slow, though. They ran forward and started covering it in napalm, driving it back onto the burning house.

  There was exactly nothing the rest of us could do. I just watched the thing being consumed by the flames. The smoke was still pouring out of the hole as it crumbled to ash.

  The kifo was dead, but both of the flanking homes were now seriously on fire and all the firefighters were gone.

  “Well, boys, looks like it’s up to us to put out the fire!” Franklin shouted as he headed for the fire truck. It wasn’t our job, but our team leader wasn’t the type to just stand around while people’s houses burned down.

  “Anybody know how to run one of these things?” When I looked around, Special Agent Campbell had fled. “Embrace the suck.”

  CHAPTER 12

  So now we get to one of the most important episodes in my life as a Hunter. The reason I sued MCB. And won. It was a rainy Tuesday. Calls had been slow. There hadn’t been a kifo eruption in the weeks since we lost Glenn. So we were hanging around the team shack when lo and behold two of my favorite people in the world showed up: Myers and Franks.

  I’d been helping Franklin with paperwork when I got called back to the team room.

  “Agent Myers,” I said, nodding in greeting. Being former MHI, the junior agent wasn’t very popular around here. “Traitor” was one of the nicer things my coworkers called him. He may have been a duplicitous jackass, but he had been a good Hunter, and he’d stepped up at Mardi Gras when the MCB had lost all their senior leadership. I just nodded at Franks and wondered why these two were back in town. “Good afternoon.”

  “We need to ask you some questions, Gardenier,” Myers said. “You’re coming with us.”

  “I won’t be interrogated without the presence of counsel.”

  “You don’t have the right to counsel in supernatural investigations.”

  “I do if such counsel is read in on the supernatural,” I said, as calmly as I could. “And in this town, throw a rock and you find a lawyer who knows about the supernatural.”

  “Franks,” Myers said. “Bring him.”

  Now, Franks just did not care. He would drag me by the hair if he felt like it.

  “What’s this about?” Franklin asked. Half the team was up and ready to pounce. The new guys didn’t know Franks. Bad move. Franks would fight the whole office and probably enjoy it.

  “Down, boys. I’m going peacefully. You want to cuff me?” I turned around and put my hands behind my back. “I’ll be fine, guys. Let it go.”

  “Hell I will,” Sam growled.

  “None of your concern, Haven.” Myers said. “Just stay out of this.”

  “Last time I heard those same exact words out of an MCB agent’s cock holster, you cowards massacred a cruise ship full of civilians.”

  “Get the hell out of our way if you know what’s good for you. Franks, cuff him.”

  “Call Mr. Lambert, will you, Franklin?” I asked as Franks put on the cuffs. I won’t say Franks and I were friends but we had fought side by side. I think I even saved his life at Mardi Gras, but that did not matter with Franks. Those cuffs bit to the bone. I’m not sure he even knew how to put them on lightly.

  “You call anyone, the MCB will throw you in prison,” Myers snapped on the way out.

  I hoped Franklin would call his bluff.

  They took me outside and Franks put me in the back of the car with a shove. Myers dropped a bag over my head.

  “Is that strictly necessary?” I knew the sound was muffled but it was a reasonable question. The answer was a hard blow on the sid
e of my head. Okay, they were playing by those rules. This would be interesting.

  I probably should have been scared. The classic black helicopter boys were whisking me away to places unknown to interrogate me. I was probably going to be beaten up. There was a fair chance I’d get shot in the head. Also a fair chance I’d see the inside of a federal prison. I wasn’t sure what they were pissed about, could be any number of things, but I wasn’t going to let it get to me.

  Prison would suck, but I really don’t fear the one thing most people fear most: Death. It’s not that I’m suicidal, but I long to die. I’ve been to heaven. It was a nice place. I’m looking forward to going back. Duty really is heavier than mountains and death really is lighter than a feather for me. I was sent back for one unknown mission. One moment when I have to achieve perfection as a Monster Hunter. Then I die. At a guess, painfully. I don’t know when that will be but I’m okay with it whenever it comes. I simply don’t fear it.

  So all this was just another frustrating episode in a world full of frustration. I’d said I was an addict about Monster Hunting. But, frankly, if it wasn’t for the whole mission-from-God thing, I’d probably find some way to give it up. This sort of shit was just getting on my nerves. I was halfway tempted to try to get them to kill me. Franks wouldn’t mind. Franks really did not have the emotional parts to mind.

  I had been expecting them to take me to some out-of-the-way spot to interrogate. But instead they took me straight to the Franklin Federal Building at Lafayette Square. I could tell even through the bag over my head. Church Street to Girod and into the underground parking lot. I recognized the bumps on Church which seriously needed resurfacing. God knows, I’d been there enough meeting with MCB back in the good ole days when Castro was in charge. I missed him.

  When the car stopped I was as helpful getting out as I could be. It didn’t matter. Franks just manhandled me out of the car and nobody can manhandle someone like Franks. Then it was more or less being carried by one arm through a series of corridors. Elevator down. One, two, three levels. The MCB interrogation and holding area. Turn left, turn right, one…two…three…ten paces. Interrogation room four.

  Hard steel seat. If the bag was off, the room would be a light salmon. Facing one of the de rigueur reflecting windows. Table, bolted to the ground. Two chairs, both steel. Not so heavy as to be a useful weapon.

  And sure enough, the hood came off.

  “Given my current relationship with the committee, you’d better have some serious probable cause for this, Dwayne.”

  Only Myers and Franks had been joined by Special Agent Campbell. Of course, Myers was still a junior agent. Grabbing a Hunter off the street was over his pay grade.

  “Nice try. This has been cleared,” Campbell said, sitting down across from me. “I know you’re involved with the Dark Masters and I know you killed your brother just to shut him up so he couldn’t implicate you in the ring. I requested assistance to clear this up once and for all, so Washington dispatched Agent Franks. And believe me, when Agent Franks assists in an interrogation, the truth always comes out. And now you’re going to answer some questions.”

  “Gardenier, Oliver,” I said. “156-25-7819. Monster Hunter.”

  “That’s the way it’s going to be?” Myers asked.

  “Absent counsel, yes.”

  “You know you don’t get counsel here,” Campbell said. “We’re the only ones who know where you are.”

  “We’re in the federal building. MCB detention and interrogation. Room Four.”

  “Nice guess. Where’s the rest of the cells?”

  “Ten paces that way.” I gestured with my chin. “Turn left. Five paces. Three cells on the right, two on the left.”

  “You know what I mean!” Campbell nodded at Franks.

  I’d been hit quite a few times. I’d been shot a couple more. Getting hit by Franks was more like being shot. I ended up on the floor, shaking my head. I’d lost at least one tooth. And I can safely say he’d pulled his punch.

  “That was an honest answer. You asked where the cells were. They’re around the fucking corner!”

  “He’s correct,” Franks stated helpfully.

  “The Dark Masters’ cells,” Campbell snarled. “Where are the rest of the Dark Master cells, Gardenier?”

  “I have no clue. I’m not part of the ring and never have been.”

  “Really, Chad?” Myers said. “We get the reading that you’re involved, you go snooping about it around the world. Then you conveniently find your brother’s cell and take out the only lead we had. Nice way to tie up loose ends. Just stopping the kidnappings is not going to save you from prison.”

  “That was months ago!”

  “Government may move like a glacier,” Campbell said. “But whatever ends up in front of a glacier is crushed eventually. Because of your relationship with some committee members, the director was hesitant to take extreme measures, but now your time has come.”

  “That wasn’t my fault. I’m innocent! I was never part of the ring! But you’re never going to believe that, are you? So now we’re definitely on the only-in-the-presence-of-counsel thing. Time to break out the pliers, Franks.”

  “Won’t need them,” he said simply.

  “It’s good to be in the hands of a pro—” And then Franks hit me again.

  It took a long time and it wasn’t pleasant. Since you’re reading this, I didn’t die and I’m not writing these memoirs from prison. I did end up in the hospital, however. The chart was fairly extensive.

  Dislocated shoulder. Broken left wrist. Broken right forearm. Contusions over eighty percent of my torso. Two broken ribs. Internal bleeding. Skull fractures. Broken right occiput. Broken nose. Four missing teeth. Six broken fingers. Seven fingernails ripped off. It was more painful than it sounds.

  The problem with interrogating someone under the assumption that they know something they don’t is that they cannot tell you what you want to hear. Campbell—who hated me anyway—was convinced I knew about more cells. If I even hinted I agreed, I was going to a secret prison forever. There would be no trial or anything like that. It would simply happen.

  Later I found out that Campbell had been really close with Agent Robinson, mentor and protégé, and he blamed me personally for Robinson getting eaten by the mava. There hadn’t been any more Dark Masters kidnappings after Thornton’s death, so the MCB director had been ready to believe my testimony before the committee. At least until Campbell used Robinson’s death to sell the story that I was still a menace, hence his insistence of bringing in Franks for a special interrogation.

  I didn’t crack. After the beating started I didn’t even wisecrack, believe it or not. I just took it and kept reciting my name and social. Oh, and I didn’t hesitate to scream. A lot.

  I don’t know when they actually stopped. I was drifting in and out. Something about a subdural cerebral hematoma. Give Franks his due, he knew how to not quite kill someone.

  I do remember it was actually Franks who called it.

  “All we want is the truth.”

  “Truth,” I muttered through busted lips. I’d spent most of the time on the floor and was starting to like it there. “Truth. Gardenier, Oliver…”

  “Franks…” Myers sounded tired and unhappy. As the unfortunate bastard picked to be Franks partner, he’d been sent all the way from Washington for this, and he’d come to the realization that I was telling the truth.

  “He knows nothing,” Franks finally declared.

  “I’ll be the judge of that!” Campbell replied. “But I think we’ll give Gardenier some time to contemplate—”

  “I’m bored,” Franks said. “We’re done.”

  I passed out. Wasn’t the first time, but this time they didn’t wake me up again.

  * * *

  The rest of it was hazy. I’d been in the Marine bombing in Beirut and it was like that. Light and dark. Voices…

  “…too extensive to treat here…!”

  Muttered
something, sharp…

  “…probably have thought of that before you beat someone to death…”

  Good. I was going to die. Sorry, God, tried to do the right thing…

  I didn’t die. I wanted to die. Especially when I woke up in the hospital room with Franks staring at me.

  I could only open one eye. I just looked at him. He looked back.

  I’m not sure what Franks is. I’m pretty certain he’s not entirely human. He has none of the emotions of charity or mercy or conscience that make us human and I’ve seen him take a fatal head wound and just keep fighting like it was nothing. But what he does have is an absolute sense of duty. He wouldn’t be upset killing a building full of orphans if there was a real need to do so. Say they were all vampires or had been bitten by loup-garou or zombies or pick a reason to wipe out a nest of orphans. He’d shoot every little tot in the head, wring their necks like chickens, whatever, and go have dinner. Wouldn’t matter to him.

  But he knew, and I knew, that this mission had been flawed from the outset. He was sure now that I had nothing to do with the Dark Masters. He knew that Campbell had acted unprofessionally, emotionally, so wound up in his anger that he’d lost all objectivity. And that he, Franks, had wasted his valuable time beating me half to death for no good reason.

  So I just looked at him and he looked back. I would say it was a staring contest but I actually passed back out after a while. So I guess he won.

  * * *

  “Mr. Gardenier?” a voice said.

  This time there was no Franks. There was a Myers.

  “Gardenier, Oliver…” I said. I tried to remember my social and couldn’t. Damn, I’d been hit hard.

  “Mr. Gardenier?” the voice said again. “I am Samuel Koltts, your legal counsel.”

  I turned my head, wincing in pain. There was another person in the room. Short, spare, very nice suit. Not MCB. Not with that suit. That was a three-thousand-dollar suit. Nice tie.

  Myers was really there and just as clearly unhappy which suited me fine. Ugly suit.