The Monsters Among Us – Chapter 4: Walk of the Town

—Season 4, Episode 6: Out and About—

For those first couple of days of interviews in the hotel, the werewolves were in and out of my room all the time. I think they’d become attached to me. It turns out picking bullet bits out of someone is a bonding experience with werewolves. I stopped bothering to even lock the door after the first day. It’s not like I could complain, they’d kept me in recordings pretty much the whole time I wasn’t eating or sleeping.

By the third day, though, I think it’s fair to say they were getting a little stir-crazy. So much so in fact that they decided it was high time to take a walk. In public, and in Jude’s case, in werewolf form. Whether that was for community outreach or novelty value I’ll leave you to judge.

After a brief discussion on whether this was in fact a good idea, Ryan, our previous vampiric interviewee, declared he’d be joining us to keep an eye on things. This prompted much bustling from his girlfriend, who I then met for the first time. She was very keen that he not forget his sunscreen, hat, sunglasses, or the other little things to keep him from getting sunstroke… “Again”.

She did, however, decline to join us on the excursion. When I saw the crowds outside the hotel up close, I could very much see her point.

…

‘Wow, the crowd looks very different from ground level,’ Cadence said. ‘Usually I’d be over there. I should describe what we have here, before we actually head out.’

She took a deep breath and peered out of the lobby window.

‘The police presence has been here since day one, and if anything has only grown since then. They’ve got a perimeter set up around the hotel’s entrance, keeping some distance between us and the various other groups outside. If I’m being entirely fair to the cops, this got dropped on their heads almost as much as everyone else, and they’ve been on their best behaviour. There have been a few heated exchanges, and an attempt or two to get past the cordon, but so far they’ve kept a lid on it without going overboard.’

‘And then there’s the press. Everyone who didn’t get an invite to the big show, and who hasn’t been in the hotel for the last couple of days is out there with a camera crew. I’m told every bar, restaurant, hotel and motel in Manhattan is making bank right now. Good for them.’

‘Of course if it was just press and police we’d have more people willing to come and go from the hotel. The elephants in the room, well, out in the street in this case, are the protestors. There are church groups out there claiming that monsters are evil, and this is a sign of the apocalypse, and accusing people of being the antichrist… Not sure how I even feel about that concept, though, now that I’ve been assured by multiple people that I really did meet one of the Devil’s sons.’

‘Just for the record,’ Haley said, ‘to the best of my knowledge that’s an entirely unofficial title. And I’m told Azazel’s nice.’

‘Yeah, ermm, anyway, it’s not just religious groups out there. There are right wing campaign groups demanding monsters be recorded and monitored.’

‘Which is right the fuck out of comic books, and we aren’t having it. Not for a second,’ Ryan added.

‘Then there’s the won’t somebody think of the children brigade, a few cults, a lot of people who I will charitably call mentally unwell, and somewhat less comfortably there is also a pressure group forming of people who claim to have had negative experiences with monsters, most of whom have previously been dismissed in one way or another.’

‘I’m sure some of them are telling the truth. I mean, I’d know,’ said Haley. ‘It’s not like there aren’t monsters who are also criminals. We’re people after all.’

‘That’s not to say, though, that everything is entirely negative. For every angry person out there waving a banner load of slurs or screaming fire and brimstone there are many more counter-protestors out there to show their support. There are plenty of the nicer religious groups out in the streets preaching tolerance and brotherhood. All manner of general well-wishers. I can spot a few banners and shirts belonging to civil rights groups.’

‘And don’t forget the pride flags,’ Haley added. ‘I think we’ve been adopted.’

‘And the furries, they’re out in force, and I’m blaming you werewolves for that,’ Ryan joked.

‘Hey, we are the Platonic ideal furry. I mean look at Jude here. So cute.’

‘Anyway, back to the matter at hand,’ Cadence said, trying to get things back on track, ‘while there is a certain tension out there, things are largely under control. The police are keeping the two sides separate, and so far at least other than a couple of scuffles nothing has kicked off.’

‘Some of us expected worse,’ Ryan admitted. ‘Which is why the council made a point of talking to the authorities first and having the police prepared. Not specifically, you understand. They found out with everyone else. More briefing them that there would be an event, that there would be protests and counterprotests, and that they were to be light touch all around and just keep the peace. The last thing we needed was a police officer panicking and shooting someone.’

‘I suspect the surprise has helped, in a way,’ Cadence said. ‘There was no grand countermovement prepared, so the media has been covering the event itself. By the time there’s a focused anti-monster movement that isn’t some crackpots in the street, the news cycle will have moved on. I’ve seen some TV interviews with the usual suspects, and it’s pretty clear they don’t have their talking points and marching orders yet.’

‘You can say Republicans, you know,’ Haley suggested. ‘Honestly, I think they’re probably all busy trying to work out if any of them are monsters before they kick off.’

‘Well, quite. Still, right now at least, the media is focusing more on the event itself, monsters and their history, and what this all means… Well, the more respectable parts of it are, anyway. Now, let’s head out, shall we?’

…

There was the general hubbub you would expect from a large crowd and associated media and police presence. It fell silent as Jude stepped out of the hotel door. Briefly, at least. When he walked out into the cleared area behind the police cordon the friendlier parts of the crowd cheered. The more hostile part seemed to have lost some of their vigour at the sight of the seven-foot tall wolf monster.

When the crowd recognised Haley the cheering turned up a notch.

‘Sorry people, no show today, we’re just going for a nice walk,’ she joked.

Jude stalked over to the friendliest looking area of the crowd. They looked a little nervous, probably entirely fairly, until a kid asked if they could pet him, and he stooped down to let them scratch behind his ear. Once his tail started wagging he lost some of his intimidation factor. The police opened the way for them, and they started making their way to the street, which for Jude was an obstacle course of being petted and hugged.

Haley had it almost as bad, a surprising amount (to her at least) of the crowd wanting autographs. Some enterprising soul had clearly been selling poster prints of her, pre- and post-transformation side by side, and she ended up signing a great many of them as they made their way to the open street. To Cadence’s surprise, more than a few people recognised her, too, and wanted a selfie along the way.

The hotel’s entire block was closed off to traffic, so heavy were the crowds, so it took them a couple of minutes to make their way through the gauntlet and get to the open sidewalks.

‘That’s a lot,’ Ryan said, once they were clear of the crowds and able to walk normally down the street once again. ‘At least I look human enough that everyone was looking at the furball here.’

Jude made an amused huffing noise.

Walking down a Manhattan street in the company of one of, temporarily at least, the most famous women on Earth and a full-blown transformed werewolf was, to put it politely, attracting attention. All eyes were on the werewolf, and he was generating the kind of personal space bubble that no one else would get on a busy city sidewalk.

The werewolf was seemingly happy enough, walking along and sniffing at the occasional thing that caught his interest. He did, however, visibly wince when someone actually screamed in surprise when they turned a corner and came out right in front of him.

‘It’s okay, big guy,’ Haley said, patting him on the back. ‘They’re not going to be used to it yet, are they?’

…

It goes to show, really, just how quickly news spreads these days. This is the third day since the press conference, Jude’s walking down the street transformed, and the vast majority of people we’ve passed don’t even seem bothered. Wary, perhaps, which I think is an entirely fair reaction. Surprised, in more than a few cases. Hell, we’ve even been stopped more than once to ask if he’s real or some animatronic.

We’ve been stopped just as many times by people wanting a selfie. Another thing that’s hardly surprising. Also It turns out our Jude is weirdly good with kids. As soon as they come up to him, he’s all big puppy smile and lolling tongue, and they’re up on his shoulders or posing with him while the parents take their pictures.

…

‘Where’s he taking us anyway?’ Ryan asked.

Jude had clearly caught the scent of something he liked, and they’d been following him for a block and a half now.

‘I find it’s smartest to just follow along and hope for the best,’ Haley admitted. ‘The nose isn’t usually off.’

It didn’t take them much longer to find what he’d been tracking.

‘A chilli dog cart, really?’ said Haley.

Jude whined and pointed at the cart.

‘Fine, puppy, but you’re buying when we do this the other way around. You all want in? Yeah? Okay. Yo, buddy. Half a dozen, with everything please. What? One ain’t gonna fill him up in this shape.’

…

Since we were out on the street, it seemed like as good a time as any for that time-honoured news tradition of asking random people what they thought. While the wolves were distracted, which it turns out happens a lot, like seriously a lot, it’s like trying to walk a husky that’s three times your mass… What was I saying? Oh, yeah, whenever they got distracted, Ryan and I would go up to some randoms in the street and see what they thought about the whole thing. It’s not exactly highbrow journalism, but you never know who’ll have something interesting to say.

…

‘D’you know what I think? I don’t think any of this is real. It’s some viral marketing bullshit for a horror movie or somethin’. That’s just a guy in a suit, and that thing on the news the other day was pre-recorded. How else would they have done the special effects? It was just sponsored content. Anyways, it can’t be real. I saw this video on Facebook that debunked the whole thing. Showed all the little glitches in the effects, and the inconsistencies between the different camera angles. There’s no such thing as a werewolf, full stop. And tell him to stop looking at me like that.’

…

‘It’s got me thinking, what else is real? That we were told wasn’t, you know? If every damn fairy tail monster is real, what else is out there? Aliens? Atlantis? Pellucidar? And what does this change about what we do know? I’m talking biology, physics, basic laws of science and medicine. I mean think about it. That girl must have doubled in mass at least, and she walked off gunshots like it was nothing. How does that even work? And if the answer is magic, then that’s a whole new set of questions. However this goes, the answer’s got to be interesting, hasn’t it?’

…

‘This is all disgusting. Dangerous animals like that prowling the street? It should be locked away where it can’t hurt anyone. Vampires? Perverts preying on decent people. I don’t believe any of this story that they’re oh so nice and innocent. Someone needs to do something before it’s too late.’

…

‘My grandpa was a gravedigger. Well, that and a load of other stuff too, he worked for the county and basically ran a cemetery among other things. He used to tell this story that one night he was there late, doing some repairs, when he heard this noise. Just the most unholy screaming, from the way he described it. Usually it’s only animals fighting or screwing, but for some reason, that time, he went to check it out. He said he saw a scuffle over a fresh grave. For a moment he thought it was drunks fighting, so he was going to go and read them the riot act. And then one of them screams at the other one, and it was that animal noise again. It creeped him out, so he just watched from a distance.’

‘He said the more he watched, the less human they looked. The screaming thing was skinny, drawn, had an odd structure to it, and he was downright insistent he saw that it had wings. And the other thing, he said it was sort of human shaped but nothing human was that gangly, and it moved like its joints were wrong, like it was sort of loose.’

‘He didn’t know what to do, so he just sort of hid and watched. In the end the screaming thing ran the other thing off. And then he says the damnedest thing. It hung around and tidied the graves up. Put the flowers back where they’d been, neatened up where the ground had been kicked up, that sort of thing. Then it hobbled away. He said he wasn’t sure it had even been real, until he went over and found claw marks on the headstone, and blood on the grass.’

‘I can’t help but think that maybe he really did see something.’

…

‘The way I see it, what difference does it make to me? They leave me alone, I’ll leave them alone. And they’ve always left me alone so far. I mean if I didn’t know they existed, how could they be a problem?’

…

‘Hey, do you mind if I stop in here for a few minutes?’ Ryan asked, as they passed a chain coffee shop. ‘Light’s getting a bit much.’

‘You alright?’ Haley asked.

‘Yeah, yeah, just need five minutes. You get a bit wobbly out in the daylight sometimes. No harm done, and nothing much I can do about it. There’s a reason Mar and I moved out of LA. I’d have had to move down into the basement. Oh, glorious air conditioning, and some shade. Perfect,’ Ryan said, slumping into a seat.

Cadence and Haley sat down beside him. And then Jude stooped slightly to step inside, pulled a chair over, and carefully sat down eliciting a creak as the chair decided whether or not it was going to collapse. When it didn’t, the big doggy grin resumed.

‘Is he… allowed in here?’ asked one of the staff, somewhat hesitantly.

‘Well, generally he sort of just goes wherever he likes, honey, but you tell me?’ Haley said.

The server shrugged.

‘What can I get you?’

‘Something big and iced,’ Ryan said.

…

‘Do you think that’s going to be a problem?’ Cadence asked. ‘Going in places, getting served and all that while, you know, visibly a monster?’

‘Oh, I don’t doubt there’ll be places we aren’t welcome,’ Ryan said. ‘It’s not like there aren’t already places certain people know not to go into, or to leave sharpish if they do. It’s kind of in our favour, though, that we’re a bit harder to pick on than the sorts of people that usually get that kind of shit.’

‘And honestly, unless I’m spoiling for a fight I don’t want to be in that kind of place anyway,’ Cadence added. ‘Plenty of places around that want me and my money in there.’

‘Still, I’m not going to pretend this isn’t going to be a question at some point,’ Ryan said with a sigh. ‘We already know this is going to be in and out of the courts for a generation. We’ve taken bets already on how long it’ll be before some state tries to pass anti-monster laws.’

‘I know enough history to know it’s not worth asking if they can do that,’ Cadence said.

‘Yeah, this is not a new conversation in the council leadership. It’s less a question of if than it is what and when,’ Ryan continued. ‘I mean are they going to try and put monster species into the census, let people refuse service to us, keep us from voting. There’s no good faith reading of the constitution that excludes us, but it’s not like that’ll stop the bastards. Bless them, some of the council talked about trying to lobby for a constitutional amendment to make it explicit, but I had to say to them, guys, we haven’t managed to pass the damn ERA yet.’

‘Some of them are a little bit, how do I put it politely,’ Haley mused, ‘historically minded.’

‘Either way,’ said Ryan, ‘the counter plans are already in place. They’ve already reached out to some of the big civil rights organisations and law firms. The second they try that shit we’ll bury them in lawyers.’

‘What was it that president said, “we will not go quietly into the night, we will not vanish without a fight?”. Which one was that?’ Haley said. ‘Was that a Roosevelt?’

‘That was Bill Pullman in Independence Day, honey,’ Ryan said, shaking his head. Jude laughed as well as he could in that shape.

‘Well whoever said it, I’m fuckin’ living by it,’ Haley said. ‘Emmanuel, back at the speech, he wasn’t speaking idly. We aren’t going anywhere.’

…

They were on the verge of deciding to turn around and head back to the hotel when a little kid came running up to Jude. He looked like he was ten at most, and his mother was trying, and failing, to keep up with him as he ran through the crowd.

Just before the boy could administer some kind of combination hug and flying tackle, Jude snatched him up and spun him around to much laughter from the boy.

Haley leaned in beside Cadence and whispered the word “puppy” in her ear. Cadence looked back at her curiously and she winked.

‘Sorry, sorry,’ the boy’s mother said, when she’d managed to get through the crowds to them. ‘He… saw you and got excited.’

Haley’s smile widened.

‘Hey kid,’ she said, squatting down to the boy’s eye level.

He gasped.

‘We saw you on the TV!’ he said. ‘You were so cool. Mom made me look away when that man tried to shoot you, though.’

‘And quite right too,’ Haley agreed, ruffling his hair.

‘I’ve never seen a real werewolf on the TV before,’ he added. ‘Only the stupid made up ones that get it all wrong. Not like…’

The boy managed to stop himself before he said the thing they all knew he wasn’t allowed to say in public. If Haley hadn’t whispered to her, she wouldn’t have picked up on it. As it was, she watched the mother, and there was the tiniest telltale wince just as the boy cut himself off.

Ryan whispered something in the mother’s ear. There was a back and forth between Ryan and the mother, and a few pointed glances the boy’s way, while he was thoroughly distracted by the two werewolves. Eventually she nodded to the vampire.

‘Hi,’ Ryan said, getting the boy’s attention. ‘I’m Ryan. I’m a vampire. This is Jude, and you saw Haley here on the TV, right? And this is Cadence. She’s human, and she does a podcast about monsters. Your mom and I have been talking, and she says if there’s something you wanted to tell us, you can.’

The boy paused, thinking for a moment, before turning back to his mother and giving her a pleading look. She smiled and nodded.

‘I’m a werewolf too!’ the boy said excitedly.

‘I’d never have guessed,’ Cadence said, giving his mother a wink.

‘I smelled you all the way down the street and I wanted to say hi,’ he said. ‘I usually only see the other wolves from the pack, but we came here to see the museums, and there are so many monsters here!’

‘There are, aren’t there,’ Haley agreed. ‘But you know you mustn’t tell, right? Unless they say you can.’

‘I’m Julia,’ the boy’s mother said. ‘And this little terror is Ernesto. I’m human, so’s his father. It skipped a generation. That was one hell of a conversation with my father-in-law, I can tell you.’

‘Wow, that is rare,’ Haley said.

While Ernesto looked around at his mother and the others, Jude mock pounced on him, and they devolved laughing into some kind of tickle fight.

‘I can imagine,’ Cadence said. ‘Did you know… before?’

‘No,’ she said. ‘Ernesto’s dad didn’t know either. My father-in-law told us when he first came to see him after the birth, smelled it on him, although we had a couple of years before it kicked in.’

‘Grandpa Thomas is fun,’ the boy said. ‘We go on nighttime runs when we can’t go see the pack.’

‘Anything to tire the boy out,’ Julia said, wearily. ‘He’s a good boy, but it’s like he’s made of energy.’

Ernesto ran back to his mother and tugged on her hand. She leaned down, and he whispered to her in that way kids have that’s not remotely discreet.

‘Mom, the park’s just over there, can I change and play with Jude? I never get to be a wolf in the day in normal places, and everyone knows now.’

‘I don’t know, it’s a bit early, still. We don’t know what people will do,’ she said.

‘We could keep an eye on them,’ Haley offered. ‘I don’t see anyone messing with Jude, and if they do, I doubt they’ll keep it up if I change too. And I’m sure our vampire friend here has some tricks, too.’

‘I can do the hypnosis thing,’ Ryan admitted, blushing, ‘but only one person at a time. I’m not very good at it.’

‘Mom, please,’ said Ernesto.

Cadence thought that if the boy was this good at doing puppy dog eyes in human shape, he’d be outright dangerous as a werewolf.

Julia thought for a moment, and then she sighed.

‘I suppose it was always going to happen eventually, and at least we’ve got some friendly faces here. Alright, would you all excuse us for just a moment?’

She looked around, and then slipped away into an alley with Ernesto.

A minute later she came back out with one of her shopping bags looking quite a bit more full, and was followed after a few seconds by a much smaller wolf monster sprinting out of the alleyway and attempting to tackle Jude.

…

I’ve spent more hours than I ever thought I would around werewolves at this point. They’re all muscle, fur, and shaggy hair; horror movie teeth and claws… If you don’t know them you could think they’re a little intimidating. Alright, more than a little intimidating if you’re on their bad side.

Werewolf puppies on the other hand, well, how do I put this? What came barrelling out of that alley was bigger than I expected, maybe teenager sized, he’d grown proportionately about as much as Jude and Haley do. He definitely bore a resemblance to my friends, but, well… He was fucking adorable. Where the adults are built and muscular, puppies are more, well, puppy like. He hadn’t quite grown into the werewolf build, and still had ears and hands and feet (or paws if you like) that were still too big for him, and his fur was all soft and fluffy.

When he pounced on Jude and they started roughhousing, I gave his mother a look, expecting her to be worried, but she had an expression which just said “boys will be boys”. It turns out werewolves play rough, or at least rough by human standards. But then when you look at wolves or dogs playing it can be much the same way I suppose.

We were only a street or two away from Central Park, so we headed over there to let the dogs off the lead in a manner of speaking. They bombed off immediately and started chasing and fighting with each other.

There was an odd subtlety to it, to watch. At a glance you might think they were trying to kill each other. Pay attention and you see all the signs of two dogs playing. Tails wagging, a wrestled back and forth between them. Whether it was natural or learned, though, Jude was oddly, well, gentle isn’t quite the right word. It seemed like he knew exactly how rough was rough enough to entertain the puppy without actually hurting him.

We found somewhere to sit and keep an eye on them, and we were far from the only people watching the show. At some point someone hoofed a soccer ball over and at that point they were lost for half an hour, playing some hybrid of fetch and soccer with the crowd.

…

‘I think I’m beginning to see what you mean about tiring him out,’ said Cadence.

‘He’s just a fluffy little battery,’ Julia said.

Cadence winced as Ernesto tried to tackle Jude to get the ball from him, and instead got lobbed twenty feet into a bush.

‘Sturdy, too,’ she added. ‘I wouldn’t worry about that. I’ve seen far worse when scuffles break out at pack meetings, it’s just the way they are.’

‘I have no idea how you’ve managed it,’ Cadence said, shaking her head. ‘I mean raising a kid is hard enough, but a werewolf? Especially when you’re not one.’

‘I’d have been even more of a little terror as a kid if I’d been a werewolf back then,’ admitted Haley.

‘It hasn’t always been easy. He’s a good boy, but every kid acts up from time to time, and that’s all the more challenging when he’s as strong as he is and he can wolf out whenever he wants. The pack’s helped a lot, it’s never been just me and my husband on our own. Thank heavens for that.’

‘There’s this whole extra layer of things you have to teach him. That he can’t just change whenever he’s bored and he wants to play. That he has to sit through school all day, and he can’t just do his own thing. The hardest one was teaching him how much stronger and tougher he is than everyone else.’

‘That’s a hard one for a kid to understand. He’s always been this strong, this is natural to him. It took a lot to teach him to dial down his own strength so he didn’t hurt his friends. It’s a lot to ask him. He has to let everyone win when they play games, so he doesn’t make people suspicious or hurt one of the other kids. God, he even had to turn the other cheek when the school bullies picked on him. He can never fight back in case, well, who knows what he could do.’

She broke into a smile.

‘Still, if he decides this is what he really wants, and he goes public, then they won’t dare raise a hand to him again.’

‘Do you think he will? I mean I’ll drop the names out of this if you like, and everyone’s too focused on the boys to have you in focus in any photos,’ said Cadence.

‘I’ll have a talk with his father, see what he thinks. If I give you my number, could you maybe hold the names until then?’

Cadence nodded.

‘As for the big decision, I think in light of what’s happened we’ll have to have something of a talk. Talk in bold letters with a capital b. I know he wants to go public, has since he’s understood how different he was from everyone else. I suspect it’ll be a question of when, more than if. The most I think I’ll be able to convince him is to pick his time carefully. To do it on his terms. He only gets to do it once, after all.’

‘There’s bound to be a big meet-up of the pack some time soon, too. Perhaps we’ll ask them all what they think, too. He trusts them, they’re basically family after all. It’ll be good for him to be able to talk it through with people that have been there, you know?’

‘He’ll be fine,’ Haley said, ‘he’s got you, he’s got the pack. All the advice he could need. And honestly, the best thing I’ve learned about being like this is that if people stop being your friend when they find out you’re a werewolf, they weren’t worth your time in the first place.’

‘Now that’s true,’ Julia agreed. ‘I think he’s picked his little friends well. I doubt he’ll be able to keep it from them for long now all this has happened.’

‘What about you?’ Ryan asked. ‘All this suddenly happening? It’s not like everyone in your position got advance warning.’

Julia shrugged.

‘If he’s happy, I’m happy, and we’ll deal with the rest later. There’ll be a few bumps on the road, I’m sure, but I’ll get him through it. It’s my job. Won’t stop me worrying, though. Every parent worries about their kids. It comes with the territory,’ said Julia. ‘I just have a different set of worries. Ernesto, well, I don’t need to worry about him getting hurt when he’s out playing with his friends or what might happen if he’s out of my sight for five minutes. He’s tough as an old boot, and if he does manage to hurt himself he just laughs it off and by the time it’s healed he’s forgotten all about it. If he roams off in the night he’s just chasing cats, and he’s never getting lost with that nose. I mean if someone tried to grab him I guarantee they’d come off worse.’

‘It’s other things. What if people find out, although I suppose that one’s out now. But what about when he tells his friends? Will he struggle with school or college or work because of what he is? Will he always have the pack, will he be lonely? The only difference now is that I’m throwing a whole new worry on top of that. Yeah, he can go public now, and I’m glad for him. But what about in five years, or ten, or twenty. What if some future government decides to go after monsters?’

‘That’s why we’ve all got to stick together, miss,’ Ryan said. ‘That’s why we’re monsters, and not fifty different subspecies. As long as we stick together, and an attack on one stays an attack on all, then we can keep each other safe. We’ve been watching for a long time. Humanity gave us all the lessons we needed.’

…

Eventually Ernesto was sufficiently played out that his mother could convince him to be led away to make the change back. He came back happy as anything, he’d had a great day after all. Trip out to the city, see some cool things, meet someone famous, get to be a werewolf in broad daylight.

I’m sure the videos were online before we even made it back to the hotel. Werewolves playing in Central Park. Lots of wagging tails and laughing bystanders. As outreach goes, I don’t think that was bad at all.

It makes me think, though, if all this goes well, his generation might be the last that ever has to face this quandary. The last one that had to live in the shadow. By the time the next generation is his age this will all be in the past. One way or another. Call me hopelessly naive, but I kind of like the idea of a future with great big fluffy werewolf puppies.

As for the rest of us we eventually made our way back to the hotel. Ryan to take a shower and, to quote him directly, crash the fuck out, and the werewolves to take full advantage of the open bar. Alright, fine, as soon as I’m done recording this I’ll be joining them.

5D Chess with Multiverse Time Travel 

All the odd stuff in my steam library, in alphabetical order – Part 1

We’ve all got loads of shit in our Steam libraries, right? Sales and bundles and whatnot? I’ve been wanting to try and actually do some reviews and some critical writing, and while I was at it, why not knock another one off the list and give some time to the games I own that I’ve never played or barely touched?

Because no one needs me to review Skyrim (because we’ve all played it), Helldivers 2 (great game, could do with even an attempt at optimisation, I swear it runs worse every time I go back to it), or Battlefield 6 (I like it, but I’ve moved to Linux, so I can’t run the thing unless I cram it into the remaining space on my “just in case” Windows partition), so I’ll skip those if and when I get to them. 

First in the list is “5D Chess with Multiverse Time Travel”, a game I picked up on launch purely to support such a bonkers concept. I played this a little when I first got it and, honestly, my brain isn’t advanced enough for this game. 

The core concept is that you start out playing a normal game of chess. Sometimes it might even end as a normal game of chess. However, that’s assuming that this game’s grand gimmick doesn’t kick in, and the computer opponent is very keen to use it. Especially if you think you’re being clever and are about to win. In all the games I’ve played while writing this, only once did the game end without a timeline branch or time travel checkmate. 

If you know how to play chess, you know enough of the basics to get started with this. Honestly, if you don’t, I wouldn’t recommend this as an intro to chess. Just don’t. There will be better places to learn. The fundamental chess rules are all intact, just with this mind-bending additional layer pasted on top. In this version of chess, pieces move in the normal directions, but also through time and between timelines. The pieces move through time and dimensions in a way that almost makes sense as being their regular moves just in a different direction, as represented in the game’s different presentations of the match timeline. It’s surprisingly difficult to explain. 

Here, for example, I’d made an absolute hash of the game. Just a few moves before the branch I’d blundered my queen, I couldn’t even reach the opponent’s kings in the past without creating more timelines because he’d decided to play on in the present (which is a thing). And then I just won out of nowhere because my bishop happened to check three moves into the past (three squares in two directions, left and backwards in time). 

And here, by contrast, I lost in the early game, because the enemy queen came out, and my king was too exposed in the past. In fact, I’ve noticed the AI favouring flank pawn starters presumably for this reason. I’m not a great players, but I’ve learned enough basics to try and take the centre, and that is not necessarily the best way to go here. Certainly not starting with the king’s pawn. 

The past cannot be changed. So moving a piece back in time creates a branch timeline, which runs concurrently. Eventually it may catch up to the original timeline sufficiently for you to move pieces between them. Also, if the current “present” is in the past you can jump pieces to the future. 

This all sounds confusing as all hell, and at times it is. Your objective, checkmate the enemy king, expands to “checkmate any instance of the enemy king at any point in the past or present”. In fact, something the game’s puzzle library really wants to drive into your head is it’s usually easier to checkmate into the past. The historical king cannot move, because it didn’t before, so you can only be stopped by taking your checking piece in the present, or by sending Kyle Reese a piece even further back in time to create a new branch timeline. 

Of course, if you get checked in the present, just have your king flee into the past or a parallel timeline, he can move one space in any number of directions, after all, and backwards in time is a direction. Now you potentially have two kings on one board, and no king on another. 

Once the present catches up, this does have a habit of creating some very confusing board states, where there are three queens on one board, and a scattering of pieces on another. But then, this just gives you more space to manoeuvre to jump across to whichever concurrent timeline has an enemy king on it, or just check directly across timelines. 

I’ve mentioned the game’s chess puzzles, and I’d thoroughly recommend starting with them. They’re every bit as frustrating as normal chess puzzles, but they’re useful as it requires you to think in the game’s way, and not normal chess’s way. I did them, but I needed to consult a guide for a lot of them, and there’s a few I still didn’t understand after I did them. They’re also the closest thing the game has to a tutorial. 

I’ll spoil one of the most basic ones here. It’s a simple mate in one. 

Now, you can’t just check the king normally, because it will either take your rook, or move away. So, what’s the solution? 

You move onto a space the king was in in the past, because a rook can move any number of squares “in one direction” (and backwards in time is a direction, as is between concurrent timelines) and it’s now checking the king three turns ago. The king you’re checking can’t move away; it’s a historical fact. It can only be stopped by taking the rook in the present, and the present king can’t get there in time. 

In fact, I would say that even a normal game of chess in here is effectively a puzzle. The longer it goes on the more timelines there will be, and the greater the chance that you or your opponent will win by simply having a queen on a spot with a long diagonal line of sight through empty squares in various timelines to somewhere a king currently is. 

Should you get it? If you don’t know how to play chess, or the above just sounds excruciating, then no. If you like chess puzzles or just want to try something that uses a game you already know to challenge you to think in a new way, then yes. 

Right now, it’s just under a tenner on Steam, and even if all you ever do is play the occasional bot game, it’s a genuinely interesting experience. If an occasionally mind bending one. 

Book Review: New Earth, by M.R. Forbes

To give a spoiler-free pitch, the basic idea is the protagonist coming out of suspended animation on a deep space colony ship where things have gone badly wrong. He wakes up, without even his memory, and is immediately set upon.

I’ll try and keep the rest light on explicit spoilers, but… you know.

The story is dark from the off. Damn near everything that could go wrong, already has gone wrong, and we’re only finding out about it as the protagonist does. As the story progresses, we learn more about both the character himself and the mission.

A mission which I find to be a very plausible scenario for this type of sci-fi story. You can easily see it happening, without too many narrative leaps of faith or unneeded technological McGuffins. Well, beyond the long-distance space travel and suspended animation that are strictly necessary for the story. It’s very “plausible near future tech”. Everything as it’s described is a functional environment, and you can see how things should have gone, and it gives me a real “rugged mechanical environment” vibe.

There is a strong theme of the risks of automation, and how a person fits into an automated system. Especially when that system goes wrong.

I really respect the choice in a sci-fi story to have a character who is out of his depth without being stupid. He’s a deeply practical man, who approaches things with his own set of distinctly non-sci-fi skills and a logical approach. Which I find meshes well with that theme of automation.

If I’m being critical (which I suppose is the point), it took me a little while, maybe a short chapter or two, to get into, and there was the occasional repetitive word choice from time to time which threw me off a little bit.

However, once I was into it, the story drew me in. I like the character, I like the sense of desperation to his attempts to survive and find out just what’s going on.

I put aside a quote from the text that really resonated with me for some reason.

“The days went by and each one was fine, and the fine was the problem, the flat sufficiency of a life that functioned without asking anything of him beyond showing up.”

I don’t know, maybe that says something about me, but I felt that one.

Anyhow, I feel like the choice of where and how to bring the story to a close for the second book makes good sense and leaves me curious.

So, would I recommend this? If “dark, mostly grounded sci-fi” appeals to you, then very much yes. Will I be getting the second one? Also, yes. So, consider that an endorsement.

The Duet

Introduction 

This story takes place in the world of my first novel, Empty Shells, and its (at time of writing) upcoming sequels. You don’t need to know all that much, but to summarise what’s relevant here: 

Hell isn’t a punishment; it’s just the default. People arrive in Hell in a place called “The Great Labyrinth”. The labyrinth is not a nice place. Demons don’t permanently die; they just regenerate and get back up once their body works again. If a demon of the formerly human variety has their body destroyed to the point there’s nothing to rebuild from, they respawn in the labyrinth after a while. 

You can probably imagine all manner of deeply unpleasant scenarios that could arise from immortality without death as an option. This is why one of the few universal laws in Hell is summarised thusly: “the fight ends when the heart stops beating”. That doesn’t mean you have to kiss and make up, just that when your opponent is dead the immediate conflict is considered resolved. At the very least until everyone’s alive again and has had some time to put their affairs back in order and decide whether they really want to be going on with whatever dispute led to their recent demise.

The Story

Demons don’t die. Not permanently, anyway. Eventually, though, if you live in Hell, you’re going to die at some point, and then once your body has sufficiently regenerated itself for you to stop being dead, you’ll be alive again. The experience has been somewhat euphemistically likened to waking up. In some cases, that’s even true. If you died in a way that didn’t do that much damage, then you might get lucky and wake up just feeling a bit groggy, as if you had just had a lousy night’s sleep. 

This wasn’t that, or it certainly didn’t look like that from Tally’s perspective. 

It was only chance that she’d found the corpse. She hadn’t been looking for corpses, after all. She had been on a backroads route between towns in the middle of nowhere when she had caught sight of a plume of thick black smoke in a rocky patch off a little way from the road. 

Being a civil-minded sort, she’d pulled over to check if someone needed assistance. Being a practical sort, before getting out of the converted double-decker bus she called both home and workplace, she had pulled the concealed kill switch and taken a shotgun down from a rack just beside the driver’s seat. It hadn’t been necessary this time, but it always pays to be prepared, out in the wastelands. 

What she had found was a trail of debris, twisted metal, and glass, leading up to the burning wreckage of a car. Or at least the bits of the car that hadn’t gone flying off in what looked to have been a truly impressive crash. Among that debris was what she assumed to be the corpse of the driver, broken and mangled but fortunately for him thrown clear of the wreck. 

He looked human enough for the most part, other than a pair of long curled black horns that matched his scruffy mid-length black hair. Well, one and a half horns. It appeared one had broken in the crash, ending in a jagged stump. That aside, though, he just looked like any other man in his mid-to-late thirties. A little tanned, dressed in jeans and a plain tan shirt, all now a little bloodied and worse for wear. 

After a cursory search of the wreckage for anything of value that hadn’t caught on fire yet, Tally had dragged the corpse through the dust and into the bus. He’d been precautionarily tied up, chained to a sturdy mounting point, stowed out of the way and left to regenerate. 

Tally had gone about her business for days, while the carcass slowly repaired itself. From time to time, she checked in on it. Partly to make sure it didn’t leak everywhere, and partly to speed it along a little. A broken neck reset here, a shrapnel chunk and some bullets pulled from wounds there. Once she was sure he had stopped leaking, she changed him into a spare t-shirt and a pair of old sweatpants. But mostly she drove from town to town as she otherwise would have, did her work, and minded her own business. 

It was the best part of two weeks later when the corpse had begun to revive, its first rasping breath so startling Tally that she nearly knocked the pan off the RV’s gas stove. She’d paused her culinary endeavours to check on him, but he was most definitely not conscious yet. She fed him a generous handful of painkillers to tide him through the worst of a rough looking reanimation and got back to her cooking. It wouldn’t be long now. 

… 

Even with the painkillers, it clearly wasn’t a pleasant awakening. 

‘Are you with me, now?’ Tally asked, sat at the RV’s table, picking at her dinner. 

The man let out a long groan, and with some evident discomfort tried and failed to sit himself upright. 

Tally sighed, got up, and heaved him upright, sitting him against the wall. 

‘When is it?’ he asked, hoarsely. 

‘September fifth,’ said Tally. ‘I’d guess you’d only been out a few minutes when I found you. Car was still burning.’ 

He nodded, then broke into a fit of coughing. 

‘Could I trouble you for a drink?’ he managed, after a few seconds. ‘It feels like I’ve been deepthroating barbed wire.’ 

Tally opened the fridge. 

‘What’s your poison? I’ve got water, fruit punch, half a dozen different fizzy things with stupid names1, and a big pitcher of lemon iced tea.’ 

‘Iced tea would be perfect, ma’am.’ 

‘Sorry about the ropes, and the chain,’ Tally said, handing him a glass. ‘But it pays to be cautious.’ 

‘I quite understand. When you find someone in the middle of nowhere, full of bullets, I think you’re entitled to a little suspicion. Frankly I’m just grateful to be waking up here and not in a wreck, or worse. Oh, that hits the spot.’ 

‘I’ve got food on the stove,’ said Tally, sitting back down. ‘I cooked extra, figured you’d be needing it. Undying takes it out of you. But first, and before I think about taking off those ropes, I want some assurances. I want to know who you are, why you were dead and all shot up, and that I’m not going to have someone hunting me down. No offence, but this is my home, and I’d drop you on the side of the road before I saw it end up a wreck like whatever you were driving.’ 

‘Completely fair,’ he said. ‘My name is Everett. You have my word you have nothing to fear from me. Not least because I think some of my bones are still not entirely solid.’ He shifted uncomfortably. ‘And as to the nature of my demise, it’s no big deal. Wasn’t even my car. Jacked it when I realised who was after me, but that’s all over now. It would have all been a lot less messy if I hadn’t lost control of the car, although I rather blame the owner for the state of their tyres. I practically did them a favour by taking the thing off their hands. Absolute deathtrap.’ 

‘You are remarkably calm for a man who just revived. How can you be sure whoever did it isn’t going to come after you again?’ asked Tally. 

‘Because it’s my turn now,’ Everett said, calmly, before taking a sip of his tea. 

‘I’m sorry, your turn?’ Tally gave him an appraising look. ‘Are you sure you don’t have some residual brain damage?’ 

‘I don’t think so, although in fairness it’s not always the easiest thing to tell. But no, I am very confident we have nothing to fear from my assailant. We’ve been engaging in a back and forth for a while now. It’s my turn to take a shot at him next, and we usually wait a few months between attempts. Besides, we tend to frown on collateral damage these days. It’s just carelessness, not the spirit of the game at all.’ 

‘Okay, roll back here, I’m going to need the large print version,’ Tally said. ‘Give me some context here. I’ll trade you context for food.’ 

Everett chuckled. 

‘I have had this conversation a great many times. I and another individual take turns hunting or assassinating each other. We have been for a long time now. We go about our business for a few months at a time, until opportunity or creativity strike, we make our attempt at the other, and then we part company again until the other chooses to take their turn. He got me this time. In a few months’ time, I’ll take my shot at him again. But for now, we’re all square.’ 

‘I have two questions. For now, that is. There will be more later. But two questions, then you can have something to eat. Question one, just how long have you been doing this? Question two, is this a sex thing?’ 

Everett burst out laughing, only to abruptly stop himself at the realisation that he definitely still had fractured ribs.  

‘Ow, ow, still tender,’ he said. ‘No, it is most assuredly not a sex thing. To the best of my knowledge, we are both entirely heterosexual and entirely male. And as to your first question that depends somewhat on how you’d define the start. I would say around a hundred and fifty years, but a fair case could be made for longer.’ 

‘Well now you have my interest. No one would come up with something that insane as a cover story.’ Tally got up and started untying Everett’s ropes. ‘For the record that chain around your neck is staying for now. Good luck shifting it, I welded the lock shut. You’ve got enough reach to get to the bathroom, the kitchen, and the couch, but not my workshop at the back or the controls at the front, or upstairs for that matter. That’s mine.’ 

‘No argument here,’ agreed Everett. ‘Again, I’d rather be here, wherever that is, than waking up at the side of the road.’ 

Everett stood up, gingerly, and set about stretching his limbs and assessing the damage. While he was at it, he made a discreet examination of the chain around his neck. It was indeed sturdy, and he didn’t think it was going anywhere. He shrugged and eased himself into a seat at the table. 

‘I’ve woken up in a worse state,’ he admitted. ‘So where are we, anyway?’ 

‘Right now? Parked up in the wastelands about a hundred miles from anything. I’m doing a scavenging run through a half dozen little drift zone towns, including a couple of ghost towns just for fun. In about a week, I’ll be rolling into Parastaxia to sell off the good stuff. Does that work for you?’ 

‘Parastaxia, huh? Yeah, I can live with that,’ Everett said, nodding along. ‘I know some people there. They’ll put me up for a couple of days, until I figure out whatever I’m up to next. I’m kind of between jobs at the moment.’ 

‘I’m told dying can have that effect,’ Tally said, nodding. 

Everett chuckled and shook his head. 

‘I’m not big on the whole “regular employment” thing. It’s too stifling,’ he said. 

‘No disagreement here. I drive around selling half-imaginary junk. Alright, a deal’s a deal. You hungry?’ 

‘Absolutely famished, ma’am.’ 

‘Good thing I put extra on. It’s nothing special,’ Tally said, stirring the pot on the stove. 

‘It smells pretty special,’ Everett said. ‘What is it?’ 

‘Sausage, bacon, chicken, beans, veg, and a bunch of other stuff. Technically I think it’s a cassoulet, but I feel a bit pretentious calling it that.’ 

‘Miss, if it smells like that you can call it whatever you like,’ Everett said. 

‘It’s Tally, by the way,’ she said, putting a generous serving and some bread in front of him. 

Everett’s attempt to maintain some kind of dignity ended about two mouthfuls into the bowl. Regenerating from a fatal injury burned up every bit of spare fuel a person had and more. 

‘That’s so damn good,’ he managed about halfway through shovelling it away. He didn’t even need to ask before a second and third bowlful appeared in front of him. 

… 

By the time Everett woke up the next day, in his place on the bus’s couch, they were back on the road. 

‘What time is it?’ he asked. 

‘Two in the afternoon. Thought I’d let you sleep in,’ Tally called back from the driver’s seat. ‘Help yourself to leftovers and whatever else is in there.’ 

Everett thanked her and set about making himself some breakfast. His movements were still somewhat tentative, as he worked around the bus’s little galley kitchen. Now, though, in daylight, and with himself no longer being the centre of attention, he allowed himself some time to look around. 

The front half of the bus’s ground floor was a kitchen, bathroom, and a small lounge (mostly just a table and a couch). The entire back half was storage and what appeared to be a workshop of sorts. The whole place had the vibe of a comfortable living room which belonged to a collector. Not a hoarder, the place was quite neat, but a collector. As to what exactly his host collected, he didn’t think there was necessarily a theme beyond “things she liked”. There was a desk which doubled as a workbench, above which there were racks of tool storage. On the desk were a handful of odd pieces of metal which were clearly in the process of being made into something. 

The ceiling was lined with storage netting, and there were shelves of books and oddities, all in addition to the cupboards and obvious hidden storage under every seat and in every bit of spare space. 

He sat back on the couch with his plate and took a moment to relax. A few days on the road wouldn’t be at all amiss. Especially with a host that could cook. Even if he was chained to the floor. He couldn’t really hold that against her, though. In her position he’d probably have done the same thing. It was just good sense. 

There was a little shelf of books by the couch, and he reached over and took one down at random and opened it to its first page. The text was unreadable, rows and rows of little letter-like squiggles. He turned back to the cover, a photo of a country mansion in some disrepair with a van parked in front of it. It looked almost normal, until you looked at the details. Odd perspectives, strange smoothness here and overly bold details there, a building layout that made no sense, a van that on a second look was no model he’d ever seen. All topped by a title that looked a bit like “CTRAHSTROG” in big bold almost-letters. 

‘What the hell?’ muttered Everett, turning the book over in his hands. 

Tally laughed from up in the driver’s cab. Everett looked over and noticed, for the first time, the convex mirror mounted beside the cab. He held the book up and gave the mirror a confused look. 

‘They’re nonsense,’ she explained. ‘They spawn in the garbage piles. They’re called dream books. I pick them up whenever I see them. There’s a whole collector market for them.’ 

‘People want these things?’ Everett asked, incredulous. 

‘There’s a buyer for anything if you look hard enough.’ 

‘You’re a scavenger, right?’ he asked. ‘It never really appealed to me. Scrabbling around in the garbage. No offence.’ 

‘None taken,’ Tally said. ‘I won’t lie; there’s a lot of garbage. But you never know what you’ll find in it.’ 

‘I’d ask if there was much money in it, but if it paid for this bus…’ 

‘It took a few lucky finds to save up for this thing,’ Tally admitted. ‘But you put the effort in and there’s always enough to get by on top of the stipend. Scrap metal’s a common one, and you can shift that by the kilo. Tools, parts, household crap, toys, you can sell that bulk to junk shops. Keeps the bus fuelled and the fridge full.’ 

‘And, what, the weird stuff like this makes the real money?’ suggested Everett. 

‘Bingo,’ agreed Tally. ‘Dream books make decent money. Even more if you find a readable one. Sometimes you get one that seems to have turned up from somewhere else. I’ve found a couple of novels that there’s no record of them ever existing, a weirdly convincing atlas of Earth, except it has like an extra continent, even a few actual books that really exist but different in some way. Story a little bit different, or names changed, or whatever. I made a small fortune once on a copy of The Stand with a completely different ending. That was quite the read.’ 

‘And that’s before all the weird little bits of art and novelty stuff. I’ve picked up so many weird knick-knacks down the years. All you have to do is find the right buyer, someone who likes their oddities, and in comes the cash.’ 

‘And I bet,’ Everett said, ‘that you know where to find those buyers?’ 

‘You know it. It’s why I prefer the town-to-town style of scavenging. I can see all the funny little specialist collectors. Gets the best prices when you can hang onto stuff for a while and get it to the right buyer.’ 

‘Sounds kind of fun,’ mused Everett. ‘No boss. Just going where you fancy. Hell, everywhere you go is home, too. Not going to lie, I like the bus.’ 

‘The bus rules. I can just park wherever and make it home,’ said Tally. ‘Best purchase I ever made. Priciest too, this isn’t an old clunker.’ 

… 

That evening Tally pulled the bus up on the outskirts of an abandoned town right on the edge of where the wastelands began to blur into the outskirts of a country sized patch of woodlands. The somewhere they were had ceased to be anything but nowhere decades earlier, so she felt fine neatly parking the bus behind an old building. Still, she didn’t quite relax until the motion sensors and alarm systems were all turned on, and the reinforced doors locked. 

‘Busy day tomorrow,’ she told Everett. ‘You never know what you’ll find in these old ghost towns, but there’ll be plenty to poke through. Manifestations love dusty old places like this. People expect them to be full of old junk and Hell’s only too happy to oblige.’ 

‘And you’re right there to profit,’ agreed Everett. His mood had been improving all day as he’d grazed on the contents of Tally’s fridge and the aches in his bones had begun fading. 

They ate, enjoyed a couple of beers, and chatted over some of the more interesting curiosities in her collection. The binders of notes and coins that had never quite existed, like the John Brown twenty-dollar bill and the nineteen forty-one German imperial mark. Tools in measurements that never existed. Street signs to places that didn’t exist, or in more of the dream lettering. Warning signs for scenarios that had never happened (her personal favourite of these was warning sign that was simply a round mirror with a red circle around it, and the word “NO” in bold block letters in the centre. She called it a personal fuck you from the universe to the viewer). 

‘Now, enough about me,’ Tally said, after showing him a binder full of posters for concerts and movies that had never happened, or with the wrong cast. ‘How about you tell me just how you got into this, what shall we call it, what’s the opposite of friends with benefits? Murder-buddies. Yeah, how’d you get into this murder-buddies situation?’ 

‘Alright, fine, I suppose I owe you that much at least,’ Everett said. ‘But it’s not all that grand a story.’ 

‘My man, you’ve been killing each other for a century and a half. This is not normal, even down here.’ 

‘Point taken. But, well, it started not all that long after I died. I went out in the eighteen thirties. I’d like to pretend it was something heroic, you know, but if I’m being entirely honest, I’m pretty sure it was something I ate. Real Oregon Trail shit. Literally, sadly. Rocked up in the labyrinth like everyone else, although it wasn’t quite so dangerous back in my days. Less people. Less guns.’ 

‘Still sucked,’ Tally said. ‘There’s not one of us that had a nice time in that hellhole.’ 

‘Very true,’ Everett agreed, nodding. ‘Still, I found my way out, wound up in the border cities just like everyone else. Lost Mercy, specifically, decided it was far too metropolitan for a frontier country boy type like me, and got on the first train going a long way away.’ 

Tally snorted. 

‘Sorry man, but Lost Mercy and metropolitan are not words I’d associate,’ she said, stifling a smile. 

‘Hey, it was the nineteenth century, and I’d just shat myself to death in a log cabin in what I don’t think was technically Colorado yet, forgive me for finding the city a bit much.’ Everett almost made it to the end of the sentence without laughing. ‘Anyway, I ride that rail until the rail runs out. Got off at the very last station on the line and started asking around for work.’ 

‘Well, you’d not be surprised to hear that where the railroad went, so went expansion. It’s Hell, after all. There’s never a shortage of people. I was in this little cluster of towns. Agricultural type of area. Farms, ranches, all that sort of thing, and with a side of logging and mining. Felt kind of more like home to me, back in those days.’ 

‘Well, following me a lead I make my way over to the local trading post. It was this little fortified town right where the major roads met the Lethe, and it had the only ferry for miles in either direction. And in those days, we didn’t quite have the telegraph yet, and the mail only ran as fast as a guy with a horse and cart. So, instead of hauling cartloads of stuff between the towns, they’d come to the trading post, sell what they didn’t need and buy what they did. And the post ran this kind of middleman service. They’d buy your wares at a fairish price, very few questions asked, so you could always guarantee shifting something. Which meant the place was always loaded with goods, valuables, and cash. So, they always needed more security guys.’ 

‘I turn up, they hire me, and there I am. It’s a nice enough place, and the work’s usually just hanging around keeping things orderly, generally making myself useful, and guard duty for caravans. I’m feeling right at home.’ 

‘I drop into the odd place like that even now,’ said Tally. ‘There’s usually a few of the more eccentric traders loitering around who’ll buy some of my stuff. And they’ve always got a decent mechanic or two on hand.’ 

‘Well in my day we had a farrier and a cobbler, but the same applies. Anyway, for a couple of years everything’s quiet. I’m getting along well, saving myself a little nest egg. Most of the guys and girls in my line of work tended to blow their money on drink and company, but at the time I had this idea about getting a little plot of land like I had back on Earth. Just with less dysentery, and maybe a few more comforts.’ 

‘Then we start to have a bandit problem. I mean they were nothing new as such, they were always around to a degree, but we dealt with them. Only now they were getting an edge on us. Whenever they hit a caravan, they always managed to evade us or take out the guards nice and quick. We started putting guards on every caravan, constant patrols of the trading post, sentries at all hours. And we held our own, you understand. We weren’t useless.’ 

‘There was a back and forth. They’d hit a caravan, we’d take out one of their camps, you know the deal. But the rule’s the rule. I suppose we could have torched the bodies and sent them back to the labyrinth, but they had every chance to do that to us and they never did. It was considered unsportsmanlike. Whichever side won would dump the bodies somewhere out of the way to revive. Leave some supplies if you could spare it. It was only polite.’ 

‘We went back and forth for a few years, and this might sound preposterous, but everyone kind of got into it. Well, the guards, like me, that is. It became a game. We tried to predict their ambushes, or set our own, or to hunt them down between raids. They tried different ways to raid the caravans, to sneak into the trading post, to infiltrate. The works. At first the bosses complained we weren’t taking it seriously. Then they got smart. Realised the more we got into the game, the harder we tried, the more creative we got, the more caravans got through.’ 

‘You got to motivate your people, right?’ Tally agreed. 

‘Exactly! The first time I ever saw him, their boss that is, I was riding guard on a fake caravan. The wagons were loaded up with armed men. Except the one that had a cannon in it. The bandits come in out of the woods, just where we thought they would. Dozens of them, this time, all coming at us at full gallop. And then we drop the sides of the wagons, deploy the riflemen and start firing back with a cannon load of grapeshot.’ 

‘We break their charge, their riders scatter, and the guys are all set to start celebrating a win. That’s when I spot their boss rallying some of them to sneak around the side through the woods and come at us from a different angle. I decide to take a shot at him and ride after him with a few of the guys. And we win. I take him down, only a few of his people escaped, they’re all scattered. We bought ourselves weeks of peace.’ 

‘Dump the bodies?’ Tally asked. 

‘Yeah, someone chucked them in a wagon, and we dropped them off a few days ride away. A few weeks later, once they were back on their feet they trojan horsed some of their guys into the trading post in potato sacks in the back of a wagon, jumped out in the night, offed half of us and looted the equivalent of a good few tens of thousands of crowns worth of valuables. The back and forth went on, and increasingly often I started seeing him. I got him, he got me, there were swordfights, horseback chases. It was, in a strange way, fun.’ 

‘Things went on like that for a while, and eventually the bosses beefed up the defences, hired more guards, really decided they’d had enough. Things went quiet for a few months, barring the odd caravan raid. Balance had shifted enough that things were going our way. The local towns were growing; we had more guards. The railroad had carried on right past us and we weren’t even the frontier anymore.’ 

‘Then, one day, when we’re minding our own business there’s the biggest damn explosion I’ve ever heard. Once I’d picked myself up off the floor, I get out of the bunkhouse and half of one side of the compound wall is just gone. It’s still raining chunks of stone everywhere. Everyone that can handle a gun is rushing to get barricades up and defend the breach, the bandits are already attacking. I run back inside, grab my weapons, and then I just stop.’ 

‘Something feels off?’ suggested Tally. 

‘Bingo. This wasn’t their style. So, when everyone else runs for the breach, I get sneaky and head deeper into the compound. And what do I find, grappling hooks and ropes and a dead sentry on the wall. The strongroom, where most of the cash and most valuable stuff was stored was underground, and you guessed it, they’ve come over right near the basement entrance.’ 

‘Everyone else is beyond busy, so I follow them underground. I knew where they were going. Found them picking the lock to the strongroom. There were three of them. And he was one of them. I drop one with my rifle before they see me and put the second down with a nice tidy bayonet rush.’ 

‘God, am I glad I never had to deal with single-shot guns,’ Tally said, shaking her head. ‘Give me a nice semi-automatic any day.’ 

Everett shrugged. 

‘It was what it was. There were already breech loaders and revolvers starting to make their way into Hell, but they hadn’t got to us out in the middle of nowhere yet. It was old school around there. I’m glad in a way. Yeah, we could have done with a Maxim gun, but, well, it would have turned every fight into a massacre. There’s no joy in an arms race. No sport.’ 

‘Still, the other two are down, and it’s just me and their boss. I drop the rifle and we both draw swords. We were in a basement storeroom by lantern light. Shelves and crates everywhere. It wasn’t exactly the most cinematic of swordfights, but it was a damn fine one. We’d both been fighting for years, so we’d gotten good.’ 

‘It’s a back and forth. He’s the better swordsman, I’ll give him that, but I’m no slouch and I know the room better than he does. I’m moving around better in the half-light. I’ve got a pistol, but he’s too close for me to draw the thing. It was probably all over in thirty seconds. I dodge him, grab a crate and smash it over his head, I nearly get him as he staggers. He parries me, I lose my footing a tad on something loose, then he throws something at one of the lanterns. Some powdered chemical concoction. Goes off with this almighty flash, blinds me for a second.’ 

‘It’s months later when I revive. Takes a long time to regenerate a new body from having your head lopped off, and we didn’t have any of those fancy regeneratives like these days.’ 

‘Anyway, by the time I’m alive again, the place has been fixed up, and they tell me it’s been dead quiet. The new guards were in place, the compound had been rebuilt and expanded, the bandits were gone. By the time anyone had found me, he’d got into the strongroom and looted a couple of hefty bags of coin. After that they hadn’t seen so much of a hint of banditry.’ 

‘I stuck around for a couple of weeks but I just wasn’t feeling it anymore. I had the cash I’d saved up, plus months of death on duty pay. So I decided it was time for a change. I’d been doing the one job for a few years at that point. I wasn’t the only one, a few of the old gang had already gone. I didn’t know half the people there any more.’ 

‘So I say my goodbyes, pack my gear, and get on the next wagon heading to the railroad. I’m not sure what I’ll be doing with myself, so I get the train to the nearest city. Not exactly a metropolis, but it had grown a lot since I last passed through it. I stop off, get a room for the night, stow my stuff, and decide to have a drink.’ 

‘I find this saloon, nice place. Last time I’d been in a city I’d been this penniless ex-peasant farmer. For a second it kind of came back to me, then I realised that wasn’t who I was any more. I had cash, confidence, and a sword on my belt. I go straight on in, sit down at the bar, and order something potent.’ 

‘I sit there for a few minutes, and I’m just about to order my second drink when the barman brings it over and points out who sent it to me. I look over and guess who it is. By blind luck, it’s the guy who cut my head off not all that long ago. I shrug, take my drink over and sit down, and for the first time we actually talk.’ 

‘He’s with a couple of friends, and a quite attractive lady he was trying to charm, and before I can say anything he’s introducing me to them and talking me up. Tells me his name’s Alonso. He was Spanish back in the day, died a few decades earlier at the siege of Gibraltar.’ 

‘So we sit, tell a few stories. The time he and his guys rode for the river ferry to escape with a load of loot and me and some of the guards chased him down on horseback and sniped them out at a full gallop just before they could get away. The time he brought a canyon wall down on us to get away after a raid. That kind of thing.’ 

‘I usually like to reminisce about slightly nicer events,’ Tally said. 

Everett laughed. 

‘Okay, I admit to the average person it might come across as a bit odd. But it had never been personal, it wasn’t malice. We were both just doing a job, and if you get a few story worthy adventures out of it so much the better.’ 

‘In the end we spend half the night drinking and laughing. Eventually it gets to closing time, we’re all kind of wasted, and when we go to head off. We’re at the emotional stage of being drunk, at this point, you know? We say our goodbyes, he tells me it’s been fun, gives me a hug and then he’s on his way with his lady friend.’ 

‘I wander back to my hotel room, which seems to have been put on some kind of turntable since I was last in there, and I crash out. Wake up the next day, about six hours after I’d planned to start walking the town and looking for a new job. I wash up, get dressed, and just as I go to walk out the door I put my hand in my coat pocket. There’s a scrap of paper in there, and all there was on it was one word. Latalia.’ 

‘Nice place,’ Tally said. ‘Right by the sea. Haven’t been for a few years. Dated an aquatic for a few weeks last time I was there. That was an experience.’ 

‘It was smaller in those days, but it was still a big city, all built around that lighthouse on the outcropping over the sea. I got there a few days later. Got off the train, walked straight to the sheriff’s office and asked for a job. I had the qualifications. Even had a nice letter from the old boss.’ 

Tally smiled. 

‘Would I be right in guessing that you didn’t mention the bandit king apparently moving into the city?’ she asked. 

Everett laughed and shook his head. 

‘Would you believe it, no I didn’t. A little bit cheeky of me, I know. But it’s not like I didn’t intend to do the best of the job. It wouldn’t have been fun if I’d let him off easy. And it’s not like he was the only person that would cause trouble in a city that size. It was weeks before he even showed up, and by then I was in good standing with the sheriff and the other deputies.’ 

‘The whole… vibe of the thing was different this time. It seemed he’d gotten bored of caravan raids. This time he was playing a bank robber, gentleman thief type act. First I saw of him was him rocking up in town and throwing a lot of cash around to make himself popular. Most of it, I assume, belonging to my old bosses.’ 

‘Doing the whole Capone act?’ asked Tally. 

‘Exactly,’ agreed Everett. ‘Prop up the needy, invest in popular small businesses, be seen at society gatherings. Works great. Especially the first time you rob a bank and all the witnesses swear you weren’t there.’ 

‘The game carried on from there. Just with rooftop chases, gunfights in the street. All that good stuff. We were there for about three years. I got commendations and bonuses; he got cash and all the kind of women who find wanted posters to be an aphrodisiac. Things escalate, just like before, the fights and the chases and the heists get bigger and more dramatic. Then one day, out of nowhere, while I’m doing my rounds walking around the city he appears out of the shadows in this alleyway. Says he wants to talk.’ 

‘We exchange a few pleasantries, and then Alonso, he says to me “Everett, buddy, I’m getting a bit tired of the bad guy act. I’ve been playing it for a few years now and I feel like a change. I’ve had my ear to the ground for a while, and I heard that Mallinar is in need of a new lawman. I applied, with a little blagging, I’ll admit, and I just got my letter of acceptance in the mail. So, I was thinking, how about we swap places for a while?”’ 

‘Now, you can imagine this set me aback a little. When I was human, I was just a normal guy. Kept myself to myself, worked the land…’ 

‘Got dysentery,’ Tally added. 

‘Then,’ he continued, trying to look serious, ‘I die, and I throw myself into being on the serious side of the law. It had never crossed my mind I could do something else. It’s not how I saw myself. But the idea gave me pause. It’s not like I hadn’t learned just about all there is to know about being a bandit from fighting Alonso for years. I wouldn’t even be making things worse, net anyway, since we’d only be swapping places.’ 

‘Alonso told me he’d understand if I wasn’t interested, but he was planning on being in Mallinar for a fair while. If I decided to take him up on it, he said, he’d find me soon enough. And I did, after a few weeks. I gave my notice in good order, stashed my savings in the bank, bought a horse, provisions, and some decent guns, my were things advancing quickly in those days, and got on the road.’ 

‘I took a ride around the town, scoped things out, then I found myself a nice place to set up a hideout in the woods a few miles away from town. I spent a month just exploring the place. Watching and learning. How cash and goods were moved around, where things were kept, where I should steer clear of. Didn’t want to go blowing up someone’s house by mistake or robbing some struggling small business.’ 

‘How very public spirited,’ Tally said, drily. 

‘Well, it’s not like I was some heartless bastard,’ Everett said. ‘And I didn’t really want the guilt. I was in this for the fun, after all. And that’s why, after a month, I made my first hit. I went for stealth. One day, I know there’s a cart carrying cash from the office of one of the big mining firms to the train to be sent to head office and banked. Well, I know the route they’ll be taking, so I arrange a little distraction, hide on a roof, drop onto the wagon, and swap a couple of sacks of coin for stones. Climb out at a handy spot and slip away. Then laugh my ass off while I watch them load rocks onto the train.’ 

‘That gave me enough cash to hire some backup, and from there it all started again. Just the other way around. We swapped around a few times, moved around Hell. Then, by the time the twentieth century was on the horizon, we met up again, and decided the whole act was getting a bit tired. Like it was fun, but it was, how do I put it… Unnecessary. We’d got to a point where what we enjoyed was the hunt.’ 

‘So, you, what, just abandoned the lawman bandit roleplay thing and started killing each other?’ Tally said, incredulously. 

‘Well, in a manner of speaking you could describe it that way. We’d both accumulated a fair amount of money; we could do pretty much whatever we wanted. So, we did. We talked it out, set a few rules, and went on our way. It’s just the game for the game’s sake now.’ 

‘And you enjoy this?’ she asked. 

‘I do. We do. It’s… look, think about it like this. This is Hell, right? People play skirmish football even though they get limbs hacked off or disembowelled or whatever. Duelling sports. Wargames. I mean, damn, do you ever watch descent racing? I’ve seen races where the winner is a bag of mince in a ball of metal by the time they get to the bottom.’ 

‘I love those!’ exclaimed Tally. ‘Only thing that’s better is when they do uphill and send maniacs in buses and tanker trucks and the like down from the top to stop them.’ 

‘See what I mean?’ Everett said. ‘The only difference is that what Alonso and I do is personal. It’s just him and me. And it’s only every few months. It might sound perverse, but with the way things can be down here, it’s kind of nice having this constant. Whatever else is going on, there’s always the game.’ 

‘So that’s really it?’ said Tally. ‘You got a liking to fighting with this guy in the underworld equivalent of the old west, and a century and a half later you’re both still doing it as a hobby?’ 

‘You could put it that way,’ Everett admitted. ‘I like to think of it in slightly grander terms. Fighting across Hell in an eternal duet. But, yeah, I suppose it is a hobby. It’s not like it makes us money. Quite the opposite in fact.’ 

Tally smiled and shook her head. 

‘You know what, that’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard, but if it makes you happy then who am I to judge. I drive a bus around selling shit I find in garbage heaps to weirdos.’ 

‘It takes all sorts, doesn’t it.’ 

… 

When Everett had woken up the next day he’d found that the chain was gone. Evidently his host had decided he was too ridiculous to be a threat. She’d woken him at dawn. 

‘Come on, eat your breakfast, then we’re getting down to business. Time to earn your transport,’ she said, putting a plate in front of him. 

‘Do you always start this early?’ Everett groaned. 

‘Can’t be wasting the daylight,’ said Tally. ‘No amount of head torches make scavenging in the dark a pleasant experience.’ 

… 

Mere minutes later he’d been handed a pair of leather safety gloves and a bag. 

‘So… what do I do, exactly?’ he asked. 

‘It’s easy, you just sort through the drifts of trash in the corners and the alleys and between the buildings, and you bag anything worth money.’ 

‘And you enjoy this?’ he asked. 

‘Hey, count yourself lucky. We’re in a ghost town right now. Worst thing you’ll find is a dead raccoon. If we were in the city there could be rotting food, shat diapers, god one time I swear I found a cubic metre of beef, still in one solid slab from the factory. Must have been there for weeks, it had gone right off, and there was a colony of rats living in it.’ 

‘Right… So I’ll just go and have a look around then.’ 

The task turned out to not be quite as onerous as Everett had first expected. He’d always been aware of scavengers and the piles of half real and half manifested garbage, but he’d never really put much thought into them. Now that he was wandering the alleyways of a town that looked like someone had last lived there in the nineteen eighties, he had to confess that he could almost see the appeal. 

He’d decided, more or less at random, to start with a heap between two buildings near where the bus was parked. After heaving aside a metres-wide corrugated iron sheet he was confronted with a wide range of garbage. He shrugged, started tossing the dull and obviously worthless stuff aside, and quickly began to see her point. Yes, there was a surprising amount of scrap metal of various types that he threw into a heap in case she wanted it. That was just the bulk, though. 

It didn’t take him long to find start finding things which gave him a real sense of confused morbid fascination. He was pretty sure the double ended frying pan was an object of such profound stupidity that it could not have been intentionally designed by anyone. There was a machined metal dice eight inches across which based on its weight would destroy any table anyone was foolish enough to roll it on. He was particularly impressed by the bath towel sized dollar bill. 

By the time they broke for lunch, he’d brought a couple of bag loads of interesting stuff back to the bus, and they’d filled the last of the space in the bus’s luggage bays with the more valuable scrap metal. 

They ate and then compared their finds. 

‘I didn’t expect there to be quite so much weird shit, if I’m honest,’ Everett admitted. 

‘The joy of a ghost town. Less split bin bags full of rotten food, more scrap metal and weird stuff,’ Tally said. ‘Can’t hit them too often, though, got to give it time to refresh.’ 

‘I never get used to that,’ said Everett. ‘The way stuff just appears here. Distance, and roads, and things.’ 

‘I love it. I mean I kind of have to, I make a living off it. Wouldn’t get all these abandoned towns if it wasn’t for expansion, and people moving around. Now, come help me with this heap.’ 

… 

In the centre of the town a heap had grown to such an extent that its weight had caused the wall of a building to collapse, merging the heap into what appeared to be the stock room of an abandoned shop. Tally had the grin of a person mentally counting just how much cash they might make out of the next few hours. 

They both piled into it, separating rubbish, scrap, and valuables. 

‘I think I’m starting to see where the cash comes from,’ Everett said, holding up what appeared to be a precisely detailed thirty-second scale glass replica of a Hyundai i10, complete down to the interior and mechanical parts. ‘It’s not like there aren’t collectors for any weird thing down here.’ 

‘Yup,’ agreed Tally, ‘and there’s the stuff I make too, I do scrap metal sculpture in my workshop at the back of the bus. It’s nice to have something to do on nights parked up just about nowhere.’ 

‘I’ll admit it, I like the bus lifestyle,’ said Everett. ‘Roomy, comfy, all the facilities, and if you don’t like the neighbours, you just drive away.’ 

‘I love my bus. And you’re not wrong about the neighbours. People can get snobby about scavengers. All I’m doing is lowering the total amount of garbage in their towns. At least with this, if I decide I don’t like somewhere I can paint something obscene somewhere prominent and be long gone before anyone notices it.’ 

‘Yeah, I’m not a neighbours man either,’ agreed Everett. ‘I don’t tend to stay in one place for more than a few years. I like to see what’s out there, try new places, you know?’ 

‘Nothing to do with the locals getting pissed off at the assassinations?’ suggested Tally. 

‘Hey, I told you we don’t do collateral damage anymore, not since the bandit days. Just blowing someone the fuck up has no artistry to it. No challenge. Sometimes it’s all about planning and precision, sometimes it’s spectacle and drama.’ 

‘I take it the most recent was all spectacle?’ 

‘You know it,’ agreed Everett. ‘I’m minding my own business and wham, out of nowhere, I’m being chased through the city by a guy on a dirt bike with a submachine gun. Had a good old fashioned chase through the city, with a bit of light gunfighting, I jacked the car, bolted out of the city. Nearly evaded him a couple of times, but he doesn’t let go once the game’s on.’ 

Tally shook her head as she examined a strange piece of twisted metal, shrugged, and tossed it aside. 

‘It might have got a little messy at times, but that can be part of the fun. Variety is important. Sometimes we get a bit competitive doing one thing or another. We had, like, a five-year sniper duel, and that… that was pure art. You must plan, study someone’s routine, choose a perfect place to shoot from.’ 

‘It’s not just the kill, either, it’s about the precision, the range. Just shooting each other from across the street isn’t the point. We’d take our time to get that perfect headshot.’ Everett laughed. ‘The only problem is it’s a bit impersonal, you never see it coming, never see the other person. We got into a habit of sneaking over to the body and leaving a card in the pocket with where we fired from and the distance. Gave us a yardstick to compete against.’ 

‘Our longest were in the three, three-and-a-half-kilometre sort of range. I think we’ll beat that next time we get into that mood, though. What with laser rangefinders, modern scopes, precision rifles, that sort of thing.’ 

‘How the hell do you get anything done? Like, how do you manage to make a living and have a life when you might get sniped at any moment?’ asked Tally. 

Everett smiled. 

‘We don’t do it all the time, remember. It’s like I said, there’s always a few months between attempts. It’s rare we do more than one a year each. Neither of us are regular job types, we’re more mercenary work, bounties, that kind of thing. We make a point of not offing each other when we’re in the middle of a job, too, it’s just polite. Not to mention, well, how do I put this… we both kind of kick started the old investment funds in our bandit days. Yeah, we both did our share of wealth redistribution… but a hefty chunk always went in the bank. Then into investments. And we both live frugally most of the time, so the cash just grows and grows.’ 

‘Rob from the rich to give to your stockbroker,’ joked Tally. 

‘Like I say, though, we kind of moved past that sort of thing, outside of the occasional very well-paid piece of work. Ditched the roleplay and went to the core of it. We did law enforcement, we did banditry, we moved on, and the only bit we kept was each other.’ 

‘I’d joke again whether this is a sex thing, but it really isn’t is it…’ Tally said. She shook her head. ‘Hey, sorry if this is a bit personal, but does this whole arrangement not derail your personal life a bit? I mean how does dating work when you’ve got this whole thing going on? How do you plan a date when you know you could be being watched by someone planning your demise?’ 

Everett laughed. 

‘We’re in Hell, everything’s kind of ridiculous.  You tell them about it and they think you’re weird. Big deal. All the fun people are weird. It does scare off the odd person, but more often than not people have got some weird shit of their own going on.’ 

‘True,’ Tally agreed, starting to count on her fingers. ‘Raised by feral imps, archdemon sex colony, all the robots, the psychotic extreme sports.’ 

‘Exactly! Anyway, you know how it is when you move round a lot, you don’t get into all that many super long-term relationships,’ said Everett. ‘And sometimes, once you explain it, people can be into it. I dated this girl Shayla on and off for a few years. Absolute livewire that woman. I’d been with her a few weeks when I explained the whole deal, it was my turn, and she wanted in on the planning.’ 

‘She helped me rig this little backstreet as a trap, he walks in, she pulls a rope, and it drops these barricades, blocking it off either end. Then we came out, introduced Shayla, then tossed him a spare sword and went for a two against one. That was a hell of a fight, he always was a damn fine swordsman.’ 

‘Is that not a bit unfair, bringing backup?’ Tally asked. 

Everett shrugged. 

‘Sometimes we hire people or bring backup, if it fits whatever the scene is. And that was a more introducing two of my friends who just happened to then try and kill each other situation.’ 

‘She sounds like a good match for you, by which I mean she’s insane,’ Tally said. 

‘Yeah, she was,’ Everett said with a chuckle. ‘About a year after that she got a reset, full memory wipe. It had always been part of the plan. Just a shame it wasn’t a bit longer.’ 

‘Jeez, man, I’m sorry.’ 

‘It’s fine, was a long time ago,’ said Everett. ‘She did it every century or so. She’d get the wipe, move to a new city, start over as someone else. Based on the notes she left for herself she’d been doing it for thousands of years. When she decided it was time she made all her arrangements, there was a great big party, then she was off.’ 

‘Yeah, that’s always hard,’ said Tally. ‘Some people just can’t do eternity. I don’t get it myself but I suppose that we all have our own way of dealing with it. Do you know some people say everyone’ll do it eventually? I don’t believe them, the idea freaks me out.’ 

‘I know what you mean,’ agreed Everett. ‘My memories are me. I ran into her, a few years ago. It had been like twenty years. I told her who I was, I had lunch with her and her husband, told a few of the old stories, just the funny ones. It was nice. Odd, though. Most of the time she was a completely different person, then every now and then she’d give me a look or laugh, and it was like she remembered.’ 

‘Coping with eternity,’ Tally said, with a sigh, ‘I never stay anywhere long enough to get bored, she becomes new people, and you…’ 

‘I anchor myself off of a murderous dysfunctional relationship with a guy I’ve spoken to maybe twenty times in the last hundred and fifty years,’ said Everett. ‘I know this is messed up. I have had a therapist. Well, a sequence of therapists, they don’t tend to stick.’ 

He chuckled. 

‘We may not speak often, but we know each other bizarrely well. It comes from the tracking. I was in kind of a bad way for a while after Shayla reset. One day I wake up and there’s a box on the table by my bed that hadn’t been there when I went to sleep. I open it, cautiously as you do, and I nearly have a heart attack. Unnecessarily as it turns out. I’d never seen a cake so convincingly made to look like a bomb. All the parts were edible, the wires, the clock, everything. There was a lovely card with it, too.’ 

Tally laughed and shook her head. 

‘I’d have loved to be in the room when he made that order,’ she said. ‘You’ve definitely got something, him and you. I might not ever quite get it, but if it works for you two, then fair enough. What do you think you’ll do when you both get tired of this?’ 

Everett mused for a moment, poking through the garbage heap. 

‘I don’t know. I think whatever it is he’ll be there though. It’s a connection. Like the two of us are tied together. Maybe eventually we’ll pivot to sports or competitive chess or set up competing patisseries or something.’ 

… 

The bus came to a stop on the outskirts of Parastaxia, outside a scrap metal depot where Tally was going to empty the luggage bays of their cargo. 

‘So, you sure you’re good to go from here?’ Tally asked as Everett climbed out of the bus. 

‘Yeah, I’ll drop in on some friends, blag a couple of days on a couch, pay them off with a movie and a big meal, then get the train home.’ 

‘And start plotting your revenge?’ added Tally. 

‘Nah, I’m feeling pretty chill at the moment. Just going to let those creative juices bubble away for a while. I think I’ll head home, catch up on my reading, do a bounty or two if any catch my attention. What about you?’ 

‘Same old same old,’ Tally said. ‘I’ve got a list of collectors and traders to see in town. I posted some of the new finds online. You’d be amazed how many people put in offers for that big dice you found.’ 

‘It weighs a ton, I think it must be tungsten or something. Scrap value alone would be a hefty handful of coin. Should more than cover the cost of feeding me,’ said Everett. 

‘Don’t sweat it, it’s nice to have some company on the road from time to time. And where else am I going to get a story that bonkers?’ 

Everett laughed. 

‘Yeah, that’s true. Most hitchhikers don’t come with remotely this kind of backstory.’ 

‘Then,’ she continued, ‘I’ll stock up the fridges, fill up the tank, then hit the road. Maybe I’ll park myself up in the middle of nowhere for a day or two. Have some me time. Make some art. I’ve got a toolbox and a bag of interesting scrap metal just calling to me.’ 

‘You take care out there,’ Everett told her. ‘There are some weird people out in the wastelands and the drift zones. Hey, I’m living proof of that. Kind of.’ 

‘I always am,’ she replied. ‘I bet you didn’t find half the guns I’ve got stashed away on that bus.’ 

‘Well, aren’t you just full of surprises,’ Everett said, chuckling. 

‘The alternative’s way too dull. You give me a call sometime. I want to hear what you come up with. Maybe I’ll even have an idea or two.’ 

‘Oh, I will. Not least so I can get your cassoulet recipe.’ 

‘It’s less a recipe, more a big pan and some vibes, but I’ll give you some tips,’ Tally said. 

‘I’ll look forward to it,’ Everett said, holding out his hand. 

Tally shook it. 

‘See you around, buddy,’ she said, and then departed into the scrap dealer’s yard. 

Everett turned and wandered down the street deeper into town, ticking through a to do list in his head. Find the bank. Get an aura scan for a new bank card. Get the cash for a new phone, and some more suitable clothes while he was at it. 

He paused, passing the entrance to an alleyway, just as he began to work through a list of who he knew in town and who might be feeling sociable. His eye had been caught by one of the half manifested junk heaps. 

He chuckled and shook his head. Hell really was a funny old place. 

Never Asked Questions – 1

It’s hard to do an FAQ post about your novel, when no one’s really asked any questions yet. Specifically because I haven’t really done any marketing yet, and everyone who’s bought a copy is someone I have met in person. Still, my first novel exists as a physical product, so this seems as good a time as any to put together a few thoughts, in the format of an FAQ. Also, I’m keeping these ones fairly general in scope, and I’ll do a more spoilery one about specific events later, if it comes up.

Behold the physical product in all its paperback glory. BEHOLD IT.

The Cover

I spent an embarrassingly long time on Fiverr trying to pick out a cover artist. It wasn’t helped by my really not knowing what I wanted. I’m not a design guy, after all. I mean you’re reading this on an orange and mustard yellow WordPress blog for fuck’s sake.

Then after over a month of back and forth, a closed account, and a Fiverr refund process, I started again. And the second time I chose better. Much better.

Consider this a full-blown endorsement for the artist who did the cover, Lena Semenkova. If you find yourself in the market for some art with a big bold colourful style, then I heartily recommend her services. Absolute professional.

Future Plans

It is no secret that this is not the end of the story. It even says so in the introduction. Specifically, while I have no intention to stop writing things in this setting any time soon, this story in particular is the first part of a trilogy. I know the tentative titles of books two and three, but I’ve yet to name the trilogy. I’ll have to figure that out when book two is releasing. Not least so I can turn on the hidden subtitle layer in book one’s cover, with the nice place to put the “Book 1 of the ?????? trilogy”.

I allude to this in the introduction to the book, but I started writing purely for fun, with no overarching plan. I wrote away until I had what felt like a story with an ending, in two rough acts with a one chapter epilogue as a finale.

Then I asked the question “wait how long IS a book?”. Shorter than what I’d written, I’ll tell you that much. As it turned out, act 1 had a very natural end point, so I split the file and that first act, after COUNTLESS rewrites, proofing, and editing passes, became Empty Shells.

For some time, during rewrites my plans fluctuated between a single sequel and a trilogy. In one version there was a single sequel with an overgrown epilogue chapter as a payoff element to the events of the story.

However, as I wrote and rewrote it, I found this unsatisfying. It limited the scope for fun asides, fluff, and world building in “act 2”, and left very little scope to explore what was happening in the epilogue, which increasingly felt to me like I was just showing a slice of the end of “act 3” without showing how this came about.

So, once again, the file was split, with me finally settling on a definite three act story, each part having a start and an end, a clear thread running through them, and plenty of space for me to explore.

Where do we stand now? Book 2 is undergoing a last few rewrites. I’ve recently reread it, and having been away from it for a while reviewing Empty Shells, and coming back with a fresh set of eyes, I’ve seen a fair few areas that need revising. Structurally, though, it’s all there. Over the next few months I’ll plug on until it feels right, but it’s smallish changes for the most part. And the ever present proofing and editing of course.

Book 3 needs a lot more work. The shape of the “A story” is in place, but I’ve got some additions and improvements in mind. The “B story” is in a much earlier state, but reading and rereading it made me feel that it was sorely needed.

As for the titles? They’re a little spoilery, so I’ll hold those for now.

Why this story?

Empty Shells is kind of the third thing I’ve started writing. The first was a sci-fi story, which I do intend to come back to and finish, at some point. The second was “The Monsters Among Us”, which I do a little bit on from time to time, but is mostly sitting in my head (and which started in concept as RPG source materials).

I talk about this in the introduction to Empty Shells, but when I was thinking about some of the chapters I wanted to do in MAU I put in one with Bariel and Sully, a married angel and demon couple. Then I started wondering how this fit into the wider setting I was building in my head, how religion, the afterlife, and angels and demons “worked”.

Then I kind of slipped sideways into wanting to do something with the Heaven and Hell side of the setting, and ended up sitting down one day and saying to myself “just start writing and see what happens”. And this time, I didn’t stop. And in the process I ended up getting attached to both the setting and the characters.

Oh, and for the record, that sci-fi story, MAU and Empty Shells are all in the same setting.

Why these characters?

Other than Bariel and Sully (who will be appearing in both one of the sequels to Empty Shells, and MAU in an upcoming chapter) I started with two distinct concepts, and as is so frequently the case with me, I decided to take both and roll with them.

The first, which I think arose while brainstorming some of the mechanical aspects of Hell in the setting, was Fin and Ash, having their chat in Ash’s room in the labyrinth. Barring some additions, that scene has actually stayed remarkably similar to my original thoughts on the topic. The concept of curses, and of the labyrinth as a cruel pseudo-purgatory came about here. I toyed with various possible relationships for Fin and Ash, whether they would be blood relatives or a romantic couple, but I found myself quickly preferring the “devoted best friends” path. Not least because it said something immediate about both the setting (this wasn’t a fire and brimstone Hell for bad people) and about the characters themselves (Fin’s decades long refusal to abandon his friend).

Ash has barely changed since that first planning session. Somehow in my head they always seem to be “just Ash” and changing them is unthinkable for some reason. Fin, however, did change somewhat. In that original concept his physical changes in the afterlife were far more pronounced. His original design concept was more reptilian, with him intended to be scaly, and to possess a tail and a more reptilian facial structure. Part of the thought at this point was that curses led to more pronounced physical and psychological changes, which I ditched fairly early on, with curses becoming more “something that happens to you, separate to the physical changes”. I think in part because I wanted it to not be immediately obvious who had one.

A key part of Fin’s place in the stories I was thinking up was that he had an established place in Hell. I also, once the concept of the labyrinth was in my mind, wanted someone who had no idea what the hell was going on. And that’s where Mikey came in. Firstly, I will admit here that I was embarrassingly far into writing the story when I realised that his original name was a truly terrible pun and ctrl-h’d it out of existence.

Mikey, too, had a much more monstrous nature in the first concept, while his physical design was similar to how it’s described in Empty Shells. That early version of him had a combination of his curse induced hunger, and a biological inability to eat anything but rotten carrion due to his fly biology. I dialled this back in very short order because frankly he’d have just had far too miserable a time for me to enjoy writing him.

For some reason I don’t fully comprehend, Reggie and Scamp kind of came into existence beside him. I think in that earliest hazy concept he met the imps while raiding bins for rotting meat, before encountering Fin for the first time. Scamp pretty much ended up riding around on his shoulder from that point on, and there wasn’t much I could do about it.

Then there’s Nox. I wasn’t joking in the introduction when I said he just turned up and refused to leave. I was writing the chapters with Mikey in the Waystation, and he just sort of appeared when I was writing it. His appearance stayed more or less unchanged from the moment I wrote his debut. His backstory was pretty much done that night, too. It was only a few details like his job and the bike that came a little later in the process.

Why so violent/horny/gay?

Okay, so roll with me on this one. It was an early decision that permanent death, for angels and demons of all kinds, would be an outstandingly rare thing, which pretty quickly became an integral part of the plot of the trilogy.

Now, when you think of a setting where people for the most part can’t die, and injuries are temporary, then that is naturally going to be reflected in the society that creates. People would be much more cavalier about personal safety, much more willing to take risks, and equivalently less concerned about violence and injury. This is reflected in the story.

As are some of the concerns that would be introduced by this. The fear of captivity, and by extension “the rule”, etc.

Now, this, in a way, flows to the second part of our question. If I’ve settled on a setting where violence is commonplace, and in fact an essential part of the story, which it doesn’t shy away from portraying… It feels prudish to then self-censor crude and sexual humour, and implied and actual sex. Especially when the sex in question is between consenting adults.

As to the general horniness, and directness of the characters, this comes from another societal consideration of the setting. In Hell, as it’s presented, it’s the case that the characters are acting in an environment where taboos and societal expectations of a certain type of behaviour are simply not present. Pregnancy is not a thing for the formal mortals, nor are STDs for the most part, so they mostly do what they like with who they like.

In my mind, when some newly dead person makes it out of the labyrinth and into the border cities, and deals with the immediate “oh fuck I really am dead” issue, there’s a kind of culture shock effect. Most people, especially people who were, for whatever reason, to some degree repressed in life start out trying to keep their head down a bit, realise quickly enough that no one gives a shit, and then kind of throw themselves into a bit of debauchery until they’ve worked it out of their system (and in most cases find themselves a new baseline which is a tad higher on the casual debauchery scale than when they were alive).

It’s also the case that in the setting “unconventional relationship dynamics” are much more common and accepted. Mostly coming, again, from that absence of an expectation that “two person heterosexual relationship” is the default. Now there’s still a lot of that, because statistically most people are straight, but there are more casual relationships, poly relationships, and other dynamics than in the real world.

An element of that being that people here are effectively immortal. There are people who have been in dedicated relationships for millennia, and others who have ended relationships after years or decades because they as people have changed, or the relationship has run its natural course (remaining in an unhappy marriage is vanishingly rare in Hell for a variety of reasons, not least of which is the stipend). And the same applies to poly relationships, with immortality granting people all the time to live in different ways and find out what makes them happiest.

A point to bear in mind, too, which isn’t really raised in the book itself (because it just doesn’t naturally come up) is that we only really see locations in the border cities and close to them. Places like Indigence and Diligence which are still the most “modern day Earth-Like”, and where age 300 is considered old. Things can get weird, the deeper you go into Hell.

And that brings me to the last part of the question. It’s been noted to me that, among the primary cast at least, the demographics lean very LGBTQ+, and that this could, hypothetically, be misinterpreted. So, to answer this in two parts:

1: My protagonists, in this story at least, are queer because I’m bisexual and just decided to write them that way because when I was planning them out I’d made my characters and decided I wanted my OCs to kiss, and they were already both boys (and then Nox turned up, and I just shrugged and let him stay). So there. And that, naturally, leads narratively to some of the people around them also being that way inclined, or of the more accepting mindset.

2: The fact they, or anyone else for that matter, is in Hell has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with their race, sex, gender presentation or sexual preferences. It’s implied at various points in the story that humanity has historically misunderstood how the afterlife, demons, and angels, work. This inludes the selection process for the afterlives. To be explicit: within the setting of these stories, Hell is not a punishment, it’s the default. Everyone goes to Hell, unless they meet Heaven’s mysterious selection criteria (which I will go so far as to say at this point, without making excessive spoilers, is primarily based around a person’s proportional contribution to the good of the world and the people around them).

Why the chapter structure?

The chapter intros came about for two reasons. The first is that one of the major things I struggled with in the past was working out how the hell to start a story. Add to that that a lot of my writing experience comes from D&D games, which involves a lot of environmental description and lore construction (often on the fly because your players have DONE IT AGAIN). So when I started writing, having roughly that first chapter in mind, I started, instead of going straight to business, with describing the labyrinth as if I was narrating the opening to a campaign.

I stuck with them because they gave me a fun way to give out related (or at least tangentially related) pieces of lore in each chapter without the need to have characters stop what they’re doing and explain them. Especially if they themselves aren’t fully informed. It means I can do things like introduce curses in a way that characters never would in dialog, and limit how much of that conversation they have to have “on screen” to the parts that are relevant to character and events. I try, for the most part, to tie each one in part to the events of the chapter, but it varies how much I stick to this.

In my head if I ever do an audiobook the chapter intros and the chapters themselves would have seperate narrators.

What’s with the footnotes?

I always loved Pratchett’s use of footnotes for little asides, and there’s an element of “shameless tribute” in my use of them. Also, though, when I’m writing I think of some joke or aside or anecdote and think “what the hell” and throw them in. I’ve been told that if you know me, they practically sound like me, which amuses me no end.

For no real reason, I’m going to end this with a photograph I took from the roof terrace in Dubrovnik where I wrote a small part of book 3. Mostly because the world needs to see this view.

This photograph not brought to you by the Croatian tourism board, but if they want to bribe me I’d happily go again. “Croatia: It’s bloody lovely”.

Dr Danny’s Astrological Extravaganza – 2026

Yes, it’s time for another batch of horoscopes for the discerning masochist.

Aries: You go on weight loss pills. Unfortunately, due to a prescribing accident, you spend fourteen months taking a laxative every morning. You mistakenly believe the consequences of this mistake to be a case of understated side effects. You do lose weight, but your electrolytes budget goes through the roof in a desperate attempt to stay hydrated. As does your underpants budget. You commemorate the experience by getting a full back tattoo of the lyrics to “Ring of Fire”.

Taurus: Your employer’s senior management decides it would benefit company morale to appoint an official “court jester” of sorts. You are randomly elected to this position, but it’s decided it would be funnier to not tell you. They tell everyone else. Just not you. You will spend the rest of the financial year being the subject of a dizzying array of practical jokes, from bizarre and offputting work assignments, six hour drives to attend meetings at fictional locations, to custard pies to the face every time you turn a corner in the office. Morale and productivity skyrocket, you are named employee of the year, and receive a substantial cash prize. And another pie to the face.

Gemini: You discover that you are half of a whole “evil twin” situation. Specifically you’re the evil twin. Your parents kept your doppelgänger because they liked them way more than you. That’s why they encouraged you to move out, they wanted your room for them, so they could come out of the attic without the risk of you corrupting them with your general awfulness. You learn this when you make an unannounced visit to your parents to bring them a present, only to find your twin already there. After meeting them for the first time you decide your parents had a point.

Cancer: Did you ever see that movie Castaway? No reason. Anyway, you decide you’ve earned a holiday and book a luxury trip to the Caribbean. You plan to spend two weeks in the sun, in a charming beachfront hotel. Wait, sorry, not Castaway, I’m thinking of a completely different movie. What was it called? Oh, yeah. Alive. That’s the one.

Leo: You become so unutterably sick of hearing LLMs described as AI that you become a vocal critic of them, and their use, both in your workplace and online. After being called a Luddite you look up what the Luddites really were, and to your surprise find yourself agreeing. You go all in on the philosophy, building a modern force of classical Luddite organised labour. For legal reasons I cannot describe the rest of the year’s events.

Virgo: After a mental health episode caused by “fucking bullshit” you decide it’s time for a career change. You consider several new lines of work, before settling on becoming a goatherd in the Cairngorms. Not officially, as such. You just train the wild goats into your personal army and menace passers-by to hand over any cash and snacks they may be carrying. You will not entirely understand how this catapults you to a significant position in The Sunday Times Rich List, and nor, frankly, will they.

Libra: You invent a new type of cheese, which becomes an overnight bestseller. “Big Cheese” objects to the new competition, and you are kidnapped by a… huh…. There isn’t actually a word for cheesemaker. We just call them cheesemakers. TIL. You are kidnapped by cheesemakers, who attempt to send a message to future upstarts in the cheese industry by stuffing you into a wheel of cheese and leaving it to cave age for several years. Their plan to sell the resultant cheese-based-crime to the world’s elites is foiled by your eating your way out. You will go on to sell a best-selling account of your battle with the cheese cartels, ghost-written by the guy that proofreads the copy on the back of cereal boxes.

Scorpio: You learn that all the inconvenient maintenance problems that have arisen recently in your home are in fact caused by a haunting. The spirits of every chicken you’ve ever eaten in there have reached critical mass and amalgamated to become a “megaghost”. This would be a bigger problem if it wasn’t for the fact that it still has the intelligence of a chicken, and is therefore completely incapable of forming any actual plan beyond “wandering around and bumping into things”. You conduct a pity exorcism after the third time it wanders into the street and gets hit by a car.

Sagittarius: You become addicted to skydiving. At the peak of your addiction you are jumping out of planes upwards of a dozen times a day. After your third hospitalisation due to midair albatross collision, your loved ones stage an intervention. The only way they are able to keep you in one place long enough to stage said intervention is to create an elaborate and highly convincing fake aircraft which you believe to be in flight. To escape the intervention you leap out of the “aircraft” and land in a puddle in a field, where you are promptly kicked in the head by a horse, curing you of your addiction and your ability to spell the word blancmange.

Capricorn: Due to a fault with your phone’s navigation app you will spend eight straight months driving in circles around the same roughly three square mile area, stopping only to fill up the petrol tank. You become a local fixture, known as “that fucking idiot”. Your journey will only end when your car’s alternator fails, causing the battery to die, and your phone to reset. You will later refer to this period as the happiest in your life, marred only by your development of a crippling parasocial relationship with several radio personalities, and “that bloody traffic light”.

Aquarius: You finally snap and turn “that” neighbour into a selection of high quality artisanal cured meats. Several police interviews are derailed by your “majestic” charcuterie boards. Due to the lead detective’s side gig as editor of “Charcuterie Gazette” you become trapped in a months long global charcuterie board construction league. You do eventually win a trophy and a premium ham worth several hundred pounds, but in the process you leave a trail of dead, cured, smoked, and processed victims across Europe.

Pisces: In an attempt to be more social you start a local book club. After several meetings you begin to grow suspicious. Firstly none of the members appear to actually live in the local area. Secondly every week when it’s time to select the next book you are unanimously outvoted by the other members to choose Dianetics. Again. Thirdly they keep trying to move the club onto a repurposed coal barge stationed in international waters. Lastly you’re pretty sure you’re either being stalked by Tom Cruise, or he’s filming the dullest movie of his career, set entirely where you happen to be going on any particular day.

The Monsters Among Us – Chapter 3: The Revelation

I wrote this one quite a while ago, but completely forgot to post it. Partly because I was busy with last editing passes over Empty Shells (available now on Amazon), and partly because I started writing the next chapter, which would have explained why the council chose this particular moment to reveal their existence to the world.

Which I’ve now entirely changed my mind on doing, at least within the scope of this serialised online bloggy thing. These are supposed to be little extracts from a chatty podcast, and firstly, narratively, it’s a little bit darker than I intended these to be, secondly it would be way too long.

And thirdly, as I’ve mentioned, this started its life as supplemental RPG materials, and I kind of prefer the event that leaves the council with no choice but to make monsters public up to the GM, or even as a playable adventure.

One other note, if you are someone who ever ends up reading Empty Shells (and its future sequels) you may recognise names that appear in these excerpts. This is not coincidence, these excerpts are in fact canon to it and take place at an unspecified point in the future. Empty Shells, and the second and third parts of its trilogy are set in spring 2024 (coinciding with when I started writing it). Just not precisely the same 2024 we lived through. What with the angels, demons, werewolves etc.

These are at some point, probably in the late 2020s or early 2030s. I’ve got a rough timeline, and everything. I won’t say who the unnamed werewolves ate in the redacted section of the following chapter, but it pretty directly resulted in major changes to the 21st century United States. Mostly because writing about the real 21st century USA would be entirely too depressing.

—Season 4, Episode 3: The Revelation—

…

‘Alright, so we’ve put this off long enough. It’s time to talk about the elephant in the room, the revelation, as it’s come to be known.’

‘I would wager, at this point, that you’ve seen the press conference. In fact, with the possible exception of people on wilderness getaways, uncontacted tribes, and my uncle Gilbert who refuses to have a phone and thinks I work on the radio, everyone has. But now, let’s talk about what actually happened, behind the scenes. Well, that and what came after.’

…

‘So I got this email, and it wasn’t to the podcast’s contact address. It was to the editor of one of the publications I do freelance work for. Believe it or not, as much as I love doing the show, historically it hasn’t made “primary source of income” money. Anyway, the editor, he says to me, he’s had this phone call, requesting they send someone to cover this event at a hotel in New York. That they won’t say what it is, only that it’s important and that they’ll regret missing out on the opportunity. The funny part, he says, is that they were very specific that they wanted me.’

‘Between us, we think it’s probably some horror movie launch junket or some nut bag with more money than sense that wants to talk about their new cult or something. It’s not like what I did in my off time was a secret, after all. If they wanted me, then… Well, let’s just say it wouldn’t be the first time I ended up covering something weird. I was kind of busy with paying work, so I would have turned it down, but as a sweetener, whoever it was had thrown in a couple of nights in a very (and I mean very) nice hotel where the conference was happening. As I wasn’t exactly rolling in money, a nice weekend away for free was not something I’d be turning down. We figured I’d sit around until it was clear it was nonsense, then bail and take full advantage of the facilities.’

‘I get the subway over and as soon as I walk into the lobby I start getting the vibes that maybe I wasn’t entirely on the ball with my guess. The place is full, and I don’t mean busy, I mean fully booked out, every last room, by the same customer. Half the lobby is full of journos and the like. An odd mix, too. There was everything from the BBC and Reuters to bloggers and podcasters. Still, I had a couple of hours, so I check in and head upstairs. I have a shower, I freshen up, and I put my “I’m taking this seriously” outfit on. It’s nice, that one. I look good in a waistcoat. I figure it’ll be an hour tops, and I’ll either fuck it off, or whack together some template piece to bung off to the editor if there’s something half interesting; and then off to the hotel bar, and then maybe the spa.’

‘Anyway, once I can’t put it off any longer, I head down to the function room they’re setting up. I arrive at just about the last possible moment, so of course all the tables are taken, packed with a mix of press and… strangers. This is not a concern, because they also had a bar, at the back of the room, furthest from the stage, where I took a seat. I figured I could swivel around when the talking starts. There’s only two other people at the bar, excluding the staff. At one end of the bar was a handsome black guy in a turtle-neck and suit jacket, watching the whole affair with a contented smile and sipping a glass of wine. Sitting dead centre was a guy in a suit with the sleeves rolled halfway up his forearms, slightly ratty sneakers, shirt half open to reveal a black t shirt beneath, and tastefully ruffled up hair. Judging by the glasses on the bar, he was on his third drink.’

‘Fourth, actually,’ Jude said, ‘we need a bit extra to get a buzz going.’

‘The casual guy, who you’ve probably figured was Jude, gestured me over to sit beside him. Asked me what I was drinking. I said if he was paying, I’d have a scotch. Don’t tell the others, but it’s an open bar, he whispered, we figured you’d need it. I laughed and asked just what this was all about, given just how much cash was being conspicuously thrown about. The guy in the turtle-neck chuckles. Jude just pretends to check the watch he isn’t wearing and says to give it five minutes.’

‘So I start on my drink and take a look around. It’s pretty clear who’s the reporter types and who’s everyone else. Or, at least, it is to me. From where I’m sitting, it looks like there’s been an almost curated distribution. Every table has a mix of the journalists and the others. There was this clear dividing line between “standard suits” and, well, everything from casual to dressed to impress. And speaking of which, this woman walks past us, and she is just stunning. She’s wearing this long black dress. It’s backless and sleeveless, so you can see she’s got some muscle going on, she looks like an athlete, then as she passes by I realise the dress is clearly something of a statement as her back is covered in this crisscross of scars.’

‘Statement would be the word,’ agreed Haley, ‘Most expensive thing I’ve ever worn. Custom-made for the big reveal. From the sort of dressmaker that doesn’t ask questions like “are you sure you want it backless with all those scars” and “what’s with the quick release catch”.’

‘Now when I say stunning, I mean it. I was not the only person who was staring at her like an idiot. Half the eyes in the place followed her as she stalked off after someone she wanted to talk to.’

‘I’d say, are you trying to get in my pants, but I ain’t wearin’ any,’ Haley joked.

‘Jude’s looking at her with this look of half pride and half awe. I’m just miles away, and I don’t even realise I’m fiddling with my shirt sleeve. You see, I… I never wear short sleeves. I haven’t talked about this publicly before, but I have some scars on my left forearm which I don’t like people seeing. It’s all in the past, but it gives people ideas. Changes how people look at you. And then this woman goes past, looking absolutely amazing, showing those scars off like war paint. By the time my brain starts up again, I catch Jude’s eye, and he’s watching me.’

‘He looks at me like he’s seeing right through me, and he says to me, “believe me, no one’s giving you shit if you want to roll your sleeves up tonight”. I get suspicious, like, immediately suspicious. Except for a very short list of immediate family, one very close friend, and a partial list of people I’ve slept with, no one knew about the scars. So I ask him what he means. He chuckles, and he tells me he’s just great at reading people. I call bullshit.’

‘He smiles, and he says that he saw the way I was looking at her, and my whole vibe changed when she passed, and I saw the scars. Between the fact I read as impressed more than surprised, and the way I was subconsciously playing with my sleeve, I gave the game away.’

‘There was more to it than that, but it wasn’t far enough into the night to just say you smelled different,’ clarified Jude, ‘Most of the people watching Haley were either intimidated or horny.’

‘Which is, of course, the correct set of responses to seeing me in a nice dress,’ she agreed.

‘You, however, all you were giving off was awestruck,’ Jude continued. ‘The rest was just people reading, and you get good at that when you’ve got the nasal cheat code.’

‘So I just sigh and roll my shirtsleeves up. Happy now? I say to him. He just shrugs and says I look fine to him. The other guy at the bar, turtle-neck guy, he gives me this oddly sage look and tells me that a person’s scars are part of the story of who they are and nothing to be ashamed of. Says that we all have a few, even if they aren’t all that obvious. Who was that guy anyway, he vanished pretty sharpish once everything kicked off?’

The werewolves shared an odd look, as if wordlessly asking a question. Haley shrugged.

‘Azazel.’

Cadence looked between them, waiting for something more.

‘Is that someone I should know?’

‘Hah!’ Haley said, with a snort of laughter. ‘Not likely. You won’t see him again, either, not wearing that face at least. He was just showing support on behalf of his dad. And before you ask, good luck getting an interview with either of them, I can get you through many doors, but that one’s a one way trip.’

‘His dad being?’

‘Lucifer,’ Haley said, as if it was the most normal answer in the world.

‘Lucifer? Oh come on, you’re pulling my leg this time. Which one’re we talking about here? Tom Ellis? Jeremy Jordan? De Niro?’

‘Honey, you’re good company, but if Tom Ellis was in the building, the only way you’d be getting me off him would be with a fire hose,’ said Haley.

‘Alright, play with me all you want, we’ll do demons in another episode. So I’m not exactly at my best at this point. I’m surrounded by weirdos, I’m suddenly all thrown off my game, and to add to it all I’ve got this weird feeling that my scars are why I’m there, which, if it had been true, would have made me very angry indeed. Still, I turn around and order another drink from the barman. And decide to mind my own business.’

‘For the record, we both looked fucking great that night, scars or no,’ Haley said, quietly.

‘So I don’t have to wait long for the main event. The lights are dimmed, and a spotlight hits this podium set up on the stage. There were so many cameras set up around that thing. Made sense really. I didn’t notice how many of them were watching the point just next to the podium, though, not until later.’

‘This older dude comes out, neat suit… expensive suit. The guy’s immaculate, head to toe. The lights were even catching on his damn shoes, they were so well polished. I have heard the term silver fox used to describe him, and honestly I can see their point. He stands at the podium, takes a deep breath, and he starts giving this prepared speech.’

…

‘Ladies, gentlemen, and others, I would like to thank you for taking the time out of your day to listen to what I have to say, whether you are here in person or watching from home. To those of you watching this in a historical context, it is my profoundest hope that we are making the right decision here today, and that the world you live in is a better one for what I am about to say.’

‘Before I begin, I would like, also, to make two promises. The first is that I am going to say some things which may be considered outlandish, ridiculous even, to most of you. You would be well within your rights to dismiss my words as such. So I will reassure you now that proof of a most graphic nature will be provided for my claims, and you will not need to wait long to see it. The second is that we mean no harm to anyone in this room, and that none of you will come to harm at our hands. I do appreciate that this may be somewhat disconcerting to those of you who have kindly attended this presentation in person, but it is better to clearly state this now, so you may be more comfortable later.’

Emmanuel paused, took a deep breath, and adjusted his cuff links.

‘The story of humanity is one of an endless struggle for rights, for recognition, for even the most basic freedoms. A struggle against the orthodoxy of the day, and against those who see equity and equality as a threat to their supremacy. I am old… much older than I look, and I have seen so much of it with my own eyes. We have watched as you have fought and scraped for every scrap of freedom to think, speak, live, and love as you choose.

‘We have watched, also, as at the slightest sign of complacency great swathes of those hard-fought rights have been swept away. As humanity has been turned against itself, while its masters laugh and count the coin they have accumulated in blood. Some of you may wonder why we would have kept our existence a secret for as long as we have. Some of you will know all too well. We have been beside you throughout those trials. Many of us have fought at your sides. Your rights and freedoms, after all, have been ours too.’

‘It was long the plan that we would remain in the shadows until humanity had grown further. Until you had moved past the petty wedges driven between you. We had hoped that we could wait until humanity had come together and built a kinder world before we would unveil ourselves. We are not perfectionists, nor are we unrealistic. We knew that it would take time, but we have seen the progress you have made, how far you have come in so short a time.’

Emmanuel paused for a moment, and sighed.

‘Events, regrettably, have forced our hand. It has been growing clear for some time that safety through obscurity is no longer a viable strategy. When every person carries a television studio in their pocket, when every movement is followed by countless cameras, and when machines track and study every action, it is impossible to truly remain hidden. With every passing day, it was growing harder to maintain the veil, and we were forced to rely more and more on those allies we have in power to conceal our presence.’

‘But beyond that, our decision was in large part made for us. While there have always been those who knew of our existence, they have been those we chose to reveal ourselves to, or those who could be persuaded that we meant no harm and that we only wished to live our lives. That is no longer the case, and our existence has been discovered by those who would do us harm. Who would use us to further their own ends. We will not allow this. It is clear now, that in this new world, to continue to exist we must abandon secrecy and stand with you in daylight.’

‘You will rightly be asking, at this point, who, or what, we are. We are many, and varied. We belong to every race and gender, and hail from every part of the world. We are seated here among you, fully half of the individuals in this very room, the people you have been chatting and drinking with for the past few minutes. We will all be introduced to you in time, but we will begin with the personal.’

‘I have used many names throughout my lifetime, but from today on, one way or another, that is over.  My name, my real name that is, the name I was born with, is Emmanuel Holton. I was born in England, in the year fifteen hundred and twelve. I am a vampire.’

Emmanuel paused as voices erupted around the hall.

…

‘So some of the people in the audience kick off at that. They call bullshit in a very literal sense. A few even get up to leave. They are all very rapidly shushed and sat back down by the people at their tables. I see now how carefully things have been arranged. The disruption is over in seconds. I glance across at Jude. Fucker just winks at me and gives me this look that says “you ain’t seen nothing yet”.’

‘At this point, all eyes are back on him. Except mine. Jude gives me a nudge and nods over towards the wings. From where I’m sitting, I can just see Haley waiting to come on. Jude leans in and tells me I’m going to love the next part.’

…

‘I have seen a great many things first hand. Civil wars, both English and American. The fall and restoration of the crown. Revolution and independence. The industrial revolution, the space race and the atomic age. Suffrage, civil rights, pride. Two world wars. So much cruelty and death. So much life and potential wasted. When you live as long as I have, you see the best and worst of humanity. I want you to understand that this is not a metaphor, not an allegory, that there is not some twist coming. I am a vampire. I am an immortal creature that feeds, consensually I might add, on the blood and life force of humans.’

‘I am very aware, however, that shy of continuing this speech for another hundred years or so, that is not the easiest thing to necessarily prove. That is not a problem, however. You see, many of my associates are possessed of more visually striking properties. Miss Stanford, would you be so kind as to join me.’

…

‘You’ve all seen this part. Everyone’s seen this part. I imagine everyone there ever will be will see this part. Up until we all nuke each other out of existence, or go so far we forget which planet we even came from. Haley strides out of the wings and comes to a stop just beside the podium. There are some more murmurs and voices from the audience, even a few laughs and jeers. Although even then, she was most definitely drawing the eye. I noticed something funny, though, that I don’t think most of the others did. She was barefoot.’

…

‘Of all of us who are capable of providing a tangible demonstration of our true natures, we have chosen perhaps the most dramatic to take the first step. On behalf of all of us, I would like to thank Miss Stanford here, and I would also like to take this moment to reiterate what I said earlier. No one in this room will be harmed. In your own time, please.’

…

‘So, Haley doesn’t say a word. She just smiles, takes a bow, and then reaches behind her neck and releases some fastener that’s holding her dress up. The thing drops away, and she’s standing there stark naked.’

‘For the record,’ Haley explained, ‘we talked about exactly how we would do it. We decided bursting out of the clothes would be more intimidating. That and all those angles on the transformation, completely uncovered, would make it way more difficult to dismiss out of hand. Every channel would be replaying footage from a different angle. Also, there was no universe where I was shredding that dress.’

‘I’ve seen what it cost,’ Jude added.

‘Yeah, well, I’m not doing that particular act in ratty sweats and an old hoodie,’ Haley continued. ‘If I’m making that much of a scene, I’m going all the fuck out. Although I did reconsider my decisions about halfway through shaving. I fired the gardener right after I became a werewolf. It seemed slightly absurd spending so much time shaving legs and pits and the like when I’d be growing 100% coverage at the drop of a hat. But it was a one-off, and sometimes you have to make sacrifices for style, and I’ve got to say the end result was pretty damn fine.’

‘That’s an understatement. Anyway, she looks into the centre camera, and says…’

…

‘Showtime!’

…

‘And then she changes. In fifteen seconds flat, she goes from a human to a full on monster. She’s all muscle and teeth and claws and shaggy fur. The room goes absolutely pin drop silent. No one speaks, no one even dares move or try to run. And then she rears up, throws her head back and howls. Every damn human in that room seems to shrink in their seats. And right next to me, the man I’ve been drinking with is howling too.’

‘That was too good a howl not to join in. Besides, Zootopia was right, that shit’s contagious,’ joked Jude.

‘I’m sort of vaguely aware that everyone else is terrified, but I’m not. Because I’ve seen a werewolf before, and I’ve been trying to find them again ever since. Eventually the howl stops, I’ve no idea how you do it for so long, and the whole place goes silent. Well,’ Cadence chuckled, ‘almost.’

…

When the werewolf’s howl ends, the room falls silent. Most microphones then pick up a single raised voice.

‘Hah, I said I wasn’t crazy! I fucking told you! Fuck you, Dr Simkins!’

…

‘I would like to take this moment to apologise publicly to Dr Maria Simkins. You’re great, I still love you, it’s just I was very overexcited and in my head you’ve kind of become this sort of avatar of all the people who wouldn’t believe me when I told them about what you call “the incident”. I’ve had to stop looking at my phone for a while, the sheer number of messages telling me I was right all along and apologising for doubting me, it’s almost pornographic.’

…

‘Well, quite.’ Emmanuel clears his throat. ‘Everyone else, you may drop your glamours.’

…

‘And then the whole room goes bananas. There’s screaming and panicking, and people running for the exits which are all locked, and I’m just there laughing my ass off because everywhere I look half the people in the room have turned into, well, monsters. There’s wings and tails and claws and fangs and fur all over the place.’

‘I look over at Jude, and he’s got this big happy smile on his face, and he’s just about the most relaxed person in the room. I ask him if he’s gonna change too? He says it’s her moment, he’s just here for moral support.’

…

‘Please, be calm, my friends. It is as I have said. No one here is going to harm you. In this room are representatives of monster communities around the world. Vampires, werewolves, banshees, harpies, selkies, beastfolk, and many more. These people live among you, they are your neighbours, your coworkers, your friends. Not five minutes ago, you were laughing and drinking with them. The only thing that has changed is their appearance.’

…

‘It takes a couple of minutes, but the various monsters gradually usher and cajole everyone back into their seats. Slowly the room gets quieter. Eventually, almost everyone’s back in their seats. The cameramen having got a great deal of footage of monsters being the nice calm ones in the room. There’s no denying how well planned this whole thing was.’

‘It was expected. It’s why we took care to spread everyone out,’ Jude explained, ‘so the monsters could singly calm down the people they’d been socialising with before. And be seen doing so. What wasn’t expected was what came next.’

…

‘I understand that this is a lot, that this is upon you all of a sudden. But we invited each of you for a reason. Your-’

…

‘Emmanuel starts talking, now that the room’s calmed down a bit, tries to get his speech going again, then this guy stands up. Shouts something I didn’t catch. I’m not sure if it was even coherent. Then he pulls a gun out of nowhere. He’s clearly almost out of his mind terrified, and he points it at Emmanuel and opens fire.’

‘I’ve never seen someone move as fast as Haley did, stepping between them and taking the bullets. He empties his gun into her, and she barely flinches. He doesn’t even seem to understand what’s happening at first. Dude just stands there firing away on empty. I could hear the clicking from all the way at the back, the whole place was dead silent again. Haley steps down off the stage and stalks up to him, growling.’

‘He seems to realise when she’s about ten feet away that he’s made a massive mistake. He stops dry-firing and starts backing up, shaking, until he backs into a table. I’ve seen the shot from twenty different angles. Haley, all bloodied and snarling, standing over him, and then just snatching the gun out of his hand and pulling it apart, then striding away and leaving him standing there blubbering.’

‘He pissed himself, too. I want to make that very clear,’ Jude added. ‘For historical record, you know?’

‘Some security guys, humans I think, take the guy away. Surprisingly kindly, given the circumstances. Jude’s whining next to me, I don’t mean complaining, I mean literally whining. I look over, and he just says “follow her, I should stay just in case”. I turn around, and I see Haley heading towards a side door, and the further she goes, the more unsteady she gets. When she gets to the wall, she leans on it and leaves this bloody smear behind.’

‘I get up and run after her.’

…

‘We had anticipated some degree of backlash, but not quite so immediate. I do apologise. Our security will have a quiet chat with that gentleman in the back and hopefully calm him down. I will not say no harm done, but at least everyone’s alive. For reference, he was more likely to kill a human than any one of us. We tend to be rather resilient.’

‘I was saying, now somewhat ironically, that we chose each of you for a reason. Some for your trusted reputations, some for your general accepting natures, some because we were fairly sure you already suspected the truth or have had experiences of your own.’

‘Our hope was that we could spend the next few days here together, and that you could tell the truth of us to the world. But there was more to it than that. With all of you here, and with the cameras watching, we want to make a statement first.’

…

‘It wasn’t hard to follow her. She’s leaving bloody handprints down the wall, changing as she walks. Before she makes it to the end of the hallway, she’s human again. She drops to her knees, the pain too much for her to walk with. Hollow points, she says, why are they always fucking hollow points.’

‘I pick her up off the floor, and I’m like, where to? She just points at a door down the hall. I help her along, and it turns out to be a linen store. I get her inside, and she just slumps and sits up against the wall. She reaches out for a towel, and winces from the pain, not quite reaching it. I grab it off the shelf for her, and she balls it up and presses it against a wound.’

‘So, I say, should I, like, call an ambulance? She looks at me and laughs, or at least starts to laugh, before she does this full body flinch and goes “ow, ow, ow”. Tells me she just needs some time for the bullets to work their way back out, and asks if I can keep her company while they do their thing.’

‘Hey, you’ll take whatever distractions you can get when you’ve got a load of mashed up hollow points slowly pushing their way back out. Never fucking stops hurting, because the tissue around them’s constantly healing,’ Haley explained. ‘It’s a bastard of a thing.’

…

‘All we want, have ever wanted, is to live beside you as your neighbours, friends, and family; and to do so openly, for the world to see us as we are. Perhaps, if we can finally be truthful with each other, the world can be a happier place.’

‘But, also, I bring a warning. Our rights, our existence, our personhood, will not be taken from us. This is not a request, but a statement of fact. We will not stand meekly by and watch while we are legislated into oblivion. Nor will we allow fences to divide us, or signs to segregate us. We have seen, with our own eyes, every horror of human history. We will not be your next victims. I promise you that.’

‘Now, I hope it won’t come to that. In the days to come, there will be many difficult conversations to be had. Yes, between the council and the governments of the world, but also between so many of you. I beg of you to remember that, when you discover that someone you work with, or your neighbour, or friend, is a monster, that they are still the person you have always known. Putting aside our status as monsters or humans, we are all, simply, people. We have shared the world in peace for a very, very, long time. Now let us do so openly.’

‘Thank you all.’

…

‘Haley and I ended up watching the tail end of the speech, and Emmanuel and some of the others taking questions from the press, on my phone, sat in the corner of a linen closet while I picked bullet bits out of her. Oh, and absolutely ruining quite a lot of towels, but I’m sure the hotel was making enough money not to care. The cleaner who came in seemed more concerned about the horrible injuries, than the mess. Nice lady. Fetched us some painkillers and a pair of tweezers.’

‘There was some swearing, and some tears along the way, but an hour later you wouldn’t know that she’d ever been shot. It was quite something to watch. Eventually, when she felt good to go again, I made her up a crude dress out of a bedsheet. It wasn’t quite the fashion show she started the night as, but we made our way back to the event. We both felt like we could use a trip to the bar.’

‘Hey, I think sheet-dress looked fine. But then I would have wandered off without it if you hadn’t stopped me,’ Haley explained. ‘Healing out gunshots really takes it out of you, so I was focused more on the buffet.’

‘We made our way back, stocked up at the bar and buffet, and found a table out of the way. Barring a few concerned monsters checking in on Haley, we were mostly left alone. It turns out people aren’t all that keen to hassle someone who’s just been shot six times while foiling an assassination. We sat and ate our snacks and watched the monsters do the first round of human/monster public relations. Interviews were breaking out all over the room, people were setting up broadcasts as fast as they could. It was a full news circus, and there were already more building up in the street outside.’

‘Not just the news, outside,’ Jude added, darkly, ‘we were already being protested. We always knew that would happen, though. Did you know those fuckers have already got a conspiracy theory that we took the gunman out the back and killed him?’

Haley shook her head.

‘Dude’s fine. Some guys calmed him down and got him a cab home. No harm done. From what I understand, he’d had a bad experience with a vampire in the past. Kept it quiet to not get called crazy, and panicked when the whole thing went off,’ Haley explained. ‘I mean, I’m not thrilled about getting shot, but at least he’s getting some help now.’

‘And now,’ Cadence resumed, ‘the whole world’s changing. Monsters are coming out of the shadows everywhere, albeit slowly. I can understand their hesitancy. Why they might want to see how it goes for everyone else first. But it’s happening. Responses are… let’s be honest, mixed. The usual suspects are saying exactly what you’d expect them to.’

‘Yeah, we kind of predicted that,’ admitted Jude. ‘Churches calling for a new crusade, between passing the collection plates. The predictable politicians talking about how “something needs to be done”. And that’s all before we get to the conspiracy theorists blaming us for everything under the sun, including quite a lot of things that never happened in the first place.’

‘Let’s see,’ Haley said, ‘I went online for half an hour earlier, apparently JFK was a vampire, was assassinated by vampires for opposing vampires, was never assassinated because that was actually a changeling doppleganger, Lee Harvey Oswald was mind controlled by sirens, while being both a vampire, a vampire’s thrall, and a government agent assigned to hunt monsters. I mean JFK for fuck’s sake, why would we want to assassinate JFK? If we were in the business of assassinating presidents, believe me he would not have been the one.’

‘That’s not to say monsters haven’t had an impact on history,’ Jude clarified. ‘I mean monsters fought in the wars, some of us have all sorts of roles in keeping the world running, and that’s before we even get to [REDACTED]. You’re welcome, by the way, imagine how much the place would have gone to shit if we hadn’t eaten him. Well, us in general, this was before my time.’

‘Jesus, Jude, I cannot use a word of that. I mean, that is history books shit. Actionable, too.’

‘Correction,’ Jude continued, ‘It would have been history books shit, if he hadn’t tried to intimidate the wrong werewolves. As it is, once they realised what he was really up to, they found out they’d accidentally saved the day. Democracy won in the end, and it’s worth it just for the climate reforms, if you ask me.’

Cadence cleared her throat before resuming.

‘It’s not just the conspiracy theories, either,’ she said. ‘We’ve already had our first celebrity monsters. Well, if I’m honest it’s kind of hard to tell which ones are tabloid gossip, which ones are more conspiracy theories and which ones are genuine. Let’s see, who do we have… Okay, I’m dismissing out of hand that any of the last seven presidents were lizard people, because certain publications have been calling that one for decades anyway.’

‘Yeah, and there ain’t no fuckin’ lizard people, either,’ Haley stated, emphatically. ‘At least not like the conspiracy bullshit. For a start, the entire conspiracy theory is pants on head moronic, secondly the place would be way more chill if a secret cabal of lizards was running everything, have you seen lizards, they just want to lie on a hot rock eating bugs-’

‘Hashtag life goals,’ Jude interrupted.

‘- and thirdly, if you ever look into where that conspiracy theory came from, it’s really racist.’

‘Aren’t they all?’ Jude pointed out. ‘I’ve never heard of a conspiracy theory that’s not just a convoluted way to blame the Jews. Frequently for something that didn’t actually happen.’

‘True. And most of these are just more of the same. There’s a lot of “this celebrity is a monster”. The only one I can find where “celebrity actually says they’re a monster on camera” is Christie MacCrain.’

The werewolves’ ears perked up at that.

‘Oh, really?’ Haley asked. ‘What is she?’

‘Banshee,’ Cadence replied.

‘That explains a lot,’ Jude said, nodding.

‘I suppose if we give it a few weeks there’ll be more. There’s probably a lot of people talking to their agents and PR right now. Maybe we’ll do a celebrity special once we know who’s for real. But for now there is one other thing I wanted to ask about. There’s something Emmanuel mentioned in the speech, that there was a reason this had to come out right now?’

The werewolves exchanged a glance. Jude shrugged.

‘It’s not exactly a nice story, and I’m sorry, but it ain’t going public just yet. There are still, well, you know how the police aren’t supposed to comment on ongoing investigations? Well in this case the council have advised us not to comment on ongoing discussions with some high level government officials.’

‘Yeah, and the story isn’t likely to fit into an episode. And even if it did, I think it’d mess up the tone. I’m sure we’ll end up talking about it eventually.’

Yes, I actually pressed the scary button and published a book.

I will have more to say on this in the future, some of the how’s and why’s and what I might have done’s of the book’s content. But most of my time, including things I meant to do here, have gone into actually writing and editing it, so it might be a while.

But, for now at least: Empty Shells, a demonic adventure story, is now available on Amazon as an eBook and paperback.

The Monsters Among Us – Chapter 2: Vampires

—Season 4, Episode 2: Creatures of the Night—

‘So, in the interest of transparency, we’re recording this episode about two hours after the last one. I’m not used to burning through episodes like this, but there’s no way I’m passing up an opportunity like this. The raw files have gone off to Eddie to do his magic with, so at this point I haven’t even heard episode one, let alone what the response is like to our new “actually having real monsters on the show” direction. I’m going to assume by the time this one’s edited, though, we’ll have a new sponsor or two.’

‘Don’t get me wrong, I’m very grateful to our old sponsors, but there are limits to just how much I can afford to do on sponsorships for recycled memory foam mattresses, home cock and ball waxing kits, and weekly novelty soda delivery subscriptions. Although I stand by Jenkins’ Sodas subscriptions. That shit’s tasty, and I’m not just saying that because they sent me a crate. Because I’m pretty sure with the amount I’ve bought since I’ve actually lost money on that deal.’

‘Our last guests are in fact still in the room. Jude, still in full monster mode, has annexed my bed and is currently napping, and Haley is making good use of my shower. If you’d have told me three days ago that I’d be recording a new episode from a hotel room bed, next to a sleeping werewolf I’d have, well, if I’m honest I’d have probably been thrilled.’

The two new individuals who have come to join us could not be more different from my new werewolf friends. The werewolves are tanned, scruffy, sociable, and seem almost entirely unbothered by all of what’s going on. These gentlemen, on the other hand, the opposite of that in every way.

…

‘Still, it’s time to introduce this episode’s guests. Here in what I’m going to call the studio for professionalism’s sake are Emmanuel Holton, with whom you will be familiar as the man who delivered the speech at yesterday’s press conference, and Ryan Spencer. Both men are vampires, who have kindly found time in the media rounds to come up and chat with me.’

‘If I’m entirely frank with you, Miss Blanchard, it is something of a relief to take a break from the gauntlet of cameras downstairs,’ admitted Emmanuel. ‘We are normally rather private individuals. This sudden exposure is exhausting.’

Yeah,’ Ryan agreed. ‘I needed out for a while. One microphone and a werewolf is practically relaxing by comparison. And this is nice, comfier than the other interviews, you know.’

‘Well, I did have plans to set the other room up for interviews, you know? I did get given a suite, after all. But then you try keeping werewolves away from a warm bed,’ Cadence explained. ‘They seem to be natural loungers. Oh, and it’s two werewolves, by the way.’

‘Ahh, I had wondered where Miss Stanford had got to,’ Emmanuel said, nodding.

…

Haley chose this moment to wander back in, drying her hair. She sat down on the couch with Ryan, who really can’t hide when he’s blushing. It’s the pale complexion, the contrast is dialled way up.

This is probably as good a moment as any to describe them physically.

Most of you will have seen Emmanuel as he was at the press conference, and that does seem to be his usual style. A tidy, and perfectly tailored, suit with a turtle-neck, polished leather shoes, and a watch worth more than my car. His hair is neatly groomed, as is his precisely trimmed beard, all dark brown with just a hint of grey at the temples. His age, his apparent age at least, is hard to discern. He seems almost ageless, he could be anywhere from his thirties to a very well-preserved fifty.

At a glance, you would assume Ryan is in his early twenties. He, too, was wearing a suit of much more modern style, although his jacket and tie happened to be draped over the back of a chair in the other room. He has a fashionably tousled mop of curly blond hair and a left ear full of various piercings.

If it wasn’t in poor taste, the phrase “deathly pale” would apply to both of them.

…

‘You can’t get rid of me that easily,’ Haley said. ‘Especially since you went and made me the star of the show.’

‘And your performance was exemplary. No one could claim that was special effects, especially given your subsequent live appearances in the car park for the assembled media,’ praised Emmanuel.

‘What can I say, the camera loves me,’ Haley said, running her fingers through her hair as the closest thing she got to a comb in usual circumstances. ‘And not that many of them ran away screaming,’

‘You say that, but some people are still trying to claim it’s all faked,’ Ryan said, sighing. ‘The cat’s out of the bag, though. Monsters are coming out all over the world.’

‘I just hope we’ve made the right decision. I, and the rest of the council, did predict a backlash, but not perhaps as quickly and dramatically as we saw last night,’ Emmanuel said, with a wince. ‘I do apologise again, Miss Stanford.’

‘Relax, old man,’ Haley reassured, ‘I don’t mind taking a bullet or two for a good cause. Besides, you weren’t done talking, that guy was being very impolite.’

‘And as silver linings go, I think a lot of people will think twice about taking a shot at a monster after seeing you tank multiple gunshots, and then pulling his gun apart like it was nothing,’ Ryan suggested.

‘Yeah, the big tough girl act lasted precisely until I managed to hide in a housekeepers closet, and the wolf nopes out and leaves me to heal out the bullets. That shit fucking hurt,’ Haley admitted. ‘Thanks for helping with the clean-up, by the way.’

‘Any time,’ Cadence said.

…

For context, while most of you will have seen Haley, still in her wolf form from the original reveal taking several gunshots at point-blank range after one of the reporters present had some kind of breakdown and opened fire on Emmanuel, you will not have seen the immediate aftermath. Once the gentleman in question had been escorted out by security, and the cameras were back on Emmanuel and his speech, Haley made a swift exit. I happened to follow, and discovered that she made it about halfway down the hallway before changing back into her human form, in considerable distress. I ended up hiding in a storeroom with her, helping clean up the wounds until the bullets came back out and the wounds closed over. As she explained it to me, a werewolf can tough out a great deal of physical damage while the adrenaline of a fight is going on, but once the danger ends they have a tendency to go human again to escape the pain.

…

‘So,’ reiterated Cadence, ‘in addition to our werewolf friends from episode one, we are joined today by Emmanuel Holton, and Ryan Spencer, both of whom are in fact vampires. Emmanuel was also the council’s spokesman for the press conference last night, so has become de facto spokesman for monsters in general.’

‘Yes, that is something that I will admit had not entirely crossed my mind,’ said Emmanuel. ‘Still, circumstances make their demands upon us.’

‘So, how about you tell us a bit about yourselves?’ Cadence asked.

Emmanuel took a sip of his tea, before putting it aside.

‘My name is Emmanuel Holton,’ he began, ‘although I have used a great many others over the years. I was born in fifteen hundred and twelve, in England, in the city of York. I was the second son of a blacksmith, and worked as his apprentice. In my early twenties, I fell into some rather unfortunate company, including a woman with whom I became thoroughly infatuated. Fortunately or otherwise, depending on your perspective, it turned out she was a vampire. During one of our… assignations, she turned me, and proceeded to introduce me to the wider world. Of course after a few years I had to move on from York. It didn’t do to raise suspicions in those days.’

‘I travelled around England, settling in various places for around a hundred and fifty years. I lost my companion to one of the bastard Cromwell’s generals along the way, and after that I wandered for a while. Eventually I lost my love for the place and took a ship to the new world. I settled in Pennsylvania, brand new that it was at the time. Eventually I made contact with the council and from there I’m sure you can imagine the sort of thing. I worked my way up, until I was senior enough to be the frontman when we went public.’

When Emmanuel finished, Ryan looked around uncertainly, until he realised everyone was waiting for him.

‘That’s really hard to compete with,’ Ryan said. ‘I’m Ryan. I’m twenty-six. I’m a video editor. I got turned four years ago by a transfusion from a vampire. Got into a nasty accident, nearly bled out. Turns out I knew a vampire that didn’t like the idea of me dying, so they got creative.’

‘You should not speak so of yourself,’ scolded Emmanuel. ‘There is far more to you than that.’

…

I think Ryan may have been about to attempt to say something profound at that moment, but we shall never know because Haley chose that moment to give him a noogie. Werewolves tend to show their affection physically, and they are not fond of awkward silences. Emmanuel laughed. I think he finds werewolves and their shenanigans entertaining.

…

‘So,’ Emmanuel asked, ‘what would you like to know?’

‘I’m sort of still working out the format, here. I figure we do the same thing again,’ Cadence mused. ‘Just like with our furry friends here. We have ideas about what a vampire is. How about you set the record straight?’

‘Where even to begin?’ considered Emmanuel. ‘Well, Stoker, I suppose. Do you know, I have a signed first edition somewhere? I had it done by the man himself, it amused me no end. Well, he entirely overestimated our capabilities, although I suppose one could attribute much of Dracula’s power in the story to the man himself and not his vampirism. Of course, culture ran away with the idea, and suddenly everyone who can read thinks that we can fly and control animals and take the form of a dog and such.’

‘Yeah, that’s our schtick!’ Haley protested.

‘Quite,’ Emmanuel agreed. ‘The reality is much simpler. Vampirism is a disease of the blood, which at some point in the very distant past was altered in some way through means magical. Scholarly opinion is that there are two likely causes. The first is a failed attempt at using magic to cure a viral infection of some form, causing the virus to rapidly mutate and become symbiotic with the magic itself. The second is a virus infiltrating a higher magic entity, perhaps an elf or a potent spell caster, or even an angel or demon, evolving over an extended period within the magic rich environment of their body, until it eventually passed on to a human.’

‘What we do know for a fact is that the cause is a virus. I’ve seen it with my own eyes in one of the council’s labs,’ confirmed Ryan. ‘Whatever it actually is, the scientists tell me it doesn’t look like anything else. Either it mutated so far from its original state that it’s effectively unrecognisable, or it’s so old that the rest of its evolutionary chain is long dead.’

‘As to the symptoms of our condition,’ resumed Emmanuel, ‘the headline item is that we are required to feed upon the blood of living humans on a regular basis. If we do not, we will develop increasingly severe symptoms of hunger, anaemia, and erratic behaviour until we effectively become feral creatures.’

‘To head off some obvious questions, no, we absolutely do not kill the people we feed on,’ said Ryan. ‘It’s about as much blood loss as you would have if you donated blood. Yes, we can get by for a while on donor blood, although eventually we’ll need a real subject. Yes, we can feed on animals, but it’s much less effective, and again only a short term solution.’

‘There is a magical element to the feeding process,’ Emmanuel elaborated. ‘As well as consuming the basic nutrients, the blood is a medium for the absorption of raw life force. Hence, the reduced efficacy of donor blood.’

‘So the rest of it, the sunlight and stakes and garlic and whatnot?’ asked Cadence.

‘Are stakes through the heart a vulnerability?’ Ryan asked. ‘Really? Because I’m pretty sure they’d work just as well on you.’

‘That is a fair point, which I will admit I had never considered during my last rewatch of Buffy the Vampire Slayer,’ Cadence admitted.

‘And while we’re at it,’ Ryan continued, ‘we don’t turn to dust when we die, we don’t burst into flames in the sun, and I can hold all the religious symbols I want to. And we don’t do that toothy angry face thing,’ Ryan sighs. ‘I wish I could pull off the coat like Spike, though.’

‘Oh, you could get away with it, no trouble,’ Haley enthused. ‘It’s all in how you carry yourself, my man. Jude. Jude! Hey, naptime!’ Haley proceeded to throw the towel she had been using to dry her hair at Jude’s face. ‘Tell him he’d look good in a long coat.’

Jude opened his eyes, and gave Ryan a big furry thumbs up. Ryan laughed.

‘It’s got some upsides, though,’ Ryan resumed. ‘The short version, physically at least, would be we heal fast. Faster than a werewolf, even, provided we’re all fuelled up. We’re a bit stronger, faster, and more dextrous than a human, and we’re very good at being stealthy when we want to. It’s not a turning invisible thing, we’re just good at not being noticed. Night vision, too. And we get these jumbo incisors. Well, fangs, really.’

‘Teefies,’ Haley said, showing off her own fangs, they were indeed more pronounced, although on that front (in human shape at least) the vampires had her beat.

‘As for downsides,’ he continued. ‘The main one is the vulnerability to sunlight. It’s not exactly fatal, it’s just the stronger it is, the weaker you are. An overcast day and it’s barely a problem. Hence the complexion, we don’t spend a lot of time sunbathing.’

‘That does sound like a bit of a bummer,’ Cadence agreed. ‘I’d miss a nice day out in the sun.’

‘You can enjoy such a thing to an extent, but you’d be mostly sticking to the shade,’ Emmanuel explained. ‘Also, modern sunglasses have been something of a boon in that area. Any amount of sunlight can be challenging on the eyes, so I always keep a pair on me.’

‘So, the elephant in the room. The feeding. How does this work?’ Cadence asked. ‘I don’t mean to be offensive, but I imagine people are already imagining something predatory.’

‘I will admit that it was that way in the distant past, but thankfully we live in a more civilised time now,’ Emmanuel said. ’Putting aside the obvious moral concerns, in purely practical terms that sort of thing could not pass unnoticed on any scale, and nor should it. Also, it adds a precariousness to a vampire’s blood supply, which can lead to much more regrettable situations.’

‘When you say distant?’ Cadence pressed further.

‘Not as distant as I should like, although I suspect you and I have a different perspective on what constitutes the distant past. To me, “The Civil War” was between the royalists and the parliamentarians. Be glad you live in a kinder world.’

‘It’s not the most comfortable topic to discuss,’ admitted Ryan, ‘but most vampires feed on some number of their friends, families, or romantic partners. I-’ Ryan clears his throat, nervously. ‘I have four people I feed on. My girlfriend, my brother, one of my friends from high school, and someone from my old work.’

‘And they’re all fine with being regularly bitten and drained of blood?’ Cadence asked, somewhat incredulously.

Ryan’s blushing turned up a notch.

‘It’s, it’s not an unpleasant process, or so they tell me.’ Ryan said, failing to make eye contact with anyone. ‘The bite itself is painful for a few seconds, but we have a, well, you could call it a venom. It numbs the bite location, accelerates healing after the bite and, well…’ Ryan trailed off.

‘It has a moderately potent narcotic effect,’ Emmanuel said, taking pity on him. ‘It’s a combination of a sedative, muscle relaxant, and hallucinogenic. The presumed evolutionary intent is to make a victim unable to resist. In better times, however, it does serve as a very effective sweetener when you are asking something quite substantial of a person.’

‘When you say narcotic,’ inquired Cadence, ‘are we talking about an addictive substance here, because that shows this in a very different light?’

‘No!’ Ryan protested. ‘Thankfully not. I mean, people can become addicted to anything they enjoy, food, drink, sex, gambling, anything. There’s no biological addiction component, though. You come out of it clear-headed, once you’ve slept it off, and there isn’t any withdrawal or other delayed symptoms. It is rather on us to choose our, you could say, suppliers carefully. It would benefit neither the vampire nor the supplier to create an addict, it would put both parties in very difficult situations.’

‘Yeah, I’ve met a few vampire, err,’ Haley considered, ‘feeders sounds wrong, victims is entirely too predatory, how about companions? We’re pretty good at reading people, and they usually smell fine. Honestly, the way they talk about the experience, I’ve been tempted to give it a go myself. Unfortunately, I’m told we taste fucking awful.’

Emmanuel winced and Ryan stuck his tongue out.

‘Blech,’ Ryan said, his tone revolted, ‘no offence, but you guys taste like musty old sweat and raw meat. It’s gross. What? Don’t give me that look, I got curious once, I know a few werewolves. They barely even got high off the process, it was a complete bummer all around.’

Haley ruffled his previously carefully styled hair.

‘Aww, who’s an adventurous little guy,’ she said.

Emmanuel loudly cleared his throat.

‘Most vampires will maintain a small group of individuals who know their nature, and potentially their historical identities, and who are trusted to maintain discretion,’ Emmanuel continued, making a valiant attempt to put the conversation back on track. ‘Revealing your true nature to someone for the first time is difficult, and often traumatic. I do not wish to demean the struggles of other species of monster, but, how to put this diplomatically? When a vampire reveals their nature to a human, you are putting a great deal of power in that individual’s hands.’

‘A werewolf, can, in most cases, simply laugh off an accusation of lycanthropy unless they are actually caught in their transformed state. Monsters who use a glamour to appear human can do much the same, even if their identity is betrayed. A vampire is reliant on some number of people knowing the truth of us. Remaining entirely hidden is an impossibility for us. That places us in a position of great vulnerability. We are dependent on humans in a way other monsters are not.’

‘It’s frightening, being so reliant on people,’ admitted Ryan. ‘When I turned, I had the council helping me explain, helping me convince people I wasn’t just out to kill them or playing some prank. Even with all that, I was lucky. Marian, my girlfriend that is, was the first person I told. I trusted her, but, I was a wreck the whole time. And it doesn’t get easier, either.’

‘Sadly, it does not,’ Emmanuel conceded. ‘Perhaps that is something we can hope for in this new world we are building. Through education, outreach, perhaps we can at least teach people that we are not to be feared.’

‘I can sympathise, guys,’ Haley said. ‘Doesn’t matter how much you think you know a person, you can never really know how they’ll react to something like this until it’s too late. At least I had the option not to, or some control over the timing.’

‘In modern times there is a support network of sorts available, particularly for newly turned vampires,’ Emmanuel explained. ‘Those first few days are the source of many horror stories.’

‘So, how does the process actually work?’ asked Cadence. ‘How does one become a vampire? In the normal circumstances, I mean.’

‘That is somewhere where, for the most part, popular culture did not actually get it that far wrong,’ said Emmanuel. ‘In the traditional process, one is usually bitten and fed upon, so as to reduce resistance and immune response, then the recipient is fed an equivalent quantity of the vampire’s own blood. This is generally sufficient to pass on the infection.’

‘There is no set duration to the process. It can take several days, or even several attempts. Or rather, subsequent attempts can speed the process along and prevent the infection sitting dormant for some time. Eventually, symptoms will begin to show. The recipient will initially develop symptoms of exhaustion, fever and sensitivity to light. It tends to progress from there into blackouts, seizures and other more severe conditions, until the recipient falls into a coma.’

‘The recipient does not at any point actually die. This is a common misconception, although one can appreciate how it came about in the time before modern medical instrumentation. At some point after entering the coma, the recipient will fall into a deeper state in which their vital signs become almost undetectable. Heart rate will drop substantially, breathing will slow and grow shallower, stimulus response and measurable brain activity will fall almost to zero, and body temperature will drop to the surrounding ambient level.’

‘Ahh, I see,’ Cadence said. ‘So this is where the undead stuff came from. Without an ECG machine and a load of medical tech, unless you’re being very, very, attentive, the subject just looks dead. And given, they’ve been getting sicker and sicker and gone into a coma, then “they died” isn’t an unreasonable conclusion to reach.’

‘Precisely, Miss Blanchard,’ agreed Emmanuel. ‘As you would guess, this has led to many instances of newly turned vampires being buried alive, and all the mythology that surrounds that. It is also why we tend to take substantial care to not leave someone in the process of turning unattended. To continue, the recipient will remain in that state for a day or two while the virus does its work. Eventually, vital signs will return to normal and the individual will regain consciousness.’

‘Which,’ Ryan said, taking over for him, ‘is the other reason you should never leave someone turning unattended. When you wake up from that state, you will be hungry. Dangerously, uncontrollably, hungry. If I had to guess, I’d say most of the accounts of vampires killing people they fed on came from that point in the process.’

‘Very much so,’ agreed Emmanuel. ‘The phrase “feeding frenzy” would not be inaccurate. I recall mine. My sire, the woman who turned me, that’s another thing Buffy got right by the way, she ensured there was ample supply of blood available to me. They may have been comparatively primitive times, but people weren’t stupid back then, and a trail of bloodless corpses was the sort of thing that would make your time as a vampire brief and unpleasant.’

‘It was kind of scary, honestly,’ said Ryan, looking a little far away. ‘After the accident I was in hospital, and in a bad way. Of course, the one time I make good time in LA traffic, I get wiped out by a semi truck. Then out of nowhere, things get weird. I sort of stabilise from the injuries I had, but at the same time I take this turn for the worse like I’ve picked up something completely unrelated. The hospital staff are scouring every surface and testing everyone in the ICU, thinking I’ve picked up some horrible infection, or brought one in with me. Then some guys in suits turn up, and I get transferred to a “specialist facility”.’

‘A facility which, in actuality, was just the council’s Los Angeles field office. Not even far from home. Then my buddy shows up, with those guys in suits, and explains to me what’s happening. I don’t believe a word, obviously. The ones I can understand, that is. I was still fucked up beyond belief, and on a lot of drugs, you know?’

‘But the process goes on and then, wham, I’m out. They say it looks like a coma. I don’t really know what a coma feels like. But this was psychedelic and hallucinogenic as all hell. Total out-of-body experience. Like I was me, but I wasn’t, and I was floating in this nothing that was like every sensation at once. And also out of my mind on painkillers because my bones were starting to reset themselves.’

Emmanuel nodded along through the whole description.

‘While I was out, my friend who turned me, he went and got Marian. They explained everything to her, did the standard rigmarole to prove they weren’t cranks, all that good stuff. You see, the feeding frenzy is a real thing for new vamps when we wake up from the coma. There’s a tradition, the sire gathers a bit of a buffet platter of willing people to get you through that first day, and then stands guard to make sure you don’t kill any of them by mistake. The first person I saw when I woke up was her, though. Right there, waiting for me.’

Emmanuel smiled.

‘You are lucky to have had someone so understanding at your side,’ he said. ‘She is a fine young lady.’

‘She certainly is,’ Ryan said, happily. ‘And the rest of the gang were great, too. My friend had called in some of his own group of suppliers, and the council has a few on standby for emergencies. And a big warm comfy room, where everything’s easily washable.’

‘I believe in my day the phrase was “blood orgy”,’ Emmanuel said, obviously teasing the younger vampire.

‘I was going to be a little more discreet than that, old man,’ protested a blushing Ryan. ‘And, yeah, me, my girlfriend, seven very friendly guys and girls, and everyone high on vampire venom and not wearing much lest they ruin their clothes, things happened. So sue me. It was a fantastic experience. We all stayed there for a long weekend in the end. Alternating between watching movies while they recovered, everyone eating massive takeout orders, and me eating them.’

Haley snorted a laugh, and Emmanuel feigned a cough to cover his smirk and chuckle.

‘For fuck’s sake, you all know what I mean. Well, I mean, they do call them blood orgies, and we were there for three whole days, so whatever you’re imagining, you’re probably not far off. But I will say it’s a far more wholesome experience than it sounds.’

‘That is true,’ Emmanuel conceded, letting Ryan off the hook. ‘Offering someone your blood, your life force, and putting your safety in their hands… It is an act of great generosity. It is a lot to ask of a person. Especially in those first hours, when a fledgling vampire is at their most erratic and dangerous. It is a moment of trust between friends, and even the best part of half a millennium later, I still have the fondest memories of those who were there for me in my first days. No one I knew in that part of my life chose to turn, so they departed this Earth long ago. But I won’t ever forget them.’

‘Marian, she hasn’t made her mind up yet,’ Ryan said. ‘If she wants to be a vampire, I mean. We’d been dating for six months, when I turned. That was a couple of years ago. That’s not a long time compared to, you know, forever. That’s a big decision.’

‘Wait,’ Cadence asked, ‘vampires really live forever?’

‘Nothing lives forever,’ Emmanuel said. ‘Nothing of this Earth, anyway. A vampire does not age in the same way as a human does. Humans accumulate damage and wear throughout their lives, then at a certain point their bodies weaken and begin to fail. Vampires are different. We do age to a point. It could be fair to say we mature. I was younger, visibly, than this when I was turned. Over the centuries I became as I am now. In the body of a mature adult, but without the deterioration that would incur in a human.’

He paused and looked at his hands.

‘I think I look rather good for someone my age,’ he joked. ‘I suspect I won’t age much more than this, if at all. But, as I say, nothing lives forever. We may be resilient, but a sufficient injury can still kill us. I am not aware of a plague in the world that could end us, but who knows what wonders lurk in the stars or in the future machinations of evolution. And eventually, the Earth will die, and take us with it, or the galaxy, or the universe. One day, death will claim us, as it will anyone else. I find it comforting in a way. One day we will join the rest of humanity again.’

‘You find weird shit comforting,’ Haley muttered.

‘No, I think I understand,’ Cadence said. ‘Everyone you know ages and dies. You can’t turn everyone you care about, or there’d be so many vampires the secret could never have been kept. Barring a handful of other vampires, there’d be nothing permanent in that life.’

‘Precisely, Miss Blanchard,’ Emmanuel agreed. ‘It has its advantages, don’t mistake me for ungrateful. I have seen such wonderful things. I saw the signing of the declaration of independence, the emancipation proclamation, electricity, rail, flight, the moon landings. And I met Washington, Lincoln, Churchill, Mozart, Shakespeare, Dickens, the list goes on and on. When I think of the wonders awaiting me in the future, I have nothing to fear. Still, I have my moments of sadness when I think of those I’ve left behind.’

‘That’s the part I’m not looking forward to,’ admitted Ryan.

‘I’ve met true immortals, in my time. Entities that will, barring some grand upheaval in the workings of things, see out the life of the universe,’ Emmanuel continued. ‘They have such a different perspective on existence to us. To them, human or vampire, we all pass in the blink of an eye. It is a fact of life to them.’

‘When you say true immortals, what do you mean?’ Cadence asked. ‘Because my furry friends here, they mentioned angels and demons.’

‘Correct, Miss,’ Emmanuel said, with a smile. ‘They were speaking God’s honest truth, if such a fellow exists, that is. We share our world with occasional visitors from above and below. They’re a little elusive on how the whole arrangement works, vis-à-vis Heaven and Hell and the afterlife and such. I think they want it to remain a surprise. I understand that, barring the most extreme of circumstances, both demons and angels are eternal.’

‘They’re not exactly monsters, though,’ Ryan clarified. ‘Not like us. Monsters are, how do I put it, derived from humanity? Does that work?’

Haley shrugged and Emmanuel nodded.

‘Most of us either were human, or are descended from humans, or evolved from humans, or something like that,’ he continued. ‘Demons and angels are their own thing. No idea where they came from.’

‘Not big on detailed explanations, are they?’ Cadence asked.

‘No, and in a way I am glad of it,’ said Emmanuel. ‘Where would be the fun in life if every mystery was solved?’

‘True that,’ Haley agreed. ‘Although our paranormal podcaster here might disagree.’

‘Hey, if the mysteries run out, I’m out of a job. And then I’d have to go back to real journalism. Well, that or sell out and go into PR, but I have my self-respect,’ Cadence said. ‘Now, I suppose there is something that comes to mind. Between all of you, you’ve mentioned a serial killing werewolf, feral vampires, and various other things. How much has humanity actually cottoned onto this. Does law enforcement have a protocol for dealing with monsters? What about governments? And historically, what, the inquisition?’

‘You aren’t far from the truth, unfortunately,’ the elder vampire said. ‘The council does, or did, a great deal of work to keep the existence of monsters secret from the bulk of humanity. This sometimes means policing our own, where humanity cannot. When a monster steps out of line, we do what is necessary to protect both humanity and ourselves. But, in these more enlightened times, we do work with human governments and law enforcement. Those that can be trusted, at least.’

‘Many law enforcement and intelligence agencies have their appointed specialists and subdivisions to handle “unconventional” cases. Or more accurately, to take them out of wider view, and to ensure they are attended to by those that can handle them safely. I shan’t break any confidences, here. We decided to disclose our own secrets, not to burn those who have helped us keep them.’

‘It was different in the past, though. So very different. The council has existed for centuries, but it cannot be everywhere, and prior to modern transport and communications, often we wouldn’t even hear about an incident until long after it was resolved, if at all. If we were lucky, and we often weren’t, then monsters would, as we always have, take care of our own. Even if that meant putting them down. You must understand, Miss Blanchard, we were people of our time. We had no qualms with humans putting down a feral vampire or some such thing. They had every right to defend themselves.’

‘The problem was that they often wouldn’t stop there. It is why we valued our secrecy so highly. A monster commits some crime, and some nobleman, inquisitor, priest, lawman or the like goes on a crusade. Do you know how many witches were executed during the Salem witch trials, Miss?’

‘Err, I know this,’ Cadence said. ‘I did a miniseries on them. At least nineteen, if, that is, you accept the findings of the court that they were witches. And that’s before the people that died before trial, and the like.’

‘The correct answer is none, Miss Blanchard,’ Emmanuel said. ‘Not a single witch was so much as accused. At the first sign of the madness that was to come, the real witches up and left. And then, in their lunacy, the people of those towns destroyed each other for fear of some imagined threat. The secret wasn’t just to protect us. It was to protect you from yourselves.’

‘We can deal with vampire hunters, witch finders, inquisitors, and every other radical that humanity chooses to throw at us. We have survived them for as long as we have existed. Frequently, though, it is those around us who suffer. Our friends, our families, our neighbours, or just the innocent strangers down the road. The other, who they were itching to blame for something, and were just waiting for the right accusation.’

‘I have an original copy of the Malleus Maleficarum in my personal collection,’ Emmanuel continued. ‘You may have heard of it in its other name. The Hammer of Witches. Even the inquisition thought it excessive. I took it from the personal effects of a demon hunter, in the eighteen twenties. Not far from here, in fact, although Manhattan looked a little different back then.’

‘The council usually leaves demons to their own affairs. They’re more than capable of taking care of themselves. But this hunter, he’d caught the trail of an incubus, a harmless thing, and something of a friend of mine. Except the incubus came and went between Hell and Earth, and while he was out of reach, this demon hunter left a trail of bodies behind him, slaughtering his way through anyone he believed tainted by associated with the demon.’

‘I hunted him, myself, through the city one night, and I dragged him screaming to a dark place below the ground. I killed that bastard with my own hands, and I offer no apology for it. That poor incubus was heartbroken when he learned what had happened, so many of his companions murdered, so many innocent bystanders killed.’

‘The bastard left little behind him, and what he did I destroyed. No record exists of him, no one but I know his name, and I left no body to be found. All that remains of him is that damned book. The delusional writings of a madman dead before even my time. It’s a foul thing, but it serves me well as a reminder that we protect humanity as much as we do monsters. My apologies, I think I rather wandered off-topic.’

‘No, no, not at all,’ Cadence said, as everyone in the room shuffled awkwardly and cleared throats. Even Jude had sat with his canine ears pricked and fur on end as he’d listened. ‘I want everything, not just the nice bits. Wait, are you going to get in trouble? Do I need to get Eddie to cut that?’

‘I think not, Miss, although I thank you for your concern. In fact, the watch at the time were most relieved to learn of his death. We had a contact at the time in what counted for law enforcement, a local constable. He had been investigating the murders himself, and was profoundly grateful for the assistance.’

‘I suppose it was a different time,’ Cadence said.

‘Indeed, Miss,’ he agreed. ‘We can be grateful that we have, for the most part, moved beyond such barbarism.’

There was a moment of silence as the occupants of the room considered the story. Then Jude whined and offered the vampires a slice of his pizza. Emmanuel laughed and scratched the werewolf behind the ear.

‘Can you have normal food?’ Constance asked.

‘We certainly can, Miss,’ Emmanuel said.

‘Think about it, we still need fuel to function,’ Ryan added, ‘and a pint or so of blood every few days just doesn’t have the calories or nutrients to keep a person ticking. And a good thing, too. Going without real food would make this whole thing unbearable.’

Jude whined at the idea.

‘Yeah, that would just be sad,’ Haley agreed. ‘And before you ask, they can have garlic too.’

‘A life without garlic would be a sad thing indeed,’ Emmanuel said. ‘I think myself rather a good cook. I’ve had long enough to practice, after all. Some of my recipes may be a little old fashioned, though, considering I learned several from my mother.’

‘Have you considered a cookbook?’ Cadence asked. ‘Medieval cookery from a guy who was actually there?’

Emmanuel opened his mouth to speak, then closed it again in thought.

‘You know what, the idea has some merit. It would be a shame if such things were lost to the world. Now that the secret is out, there would be no harm in doing such a thing openly. Not that I need the money, but I could just put them on the internet.’

‘Cooking show on YouTube,’ Ryan said. ‘Think about it, council’s going to be needing to do all sorts of outreach, and you’re a known face. We could put up an official channel, and have a few shows. Let people get to know us.’

‘YouTube, podcasts, people connect to it. It’s not a bad idea,’ Constance said, considering the potential of a vampiric cooking show.

‘I wonder…’ Emmanuel said. ‘I will raise the idea with the others. I am sure there are a few monsters and related individuals who have a topic of interest we could use as part of our outreach strategy. Home remedies with a witch, gardening with a dryad.’

‘I got to admit, from what you’re telling me, if you exclude the big obvious things like the blood and the longevity, then life as a vampire seems pretty normal.’

‘It really is,’ Ryan said. ‘There are adjustments, obviously. I tend to be pretty nocturnal, not that I strictly have to be. If I really wanted to, I could have kept my old job, and my old hours, and no one would have been any the wiser for a long time. I think Los Angeles summers would have been a bit too much for me, though.’

‘Yes, I must admit a more moderate climate is more comfortable for us,’ Emmanuel agreed. ‘You come to appreciate longer nights and milder summers. We vampires are urban creatures for a reason. It’s no coincidence that we are associated so much with the more temperate areas of Europe, New England, and places like that.’

‘Tall buildings, shade, subways, lots of indoor activities, night-life. New York’s perfect,’ Ryan said.

‘Are you concerned that the reputation monsters, but especially vampires and werewolves, have from fiction and folklore might be harmful to you. Especially since you’re talking about a need for outreach?’ Cadence asked.

‘Can’t not be,’ Haley said. ‘And if we’re being fair, some of it is understandable. Look at what happened yesterday. Guy did something stupid, but it was because he was scared. That didn’t come from nowhere.’

‘We are most fortunate that it was you and me in the firing line, and not someone more vulnerable,’ Emmanuel said.

‘It’ll take time for people to adjust to the fact we’re real, but that’s just what’s going to have to happen. We’re done hiding in the shadows. This is our world too. And people will find out soon enough that there are way more of us than they might think,’ said Ryan.

‘But we’ll extend the olive branch first, at least,’ Haley said.

‘Can I ask, the other humans in your lives, Marian, your other friends, how did they feel about this change?’ Cadence asked. ‘Are they concerned at all for their safety, or yours?’

‘I think everyone’s worried and hopeful all at the same time,’ Ryan said. ‘There were probably all of a few dozen humans who knew about this in advance. Basically only people who were so associated with the actual individuals who would go public that they kind of got outed with us by default. So they got some heads up so they could decide what they wanted to do. Marian stayed in town. She absolutely refused to hide.’

Ryan smiled proudly as he spoke.

‘When I told her what was going to happen, she said it was about damn time. She’s in my room down the hall, wanted to be right here for the big show.’

‘Some of us are fortunate in who we have chosen to associate with,’ Emmanuel said, nodding. ‘She has shown impressive fortitude for as long as I have known her.’

‘This might be a little personal, but how do you both feel about, well, not to beat around the bush, your difference in relative life expectancy?’ asked Cadence.

‘It’s a fair question,’ Ryan admitted. ‘We’ve talked about it. Obviously, that’s going to come up. We haven’t quite made a decision yet. I mean, before the accident we were just starting to talk about getting married, maybe. Then out of nowhere it became do you want to be a vampire. And it’s not like she’s outright opposed to the idea, but there’s a kind of elephant in the room.’

‘What, vampirism isn’t enough?’ said Cadence.

Jude whined, and his ears went flat.

‘Yeah, I know, shit sucks man,’ Haley agreed.

Ryan sighed sadly before resuming.

‘Vampires can’t have kids. There’s a whole technical explanation for why, but basically the virus sterilises us. We both wanted to have kids. That’s already out for me, my own anyway, and it’s a big ask for her. We’re kind of thinking through options at the moment.’

‘It is a difficult point for many facing that choice,’ Emmanuel added.

‘Or the alternative, which is functional immortality while you watch your family age and die,’ Ryan finished.

‘Or, if I may suggest another viewpoint, to watch over and shepherd generations of your descendants. I’ve known vampires who had children before they were turned,’ Emmanuel said, ‘and for them while the passing of every generation is a grievous wound, they get to see so many of their children’s children grow and flourish.’

‘Did you have children? Before you turned, I mean?’ Ryan asked.

‘No,’ the elder vampire said, shaking his head. ‘At least not that I know of. I kept track of a few branches of the family for a century or two, but we drifted apart. Quite literally in my case. On a boat. I feel myself suddenly in the mood for a stiffer drink. What does everyone say to my calling the room service?’

Haley snorted, stifling a laugh.

‘I meant for a bottle of wine, for heaven’s sake,’ he protested. ‘I’m rather partial to a nice red.’

Dr Danny’s Astrological Extravaganza

April 2025

Horoscopes for the discerning masochist.

Aries: You will meet a tall dark stranger. Specifically, they will be fourteen feet tall and utterly incapable of reflecting light. They enjoy striding ominously through shadowy woodlands visible only in the peripheral vision of innocent bystanders, absorbing thermal energy from lesser entities, curating ritual displays of viscera, and those premade escape room in a box puzzle games.

Taurus: You will give a gift to a friend or relative without realising that the object is in fact a niche sex toy. It will take you several days to understand the highly euphemistic thank you message you received, at which point you will become deeply concerned by their suggestion that they now have something in mind for your next birthday.

Gemini: They say “walk a mile in someone’s shoes”. They didn’t mean stilettos, though. You will break both your ankles trying to run drunkenly away from a pub in a stolen pair of high heels. The owner will then catch up and beat you senseless with a handbag.

Cancer: Your car will develop mechanical issues. Your usual mechanic will be unavailable, so you will have to go instead to “Galathrax the Bone-Whisperer”. His prices are excellent, but you begin to grow uncomfortable with the number of parts of your car which he insists need to be replaced with bones. Especially when the car starts climbing in through your window at night and curling up at the bottom of the bed.

Leo: Due to a mix-up at the dry cleaner, you will end up with someone else’s skin. Unfortunately your new skin will be a size too small, and it’ll take weeks to stretch it enough that you can bend over without ripping the arse all the way to the shoulders. On the plus side you can get a whole new set of inadvisable tattoos. Let’s hope those new fingerprints aren’t legally problematic!

Virgo: There’s an odd superstition that it’s lucky to be shat on by a bird. Whatever your view on this, it will be tested during the upcoming six-week period where every bird that sees you will shit on you. It’ll be like a fecal version of Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds.

Libra: For reasons not fully explained to you, you will be put on an all-Marmite diet. To get sufficient calories you have to consume an entire 250g jar per meal. You will reach out to Marmite for a sponsorship, and you will receive a crate of Marmite branded spoons. By the end of the first week all of your bodily fluids will have been replaced with Marmite. Passers-by will be able to scrape toast on you for free flavour. Marmite. MARMITE. MARMITE.

Scorpio: You will be the victim of a brutal campaign of televised “practical jokes”. These will include such hilarious pranks as connecting the water in your toilet bowl to the mains, beating you with baseball bats every time you use your debit card, hiding bucket loads of old fish around your house, and “all of world politics from 2015 to present”. All of it. That was all to fuck with you. You’re welcome. Also, you should probably throw your mattress out, we’ve replaced the stuffing with old shrimp.

Sagittarius: You will be diagnosed with “Japanese Knotweed”. You request a second opinion, and they tell you that you’ve also got subsidence. Your doctor is as confused about this as you are. You think he’s onto something, though, because you’re growing increasingly lopsided and estate agents have started making the sign of the cross and fleeing on sight. So you’ve got that going for you, at least.

Capricorn: You will adopt a pet. Several days in you begin to suspect that you have in fact adopted a furry. Clues include the fact that they appear to be toilet trained, can cook and perform basic household tasks, are employed full time as a database admin, and run a lucrative side gig streaming Hearts of Iron IV.

Aquarius: Having finally had enough of your neighbours, you decide to take up “waspkeeping” as a hobby. You now live in a perpetual cloud of wasps. Everything you own is full of wasps. You are full of wasps. The neighbours, council, and several conservation groups want to complain, but they can’t get within half a mile of you because the wasps attack them. You are pretty sure you can see the postman’s foot sticking out of one of their massive nest-structures. It still twitches.

Pisces: In an attempt to de-stress you take up knitting. Unfortunately, you black out, and wake up several days later to find you’ve knitted an arcane woollen doppelgänger which has taken over your life. Sadly everyone prefers them to you, and your only purpose now is to perform tasks which require one to be “water-resistant”.