American Monsters
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The pregnant bogle grunted, dumping a reddish-tinged liquid on to Amber like someone had upturned a bucket. The smell hit her and Amber clamped her mouth shut and stopped breathing as she turned her head away.
Axton was weeping. “Nature’s miracle,” he said.
Amber looked back at the bogle as its straining got more intense. Its belly bulged, and as the egg protruded Amber tried to go to her happy place. But she didn’t have a happy place. All she had was the floor of a department store at night, and the furry monster that was laying its eggs on her belly.
The first egg plopped out. It was grey and mottled, covered in a thick, mucus-like liquid. It settled on her belly.
The bogle strained again, and a second egg began to appear.
“How many?” she muttered between clenched teeth.
Axton raised an eyebrow. “Sorry? What was that?”
“How many eggs?”
“Ah,” he said. “Typically six, though I have seen some bogles lay nine.”
Amber lay there and tried not to breathe through her nose as more eggs plopped out, joining the sticky mess on her belly. A group of bogles stood close by, their eyes on the eggs. They all wore ties around their necks, and stood like expectant fathers. They were short, furry and they all looked the same.
The pregnant bogle was done and it collapsed, but there were others to catch it before it hit the ground. They held the bogle overhead, like it was solemnly crowd-surfing, before dumping it behind a display. Amber counted the eggs. Seven of them.
“How long?” she asked Axton.
“Mere moments,” he answered, jotting something in a little notebook. “Try not to move. They’ll emerge feeling nauseous if you move too much.” He checked his watch.
One of the eggs cracked, and Axton scribbled furiously.
A clawed fist punctured the shell from the inside, and the baby bogle squeezed its mucus-coated, furry head through the gap. It looked around with huge, crazy eyes, drawing a chorus of ooooohs from the assembled crowd. A fist burst through another egg, and another, and suddenly it was a race to see who’d be the first one out.
Amber didn’t bother keeping track, but one by one the baby bogles emerged, already scratching Amber’s belly with their sharp claws. When the last baby hatched, there was a cheer from the tie-wearing bogles, and Amber watched as one of them handed out cigars. Another of the little bastards had a lighter, and soon they were all puffing away like proud fathers, chattering in that nonsensical language of theirs.
Amber watched them puff those cigars, watched the cloud of smoke slowly rising …
An alarm went off and the sprinklers activated and the bogles, every one of them, looked up to see where all the water was coming from. Amber turned over, brushing the chittering babies to the floor, and scrambled up. Axton saw her coming and shrieked. He ran and she followed, knives flashing at her heels. He slipped on the wet floor and she grabbed him, swung him round, used him as a shield as the bogles closed in.
“Tell them to back off,” she ordered, and gave him a violent shake. “Tell them to back off!”
“Ah ween oh shah!” Axton cried over the sound of the alarm. “Ah ween oh shah, kah plemby!”
The bogles kept coming.
“What did you tell them?” Amber snarled into his ear as she dragged him backwards.
“I did what you asked,” Axton said. “They’re just not obeying.”
“Why the hell not?”
“I don’t know,” said Axton, listening to the bogles babble. “I … I don’t think they like me.”
“Seriously?” said Amber, spitting water.
“Also, they don’t like getting wet. That’s one of the rules. It puts them in a most disagreeable mood. So this …” He looked up at the sprinklers, still spraying water. “This is bad.”
As one, the bogles screeched in homicidal rage, and swarmed in. Amber spun, Axton right behind her.
They ran and slipped and scrambled and fled, and the bogles screeched and snapped and swiped and pursued. The water shorted out something over in the home-entertainment aisle, throwing sparks into the air like fireworks. The bogles stopped running and stared in wonder, and Amber and Axton ran on, deep into the grocery section.
Amber threw Axton behind a freezer in the middle of an aisle and fell to her knees beside him.
She grabbed the front of his shirt and twisted. “How do we stop them?”
“We run,” said Axton, still panting. “We get in a car and we drive away. They won’t be able to follow. They can operate machinery, but not very well. It’s their short attention spans – they’re always crashing.”
“We’re not going to just leave them here,” Amber said. “They’ll kill people. They’ll spread.”
The water cut off, but the alarm kept wailing, and Axton blinked at her. “So?”
“So I don’t want innocent people to die,” she told him.
“What do you care? You’re Astaroth’s representative. Saving innocent people isn’t exactly your job.”
“Yeah, well, I’m changing the terms of my employment. How do we stop them?”
“We can’t,” Axton said. “There are too many.”
Amber resisted the urge to throttle him. “Can we draw them all into one place? Is there something they can’t resist? Catnip for bogles?”
“Not … not really.”
She leaned in. “You hesitated. There is something.”
“I … well, I’ve always worked hard to keep them away from alcohol. They have an … unhealthy reaction to it.”
“Unhealthy how?”
Axton looked conflicted, and Amber punched him.
“Ow! Why did you do that?”
“Because you have a face I like to punch, and you’re holding something back.”
“Fine,” he muttered. “I introduced five bogles to alcohol in a controlled environment in order to study the effects it might have on them. None survived.”
She frowned. “Alcohol kills them?”
“No, alcohol gets them drunk. Really fast. Once they’re drunk, they argue and kill each other. At first, I thought it merely heightened their violent tendencies. Then I realised it just made them bigger jerks than they already were.”
“They get drunk, they annoy each other, and they fight until they’re all dead,” said Amber. “Okay, that’s a definite weakness. So how do we get them to drink?”
“Well … that shouldn’t be a problem. You just need to show them booze, and they’ll do the rest.”
Amber jumped to her feet, took Axton with her.
“So what’s the plan?” he asked as she dragged him after her. “You’re going to lead them to the drinks? Where will I wait? I can wait over there, if you want.”
“You’re coming with me.”
“Is that strictly wise? As you have seen, I’m not very good at physical confrontation.”
“Is it my fault you sold your soul in order to be a bigger nerd than you already were?”
“I – I guess not.”
“Hey!” Amber shouted over the wail of the alarm. “Hey, bogles! Here we are! Come get us!”
Wet bogle heads popped up and out from around corners, and suddenly the aisles were swarming with them, their little feet splashing in water as they came.
Amber pulled Axton backwards and they ran, past the frozen meats and the chips and the sauces, and plunging down into the wine, spirits and beer section. They got to the very end before stopping and turning, just in time to see the bogles come round the corner like a wave, rolling towards them.
Then the little bastards noticed where they were, saw the bottles of booze all around them, and the wave slackened, and became smaller, and eventually stopped. The alarm cut off. A happy, gurgling cheer rose from the bogle ranks, and Amber and Axton stepped backwards, forgotten about.
It took fifteen minutes of revelry, arguments and carnage before the last bogle slumped to the ground, impaling itself on a broken beer bottle.
“So sad,” Axton said, wiping away a tear. “Such a tragic waste.”
“They wanted to kill you,” Amber reminded him.
“True,” said Axton, “but you can hardly blame—”
Amber slugged him across the jaw and he dropped, unconscious.
“No,” she said. “I guess you can’t.”
She returned to the sports section, found the activewear and picked out a dry pair of yoga pants and a tank top to replace her own ripped, wet clothes, then slipped her feet into a new pair of sneakers. By the time she was dressed, her scales were once again under her control. She took hold of Axton’s shirt collar and dragged him towards the exit.
She was halfway there when she stopped, hauled Axton back a few steps, then let him drop. She wandered over to where Milo Sebastian was tied to a large display table.
“Hey,” she said.
“Hey,” said Milo. Like the rest of him, his dark hair, shot through with grey, was wet. That, combined with the stubble on his square jaw, made him look like a mature aftershave model who’d just emerged from the pool.
“Sorry about the sprinklers,” Amber said.
“That was you?”
“Kinda.”
“And all that singing and screeching?”
“I got them drunk,” she told him. “The bogles. Got them drunk and let them kill each other. Vicious little bastards.”
Milo grunted. “Yeah. Axton?”
She turned one of her fingers into a claw, and cut the ropes. “He’s over there. He was studying them, can you believe it? I get the feeling he knew way too much about their mating habits. Do you know they lay eggs?”
“I do,” said Milo, standing and wiping the slime off his chest. “I do know that.”
“They laid eggs on you, didn’t they?”
“Yeah,” said Milo. “You?”
“Nope,” she said. “They didn’t. They tried, but I got free.”
“You’re lucky. It was … disgusting.”
“I can only imagine,” said Amber. “The clothes section is behind me. You can get yourself a dry shirt. Maybe one that isn’t ripped. I’m going to deliver Axton.”
Milo nodded. “Meet you back at the car,” he said, and walked away.
She dragged Axton out into the parking lot, heard the sirens approaching. The Kingston Valley Fire Department was not the fastest to respond to possible emergencies, it had to be said. Amber dumped Axton behind a wall and used her claw to open a cut on her palm. Blood flowed freely and she turned on the spot, forming a circle of blood around both Axton and herself. When the circle was complete, the blood caught fire, and they weren’t in California anymore.
THEY WERE IN A castle with high stone walls that vanished into the darkness overhead, walls that were decorated with tapestries and punctured by stained glass. A cold wind blew through the castle, and carried with it the screams and sobbing of the damned. Amber threw Axton from the circle of fire, and he woke as he landed.
It took him a moment to realise where he was, and then he spun, eyes wide.
“No,” he said. “Please.”
Footsteps approached, from one of the five arched doorways ahead of them. Axton tried to scramble back into the circle, but Amber stepped out, pushing him away, as Bigmouth led Fool into the chamber.
The meat beneath Bigmouth’s peeled-back skin glistened like a freshly made wound, and blood still trickled from the hooks that held those layers of skin in place. His lower jaw, reattached to his skull with thread and wire, swung with every step he took. Behind him came Fool, a thing without gender dressed in a patchwork robe, blinded by the lengths of glass that still pierced its closed eyes. Its bald head was covered in ash and its mouth was smeared with lipstick. It bared its glass-shard teeth as it sniffed the air.
“Amber Lamont,” it said. “And … Ooooooh. Axton, Axton, Paul Axton. I remember you, Paul Axton. You tried to cheat my Master. You tried to run.”
“It was a misunderstanding,” Axton said. “I swear that’s all this is, a simple misunderstanding.”
“Then why run?”
“I panicked. I got scared. There’s really no need to—”
Amber smacked him to shut him up. “I need to see Astaroth,” she said. “Just a word. That’s all I want.”
Fool frowned. “Pertaining to what matter?”
“Pertaining to me, Fool.”
“I will tell Lord Astaroth you are here,” said Fool, and tugged on Bigmouth’s chain. Bigmouth scrambled ahead and Fool followed, disappearing through a wide crack in the wall. Amber didn’t know the shortcuts the way Fool did – she barely knew how to take the long way round – so she shoved Axton ahead of her and started walking.
When they got to the giant doors, Fool and Bigmouth were waiting for them.
“Lord Astaroth is ready to receive you,” said Fool.
The doors swung open, and Amber dragged Axton into a large hall with mirrored walls, in the centre of which were ten steps that led up to the throne of the Shining Demon. And there he sat, Astaroth, gazing down at them, orange light swirling like lava beneath his skin.
Axton dropped to his knees. “My Lord Astaroth. Forgive my stupidity.”
Astaroth ignored him, looked instead to Amber. “You grow impatient, it seems.”
Her eyes flickered to Fool, who kept its head down. “Not impatient, Lord Astaroth, just … eager. You sent me to track down my parents, but every time I get close I have to go after people like this.”
“And that upsets you?”
“I just … I feel like if I could focus on my parents, I’d be able to get them to you a lot quicker.”
“And you want your vengeance, naturally.”
She saw no point in lying. “Yes,” she said.
“You are impatient,” said Astaroth, “yet, to me, not even a moment has passed since your parents were born. You place far too much importance on the passage of time, as if time has any bearing on this place, or those who dwell here. Your parents will not escape me. That is all you need to know.”
Amber bowed. “Yes, Lord.”
“There is something else you wish to say.”
She looked up. “My Lord?”
“Speak, girl.”
A hesitation. “I’ve been carrying out my duties, my Lord, but on occasion I’ve had to call on the extra strength you provided in order to do so.”
“You have been consuming the vials of my blood.”
“Yes.”
“How many?”
“Two, my Lord.”
“And you want more.”
“No, my Lord, actually, I … I don’t. Your blood makes me stronger and it’s … intoxicating, but I’ve been, uh, I’ve been seeing things. And hearing things. Hallucinations. I was—”
“You worry that you may be losing your mind,” said Astaroth.
“Yes, my Lord.”
Astaroth smiled. “You are my representative. As such, you must be open to different ways of thinking, to new ways of processing information. My blood is helping to expand that capacity.”
“So I’m not going crazy?”
“Oh no, you most definitely are. But, as long as you stay useful to me, you will remain alive.”
“But … but Lord Astaroth …”
“Begone, little creature,” said the Shining Demon, turning to Axton. “I have other matters to attend to.”
Amber hesitated, but left before Axton started screaming. She didn’t like the screaming.
AMBER RETURNED TO THE wall behind Walmart, and the circle of fire around her died and she stayed where she was, her hands curled into fists. Bright light raked the air in rhythmic sweeps, announcing the presence of the Kingston Valley Fire Department. Right about now, perhaps, they were discovering the eyeless remains of the security guard inside, or maybe they were gazing in puzzlement at the dozens of little furry bodies lying in pools of water and whiskey.
Amber left them to it. She didn’t know what happened when the civilian world encountered the horrors of the Demon Road. She didn’t know who they called or what they did. She didn’t care.
She hopped the wall, made for the Dodge Charger parked by the kerb. The trunk popped as she neared and she reverted. Gone was the six-foot, red-skinned goddess, and here was her shorter counterpart, the girl with her brown hair in tangles and her belly stretching her tank top. Her face lost the high cheekbones and the perfect nose and the plump lips as it settled into its normal, less beautiful shape. Months ago, this reversion would have depressed her, but these days there was someone out there, a girl with tattoo sleeves and a smile as wicked as her sense of humour, who found this version of Amber quite beautiful indeed.
The thought of Kelly made Amber smile. But then she remembered their last conversation, when Kelly had found out that Amber had agreed to become the Shining Demon’s representative, and the smile faded and died.
She opened one of her bags, took out sweatpants and a T-shirt, pulled them on over her activewear. Then she rooted around for her phone, finding it right at the bottom. She’d had it for three weeks and already the screen was cracked. She stuffed it in her pocket, closed the trunk and got in the Charger.
“All done?” Milo asked as he turned the key. The Charger started with a roar.
“Of course,” she said.
They headed away from the flashing lights. “He say anything of note?”
Amber shook her head. “Not really.”
“Did you tell him what’s bothering you?”
“He’s not my therapist.”
“Did you mention the hallucinations?”
“I did. He said it’s to be expected.”
“So it’s a side effect he didn’t bother to tell you about?”
“We didn’t really have time to go into specifics, Milo. The blood makes me stronger, but it also does other things. He says it opens me up to a new way of processing information.”
“What does that mean?”
“I don’t know.”
Milo didn’t say anything for a bit. “The blood is dangerous. You’ve had, how many, two vials so far, since we left Desolation Hill? So that’s two in four weeks.”
“The situation called for it each time.”
“I’m not disagreeing. You last drank a vial four days ago. Have you had any hallucinations since then?”
Amber looked out of the window. “No,” she said.
“You haven’t even been hearing things?”
“I told you, Milo, don’t worry about me. We don’t need to worry about the blood, all right? Astaroth said so. He said no more hallucinations. He said I’m fine. So now the only thing we have to focus on is hunting down my parents.”
“And breaking your contract with Astaroth,” Milo said.
She sighed. “Yes. That too. Could you stop lecturing me now? You’re not my actual uncle, you know. We just say that so people won’t look at us weird. I don’t need a lecture, I don’t need to be mollycoddled, and I certainly don’t need to be reminded of how much trouble I’m in.”
“Okay.”
“Can we get off that topic now?”
“Sure thing.”
“Thank you.”
“So how is the boss?”
Amber’s temper flared, but she kept it down. “Can we please not call him that?”
Milo glanced at her. “What are we supposed to call him?”
“Astaroth. The Shining Demon. A Duke of Hell. The Great Burning Asshole. I don’t care, just not the boss. Why are you giving me a hard time about this? It’s your fault that I’m working for him in the first place. If you hadn’t got yourself caught, I’d never have had to trade my servitude for your life. I saved you, and all I get from you is grief. Jesus Christ, I do not need this.”
They drove on in silence for a bit. It was nice, the silence, but then Milo had to go and ruin it.
“Ever think that maybe you shouldn’t have saved me?” he asked. “Ever think that maybe I deserved to be in Hell after all the innocent people I killed?”
“No, Milo,” she said, feeling stupid for losing her temper, “I didn’t. You lost your way. You sold your soul to the Whispering Demon, whatever his name is—”
“Demoriel.”
“Whatever. You sold your soul to him – you must have had your reasons – and he made you a demon. The people you killed when you were the Ghost of the Highway, they … they …”
“Are you going to tell me they don’t count, just because I can’t remember them?”
Amber sighed. “No, I’m not going to say that. Obviously, they count. Obviously what you did was … was evil. But that was twelve years ago. You’ve changed. And I’m sorry if you think I should have let Astaroth hand you over to Demoriel for ten thousand years of torture while Astaroth tortures me, but I don’t, and, while I’m paying your salary, you will do what I—”
“You haven’t paid me in over four weeks.”
“Really?”
“Really. I’m not sticking around because of the money. I’m sticking around because I promised Imelda that I’d keep you safe, and because I’m not going to just abandon you when you need backup.”
“Oh. Well, thank you. I’m not going to abandon you, either.”
“Right.”
“So it looks like we’re stuck with each other.”
“Yes, it does.”
“So can we stop talking about this now? It’s late, I’m tired, and I’m cranky, and I’ve still got bogle juice on my belly.”
“I thought you said they didn’t lay their eggs on you.”
“Yeah, well,” she replied. “I was just trying to make you feel special.”
They drove to the very outskirts of Kingston Valley, and pulled in at the Catching Z’s motel, an L-shaped building with a diner out front. The Charger rumbled as they passed a massive old truck cab occupying two disabled parking spots, and they parked up near the manager’s office.
They each grabbed their overnight bags and headed inside, found the manager reading a battered paperback behind the counter. He had large ears. The rest of him failed to register with Amber because of the largeness of his ears. They were very large ears.
“Two rooms, please,” Milo said. Amber dropped her bag at her feet and put the money on the counter.
A girl came in – pretty, blonde, around Amber’s age. She stood beside them at the counter, picked up a brochure and flicked through it.
“You have room service?” she asked the manager when he came back with the keys.
“Sorry?” the manager said.
“Room service,” the blonde repeated. “Do you have that here?”
“Uh no.”
“So I’d have to leave my room in order to get food? I don’t know, man. Seems like a lotta work. Why don’t you do room service?”
“We, um, we don’t have a kitchen.”
“All I’d be looking for would be a sandwich or something. You can make a sandwich, can’t you? You don’t need a kitchen to make a sandwich.” The girl sighed. “I don’t know. I like the look of the place. It’s nice. It’s got a nice ambience. I like what it’s called. Catching Z’s. But the room service thing … that might be a deal-breaker.” She drummed her fingers on the counter as she made up her mind. “Listen, I’ll check with some of the other motels in the area, and if they don’t do room service, either, I’ll come back here. How about that?”
The manager nodded dumbly, and the blonde picked up her bag and walked out.
“Takes all kinds,” Amber said to the manager, but barely got a grunt in return.
Milo leaned a little closer. “You realise she took your bag, right?”
Amber looked down at the space her bag had been occupying. “Ah balls.”
AMBER HURRIED OUT OF the motel office, caught a glimpse of the blonde disappearing round the corner. There was no one else around so she shifted. She ran to the Charger, jumped and got a foot on the edge of the hood, then sprang, reaching the roof of the motel. She kept low as she jogged across the rooftop, anticipating the blonde’s path. She dropped down the other side, reverted to normal, and waited a few seconds, until she heard running footsteps. Then she stepped out and the blonde shrieked and leaped backwards, lost her footing and fell.