Agency 13 # 6
Grade A People
Ringed by police on a busy street corner, we see Sir Tophat and Seņor Barnett investigating the grisly remains of some poor slob - namely, his feet. That's it - the rest of him is totally gone. As curious onlookers look on, Sir Tophat prods the feet with his magic cane, while Seņor Barnett appears to be looking away, but morbid fascination is pulling his eyes, though forcibly, back towards the feet.
(That should do for a 'cover', shouldn't it?)
Notice: for those of you that are faint of heart, the following tale is not at all G-rated. It may include foul language, excessive violence, sexual innuendo, and other things that would get this story burned, were it in a printed form, by the more fanatical elements of every religion on earth. In other words, if these things offend you, you may want to stop reading now.
(That should do for a 'disclaimer', shouldn't it?)
***
The beast fled.
Running up to the scene of the crime, the two tall men prepared for battle, though their quarry had, in fact, left the area. One couldn't be too careful, however, as this could simply be a feint before a deadly ambush. However, one of the men pulled out a stage magician's cane, a foot-long black rod with a white tip on top, waved it around, and announced to his winded partner "It's gone. You can put that away."
The other man, wearing cowboy boots, jeans, and a bloody T-shirt, nodded once and put the gun away. He never used the things if he could avoid it, but this particular case had him scared silly. Besides, it was hard to aim with it while leaning on his cane; his bad leg was already throbbing from the chase in any event, and any shots he made would be wild. None of this mattered, however, as the simple truth was painfully apparent.
They had failed to stop the monster from killing again.
"Damnit! How'd this thing get past us again?" Looking at the remains of this creature's latest victim, Seņor Barnett tried not to retch, but once again his efforts were for naught, and as he had the six other times they found the results of this beast's feeding, he threw up. His partner, on the other hand, simply prodded the feet a couple of times, and smiled with delight as he found what he had been looking for at last.
"Barnett, I have what we need. Let us go back to the hotel for the night, and when we're freshly rested, we can resume this hunt - for the last time." The more emotional of the two investigators swore, and lit up a cigarette.
"It's about time. I'm sick of finding these stupid pairs of dead feet all over the place. It's disgusting." Looking at his partner, Sir Tophat nodded.
"Indeed. Especially for this creature's victims."
The two indeed returned to their hotel room, and slept the night away. Or so they tried, at any rate. Both of them were too wound up by this case to rest properly; Seņor Barnett was disturbed by the nature of these killings, while Sir Tophat was fascinated by the beast that was committing them. It was magical in nature, he was sure, and definitely alien. He wasn't sure, though, if it was from another planet or instead from a different plane altogether.
Though these savage slayings bothered him severely, Seņor Barnett eventually managed to reach a fitful rest, and when he woke up, the hotel room had changed. The walls had been draped in black sheets, and there were candles everywhere. Somebody had painted occult-looking symbols all over the place, and Seņor Barnett had a good idea who. When he focused on Sir Tophat and saw him chanting in the nude, he definitely knew who it was.
"Is all this creepy mumbo-jumbo necessary? I mean, it was only a tooth."
Slowly ending his chant, Sir Tophat looked up at his gruff companion and nodded. "Not all magic requires this... mumbo jumbo, friend. However, it seems to impress the spirits, so their likes are my only concerns. If this bothers you, feel free to step outside for about an hour, and I will have the information we seek." With a harrumph of frustration, Seņor Barnett left the room.
It wasn't that he was particularly freaked out by his compatriot's religious magic, in that it had been proven effective before, it was just that he didn't understand it. Why a spirit would be more impressed by arcane sigils and occult frippery than sheer honesty was beyond him. Perhaps they appreciated the effort, who knows? Walking out of the hotel to have an early morning smoke, Seņor Barnett missed the fireworks.
After resuming his entreaties to the Loa, Sir Tophat managed to get one's attentions, and it then began to 'ride' him, as it were, while he questioned it about their monstrous quarry. Fifteen minutes later, Tophat returned to full consciousness, and the hotel room was a shambles. Overturned tables and candles (none of which, thankfully, had started a fire), a broken television set, and his sigils and blankets had been ripped apart.
But he now knew about the monster.
When Seņor Barnett returned about an hour later, and after he quit ejaculating profanity at sight of the shattered hotel room, Sir Tophat explained just what he'd learned from that piece of broken tooth he recovered from the latest corpse its former owner left behind. "It's an alien, of a variety that identifies themselves as B'ntri. That's not entirely accurate; I simply cannot make the proper gurgling noise with my merely human vocal cords.
"They are a sorcerous people, though I use the word 'people' loosely, for they aren't human - or humanoid - at all. Here, take a look." Sir Tophat pulled a bit of powdered tooth out of an overturned dish and waved his finger over the dust when he spread it around in the air. An image of the beast emerged in the dust, almost like light from an old movie projector being caught in a cloud of cigarette smoke.
"Yikes! It's all teeth and tentacles! Lookit that thing!" Sir Tophat nodded.
"Yes, and it is fortunate that you brought that device," motioning to his holstered gun, a laser pistol disguised as a .357 Magnum, "As those canes of yours wouldn't harm it's rubbery flesh. Nor would a standard pistol, if I am correct in my assumptions about its power." He stopped again, and breathed deeply. "We must stop this creature before nightfall, as it is nocturnal.
"We stand the best chance of destroying it now, and if we are lucky, it will be resting when we find its lair." With that, Sir Tophat removed the rest of the powder from that overturned dish, and dropped it on a candle he had prepared. Lighting it, he opened the hotel room door, and led Seņor Barnett towards the dangerous B'ntri beast. "Quickly - we have an hour before this candle will burn out - and the monster is not near!"
Fifty-five minutes later, their cab pulled up to a small, abandoned office park near Eppely Airfield, the local major airport, and the two stalwart investigators could see the hole in the roof; either the place had been struck by lightning recently, or something dug its way into the abandoned building. "Should we climb in the top, or bust in the front door?" Seņor Barnett approached the broken glass door, boarded up on the inside, and checked it out. It was locked.
"So much for that idea." As Sir Tophat inspected the door, Barnett looked around for another entrance, and eventually found one - towards the back. One door there had already been pried open, possibly by youths with nothing better to do and seeking a 'cool' place to hang out, and the two Agency men entered, if warily.
"Be careful, Barnett, for we know not where this beast lies, or if there are any traps set to end our hunt prematurely."
"Yeah yeah yeah. S'aright, Mister Tophat. I got this baby." Pulling out the disguised laser pistol, Barnett followed Tophat into the gloom of the abandoned strip mall, and tried to keep his eyes off the glowing candle that the Voodoo priest was carrying. It was difficult, and it kept ruining what night vision the aging man had, which only helped to heighten his anxiety - one misstep could cause him to be eaten whole - all save for his feet, mind you.
After a few seconds of search, Sir Tophat spoke up, his deep voice penetrating the velvety darkness and echo-laden silence of this abandoned lair of commerce. "I believe that our quarry lies right... oh, dear." Just then, the candle he was using to track the beast flickered out, leaving the two in a widening realm of darkness, a darkness that suddenly made a slithery sort of noise. "Um, Seņor Barnett, you DO have your gun out, correct?"
"You're darn tootin'!" Flipping a switch on the gun, the laser emitter switched to a non-polarized beam, and a red wave of light issued forth from the gun barrel. Looking around, Seņor Barnett saw nothing, but felt something fall from the ceiling, and moved mere seconds before the monster fell where he was. He heard the hiss of digestive juices burning into the concrete where he stood mere seconds ago, and he cursed. A lot.
Looking at the monster bathed in red light, Barnett abruptly stopped cursing when it began to turn his way. It was horrific, basically eight rubbery tentacles, each about seven feet long, extending from a central body region that seemed to consist entirely of mouth - and jagged, jagged teeth. Seņor Barnett could see a bit missing on one of the teeth, a tooth dripping with digestive fluids and the like. His perception slowed...
And he moved again, anticipating the lunge. Knowing his life was on the line, Barnett moved with absolute clarity and concentration, and narrowing the beam on the laser gun into a phase state again, he fired. The darkness was suddenly filled with a gurgling howl of pain, and Barnett heard the meaty slap of flesh hitting the ground. Before he could readjust his gun to see again, Sir Tophat had finally made himself useful, and produced a lantern.
From where, Barnett could not tell, as Tophat's tuxedo had absolutely no room to hold such a device, unless the odd priest held the lantern in his tophat. "No, he couldn't...", Barnett thought. Looking where he saw the noise, Seņor Barnett saw the B'ntri dragging itself away with all due haste, an act hampered some by the fact that one of its tentacles was totally useless, more than half of its mass having been severed by Barnett's laser cutting beam.
"Aha! You crappy alien! Got you now!" Moving closer, Barnett didn't see the tentacle whip back towards him until it was too late, and before he could react, the thing had wrapped around his leg and yanked violently, throwing him to the ground. Losing his wind, Barnett also lost his grip on the Agency 13 laser pistol, and found himself being dragged, foot-first, towards the angry alien.
In a gurgling, telepathic voice, it said "Crappy am I, you stupid monkey? We shall see just who has who, now, won't we?" Looking at the B'ntri in shock, Barnett squealed.
"You can talk?! Sneaky!" He went to grab his pistol, but by this point he'd been dragged too far towards the alien, and couldn't reach it.
"I am going to enjoy this, human. I think I will even savor the flavor of your putrid feet." As he grew closer, Barnett could smell digestive juices, and saw things moving behind the B'ntri's teeth.
"Tophat, if you're going to do something, you better do it now! It's gonna EAT me! Aaaaah!" At that point, in fact, Sir Tophat managed to finish what he was doing. Though it was something of a rush job, he again invited one of the Loa, or spirits, to 'ride' his body. Since he had little time, he had no control over just what possessed his form, and as such, one of the local spirits grabbed hold of his body.
Sensing this magic take place, the B'ntri looked at Tophat in shock, dropping its hold on Seņor Barnett, who promptly scrambled back towards the Voodoo priest and his laser gun.
"Know me and tremble, fell beast, for I am Nxyrolpas!!" Sir Tophat had grown to an impossible eight feet tall, and his features had a sudden reddish cast to them. He then ran straight for the alien, pummeling it with furious fists as Barnett seized his small little hand cannon.
"Get out of the way, Tophat, and I'll chop this monster into little sausages! C'mon, move it!" However, Sir Tophat did not move, controlled as he was via an unknown spirit - one bent on ripping the B'ntri to shreds itself. After a fifteenth punch, though, the B'ntri got one in as well, whipping Tophat in the face with a tentacle and stunning him. It picked the priest up with two tentacles, intent on eating him, when Barnett fired.
He held the trigger until the gun's power cells had totally drained themselves, but the work had been done. When the smoke cleared, and the gurgling stopped, Barnett stood up and limped over to where the alien had been standing, as it were, and saw that all of its eight tentacles were lazed off. It's massive maw was gaping in shock, horror, and hatred, and before it gurgled its last, it said unto Barnett:
"There will be a reckoning, monkey. Count on it."
Kicking the dead alien upside it's... mouth, Barnett checked in on his partner, and saw that he had returned to normal; well, his usual self, at any rate. He was his proper height again, and his correct pigment, though he was barely conscious. "I don't know what happened. I am unfamiliar with the spirit that grabbed hold of me... it is not of this earth, just like the creature we fought. Interesting..." He then passed out, and Barnett lit up a cigarette.
"Sure it is, pal. Sure it is." Sitting down amidst the gore, Barnett took a nice, long puff, reflecting on the events of the day. He then pulled a knife out of Tophat's pocket, and cut a piece of the B'ntri off for future reference. He knew that the priest would kick himself forever if he didn't manage to get another sample of the thing's flesh, so he grabbed one for him. Resting for a few minutes, he then began to clean up the bloody mess.
***
After the bloody case they dealt with this month, Seņor Barnett and Sir Tophat took a nice, long vacation. So, when Mike 013 needed somebody to look into a battle between Mindwatch and the Society of Explicated Brethren, Agency 13 newcomer Stick McLellan got the job. Though armed with information on both secret societies thanks to the Jensen Congress database, can this one-woman army solve this strange mystery?
***
Agency 13 # 6 - Grade A People
Copyright 1999, 2004, 2012, 2023 Denny Hill 2
All rights reserved and so forth.
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