I have to weave between some cars and people to get back to where I left Anna and Brad. Once I do, I see that the EMTs are putting Brad onto a stretcher. A large crowd is yet growing even larger around the ambulance, and people are trying to get a good view of him being loaded into the back. Some of them have their phones out.

Again, I hate that.

As I approach, one of the EMTs puts a hand up in a gesture meant to stop me. Her eyes go wide and her brow creases while she takes in my disheveled state and I do the same to her. She has dark skin, long multi-colored box braids tied up in a bun on top of her head, and a look that says 'you're not coming any closer to him looking like that.'

"Is he okay?" I ask, stopping before my chest reaches her hand.

"Are you?" she asks.

I scan myself quickly, and it is definitely a fair question. The burn marks would have been one thing, but I know the back of my shirt is ripped open as well. I can feel the dried and drying blood crusting the rips from the claws even though the pain has mostly subsided.

"How did your clothes get like that?" she asks.

I scramble for a quick excuse and make something plausible up on the spot. I am really good at it. "Oh, uh, cosplay? Yeah, cosplay. I was in costume as a zombie and cleaning off my makeup when that thing showed up. I got it to chase me and fell a few times when I was running."

Ok, I lied–I am not really good at it, implausible is what I’m good at. I also probably should not agree with my own story while I’m telling it. That is real sus.

“Mm hmm.” She eyes me with distrust.

“I was coming back to see if my friend was okay,” I say, pointing to Brad. “Is he going to be alright?”

“We're going to get him some help. Is this girl your friend too?” She gestures to Anna, who is sitting on the ground near the ambulance. Another of the EMTs is checking her pupil dilation with a flashlight. Her eyes are red-rimmed and her hair is windswept and fraying out of the ponytail. She looks lost, and she has got blood on her hands, her shirt and smears staining her white pants.

“Yes, I'm so glad she's okay.”

“I wouldn’t say she’s 'okay.' Whatever happened here, she's not talking. We can't get her to tell us anything.”

I divulge the story with a few edits. Her posture relaxes after the brief rundown of what happened. I make it a point to leave out the hound from hell, of course–I want this to be believable. I describe the same thing that the news has been reporting–a vicious animal attack–and she lets out a frustrated sigh. She’s probably had to deal with this a couple of times.

“Can I talk to her?” I ask.

She makes a 'be my guest' gesture with her hands. “We'd like her to come too. She has an elevated heart rate, difficulty breathing, confusion, and she's very clammy. She's showing signs of shock and we'd like to take a closer look. It also seems like something else is going on–but that's really out of my scope. Between you and I, has she been through any trauma recently?”

“I can ask her.”

“If you can get her to accept treatment, we can try to help her.” I nod in acknowledgement and step toward Anna, sitting on the ground next to her. I wait for the EMT to finish checking her before speaking. He asks if I need any assistance, and I give him the same fake story–that I'm fine and it's just makeup. He looks like he doesn't believe me too, but gets up and goes to talk to the other EMTs that are checking on the crowd around us.

“Hey, Anna,” I say quietly, “Are you okay?”

She looks at me and has that same blank, faraway stare. Tears are still flowing from her eyes. “Hey, Mike.” She attempts to smile, but it falters quickly as more tears fall. “I don't know what's happening. Can you tell me?”

I look over at the ambulance, then back at her.

“Brad was attacked by that creature the news has been talking about,” I lie. “They are taking him to the hospital for treatment.” I gesture toward the ambulance.

She shakes her head. “I don't even remember it. I've been having some problems lately that I can't explain. I feel like I'm losing my mind.” Her eyes actually focus on me and her face takes on a pained expression. “Are you okay? Did they check you out?”

“I’m fine. This is all unrelated if you can believe it,” I say, gesturing to myself. “But I think you should go with them, or at least stay by Brad's side. They’re about to leave. Tell them about what you can remember and see if they can help you too.” I think that’s safe. She was kind of unresponsive when it came to the attack, so she shouldn’t say anything that would make them think she’s unstable. At least, I hope.

She looks down at her hands. She's been wringing the hem of her shirt and wearing the stitching. The blood from her hands has smeared on it, staining the bottom of the garment a purplish color.

She takes a shaky breath. “I think I'll do that. Thanks, Mike.” She gets up and walks toward the ambulance.

“Take care,” I say. The woman I spoke with looks at me as she is loading Anna into the back and mouths 'Thank you.'

Two of them close the doors of the ambulance, get in the front, and I watch them go. I will look into what is going on with this Hellhound, but I gotta make a call first. While walking to my car, I pull my phone out of my pocket and call Kai.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“'Ey, Mike. Whaddup, bruh?”

Well, at least he's not acting like he doesn't know me this time. Kai is a friend of mine from when I was younger. We had had some run-ins when I was an angry youth and then became allies of a sort when I stopped being an ass. He helped Anna last year when she got what I call 'spell sickness.' It's what happens when someone of the supernatural community uses their ability to manipulate the mind of an unwilling human. The leftover magic courses through them and literally makes them sick. If there is enough of the leftover energy, it could even kill them. That is what was happening to Anna. It was the first clue I had that some of my people were in town. The incubus, Bezhir, had targeted her, and I used my abilities to make him stop, but it was a case of too little too late. Kai helped me cure her of it with his 'tea,' which he concocted from the venom of a pseudo-snake tattoo that slid down his arm and rested over the back of his hand. It bit down, and its fangs pushed out of his palms, dripping the venom into the liquid. It was awesome.

But now I've got to see if it could backfire somehow. I need to know if there's a chance that it messed with her head. So I go straight to the source.

“Kai. Hey, man. Do you remember last year when you made that leech tea for me?” I ask, walking back through the strip mall. Leech is a term he and I give to those beings that feed off others. Well, it's not just us, but I use it a lot. This includes things like succubi, incubi, vampires–hell even a chupacabra, though I don't know if they actually exist.

“Yeah, you still owe me for that,” he says.

“We'll see about that, 'cause I've got a question. Could that tea have any adverse effects?”

“Whatchu mean?”

“Like, screwing up someone's perception or making them lose time or disassociate?”

I kick at rocks on the sidewalk on my walk to where I parked.

Kai is quiet for a moment before he responds. “Mmmm, nah, bruh. It actually fortifies the mind, the psyche. It makes it harder for those things to take full effect.”

“Well, those things are happening to my friend that you treated. Do you know what's going on?”

“If I had to guess, I'd say maybe your friend has bad luck, huh? It sounds like either someone tried to mess with her head again, or maybe someone else worked some kinda mind mana on her or something. That potion I gave her doesn't fail. Ever, man. I'm sorry.”

Damn. I was really hoping something went wrong that could be easily fixed. This opens up a whole new can of worms.

“Shit. Alright, thanks, Kai,” I say, passing back through the area where the Hellhound and I split up.

“No problem, bruh. So you still owe me, I'll hit you up soon for that favor, huh?” he says.

“Oh, wait,” I say, but he already ended the call. I'll just text him about the guy from the shop yesterday.

I think about what he said and come up short. Could Bezhir really have tried again before he died or something? Double Damn. Certain events are matching up now, but not quite quick enough for me. Come to think of it, Anna didn't even remember being cured last year, but I thought it was stress induced somehow. Now I learn it may have been something else. It could possibly have something more to do with the people that were chasing me. Kai may be right. Brad may be right, for that matter. Maybe it is me that’s causing this somehow.

I'm sorry, Anna. Apparently, I am your bad luck charm.

I don't know which hospital they are at, but I can message Anna later to find out. She and I will have to have a longer conversation regarding her memory loss. I want to try to help her get to the bottom of what is messing with her mind.

I also need to make sure Brad is on the mend. I mean, I hate the guy, but I never wanted anything like this to happen to him. I don't like that people I know are getting caught up in stuff I don't even want to be involved in. Eph's place comes into view as I round the corner almost to the alley way. He's standing outside, looking my way with his arms crossed and a stern expression on his face. His long gray hair is now pulled back into a tail while his beard is tightly braided. He waves me over and I jog up to him.

“What the hell happened now, Mikael?” he asks, eyeing me up and down. “I just saw you ten minutes ago!”

“There was a building on fire and a woman was screaming that her baby was still in there.”

He studies my face, then his own darkens further. “Ha-ha, very funny,” he says, his tone deadpan. “Seriously, what happened? I could feel your energy being thrown against something else.”

“Yeah, so that creature we've been talking about. Turns out it's a Hellhound. It attacked some people and I had to fight it off.”

He scrutinizes my face again. Perhaps he thinks I am still joking? Apparently, he decides I am not.

“Jesus Christ, boy. Why is trouble drawn to you like a fly to shit?”

I spread my hands, shrug my shoulders and frown. “I don't have an answer for you.”

He shakes his head and exhales. “Didja kill it?”

“No, I didn't,” I say, hanging my head. “Its claws raked through some of the buildings and our chase wrecked some pavement. I might have damaged some tables, but its bark did the worst of it. It caused some of the weaker construction to collapse in the shops down the street and shattered some windows, as well. I hit it pretty hard, and then it dug into the ground and disappeared.”

He looks at me flatly, squints and grunts.

“Don't look at me like that–I'll find it. In my experience so far, if they get away, they always want a rematch. I assume this will be no different.”

He stares off down the street, and his eyes flicker with crackling energy. They flit back and forth as I watch. I know he's surveying the damage at a distance by projecting his vision outside of his body. It's like how a ventriloquist throws their voice, but more intense. I saw him do this over the summer. There was a rash of break-ins where someone was stealing from the shops of the strip mall near his store during the gremlin incursion. Eph caught them after he watched them from here and tracked their movements. It was cool.

The energy lighting up his eyes fades and he blinks a few times then frowns. After a pregnant pause, he speaks again.

“Do what you need to do, Mikael. Since I know it's pointless to tell you to let someone else handle it, I'll just tell you that your job is safe. Don't come back until you're sure this is over.” He reaches out a hand, and I grasp it with mine, shaking it.

“Someone else always waits until too many people die,” I respond and he winces. I know he's very withdrawn from magic other than his own use and teaching, but what I said looks like it bothers him. He usually doesn't intervene either, other than catching the thieves. I decide to roll past it and respond instead to the reprieve he has given me so I can focus on this threat.

“Thanks, Eph. I really appreciate your understanding.”

He nods, turns, and walks away toward his shop. I turn to walk away as well, finally ready to go to my car, but there is something I should confirm first. I have bills to pay, and he is the one telling me to miss work. I turn around, walking backward while I ask him, “Wait, am I still getting paid?”

He starts whistling while he walks.

“Eph?”

He must not have heard me.