“I don’t know man. First thing I knew that kitten…”
“The kitten stuck in birdcage I tell you not to touch,” Nova interjected from where she sat in the rear seat.
“You didn’t know what it was,” Brock said, wiping the bleeding cut through his eyebrow for the hundredth time.
“You’re sure you don’t want me to drive?” Darius asked again from where he sat in the plush leather on the passenger side. He was leaning out the side window, and was watching the nocturnal storm rolling on behind them.
“No. I’m alright. Thanks. I can see it in the mirror. I think we’re staying ahead of it.”
“Ya. We are. Just.” Darius said sitting back down. “It’s keeping up though. And still following us. All those turns you tried didn’t help. This storm goes wherever it wants to.”
“And I couldn’t just let the cute little kitten burn, now could I, Nova?” Brock continued.
“Yes. Sure. Was cute kitten. Cute kitten with alarm bell on neck in birdcage on rusty pole hook outside spooky house with crooked bell tower and dug up graves and tiny naked lizard women flying around. You keep being stupid next time Nova won’t save you. I had use gorilla earring. Present from Juro.” She brushed a fingertip across the silverback gorilla earring. “Maybe won’t work next time. Maybe all used up.”
“I thought we were a goner once I saw how smashed the car was after you and the cat hit it,” Darius said.
“It felt more like the cat hit the car with me. I blacked out for a bit. Came to, and like I said, what the doctor told me to do, no matter how the limo looks, just put the key in and try to start it. No matter what. She said she inundated it with self-repairing technology. Stuff they hadn’t invented yet in where we’re from.”
“But you. What about you.” Darius said. “You should be hurt more. That looked really bad. You bent in the front of an armoured limousine with your body. I thought you were dead.”
“I don’t know, man. I just remember sitting up and looking around. There was the town in front of me. I watched the last few buildings kinda ‘appear.’ I did black out. I did lose some time, that’s for sure. I don’t know. We’re different here. Maybe the way Nova moved so quickly. When we thought she hadn’t gone to scout out the house when she actually had. We didn’t believe she could tell us all those things about it that turned out to be the same thing we saw. The way that cowboy kid couldn’t hit you with his bullets.” Brock added.
“Yes. This is a different place,” Nova said. “Like we are us. But we are more, different or something.”
“Well, at least we're not birds anymore,” Brock said.
Nova was suddenly leaning forward to peer out the window, “Stop,” She said. “I see something.”
“I don’t see anything,” Brock said, slowing the car to a rest.
“I don’t care what you see. Nova sees.” Nova said and slid up onto the seatback and out through the sunroof.
Brock and Darius waited.
“It’s a town. A village.” She dropped back through the sunroof onto the seat. “Let’s go.” She said.
“I don’t know.” Brock looked at her. “What if it’s got another magic cat?”
“Then don’t let out of birdcage,” Nova replied. “But never mind. This don’t have cat. Has big white bull.”
“What?”
“Don’t worry. I have good feeling this time. Last time, bad feeling. This time, better feeling.”
“So what is it, a good feeling or a better feeling?”
“Mmmmm, better.” She said. “Only better.”
“Oh great,” Brock said.
“At least you listen to Nova now. And also know not to open bird cages. You learning.”
“What do you think, Darius?”
“Let’s go. But I think we’ve learned to be really careful with anything from now on. We don’t know the game yet. Don’t forget that. We barely got out of that last scrape. Let’s not let that happen again.”
“Got it, mate,” Brock said.
“But we need to make decision even if we don’t know the game,” Nova said.
“Ya. That’s the problem. Making the right decision.” Darius said.
It was a small village. A cluster of white-washed houses, straight and true standing around a main building that looked like an old inn. The larger central building was the only place with a light on.
They had stopped before getting too close to the town. They considered staying put till dawn, but they didn’t know when dawn was, even if there was a dawn, and with the lights on, Nova said it was a sign, and they should just go to the shop.
“You want I have a look?” Nova asked.
“No. I think we stay together this time and watch out for traps, right, Brock?” Darius said, giving him a sideways glance.
“Ah, yep.” He replied with a heavy nod. “Watch for traps. Got it.”
The building looked much nicer than the last. The same type of structure, but clean and well taken care of. It had a bright new paint and the windows were little perfect window panes of clean glass.
They walked over the same ground, the same dried-up mesa as the last town. The big bull, it’s long horns wide and still watched them as they came. The rail fence looked new and sturdy, just like the house.
“Even though we don’t understand game, doesn’t mean we can’t see it.” Nova pondered as they walked.
“What?” Darius said.
“I think I see what she’s saying. Even if you don’t know how to play a game, if you sit back and watch it for a while, you’ll learn how to play it.”
“Ya. Ok, guys, but we don’t have that much time.”
“Think about what we know now. How far we come. What we see on the way. We learn lots.”
“Like what exactly?” Darius asked.
“Maybe how dreams work. You can be weak in dreams, or you can be strong. Maybe this is a dream we are in now?” Nova said. “You can see into dreams. When Badrik took us by hand and hypnotize…”
“Ya, he hypnotized us all right. Don’t know why you won’t let me try it.” Brock said.
“Stupid. Badrik can do. You can not. But he took us in dream. Badrik took us to camp with girl sleeping in tent. She had the powerful staff. Magic staff that is made out of same chip from your operation Darius. So I think really you, Darius, took us in dream. It is your chip that keeps us. The operation on your face they saved you from. The operation they made work. So you are supposed to be able to walk in memories. Would not a walk in memory seem the same as a walk in a dream?”
“And I still have no idea how that’s supposed to be done.”
“Maybe this is practise?” Nova said. “This Valhalla place is like dream walking. Memory walking.”
As they walked, the storm followed them closer to the town. They all looked back at the boil of clouds being traced by lighting. And they noticed fewer buildings now. The buildings they had just walked through were starting to look insubstantial. Ghost-like. Then, another one disappeared entirely.
“This is a good place. Opposite to last. These buildings disappear as Chaos comes. I see a good place that look kind the same as bad place we just came from. Instead of kid gunslinger missing the top of his head, a good person is waiting for us inside. It is ok.” And she lifted the gate latch and stepped through the open gate. The bull’s head swivelled to watch them with a heavy gaze. It wore a large black cowbell hung from a heavy leather collar.
The bell ‘dung-dunged’ a bass tone as the bull moved.
They kept their eyes on the bull but followed the neat path up to the front steps of the building. Wide long planks, almost like you’d find on a dias lead up to a low, broad balcony. White, thin curtains let the easy golden glow of lamplight out through the window panes with bevelled edges that bent the lamplight. Beside the doorway, mounted high so the covered porch had concealed it, was the twisting helix of a barbershop pole. This one was an old fashoned one, but it looked new, fresh with oil and a clear glass tube. A twist of black and white twirled around each other, never ending.
Over the door, there was a whiteboard painted with neat cursive black text.
Major Hubb’s Shoppe of Transformation
Various Over Garments and ITEMS for today’s aspiring carpet bagger priced Accordingly
(supplies are limited naturally)
Maj. C.E. Hubb soul propritor
On the opposite side of the door, across from the stub of a barber’s pole, was a tall, narrow chalk board with the following listed down it;
Brush Downs 5 pi
Cuts 25 pi
Wash up and or Shave 10 pi
New Teeth 100 pi
(Wooden. New non-
yellowing porcelain arriving soon!)
Credit available with interest.
Absolutely no fighting, quarrelling or
roughhousing allowed.
Misunderstandings are expected.
Tipping is encouraged.
Please don’t forget to check the
Lost-and-Found on your way out!
Nova turned away, put a hand on the doorknob and turned it.
“We need to get what we came for and get out of here.” She said.
Darius stood, still watching the oncoming storm. “I just don’t know if it will matter. He came to the Diner last time. Even if we get away now, what’s going to stop him from finding us there again?”
The few houses that remained between them and the storm disappeared.
The shop door swung open.
A man who looked like a bad-ass version of a young Santa Clause stood on the other side of the threshold in well-shone dress shoes. He said, “You, my young gentlemen. You can stop him from coming next time. Now, before it is too late, please come in and let me offer you my protection.”
Darius studied the man. Solid looking. He wasn’t tall, but he was one no one would mess with. His voice had a sombre register. He looked to Darius like the man could have been some type of warrior not so long ago. He had a newspaper clutched in one hand that was a little rumpled as if he had come to the door in a hurry. Behind him, on the far wall below a black telephone, was a short counter with an old-fashioned machine till like they had back at the diner. A coat closet was behind the counter with a curtained passage beside it, and on both sides of the room were chrome barber’s chairs in front of tall, bright mirrors.
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
They all stepped through into the barbershop. “You can stop him? And you can tell me how?” Darius asked excitedly as the man closed the door on the storm behind them.
“No, and yes. I can only deflect him. You already have the ability to stop him. We just need to discuss it, young man, and during our discussion, we’ll stay living in the rules of nature, naturally. Entirely within bounds.”
“Now, please, have a seat.” He continued and gestured them to the barber chairs.
Darius stepped to the chair in front of him, and he watched as Nova and Brock's reflections did the same. The mirrors facing mirrors on either side of the room behind the chairs became reflections within reflections to where he could see no end. Each Brock and Nova had their own barber. The same Santa biker stepped up behind them as the man draped a white cloak over Darius’ shoulders and fastened it. The same man draped cloaks simultaneously over Brock’s and Nova’s shoulders in reflections that stepped off into infinity across the room.
Heavy, gentle hands brushed the cloak on Darius to remove the wrinkles.
“Remove the wrinkles, and there is nothing to catch onto. Speaking of which, you did well with Hector. That was a wicked trap set for ones so new. I can see you already have luck on your side.” Darius glanced sideways out the front window. The storm was quiet. He could still see the storm in the distance out there, but it didn’t seem far so bad as it had when they had been standing on the front porch only moments ago.
“You know about that? How do you know?”
The man gestured to the newspaper that he had dropped on a side table. “I always keep up on the latest news.”
“Who are you?” Darius asked. He asked now because the last person they had run into hadn’t been really what he had seemed at first.
“Ah, son. Don’t worry. This isn’t like the last spot. Everything is a reflection. Everything is kept in a check and balance system. There are no traps for you here. Only protection and aid as I stated at my threshold.” Darius glanced and could no longer see Brock and Nova in their barber chairs.
“If you are looking for your friends, they are over at the counter.” The man said to him.
The same man that stood behind his chair was also standing behind the back counter. Daris watched in the mirror as the man placed a large square case on the counter in front of Brock. In front of Nova, he set a shoebox.
“Gifts from your friends. Now, to answer your question, I am Major Hubb, but you knew that by reading the sign outside. So, to answer your true question, I’m a retired forge cleric. Yes. An old warrior with a history of doing interesting things in crazy locations for the greater good. It was the righteous things I did that had me unable to move on past manning this way station here at Mount Meru.
“We didn’t see a mountain on the way in.”
“Ah, the mountain has been gone a long time now, but the place remains the same.”
“How is this happening? I see the others, and I see you with them.”
“We don’t have the time to do this linearly.”
“Nova. Brock. What is going on?” He saw Nova give him a thumbs-up again, but it was like he couldn’t hear her, or she couldn’t hear him. He watched as Brock picked up the heavy case and took a ticket stub from his barber. Brock looked straight to Darius then and gave him a wink. Brock's split brow looked totally normal and didn’t have any sign of blood.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m giving them train tickets along with their gifts and letting them get on their way.”
Darius leaned forward in his chair and reached to pull off the cloak. “I’m going with them.”
“But let’s think about that for a moment, shall we? Who exactly is Chaos hunting for?”
Darius met the stout man’s serious look in the mirror. He settled back into the barber chair.
“He’s after me. He’s always been after me.”
“So how bout we let your friends get clear of here? You and me, we’ll chat. I have a proposition for you. You’re going to have a difficult trip getting out of here. So you decide. Take your gift and clear out with your friends, or stay and maybe have a sticky time of getting clear of here?”
“I’ll stay then.” He looked out the front window. The storm was much closer now, and there was no sign of Brock or Nova. “What’s the gift?”
“Right there.” The major pointed a comb at a hat on the small counter beside the shaving brushes and the scissors. Darius knew that it wasn’t there a moment ago. He would have noticed it. An old man’s hat. Or a hat that looked like an old man would wear it.
“An old fedora?”
“Close. It’s actually a trilby. It has a narrower brim than a fedora and more of a sloped front to it.”
“Ah, ok, thanks for the gift, I guess. Don’t think it really suits me though. They stopped wearing them about a hundred years ago.”
“Oh they aren’t from me. They were just left here for you. The gifts are from the ones that preserved you. I run this way station and offer sustenance, protection and order, and I’m looking to expand.”
The Major ran a comb through Darius’ hair and set it down beside his new hat. He picked up a glass ointment jar, removed the top, and put a few dabs of scented oil on his palms and rubbed them together. “For all my power, I can only deflect and give a blessing.” Mumbling some words like a priest would, the Major bowed his head for a moment and then anointed Darius with the scented oils.
Darius was moved. “Thank you.” He said.
“Now that is my gift to you. As for all of the rest of it, my proposition to you is for you to help me.”
“Me. Help you? I would do whatever I could.” And Darius knew that this was true. He would go to the ends of the earth and beyond for this man. And he thought it wasn’t just the strange way he felt. He knew anyone who met this man of such a powerful presence and a kind heart and wise disposition would do the same. It must be what it was like to meet a king, Darius thought. Not a king of some land, but a king among great men. A king who would lead armies. And then Darius thought he got a glimpse of this man’s past. Why he stood here, in this barber shop, locked in this desert mesa for long enough to watch a mountain melt. Darius thought he could also picture vast armies dying. Thousands of men in armour under pennants. Hundreds of thousands of men. Ships burning. Towns and walled cities burning. Bad things that only the good with a richeous mind can do.
“There is a new realm only you can walk. The realm of scientifically stored memories. A hidden deck of cards not yet played. Chaos can see to the future, where he has already won. You, and only you, can bring these lost cards into play. With the help of luck, you could even stack the deck. Make a good card better. If you are able to bring these cards into play and possibly throw a little twist of luck on them, the game may not be lost yet.”
“How do you mean?” And Darius couldn’t help but stare out the window at the oncoming storm. “What cards? The memories? I don’t know how to do that. You told me I already knew how to stop him.”
“A thirteenth-century poet once said musical notes are footsteps to the holes you fall through into space. You can do this Darius. Chaos cannot.”
“I don’t know what you mean by that, and it doesn’t matter because he’s coming. Now. Here.”
“It’s ok. The train with your friends on it is pulling away now. And you’ll be on the next one.” The Major was holding a ticket stub out to him.
“Ya. And where to exactly?”
“To the diner. The Slingers Grill and Pump. An awful name. I was thinking we could rename it to something more appropriate. The Dream Café.”
“And what good with that do. He came there last time. He’ll come there again.” A flash of lightning and a boom of thunder shook the windows of the shop. The cowbell on the bull rang outside; its flat low ‘dong dong dong’ carried to them between the rolling thunder.
“The diner is no longer in your timeline. That timeline you were rescued from by the Luck Gods was destroyed. Nor is the diner in the Astral Plain like it was when Chaos found you there the last time. He can no longer come to where the diner is.”
“And why is that.”
“Because you control the diner now. It is preserved in your memory. The diner, The Dream Café, is in your mind. A stored mind. One that can move to any other stored mind. You hold the doctor and Juro in there with you, along with your friends. The Grandmother even. She is a great and powerful spirit. Like her, you are very powerful, my young man. They all made you that way.”
“My mind castle is what Badrik called it. The diner is now part of my mind castle?”
“Yes. You have expanded it beyond the Grandmother’s cabin, across the bridge that bridged the gap, and to encompass the way station. The neutral ground. The fuel pumps. The diner. From there you can walk through the stored memories. Your mind castle, your safe waypoint, I call it a transformation station.”
“The walls are down. Wrecked from when he came last time.” Another flash of lightning revealed Bucky standing on the front porch. Darius jumped in fright. He tugged the cape from his neck and let it drop to the floor.
“It’s time I got out of here.”
“The diner will be fine. Now, don’t you move. You must sit very still. I’ll tell you what is going on right now. You are my trap. My cat in the birdcage. If you leave my protection he’ll be on you all teeth and claws. You sit right there.” The Major went over and dropped the blinds on the windows. Wooden white shutters clacked together to block out the view of the shadow of Bucky standing motionless on the porch outside.
The doorknob turned slowly, then stopped. Then the door shook a wicked shake as if it were alive. Darius went to stand.
“Sit right there, son. Right in that chair. While I become the bullfighter, I can’t afford you getting in my way as I deal with every other possibility. I can only keep you safe in one possibility, and that is you, sitting there, in that chair, here and now.”
“I’ll help you, and you’ll be under my protection. I’ll spread the word. You and your crew will be part of my organization.”
Darius shook his head. “But there is still so much I don’t know!”
The door rattled harder.
“Of course there is. It’s that way for all of us, and we go on and take every opportunity given us to learn. Now remember. Stay right there. You may lose sight of me, and I’m going to step into a few other dimensions now.”
The door of the barbershop crashed open and folded back on its hinges, smashing the windows. The white sheer curtains danced and billowed in the wind. The mirrors on both walls reflected the billowing curtains into a confusing landscape of movement.
Bucky stepped through the doorway. He wore the leather greaser jacket and the blue jeans from the diner and the chase across the footbridge.
“Hey kid, long time. It will be good catching up.” Bucky walked over to him. Right up in front of Darius, where he sat in the barber chair. Darius felt his mouth go suddenly dry. “Where’s the old man?” Bucky lifted his head and hollered into the back of the shop. “Hey! Old man! So I put a yowler in a birdcage and tie a bell on it, and you get to put a white Brahman bull with a cowbell in a paddock? Really? I’ve got a hole in my cool jacket. No, don’t worry, my yowler is still alive, so I didn’t kill the bull. You know, just annoying all that balance shit you insist on all the time.”
Bucky turned back to Darius. “You’ve been a busy little bean, haven’t you? Skipping about here and there, hither and thither, yonder and…” Bucky leaned in and sniffed. “You’ve met him. I can smell his incense on you. Having a good ol’ visit, I see. Say, what’s the old baby killer been telling you anyway?”
Darius looked around for Major Hubb. All he could see was a waterfall of reflections in the surrounding mirrors of him and Bucky. It was definitely Bucky. Bucky was back.
He dropped his forehead down towards Darius, and his eyes went from normal Bucky eyes to those black ichor eyes.
“Speaking of balance and killing. You and your friends are supposed to be dead a long time ago. I’m just here to help, actually. It is my job, you know. And I especially enjoy doing stuff I really align with.”
The Bucky thing shot out his arms and swung his hips back and forth as if he was on a swing. With every thrust, he shouted a word, “Right – Up – My – Alley!”
He walked to the little counter in front of the barber chair that Darius’ new hat sat on and picked up a comb. Bucky admired himself and combed his pompadore haircut in the mirror. His eyes were back to normal.
“Stuff like making sure things that are supposed to be dead are. So, before I pull out your spine and flatten your skull, I’d appreciate the answer to my question. What did the old man tell you?”
Darius wanted to stall. He wanted to say that it was all a trick so his friends could get away. He wanted to think if he could just get back to the diner, that, he’d be safe, but he thought Chaos knew those things already, and if he tried just one more second of delay, he’d die.
So Darius decided he’d tell him the truth.
“He said that there is a deck of cards, a hidden deck, that I could manipulate to change the outcome of the game you have already won.”
Bucky tipped his head under the comb. “Humph. True. What else?”
“He was about to tell me how I was supposed to find the memories to change.”
“So he didn’t tell ya?” The Bucky things eyes had gone back to the normal Bucky eyes again. Darius could smell the vomit smell on it still. The same vomit smell that had been at the diner that day he came to destroy it. When it was still old Bucky, merged with some ghoul, the twins had said. When Bucky was still alive, in some way. Now this thing with him was pure Chaos. Pure hatred.
“No. He didn’t get time to. You got here too quick.”
Bucky grinned. A normal grin not filled with the monster teeth over a bulging monster neck. Just a normal ol’ Buck grin from back in the day on the baseball diamond.
“Cool. It feels nice to have someone tell you that you did alright, you know kid? But you know why he didn’t tell ya? I don’t think the old man knows. It’s not his area of expertise, as some would say.” Bucky continued combing his hair.
“Well, he was going to tell me,” Darius said.
“Ya, you can keep sayin’ that, but he doesn’t know.”
“Well, how do you know he doesn’t know?”
“Don’t try that. Don’t try to bullshit me. You’re supposed to be this new special thing, you know, a challenge for me, but here you sit just a kid in a chair already dead. Before I kill you I can show you your future.” Bucky put the comb down and turned.
Darius crossed his arms. “Go ahead then.”
Bucky walked away, his big shit-stomper boots clunking against the hardwood floor, over to the front door, and the storm stopped. It went silent. One moment, the rain and wind were rushing and pulling at the curtains; the next moment, it was calm.
Darius could hear crickets from outside. Frogs croaking in the night. Bucky turned and pointed at the mirror behind the barber chair where Darius sat. Darius looked into the mirror and saw himself.
But he was dead. Slumped back into the chair, his eyes were the white-grey of the dead deer that had fallen into his grandmother's canyon. The eyes with no life in them that he had peered into when he was a young boy. The time in the mirror sped up; the sun rose outside the door of the diner and set and rose and set. The flesh of his face puckered and cracked. Flies scurried too fast across dry skin, and then he was bones in a brown sweatshirt. The sun rose, and the sun set faster and faster. The sight chilled Darius. It looked so lonely. So alone. Forever. He spun the chair away from the mirror.
“You don’t know either!” Darius yelled at Bucky, who stood smugly at the open door.
The Bucky/Chaos thing wore the black eyes again. The black ink that filled its eyes to overflowing ran like old mascara down its face. It grinned at him with teeth too large out of a neck with far too much muscle and stepped towards him as if to take a bite out of his face.
Darius pushed himself back in the chair as far as he could.
“It’s so easy,” The Bucky thing leaned in and growled the words as saliva dripped from fangs. “Just like mine do. They would have come to you. They would have found you. Sought you out. So, so easy. And you see now, don’t you? You weren’t really a challenge after all. Time to die now. Your friends die too. They are right here where I will bite,” and a big claw reached up to tap – tap – tap that spot on his cheek where the crystal lay inside. “They’re dead too when I crush your fuc…” But the last tap, the third tap didn’t land.
The creature wasn’t there anymore. Well, he was ‘there’. Darius could see him, but he was tapping on the cheek of his reflection. The thing turned and looked directly at Darius, and another mirror moved to make a third Darius. The thing moved back closer to Darius, and then suddenly, there were six of them/him.
The reflections of the creature leaned back and howled. In the howl, the mouth grew to become that even larger mouth, and then there were twelve cartoon-muscle-necked creatures. In a blur of movement, a mirror smashed, and there were creatures reflected in those shards, so many Darius couldn’t count. The mirrors swirled with the motion of the creatures. Faster they blurred and moved through the flat glass in the barber shop. The reflections in the shattered glass on the floor, the reflections in the mirrors.
A great muscled arm reached for him from a mirror. Darius ducked and the mirror shattered to trap a thousand reflected arms still moving in glass that fell to the floor.
Major Hubb stepped from behind the curtain on the other side of the counter.
“I think that’s got him for a bit. Take your ticket son, and don’t forget the hat. Out the door to your left, down the walkway and on the train with you. Remember, the train will be a sticky trip. A test.”
Darius stepped down from the barber chair, being ever so careful not to touch any of the glass shards, plucked up his hat and took the ticket.
“I know what he said about me. We all try to make the world a better place. Just be careful you don’t make the same mistakes that I made. For entropy to increase, the path you follow may not matter. The result depends on whether we attempt to uphold the laws of nature and morality over chaos in each instant. You are that agent of luck applied to make each chance a better one. Have a safe trip. Once you get past it, you’ll be on a path of inevitability. The Dream Café. Think about it. Oh. And good luck.”
“Ok,” Darius said. He didn’t know what else to say to the stoic man who now stood there gazing at him with an earnest look, even a bit of an ashamed look.
And then he did know what to say. “Thank you. And good luck to you too.”