Newford Spoor Squad

Charles De Lint

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We haven't had any rain for the past few weeks, so the water level in

the storm drains isn't high — a trickle in most places, though

occasionally it comes up to our ankles. But not having to slosh through

heavy storm water doesn't make it any more pleasant to be down here.

Our flashlights cut a series of criss-crossing beams into the darkness

ahead of us. The air has a musky scent, and I keep hearing things

scuttling away from us in the darkness.

Rats, I guess. Nothing big. Not what we're looking for, but then who

knows what the hell we're really looking for? All I know for sure is

three workers from the Water & Sewer Department have gone missing down

here, and no one knows what happened to them.

"What's that up ahead?" Hellboy asks.

The beam from his flashlight plays on a side tunnel. Walker checks the

screen of his PDA. He downloaded the specs for this tunnel system

before we left headquarters.

"It's a dead end," he says.

When we reach the branching tunnel, Hellboy plays his flashlight down

its length.

"A dead end?" he asks.

"That's what's showing up on my schematic," Walker tells him.

"Then how come I can feel a breeze?"

He's right. There's a draft coming down the tunnel toward us.

I step around him and move further in, the beam of my flashlight

showing nothing but damp stone walls as far as it will reach. The

passage slopes away from us at a slight angle. After ten feet, it makes

a turn to the left. There's no telling how far it goes.

I start to take another step, but Hellboy catches my arm.

"Wait," he says. "Hear that?"

I shake my head.

"There's something ...," he begins.

But then we all hear it. Hell, we feel it. A sudden pressure in the

tunnel, a sound like something's shifting deep underground. Something

big. The stone underfoot sends tremors up our legs and right through

our bones.

I look at Hellboy and he grins.

"Now it's getting interesting," he says.

He sets off down the tunnel, his partner, Agent Sherman, on his heels.

Walker and I exchange glances. He looks as uneasy about all of this as

I'm feeling.

"Crap," I say.

I don't want to go, and neither does Walker. The hair on the back of my

neck is standing up.

But we follow them into the tunnel all the same.

[IMAGE]

Then ...

My name's Sam Cray.

One week ago I was a detective for the Newford Police Department's

Special Investigations Squad.

Six days ago I was put in charge of the NPD's new Paranormal

Investigations Task Force.

No matter what I've been told, I figure I must have really pissed

someone off to get the transfer.

"Tell me you're kidding," I say to Bill Sweet when he gives me the news

in one of the downtown conference rooms.

Bill's the chief of police now, but we go way back. We came up together

from the Academy, and even our rabbis were partners. We both made

detective around the same time, but Bill was always more ambitious than

me. Right from the start, he had a leaning toward the politics of the

job, while I just wanted to be on the street, putting away the bad

guys. I'm not saying one's better than the other, just that we're

different. And it's worked out well, because at least we have a Chief

who actually knows the job from the bottom up.

Yeah, he knows my job, but at times like this, I can't believe what's

involved with his.

"You can't do this to me," I tell him.

Bill shakes his head. "The mayor insists on it."

"And there's room in your budget for something like this?"

"No. The task force is being funded by an anonymous group of concerned

citizens."

"Who expect to get what out of it?"

"Nothing, Sam. In case you haven't been paying attention, a lot of

seriously weird things go down in our city — not just once or twice,

but all the time. These people are worried about its effect on

real-estate values, on the tourist trade, on their ability to lure new

businesses to town. So it's not like they're being particularly

charitable here. But that's fine, because no matter how self-serving

their motivations might be, it still gives us the budget to actually

help the people who are being affected by this."

It's a good speech, but I don't buy it.

"This is bullshit," I tell him. "What exactly am I supposed to do?

Track down monsters and spooks and things that go bump in the night?"

"If necessary. If that's what comes up."

He says this with such a straight face it makes me glad I never played

poker with him.

"Seriously," I say. "What'd I ever do to piss you off like this?"

"This is a compliment to your abilities, Sam. Simply put, you're the

best man for the job. I went to every precinct with this, and only your

captain was against you being offered the position."

"Really? Well, at least Monroe's not trying to screw me."

"Don't be an idiot," Bill says. "He just doesn't want to lose you to

the task force."

"I can't believe you're even calling it a task force. I'm going to be a

laughing stock when this gets out. Jesus."

Bill shakes his head. "This task force won't officially exist, so no

one's going to know."

Like that ever stopped information from getting around before. I swear,

cops are worse than little old ladies when it comes to gossip.

"And you don't answer to anyone but me," Bill finishes.

"A task force," I say. "On the paranormal. Do you have any idea how

that sounds?"

"Last week we had a rain of frogs inside the Williamson Street Mall,"

he tells me, "Monday a complaint was filed about something that looked

like a cross between an eagle and a lion flying off with some guy's

Doberman. Just this morning two female joggers reported a fishman

rooting through a garbage bin who dove into the lake at their approach

and never surfaced. Do you need any more? Because I've got stacks of

them."

"Look," I say. "I'll admit this city seems to have more than its fair

share of nutcases, but that doesn't mean we should start believing what

they tell us."

"The guy who lost his dog," Bill says, "is the president of the Newford

First National Bank. One of the joggers sits on the city council; her

friend is VP of Human Resources at McCutcheon & Grambs."

Doesn't mean they're not loopy, I think, but I say, "Okay, so I'm

supposed to do what? How is anybody supposed to figure out who's

responsible for this crap? Come on, Bill. You can't arrest smoke and

shadows and hearsay."

But he's shaking his head. "It's not a lot different from what you're

already doing, except instead of collecting data on gangs and

subversives and extremists, you're going to be investigating the weird

things that go on in this city. Hopefully, you'll get to the point

where you'll be able to identify and prevent the incidents from

occurring in the first place."

"I don't know the first thing about the paranormal."

"That's why we brought together those advisors for you."

He's talking about the collection of misfits he's got waiting for us in

the room on the other side of the one-way mirror where we're having our

meeting. Like the idea of working with them would even remotely boost

my confidence.

"You get to pick your own team," Bill says. "No strings, no PC

processes. Choose whomever you want, and if they agree to the transfer,

they're yours."

"Plus that bunch of bozos," I say, pointing to the group waiting on the

other side of the mirror.

"These people can be useful, Sam. They know things we can't guess at."

Because we still have the full use of our senses, I think. Or at least

I know I do. I'm not so sure about Bill anymore, because these people

...

I recognize some of them — mostly from pulling them in on various

charges when I was still walking a beat. There's the alcoholic priest

who thinks he talks to angels and demons. The owner of The Good Serpent

Club in Upper Foxville who claims to be a voodoo priestess. At least

two of the people Bill's brought in do the phony oracle shtick in

Fitzhenry Park, or down on the Pier.

I also recognize the writer, but not from a rap sheet. I've just seen

his mug in the paper when they're reviewing his books.

"Who's the old guy beside Christy Riddell?" I ask.

"Dr. Bramley Dapple. He's got a couple of Ph.D.s, but the one that

interests us is in mythology and folklore. He's supposed to be a

world-renowned expert in his field."

"And he's got time for this?"

"He thinks it's important and long overdue," Bill says. "As do I."

"You're not asking me to head up a task force," I say. "You're asking

me to babysit a pack of charlatans and lunatics." I turn to look at

Bill. "I have to work in an office with these people?"

He shakes his head. "This is just a meet and greet to let you all put

faces to each other's names. I want you to go in, introduce yourself to

them, thank them for being a part of this. That's all."

"I don't do this well," I warn Bill.

"I know. Just be nice and get it over with. After this, you'll only

speak to them when you need their expertise on a particular case. And

you don't even need to do that yourself. You can delegate one of your

people to be the liaison."

I shake my head. Now I've got people. "Let's get this over with," I

tell Bill.

[IMAGE]

Now ...

Is he always like this? I ask Hellboy's partner when Walker and I

catchup with her.

I can see the light from Hellboy's flashlight a good twenty yards

further down the tunnel from us.

Agent Sherman smiles. "We spend a lot of down time, back at

headquarters, twiddling our thumbs. Which is a good thing, of course,

because it means there isn't some big crisis that needs looking after.

But Hellboy likes it best when he's in the thick of the action."

"What's his real name?"

"That's it. Just Hellboy."

Okay, I think. Be like that.

"I've read the stories. Saw that Life magazine cover back when. But I

always figured it was mostly image stuff, P.R., all that," I say.

"What, was he caught in a fire or something when he was a kid?"

She gives me a look that's beyond cold. There's anger in it and ice,

and just the hint of old ghosts. It stops me in my tracks and Walker

bumps into me, but she just keeps walking, back stiff, long red hair

bouncing against her back.

I turn to Walker. "What'd I say?"

He shrugs. "Who knows? But I wouldn't bring it up again. Maybe it's

like asking if my skin's so brown because I fell down a crapper."

"Who's going to say something that stupid?"

"I don't know. Maybe some kid back when I was in high school — just

before I broke his nose."

"Christ, so now I'm a racist?"

Walker smiles. "Not that I can see. Seriously, though. You think the

guy's a fake? Somebody's going to pretend they're a demon? Big media

hoax? Who'd do that?"

"Stranger things happen. Maybe you should ask Agent Sherman?"

Walker shakes his head. "Nah, I think I'd rather give myself an enema

with a fire hose. Man, if I didn't know better, I'd think she'd done

time because she's sure got that thousand-yard stare down pat."

I grin in agreement and we quicken our pace, rubber boots splashing in

the few inches of water we've got underfoot. But just because I'm in

better humor doesn't mean I'm not checking out the walls and tunnel

roof for cracks or fissures. That sound we heard earlier, I figure it

came from a piece of the roof falling in somewhere down a ways, and I

don't plan on getting stuck here.

[IMAGE]

Then ...

Chad Walker is my first choice for this task force I'm putting

together. He's got experience, he's tough, and at six-foot, two-twenty,

he can hold his own. I've seen him in action. He can look like a street

thug, and he's played the part in the past, though he can't go

undercover again — not since he put away most of the Taggart Street

Runners, along with their main man, Frankie Chestnut. Walker's also

smart as hell, but more importantly, he's a guy I can get along with.

If I'm stuck with this job — if I'm going to have "people" — at least

they're going to be people I like.

Walker grins at me when I walk up to his desk at the 12th Precinct.

"If you're here to ask me if I want to join up with your Spook Squad —

" he starts.

"Jesus, who's calling it that?" I say, before he can finish.

"Everybody. Come on, what did you expect?"

"Well, I knew no matter what the chief said, it was going to get out. I

just didn't think it'd be this fast."

"Or that somebody'd come up with such a cute name," Walker says.

"That, too."

"Anyway," he goes on, "I'm in. Unless you're here to ask me to go for a

beer, and then I'm going to be seriously embarrassed."

"Why would you want in?" I have to ask.

"Are you kidding me? This is the gig of a lifetime. I mean, think about

it for a minute: they're willing to actually pay us to investigate all

this weird stuff that goes down in the city. Which reminds me, do I get

a raise?"

"Put it on your list of demands."

"I get to make a list of demands? Sweet. I'm putting in for a Ferrari.

Maybe that'll finally get me some respect in the old 'hood."

I laugh. "But seriously," I say. "When did you get into the weird

stuff?"

"Living here, how can you not? It drives me crazy trying to figure out

what's really what."

"You're beginning to sound like Ricker."

"Oh, crap. You're not bringing him on board, are you?"

Alfred Ricker's been collecting data on unexplained phenomena for about

as long as anyone can remember, and everybody avoids him because he's

got a hundred theories — and he's not afraid of sharing them with you.

At great and tedious length. The only way you can get him to stop is to

just walk away.

He'd probably add a lot to the team — if he didn't drive us all insane

first. I'm surprised Bill didn't put him on my board of advisors,

considering some of the other winners that are there.

"No," I assure Walker. "I'm asking Ramirez next."

"Judita's good," he says. "I heard she once stood down a swarm of

fifteen or twenty kids going after a couple of Arab boys outside the

Williamson Street Mall. Just her on her own, no backup. Knowing her,

she stopped them dead with the sheer force of her will."

I nod, wait a beat, then ask, "So is she a believer, too?"

Walker gives me a puzzled look. "I don't know. Why do you ask?"

"It's just ... everybody's treating this so damn seriously."

"And you don't," Walker says.

It's not a question, but I can see he's just figuring it out now. The

Looney Tunes crap the task force is being put together to investigate

isn't something the two of us have ever really discussed before. You

want to know the truth, I don't like to talk about it with anybody.

"Which really makes me wonder why they've got me heading up the task

force," I say.

"You're a good cop."

"I try. But this stuff..."

"Maybe they want someone in charge who's going to stop and ask

questions instead of just running with the weirdness of the moment."

"I guess ..."

Walker doesn't say anything for a long moment. He just sits there,

studying my face — hesitating, I realize, when he finally does speak.

"This have anything to do with Lela?" he asks.

It's been three years, but I still feel the ground disappear under my

feet at the mention of her name. Lela Searle. We were supposed to be

married. She was going to leave the Job, become a civilian, raise our

family. Instead, she got torn apart by a pack of dogs set on her by a

crack dealer in Butler University Common. Except the whisper in the NPD

is that it wasn't dogs. The whisper says it was the dealer himself,

Bobby Cairns. That he goes all Wolfman three nights of the month. That

she wasn't paying attention to the lunar cycle when she went to make

her bust because otherwise she'd still be alive.

All of which seriously pisses me off. Lela was a good cop. Maybe she

shouldn't have been out on the common at night without backup, but

those kinds of situations happen on the job. In the heat of the chase,

you make the judgment call. It was bad luck Cairns had those dogs. It

wasn't supernatural. And if we ever pull in the murdering son of a

bitch, I'll go a few rounds with him and prove he's just a lowlife with

a freak for fighting dogs.

I hate the fact the whisper says she was killed by bad mojo. I want the

world to know it was a man that got the drop on her, not some monster.

If we buy into monsters, then what do we have left? What good are we

against monsters? I mean think about it. If there really are these

wolfmen and vampires and crap out there in the dark, how are we

supposed to protect the public against them? We're as helpless against

that kind of thing as the average joe.

Sure, there's weird shit on the street. But the point is, you get the

facts, you take the incidents apart, and you don't find monsters — at

least not like in some freak show. We've got plenty of human monsters

as it is. We don't need to make up storybook ones.

Lela's death has to mean something. She was a good cop. She died doing

her job. She didn't die because some random boogeyman stepped out of

the shadows and tore her apart. She died trying to bring down Bobby

Cairns, a crack dealer, end of story. Accepting anything else

diminishes her death.

"No," I tell him. "I don't buy this crap for a lot more reasons than

that."

"And if it turns out to be true?"

I shrug. "Then I'll buy myself some silver bullets for when I finally

track down Cairns."

[IMAGE]

Now ...

When I was a kid, my friends and I were fascinated with the idea that

the bedrock underneath the city was supposed to be honeycombed with

caverns, some so big you couldn't see from one side to the other.

Discussing the possibility of their existence was a big deal for us.

We'd sit around for hours planning all these Tom-Sawyer-in-the-caves /

Journey to the Center of the Earth expeditions that never got further

than the neighborhood storm sewer, though it wasn't for want of trying.

We could just never find the secret entrances.

You put that kind of thing behind you once you grow up and find other

interests — like, hello, girls — but it stays there in your

subconscious. Every once in a while, I'd remember. Maybe I'd be on a

stakeout, and the steam coming up from a manhole cover would remind me.

Or I'd read in the paper about the fire department rescuing some kid

from a storm sewer.

The city's got an underground history, too. Everybody knows about Old

City — that section of Newford that got dropped underground during the

big quake at the beginning of the last century — but nobody goes there

except for the homeless. They say there are still buildings standing

down there in some subterranean cavern — that's what happened during

the quake: the roof of one of those caverns collapsed, and Old City got

swallowed up, buildings, streets, and all.

I'm thinking about that now as Walker and I follow Hellboy and his

partner down the storm sewer, pretty sure that what we heard and felt

was a cavern roof falling in. But then we get to where the other two

are standing, their flashlights playing over what appears to be a large

body of water. I can't see the far end. There's no longer concrete or

brickwork underfoot or on the walls. There's just bedrock, with a bunch

of loose boulders and stones along the edge of this underground lake.

If my childhood pals could see me now ...

"How deep are we?" I ask Walker.

He shrugs. "Hard to tell, with all the ups and downs and turns we

took."

"Probably the equivalent of a ten-story building," Sherman says.

Her voice is completely normal, like she didn't give me the big

ice-stare two minutes ago.

I shine my light across the water, and wonder what its range is.

"There's something moving in there," Hellboy says.

He's shining his light into the water but it's so murky I can't make

out a damn thing.

"Something big," he adds.

It's like he calls it to us, whatever the hell it is. I'm just aware of

some large shape that comes out of the water like a whale, before the

waters close over it again. The motion sends waves toward us, lapping

at the tops of our boots.

"Jesus," Walker says. "What the hell was that thing?"

Hellboy grins. "It looked like a kraken."

"Yeah," I say. "You'd have to be on crack to make sense out of

something like this."

Hellboy shakes his head. "I said 'kraken.' It's a kind of sea monster."

"In the city sewers?"

"It's a small one," Agent Sherman says. "But you're right, it is

puzzling. I didn't think they could survive in fresh water."

"Hey, the water down here's anything but fresh," I put in.

Hellboy smiles at me, then turns back to his partner. "Remember Nazas,

in '88? We had a pair of them."

Sherman shakes her head. "You were with Abe that time." She pauses a

moment, then adds, "I thought they were Nessies."

"What the hell are you people talking about?" I ask.

"Do you remember those Ray Harryhausen movies with the giant octopi?"

"Sure. But what's that got — "

"They were actually kraken, which is like a giant cuttlefish or squid."

Walker grins. "Man, I knew this was going to be an interesting gig."

They're all nuts, so far as I can see. And then Hellboy, as though to

drive the point home, strips off his trenchcoat. He unbuckles his belt

and lays that oversized handgun of his down on top of it, but he keeps

the big glove on. I'm starting to think maybe the hand inside is

deformed — you know, like he's got elephantitis, which would maybe

explain his size and coloring, too, but I'm no doctor. And the thing

is, his hand works fine. It's just big.

"What're you doing?" I ask.

"Going to have some fun," he says.

He turns to the lake, and that's when I see it. A red tail. He's got a

freaking tail.

I'm still trying to register the fact when he dives in.

I take a step into the water, but his partner calls me back.

"I wouldn't try to follow," she says. "Not unless you can hold your

breath for five minutes or so."

"And Hellboy can?"

"He's kind of bigger than life in a lot of ways," she says.

Walker laughs. "No kidding."

"He's got a tail," I say. I turn to Walker. "Jesus, did you see it?"

Walker only shrugs, and I make myself calm down. Okay, so he's got a

tail. I guess it should have sunk in by now that he's not exactly like

you or me. All along I've been telling myself he isn't what everyone

says he is. But he has a tail. That one's hard to get by.

Agent Sherman sits down on one of the nearby boulders and rummages

around in her pocket. She comes up with a pack of smokes.

I step out of the water and sit on a rock near her, pretending a

nonchalance I don't really feel. But I figure if she's not concerned

about her partner, I'm not going to be either. At least I won't let on

that I am.

"Look," I say. "About what happened earlier. I didn't mean — "

She waves me off before I can finish.

"That was my fault," she says. "It's a touchy subject for me. I lost

some people close to me in a fire."

She snaps her fingers and damned if a little flame doesn't appear,

hovering there between her fingers long enough for her to get her

cigarette lit. She offers it to me, but I shake my head. Walker accepts

it, though, and I watch in fascination as she lights herself another.

"Nice trick," I say.

She nods, but doesn't explain. I guess she holds to that magician's

code where you never reveal how you did the trick, though she did do it

twice. Didn't help me much. I couldn't figure it out either time.

I turn to look back at the water, then check my watch. It's been almost

three minutes, and there's still no sign of Sherman's partner.

[IMAGE]

Then ...

So Bill has one more surprise for me. I'm six days on the job, and the

task force is just settling into our new offices at police

headquarters, when he drops by with agents from something called the

Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense. Turns out the Feds have

their own full-time investigative task force.

"These are agents Hal Jones and Liz Sherman," Bill says as he ushers

them in.

The man is just a nondescript suit, but the woman is a real looker.

Great figure, pretty face. Long, red hair falling past her shoulders.

Cool, blue-gray eyes. But attractive as she is, she can't hold my

attention once the third member of their team comes through the door.

"And this is Hellboy," Bill finishes.

The third team member has to duck his head coming through the door

because he's got to be seven feet tall. I've read the news stories

about him, seen an interview or two. But I always figured it was just

some gimmick. And maybe it is, but if so, it's a good one. I put his

weight at close to four hundred pounds, but even with the trenchcoat,

you can tell there's not an ounce of fat on him. So his size grabs you

right off the bat, but then there's his skin: bright red like a cooked

lobster. Weirder still, he's got a couple of disks stuck to his

forehead — wood, bone, I'm not sure what. Except they look like they're

growing there. Like maybe he had some kind of growths and they were cut

off, which makes no sense at all. What the hell would anybody have

growing out of their head like that? But then I don't know anybody who

has his size or skin coloring either.

I can't tell the caliber of the gun he's got holstered at his hip. I

just know it's the biggest damn handgun I've ever seen. And then

there's this glove he's wearing on his right, doubling the size of his

hand. The cloth has a texture that makes it look like stone.

And he's supposed to be one of us, one of the good guys, for Christ's

sake.

I guess I've been staring, but he doesn't seem to take offense. He

smiles, like he's used to it. Like I'm an idiot for staring. So I turn

it around and focus on the strangeness of him.

"That's a seriously bad sunburn you've got there, buddy," I tell him.

The monster laughs and turns to Agent Sherman.

"Already I like him," he says to her.

"Now that we've established that we all like each other," Bill says,

"maybe we can get down to the business at hand."

"I'm all business," Hellboy assures him, but he winks at me.

It's a friendly gesture — brothers-in-arms bonding and all that — but

something goes pit-patting up my spine all the same.

Bill lays it out for us once we're in his office. A worker from the

Water & Sewer Department went missing on a regular maintenance recon

down in the storm sewers earlier this morning, so they sent in two more

to look for him. They haven't come back either, but one of the men did

make a cell call just before Water & Sewer lost contact with them.

There was screaming on his end of the line, screaming so bad that the

receptionist who took the call was being treated for shock at the

hospital as we spoke.

"What makes it our case?" I ask.

"Stafford at Water & Sewer says his men have been talking about weird

sounds coming from down in the lower sewer levels," Bill says. "Says

it's been going on for some time now."

I nod, wondering if this is how it's going to be. If every time someone

gets some little whiff of the weird they're going to call in the Spook

Squad.

"I know you and your people only came down to introduce yourselves to

my men," Bill is saying to Agent Jones, "but seeing how this will be

their first active case in the field ..."

"No problem," Jones says before Bill can finish. "Hellboy and Agent

Sherman will be happy to assist."

Great, I think. So now I'll have the Feds breathing down my neck while

dealing with my first case.

There's a little more talk between Bill and Jones, but I tune them out.

It's all bureaucratic doublespeak, making nice, we'll work together,

share resources, yadda yadda. Instead, I concentrate on what I need to

do once I get out of Bill's office. I'll take Walker and Ramirez.

Walker to come down into the sewers with me — and won't he love that —

Ramirez to set up a command post at the entrance. We'll have to grab a

couple of uniforms. I'm trying to decide what the closest precinct is

when I realize the meeting's come to an end.

"So what do you think we're looking at?" Hellboy says as we're walking

back to the Spook Squad offices. "Giant albino crocs? Mutant rats?"

I look at him, then at his partner.

"Is he for real?" I ask.

"If this is your first time out on something like this," she says, "I

guess it can seem a little over the top. But..."

She shrugs.

"Wait a sec'," I say. "You guys have seen crap like that?"

"1 just hope it's not zombies," Hellboy says. "I hate zombies. It takes

forever to wash the stink away."

[IMAGE]

Now ...

I just about have a heart attack when my radio squawks, but it's only

Ramirez at the command post, checking in.

"No, we're good," I tell her. "We just found this lake, and Hellboy's

gone for a swim looking for some giant octopus or something."

There's a moment's silence before Ramirez says, "You're kidding me,

right?"

"I wish I was."

"But — "

"I'll get back to you, Judita."

I cut the connection, still staring at the water.

"How long's it been?" I ask.

"Four minutes," Walker says.

I turn to Agent Sherman, but before I can ask if we shouldn't be

starting to worry, something explodes out of the water. No, not

something. It's Hellboy. The beam from Walker's flashlight follows his

trajectory as he sails maybe fifteen feet above the water before

smashing against the wall to our right. When he lands, he lies still,

but we don't have time to see to him, because there's something else

coming out of the lake.

Now, I heard what the B.P.R.D. agents were telling me earlier about

giant squids and crap, but it didn't really register. By which, I

guess, what I really mean is, it was just too stupid to take seriously.

But this ... this thing ...

Stupid, impossible, whatever — I can't deny what I'm seeing.

The water churns, and this monster the size of a small car rises up out

of the lake. We play our flashlights on it, but there's no way their

beams can take the whole of it in at once. I freeze when my light

illuminates one huge eye along the side of its head because there's ...

not exactly intelligence, but certainly a cunning that's more than

animal in the look it gives me.

Tentacles ... arms ... these appendages thick as tree trunks come

whipping out of the water, and then things get even weirder.

Turns out Agent Sherman's trick with lighting a cigarette is just the

tip of the iceberg when it comes to her talents. She puts her hands

together, and when she moves them apart, a ball of fire forms in

between.

I don't know what she plans to do with it, because she doesn't get the

time. One of those tentacles comes ripping out of the water and knocks

her flying. The flame ball lands in the water and splutters out. She

lies still.

I manage to duck as the tentacle comes for me — I don't know how, I'm

just a gibbering idiot at this point. It's like everything's closing up

inside me, and I can't even remember how to breathe. I've been a cop

for over fifteen years, and I've been in situations before. Serious

situations. I've seen shit nobody should have to take home from work.

But this thing does what nothing else in my experience ever has. It

just shuts me down.

So I don't know how I manage to duck. I just do.

Walker isn't as lucky.

He's standing there like me, frozen, just staring at the thing. He

starts to move when the tentacle comes for him, but he's not quick

enough. It wraps around him and tugs him up into the air.

I know I couldn't have done this for myself. I just didn't have what it

would take in what was left of me. But on the job, your partner's a

sacred trust. That's the first thing my rabbi taught me when he took me

under his wing. No matter what, you watch your partner's back. You

stand by him and take the bullet for him if that's how it plays out.

So seeing that the monster's got Walker is what makes me move. I know

my .38's not going to do a damn thing against this creature, but we've

got something else down here that might.

I take the few quick steps over to where Hellboy dropped his gear and

tug that oversized handgun of his out of its holster. Turns out it's

not so much a handgun as small mortar cannon with a handle, and the

damn thing weighs a ton. I need both hands to hold it, to aim. I

squeeze the trigger, and the blast pretty much deafens me. The gun

bucks in my hand, and I feel a snap as my shoulder dislocates. The gun

falls from my hand, back onto Hellboy's coat.

But I hit the monster.

Didn't kill it, I don't think, but I did enough damage that it shrieks

with pain and drops Walker into the lake. Those arms of its are

churning the water into a froth. My gaze goes from the gun to Walker. I

don't think I can lift the gun again, even if I had another shot for

it, but I don't know that I can get out there to Walker either.

Then a big shape looms up beside me, and I don't have to decide.

Hellboy stoops and picks up his gun. He cracks it open, knocks out the

spent shell and inserts another that he gets from the pocket of his

coat.

"I'm impressed," he says. "I haven't met many guys who can fire this

and actually hit anything."

He holds the gun with one hand and fires off a round, reloads and fires

again. The first goes deep into the oily skin on the monster's side.

The second hits it in the eye. Bam, bam. Just like that, and the

creature's falling back into the water, dead. The impact of its body

sets up a wave that brings Walker in close enough that I can wade in

and pull him back to shore with my good arm.

He coughs up some water, but otherwise he's okay.

I find my flashlight. I play its beam over the body, and we just stand

there staring at the damn thing floating in the water. Then I think of

Agent Sherman. I turn to find that Hellboy's already seen to her. She

seems to be shook up, but okay.

I remember the fireball she made in her hands.

I turn again to look at the impossible monster floating in this

underground lake.

"Everybody okay over here?" Hellboy asks as he walks up to us.

Walker nods.

"I think your damn gun dislocated my shoulder," I tell him.

"Yeah, it's got a kick. Here, let me fix it."

"No, it's okay. I can wait to see a — "

I don't get the chance to say "medic" before he's already grabbed my

arm and popped my shoulder back into place. The pain goes through me

like a white heat.

"Th-thanks," I manage.

"What happened to you down there?" Walker asks.

Hellboy shrugs. "I couldn't get a grip on its skin — it was too slick."

Agent Sherman joins us. She lights a cigarette, and I don't even blink

at her not using a lighter.

"We were lucky," I say.

Hellboy shakes his head. "The hell we were. We're better than the

monsters. We're smarter, and we never give up. That's why we're always

going to come out on top at the end."

"I guess ..."

"I'm serious," Hellboy says. "You want to survive in this business, you

need to remember that. The monsters are strong, and they're mean, and

they can scare the crap out of you. But we can stand up to them. We can

put them down. It's what we do."

Agent Sherman smiles. "Make the world a safer place, yadda yadda."

"But it's true," Hellboy says.

"I know it is," she tells him.

Hellboy works a kink out of his neck, then bends down to get his coat

and holster.

"You know what I need?" he says, looking at us.

Walker and I shake our heads.

Hellboy grins. "I need Peking ravioli."

[IMAGE]

There's paperwork and debriefings to go through, but here's the good

thing about having the Feds at your back: you can put it off until

tomorrow on their say-so. We take Hellboy and Agent Sherman to

Cassidy's, a cop bar on Palm Street, but not until he's had his Peking

ravioli. Hell, he earned them.

"So you still think the boogeyman's all a load of crap?" Walker asks

later when we're walking back to our car.

I shake my head. "I just don't get how we don't hear more about it.

You'd think the papers and TV crews would be all over this stuff. You'd

think there'd be federal task forces with their scientists dissecting

these things right down to the cellular level. But there's nada."

"Well, we don't know about the scientists," Walker starts.

"What do you mean?"

He shrugs. "Someone's going to go down there and take that monster

away."

"I guess you're right. They're just going to keep a lid on it."

"Everything's need-to-know," Walker says.

"But what about the ordinary joes who get caught up in this kind of

thing?"

"I figure it's a kind of consensual denial, you know? It's easier to

let it just be something that never happened. Human beings, we're good

at that."

I nod. "I suppose we are."

It's another half-block to where we found a parking spot earlier, and

we cover the distance in silence.

"Do you think the armory carries silver bullets?" I ask when we reach

our car.

"I don't know. Why?"

"It's a full moon next week. I thought I might go hunt me a werewolf."

"Bobby Cairns," Walker says.

"Since I can't find him as a human — maybe I'll have better luck

tracking him down as a creature of the night."

I can't believe I just said "creature of the night" in all seriousness.

I guess I'll have to get used to it on this job.

"You doing this for Lela," Walker asks, "or for the safety of the

public?"

I have to think about that for a moment. I know what my immediate

answer is, but now that I've learned what I have about how the world

really works, everything's more complicated.

"Bit of both," I finally tell him.

He nods. "Either way, let me know when you're going out. I'll watch

your back."

Special thanks to my pals Dave Russell and Mark Finn for vetting this.