Anton Strout - Dead Waters

The Inspectre paused in recall, but I stepped forward.

“I do,” I said. “That was the day you almost died, yes? There was a fissure in the earth of a graveyard, ghouls pouring out it—”

“Exactly,” Mason said, giving me a look of suspicion, “but how do you know that?”

I held my hands up and wiggled my fingers. “Psychometrist,” I said. “I let my fingers do the walking.”

“Fascinating,” he said. A spark of interest lit up on his face, the same spark of fascinated curiosity I had seen on it from the vision.

“Look,” I said. “I get it. I really do. For the Inspectre here, that day is but a distant memory, but for me? My powers made it seem like only yesterday. I’ve even felt how you feel. I know the panic you felt that day when you were nearly dragged down into the earth. I understand why you walked away from that life of risk. Hell, I have days in the office where I want to just throw the towel in, too.”

Mason was paying attention to me now. He stared at me like I was stupid. “So, why don’t you, then?” he asked

I shrugged. I wasn’t quite sure of the answer myself

“It’s not in his nature,” Jane said, speaking up in my defense.

Mason Redfield laughed at that. “Not yet , anyway,” he said.

“What do you mean by that?” I asked.

“How old are you?” Mason asked. “In your twenties still, yes?”

“What’s that got to do with it?” I asked.

“Everything,” he said, darkness thick in his voice. “I almost died that day you saw, and every day after that I wondered when the other shoe was going to drop. When was the grim reaper going to show up at my door? Over time it built, festered. . . and the years slipped by, age creeping up on me, robbing me of my strength, and I couldn’t help but wonder if maybe there was a way to cheat death. There had to be.”

The Inspectre shook his head at his old friend. “So you struck a bargain,” he said, “with that woman in green. Tell me, Mason, how did you manifest her? You haven’t practiced arcana in years.”

“Actually,” Mason said, “finding her was purely accidental. I unearthed her withered remains while researching the ship graveyard below the Hell Gate Bridge for a perfectly normal documentary I wanted to do about those mundane horrors your friend here suggested. Charybdis was damaged, weakened, and needed my help, which I gladly offered in exchange for some help of my own I wanted.”

“This is her weak?” Jane asked. “Geez. I’d hate to see her in tip-top shape.”

“No,” Mason said. “Once we raise Scylla and Charybdis takes control of her host, she will return to her full power. It took years to return her to her current state. I helped her recover and she promised in return to tell me dark secrets to assist me in pursuit of my rebirth.”

“At the expense of others,” the Inspectre reminded him.

“No,” Mason said. “Not at first, anyway. Originally I only twisted my students to the use of magic trying to make film come alive. Nefarious, but mostly harmless. I kept my grander plan for my youth a secret. When Charybdis was recovered enough to her satisfaction, she finally shared those dark secrets with me. I never knew she would want blood in return.”

“Oh, come, now,” the Inspectre said. “We both know that’s not true. You must surely have suspected. Even with what you had seen in your short time with the Department, you must have known that such a bargain would bear a heavy price.”

“Perhaps,” he said, admitting it with a slight smile, “but it is a price I’ve come to live with for the promise of rebirth.”

It was the Inspectre’s turn to smile, but there was a sadness to it.

“You can’t cheat death,” the Inspectre said.

“Oh, no?” Mason asked, turning to look at Aidan. “What about him? He seems to be doing quite well at it.”

“Make no mistake,” the Inspectre said. “Death even comes to their kind, even if it is staved off by supernatural means. Some give up wanting to live, some are struck down by vampire hunters, but eventually death comes to us all .”

“Hey!” Aidan said. “Not cool with all this talk about me dying, guys.”

Mason Redfield looked around for a way to escape as we argued in the growing fury of the storm, but there was none.

“Come, now, Mason,” the Inspectre said, walking after him. “Give yourself up. You can’t run anymore. You’re surrounded.”

Mason spun around, angry. “Are you happy growing old, Argyle? Are you?”

The Inspectre stopped. “Honestly, no,” he said, “but it has made me appreciate life all the more for what it is. We get one go-round, Mason. That’s all.”

“Well, not me,” he said, “and once I am finished carrying out Charbydis’s wishes, I intend to get right on appreciating my second one.”

“How are you helping her with the ritual?” I asked.

Mason fixed me with a sinister stare. “You shall see,” he said.

“No, Mason,” the Inspectre said, good and pissed. I had never seen him this angry. “This ends. . . now.”

As a group, our circle closed in on Mason Redfield. I held the business end of my bat up high, ready to swing. Redfield was close enough that I’d have no trouble dropping him if needed, but a second later that wasn’t even an option.

A blast of water shot up through the slats of the bridge itself, shattering some of its structure and flinging shards of it in every direction. The water wrapped itself in a wide circle around Redfield, rising up above him for several feet and staying around him like some bizarre waterfall feature at a mall. One thing was sure: Mason Redfield wasn’t responsible for it. Even he looked surprised to see it happening.

Inside the protective circle the water began to solidify until the woman in green stood by his side. Her hair swirled in the chaos of the growing storm.

“Nice Medusa effect,” I said.

“Wrong Greek monster, kid,” Connor said.

“Sorry.” I tested the wall of water with my bat. The rushing water threatened to tug my bat skyward from my hand, but I tightened my grip and pulled it back. Before I could do anything else, the woman’s voice boomed out into the night.

“Prokypto,” she said, holding her arms out and looking down through the bridge.

“What?” I said.

“It’s Greek,” Connor said. “ Arise. She’s starting the ritual now!”

I looked down, too. Below, the water churned against the edge of the island like it was boiling. Bits of old, rotted wood rose to the surface, ancient timbers that littered the surface, looking like tiny toothpicks from where we stood.

“I gather those are the remains of the General Slocum ,” Connor said.

“And countless other ships, no doubt,” the Inspectre added.

“Aidan,” I said, looking over at him on the far side of the water barrier. “Do something!”

He shook his head. “What part of ‘not good with water’ did you not get, Canderous?”

“Fine,” I said. “I’ll handle it myself.” I rushed the wall of water protecting the woman and Mason Redfield. The woman was already looking toward me, waiting. She pointed her arms out at me.

No, not at me. Past me. Jane screamed, stopping me in my tracks. I spun around. She was doubled over, clutching her arms around her midsection. “Jane!”

“Get her away from here, kid,” Connor said. “Now. At least off the bridge, anyway. If the woman can’t have Jane, she can’t complete her ceremony. Hopefully, anyway.”

“Right,” I said, grabbing Jane around her shoulders. We ran off as the Inspectre started talking reason with Mason through the wall of water. As we ran farther away from the woman and the professor, a new sound filled the air as we dodged through the swarm of lingering ghosts. A rush of water of tidal-wave proportions filled my ears and I looked down through the bridge. The surface of the river erupted, a greenish gray mass of land rising up, water pouring off it in waterfalls. No, not land, I realized. Flesh. Whatever was rising was alive. It rolled as it rose, exposing the familiar yellow eye I had seen in the vision of the General Slocum sinking. Scylla was no longer dormant, and even bigger than when I had seen it. A jagged maw of teeth opened to nearly the size of a bus, water running down into its throat. A gurgling roar rose up from it, causing me to grab Jane tighter and run a little faster.