C.O.P.S.
THE YANKEE
Chapter One
"Hey Harry, I picked us a weird one." Johnson said to me with a grin. He was ex military and it showed but he was also scrawny, ginger, and had big old Dumbo ears so folks called him Radar. Despite the fact that I usually work with my sister, she and I have separate partners. She has Carmichael and I have Radar.
"They're all weird or they wouldn't be down here." I said sitting in my desk across from his. I took out a soft cover novel by Justin Gustainis, my new favorite author, and a picture Susan made for me with a couple selfies (or is the term us-sies) she took of the two of us with a disposable since her phone would fry in my presence. The frame held four photos so there was also a shot of me wearing my cat on my face while I slept and the fourth slot had her looking amazing in a cocktail dress. At a bit of an angle there was a photo booth strip glued to the frame of the two of us; kissing, picking each others' noses, her giving me a noogie, and one that looked like us getting frisky to the untrained eye. I was tickling her but her only ticklish spot is where her bum meets her leg, and there's so little room inside a photo booth.
"Nice. So you are dating that reporter." Radar said approvingly. He'd been married for over a decade to his high school sweetheart. He only kept the wedding photos on his desk to show off his beautiful bride. Lots of folks assumed they were newlyweds. The truth was; like most military house wives she doubled in size, stopped grooming herself, then started popping out kids like she had to make quota. "You don't think she's just using you for the insider tips do you? Reporters tend to have a one track mind when they smell a story." I shook my head then spared a glance at his pictures. In the photo she had a pert little nose on a heart shaped face, long forest green hair in wide curls gathered over one shoulder, and a slender frame. These days her pert little nose resembled a potato dead center on her face, just an inch below her eyes. It reminded me mildly of the few trolls I'd met in my time who didn't immediately try to eat me. Changelings could live virtually undetected among mortals if they wanted. There was a chance, seeing how drastically she changed that she had a little troll heritage. I didn't want to mention that to Radar, though every time I saw his wife I was sure of it.
"Even if she is, I get to wake up next to that." I nodded to the picture of Susan. "No way am I missing the opportunity." I answered. "So what's this weird case?"
"I got called to an armed robbery down at Left Hand Goods, being in the neighborhood, and this guy is stealing just weird stuff from that place with all the crystals and occult stuff… is that what you people call it?" he asked. Because of my pentacle necklace I inherited from my birth mother and… expertise, folks lump me in with the goths and the pagans.
"Nah man, we just call them supplies. Really you don't need to go to those places to get what you need for spells. That place is for tourists and posers." I explained to him. He shrugged.
"Well he's taking like eye of newt and toe of frog and whatever, then when I show up he tells me I'm not going to shoot but I better turn off my lights or an old lady is going to rear end someone bad because she's busy rubbernecking. Before I can say a thing, CRASH!" I jumped in my seat. He's good at telling stories. "I turn to see, then turn back, he's gone. We dusted for prints, got a sketch artist rendering because there's no cameras on the joint, then I came back to file my report. I get the results on the prints, it's a guy named Hank Mitchell, only he couldn't of been on the count of the fact that at that very moment he was robbing Bert Decker's shop, he was miles away attending physics lectures at Connecticut University with two dozen alibies." Radar slapped the desk.
"Okay that is weird." I agreed. "Could have been a doppelganger or even an illusion. The one in class would have to be fake."
"Any way they might be twins like you and Boss?"
"Even twins have different finger prints." I shook my head. No use correcting him on the 'me and Boss' bit either. She still seemed a bit upset at me for moving out. My shift is at night while hers is in the day. She's not afraid to burn the late night oil but all the same, since I moved and she put me on nights, we saw each other maybe an hour a week. It reminded me uncomfortably of the four years we lived with DuMorne. She had seemed pretty happy these past couple times we ran into each other. I guess separating did us both some good in the romance department and working with our actual partners was probably earning us a bit more respect in the precinct.
"Yeah, it was a flimsy idea any way. The guy looked in his 40's, the prints say he's 20."
"He might be even older than that. Folks in the magic community don't age like everyone else. He might look 40 and be 100 for all we know. Did he leave anything of his behind?"
"No, but Decker is faxing over an itemized list of what was taken."
"Of course he is." I grumbled. Once Johnson got me the fax I examined things and didn't know what the heck I was looking at. "Stars… hey Johnson, you mind making me a copy of this?"
"Guess I better. The thing fouls up enough already without you getting near it." He took the list back then got me a copy. "Can I get you some coffee too Mister Murphy?" he snarked before getting back to work sifting through some lore books I compiled in the office. Lunch break I went home and consulted Bob.
"Oh no, Harry this is bad! This is rift in the fabric of reality bad news Harry!" Bob exclaimed.
"Tell me about it." I asked genuinely.
"Harry, you're a smart guy, not the smartest, but pretty up there, but I doubt you would truly be able to comprehend." Bob began.
"Well I have to do something, I'll need to understand what I'm dealing with here." I said, sitting with a sandwich and a coke to eat while I listened.
"He's preforming a spell obviously but it calls for a sacrifice that only a sick sort of fellow would be capable of. That's hardly the worse part. The spell is to travel in time!"
"That's… how is that possible? I thought you couldn't truly pass through time and even if you could it was forbidden." I said confused.
"That is where your feeble human brain with all its misconceptions of boundaries and propriety is too encumbered to comprehend." Bob sighed in exasperation.
"Enough with the $5 words, Bob, try to explain."
"Well first off, time is relative. Humans slapped a unit of measurement on it so they could use it to better understand the events around them but you must understand there is no second or minute, or hour. Likewise, it's not so much moving forward as you are moving through it. Now casting aside what I just said, from this second to the next there are infinite possibilities as to what will happen next. Depending on what's going on now, we can predict with 90% certainty what will happen next." I nodded, wondering if I should be taking notes. "But there are some pre dictated events that are near unavoidable. We all call it fate or destiny. Say you are destined to go to the aquarium. You have no need, and don't even know you want to go –yet- but Susan calls, she just got tickets so she can write about the new exibit of… I don't know an extinct fish, so you go to the aquarium as planned."
"Okay, but what if someone mugs her and takes the tickets so I don't get to go?"
"That's precisely what this spell poses! Someone tries to, in this example, take those tickets. In this case, fate would improvise. Suddenly there's a case where the fish in question eats one of the tank cleaning people, so Karen sends you to investigate, then fate is back on track. Only problem is, by coming back to mug Susan, the mugger has created a reality where she takes you to the aquarium, and one where you go because of a case instead of a date."
"Okay I get it but it doesn't sound too bad."
"Well what if the time traveling mugger keeps going back and back and back, trying to keep you out of the aquarium dozens of different ways? Where are we going to fit all those realities?" Bob asked. "I'll tell you where, they'll begin to merge, overlap, implode even. The universe (and multiverse) is allegedly infinite, but for some reason the tampering of time doesn't agree with it and… what's a sound effect for imploding?" I sat stunned and quiet so Bob moved on. "Well whatever the case, there's no telling which reality would come out on top. Then we might be stuck in one where you were, like, a white court vampire bent on world domination." Bob concluded his lecture.
"I see your point. What's the sacrifice?" to Bob's confused look, I took a swig of Coke then cleared my throat. "What's the messed up thing Mitchell would have to sacrifice to make the spell work?"
"Himself… the one from this timeline anyway." Bob said solemnly.
I compiled everything Bob said and what was in the case file into a report for the boss and typed it up on an old-fashioned typewriter. Johnson and I went over the case, and left what we had so far for Karen then went home for the day. That's when I had to figure out what to do about it. If we arrested the kid and put him into protective custody, Hank might have already experienced us doing it once and took counter measures ahead of time. Beside that, he was a warlock, breaking into a mortal prison or safe house would be cake. I could fly to Connecticut and watch over the kid, but for how long? For a second, just a second, I thought of maybe killing the kid before he could be used in another spell. A sick shiver ran down my spine. Of course I couldn't do that. But it would solve the problem. I went for a jog to clear my mind. Maybe it'll shake out more options.
When I got back I saw my sister waiting for me. She was two feet shorter than me with brown hair and blue eyes. Nobody ever believed us when we said we were siblings until she started dying her hair brown. She started getting a bit more respect around then too. Her physique was a bit stocky looking but that was mostly due to the Kevlar vest and shoulder rig with her 1911 under her shirt. She wore her pea coat over a blue silk shirt and khaki slacks. Since our childhood I'd only seen her in a skirt once. She waited patiently for me to jog up to the stairs to my front door then held up my report.
"So what, Marty McFly comes and robs a joint in Chicago but his main ingredient is in Connecticut? Why is he here?" My sister seemed more bothered than usual today.
"I don't know. I just wrote what Bob told me about the spell."
"And there are no other spells or maybe combination of two spells that can require these same exact ingredients?" she demanded.
"I didn't think to ask."
"Harry, Magic is frightening enough when its making tables float, and an ace of spades come out somebody's ear, and I know the things that can really be done with it…" Karen's voice cracked. "But now you're telling me this fellow has pretty much been here and done this, any number of times, tweaking around events to his benefit? This is catastrophic! You need to fix this, I don't care if you fly to the constitution state and personally bodyguard this guy, fix it yesterday." Karen's hands had a shake to them.
"What's the matter, sis?"
"I just told you what the matter was." She replied. I shook my head.
"No what's really bothering you?"
"I… the artist rendering Johnson had made… it was of a guy I met at a bar around the time you moved out. Called himself Hank. I really liked him. I almost let him… in the house." She rolled her eyes. "And now he's a time traveling murderous sociopath who, Hells Bells, he might have researched me and was trying to scam me, or something."
"you were about to say something else… Almost let him, what?"
"Almost gave it up for him… you know, my," she mumbled virginity. I was shocked. How was she still a virgin? If she could be a virgin at our age she'd have to be pathetic or a saint… she was far from pathetic, heck a lot of her haters were just guys without the balls to ask her out. They'd convince themselves she was a cold fish and call her worse hanging out with the other guys. Man I felt embarrassed. I'd been a little horn dog since the age 14. Elaine and I gave it up at the age of 16.
"Wow… I didn't know." I said not knowing if it was the right thing to say. I swallowed hard. "Uh… I'll see if I can get the wizard council over here to grab the guy. I just hope they get here in time." The wizard council has an odd way of prioritizing but use of the black was up there on the list. I exchanged a now terribly awkward hug with my practically canonized sister, trying not to taint her with my unworthy presence and went to the wire to get a council member to Connecticut.
I was glad to hear McCoy was heading over to help with my time sensitive issue. He was my mentor for nearly three years. After laying it all out for him he concluded it was perhaps the best course of action to kill the Hank of our time AND the traveler.
"He's innocent!"
"We don't know that yet, Hoss. Fact, the young one might be more dangerous for all we know. Both of them are warlocks any case, current or prospective, and you know the sentence for warlocks." McCoy shook his head in apology. "Sorry Hoss, but time isn't on our side in this one. It's working for the other guy."
We got to the University campus in the old truck McCoy always drove, and I looked around the semi-modern red brick buildings for an info center or map or something. Eventually we found an info center with the student volunteer being a chubby perky little blond. Her face was a perfect circle and her hair was pulled so tight she almost looked Asian. She directed us where we could find Hank then we went on our way to find him.
When we did, I can't say I was too pleased. I had painted him as an innocent kid who could turn over a new leaf, who had the chance to be something, a good person even. We busted in on him in the basement of one of the administrative buildings. We had broken into his room and did a tracking spell for him using stuff we gathered from there. He had apparently let the older Hank set up the spell and turned on him. He was in fact about to plunge the dagger into his older self's throat when we came in and McCoy struck him with green lightning.
Hank lesser jumped up and formed angry red orbs of energy and flung them at us. I barely escaped but it managed to melt off the bottom of one shoe. We split up to divide his focus, which helped. He threw another orb at me so I used my shield, praying it would work, to deflect it back to him. He leaped out the way, and then while he was distracted, McCoy cast a spell that coiled purple smoke around him until he was completely encased in it. He struggled for a while then went limp. I was horrified but I accepted it as necessity. We turned to focus on Hank major but-
"Where'd he go?" I asked McCoy.
"Look out!" McCoy shouted, hurling another green bolt toward me. I dropped and rolled to the side then McCoy charged another bolt but Hank made a gesture and McCoy and I were tossed against the wall.
"You don't belong here, Hank!" I shouted, trying to peel myself from the wall.
Hank shrugged. "He who is transplanted still sustains."
"Why are you doing this? What do you hope to change?" I asked to get him talking.
"You don't realize what a freaking hero you are, Harry. Nemesis tried EVERYTHING to get rid of you, but nothing worked. You saved the world… multiple times." He mused as he used another gesture to push Hank lesser into the circle. The purple smoke vanished. "So, Nemesis sent me back in time to prevent your birth." He took the knife that was once trained on him and slit the young man's throat over a stone basin centered in the circle. "I killed Malcolm Dresden, so your slut mother just had you with someone else. You actually turned out MORE of a threat. So I tried again. Tried to kill your mother, but she was too good. Not powerful as you, but a lot smarter. I tried 20 times before I got just about the right recipe. I killed Malcolm as soon as you were conceived, couldn't kill Maggie, no problem, she died in childbirth. I had to let the Murphy's adopt you because when you were raised in the foster system you had street smarts that gave you certain advantages at times. I couldn't afford that." He waived his hand in the air, waiting for the slow dead blood to drain. It took a while because there was no heartbeat to pump it out.
"Then I had to wait around 11 years for you to come into your powers then killed Colin Murphy. Once he was out of the picture you grew weak. After that, I tried to burn the house down with you and all the rest of the Murphy's in it… except for Karen. But you mucked that plan up too!" he waited for the blood to fill the stone basin. "You must have crawled into bed with her earlier that night." He said sourly. "I told the fire demon leave her room, incinerate the rest of the house."
"Why would you care if Karen got out safe? You're willing to kill yourself, women, children, babies…" I struggled to push aside the thought of my newborn sister Lisa; dead before she could even live. I pushed aside the tears and hatred... "Why were you trying to get into my sister's pants any way? You had to know you were risking exposure." I asked, mostly to keep him talking till I could figure a way out of this pickle.
"Because I love her." He said frankly. I blinked. "I've done this multiple times, obviously, and every time, SHE has been your greatest asset. She has brought you to where you had to be, backed you up unquestioning, and held you up when any greater man would have fallen. She's a pillar of goodness, an angel. I hoped this time around, I could make her my angel instead of yours." His voice became rough. "It didn't quite pan out that way… so this time around I know what I must take from you to ensure you can not stop Nemesis." He had furious and mournful tears in his eyes. Suddenly I understood. At least to him, Karen was going to help me stop this 'Nemesis' or whoever, and he developed a crush. He decided everybody wins if he could get her on his side instead of mine but Karen must have broke it off and he decided to go back again to kill her so she couldn't be of use to me or anyone.
That scared me. Karen was a freaking saint, she didn't deserve to die, our brothers didn't our mother and father didn't, my real parents didn't, and baby Lisa didn't. I got angry. I may not have turned green and ripped my pants, but Hank wasn't going to like me angry. I turned my hatred into will and pushed against Hank's power. He was now focusing on the spell to travel back and maybe let Karen and me die in that fire. I thought maybe I could prevent anyone from dying in the fire, but if I went back I'd be stuck there and not here to stop Nemesis. I had to stop Hank now. I clawed to the circle. If I could break it, the backlash would kill Hank. I could possibly throw up a shield fast enough to keep McCoy and me safe in the process. I had to try.
I slapped my hand on the painted circle and smeared the semi fresh paint around, trying to will the spell broken. I felt a pull- no, the push stopped! I felt it and looked up, and Hank smiled down at me before he just vanished. He had completed the spell before I even got there… he was going to some alternate reality right now to murder my family for the umpteenth time.
"Buck up, Hoss, you did what you could. He wont be coming back here at least." McCoy tried to comfort me. Once he left, I sat in my apartment and cried. It had been a while since I let myself remember what happened to my family, and now it was there like it just happened hours ago. I was saved from the fire by a nightmare. That was why I was in Karen's bed. I dreamed that I became a monster and tortured and killed other monsters, betrayed friends and family, and all sorts of things like that. I had claws of ice, and a demon inside my head, and did a number of unspeakable things. To me, I failed to save a great number of people today.
"Oh get over it, Harry!" Bob cried out.
"GET OVER IT?" I demanded. The flames of all the candles turned angry red and jumped two feet tall, scorching the ceiling.
"You forgot what I said about fate! Hell Harry, I wouldn't be surprised if you end up saving your family the next time around. Without being in Karen's room that night, you would have been on fire. Your wizard instincts would have kicked in and you likely would have put the house out before anyone had died. Who knows? But you can't beat yourself up about it because it was out of your hands from the start." Bob explained. "It's useless thinking about the past. It's done. Move forward!"
"You said time moving forward was an illusion." I grumbled.
"Time is an illusion. Events happen, we can't change them… most of us can't. So no use dwelling on it." Bob sighed. Neat trick when you don't have lungs, but so is talking. The phone rang. I picked it up reluctantly but it could have been important. It was Susan. She apologized for being busy lately and wanted to come over. I was too busy to notice. I didn't want human interaction at the moment but I thought I should talk to someone who might console me better than Bob. I gave him a look then rubbed my sore puffy eyes.
"Sure, I need the company right now." I answered. She asked if I was all right, but I waited for her to come over to tell her about the fire and my four siblings and our parents. Susan actually cried along with me, which felt comforting somehow. She held me till we fell asleep.
The next morning I delivered the final real report to my sister so she could embellish it into something more acceptable to vanilla closed-minded mortals. When she finished reading it she frowned up at me. "This guy says you are supposed to save the world… multiple times." She shook the report.
"You help, apparently." I grumbled a bit too roughly. "Sorry, I'm just so pissed! Its my fault they're dead. It's because of me that the house was burned down. Had you never taken me in-" my voice cracked.
"Its not your fault. You blame a girl who dumped a guy if he turns around and starts shooting folks? No you blame him! You didn't burn our house down, he did. The sick son of a witch. Harry, go home. Take as much time as you need."
"I wasn't blaming you either." I said. She gave that particular analogy because she was blaming herself; I had to make her understand it wasn't her fault either. "I mean I resent you for tons of things. I hate how much cuter than me you are, how much smarter you are, how pure and righteous you are, and apparently you are how I save the world. Hells Bells that sounds pretentious. But this guy killed mom, the boys, and Lisa. You were absolutely right to dump him. You should have given him a Lorena Bobbit Job!" she blinked down at her desk then in her best hard boiled city cop impression she turned to me and said,
"Get outa here!"
Page 10 of 10
