"Who do you know in Andover, Massachusetts?" my wife asked me. She had brought in the mail, as she usually does on her way to work, and on the top of the pile was a letter with a handwritten address, postmarked from Andover.

"Nobody, as far as I know."

"Is it someone else selling solar panels? Should I throw it away?"

"No, let me see it first."

She handed it over, and I opened it and scanned it quickly. "It's from Naseem! Old Army buddy," I explained. "He says . . . he says he's coming here next week. On some kind of cross-country tour. With . . . oh, boy."

"What? What is it?"

"He's bringing Wind-Over-Mountain."

"What is a Wind-Over-Mountain?"

"He's a yeti. Bit of a long story."

"I want to hear this."

"No time right now. You'll be late."

"Then write it out for me. I want to know how you met a yeti, and why he is coming here."

"I'd like to know that myself. Okay, I'll have it ready for you when you come home tonight."

It's like the old saying goes. You can take the boy out of Eerie, but . . .

It was bad enough having to deal with weird stuff at home. When weird stuff followed me halfway around the world, I knew this was not coincidence. This was my calling. It became my job to figure out what we were facing, and how to beat it.

It started with the zombies. Now, these weren't bloody, vicious, Walking Dead zombies. These were enemy combatants who wouldn't go down when we shot them.

"Why won't they drop?" my buddy Ellis cried out in frustration.

It was then that I saw it. You can always spot a zombie by the eyes. Their eyes are blank and white, with no irises or pupils. Of course, if you're close enough to see the whites of their eyes, you're in trouble.

"Head shot!" I advised the others. "Blow their brains out!"

"What?" Hector Gonzalez asked.

"Only way to keep 'em down!" I was already aiming at the closest zombie. I'm no sharpshooter, but he was close enough that I made the shot.

There were only about a dozen zombies, and eight of us, so we got rid of them pretty quickly. Once the danger was past, our sergeant, Harrison, demanded to know what had just happened.

"Reanimation spells are actually pretty easy," I told him. "I met someone once who brought her dead boyfriend back to life. It didn't end well. But if someone wanted to make a bunch of zombies, all you have to do is recite the spell over the corpses, add the secret ingredient, and then give them simple instructions. Fortunately, as you saw, zombies are also easy to kill. Disrupt the brain, and they die. Again."

"And you know this how?"

"Remind me to tell you about Eerie sometime," I said.

A few weeks later, we were ambushed by a huge flock of what looked and acted like birds with metal wings, dive-bombing us from out of nowhere. A few of us got clipped before we made it inside the command center, and we could hear the "birds" slamming into the walls.

"What the heck were those?" Sergeant Harrison demanded.

"I don't know," I said, "but I know how I can find out."

I logged onto the computer and e-mailed Simon.

To: SHolmes221

From: SpookyT

Re: possible creature ID

You know anything about birds with metal wings? They attacked us just now. Any idea how to get rid of them?

Thanks,

M.

It was hours before the reply came in, due mostly to the time difference. In that time, we stayed inside, though all was quiet outside. I thought the birds might have gone off to feed or roost or whatever. But I didn't want to sound the all-clear unless I knew for sure they were gone.

Then there was a ping as the reply arrived in my inbox.

To: SpookyT

From: SHolmes221

Re: creature sighting

Sounds like you've got harpies. They're not usually found east of Turkey, but something's disrupted their migration patterns the last few years. They're bulletproof, but a couple of incendiaries chucked into their midst will destroy them and scatter the survivors. They shouldn't bother you again.

I'd ask you to save me a sample for study, but they don't do well in captivity.

Hope this helps.

S.

I turned to Sergeant Harrison with a smile on my face. "We need," I told him, "to make them go boom!"

That wasn't the end of it, by any means. So much weird stuff happened to us that we decided there must be a sorcerer with a grudge working for the other side. Any time something out of the ordinary happened, we said, "Jafar's at it again."

The insurgents had Jafar; the U. S. Army had me. So, no contest there.

And then one night, something big and hairy blundered into our camp.

I was on night watch, along with Ellis and Gonzalez. It was only a quarter moon, so it was safe for me to be seen by others. On full moon nights, I took solo watch.

Hector and I were playing cards with his new JLAnimated pack, when suddenly his head snapped up and he sniffed at the air. "Something out there," he said.

"Some thing?" Ellis asked, picking up his weapon.

"Doesn't smell human."

"How can you tell?"

I could hear it now, too, stealthy rustling in the underbrush behind us. "Don't make any sudden moves," I advised.

The rustling stopped.

"Maybe it's gone away," Ellis said.

Hector sniffed again. "Nope. It's still here. Ellis, grab that light."

Ellis picked up the emergency light on the ground at his feet. He switched it on and swung it around in a one-hundred-eighty-degree arc.

"I guess he's gone," he said hastily.

Hector shook his head. "City kids. When that thing leaves, we'll hear it."

"What do you think it is?" I asked.

"Don't know. But it's big. Smells like wet dog."

I could smell it now. "It's coming from that direction," I said, pointing to my right. "Ellis, shine the light that way."

"I'm tellin' ya, there's nothing-"

He swung the light around and we saw it.

It was huge, towering over Ellis, who was six foot five. It was covered in whitish-gray, shaggy fur, and its face was flat, like an ape's. Its claws were at least an inch long.

Ellis dropped the light and reached for his rifle. I picked up the light and asked him, "What are you doing?"

"I'm not gonna shoot it! Just fire a warning shot to try and scare it off."

"I don't think something that size scares easy," said Hector.

"It's a yeti," I said. "But they live way up in the mountains. What's he doing down here?"

"I don't know," Ellis said, "and I don't care." He lifted the rifle and put his finger on the trigger.

And then something happened that surprised even me, the resident weird expert. The yeti raised his hands in the air and said something.

"What's he doing?" Hector asked.

"'Don't shoot,'" I said, translating the words. "It's the one Farsi phrase I know."

"That thing speaks Farsi?"

"Ellis, put the gun down. And go find Naseem."

He seemed dazed as he set the rifle down and went back into base camp. "A yeti. One that speaks Farsi, no less. Now I've seen everything."

He returned a moment later with Private Naseem Ayali, who was born in Iraq, emigrated to the US with his family as a child, and had jumped at the chance to go and defend his homeland on behalf of his adopted country. He usually served as our translator.

"What is it?" he asked.

I pointed.

Naseem's face went pale. "The Hairy Man," he whispered. "My mother told me, when I was very young, that if I didn't behave, the Hairy Man would come and take me away."

"Folk legend," I said. "Yeti rarely leave the high country. They might spy on an encampment, but they don't bother with human settlements. We have to find out why he's here."

The yeti was watching us closely, those clawed hands still in the air.

I approached, Naseem a step behind me. "Hi," I said. "My name's Marshall. This is Naseem, Hector, and Ellis." I didn't know Ellis' first name; like Cher, Madonna, and Mario, he only used one name. "What's your name?"

The yeti blinked. Clearly he wasn't expecting us to try and talk to him. As soon as Naseem had finished the translation, he spoke. His words were rough, almost a growl, but they were clearly language.

"His name is Wind-Over-Mountain," Naseem told me.

"Pleased to meet you, Wind-Over-Mountain," I said. "Are you alone here in the low country?"

Translation. Response. "Yes, I come alone."

"How did you get here? Did you walk down the mountain?"

"I followed the moving light."

At this, the others looked at me. "Moving light?" Ellis asked.

"Could be troop movements."

"I don't think anyone's up in the mountains right now."

"Yeah, cause you're Mr. Military Intelligence, aren't you?" Hector teased him. "Ask him what the light looked like."

I relayed the question.

"It was like fire in the air," Wind told us. "Fire that stayed ahead of me, no matter which way I turned."

"Doesn't sound like truck headlights to me," I said. "Wind, were there two, or just one?"

"Just one," was his answer. "It was like a ball of green flame, floating in the air."

Everyone looked at me again. I shrugged. "I'm not sure, guys. Could be what they used to call foxfire. Could be a natural phenomenon."

"In swamps," Hector pointed out. "Not out in the desert. I think Jafar's at it again."

"Someone magicked up a ball of green fire to lure a yeti into our camp." Ellis' tone was one of mild sarcasm. "They couldn't just throw a bomb?"

"Not when you can throw a living bomb," I said. "Think of what could have happened if you didn't put the gun down. You would have shot him, he would have gone berserk and smashed up the place. Maybe even killed someone. He could have done a lot of damage before we could take him down. Like a furry suicide bomber."

"So what do we do now?" asked Naseem.

There was only one thing to do. "We have to bring him home."

"Absolutely not!" Sergeant Harrison roared.

I had gone into the command tent alone, not knowing what Wind would do if I brought him along. He wasn't used to people, and facing people with guns would not be good for any of us. So I left the others in charge of him and went to consult the CO alone.

"But sir, he won't last down here very long. Once the sun comes up and it starts getting hot . . . yeti are cold-weather animals. He's not used to the warmer weather, and we can't keep him inside all the time. He's not a pet."

"Why does all the weird stuff[1] follow you around, Spooky?"

"I think Jafar just doesn't want to give up. He wasn't expecting resistance."

"He can stay here tonight and into tomorrow. But at sunset tomorrow, you drive him back up the mountain. He won't fit in a Humvee?"

"No, sir. That's why I asked for the truck."

"You walk him up the mountain if you have to. And you make sure he doesn't find his way back. Don't make me regret this, Teller."

"No, sir."

It's hot in Iraq. Imagine the hottest summer day you've ever known. Now imagine you're stuck in the house with no air conditioning, in front of an oven that's turned on. That's how hot it is in Iraq.[2]

Now imagine it with fur. It's like being inside the oven, slowly roasting. Wind was all right during the night when it was cooler, but as soon as the sun came up, he started panting like a dog.

"What do we do?" Ellis asked me.

We were keeping him in the supply tent, which was currently empty. We were due for another shipment in a few days, so hopefully he'd be okay until nightfall.

"Keep the fans on," I said. "We should get him some water, too."

Ellis poured some water from his canteen into a paper cup and handed it to Wind, who took it between his thumb and forefinger. The sheer size of his paws made the cup look no bigger than a thimble. He tried to lap the water from the cup, but the size of his tongue compared with the size of the cup made a huge mess.

"He needs something bigger," I said.

Hector jerked his head up. "I'll be right back," he said. He disappeared into the barracks and came back with a metal bowl with SKIPPY written on the side in red Sharpie.

"Won't he mind us using his bowl?" Ellis asked.

Hector and I looked at each other. "He's . . . on temporary assignment," I said. "With the 18th. He won't be back for a few days."

What nobody but the two of us knew was that Hector was Skippy, in wolf form. Someone who thought about it might have wondered why the two of them were never seen together, but most of us had more important things to worry about. Like not getting shot at or blown up by a roadside bomb. "Skippy" was really good at sniffing those out, in both forms.

Wind held the bowl in one huge hand and tipped it up into his mouth. It worked much better than the tiny little cup. When it was empty, we refilled it.

Wind was introduced to American music, most of which he liked. (Country music was his favorite, although it's never been mine.) He also had his first taste of Coca-Cola, which he didn't like so much.

I summarized our experience in an e-mail to Simon:

To: SHolmes221

From: SpookyT

Re: Yeti info

Some interesting facts about yeti:

1. They can learn and speak language. Ours speaks Farsi (good thing we have a translator)

2. Loves Toby Keith.

3. Likes hot dogs and nachos, hates Coke.

4. Does not fit in a Humvee. We have to bring him home in the supply truck.

I'll keep you posted. We move out at sunset.

M.

The truck that we were planning to bring Wind home in was our backup supply truck; the good one was off on assignment. It had a habit of slipping out of gear if you didn't keep a constant eye on it, and the brakes sometimes stuck a bit, but it was all we had. While Naseem and I stayed inside with Wind, Ellis and Hector did some last-minute maintenance on the truck, making sure all the lights worked, the tires were fully inflated, and that we wouldn't run out of gas halfway up the mountain.

"Why?" Wind asked me.

"Why what?"

"Why are you helping me?"

It was a strange question. "Because . . . this isn't your war. It's . . . politics." I didn't understand it myself; how was I going to explain it to him?

"What is politics?"

"Countries . . . not getting along." I looked to Naseem for help. "How do I explain this to him?"

"The same way my father explained to me, when I was five years old, why we had to leave our home. Because the person in charge of the country has done some bad things, and we're protecting the people who just want to live their lives." He turned and spoke to Wind in their native language. It went on for a while, and I wished I could understand it, but languages have never been my thing.

"What's it like in America?" Wind asked.

"Cooler than here," I told him. "I live in Indiana, which is in the middle of the country. It's . . . nice. People get along and help each other. It's fall there. The leaves fall off the trees, and it's windy and cold a lot of the time. It's almost Halloween."

"What is Halloween?"

So I explained, in simple language, the tradition of dressing in costumes and going from door to door, seeking treats.

Ellis came back, wiping his hands on a rag. "We're good to go," he said.

Wind said something, and Naseem translated. "He wants to know," he said to Ellis, "about where you live."

"Baton Rouge? Well, okay. It's in Louisiana, near the Gulf Coast. Gulf of Mexico, not Persian Gulf. We're about two hours away from the ocean."

"I would like to see the ocean," Wind said.

"I live near the ocean," said Naseem. "Well, an hour and a half from the ocean. If you came to visit me, we could drive up the coast to Gloucester or Rockport. Maybe even Hampton Beach in New Hampshire. Of course, we'd have to go in the off-season . . ."

"Too hot," I explained. "I used to live on the East Coast, and sometimes it gets really hot in the summer. Winters can be really cold, though."

"I can handle the cold," Wind said.

It was a long drive to the mountains. At least the truck had a tape player; we spent the time listening to Ellis' jazz tapes. Some of them were pretty good. The one that Wind especially liked was labeled "John Petersen, River Run, 1974."

"What's River Run?" I asked.

"A bar in my hometown. It's not there anymore, but they used to have some great shows. I mean . . . my dad and my uncle would go all the time. They bought this tape outside the show. Well, not this one; this is a copy of a copy. Tapes don't last that long."

"I've never heard of this John Petersen," said Hector.

"He died in 1976. Traffic accident. Someone ran a red light, and bang! The end of a promising career."

"How long do humans live?" asked Wind, through Naseem.

We all looked at each other, not sure what to say. Finally I said, "The average is about seventy-five years. Some live longer. Some die young."

"Yeti live much, much longer. Centuries . . . but there are not many of us."

"Sounds like my family," said Ellis. "My grandma's ninety-six. My uncle's seventy-five. My dad's sixty, and Mama's fifty-one. And we're all that's left."

"How sad. Treasure them."

About an hour later, we reached the point where the road ended. We would have to go on foot from here on. Hector took point, since his senses were sharpest. I went next, then Naseem, then Wind, and finally Ellis on rear guard. We had our rifles out, and it's a good thing we did, because the next thing we knew, a bullet flew past my ear. It made a sound like zzzzzzzzip!

"Get down!" We all hit the dirt, trying to make ourselves as flat as possible. Not possible when one of us was a three-hundred-pound yeti; Wind's backside stuck up like a white flag. I wished I had some sort of a cover to throw over him. And then I remembered my jacket. I took it off and tried to cover him, but it looked about the size of a washcloth.

"Guys, help me!"

Naseem saw what I had done and took his own jacket off. "We need one more!"

Hector started to wriggle out of his, but Ellis beat him to it. "Got it," he said, and laid the dark fabric over the last bit of white fur.

"Anybody hit?" I asked.

We checked ourselves as best we could in the darkness, but no one seemed to have been shot. "What do we do now?" Hector asked me.

"How the heck should I know?"

"I thought you were in charge! You always know what to do!"

"If it's something supernatural, I know! This is just a regular group of insurgents. We stay down till they either pass by or attack."

"When will we know?" Naseem asked.

"Pretty soon, I would guess."

There was a whisper of sliding fabric as Wind got up. He said something, and Naseem translated, "Stay down. I will take care of them."

"What? No!" I started to get up, and Wind pushed me back down with the leathery palm of his huge hand. Dirt went up my nostrils, and I struggled not to cough and give us away.

I needn't have bothered.

I heard the rapid-fire thunder of a machine gun, and then a roaring sound that filled the whole world. Then screams that were cut off suddenly. I lay there in the dirt, afraid to move, and it was only when things went eerily quiet that I dared raise my head. It was then that I found out that Ellis was gone.

"Where is he?" I motioned for the others to get up and together we began searching the area. I saw spent shell casings all around us, but not a single bullet had touched us. That had to be nothing short of a miracle.

Then something crashed through the bushes, and I raised my rifle. It was only Wind, dark stains blotching his white fur.

"Oh, my God, are you hit? Are you shot?"

He looked down at himself, and then he said, "No. Their blood. No more."

"No more what?"

"No more shooters. We can go."

"Not yet. We still have to find Ellis."

"I'm right here." One second he wasn't there, and then suddenly he was. There were a couple of bullet holes in his clothes, but no blood anywhere.

"Were you hit?" I asked. "What happened?"

He shrugged. "Dunno. Don't think so. Let's go. I don't think we're gonna have any more trouble."

We set off again, and it was true: we had no more trouble from any other insurgents. Word must have gotten around that the Hairy Man was on a rampage. We made it to the top of a ridge when Wind told us, "This is as far as you can go. I can find my way from here."

"Will you be okay?" I asked.

"Yes. My people wait for me. Thank you for your help, my friends. Farewell, Marshall, who came to me in friendship instead of fear. Farewell, Naseem, my countryman. Farewell, Hector the changing. Farewell, Brother Night. I hope to see you all again someday." He smiled, a strange expression on that strange face, and then he turned and disappeared into the brush.

None of us followed him.

As we started back down the mountain, Hector asked Ellis, "Why did he call you Brother Knight? Should we call you Sir Ellis?"

But Naseem was already shaking his head. "Not 'knight' like Knights of the Round Table. La noche." It seemed that Farsi wasn't the only language he knew.

And in that moment, it all clicked. All the little eccentricities that I had observed about Ellis up till that point. They were so mild that I had dismissed them as just him being Southern, or introverted, or just weird. The way he always volunteered for night watch, and was rarely seen during the day. The way he ate his meat as rare as he could get it. The way he had disappeared when the fight began, and showed up after it was over, with bullet holes in his clothes but not a scratch on him.

How had I not seen it before?

"You're a vampire," I said.

Ellis sighed. "I knew you'd figure it out sooner or later. Spooky Teller, the weirdness expert. Yes, I'm a vampire, but it's not like you see it in the movies or on TV. I can go out in the sunlight, but not for long periods; it drains my energy."

"All those afternoon naps," said Hector, who was probably wondering why he hadn't seen it before either.

"Some things are true. I'm at my best after dark, especially after midnight. I'm faster and stronger than ordinary humans, but not by a whole lot. There's been a lot of interbreeding over the centuries."

"What's not true?" I asked. I felt like I should be taking notes.

"I'm not dead. It's just . . . a different state of being. Crosses and holy water don't bother me. I think that's old race memory from the Crusades and the witch-hunts. And garlic-I love garlic! Cajun cooking is full of it."

"But you do drink blood?"

"It's not like it used to be. We have donors now. For some reason, the blood has to be taken from a living being. Dead blood is no good. We've figured out a way to dry and concentrate it into capsules-"

"Those care packages you get once a month," I guessed. "Your supply?"

"Yeah. One of those in a glass of water once a day does for me. I try to drink it when no one else is around, so I don't gross 'em out."

"And you're bulletproof."

He looked at me strangely. "How'd you know that?"

"When I got up after the firefight, I saw a circle of spent shell casings all around us. But not one bullet touched us. You deflected them, didn't you?"

He looked down at the holes in his uniform. "Most of 'em. One or two got me, but that's all healed up now."

"How old are you?" asked Hector.

"Old enough to hang out in a bar in 1974."

"So . . ." He tried to do the math in his head. "Fifty?"

Ellis laughed. "Older than that. I won't blow your mind by tellin' you, but I once met Teddy Roosevelt on his campaign tour."

"Wow." Even Naseem was in awe.

"So who else knows about . . . what you are?" I asked.

"Nobody but Sergeant Harrison. I've done my best to try to act normal around everyone else."

"You've done a great job," I said. "You even had me fooled."

"That is some story," Sylvie said when she'd finished. "When does he say he is coming?"

"Tomorrow. He says he'll call in the morning and find out when's a good time for us to meet."

"And he is bringing a yeti here?"

"Why not? In this town, a yeti won't even stand out."

She couldn't argue with that.

We ended up meeting at the Starbucks inside the World of Stuff the next day at about ten in the morning. I saw the RV parked outside and knew it had to be theirs. No way would a yeti fit in anything smaller.

I went inside and there they were. Well, I mean, it's a little hard not to spot a seven-foot-tall yeti in a down jacket and cap with earflaps, but no one else seemed to notice them. They were sitting at a table being left completely alone.

I went up and ordered my usual mocha, and when it was ready, I joined them at the table. "Hey, guys."

Naseem looked pretty much the same as he had fourteen years before. Maybe a little grey in his hair, maybe a few lines that hadn't been there the last time I had seen him, but otherwise he was unchanged. "I see you got my letter."

"Just got it yesterday. Just in the nick of time, as they say. Hello, Wind Over Mountain." I waited for Naseem to translate, but it seemed it wasn't necessary anymore.

"Hello, Marshall," Wind said, in heavily accented but perfectly understandable English.

"Wow," I said. "You've been teaching him English."

"I thought it would help," said Naseem. "We have been all over the place since we got off the plane in Boston: first I brought him to my family's home in Andover, then we took a ride up the North Shore to Gloucester, and the next day we started our road trip. We've already been to see Sergeant Harrison in Detroit; after we leave here, our next stop is Baton Rouge, and then we'll stop at the Grand Canyon on our way to Hector's family compound in California."

"Sounds like you've got this all planned. I wish I could come with you."

"We should meet somewhere," Wind said. "Washington. Dee-See. We saw the White House, but your President wasn't there."

"Yeah, he's been busy," I said. "I don't know . . . would it be too hot to go there in July?"

"If we met by night," Naseem suggested, "I suppose it could work. I should get my money's worth out of this thing."

"I thought it was a rental."

"No, I bought it outright. I told Wind he can come visit us any time he wants."

"Does he have travel papers?" I asked. There was a lot of talk recently about banning immigrants from the Middle East.

"Officially, he's my cousin from Fallujah. The papers stood up at customs in Iraq and at Logan, so he should be okay."

"And maybe you can come visit me," Wind said.

"Maybe we will," I said. "Okay, spread the word to the other guys: July 4th, about 9PM. Where's a good spot to meet?"

"Ellis suggested the Vietnam War Memorial. He said he would show us his name on the wall."

I stared at him in shock. "I thought he said he wasn't dead!"

"He faked his own death, officially, to get out of Vietnam. Did you think Iraq was his first war? He's been lucky enough to get to serve his country many times. I'll let him tell you about it when we see him."

And so it was that on the evening of July 4th, 2017, I took a detour from the usual family vacation and drove to Washington to reunite with my old war buddies. We laughed, we caught up on each other's lives, and we finally learned Ellis' first name when he showed us the inscription on the black stone: MERRIWETHER ALLAN JOSHUA ELLIS. He warned us never to utter the name in public on pain of death.

"I haven't killed a human for food in fifty years," he said. "I haven't killed one in anger since I hauled the driver who hit John Petersen out of his car and snapped his neck. Don't make me break that streak."

Someone took a group photo, which made the rounds on Facebook. It's framed and up on my wall now. There I am, right between the werewolf and the vampire, in front of the yeti, and next to the only two normal humans in our squad.

People ask me what I did in the war. Pretty much the same thing I do at home, I tell them. Dealt with the weirdness the only way I know how: sometimes with guns and bombs, but mostly with my greatest weapon.

Friendship.

[1] Not exactly what he said; I sanitized the language for family consumption.

[2] Except in the mountains.