The Further Adventures of Val Williams # 1 - Bad Moon Rising pt. II

Boann sat on the sidewalk, combing her hands through Little Gary’s hair. He was a strong new weapon in their arsenal. No one would pass by a mother and her child without throwing change, and, in the right parts of the city, no one would stop to ask too many questions either.

Dagda and Boann found Little Gary on the corner of the street, staring into the window of a McDonald’s. For over ten minutes, he stared dewy eyed and no adult claimed him. He was lost.

When they grabbed him he wouldn’t stop staring at Dagda’s trench coat, something about it made him think a million baby spiders would rush out of there the minute a strong gust of wind would flap it open.

Around Little Gary's neck was a rock attached to a string, Boann had a sickening impulse to snatch it from him, she didn’t know why.

“What’s that around your neck, Little Gary,” Boann asked him, crouching down to his eye level.

“I’m not supposed to talk about it,” Little Gary said, intense. There was a strength in the boy. “My dad gave it to me, and he told me to hide it.”

“Where is he,” she asked.

“The men in white coats took him away,” he said.

Boann and Dagda exchanged weary glances.

“Where’s your Mom,” Dagda asked.

Little Gary shrugged, “at home, I guess.”

“Well, why don’t we give her a call and take you home,” Boann offered.

“No,” Little Gary shouted and turned to run.

Padraic triumphantly rounded the corner with a couple McDonald’s bags in his hands, sipping a drink.

“Padraic,” Dagda shouted, and pointed to the boy, running in his direction.

Padraic caught the boy across the chest with his right arm and reeled him in, dropping his drink in the process.

He made his way over to his friends with the boy, held up the bags and said, “someone left, like, half a burger. Who’s the kid?”

“I don’t know,” Dagda said, “but he’s got a moon rock around his neck.”

***

I don’t want you to think it’s grimmer than it is, but it’s darker than you think. When people start to believe in the existence of werewolves, vampires, ghouls and aliens or anything else that lives under their beds it opens the gates of hell. The guy who had my job in the 17th century had his hands full keeping the world in one piece. We’ve only just got things back to relatively normal. But I got my work cut out for me tonight.

There’s no brick in the park, no magnetic stone, nothing. Damn. Brick acts like a spiritual tape recorder. It’s gonna be harder to pick up any residual energy from those wolf forms, if they even exist, or that character in the trench coat. Most of it’s probably dissipated back into ether by now. Then again, maybe it’s not so bad, tonight I‘m watching over the city and the sun’s about to go down…

Stay tuned for part 3…