Tales of the Starbuck Avenger!!! (68)
It was quiet inside the church. Too quiet.
I know, I know. People overuse that line like crap. No joke, I first heard that line when I was just a little tyke watching Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2: the Secret of the Ooze with my little brother, and even then, the screenwriters knew it was an overused line, because they made some kinda metagag out of it. Point is, people have been saying things are "too quiet" in their adventure stories for longer than I've been alive, but that doesn't change when something is actually the case, just because screenwriters have been hogging it.
"It's too quiet in here," I said, and nobody called me on it. They just kinda nodded. Well, Mebby kinda nodded. The Absolvatron stood with his robo-head high and motionless as usual, and our cat, who was still the Mighty Hercules, was surveying his surroundings with smug caution. Or maybe he was just being a cat.
"H-- how so," remarked Mebby, asking, as usual, that we all count on context to tell that there was a question there.
"Working theory says that Martian McStabbypants went in through the basement and is making his way up to the steeple, right?" I pointed behind us. "Except that's the steeple. We just passed under it when we came in the front doors. Which means he would have to come to the front doors in order to reach the steeple, and since I don't see or smell any evidence of alien passing right in front of me, it means he hasn't made it up to this floor."
"Then it's obvious!" said the Mighty Hercules. "He's still at the level of the basement!"
"See, that's where my 'too quiet' thing comes in, Mr. Puss. Have you ever been in a church basement?"
"I have to admit I have not," said the Mighty Hercules.
"Hard to navigate in without knocking shit over," I said. "Even when you're a guy or lady who has been raised in them your whole adult life and basically know what's what. If you're an alien messing around looking for a way up, there is no way you're not going to make some noise." I glanced down at the floor. "So he's not down there either."
"Dogg has already l-- left the basement," concluded Mebby. "Where can a b-- body go from a church basement if not up."
"THERE IS A PARISH HALL NEARBY" (mentioned Absolvatron.) THERE MAY WELL BE AN UNDERGROUND CONNECTION"
"Right," I said. "He doesn't have to get to the steeple, he just has to see it up close. I bet he's going for the parish hall roof."
"Well," said the Mighty Hercules, "we'll just beat him to it! Tell me, beautiful young lady, is there a connection to this 'parish hall' from within the temple?"
"Okay, first," I said, "Never call me 'beautiful young lady' again because it puts about eight different kinds of wrong picture in my head. Second, yes; you can get to the parish hall through the back. I remember being here as a kid and doing it."
Mebby gestured. "L-- lead the way."
I nodded, gripped my spear, and began walking down the aisle. The sober smell of incense residue filled the air and rows and rows of stained-glass saints stared down at me from the walls. My family never went to Saint Raf's for usual churching, as it's just a little too far of a Sunday drive from Rio, but as it's the diocesan HQ, we did a lot of the fancy stuff here. First communions, midnight holiday Mass with my uncle Franklin, shit like that. I guess I gotta add "alien-hunting" to the list of fancy stuff.
We approached the white-shrouded altar. Absolvatron and I made a quick sign of the cross, him out of entirely synthetic artificial devotion, me out of habit hammered into me over many long years. I had the weird thought that neither one was a real gesture, for two entirely different reasons. "Okay," I said, shaking off my distraction. "The connecting passage is in back, through the vestry." I nodded up at the sanctum, and then weaved around the communion rail and hopped on up there. My three companions followed.
I was passing through a church, on my way to what very well might be my death, and I didn't devote a single moment to prayer. It's funny how things change like that.
* * *
We found a set of stairs that promised roof access. At the top was a heavy, locked metal door, and none of us could smell alien passage here either, so after sending the Mighty Hercules around and verifying that out of two staircases servicing either end of the parish hall, this was the only one that led further up, we hunkered down and waited at the point where the stairs met the top floor. From my vantage point, I could see down a long hallway of closed Sunday school classroom doors, dark and sealed. Crudely-drawn loose-tacked papers and banners proclaiming God's love for us lined the halls, and every time one of those things even shifted in the breeze from the heat vents, I practically jumped out of my skin. I was on edge; I kept wanting to babble on stupidly about anything and everything that came into my head and then my monkey caution would smack me down and say that noisy monkeys are the ones who get eaten alive by, shit, I dunno, tigers or something, so I better be wise and shut the fuck up. The result was a weird kind of faltering energy that would start and then stop and start and stop again and after about three minutes of this I was ready to about scream.
"All right, we can't just wait here," I said.
"W-- what does dogg suggest," said Mebby.
Ah, geez. You get a couplea inspirations courtesy of the weird voice inside your head, and all of a sudden, you're the Leader. Thanks a fuckton, Inner Greatness.
"You're welcome," said my Inner Greatness, smugly, and as usual, no one could hear.
I wanted to clarify things to Mebby, I wanted to tell her that the reason I said that we couldn't just wait here was that I was going off my nut and I was just about ready to say screwit to the alien-hunting plan, tear out of the building, howl a couple times at the sky and then run back to my apartment and put my head under my pillow and forget that any of this had ever happened. I would be within my rights. Nobody assigned me to this shit. I didn't put my name on a contract. I was a gee genuine 100% volunteer world-saver. But my heart wasn't in it.
I closed my eyes.
"Okay, Mebby, you're the expert here," I said, eventually. "You've got more experience fighting evil than the rest of us put together, except for if you count the entirely fictional years that Hercules Cat spent fighting evil in the movies, and I don't count that because what the fuck. My leadership has put us all glommed at the top of a staircase waiting for a monster that might never come. What do you think we should do?"
"You has s-- stone nailed it with yo' last utterance," said Mebby, after a moment of thought. "We hell of require some fresh recon."
"Right," I said, squeezing my eyes shut and tapping at my forehead. "You're absolutely right. We gotta send somebody down to search. But I'm not abandoning this door, because that's just what we'd need. And I want to send people down both stairwells at the same time, because you just know that as you're going down one, the Snatcher's gonna be coming up the other one. And I don't want anyone going alone. So that's, um, one-two-three-four-five six guys I need." I looked around at my hero team and then bumped my head against the wall a couple times. A couple minutes ago I was just exhilarated to have four people in my corner. My hero needs keep growing.
"T-- two at tha door," said Mebby. "That is basically our last line of defense. Send the fastest two to scout, one on each stairwell. S-- shout loud if you find something."
"Right," I said, trying to blot out visions of all the horrible fates I might be condemning each one of my party to. "Mebby and Cat. Mebby, you take this staircase. Cat, head down the hall and check the other. I'm anchoring the door with the Padre here."
"THE DEDICATION YOU SHOW TO BRINGING A WAYWARD SOUL TO CONFESSION" (said Absolvatron) "IS TRULY INSPIRING."
"Thanks, Father," I said, and I couldn't tell if I was humoring him or not.
We exchanged a couple of quick nods and I sent Mebby and the Cat on their ways. Pretty quickly after they vanished into the darkness, I realized the first flaw in my plan, inasmuch as a couple of minutes ago I had been going out of my head with the constant waiting all the time, and while the feeling had gone away slightly when I was being all hero-like and talking about plans, I was now back to, and had in fact assigned myself to, waiting duty. I huffed with frustration, then moved away from the stairs and started finding light switches for the upper parish hall and flicking them on. Pretty soon, I had the immediate area surrounding the roof access stairs lit up like noon. It helped a little, but not much. I went back to stand beside the Absolvatron and continued waiting.
"YOU SEEM NERVOUS" (said Absolvatron, out of the blue, very nearly triggering a total freakout.) "IS THERE ANYTHING I CAN HELP WITH"
"That's sweet of you," I said to the robotic monster that had not three days ago teleported me a thousand feet in the air and threatened to drop me from that height on the mere suspicion that I was a damnable heretic. "But no, you're good. Just keep a weather-eye out for our dude. Detain him in whatever way you need to, do your confession stuff. And then we'll see." It was as good a plan as I had to offer. Truth to tell, I wasn't sure what to do with laughing-boy. I was just planning on surviving as long as possible and seeing what happened after that. When you have thoughts like this you start maybe wishing and hoping that you'll have no choice but to accidentally kill him and just make everything simple. And you try to beat that voice back with a stick, because you really don't want to become that person. That's Evil Duplicate territory there.
Absolvatron nodded. "WELL THEN" (he said,) "THE PEACE OF THE LORD BE ALWAYS WITH YOU"
"An' also with you, Father," I said. It was the same automatic rote response as the genuflection had been, but somehow, I meant it more. For a moment, I felt good.
Then the scuttling began.
I know, I know. People overuse that line like crap. No joke, I first heard that line when I was just a little tyke watching Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2: the Secret of the Ooze with my little brother, and even then, the screenwriters knew it was an overused line, because they made some kinda metagag out of it. Point is, people have been saying things are "too quiet" in their adventure stories for longer than I've been alive, but that doesn't change when something is actually the case, just because screenwriters have been hogging it.
"It's too quiet in here," I said, and nobody called me on it. They just kinda nodded. Well, Mebby kinda nodded. The Absolvatron stood with his robo-head high and motionless as usual, and our cat, who was still the Mighty Hercules, was surveying his surroundings with smug caution. Or maybe he was just being a cat.
"H-- how so," remarked Mebby, asking, as usual, that we all count on context to tell that there was a question there.
"Working theory says that Martian McStabbypants went in through the basement and is making his way up to the steeple, right?" I pointed behind us. "Except that's the steeple. We just passed under it when we came in the front doors. Which means he would have to come to the front doors in order to reach the steeple, and since I don't see or smell any evidence of alien passing right in front of me, it means he hasn't made it up to this floor."
"Then it's obvious!" said the Mighty Hercules. "He's still at the level of the basement!"
"See, that's where my 'too quiet' thing comes in, Mr. Puss. Have you ever been in a church basement?"
"I have to admit I have not," said the Mighty Hercules.
"Hard to navigate in without knocking shit over," I said. "Even when you're a guy or lady who has been raised in them your whole adult life and basically know what's what. If you're an alien messing around looking for a way up, there is no way you're not going to make some noise." I glanced down at the floor. "So he's not down there either."
"Dogg has already l-- left the basement," concluded Mebby. "Where can a b-- body go from a church basement if not up."
"THERE IS A PARISH HALL NEARBY" (mentioned Absolvatron.) THERE MAY WELL BE AN UNDERGROUND CONNECTION"
"Right," I said. "He doesn't have to get to the steeple, he just has to see it up close. I bet he's going for the parish hall roof."
"Well," said the Mighty Hercules, "we'll just beat him to it! Tell me, beautiful young lady, is there a connection to this 'parish hall' from within the temple?"
"Okay, first," I said, "Never call me 'beautiful young lady' again because it puts about eight different kinds of wrong picture in my head. Second, yes; you can get to the parish hall through the back. I remember being here as a kid and doing it."
Mebby gestured. "L-- lead the way."
I nodded, gripped my spear, and began walking down the aisle. The sober smell of incense residue filled the air and rows and rows of stained-glass saints stared down at me from the walls. My family never went to Saint Raf's for usual churching, as it's just a little too far of a Sunday drive from Rio, but as it's the diocesan HQ, we did a lot of the fancy stuff here. First communions, midnight holiday Mass with my uncle Franklin, shit like that. I guess I gotta add "alien-hunting" to the list of fancy stuff.
We approached the white-shrouded altar. Absolvatron and I made a quick sign of the cross, him out of entirely synthetic artificial devotion, me out of habit hammered into me over many long years. I had the weird thought that neither one was a real gesture, for two entirely different reasons. "Okay," I said, shaking off my distraction. "The connecting passage is in back, through the vestry." I nodded up at the sanctum, and then weaved around the communion rail and hopped on up there. My three companions followed.
I was passing through a church, on my way to what very well might be my death, and I didn't devote a single moment to prayer. It's funny how things change like that.
* * *
We found a set of stairs that promised roof access. At the top was a heavy, locked metal door, and none of us could smell alien passage here either, so after sending the Mighty Hercules around and verifying that out of two staircases servicing either end of the parish hall, this was the only one that led further up, we hunkered down and waited at the point where the stairs met the top floor. From my vantage point, I could see down a long hallway of closed Sunday school classroom doors, dark and sealed. Crudely-drawn loose-tacked papers and banners proclaiming God's love for us lined the halls, and every time one of those things even shifted in the breeze from the heat vents, I practically jumped out of my skin. I was on edge; I kept wanting to babble on stupidly about anything and everything that came into my head and then my monkey caution would smack me down and say that noisy monkeys are the ones who get eaten alive by, shit, I dunno, tigers or something, so I better be wise and shut the fuck up. The result was a weird kind of faltering energy that would start and then stop and start and stop again and after about three minutes of this I was ready to about scream.
"All right, we can't just wait here," I said.
"W-- what does dogg suggest," said Mebby.
Ah, geez. You get a couplea inspirations courtesy of the weird voice inside your head, and all of a sudden, you're the Leader. Thanks a fuckton, Inner Greatness.
"You're welcome," said my Inner Greatness, smugly, and as usual, no one could hear.
I wanted to clarify things to Mebby, I wanted to tell her that the reason I said that we couldn't just wait here was that I was going off my nut and I was just about ready to say screwit to the alien-hunting plan, tear out of the building, howl a couple times at the sky and then run back to my apartment and put my head under my pillow and forget that any of this had ever happened. I would be within my rights. Nobody assigned me to this shit. I didn't put my name on a contract. I was a gee genuine 100% volunteer world-saver. But my heart wasn't in it.
I closed my eyes.
"Okay, Mebby, you're the expert here," I said, eventually. "You've got more experience fighting evil than the rest of us put together, except for if you count the entirely fictional years that Hercules Cat spent fighting evil in the movies, and I don't count that because what the fuck. My leadership has put us all glommed at the top of a staircase waiting for a monster that might never come. What do you think we should do?"
"You has s-- stone nailed it with yo' last utterance," said Mebby, after a moment of thought. "We hell of require some fresh recon."
"Right," I said, squeezing my eyes shut and tapping at my forehead. "You're absolutely right. We gotta send somebody down to search. But I'm not abandoning this door, because that's just what we'd need. And I want to send people down both stairwells at the same time, because you just know that as you're going down one, the Snatcher's gonna be coming up the other one. And I don't want anyone going alone. So that's, um, one-two-three-four-five six guys I need." I looked around at my hero team and then bumped my head against the wall a couple times. A couple minutes ago I was just exhilarated to have four people in my corner. My hero needs keep growing.
"T-- two at tha door," said Mebby. "That is basically our last line of defense. Send the fastest two to scout, one on each stairwell. S-- shout loud if you find something."
"Right," I said, trying to blot out visions of all the horrible fates I might be condemning each one of my party to. "Mebby and Cat. Mebby, you take this staircase. Cat, head down the hall and check the other. I'm anchoring the door with the Padre here."
"THE DEDICATION YOU SHOW TO BRINGING A WAYWARD SOUL TO CONFESSION" (said Absolvatron) "IS TRULY INSPIRING."
"Thanks, Father," I said, and I couldn't tell if I was humoring him or not.
We exchanged a couple of quick nods and I sent Mebby and the Cat on their ways. Pretty quickly after they vanished into the darkness, I realized the first flaw in my plan, inasmuch as a couple of minutes ago I had been going out of my head with the constant waiting all the time, and while the feeling had gone away slightly when I was being all hero-like and talking about plans, I was now back to, and had in fact assigned myself to, waiting duty. I huffed with frustration, then moved away from the stairs and started finding light switches for the upper parish hall and flicking them on. Pretty soon, I had the immediate area surrounding the roof access stairs lit up like noon. It helped a little, but not much. I went back to stand beside the Absolvatron and continued waiting.
"YOU SEEM NERVOUS" (said Absolvatron, out of the blue, very nearly triggering a total freakout.) "IS THERE ANYTHING I CAN HELP WITH"
"That's sweet of you," I said to the robotic monster that had not three days ago teleported me a thousand feet in the air and threatened to drop me from that height on the mere suspicion that I was a damnable heretic. "But no, you're good. Just keep a weather-eye out for our dude. Detain him in whatever way you need to, do your confession stuff. And then we'll see." It was as good a plan as I had to offer. Truth to tell, I wasn't sure what to do with laughing-boy. I was just planning on surviving as long as possible and seeing what happened after that. When you have thoughts like this you start maybe wishing and hoping that you'll have no choice but to accidentally kill him and just make everything simple. And you try to beat that voice back with a stick, because you really don't want to become that person. That's Evil Duplicate territory there.
Absolvatron nodded. "WELL THEN" (he said,) "THE PEACE OF THE LORD BE ALWAYS WITH YOU"
"An' also with you, Father," I said. It was the same automatic rote response as the genuflection had been, but somehow, I meant it more. For a moment, I felt good.
Then the scuttling began.