Chapter 24 - Horror Movie Tropes

Day 19

Mid-Afternoon

Back To The Real World

Logan and Sydney spent more time than they would have liked locating the crater Erin had mentioned. Without her, they didn't have a guide, just the brief explanation she gave. So they triangulated with a map, knowing Erin couldn't have been more than five kilometers away, and knowing it was outside town. They realized that they had gone too far when they found the remains of Lieutenant Hawthorne's landing zone.

From there they could move closer to town, where they found the trail that Erin had described.

Sydney, experienced in tracking from her scout-sniper training in the military, quickly confirmed what Erin said. "Yeah, whatever landed here was definitely dragged."

Logan shifted around the crater, looking for evidence, "Now, how can we confirm this was Thaddeus?"

Shrugging, Sydney said, "The location fits with the direction she booted his ass, but that only gets us most of the way to confirming it was him."

"What about this?" Logan kneeled down, having shifted some detritus. He grabbed a gold earring that had lost some of its lustre. "Looks like an earring. Status check says it's a Gold Earing of My Experience." He read the details to Sydney.

Gold Earring of My Experience

Quality Level: Gold

Description: The Gold Earring of My Experience is only usable by people with narcissistic tendencies. This earring guarantees that your party's experience will become your experience.

Modifier: My Experience. 25% of the experience earned by party or guild members is automatically transferred to the user of this earring.

Notes: Ah, what would a narcissist be without the ability to take credit for the work of their underlings?

"Certainly sounds like something he would have, and it would explain how he leveled so much faster than us. Also explains why the rest of the DN were fairly low level." Sydney reasoned.

Logan pocketed the earring, "We need to see where he was dragged off to then."

Sydney gave Logan a disapproving glare, "We should call in some support on this, Logan."

"You mean the soldiers who are undermanned and have stretched themselves thin protecting Erin, her family, and friends? Or the kids Erin is training into an army that lack any real combat experience? Or maybe the other Deputies who have told us both repeatedly they will not return to duty in this clusterfuck?"

Sydney just sighed. He was right, she knew it, and if Logan had a better idea she was certain he would offer it up. "Dammit, if I die I'm going to murder your ass."

Logan chuckled then said, "Hey, if this were a horror movie I think brown guys die before white girls with military training."

"Not funny!" Sydney's tone was serious, but the smirk on her face added some levity.

Gesturing along the path of the drag marks, Logan added, "So, we follow this and when we find something with the right amount of mystery, we can split up. It's a better deal for you under the rules of horror tropes."

"Yeah, we'll see." Sydney took the lead, which Logan didn't mind so much because of Sydney's trump card. She refused to tell anyone about it, but if they got into a fight with the same guy that hurt Erin, he didn't know how she could hide it. Then again, if he died out here, she could make up any story she wanted. Logan chuckled at that thought, knowing Sydney just wasn't built that way, which in turn got a look from her.

"What's so funny?"

"Oh, ya know, just tried imagining you leaving me out here and how ridiculous of an idea that is."

"Not before Noah reverse engineers your SUV."

Logan laughed harder, "I knew it! You're just sticking around for the truck. Of course, my work wife wants the truck in the divorce."

Sydney went silent after that joke, and Logan misinterpreted it as her focusing on reading the tracks for extra clues. Inwardly Sydney bottled up her frustration, a regular occurrence when working with the guy she cared about, who wouldn't date coworkers. It wasn't that she blamed him. Logan had never been made aware of her feelings, that she knew, but she wasn't entirely subtle about implying her interest at times. Now he found a girl outside of work he might be interested in, and Sydney wasn't sure if she could take that and the apocalypse all in one year.

Before Sydney could fall any deeper into her personal pit of despair and self-pity, she held up a fist to signal Logan, then kneeled down to reduce her visibility. When Logan came up alongside her in a crouch walk, she used a low voice to explain, "This clearing ahead isn't natural. It's at least 20 meters wide, but I don't see signs of equipment being used to remove trees."

Logan nodded, "That's weird, but why is it relevant?"

"See in the middle there?" Sydney pointed out where she meant, "The drag marks stop right in the middle, but there are zero signs of where he could have been dragged after that."

"No other signs of movement you can see from here?"

Sydney shook her head, "I don't even see animal tracks entering the area."

Logan looked around, then decided, "Alright, we can circle the perimeter and look for more clues."

"God dammit, Logan," Sydney cursed at him, "You want to split up, don't you?"

"Yeah," Logan nodded and smiled, as he confirmed Sydney's assessment of the plan."

Turning to the left, Sydney said, "I won't come running, even if you scream like a girl."

"Hah, of course you will. No way Sydney Cade passes up a chance to hold one over my head." Logan caught a glimpse of Sydney flipping him the bird behind her back as he turned to his right, heading counter-clockwise around the perimeter.

The Stranger watched, using a combination of monitoring tools and what little he could glimpse with his own eyes. The tree cover made things harder, but his over-abundance of caution out here didn't help. Not that he had much to worry about. No one on this world could harm him, plus it was a fatal flaw of most humans to not look up.

As the deputies went opposite directions around the clearing, the hideout he had here long gone at this point, the Stranger debated how best to handle these two. Death wasn't on the table for now, but he would very much like to have a conversation with Logan. That would be hard with the other deputy nearby, so he may have to disable her.

His voice was not that of an entirely sane person as the Stranger expressed his thoughts, "Hmm, ideas, ideas, ideas. Which one should I use?" Tapping a finger to the side of his mouth, he vocalized some of his thoughts, "Fire trap could be too fatal, same with poison trap, freeze trap might not hold her long enough depending on stats…ooh, I know!"

Pulling up a menu in his HUD, the Stranger located a map of his traps and found the one he wanted to use. Waiting very impatiently as Sydney crept carefully along the edge of the clearing, he was tempted more than once to use a fatal trap and toss the consequences out the window. When she finally got into range, he almost jumped out of his tree in excitement. Activating the trap, a flash of rainbow light blasted out from the trap. When the light disappeared, Sydney was gone.

Licking his lips, the Stranger smiled gleefully, then located Logan and started heading that way through the trees. He didn't immediately announce himself to the deputy, waiting to see if the man would notice the Stranger in his tree perch. While not very high up, he was at least high enough to not be grabbed from the floor of the forest.

When the Deputy's angle past the apex that would start putting his back to the Stranger's position, he sighed, cleared his throat, and said, "Bang! You're dead." Before laughing gleefully.

Logan spun around with decent reflexes, drawing his Walter PDP, but keeping his eyes parallel with the ground. Not seeing anyone, Logan called out, "Who's there!?!?"

Sighing again, the Stranger said, "Up. Here. Idiot." He was going to get impatient with Logan at this rate.

Logan spotted the Stranger quickly with that pronouncement, knowing now to look up several degrees, "Who the hell are you?"

The Stranger looked thoughtful for a moment, "Well, that depends if you want to know the philosophical answer, or who I was on my world."

"What's your real name?" Logan probed, checking his surroundings periodically.

The Stranger shook his head, "No, no, no, that won't do. No spoilers, no spoilers, we don't give out spoilers, it ruins the surprise! Oh, well, fine, I guess you can just call me Al."

"Alright, Al." Logan accented the name, indicating he didn't put much stock in it. "What are you doing here, and why are you sneaking up on police officers?"

"Why, waiting for you of course." The Stranger shifted his head side-to-side periodically, reinforcing a growing belief Logan had that this person wasn't mentally well, "I cleared out the base here right after that incident with the soldiers and Erin the other day, truly unfortunate. Didn't want to hurt Erin, just teach those soldiers a lesson for being nosy."

*Sydney!" Logan yelled, trying to get her attention across the clearing.

"Oh, she can't help you, Deputy." The Stranger wagged a finger.

Logan started to raise his gun, thinking this was going to turn into a fight or flight situation, "What did you do to Sydney?"

"She's unharmed, just too far away to interrupt this conversation." His head shifted again, "But I knew you would come asking questions." The Stranger shook his head back and forth, "No free information though! You only get what I want you to have when I want you to have it."

Squinting at the Stranger's weird words, Logan encouraged him to say more, "Alright, what is it you do want me to know?"

The Stranger's voice got a little manic for a second as he said, "Erin's mine, Erin's always mine, every world, don't touch, all mine!" Then like a lightswitch his personality flipped, his mannerisms changed and his voice became that of a seemingly sane person, with an almost posh accent, "Tell me Logan, what do you know about multiple worlds, the multiverse, things like that?"

Logan got more cautious with the behaviour shift. Insanity was unpredictable, but sanity could be dangerously cunning, "I know there's an old sci-fi show where people in another universe all have beards."

"The stranger laughed, and it sounded sincere, "This is not like the mirror universe, no. Think more like an old show from the 90s about a genius who uses a TV remote to travel parallel universes. Meet yourself with a different career, see historical events take another path, that sort of thing."

Logan chuffed at the implication, "And you're going to tell me you come from one of these…other worlds."

"Ooooh, I am. Your belief in parallel universes is irrelevant to their existence, though." The Stranger checked his fingernails, "Maybe, if you live long enough, you'll see another world. Maybe, if you're anything like me, you'll even take over one or two." Dropping to the ground with no more effort than taking a step forward, the Stranger said, "Now, put that underpowered pellet gun away and let us have a chat."

Inside Middletown Borders

Sydney paced back and forth on the road leading out the east side of town, waiting for her backup to arrive. When the grinding metal sound reached her ears, she stopped pacing and stood in the middle of the street, hands on hips, right foot tapping an aggressive beat.

As the tank pulled up, the top hatch popped open and Dubois stuck his head out. "Deputy, Anderson and Cohen are remaining at the household to help defend Ms. Moon's family, but he sent us to help."

Cursing, Sydney said, "We're getting low on combat resources."

"You're tellin' me, Deputy. We were a dozen grunts, one surly ass Sergeant, this tank crew, plus the Lieutenant and the General when we left base." Shaking his head, Dubois continued, "Not only did that shithead LT turn on us, but we find out he and his people killed the Sergeant. Not sure we even have enough people to make the trek back to base."

Sydney climbed up and sat on the main body of the tank, grabbing a handhold to steady her position. "All the more reason we get Logan back." As she settled in for an uncomfortable ride, Dubois pulled the charging handle on his .50 cal mounted gun, then hammered the top of the tank a couple times. Without preamble, the tank started moving, Sydney as the guide.

Outside of Town

Logan could hardly believe most of what was being said. This random guy who claimed to be from a parallel universe wanted Logan to believe that Erin was a danger to herself, her family, and the whole world. Worse still, the Stranger tried to claim he was the only one who could help her. Logan tried the Status command on the Stranger again, and again he received the message Status Undetectable.

The Stranger cocked his head, "You can't read my status, Deputy."

"How…" Logan wasn't aware of anyone being able to detect that function. Even Erin didn't get an indicator when they checked her status.

"It's a unique ability for high level users."

Logan started to open his mouth and ask more questions, but the Stranger spoke over him.

"Look, you don't need to trust me," The Stranger insisted, "You will see for yourself soon enough. The cracks will begin to show, Erin's rage will become stronger, and none of you will be able to stop her. I have the tools and the skills."

Logan, not for the first time, shook his head in disgust, "So you would have me betray a close ally and friend in favour of a random stranger I met in the woods?"

The Stranger maintained the cool demeanor he had switched to, but there were physical ticks starting to indicate his impatience, perhaps displeasure, "The Logan I knew would do anything to protect Erin, even if he had to protect her from herself."

Logan snorted derisively, "The Logan you knew? Where's he at now? Why not talk him into betraying her then?"

"He's…" The Stranger turned his head as if listening to something. "Hmm, it seems our conversation is going to be cut short sooner than planned. Your friends have arrived." The Stranger launched himself back onto a tree and perched a moment, before launching through the trees, towards town.

"You're wrong, ya know!" Logan called to him. "We'll never be anything alike!"

The Stranger didn't look back, respond, or otherwise show Logan that he heard what was said, but a smirk did grow on his face.

Sydney, and the Tank Crew

Sydney barely had a chance to register the warning Logan sent via private message. One word: Incoming.

She dove in front of Dubois, made more awkward by the .50 cal mounted gun he was gripping. Luck, or pure coincidence was with her this time as she caught the gun behind the gimbal and spun it out of the tank gunner's grip. There was a whizzing sound, then a thump against the back of her armour, and a dull pain from the impact. Curling her legs up to bring her into the fetal position, inadvertently pulling Dubois against the front of her armour as he tried to duck down into the tank.

There was a cacophony of scrapes, thunks, scratches, and then a clunk-clunk-clunk-clunk-clunk-thud sound her brain deduced was a tread giving way. Then nothing. Dubois squirmed to get free, and Sydney uncurled her body, slowly at first, then faster as she shifted to a sitting position on top of the tank turret. The tank…was a wreck.