A Friend You Haven't Met: Part Three

 

“We’re not shuffling along after some old geezer!” the big one barked. “Just point the way and we’ll chase it!”

“And get chased yourself before long, I reckon,” I snapped. “Faces like yours aren’t common around here. We’ve got to get you undercover first, and then, if this Tekkel of yours is what you say it is, we got to pick up a few necessities. As it is, at the moment, I’m woefully undersupplied for such an encounter. Come on.”

I headed for my old car, the two, perforce, following in my wake. The skinny fellow seemed to have taken my warning to heart and was looking around fearfully as we went, while the hefty one scowled at the delay. When we got to the old tank, they stared at it doubtfully. I pulled open the door to the back seat and gestured them in.

“Make yourselves t’home,” I said. “Stay away from the windows and keep your heads down if you think anybody can see you. Luckily, we’ve only got a couple of blocks to go to get what I need.”

“Don’t tell me you’re going to push this thing all by yourself?” the big one said incredulously. I smiled.

“You don’t know what a car is, do you? My friends, you’re in for a big surprise.”

I shut the door on their puzzled faces and went around, getting in the driver’s seat. They looked curious the first few times I ground the ignition, but they positively jumped, clutching the seat in front of them, when the engine started up with a coughing roar that shook the whole vehicle. I looked back at their startled faces in the rearview mirror.

“Don’t worry,” I cackled cheerfully. “Took me the same way the first time ever I was in an auto-mo-bile. We’re going for a little ride, is all.”

They watched in silence, eyes wide, as I put old Bessie in gear, pulled out cautiously, and headed down the street. After a bit, the thin one plucked up the nerve to clear his throat and address me. He leaned forward a bit.

“You’ll pardon my asking, sir, but … you are human, aren’t you?”

I cut him a glance in the mirror.

“Mostly,” I admitted. “But some folks would find that a moot point. Over the years I’ve had an adjustment or two. My right forearm’s basically a titanium rod. Other things … they ain’t quite so tangible.”

He glanced nervously at his companion, then back at me.

“Are you … are you a wizard?”

I considered the question a moment.

“No, but at my advanced age I do know a thing or two.” I chuckled. “If you’re talking about the car, that’s nothing special; just a kind of machine. Lots of folks got cars here.”

“And do they all go so fast?” The big one looked queasy.

“Why, we’re barely breaking ten miles per hour,” I said. “Most people go forty-five here in the city, when they’re up to speed, and a lot faster on the highway.” He moaned a little at that.

“My name’s Bob, by the way,” I announced, in an effort to distract him. Didn’t need any alien barf in my backseat. “And where are you boys from? Mars? Titan? Zeta Reticuli?” I smiled. “I know it ain’t the moon.”

Now it was Skinny’s turn to consider the question. He tilted his head back and forth, brown beard swishing like an archaeologist’s brush cleaning up a baffling artifact, then looked at the other, then seemed to settle first on a less complicated answer.

“My name is Korm, Mr. Bob,” he announced. “And this is Roth.” He picked his words carefully. “We are Morgs, and our home is a place called Ortha. These other names you mention mean nothing to me, except the Moon. The translation charm I gave you does not seem to work on those other … terms.”

“Translation charm, eh?” I took one hand off the wheel to finger the disc. The car lurched a little, and the big one – Roth – groaned again. “Sorry,” I said quickly. A thought struck me. “Say, you’re not wizards yourselves, are you?”

“Oh, my, no,” the skinny one said quickly. “We Morgs have no magic – but we do know a human wizard. It was he who gave us the charm. He said it could be useful as we went visiting through the Domain of Doors.”

“Korm!” the other barked warningly.

“What?”

“Should we really be talking about that? Isn’t that … I don’t know, maybe a secret?”

“Why not? I certainly don’t understand it; what do you think we can reveal? Can YOU explain it? In any way that anybody could use?”

“Well ….” The other subsided, unconvinced.

“So anyway,” Korm turned to me. He seemed happy to be explaining; I got the impression that he was by nature something of lecturing blabbermouth. “The Domain of Doors. The way it was explained to me is that it’s a hallway whose doors lead into other worlds, completely different realms a hairsbreadth away from each other but normally unreachable. Our world was locked for a long time, because of a great evil, but since it has been defeated, passage is freer now. Our wizard friend, Koppa, suggested we go on a little exploratory excursion, so we loaded up some of our old friends and set out. It was going to be a pleasure trip, a chance to see wonders.”

He sighed. Roth looked grim, arms folded across his armored chest, looking mulishly away out the window.

“But our great evil had left at least one door ajar, it seems. Koppa sensed it, and we followed him, until we found the Tekkel, lurking near the way to its world. It must have waited there for centuries for its dark ally to return. Before we knew it, it had knocked Koppa down, wounding him, and fled. At his urging, Roth and I started to chase the thing, leaving Koppa in the care of our healer Melniar. He yelled after us that in the Domain, its powers were limited, but not to let it enter another world.”

“Why you chose to come after it when it picked this place is beyond me,” Roth grumbled.

“I just wanted to duck my head in and see where it went! You pushed us both through!”

“Now, now, don’t fight, boys,” I chided. I looked up. “Hold tight now,” I said. “I’m turning in here.”

Roth grabbed hold of his seat – put nail-holes with his claws in the plastic cover, I found out later – but Korm leaned forward with interest to see where we were going. Climbing up out of the surrounding oak trees was the red-brick steeple of St. Joseph’s, Walnut Springs’ old Catholic church.

“What is this place?” the thin Morg asked, eyes wide.

“It’s a temple of sorts, if you people know what that is.” I drew up into a space off to the side and put old Bessie in park. “It’s got what we need, I think. Now keep your heads down ‘til I get back. Shouldn’t take but a minute.”

Notes

I had fun writing this short story, both in seeing how two of my old literary 'friends' would react to the 'real' modern world and how the character Bob would be here now at his age. It has various connections to other short stories here on the Niche.

The Tekkel and the Domain of Doors are both featured in Shutting the Door; Roth features in another character crossover tale, Come Together, which pretty much started up my most recent spate of short stories in the past few years. 'Old Bob,' though considerably younger than he is here, tells the events of Remember the Bellamy.

A couple more crossover characters are yet to make their appearance. They too have connections with Remember the Bellamy. And there will be one absolutely new character introduced; though, now that I think about it, there might be some faint echoes from The Day Delphine Disappeared. At least I can imagine Delphine meeting the other character and them liking each other.