My first encounter. Turns out it was all just a dream.

[cab312]

I jammed the brakes as the monster landed in front of us. The BMW skid to a stop and I push the gear selector into reverse and buried the accelerator. The monster started to run after us and then took to flight. I J-turned at the very next intersection and wound through the gears able to out run the monster somewhat. I killed the lights and popped into a parking garage.

“Whoa! What the fuck are you doing?” Raven shouted.

“Short cut,” I said being all calm-like.

“9th Street Parking Garage, retard. One entrance. One exit.” He said being all preacherly-like.

“Oh shit,” I said immediately understanding the gravity of our situation. How'd I forget that?

I whipped the wheel round and sped back towards the entrance/exit. The monster landed just ahead as I jammed into fourth gear.

“Not going to make it,” Raven said.

“We’re gonna make it,” I said, jamming fifth gear. As we approached, “maybe not,” and I yanked the handbrake as I abruptly twisted the wheel round, downshifted, and head for the second level.

“Oh my god,” Raven sighed.

I almost made it into third gear when I emerged out of the tight circular ramp, getting some air at the same time. The monster took the short cut by flying up the middle of the column and I made break for the down ramp. Despite flying down the center, I had a head of speed and the angle. I made it to the garage’s exit. I sped out towards the river road, a long straight bit of pavement where I could stretch the Beamer’s legs.

“Hilltop Winery?” I asked.

“As good as anywhere, I guess,” Raven replied.

“See you there,” Owl said, and disappeared from the back of the Beamer.

I took a while to slow enough to make the turn. The gravel road wound up the hill and I fishtailed the entire way up. I parked behind a small advertisement sign and we poured out of the Beamer. I checked the .45 on my hip as I pulled the S&W shotgun from under the seat. We hoofed it over to a clump of trees.

“It’s not far behind,” Owl informed us, although I had no idea where he actually was positioned.

Raven got into combat mode. Me? Well, I’m just the driver, so with any luck my next action would be driving outta there.

As the monster approached our position it was flying along the road and did not seem to know where we were. Then a shot of white light come up from behind the winery building intersecting the monster’s flight path. The monster tumbled in the air and I could hear it crash into the river. And then another white light arced from behind the winery building and plunged into the river. Within a couple of seconds something shot out of the river and landed just in front of Raven and I.

Then I saw Owl roll away and the monster stand up. One of its wings had been severely damaged. I opened up with my S&W while Owl recovered. Then Owl and Raven went to work on the monster. And then the battle suddenly stopped and the movement sort of stopped.

“Fucking shit, son of a bitch!” I heard Raven howl, and I saw him holding his side as he stumbled back to the car as he tried to sheath his sword. “I don’t know, at least two ribs broke,” he said through a twisted and grimaced face.

I grabbed the radio. “cab312 on net Echo calling Mariner. Copy?” Using the secured net, I radioed in our situation and we started heading back into the city. As I rolled along the river road we were overtaken by a number of sheriff’s deputies heading towards the winery.

We got Raven all patched up and ready for the next night’s job. In the meantime, though, I was quite interested in figuring if we were set up, who set us up, and why we were set up. It was supposed to be a routine snoop.

As for the monster: nobody knows what it is. It is not a gargoyle or any other winged monster I am aware of. It is winged like a gargoyle but the head is much more goat-like and it’s build is not as powerful. Getting a good look at it proved impossible the first time we ran into one. This night was likewise impossible. It discorporated well before we could get a good look at its corpse.

I was giving the vehicle a thorough inspection to ensure that everything was in tip-top condition. And then I heard somebody walking slowly up behind me. “How’s it goin’, mack?” my boss asked.

“I’m well, the car’s well, so I guess everything is,” I responded.

“Everything is, otherwise it wouldn’t.” But before my mind caught up with what he said, he then added, “German engineering, ay?” and then he chuckled somewhat.

I nodded. Of course there were so many customizations and modifications that the vehicle was hardly a BMW anymore, but I wasn’t in the mood. “Nothing better,” I condescended.

He faked a smile and nodded briefly. “So what do you make up of the surge of paranormal activity lately?” he asked. I was the new guy, so I had no idea what the hell he was driving at.

I shrugged. “Not really sure.”

“You look like you have an idea,” he responded. I could feel the pressure of his questions pressing hard against me. I had to deflect.

“I’m tired and I’m not really the fighter type, you know.” I exhaled somewhat, “been a long night. I’d like to wrap up here and get some sleep.”

He smiled only a little less fake this time. “Sure. Finish up here and head on home,” he said. He turned around and started to walk out of the garage area.

Some people shoot hoops or shoot guns to relieve stress. Me? I juggle. I had a couple screwdrivers and a wrench. After about 45 seconds I fumbled the wrench and he crashed against the concrete floor and reverberated throughout the garage as if a bomb had just detonated. “Oh shit,” I jumped, startled. I started to put both screwdrivers in one hand and kneel down to pick up the wrench when I noticed the screwdrivers moved in my hands, but ever-so slightly. “What the hell?” I thought out loud. I started walking around the garage and the screwdrivers’ points moved further or closer from or to one another as I moved through the garage. I noticed that they moved closer and faster as I neared the cabinet where I kept the used motor oil and would eventually weaponize or recycle. The closer I came to the cabinet, the closer the screwdrivers’ points came to each other and the stronger their attraction to one another. And the louder the scratching sound in the cabinet became.

“Oh, mack, I almost forgot,” I heard my employer call out from the darkness.

“Jesus god!” I damn near jumped out of my skin and stumbled backwards trying to get turned around.

My employer was smiling like the devil and laughing a little. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to give you such a fright,” he claimed innocently.

Just how much of a fright then? I thought to myself.

“Thought that you’d like to know that the guys said that you were all aces earlier,” he said. He lost his devil’s smile and his face became serious.

“Thanks. Thanks. I appreciate that. I’ll tell them ‘thanks’ tomorrow.”

“You do that.” And back to devil’s smile. “Be sure to get some good sleep. I have a feeling you’re going to need it,” he said, raised and lowered his eyebrows quickly, still smiling like the fucking devil himself. I watched has he walked off and disappeared into the darkness. And then he added, “One more thing. Just because you’re paranoid, that don’t mean they’re not out to get you.” And then the door closing echoed in the garage.

I turned around and looked at the cabinet. I grabbed my .45 and a prybar and staying as far back as possible I reached out with the prybar and lifted up on the cabinet door latch. The door clicked open and started open under its own weight. I stepped back twice ready to put my pistol to work.

But nothing happened. I pushed the cabinet door shut with the prybar and got the hell out of there. I could feel the weight of my eyelids increasing. I sat my desk and looked at the clock. It was almost 5:00 in the morning. When I opened my eyes it was 5:15 in the morning. I walked out, started up my Nissan and drove home. Nothing was making sense to me; I could not get these uneasy feelings out of my head.

After getting some sleep we gathered for the briefing for the night shift. I was apparently somewhere beside myself, visibly. Raven suggested that I’m only comfortable at 90 miles per hour and I smiled weakly; then my employer chimed in “and when something’s trying to kill him.” Everybody in the room got a good chuckle out of that comment. I tried to smile wider but some random grunting noise came out instead.

“Hang in there, mack,” Owl said to me. “You’ll acclimiate to the job. You’re a natural. You’ve got good instincts.”

Not so fast, Owl, I think our boss is trying to kill us—or at least trying to kill me.

“After all, you can only trust yourself, right?” Raven said.

“Yeah, except for those times when you can’t,” my employer chimed in, and again he wore the devil’s smile. He was full of glee and everybody in the briefing room seemed to enjoy the joke, but I did not find it funny.

I was on my way to picking up my first fare for the night—move agent A to point B type of deal. While I was driving I recalled the previous night. It was supposed to be an standard snoop. We went into the warehouse to check on a poltergeist claim that ended in a high speed chase and a shootout. We were not prepared for that fight, but only by the skin of our teeth did we come out on top. I could not get ay of it out of my head. And then I got this sense that something was about to go horribly wrong. At the time I was just pulling away from a traffic light and as we approached the next intersection the brakes felt like sponges, which was impossible, I had gone over everything earlier in the morning, especially the safety systems such as the brakes and the restraining harness; it’s a force of habit, it’s something that always do. “Oh shit,” I said, the car rolled to a slow stop just before pinging the vehicle in front of me. I needed to get off the road, fast. The light turned green and immediately the assplug behind me laid on his horn. There was too much congestion that I could not zip off to the side of the road, besides, with the condition of the brakes if I zipped anywhere, I wouldn’t be stopping, not with the brakes anyway. I managed to snake over a couple of lanes. “Almost there,” I told myself. And then I heard the sound of a horn that only comes from the big trucks. I looked in the mirror and a Peterbilt was bearing down on me, unable to stop. I had to hit the accelerator or get crushed by the Peterbilt. I hit the accelerator enough to get me out of the way and steered into a large tree off the side of the road in order to stop the car.

That was 1985.

Needless to say, I’ve lost a lot of time. When I regained consciousness a few years back I required several years of physical therapy and needed to relearn some basic skills such as mathematics. I received great treatment and care from everybody involved in my recovery. And I just recently passed the physical exam given at the county’s police academy, so I guess I’m doing pretty well.

The problem was during recovery that everybody also told me that the things I were saying were all in my head; they were dreams and an over active imagination while I was in a vegetative state at the hospital. They all had reasons why the things I was remembering where not real but just figments of my imagination. Eventually I just stopped asking because I was not getting any real answers. And then eventually I started to believe that it was just figments of my imagination. There was a settlement with some of the doctors that were treating me while in the coma and then the vegetative state. I was told that they skipped town to a country with no extradition treaty. I had the money in the bank. So I eventually stopped asking about the doctors and the sealed court records, too. Within the last few months I finally resolved that everything I just told you occurred nowhere else except in my head.

Apparently I was daydreaming behind the wheel, swirved to miss the Peterbilt, and slammed into the tree. I find that hard to believe. Then again, I can't believe that I still have auto insurance at a normal rate and managed to get a job anywhere near a car. I squirreled the settlement money away (which I actually got all at once without another legal battle) and went to work driving cabs in New York City. I love driving. It's a passion for sure. Being a cabbie means that you get to hear all sorts of interesting stories and meet interesting people when you drive them from Point A to Point B. I'm damn good at it and having a ball at the same time.

I am also getting into some adventures, which I’ll be passing along as they occur.

If you’re in New York City or ever in New York City, you just need to look up Cab 312 and the fare is on me.

[skeptic]

Oh, how charming is that?
The capacity for the human brain to imagine is boundless.
At least we know you don't have self-esteem issues.