Chapter Ten: Down on the corner, out in the street. Later I get home, aggravated, and then I maybe read.

I walk out after that mess at Lucas'-  well, maybe "mess" is exaggerating. It was just more like, *inconvenient* for the both of us from my horning on in without asking first. But I am known for being expressive, right? So anyways, after that mess, I feel uneasy. The weather is still crap. I figure the sun is setting because it's darker. I take the train home. I don't feel great on that either. I'm walking home from the train stop. Still out of it. I even forget to stop for the groceries I was supposed to.

Before I know it, I'm at my building and I suddenly forget- about being out of it- because I get this feeling. And this surprises me because I live in what is pretty much the basement of this huge and ancient- but well kept- catholic school. Twice as high as it is wide, and square around. Whatever you might think of the Practice, the Place is always... solemn I guess you could say. Grounded. Like two big blocks of stone stacked on the Holy Dirt.  But now I'm getting this alert happening and I'm really wondering why, right?

So I take a gulp, and breeze through the carved oak slabs that pass for doors around here and get right into the busy. Children and Teachers buzz through the main hall and clump up into lines that disappear into the warmly lit opening at the far end of the space. Really they're just going down the big winding stair that hugs the wall of the pit down, but from where I am, they look to be swallowed up by the glow. I don't see anyone strange, but I feel like eyes are on me from the shadows that stick to the sides of the foyer. But what am I going to do about now, right? So I make my way to the stair clogged with school people.

The kids are all lined up to go down for lunch. And as usual, I've got to be polite and say excuse me, and hello, all the way down, to the teachers and maybe some kids that recognize me and whatnot. It might sound like a little much to deal with to get home, but I tell you: the kids are not there all the time, I've got a huge place in a solid building, I come and go as I please and the rent is for nothing. So it's worth it. I'll tell you some other time how I got into it. It might be interesting.

Anyways then- not like usual- I run into a guy standing there a ways down. Acts like he knows me, asks me about my day. Couple of other things I don't hear because I'm too busy noticing a pin on his lapel. Like a green rectangle. But I do get that he's trying to act familiar even though he's not. He's fishing, but I don't know for what. And this bothers me because that's always trouble. Truth is though, right now I don't care and I do not want to talk to him. Then he starts on about the kids and some of the little girls making their way by. How are they doing in school and so forth. I've had enough, so I point him to one of the principals I know and call out to her. In this moment of confusion, I play it slick and take advantage of his having to deal with Ms. Ingles. I slip away down the steps. I don't think he's following me, so maybe he's asking everybody questions. I don't know.

I make it all the way to the bottom- three levels down to the basement- and past all the little happy, hungry children queued up for the cafeteria. The adults are looking out and keeping the line moving orderly, like. I feel the eyes on the back of my neck this time, and I look back to where this Questions Guy was and he's not there. I look around and don't see him or Ms. Ingles anywhere so I think maybe it was nothing, but in my gut, I know it was something. My feet go a little faster home...

Chapter Nine: The Fantastic Name Everyday Life

Went in to see Lucas the other day at the FANTASTIC NAME Elderly Care Center where they house the man, Lucas Vell Grandiothorpe The Third. Though he'd always say "turd" before I could get to it. He's faster than me like that despite his AGE.

So anyway, I walk down in there and catch him hunched over forward, working something furiously, with his chair facing the window. On account of his angle, even though the curtains were drawn, with the shitty weather, so many plants in there, and none of his lights on, it was dark enough that I couldn't see what he was doing. And I thought that knowing Lucas, there's a good chance I wouldn't want to see what he was doing anyways. Then he POPs up like a friggin JACK IN THE BOX, wood sticking straight up in the air and blade in the other hand, also stuck up into the air; and he blurts out that he was whittlin for chrissakes. Then he called me a sick fuck. The stunt shocked me senseless since I hadn't made a noise over his wheelchair squeaking. Then he said for me to shut up and sit down. So even though I still hadn't said anything, I did and he got back to work with his tool.

On account of his hands were occupied both with the holding and also the shaving of the stick in his lap, he used his chin like a finger to point at his activities as he talked. Said how he was taking the extra skin off of that GIBBOUS as he called it. And then he said some other things I didn't quite get, but who knows with him right? He says a lot of weird shit, which is fine. But then he found out I thought he was talking about carving the monkey and he called me a simple fuck and a dumb ignore-amos. But I don't mind him like that because he's been through a lot, you know? You do what he's done and try not coming out the other side a fucking grump at least. Yeah.

Anyhow, after he pops off like that, I usually give him some space and let him get back into his groove. So we sat there a little while... Sometimes I watched him, sometimes I looked around at his place. Even before this particular time I'm talking about, I always wondered how he could get away with having so many plants in there. Or why it always smelled like vinegar. It wasn't bad, just usual, you know? It stands out obviously, and usual, so I wondered about it.

So one day, a completely different time than this, I asked him about it. He said it was the only thing that worked on his nightmares. I thought he was making jokes, but he made this face at me, then he told me about them. He said they were as serious as could be. Always the same. First were the sea devils that comes as he was floating alone deep down. They would swim out of the black water with smooth eerie faces and needles for teeth and look at him like he was food, he said. With seaweed all over them. Covered all over, he would say, even over their heads. Knowing he couldn't get away. Then the fire people, who he said I would know, though I don't get why. Then total war, total chaos. Like people were volcanoes, he said. He said, for them, the people in his dreams, there was a small group of them. There was one guy who would always try to lead, real determined-like, though not very sure of himself. Not very confident. And Lucas would say how he- that guy- goes out and gets himself and some other people killed. But he comes back wearing a different body and tries to charm Lucas' dream wife away from him, so he has to beat him off. Which was not good. He said they were terrible. A close call- could have been, he said to me. Whatever that means.

At the time, I figured it was just flashbacks or something from the war, but then I got that last bit in my head, and I never know with him. So anyway, he found out the plants helped a little, I don't know where. Then later, someone told him about the vinegar. He never told me who. and I never thought about it until now, but I can see how it might help with the thing. Maybe I'll find out next time for you.

So anyways, I'm sitting there, thinking about that, and Lucas was whittling away over there, with his wheelchair squeaking, and I'm wondering why I didn't call first. Then out of the frickin BLUE, he says to me right then, that there would have been peace- basically forever- weren't for the conspiracy in between the worlds. Then he said there were FOUR. Brought the wrong kind of people coming around, he said. If you could call them that, he meant. At least, wrong for where we are, he said. Our side of the fence, he told me. And then he corrected himself saying he meant to say bubble. Inside of our bubble. Okay.

Chapter Eight: The Retuschieren King

The stagger back, Lucas said, had him notice how disrupted he was. Mostly on account of the terror, and also probably the exhaustion, he would point out. Being in that condition, he says, probably is what caused him to look into a room he'd never noticed before. He said the way the walls folded into it right off the entrance of a corridor he knew (that went to the store rooms and officers bunks) would likely make it easy to miss he said he figured. Another way he'd make sense of it was that he wasn't often to going this way, and in this direction; so it was maybe not so crazy for him to have missed it before. 

Even so, it was more suspect than not, he'd say. For example, the real bright light that poured out from the middle of it from a big window up in front of the far wall of the room. Could have been a brand new flatscreen television set the way he described it, but of course they weren't even an idea by that time. And then he'd correct me and say that it wasn't on the wall, it was in the middle of the air back there behind the Ret sitting on the throne. He'd argue with me, saying there was so much light coming out of it, he'd say, that because of the weather, and that it was an inside room, there was no way it could have been a window. But there it was, he said, and that was how he always described it to me, so there you go. I would never argue with him.

Going on, he'd say there was a big Ret sitting in front of it. Had to be the king of them, he said he figured, though he'd never seen him prior to that; and the Ones he did see never talked about anything else but what their plans were and what they were doing. At any rate, the Retuschieren King was sitting over on this big wood chair in the middle of this room and all this light. So Lucas says he slowed down to get a better look because what in the hell. I notice, as an aside, that even with how he'd seen so much oddness in his life, Lucas is still a goddam peeping tom for it. Gets his rocks off like that. Most people will habituate to most things and then stop thinking about them so much, if at all. But not this One. He'd still follow it down like a RABBITHOLE until he either got to the end of it or the end of it got to him.  

Anyway, like he said, it was harsh what was coming in from that window. And you know how when strong light is in the eyes, you might as well be sticking your fingers in them. But Lucas said he could still hear all right and he heard there was another one in there talking to the King. And he said he kept walking, so his eyes got used to it, and the new angles gave him a better view and he says that he saw that it looked like the King was in grief, but still listening to who was talking. Like he was being briefed. Lucas figured it was over one of them that died in the battle and was close to him or some such, though they seemed to All look the same to him, Lucas said. 

And POP, Lucas saw something shocking to him if you can believe that. He saw the King was messing with something in his lap. Lucas said, it was- at first what he thought- was his member, but actually was less of a penis and more of what a stretched out version of what the lady's parts look like. He would say it like "a miniature thing with hanging wings that sort of flapped and swung while he messed with it". Like a bat. So I don't know outside of that. Like nothing I know. Like it was man parts and lady's parts or something. 

Either way though, what he was saying was that the king, in his grief, he was playing with his thing. Lucas said it seemed to be all he could figure was happening though he had no idea why it would be the natural thing for them to do. He said this question occupied and dumbfounded his mind so completely and so thoroughly in the moment, that he did not notice how his legs kept walking him past without him realizing it, so that he did not see the King finish, though he heard the finish and that startled Lucas, he said. Because of the suddenness of the noise it made.

But when he looked back, he saw that the room looked normal again, no lit up window, and no Retuschieren King on a wood throne. But he still heard voices in there, though at this point he didn't give a shit about looking anymore because he was probably hallucinating, he said, from nearly being dead to exhaustion. Besides, he would always say They were not anything like He was, so who the hell knows with Them. For all of that, everything in his head could be fake he realizes, so he couldn't possibly judge and he kept on with walking he said, and didn't stop until he got to his lean-to. He was done. 

He said he was just about to sack out when he heard a commotion from where he came from and saw two Retuschieren coming from that room. They were in robes and they were chanting and walking together. Lucas said that without him seeing how, the two Giants were behind and on either side of him; all three of them walking back up the walkway to the catwalk. He says he thought he was already dreaming, and his brain hurt. He figured they were doing something to him because of what he saw in the room.

When they got to the middle of the gangway, Lucas would say it was clear to him he was to do like they were doing. And he said he tried, though awkwardly through his tiredness. Likewise, he said he was compelled to join in on the chant, but it was nonsense to him. Something, he said, like  "I DONE, I, HI, ARM REST", which he thought was ridiculous and embarrassing as it was obvious. But he said he noticed that thinking stopped short, because he says "great orbs of gold light drew down into our sphere." He makes me say those exact words. He would also say he had to say it that way because it was the only way to say it despite how it sounded. Even to him, he would insist. 

He would explain that the orbs had come out from were we are, but from another place, if you can get that. I can't. But that moment did something to him he said, because they came out there at Kerberos to finally do what they three had done, after all the rest that happened. He said right then he knew why they had been there and why the Greensleeves had made the Nazi's to go after them with their animals. But now Kerberos was gelled and could stand for a good long time without them.

Chapter Seven: The Defense of Kerberos

The wolves. right? Well, they were wolf-like at least, as he said. The shaggy things that came out of the mountain because of what fuckery them Nazis were fooling with he was always saying. Then he'd follow it with something like goddamn Nazis and their Greensleeves and how it wasn't for the Retuschieren, we'd all be dead. That was what the giants were called, he said, though he also used Rets, which they didn't seem to mind  he said. They didn't seem bothered much about anything, Lucas would always say. They were there to do their business and not much else apparently, and he admired and respected that. He said they showed up when the demons did and fought them off, thank the lord,  which he loved to say, despite his being a pagan heathen. That was my joke with him, but it was true. He's been a heathen ever since since the war, though he was an atheist before that. 

Anyhow, Lucas said he'd never in a million years believe that any of it was real, and that the only thing to explain it he figured was that it was all because of something the Nazis might have probably been doing to him, the conniving sadistic fucks, he'd say. But there they were, in that place, and what was in his head seemed real enough, he'd say. And then he'd point out how in the end, we did survive, we did win the war here. And when he'd say that, he would always tap the floor where he was with his cane, which didn't suss out because of where we were.

Now, I don't ever believe a thing Lucas ever says, okay? Because it's most always peculiar, he did have the stroke, and also for a haul of other reasons I'll probably get into another time; but I did always listen, because it is always a good experience though. Am I right? Yeah, of course I am. But no, I could never believe a thing he says. But there is always one thing that always got me WIRED was how he never changed the way he told it. Not a detail. Not a thing. Not never. I know this for sure because I test him sometimes.  A month later or something. About one detail or two that I'll think on and save for the purpose. And every time, he'd get it right. Every time, right on the money.

Anyway, he said the Retuschieren had powers. Make things in the air or out of thin air. With light or fire, he'd tell me. They'd draw shapes- pictures in the air with light, he says- I know, right- but they were some kind of weapon or something. They had a name for it, but he could never remember it. He thought it maybe sounded something like HORNETS, and because of how it sounded when they were made, and how they stung those beasts, or bounced them off straightaway, he thought that was good enough. Lucas said the Rets taught some of them, himself included, to make them and recharge them, because I guess the things ran out of fire from time to time and they needed help in the upkeep. Like that time just then, as a matter of fact, seeing as to how many of them shaggy wraiths as there were attacking right then. That hellatious ruckus snapped him right out of it, he said, and a good thing, he said because down the catwalk and at the far wall from where he was, he saw a hornet was flickering. So he ran. 

Shee it there were a lot of them that time, he'd say. It was like this was the battle. They were hitting hard, he said, hammering on the walls to try to get through. Driven by hell it seemed and he said the whole thing had him rattled. Terrified, even. And that was saying something. But he recharged that hornet anyway, he said, and saw that most everyone else were on the walls and battlements trying to kill the sumbitches, he'd say, and with some of them being killed themselves. So he went to running around from power spot to power spot, recharging one after another. There was one hornet across the fort, he said, that looked like it was about to go out and that wall was being hit hard. But it was a little too far away. He was right tired, he said, with his lungs bursting and stitches around his middle. But he ran like hell to get over there anyway. Thinking he was going to die in the trying, he said and it seemed like the things were gonna beat him to the punch. That whole huge log wall rattled and shivered in every blow. They were all dead, he said he was thinking. But snap quick, a Ret flew in from out of nowhere to get it in time and looked at him like he shouldn't worry. Then, he said, it was over. Just like that, he said. The walls were strong and the outpost was safe. For a spell, at least. And he'd say how after that he was plum tuckered for sure, and so figured he'd go on back to his hammock in the lean-to to catch is breath.

Chapter Six: The Garrison of Kerberos

Standing up there looking around, he was struck right dumb, he said. Lucas, if you remember, had stopped up on the middle of that catwalk to suss out what the men were up to. But he said that, while there were lots of soldiers running about, there were only a few men at the camp. And by that, he said, he meant any joe or sam you might see on the street. A man, if you will. You get what I'm saying? And before he went on, he would always make sure to point out that they were, all of them, himself included he realized, they were all dressed strange-like, he says. Like they were wearing dark skins and cloaks and the like from a fairy tale or something. But, honestly, he'd always say, honestly, the clothes were the least strange out of the whole picture and he forgot about them almost immediately as he realized it.  

Why? Well, that's because the rest of them, the rest of all of those soldiers, he'd say- were giants. Big, WHITE GIANTS. Okay? Not like giants like as in Jack and his beans, but compared to your average man. Maybe 12 or 15 feet tall, had skin as white as a cloud, pointed ears, and long white hair. And they all wore a sort of tight black skin for cover, Lucas said. He'd say the whole scene made it feel like a Grimm STORY. But there he was, real as could be, he thought. And the why of how he felt- like he was just dropped there out of the blue- and how that got him feeling strangely, you know? That wondering why and feeling strangely, started to go away, he said. Because again, that's what was going on right then. There he was, right? And as it happened, those last bits of confusion, he said, the perplexing nature of it all, vanished like something natural you could think of, like a slick simile of something, because right then, the wolves started to howl and nothing else could stay in his mind.

Chapter Five: Outpost Kerberos

So as I was saying, next that happened, Lucas woke up. 

First thing he touched on he said, was the swaying of the hammock under his little brush lean-to. He said he remembered noticing that the leaf and dirt-covered branches of the shelter were warmly lit- like as if they glowed, he'd say. He turned his head to look at the fire, he said, as his dream from the night before dissolved back away from the light of his waking life. DISORIENTED was the word he used here, and that struck me, because it was never really a kind of word he was usual to use. 

He squinted his eyes, he said, to get his bearings, and looked around to gauge the activity of the garrison. The fort, he said, was in the DEEP wilderness of Tenarus, in the lowlands somewhere between Switzerland and Austria, he said this time. And he never could remember why they were there, although he knew how bizarre and dangerous it was. They were there to stop whatever it was the Nazis had let out of the mountain heart, and he hated to think about it, I knew.

Anyhow, it was a sloppy bog, with firm dark mud everywhere, running level as far as he could see, he said. Though he could not see far on account of the thick fog that always held outside the wall of the OUTPOST. The wall was made of the thick black trees that stuck out like grasping, bony fingers all around through the mist. There were great looming shadows in the distance, he said, that could have been the mountains. He couldn't ever be totally sure. Which didn't make sense to me because how in the hell did he get there without knowing something about what was around him? There was lots that was strange about those times, he would always tell me. 

Anyways, as groggy as he was, Lucas said, he forced himself to ease out of the hammock in a way that kept him from slopping face-first into the muck. He was successful in this for once, and stretched as he walked to limber up and get a better look around. The walls seemed to be about 20 or 25 feet high and several feet thick.  There were lookout towers around inside the walls, he said, but he couldn't rightly see how to get up into them without causing a fuss. Bisecting the fort, was a sort of catwalk with big obvious stairs at either end. It seemed high enough to get a look of the land, so he made his way over. As he climbed the steps, he noticed that the land to the left side of the camp- the shadow that could have been a mountain was to the right- there weren't no trees sticking up that he could see. As he got to the top, he realized there were no trees there because they were close to the shore of a huge lake. Furthermore, he said, as he walked the planks, he saw that outside of the wall towards which he was walking, there was a great rushing river feeding into and back from the body of water that could have been a lake. He said that it reminded him of if the Amazon River had moved to England, though I know for a fact that he's never been to either of those places. "Shut the fuck up and let me talk," he'd say. I did like to yank his chain.

Now, at this point, he says, now that he got his bearings and was reasonably woke, he started to look about inside to see what the men were up to. And when he did, he about shit his pants. An action, he said, he might of actually followed through with on account of the slop he'd been eating.  

Chapter Four: Line 23

As soon as they saw the wood bubble houses, Lucas said, was when it got strange. Since he was a little distance away, he said, he didn't get caught up in the confusion so much, and could see what was happening. He said that out of nowhere came this woman as dark as the night they were in. She was like a queen he said, not looking at any one person or thing, but at everything, like she was in a trance or something, he said. That, and because she was surrounded by guards in armor. But the weird thing about that, Lucas said, were actually two things. First, was that there was actually only one guard, he said, when he looked at them hard- like keeping from seeing double when you're drunk. It was only one guy when he squinted and shook his head, but for some reason it seemed like there was a lot of them when he looked at them regular. That gave him the right willies in his gut, he'd say. Like he was gonna be sick. And two, he wasn't sure if it was because it was dark or the distance, or the fact that he was already "fraught silly with the heebie jeebies" or all of the above, but the guards (or guard) had helmets (or a helmet) that made him (or them) look like a dog (or dogs) walking like a man (or men). He said it sort of got him off his hinge trying to make sense of it. Whenever he mentioned the guard (or guards) Lucas would always get really strange and far off until food came.

Anyhow,

From then, Lucas said, ostrobogulous became more and more a distant relative of the current scene. I still don't know who that is, but I guess that's besides the point. The welcome party didn't treat the men badly, he remembered, but in general acted like they were part of the scenery. Like tree stumps or bushes. They arrived, surveyed the men, and turned to go back. Lucas said the leader of the "village ijits" was already more scared and tired of being lost in the woods than he could handle and so was desperate to get a word in with these people they found. Again Lucas would chuckle here, and just marvel at how stupid and backwards these people were to not be able to survive without help even on their own land. And they gave him a hard time? It was a laugh.

So back to how, scared as the man babies were, seeing how this queen woman and her guards would not answer their pleas or questions, the party leader decided to write a note he could put in front of one of them. Lucas thought this was one of the dumber things he'd ever seen, but he knew they were desperate and he was there for the entertainment, so he let it ride. Though he did get more than he bargained for, because what he saw next made him say a prayer to his Granny Laveau beggin forgiveness for ever doubting her word when she was alive:

The walking turd, Lucas said, tried to put pencil to paper, but by damn sight, his hand was obstructed by some invisible force and could not write anything legible. Instead, what came was a child's scribbles that looked like random numbers of various sizes: a small 9, a large 4, a 1, a small 2, an 8, and possibly another 8, but the man, being the pitiful coward he was, Lucas said, quickly gave up trying to create anything readable, as the opportunity to present a message at all was lost, as the soldiers and queen had left and moved quickly. The outright strangeness of that event was immediately forgotten though, he said. Because all of a sudden, they had come up on the main pod that was perched highest on the mountain and above the rest of the settlement. And what's more, the people they were following were gone, DISSAPEART he said.

Lucas said that while those idiots were shitting themselves at this sudden turn of events, he noticed above the entrance was a sign. It seemed like a family crest or something, he would say, with writing in a language he didn't read. But in the center, between the words, was a painted wood carving of a rose in a short cup with some honeybees and PEARLS around. It was the only real color he had seen since the torches went out, he said, so the sign popped out like lights, burned in his head. It was right about then, Lucas said, that all at once, they saw that the pod they were walking into was a gate to a massive cave into the mountain that went on for more than they could see into the darkness. There were small individual sandy beaches with their own lagoons, more than he could count, in front and to either side of them he said. And those lagoons spilled out to a great lake or ocean, for all he knew. It was that big! he would exclaim. And then, it was all pandemonium, he'd say.

Apparently at this point, the "idjits from the village" had run to the waters, stripped their clothes off, and fell into it like hogs. As if they had been without water for days, he said. DISGUSTED he'd say. And then just as quickly they were shut out from the water by giant gates which all of a sudden swung down and sealed the openings flat. Lucas said the baby-men started howling like infants pulled too soon from their momma's teats. Though the whole thing had startled him, he took a moment to take satisfaction in their wailing. And then it went black. And then he woke up.

Chapter Three: Mountain Bubbles

So one night, Lucas would say, the village headman's idiot son didn't come back. And he'd say that even as superstitious and terrified by their own shadows as these backwards ass people were, the son of the headman was a pretty big deal. So they just couldn't let it go on account of cowardice he figured. They'd got themselves good and worked up, he'd say, and put together a sort of posse, as he would call it, and then they'd make plans to go out and "get them sumbitches" complete with torches, pitchforks, and other gardening and hunting tools. 

Now, as salty as he had gotten about the villagers by that time, Lucas was always quick to point out that they were people also. And he didn't like to see people hurt or loved ones taken away no matter what kind of assholes they might have been, so he decided because of that, he'd tag along and maybe keep an eye out for them from a distance, and stay out of the torchlight. 

Well, it wasn't long before the shits got lost, he'd say. And in their own wood! which would always make Lucas legitimately guffaw. All compassion aside, he savored every chance to see them humiliated. They'd go all charging out into the forest and get a hundred yards or so and then realize they have no idea where they're going. It was hilarious, he'd say. Nobody ever knew where to find the supposed Greensleeves, but they would never stop to consider that and this time was no different. From that point on, he said, they just argued and changed direction so many times, they didn't realize where they had ended up. Even Lucas, who had been enjoying the show maybe too much, wasn't so sure where they were. But he didn't care, he said, he could always last the night and then find his way back in the daytime. It was kind of spooky though that night, he would say. That night, the trees there blotted out the sky, and even the torches eventually got swallowed up by the darkness. The loudest thing was the crunching of the snow, so in that way he had no problem following them. They got quiet as shit when the torches went out. Not so brave without their lights, he'd say, properly disgusted.  

Eventually, right about when those "panty-waisted chickenshits" started to wail and moan about how tired and cold they had gotten, Lucas recognized the crotch in the mountain they were nearing. Once up to the pass, they all started to chatter about this great bubble of soft white light coming out ahead. Soon, Lucas said, smallish gray wood dome houses trimmed in white appeared. They were all a little mystified, him included he said. Saying that the scene looked a lot like soap bubbles- the light and the wood- clinging to the face of the green-black mountain they were hanging on. 

2 - It's important you understand correctly something about what he said.

Remember this part? : How he wouldn't have been at all surprised if that shaggy thing was some kind of demon that come from inside the mountain? He wasn't aiming to be dramatic. He'd say all the time ,deadly serious, how there was a reason behind why all the stories he told me sounded so crazy. He said it was the Nazis. But not really the Nazis. They were just like puppets he says. "Green sleeves hide the arms," he's say. Like I would ever know what that meant. And when I would ask him about it, he'd look at me like I'd just tracked dog shit in again. Then he'd get all quiet and suddenly blurt out "conducting satanic and INHOLY (how he says it) experimentations inside of those mountains." 

He was sure of it. Whatever it was.

Now, I'm not saying I ever believed much, if anything, that Lucas would tell me of course. But nutty as it sounds, it is at least a reason that makes sense given what all he told me about before and since. And right after he said it, I thought to myself that I have heard before that the Nazi's did follow around with some strange shit. Then he'd say real sudden -like to answer my thought- that it was common knowledge. Which got me. Did I say that out loud? Anyway, then he said to just look at what they wore, right? But beyond that, he'd say he had real proof. That it started with how the villagers were always on about this movement of sorts around the villages on the mountains called the GREENSLEEVES, he said, what coincidentally just showed up in the months before the War began. 

Among other things, they were the reason for it not being safe to go out into the wood at night. He said every once in a while one of the kids or one of the more dim of the bunch would go out and not come back. The rest that was left would get so worked up about it, he'd say. Like chattering monkeys. The villagers thought the greensleeves were eating who they caught or sacrificing them to the devil or some silliness like that. But boy were they wrong, he'd always chuckle- Lucas was kind of a sick fuck, sense-of-humor wise. Then he'd again swear up and down he had proof. And then he'd say about when they discovered what was really going on, those mountain goats more than shit themselves. And how a few of them actually did drop dead straightaway "and good", he'd say. And then he'd get this real satisfied look on his face. He never did seem to get over how they always made fun of him on account of his dentures. And how they never helped him get a more presentable set or get him laid at least or anything like that to show their appreciation for what he did for them. They were always shitty to him because he was a hillbilly, he said. As if they were some high society or something, he would snort at me. 

Besides all that, I'd always tell him at this point that none of that so far sounded like proof to me. And he'd always snicker and say that he knew that and then called me fuckstick. And then like always, he'd promise me I'd get it when he come to it. And also like always, I would believe it when I saw it.  

Chapter One: Did I ever tell you the story about my buddy Lucas?

So here's the thing about Lucas: He was an amazing sharpshooter. He was in the Swiss Alps fighting against the Axis during WWII. Just ran around in overalls and light shoes like a hillbilly. Sometimes just barefoot. He was nuts, like untouchable. But he came from a really poor family, they had no dental care, so he ended up losing all of his teeth before he was drafted into the military. And since his family was poor, he couldn't afford proper dentures, he could only get these really awkward looking, oversized ones that could easily have been repurposed fake teeth they use for comedy shows. The dentures fit so poorly and they were so uncomfortable, he would mostly only wear them when he needed to eat. Anyway...

So like I said, Lucas was stationed in the Swiss Alps, and there was a little village he would pass through now and again on purpose, just so he could catch a glimpse of the dairy farmer's daughter- Helga, Olga, or something. I always forget. But she was beautiful, he would always say. Although after he turned about 38 I think it was, he could never go on to describe her without getting really nasty and filthy about it. I mean, you know me, but he'd make me cringe with some of the things he'd say. I guess being cooped up in that nursing home and all the rules they had made him go a little nutty that way. He didn't want to be there, but he couldn't do anything about it. Also maybe it was the stroke. That made him be like that.

But I digress.

The farmer's daughter we were saying- let's call her Elke- Lucas loved her. But because of his teeth, and despite the numerous times he'd literally saved the entire village, she wanted nothing to do with him. Technically, you couldn't blame her too much for it, as he was not so easy to look at. But still... At any rate, Lucas was telling me how this one time, while he was patrolling, an SS officer happened through this part of the WOOD, terrified, screaming, and waving his hands in the air, begging for help. Normally, he would have just shot someone like that right off the bat because, Nazis. But this guy was not acting right, so he wanted to know what the fuck. So he laid low and let him run right in. He could see the officer was definitely torn to pieces and he had blood in a bunch of places which made him curioser. When the guy got to where he was hiding, he popped out and knocked the guy into the ground with his rifle butt. Staying low, he said, Lucas jumped on top and held the officer's mouth closed, all in case it was a ruse. The officer tried to keep quiet, Lucas said he was definitely a pro, but was so scared and hysterical he started to cry. Even got to pissing himself. 

The guy did get himself together enough to make complete sentences though. And was quiet enough so Lucas let him up, thinking that by the pissing, it probably wasn't a trick. Cowering behind the tree, the guy explains in halting english how his camp was attacked by an animal. Something he had never seen before: like if a bear was stretched long. And it made blood-curdling crying noises, like howling. The officer started to babble and cry again and so Lucas shot him. I told him that was pretty cold-blooded, but he said he didn't have the patience for that shit from people like that and that I should shut the fuck up about shit I don't know and let him finish his story.

So he went on to tell me how as he went through the guy's pockets, he was thinking that he had no idea what the fucking kraut was talking about, since there were no bears or anything like that where they were. He would know, he said, since he was out wandering around all the time and would have seen something like that by now. So he left the corpse where it was to get back to patrol and forgot about it.

The rest of the trip, he says, wasn't worth mentioning. But on the return trip, he said, was different. It was late, and getting cold. He was out of the schnapps he had snatched from one of the farmers while they were sleeping; and on top of this, he was getting hungry. Whenever he got like that, he'd say, he'd start thinking down. Like he was depressed. Lucas did always say how the quality of his thinking was right on line with the feeling of his belly and his belly did not feel great. He was in this state, nearing the last stretch of trail, when he got to think about the creature the Nazi was jabbering about. The guy *was* slashed up pretty bad. And just considering it, he'd say to me, it got him a little creeped out and maybe jumpy. Every little sound set him off, he said. The idea of this Thing out there gobbling up a man took up more and more space in his head until he was just about at a full sprint to get back to the tree to inspect the body and make sure of what he saw.

Huffing and puffing, sweating bullets into his itchy thermals, he gets back to the tree finally and nearly convulses. He said it looked like the guy exploded, he says. A big bloody splot with guts all over the place. Now he's really getting freaked out, right? The body was there in one piece, he says, now it's everywhere? He's never seen anything like this before and his empty stomach heaves itself up and out of his mouth, but he gets a hold and swallows it down. He was good at that. Lucas was always about staying on top of himself in the moment no matter what. And he thought he'd let himself get too far in this particular situation, so he put a grip on it. Handy skill that turned out when the war came around, he'd say. Anyhow, there he was getting a hold of himself when he hears shrieking- Elke! He said his feet slipped in the guts when tried to leap up, but he jerked and flailed his body around to stay on top of them so he could make it to the rise towards the trail that led to the village.

As he comes around the bend, he says, the front edge of the village eased into view and Lucas said he could see his wanna-beloved running down the far side of the field towards the main thoroughfare- the same road he was headed to.  He saw blood on her so he hit the gas and as he gets closer, he said, and could hear her screaming about the goats or something.  But before he got to 50 yards from her, a tremendous roaring/screaming came from down the mountain to his right. He turned to see what it was and out of the brush comes this brown shaggy monster- exactly like the SS guy described. Lucas said how he froze a second, because he thought for sure it was some demon that had come out of the mountainside on account of the weird shit the Nazis were doing in there. But fortunately he didn't stop too much to think about it, because instincts took over, raised his rifle, and BAM (click cluck) BAM (click cluck) BAM (click cluck) and the thing hit the ground. But just for a second.

Whatever is was, he said, HOWLED, like nothing he'd ever heard before, and veered off away and into the woods. Away and never to be heard from again that day. When he was sure the thing was gone and the perimeter safe, Lucas said he made his way over to Elka who was screaming bloody murder nonstop the entire time. She was screaming so crazy, he said, that she looked like "a plum ready to pop, ok".

He waited until she settled down and Lucas, thinking this was the time- finally- since he'd literally snatched her from the jaws of death this time- made his move to comfort her. But in all the confusion, he forgot that he had been wearing his shitty dentures. So when she came to, and realized gratefully what had happened, she looked up to him and saw the teeth all goofy and sticking out in weird places and suddenly burst into laughter. So did the other few townspeople who happened to gather around at the commotion.
"Fuck those people." he would always say. "Fuck those people. Should have shot them instead."