Lucius and the woman passed the bottle back and forth three times before the shouting started. Angry male voice cutting through twilight. Heavy footsteps.

"The fuck is this?"

Raiders jacket from the gas station. Face twisted with suspicion. Eyes darting between the woman and Lucius.

She flinched. Not surprised. Just resigned.

"Just talking," she said, voice small. Twenty-seven, maybe, but sounding younger under his glare.

"Just talking," Raiders jacket mimicked, high-pitched, mocking. "With some fucking bum behind a liquor store."

"It's not—"

He grabbed her arm, yanked her close. "I been looking for you for an hour."

"Sorry."

"Sorry don't cut it." His fingers dug deeper. "Get in the car."

She handed the bottle back to Lucius, wouldn't meet his eyes. Let herself be pulled toward the parking lot.

A small sound escaped her. Not a scream or a call for help. Just a whimper. Like a dog that's been kicked too many times.

Something stirred in Lucius. Not chivalry. Not heroism. Just an echo. His sister's face when Marzetti's guys came around. That same resignation.

Lucius stood, brushed off his jeans. Time to go. Not his fight. Not his woman. Just another night in the city.

He walked toward the alley mouth, opposite direction from them.

"Where you think you're going?" Raiders jacket called after him. "You think I didn't see you with my girl?"

Lucius didn't turn. "Nobody's with your girl, man."

"The fuck you say to me?"

Footsteps behind him. Fast. Lucius half-turned.

Raiders jacket's fist caught him in the temple. White flash. Knees buckling.

"Think you're some kind of hero?" Another blow, glancing off Lucius's shoulder as he fell. "Think you're gonna save her?"

Concrete hard against Lucius's palms. Then weight on his back. Raiders jacket straddling him, breath hot with beer and rage.

"Nobody wants to be saved from me." His fist connected with the back of Lucius's head.

Lucius twisted, bucked, threw the larger man off balance. Rolled. Got halfway to his feet before a boot caught his ribs.

Air exploded from his lungs. Can't breathe. Can't think.

But instinct remained. Prison yard instinct. Skid row instinct. Survival.

Lucius grabbed the ankle before it could retract, yanked. Raiders jacket stumbled. Advantage enough for Lucius to scramble up, back against the wall.

"Just walk away, man," Lucius wheezed. "We got no problem."

"Talking to my girl is a problem." Raiders jacket advanced. "Sharing a bottle is a problem."

The woman stood frozen by the dumpsters. "Mike, please—"

"Shut up." He didn't look at her. Eyes locked on Lucius.

Mike lunged. Wild haymaker that Lucius slipped. But the follow-up connected—knuckles to cheekbone. Copper taste in mouth.

Lucius ducked another swing. His hand found the plastic trash can lid. Heavy-duty commercial grade. Like a shield in his grip.

Mike's next punch glanced off plastic. Confusion crossed his face. The lid wasn't part of the script he'd planned.

Lucius blocked another blow. Then another. Mike growing frustrated, swings wider, wilder.

An opening. Lucius stepped in, swung the lid like a frisbee. Edge caught Mike across the bridge of the nose. Cartilage gave with a wet snap.

Blood. Immediate. Dramatic. Mike stumbled back, hands flying to his face.

"You broke my fucking nose!" Disbelief through bloodied fingers.

Sirens in the distance. Getting closer.

Mike looked toward the sound, then back at Lucius. Calculation behind the rage. Then decision.

He charged, blood-slick hands reaching. Both men went down hard. Rolling in garbage and gravel.

Lucius got on top. Raised the lid again. Brought it down.

Sirens louder. Flashers painting the alley walls blue-red-blue.

"POLICE! BREAK IT UP!"

Voices. Footsteps. Hands grabbing Lucius from behind. Pulling him off. He didn't resist.

Two uniforms. Young guys. One for each fighter.

"He attacked me," Mike said through the blood. "Crazy homeless guy."

The woman stepped forward. "That's not what happened. Mike came at him first."

Mike's eyes flashed murder. "Shut your mouth, Angie."

"Both of you on the ground," the taller cop ordered. "Hands behind your backs."

Plastic zip ties. Cold against wrists. The ritual of arrest. Familiar to Lucius.

"You got ID?" the cop asked Lucius while patting him down.

Lucius nodded toward his pocket. "Wallet."

The cop checked it. "Lucius Taylor." Into his radio: "Run Lucius Taylor, DOB 6-15-89."

The reply crackled back. Lucius couldn't hear it.

Mike's ID produced different results. The cop's eyebrows raised.

"Michael Vasquez. Outstanding warrant for assault from San Bernardino County."

Mike's cursing turned the air blue.

The woman—Angie—moved closer to the officer holding Lucius. "He didn't do anything wrong. Mike started it. I saw the whole thing."

"You're a lying bitch," Mike snarled. "After everything I done for you."

"Step back, ma'am," the officer told Angie. Then to Lucius: "You're being detained for disorderly conduct and public fighting."

"What about him?" Lucius jerked his head toward Mike.

"He's going in too. Plus the warrant."

They were led to separate cruisers. Angie followed Lucius and his officer.

"I'll testify," she said. "It was self-defense."

The cop's face remained neutral. "You can make a statement at the station."

"Will that help him?"

"That's for the judge to decide."

The cruiser's back seat smelled of vomit and despair. Door closed with the heavy finality of cell doors. Through the window, Lucius saw Angie standing in the blue-red wash of emergency lights. She raised a hand—half-wave, half-salute.

Behind her, in the other cruiser, Mike glared hatred through the glass.

The engine started. Radio squawked. The alley and the girl and the night disappeared as they pulled away.

The boy watches. He always watches. It’s what he does best.

His father, Jimmy, is slouched at the kitchen table, bottle between his knees, glass in his hand. Bourbon—cheap, dark, a stink that fills the room and seeps into the walls. He drinks the way some men breathe. His eyes are small and mean, but dull from years of this, decades maybe. He’s muttering something about respect, something about how the world used to be different. The boy only half-listens. The words don’t matter. The rhythm does. A lullaby of collapse.

His mother, Carla, is draped over the couch in the next room, barely visible from the boy’s perch in the doorway. A track mark peeks out from the crook of her elbow, fresh and angry. The TV is on but muted, the blue glow making her look waxy. Her breathing is slow, deep, like she’s sleeping underwater. She probably is.

And the boy, sitting cross-legged on the linoleum, absorbing it all like a sponge, like something born to be soaked in it.

Jimmy takes another drink, wipes his mouth with his sleeve. The bottle tips, spills a little on the table. He lets it drip onto the floor.

“Come here,” he says. His voice is rough, like he’s chewing on gravel. The boy hesitates. He knows better than to move too fast or too slow. He gets up, drifts over. Jimmy holds out the glass.

“Try it.”

The boy is eight, maybe nine. Not that it makes a difference. He takes the glass, lifts it, sniffs. He doesn’t wince. He learned that already. He takes a sip. It burns. He swallows anyway.

Jimmy nods like that means something. “See? Makes you strong. Makes you a man.”

The boy sways a little. His body protests, but his mind clings to it, studies it. He’s learning. Everything here is a lesson.

In the living room, Carla shifts, mutters something in her half-sleep. The boy glances at her, then back to his father.

Jimmy laughs, short, sharp. “Don’t end up like your mother.”

The boy doesn’t answer. He stares at the floor, at the stain spreading from the spilled liquor, soaking into the tile, becoming part of the house. The house that has never been just walls and a roof. The house where lessons unfold in ways he can't ignore.

Tomorrow, he will sneak a sip when no one’s looking.

Next week, he will start talking like his father.

Next year, he will hit someone for looking at him wrong.

One day, he may realize where his path began.

But tonight, he drinks.

Why’s this happening? Why am I being chased through a bayou? How did I end up ankle-deep in a foreboding swamp that is inundated with what first appears to be blood but upon closer inspection, is actually salsa? And no matter how hard I try; little forward progress is made. My legs aren’t responding to my panicked demands. Lifting my right foot, I see an oversized boot. Where are my Sketchers?

Growing concerned, I glance behind me. A shrouded figure seemingly floats unimpeded over the red quagmire. Pending doom sets in as the gap closes. Looking for help, I recognize my eighth-grade Spanish teacher among the crowd of gawkers to my left. Why is Mrs. Hernandez shaking her head while holding a gato in her arms? I try screaming for help but can’t formulate words. The ominous presence now looms over me. I frantically gesture for mercy then cower as an arm extends towards my head.

Waking up, I’m sweating. My legs are cocooned in the top sheet. Lying there, reality comes into focus. I take a moment to slow my heart rate. Sooooo, now let’s add enchiladas to the long list of food I can’t eat after 9 p.m.

The bar was half-empty, neon bleeding into the condensation on his glass. Marcus sat hunched over his beer, tracing the rim with his thumb, watching the bartender chip ice from a block, little shards scattering, melting before they hit the well.

“Funny thing,” he said, mostly to himself. “You don’t really pick a place like this. You just end up here.”

The old guy next to him—gray stubble, hands like he’d spent a lifetime fixing things—took a slow sip of his whiskey. Didn’t look over.

“Guess that’s one way to see it.”

Marcus exhaled through his nose, half a laugh. “Yeah.” He swirled the last of his beer, watched the foam collapse in on itself. “Guess it is.”

A dark figure stood in the corner of the room, tall and slender, its eyes dark yet somehow faintly glowing. It stared at Dianna. She tried to scream, but no sound came out. Panic surged through her, a cold wave of terror that left her paralyzed. The shadow smiled a smile so wide it's teeth could be seen even in the darkness of the room. Long thin fingers reached into a tiny ornate sack.

It stood there, watching, eyes burning into her. It slowly removed it's long twisted hand from the sack. It came up to it's face, still grinning that impossible grin, laid one finger against it's mouth with a "shhhh". It then opened it's palm and blew sparkling sand at the bed.

The world shifted. The figure vanished, leaving behind only a lingering sense of dread.

Dianna jolted back up, her heart still pounding, her mind racing. She couldn't shake the feeling, the images, she could sense something still watching her. She kept staring at the corner, she swore she could feel a presence. But she had to let the irrational fear go, let it fade, as all nightmares do, back into the darkness from whence it came.

So I sat under the old apple tree looking at some strange curved thing like something out of H.R Gigers fevered dream.

The trunk was hollow while the branches bore apples still of the old crab apple variety no good for eating maybe cider.

A bottle of red I found fit perfectly in a hollow branch like it was made for it as the branches gave me shade from the heat of the sun.

I craned my neck and the branches brushed it giving me comfort like an old friend.

This was all I needed right here right now as I sat for hours and hours by the gnarled trunk riddled with holes and still living an ancient thing.

A beautiful thing must have been over a hundred years old.

If it had words to speak perhaps I heard them if I listened carefully not whispers or voice but a communion somewhere in my mind in the hidden places where thought goes.

All sorts of thought entered my mind as I wondered if trees had thought did they think the same as us I sat silently giving my offering to the old tree.

On this strange summers day a thinking.

I was six the first time I met him. My mom had tucked me in bed after making me sit in a tub of ice water to get my temperature down - as my Aunt Mabel had recommended. We weren't ones to go to the doctor in those days.

I was falling asleep, snuggling with my favorite teddy bear, Buster. Apparently, my temperature had barely dropped despite the ice bath and was still hovering around 105. I could hear my mom on the phone whispering outside my door. Sounded like she was crying a little, too.

Then I saw him. He was standing next to my bed, just watching me. For some reason, I wasn't afraid. I just said, "Hi."

"Hi, little one."

"That robe is too big for you."

"It's comfortable."

"Hmm, my purple jammies are comfy, too. So soft. Like Buster," I whispered, pressing my nose into Buster's belly.

"I thought I might take you on a trip."

"Mommy wouldn't like that."

"No, she wouldn't. Fortunately, it seems that an error was made. It happens sometimes. Live well, little one. Be seeing you."

Now, eighty-two years later, he's back.

No mistake; I'll be traveling with him this time.

A lady walks down the street with a little girl in tow. She looks at her daughter’s face as it morphs into that of a wolf. Frightened, she lets go of her hand. “What’s wrong, Mummy?”, says the girl. “It’s okay, dear. We just need to get you home soon”, says the lady. They hurry along. The girl runs ahead, then her legs turn into flippers. Her mummy picks her up and shrouds her with her coat.Even then she knows it’s too late. The metamorphosis has taken root earlier than expected. A beam of light shot right through her daughter’s chest into the heavens. Frantically, she ducked into the foliage. She tried to shield her from the rays, nearly smothering her girl in the process. She could feel her body lift underneath her. She was losing her grip on her torso. Screaming hysterically, she dug her heels in but there was no traction. Now it was just her arms she held onto. “Don’t worry, Mummy. I will be back soon” said the girl as droplets of gold ran down her face. As her fingers slipped away, she watched her girl float off towards the sun. “What will you be?”she whispered.

Cole took the front lines for a reason whenever they took weekend hunting jobs.

From a completely practical perspective it simply made sense much as Donna may loathe so, even recently turned Cole with his vampiric powers made the ideal tank.

And in this parallel world full of ash and bone dust that position meant the difference between whether their mother and father would still have children by some sunset. Tine ran fluid in the world Nezgrat, where demons resided.

The air made her agitated. Her mouth constantly tasted of bile and she had to force herself to find a taste in the scraps or flayed meat from a bony creature that they could catch.

The air... made Cole's bloodlust burn until he'd nearly scratched himself out of his skin.

***************************************

Cole came to see...

That he might be a very terrible person.

As he fisted through bony ribcages and marveled at the fluids that spilled out from gorgons and laggers he'd dare say getting caught in Demon Lord Gogormazel's trap was the most fun he's ever had.

His mouth split open in a grin to see the last biped sneak attack him.

But the looks on his siblings' faces...

Feeling hot, Sam reaches up to wipe sweat from his brow, but instead streaks something thick and viscous across it.

What is that?

He looks at his hands.

Lacquer? No.

“Oh!” He exclaims, a nervous laugh erupting from the pit of his stomach. “It's just sap.” He laughs again, this time more forced, as if to chase away a deep-seated worry.

He wrestles a difficult log up onto the block, centering and securing it. He reaches out to a long slender piece of wood, his axe, resting against a nearby tree, hefting it into his other hand and moving into position.

The wind bullies the trees to his left, and Sam’s head darts up; nothing. His neck whips from left to right, eyes frantic, searching the surrounding woodlands.

Wolves? No.

This time, he can’t force the laughter out. He turns back to the task at hand, grips near the head of the axe, letting it slide the length of the handle as he puts his whole back into the swing.

The blade falls heavy. Tina’s screams become gargled as blood spills out onto the block.

What is that?

“Oh! It's just sap.” He laughs, hefting the axe above his head.