The Witches of Isle Royale

America has collapsed and nothing is like it was. Now, in the sprawling metro area of the M in the Northeast Regional Sovereignty where everything is negotiable, unlicensed private investigator Kim Murayama agrees to help one of the mysterious contraband “witches” of Isle Royale. Returning her to her quarantined island in Lake Superior shouldn't be that difficult a job. But whispered rumors of immortality and far-fetched tales of witchcraft aren't even half of the story. He may have opened a Pandora's box that can't be closed.

She didn’t look like a witch. No warts or gnarly knuckles, no ugly long nose. Nothing like that. She had a nice nose, ingenuous oval features and a cameo complexion with chestnut brown hair intricately braided in an attractive chignon. Glass clinked beneath conversation and laughter, of numbers bets being placed in the thin haze of tobacco and stick smoke that gave Jack's Place a surreal look. The piquant smells alone were enough to get high on, but didn't trouble me sitting in a back booth as we were. The morality of it doesn't bother me, either. I do a lot of my business out of Jack's seeing as I don't have an office – don't have a license – and Jack sends clients my way now and again so I don't much care about drugging at the bar. Beer's my preference. Or sake when I can get it, but Jack doesn't stock that. I sipped my beer and regarded soft brown eyes across the table. “You’re looking for passage on the lakes.” “Can you help me?” she asked quietly, hands folded demurely on the table. “I want to go home.” She was probably running, but though her simple loose black top and black pants hinted at fugitive status she was calm and collected, looking not at all like a frightened rabbit, someone on the run in this soul-corroding shithole that tramples people without a second thought. She didn't look as though she belonged here at all with dregs, drunks and bookies at the bar. I wondered if she thought I looked like a resident. Her gaze was steady, more curious than anything. “The man serving drinks said I should talk to you, the Japanese man.” “That'd be me. Kim Murayama. And you?” With the beginnings of a small smile she replied, “My name is Mick.” Mick. I liked the name. And the way she said it. I wasn't sure it fit her, but it interested me. For some reason I couldn't immediately pinpoint, she interested me. “Mick what? Last name?” She cocked her head and gave me a quizzical look. “Only Mick.” Incognito, then. Okay. “You running?” This perplexed her. “Are you UD?” I wasn't necessarily averse to helping her out even if she was. If the price was right. “What is U-D?” She articulated it carefully, utterly unfamiliar with the acronym. That hoisted a red flag. “Undocumented,” I replied carefully. “Do you have a plate? For identification.” Purchasing, riding the Tube. The bus. I wondered idly how she'd gotten to Jack's from wherever she came from. You can't live in the M without a plate. Well, you can, but it isn't much of a life. Not that life here is all frolic and merriment to begin with. She said, “I am not from your great city.” I ran a finger up and down my beer glass drawing thin lines in the condensation while I considered this. Maybe she was Canadian or maybe she just didn't know the difference between authoritarian guvy and a monarchy, but either way she was definitely fresh off the boat in the Northeast Sovereignty. “Where are you from, then?” I raised my glass, watching her over the rim. “Isle Royale.” She said it right out as though no one might overhear. “Shee-it.” I almost choked on my beer. I didn't know a ton about Isle Royale but I knew it was prohibited and anyone off it is contraband. A “witch.” Whether the obscure, little-known and seldom spoken of inhabitants were really dangerous, malicious crones with a bounty on their heads or if that was just more Ministry of Information saturation hype to encourage people to turn them in, the woman across from me appeared in all respects to be undocumented and I might be pinched as an accessory just being in her company. I glanced at Jack surreptitiously watching me. “It is in Lake Superior,” Mick went on, heedless. “Near Thunder Bay.” “I know where it is.” If she'd told Jack that he could already have made a call. I had the sudden urge to vamoose and stood. “Come on.” “Where are we going?” She slid out of the booth, not nearly as skittish as she ought to be for her circumstances, more evidence that she didn't have a clue. “For a walk. This isn’t a good place for you.” I threw some Bs on the table and we waded through the haze, Jack's hungry eyes following us all the way out the door. On the walk I checked for police. Nothing yet. I gestured in the direction of the Strip a half block on where we could hop the Tube. Mick fell into step beside me. “Why must we leave?” “Because you ain’t got a plate.” “This is bad, yes?” “UD is bad.” I looked her up and down. “You really from Isle Royale?” She nodded ingenuously. “That’s even worse.” A thousand B worse. Even if the stories were bullshit, some myths can be very lucrative. We crossed the street and headed toward the glare and noise of the Strip. I touched Mick’s elbow, guiding her around a group of lounging streeters holding up the side of a dull red brick building smeared with graffiti that I recognized as Wall Flowers' tagging – a bleeding heart and purple foxglove growing by a river of blood. Green Isaac's outfit. These bums in their post-apocalyptic burner jackets were somewhere between steampunk and diesel-delinquent. There was a pair of daffy welding glasses, what looked like a bionic armored gauntlet on another guy and gallons of ink showing on everybody everywhere not covered by all this imaginative fashion. Way too anachronistic, and unrealistic, to be with the Flowers. Smoke drifted, a pungent mix of straight tobacco, marijuana, and a hint of some other psychedelic leaf currently popular with trendsetters and now filtering down to the lower lifeforms. Neon eyes tracked us, but none of them made a move. Mick stared with all the naivete of someone utterly unfamiliar with the process of devolution going great guns in the M. “Who are those people?” she wanted to know. “They look strange.” “They are strange.” One of them had a slime-green reptilian tail that made me think of an iguana. I hadn't seen that particular permutation before, but it didn't surprise me. Swallow the right DNA modifier, you can grow whatever you like. I've always wondered if the process can be reversed should something you don't anticipate grows somewhere you don't want it. A lot of bathtub brew from down below the Dead Line in the Kamaly isn't produced under real stringent quality control, so I suppose such a thing could happen. Me, I never changed, never swallowed any of the mods that are so popular with these trailblazing buffoons, so I don't know for sure. Or much care. The Collapse has had a cataclysmic effect on all of us, but changing isn't my idea of coping. “They're goofballs,” I told Mick, “Stay away from them. All they’ll do is cause you trouble.” “There is much trouble in your world, yes?” My world. As though I had any influence in it. I almost laughed. “If you don’t like it, you didn’t have to come here.” “I did not choose to,” she assured me. “They brought me here. Thompson and the men on the ship.” Kidnap, then. Off Isle Royale? What the hell for? Far as I knew whatever folks were on the island were quarantined, and you hardly need to go to the ends of the Great Lakes to impress prostitutes. I suppose the Syndicate could afford to do that, but it doesn't have a GDP equal to or greater than the Sovereignty's because it wastes money. There's plenty of hooker material just on the God damn Strip. Mick came to an abrupt halt. “Is that what you think I am?” she demanded. Jesus. I came up short myself. Did she know what I was thinking? Maybe the stories were more than just fairy tales. Traffic sounds and the drifting, heavy thump of clashing music leaking out of watering holes up and down the Strip receded; her eyes grew wider, the kind of yawning deep you fall into and never get out of. It wasn't easy, but I kept my expression flat, just staring at her. After several long heartbeats during which I didn't fall in, I shook myself and resumed walking. “We need to get you out of the M. This Thompson’ll be after you. Or the police will.” Or both. She scooted to catch up. “You are not afraid of me.” “Should I be?” I asked absently, scanning again for any sign of interest in us that we didn't need. She didn’t answer me. Maybe she knew what I was thinking and maybe she didn’t. What difference? No one wanted to be caught with a contraband loose off her quarantined island. No secret that. We turned a corner into the full, glorious blaze of the Strip, a whirlwind of bleeding neon and flashing lights from the front of gin mills, porn shops, tattoo parlors and bawdy houses, the street picketed by working girls, pimps and dealers. Horns blared as aggressive-line muscle cars cruised, old Chevy's with big-block 450s still rolling, a yellow 340 Duster with black striping and 325 horses under the hood that would have been a classic before the Collapse. Always liked those. Never had one, but always liked them. A garishly painted low-rider eased along, bouncing on its hydraulics, probably one of Green Isaac's fleet. Mick took all this in with a wide-eyed wonder. A Tube stop beckoned a block up. Unthinking, I took her hand and pulled her after me. “Where are we going?” she asked again, more curious than desperate. “The docks. To see about getting you a lift home.” Half way to the Tube stop the streeters reappeared, led by the Tail. They came up fast from behind and to the side. “Hey, you Bakery Man!” The Tail jumped in front of us, glitzy red eyes shining. His growth twitched. I bit my tongue and started to go around him, trying to avoid a spectacle in the street, but he sprang again. “Bakery Man, hey! Don’t run, play.” His companions, two young men and two young women, the latter decked out in ruffled Capris, leather cinchers and slave bracelets, circled us. They were just rowdies, but they were going to be a pain in the ass. I stopped, showed them an affable smile and empty palms. “Excuse us. Please.” The Tail's lower lip protruded, freakishly festooned with silver and black horseshoe rings. “Bakery Man make sadness. Bakery Man make all things sad.” “I’m not from the bakery,” I told him. “Please excuse us.” “No Bakery Man?” He leered at Mick. “Fib me big. Got fresh hot tart.” He reached for Mick. She jerked back, scowling owlishly. The streeters guffawed. I took a deep breath and tried one last time. “Excuse us.” Laughing louder, the Tail went for Mick again. She sprang back, surprisingly agile and balanced. I snatched the young man’s hand, twisting it over and around in a compression wrist lock. He yelled and tried to pull free, but I applied more pressure giving him some real pain to think about. His knees half buckled, his expression a twisted grimace of surprise and shock. I pulled him close enough for intimate conversation. “Get out of the way, stupid. I’m not going to ask again.” “Ai! Bakery Man, okay, okay!” He sounded as though he meant to back down, but his free arm moved, hand arcing up toward my face. I automatically executed an outward middle block – chudan-soto-uke – stopping the punch. As soon as his arm struck mine it started back down and around in a classic knife fighting counter-strike. “Fucking Slant!” he snarled. I shot a low block, catching the inside of his wrist and stopping that strike. The blow vibrated up my arm, but I ignored it and twisted the wrist I still held, snapping it before he could get a third try at cutting me. He screamed and the knife clattered on concrete. My knee slammed into his groin, doubling him. As he went down I delivered an elbow strike that knocked out a couple molars. He groveled, one good hand clasped to his bloody mouth. I turned and threw myself back just in time to avoid another blade slicing for me. “God damn it!” I arced a crescent kick. Mikazuki-geri smashed the attacker’s knife hand in a chancy move that could have gotten my leg or Achilles tendon slashed if he was better or I missed, but he wasn't and I didn't. That blade spun off taking the metal gauntlet, which appeared nothing more than decoration, with it. I continued straight into yoko-geri. The side kick took him in the face and I felt his nose break. I leaped on him before he hit the ground, fingers closing around his throat. “You like knives?” I growled. “Huh? Do you?” The kid goggled. My fingertips pressured the cartilage rings of his windpipe and his tongue protruded, light glinting off a cheap imitation diamond stud through the tip. I drew my free hand in close to my body, palm up, fingers rigid. “I’ll rip your God damned heart out, you piece of shit.” Someone yelled. I dropped the piece of shit and spun into a middle stance. The third man was on the walkway, tangled in his burner jacket and neck beads, neon blue eyes crossed; the women stumbled away from Mick, hands raised as though to ward off evil. She faced them, her expression impassive, arms loose at her sides. Neon yellows and pinks wide, the women turned and ran. Mick stared after them for a moment, then looked at me and inquired solicitously, “Are you injured?” I hate knives. I hate that one took everything from me once. I clenched my fists and glared at the streeter at my feet, imagining the lethal technique I'd threatened him with. I could do it. How I wanted to, but instead I swallowed and sucked in a breath. “I'm okay. You?” “Uh, huh.” Mick came over and put a hand on my arm, guileless brown eyes searching mine. She had to hear my heart hammering. “I think these people meant us harm.” “Without a doubt.” I decided that she was indeed a cool cookie, but naive? My God. My head swiveled as traffic moved past. The night wound on, no one paying our show any particular attention. This horseshit happened on the Strip all the time. I took Mick's arm and we resumed our trip.