Among the Living (Tyler G Book 1) Page 8

  "Okay, so Calley first, since she's closest. Then we can swing by and get Ginger, if we can. I really should have called first." It was an oversight, actually. Then, neither of them called him either, so it might be fair.

  It turned out, as soon as he got all the way out into the hallway of the place, that it wasn't that hard to find the girls after all. They were both in front of Brand Village and walking toward him quickly.

  The adorable redhead with the glasses waved at him like they were long lost friends.

  "Ty! We should hurry, since you need to be back in about an hour." They were both moving at a good clip, and dressed as differently as you could get really.

  Ginger looked ready to work at a fast food place, more or less. No uniform, but she was in jeans and t-shirt. A pink one with gray sleeves that left him feeling bad about how cute she was until he recalled that she was actually older than he was by a few years. Totally fair game, just young looking.

  The other girl was dressed like a professional woman, in a skirt, hose and dressy jacket that matched the rest of the outfit. She also moved like she was on crack, flapping and twitching constantly, even as she walked along.

  "Come on. It isn't far. We can jog over."

  She meant it, even if she wasn't dressed right for that kind of thing. Neither was he, but she wasn't kidding. They hit a decent speed the whole way. The house they were going to was no more than three blocks from the mall, on the back side, past the movie theater that he hadn't known about until they went past it. Even better than that, most of the trip was taken up with parking lots, which meant they were at the place not seven minutes after they started. True, running, since the women with him didn't seem to understand the idea of jogging in particular, but he was only a bit out of breath when Calley unlocked the front door.

  "Home sweet home!" It wasn't a vast palace, but it was clean and looked well kept up inside.

  Tyler followed the others in, watching everything carefully the whole time. The front space had hard wooden floors, and he caught a glimpse of a rather large kitchen through a set of double doors. They were the swinging saloon kind, and done in dark stained pine.

  Calley went into a speech then, one that sounded a little breathless and excited.

  "I own the place outright, so I won't have to charge a lot. I'm... You know, Bat Shifters are social animals, so I kind of need to have people around. That's an actual thing for me, so..."

  Ty filed that one away. She was a Shifter, which probably meant Brand Village was her embassy. A Bat too, whatever that really meant. Changing into a bat, probably, which beat his super power of infinite patience, as far as coolness went, by about ten thousand times.

  "We have two free rooms, though if you need we can switch around. I'm not that picky. Here... The first one is kind of small." She moved to it, and showed that the thing was about the size of a walk in closet.

  Not that it was too small for him really, since all he'd need was some clothing and a place for a bed. Tyler resigned himself to getting that tiny room then, since he wasn't a girl. They always had more stuff, he thought. That was the rule, at least as far as television had taught him.

  The other room however, was a decent ten by twelve thing.

  Fluttering a bit, the Bat-girl moved in and touched him on the back, then she did the same with Ginger.

  "So, you don't sleep, right?" That was for the Vampire, who nodded firmly.

  "True. I could take the smaller one? How much?"

  Calley shrugged, her movements a bit agitated. That seemed to just be part of how she rolled, so Ty didn't let it bug him. "How about two hundred a month? Each? That covers electric, and reasonable food too. Animal blood, not the expensive Human kind. You only eat fruit and stuff, right Ty?"

  That she knew that amazed him for a second.

  "Right. Some rice and stuff on occasion." He was ready to explain the health benefits, when she just smiled at him like he was brilliant.

  "Good. I have family that are fruit bats, so I'm used to the idea. I pretty much just stuff my face when I can, but I can shop for that. The bathroom is decent, but we have to share. Kitchen... There's a basement, but I just use it for storage. You can too, if you need?" The whole thing was shown to them. Including her bedroom. It was the big one, and had a private bathroom, but he could see that, she owned the place, so it seemed fair.

  Ginger looked at him, and then nodded.

  "I think we'll take it?"

  It was fast, and he didn't have any money, but he should have some soon enough, he hoped.

  "I won't get paid for a while, but..."

  "No problem. Like I said, I need people around. It's been weeks since my last roomie moved out. He got married, the bastard. I offered to let them both move in here, but his wife is a Human, and not open minded enough for that I guess? You two are good that way though, right? I mean, if I have a friend over occasionally?"

  It was her place, so he just shrugged. Listening to her getting it on probably wouldn't be that wonderful, but he'd live. Other people had roommates and did all right, so he could probably do it too.

  "Should be fine?"

  "Awesome!" They were both hugged then, which meant a tight and fairly hard body being pressed against him. The girl was incredibly warm, he noticed. Probably due to an accelerated metabolic rate. He didn't know if all Shifters had that, but it would make some sense, he thought.

  Then the woman danced a bit in place. It was a slightly chaotic thing, but her words were clear enough, for all that.

  "You can both move in now? Today? We'll need a truck. I can borrow one, I think. You get off at six, when Ben gets in, right Ty?"

  He didn't really know, but nodded, since that sounded right. That the Bat-girl in front of him knew as much as he did about his schedule didn't make much sense, but she wasn't wrong.

  "I think so? It could be later. Not that I have a lot of things that need to be moved. It would be good to have a bed, but mine is being used right now. It won't be free until nightfall, I don't think."

  There were a few cute nods then, rapid things that left him feeling excited. It was the raw energy she held all the time, he thought.

  "No problem. Ang doesn't sleep. He's a Dragon, so he wouldn't."

  Then, as if that were a good place to leave a conversation, the girl led them back to the mall at a run.

  Chapter six

  When he got into work, a few minutes earlier than his personal deadline of one o'clock, Tyler noticed something odd. It wasn't truly bizarre, just a green spiral notepad, with his name written on the front in rather nice calligraphy. Tyler Gartner. Zack was talking to a young girl across the room, so he opened the thing, not getting the idea at first.

  Inside there was an inscription, in the same nice writing that the front had on it.

  "This is a place to start. Collect the information you get here, and I'll help you with the rest when you fill the book." There was a D. underneath it. For Darla, no doubt. Zack's mentor. The girl hadn't said what kind of stuff he'd be learning, but it was probably demon related, since Zack wasn't that old, and the blonde had said she was his aunt.

  Whatever was going on across the room, near the science fiction section wasn't going that well, it seemed. At least the little girl, who was bit freaky seeming, was raising her voice. It wasn't about anything wholesome like finishing her collection of American Girl novels, either.

  "We should rip her head off, defile the corpse and have gnomes shit in her mouth." That came across really clearly, though Zack didn't seem half as worked up. In fact he was smiling gently, even when she turned and stomped like a child having a tantrum directly toward him.

  Tyler suddenly found himself hoping the gnomes weren't in his near future. Also, he had to wonder if those were real. There were Vampires and Shape Shifters, Succubi and other things too. Bigfoot worked down the way and had a really nice truck, for instance. So it was just possible that he was about to have his corpse defiled.

  "You! Tell me, what
would you do if a man stole your pet dog?" It was a strange thing to ask, but Tyler thought first, trying to remember that being polite thing. It probably meant not being condescending to children, for one thing. After all, for all he knew this one was Zack's mother or something.

  "Um, I guess I'd try to get it back."

  That got the girl to stop for a second and frown at him, then she leaned in, about three feet from him. It was meant to be intimidating, he didn't doubt. It sort of worked too, since you didn't expect kids to act like that.

  "After you killed the guy, right?" She spoke like he'd better agree with her, but he had to shake his head.

  "For just taking my pet? No. I'd just get it back."

  Her face turned slightly shrewd then, rather than more upset.

  "What if he'd been raping your dog?" It seemed totally wrong, coming from a glasses wearing eleven year old face. The kid was really pale too, but moved too much to be a Vampire. It was a subtle thing, but he could kind of tell the difference with most of them.

  "Oh. Well, then I guess I'd make him stop, if I could."

  "You mean kill him?"

  He felt bad, and Zack was looking at him like he shouldn't be talking at all, but Ty had to shrug.

  "Yeah. I mean, I'd try to do something else first, if I could, but that would probably end up being what happened. Not that I could do that." Well, he'd killed before, in cold blood, so he might be able to get it done, if he had to. "Has... Someone hurt your dog?"

  The little girl her blue eyes shining with tears, nodded.

  "My pet Elth. Taken by The Storm. I came to get the Line Walker to help me take her back, and punish her for the theft and harm done. That's only fair!"

  Zack rolled his eyes a bit.

  "It could also start a war. We don't really need that kind of thing right now. We never do. Have you tried asking for Lettle back?"

  "I don't have to ask! She's my property! I swear, help me or I'll raise an army of the dead to destroy this world, Line Walker. All worlds, if I have to!" She stomped her little shiny shoes foot. It was out of place and reminded him of the snotty girl from the old Willy Wonka movie. She even crossed her arms to show how upset she was.

  Zack didn't seem impressed.

  "Fine, I'll make a phone call. Let's find out about this first, before assuming the worst. The Storm isn't a nice being, but for one of us she's relatively sane. She could just be protecting Lettle from you. It's not like you're always calm and reasonable all the time."

  That got another foot stomp, but a tiny smile too.

  "Do it then." Almost grumpily she went on then, "thanks. I guess. She's my favorite toy."

  Zack turned to walk to his office in the owl room, and the girl seemed to calm down, instantly. She didn't follow the Greater Demon though, just pushing her hand out, to shake, like an adult.

  "Anne. The Rotted."

  Tyler responded smoothly enough that it probably wasn't insulting, he hoped it wasn't anyway.

  "Ty, The Clerk."

  He meant it to be funny, but even after touching him, which seemed to be when the Greater Demons got their information about you, from what he'd noticed, the girl locked eyes with him.

  "Nice to meet you, Clerk. Do you think you could help me find some things I need? I can leave a list with you. There's no immediate rush, and I can make the purchases myself, but it will be faster to have someone else do the work of finding the items. I'll pay you for it. One small favor?"

  He didn't know how to respond, but didn't know what kind of favor the girl thought she could do for him.

  "How long is the list? How hard will it be to find the things on it?"

  "Four items, and middling hard, or I wouldn't suggest that you do it instead of me." She looked at him like he was stupid, which got him to snort at her and look away. He needed to be polite, but that didn't mean being taken advantage of, did it?

  "Um, if they're middling hard to find, then shouldn't it be a middling favor? Really, shouldn't that be four of them? That only seems fair. You were just talking about things being that way, so you have the concept."

  The girl smiled at him like he could actually get something for her, which he didn't know that he could actually pull off. If you could buy it at Wal-Mart, then even a kid wouldn't need his help. If not, then how was he supposed to do anything about it? Unless they were books. Then it made sense.

  She didn't look away, just crossing her arms again.

  "Two medium sized favors, but I can reject them at the time. If so, you'll have to switch to something else, later."

  "Four items, four favors. How about two medium, one large, and one small?" There was no way he could tell what that meant, so it made sense to go big. The girl shook her head.

  "That's too much for some shopping, Clerk. How about this. Two medium favors, but if you do a good job, I'll recommend your services to my friends, and send more work your way? You have the Line Walker here, which should make it all a lot easier for you to pull off. I'd use him, if you can. Sooner or later that option will be gone, but for now he's very nearly a nice person."

  "Fine. But if I can't find them, then I can't. I'm not betting my soul or anything here. I just do the work, or I don't." Ty had to guess that if he didn't find them all he wouldn't get anything, but that was just business.

  The girl nodded, happily enough.

  "Excellent. Let me write up what I need and where you might find it. Again, I just need the locations, and how to find them. I'll do the actual buying. You haggle like a little girl, you know that? You could have gotten three medium favors out of me if you tried harder. I expect that to change, if I send anyone to you for this kind of thing? Otherwise people will think I work with fools."

  "All right?"

  "Good! Now, let me see."

  She looked at his new notebook, but put that down after reading the inscription, and used a piece of paper off of a yellow legal pad. Without asking if it was something allowable, she grabbed the high stool from behind the counter, and a pen, then wrote for a while. Seeing that he wasn't needed and no one else was on the floor, he ran over and pasted the out of service sign on one of the reading room doors.

  When he got back the list was there, which he glanced at, then tucked away in his pocket. It might not hurt to help out little girls, but not one of the things there was a book, which meant he needed to do his real work for the time being. Nor was there any indication that she needed some spooge cleaned up. Ty was willing to bet that Kait however did need something like that.

  The rest of the day was relatively boring, and probably a lot like a regular store was. The big change up came at a bit before six, when a man that had walked to the back without making eye contact came to the front, wearing a nametag. He was average sized, being about five-ten, and probably fifty pounds heavier than Ty was. Not that he was incredibly chunky or anything. A bit maybe, but not too bad. He had a well trimmed brown beard and a red button up shirt on. Other than that, there was nothing particularly interesting about the man. Except of course, that he was smiling and seemed pleasant. That was kind of a thing to remember. His name tag said he was Ben.

  "Hey! You must be the new man here?"

  That got them to shake hands, which still felt a bit strange to him.

  "Tyler. You're Ben?" He felt stupid saying it, but this could be a Greater Demon with Ben's name tag on. How the hell was he supposed to know things like that?

  "Yep. Let me get my till set up. Did anyone show you how to count one down yet?"

  They hadn't, and while it wasn't hard at all, there were several people standing in the front of the place when he finally came out with his bag, twenty minutes later. The blue thing was old, and looked to be made of blue jean material. His mother had gotten it for him about five years before, so there were patches on it in places. No one said anything about that.

  Calley was with Ginger, Eve, and a trim Asian guy, who he was going to guess as being Ang, the Dragon Shifter.

  Before he got to the
m, the small man waved to him.

  "I'm out back, in the employee parking area. We don't really have room for everyone. It isn't an extended cab." The words held a slightly cold, but reasonable sense to them. At first Ty wondered if they were putting the man out, but Calley patted him on the back and shook her head.

  "No, it isn't anything like that. Ang isn't a bigot or anything, Dragons just hate being too crowded. To that end, I'll go to my place."

  Eve nodded then, and looked around.

  "Ginger and I will run over. We need to see about something near there anyway. Oh, I have a report for you, once we get inside, Batman."

  The casual use of the word meant that Ginger was pulled in to tell the story of the day before, including what he'd said, which got Calley to laugh.

  "Bats do rule. That's probably why they ran off like that."

  It got a polite sounding chuckle, and Ang to take him away. The man wasn't exactly a chatterbox in the truck, but it didn't take that long to get to his house, either. His old place, now. His mother was gone, but Eve and Ginger were already there when they pulled up. Sitting on the front stoop.

  Because they were just that fast. It was hardly fair, if he was going to even think about things like that. Ty decided not to. It wasn't like anyone expected him to run around at hundreds of miles per hour or anything. Plus, now that he thought about it, how did they do that without making sonic booms?

  Ang didn't get out of the truck, which he took to be about not wanting to load up things for hours, but the truth was, all he needed was his bed and some clothing. The rest of it could either stay, or more likely, end up in the trash. Well, he wanted his radio. His books too. Grinning, and trying not to act like a total moron, he jogged to the door, and let the two girls in.

  Rather than get things set up to move instantly, Eve put her hand out, and whispered to him.

  "We got most of Robs' group last night, so they won't be around to bother Tara. He got away, with his two top people. That probably won't be a problem for you, since they know that Bey is in town. Most of the Vampires he goes for just die, so the rest tend to run and hide if they can. Still, we need to move Tara tonight. Actually, I can take her to a safe place now, after we get your things in the truck. Here, don't help, just point." That was awkward, but he didn't have any nudie magazines, or cool sex toys, so the truck was loaded about the same time he actually pointed to what he was taking with him.