The Lightwielder Files

Chapter 3

The next morning, Max woke up on the floor. He wasn;t sure how he got on the floor. He tried to reimagine how he had fallen asleep last night. Head on his pillow, his blanket, the thinnest one he could find, at waist level. So how on earth had he landed on the floor, with his blanket folded neatly on his bed. He did not remember doing that. He got up and picked up Unwind which had fallen on the ground with him. 

He tossed on a shirt before going into the living room, then stopped in his tracks. 

The furniture was thrown into all over the place. The cushions were torn open the chaits missing legs, the curtins knawed to pieces. Max ran intot the kitchen and met a similar state, the floor was a mosaic of broken plates, and cups, fcuterly strew about like the remains of a mediavsl battlefield. 

“Dad!” Max yelled desperately. No answer. Max pickedd up a knife from the floor. If whoever did this was still here, he wanted to be prepared. 

He walked out of the kitchen back intot he mess of the living room and looked into his dad’s open room. It was empty and clean just like Dad left it. 

Max had to  hold himself from shakinfg what the hell was going on? 

He rushed back out and jumped over a borken vase to get to the office door. 

It was open and like the living room and the kitchen trashed. All off dad;s files lais atrwne onf the floor, his  swivel chair was upturned and were those claw marks on his desk?

Max ran back to his room and scrambled for his phone. He dialled his number.

“I’m sorry but this number is no longer in service”, the operator said in a faux friendly voice.

He tried his dad's other number but the annoying voice met him there too. 

He leaned helplessly agsinsdt the doorfrsme. He could csll the guys at his dad’d office. Maybe he went there. Before max could look up another contact he heard something or maybe the diater of the morning was getting to him until he heard it again.

A low growl. Max put down his phone and held his knife in a death grip beofre stalking back into the living room. He stood in the centre beside the broken coffee table. From there he could turn around easily and meet whatever was in the apartment head on. Unofrtunateluy for max, he was so focussed on what was around him and not what was above him. 

There was a loud shriek and Max lpooked up too late at a raging ball of black fur hurtling towards him. It knoclegd the knife out of his fhands under the a table leg out of his reach. The thing sunk teo feral claws into Max’s back. Max tried to shake it off, but it’s grip was mean and getting deeper. Max threw a hand behind him and start to pull of the creature along with chunks of his shirt and skn. 

From a distance, Max heard a crash. It couldn't be another one of those things could it? He was barley managing this one, that he flung away but was staring him down with yellow beady eyes like an evil right. 

Max picked up a broken table leg and held it out, the edges sharp but that didn’t stop the creature. It charged and Max dived at the last minute away falling into some shards osf glass.

“Ah”, he winced, getting up quickly before the creature recovered. But it didn’t. The next time Max saw it was skwered like a horror move style kebab, on the end of fantastical looking spear and holding the spear was a girl and not just any girl, the girl from yestrey downtown. There she looked like some normal fashion-forward teenager, now in  a black jumpsuit, she looked like some warrior princess. 

She turned to Max, her eyes wide. 

“Are you okay?” she asked, shaking off the dead creature until it landed with a loud thud on the floor.

Max was stunned silent and to teach himself that words were appropriate in this situation if you couldn't find them. 

“What? How did you get in here?” he asked wildly.

The girl pointed to the blasted-out door off its hinges.

“It was like that when I got there.”

“Okay, better question, what is that?”

It was Max’s turn to point to the dead animal creature thing on the floor, which was starting to turn grey.

“Oh, that”, the girl said dismissively. “That is a pygmy hound. Or was a pygmy hound more like? Small but very vicious like most small things are.”

Ma’s head spun with confusion. “So what was it doing here?”

The girl cast an analytical eye around them as if she could see something beyond the destruction of Max’s home.

“My guess is that it was looking for something. Something it didn't find or else it wouldn't have been here. Pygmy hounds are grumpy solitary creatures. They don’t usually come out and hate being disturbed unless one was sent here.”

“Sent here? Why?” That’s when he thought that maybe it was looking for his dad. But then why was it still here?

“That’s the question isn’t it?” the girl mused, still looking around. Then she frowned. “Where’s your dad?”

“My dad”, Max stuttered out his voice trembling. “I don't know where he is.”

The girl’s eyes widened. Then she ran to the bathroom. It was like dad’s bedroom was the way Max remembered it except it seemed even cleaner. He wasn’t even in the right mind to appreciate the irony of the situation or the girl who was rummaging around his house moments after some wild animal was found in his house. 

“Who are you?” he snapped, unable to take any more suspense. “And how did you know where we lived and how did you get here and what is going on between you and my dad?”

The girl looked down sheepishly as if debating whether or not she’d answer. 

“My name is Mona. Mona Davenmeyer. My dad and your dad were friends so I found your address in my dad’s address book. I haven’t seen you or your dad in ages so that’s how I knew him. And I took the L train here which was super slow. “

Max wracked his head for any memory of anyone who looked like this girl but he came up empty. 

“How do I know you’re telling the truth?” Max asked, beginning to wish for the knife or a broken table leg in case things got violent.

Mona threw her hands up in the air. “Well, I did save you from a very vicious pygmy hound.”

Max crossed his hands across his chest. “That doesn't mean you’re honest. You could have saved me and now are planning to do something horrible to me now you have my trust.”

“Wow, you must be a fan of true crime. Look, I know you have no idea what is going on here and you seem like a nice guy so I’m going to give it to you straight. Someone sent a pygmy hound to look for something  and now your dad is nowhere to be found, and I saved your life so maybe you should start listening to me.”

Mona was awfully cocky, Max noticed, and also his best chances at unraveling the mystery of what happened here, but he still had one more pressing question.

“What were you doing in the area?”

Mona sighed deeply looking at her spear.

“I was sent to ask your dad something, or rather for something.”

Max narrowed his eyes. “And what was that can I ask?”

Mona drew a hand through her dyed locks. “You.”

Max blinked as if he hadn't heard that right because he was absolutely sure that he hadn't.

“Me?”

Mona’s ears pricked up and she grabbed Max’s elbow and dragged him out of the bathroom and into the living room through the rubble.

“Come we need to go”, she said dragging him towards the hallway. “I don’t trust this place.”

Max pulled away suddenly sheepish.”Wait, I can’t go out like this.” He gestured to his pajama bottoms and torn night-shirt that was oozing yellow pus from the pygmy hound’s claws.

Mona pulled a cloak out from a pouch at her waist and threw it to Max who caught and eyed the silk material warily. It looked like the night sky, black with specks of silver. 

“Put it on quickly”, Mona chided, checking the hallway for more pygmy hounds or maybe even his dad. 

He threw it over his shoulders and fit like a poncho, he shoved his feet into the nearest pair of shoes, a pair of green crocs that he never wore but had from the year before. 

Mona shoved her spear thing into the same pouch and Max had to rub his eyes to make sure he had really seen that.

She turned to him to see if he was dressed or as dressed as he could be. 

“Let’s go”, she said, walking into the hall. When he moved to take the elevator she threw her hand out against his chest. 

“Let's take the stairs, the elevator would be perfect for an ambush.”

“An ambush from who?” Max asked desperately, jogging to catch up with Mona who was nearly floating over the stairs. 

Mona held out her hand again when they got to the second floor and looked around before gesturing to Max to keep running. 

“Let’s just see that the people who command pygmy hounds are not the sort of people that you want to be around.”

“Wait.” Max stopped in his tracks when they were on the ground floor in front of the mailboxes. “Are those the people my dad was involved with?”

Mona’s head went back and forth between him and the front door as if telling him that now wasn’t the time or place to have this conversation but Max stood his ground. 

“Answer me, Mona! What is my dad involved in?”

Mona’s cocksure look was gone, replaced with almost fearful desperation. 

“Look, I will tell you everything you want to hear, but not here. You have to come with me. You have to trust me.”

Max looked back up towards the stairs leading back to the apartment that he shared with his dad.

He could always go back and call the police and his dad's colleagues but something nagged at him. They wouldn't be able to help and if he told them about the mysterious creature, the pygmy hound, he was sure they would think he was crazy unless it was still back at the apartment. Even if it was and they believed him, he knew in his heart that what his dad was involved wasn’t something he could bring the police into. This girl, Mona, was his only hope right now. 

He lowered his head resigned. 

“Okay”, he replied. Mona nodded and grabbed his poncho-covered arm leading him out into the glaring light of day.